The Connections Series, Part 13/?, "Completely insane" (Charlie/Colby, PG-13)
I just came home from my exam... I think it went pretty well. :D
So here it is chapter 13. Enjoy and comment, you know I love it. :)
Any mistakes on POV in this chapter are mine. My lovely beta did her best, and I'm still learning... Let's see how this goes.
VERY IMPORTANT AUTHOR'S NOTE TO THE READERS
In this chapter Colby will mention what happens during my little 3-part fic called " I'll show you what's smooth". You should probably read it before continuing, or at least read it before the stories goes on, because that's the only way you'll understand next chapters involving Colby and David's conversation.
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Title: Completey insane
Series: The Connections Series, Part 13/?
Characters: Charlie/Colby, Megan, Larry
Rating: PG-13
Spoilers: None.
Summary: After being discovered by Megan, Charlie and Colby have a private fight.
Feedback: ALL COMMENTS ARE WELCOME AND APPRECIATED.
Disclaimer: I do not own Numb3rs or anything related to it.
Beta: Giant thanks to the amazing irena_adler . I tried to fix the POVs. Let's hope it works.
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Go to Part 12: Voices on the speaker phone, PG-13
Go to Part 14: The key to the secret, PG-13
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The Connections Series
Part 13: “Completely insane”
“Oh my god,” Megan said, and she lowered her flashlight and her gun.
“Megan?” Larry’s voice said, because he was coming upstairs, and Megan was so astonished about what she had found that she couldn’t stop her lover getting to the room.
Larry ran to the door and without thinking, he just turned the lights on. “Charles, are you ok…?” He stood there with his mouth and his eyes wide open, his fingers still on the switch.
“Oh god, not you, Larry…” Charlie mumbled, running his hands over his entire flushed face, and he ran to grab his t-shirt and his sweat-pants. Colby immediately went for his suit.
When they were messily dressed again, they stood in silence in front of Megan and Larry, who stared at them without saying a word.
Charlie seemed not to be able to look at his friends. Megan supposed he was thinking that she had to be trying to find a psychological reason for him to get into bed with a male partner at this point of his life. But that wasn’t the case.
Megan turned her head to watch a totally astonished Larry. Then she took a deep breath, while she ran a hand over her forehead. She was exhausted, surprised and worried. “I knew this was going to happen…”
“What?” Colby asked, his voice a trembling whisper. He was obviously embarrassed that he had been caught having sex, like a teenager being discovered by his parents.
“How…?” Charlie suddenly added.
“This was the first option, the positive one you suggested?” Larry said finally.
Megan just nodded and tried to calm down. She looked at Charlie and Colby and said, “Your bond has become so strong, guys. And it wasn’t just friendship, I could tell. As a profiler, it was very easy for me to notice that this was finally going to happen. That’s why I didn’t want to come here tonight. I wanted to give you time to get you know your feelings. But I didn’t expect this… special moment… to be tonight, and I less expected to run into you in the middle of it…”
There was silence for a few seconds. Everyone was processing the information.
Larry was the first to talk. “So what is this, the beginning of a romantic relationship?”
Neither Charlie nor Colby responded immediately. It all had happen without any kind of control, and nothing had been decided yet. They looked at each other. Then, Charlie just stared at the floor.
It was obvious for Megan that he wasn’t sure of what he had done tonight. She saw that Colby was watching Charlie with an expression that meant true disappointment.
“Oh, c’mon Charlie… I can’t believe you’re considering…” Colby mumbled, and went to the window.
Charlie followed him and said “I…” He stopped, and that was the sign for Megan and Larry to leave Charlie and Colby alone.
So Megan and Larry went downstairs. In the living room, Megan looked out the window, just to make sure they were all safe. Nobody dangerous seemed to be around. She sat on the couch with Larry and squeezed her face with her hands.
“I can’t believe this,” Larry murmured, and he was running his hand over his tense neck.
“What, you don’t agree with what they did?” Megan didn’t sound angry. She sounded deeply tired.
“No, no, it’s not that. It’s none of my business… Besides, I know for sure that no one can tell his heart what to feel. For example, when I first met you, I didn’t have any hopes about consolidating a mature relationship with anyone in a long-term view, and look at us now... As much as I’m concerned, I’m the happiest man on earth, and I don’t even care about the mathematical odds there were for this to happen.”
That little speech brought out a smile from Megan, who let her head fall against Larry’s shoulder. “I think that’s the sweetest thing you’ve ever said to me, Larry.”
He flushed a little but still kept talking. “Well, your appearance in my life entirely changed the way I see the order of universe… There’s no such thing as being destined to be alone. There’s only a long road you have to take until you find the one person who suits you… We have a living proof here that there’s a higher entity guiding our lives to fill them with joy.”
Everything that Larry had said made Megan glow and once again she felt completely sure that he was the most amazing man she had ever met. They sat like that in silence for a while until there were noises outside and she had to see what was going on.
Don had arrived, and he wasn’t alone. Megan got the feeling that the reunion that was destined to happen at the Eppes’ residence had a very good chance of turning into a somehow bad experience. She just hoped that what Larry had said about a higher entity guiding the universe towards good was actually true and that everything would be ok in the end.
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Upstairs, things were getting ugly. “Colby, it’s not that I don’t want to be with you…” Charlie said over and over.
“Well, it seems like you don’t. How can’t you know what it is, this feeling we have for each other…?”
“We have to think differently than before. Some things have changed…”
“Charlie, have you forgotten what was going on here, in this very room, just a few minutes ago?” Colby was angry, devastated and scared about what Charlie’s response to his question could be.
They remained looking at each other’s eyes for a moment. “No, I remember everything very well,” Charlie answered, and his cheeks flushed. He took a quick glance at the bed and some of the sheets that lay on the floor. “I remember it all.”
”And still, you’re having doubts about where we should go from this moment on. You don’t even know what this is. Look, even if Megan and Larry know…”
“I told you I had to take that phone call,” Charlie said, and he was raising his voice.
“What are you suggesting, that this is my fault?” Colby yelled, because he couldn’t believe Charlie’s attitude. “Excuse me, but you didn’t exactly complain when I threw the cell phone away.” Colby was absolutely sure that he had a very good point. He was amused that Charlie had the nerve to answer back.
“What if it had been Don the one to come in while we were…? Oh god, it would have been the end of everything…”
“The end of…? Oh, c’mon. Really? You would have stopped all of this? Everything, like you just said? Because two people got to know about us?”
“Don’t forget about Amita… She knows enough already.”
“Yeah? Well, David knows some things too.”
If there was any possibility for Charlie to embrace Colby’s point of view, it was gone. He just stared at the agent and snapped, “David?”
Colby just told him the truth. “Yes. I told him on Thursday night.”
“You’re kidding.”
”No. Why, is it wrong that I had shared my feelings for you with a friend? I didn’t even think I had a chance with you then.”
“Colby, now everything’s too dangerous! There are too much people who know too much…”
”So what? They are our friends. They will keep the secret if we ask them too. They care about us, and they’ll understand what we feel…”
Charlie shook his head and threw his hands to the air in a dramatic gesture that matched his angry voice. “That’s not the problem! I’ve already told you about what this could mean to my family!”
It was just terrible for Colby to see that Charlie was freaking out again. He just stared at the mathematician with his mouth hanging open, not being able to understand how, after the amazing night they had just shared, Charlie could still restrain his own feelings.
So he cut Charlie off and yelled, “Listen to me, you’re completely insane. So as long as you don’t want to truly accept what you feel, stay away from me. I can’t take your confusion anymore. It’s making me crazy.”
“You’re wrong. I know what I want, and that’s to be with you. But the point is that…”
“You haven’t made any decision about what to do with me, Charlie! You said you did, but you didn’t, though. You keep making excuses, don’t you see?” Colby took a breath. “You are hurting me so much, and what’s even worse, you don’t seem to care.”
Those words fell on Charlie’s body like cold water. He was all angry and scared and shocked by having been found in bed with Colby and by getting to know that almost everybody knew that something was going on between them. But this, Colby saying that he should stay away from him, that Charlie didn’t care about him, that he was hurting him… it broke his heart.
And this was all his fault. Just his.
Colby was about to leave the room when Megan entered and said “Guys, speak softly, please! Don is downstairs, and he could hear everything about...”
“About what? There’s nothing going on here, anyway,” Colby interrupted her, taking his jacket and going downstairs while he tried to flat his spiky hair.
Charlie felt Megan’s eyes on him and heard her voice saying, “What happened, Charlie?”
He wasn’t sure whether he should trust her with the details of the fight or not.
“C’mon, you can trust me. Everything you say will stay between us,” she encouraged him.
After giving up in a second, Charlie sat on a chair that was in one of the corners of the room. He took a deep breath and his voice broke. “I can’t do anything the right way. I’m not even able to tell him how I really feel. I just encourage fights.”
“And why do you think that is?”
“First, I thought our careers would be destroyed. Then Colby convinced me that this wouldn’t happen, that you guys all would keep our secret.”
“Well, that’s true.”
Charlie’s eyes relaxed a little because of that confirmation. “Thank you… that means a lot.”
“There’s nothing to thank for.” She smiled at Charlie, who smiled back sadly. “Then, what?”
“The other big excuse I seem to find every time is Don and my father’s probable reaction to me being with a man…”
”Do you think they wouldn’t approve that relationship, in case you both and Colby decided to have one?”
The mathematician looked at the ceiling. “There’s this image I have in my head… Don is shocked by my confession and my dad can’t even look at me. I couldn’t live with that.”
“Ok… but could you live without knowing what a potential relationship with Colby could have been if you would just have dared to give it a try?”
Charlie became speechless. The two possibilities, his family’s rejection and Colby’s were on the same level of sadness and regret.
“Just think about it, Charlie. Take your time… but whatever you decide, just make sure not to give Colby false expectations, ok?”
“Of course… Thank you for your advice. This conversation has been very helpful for me… and it has made me gain a different point of view about this whole situation.”
“Don’t worry about it, Charlie. That’s what friends are for.”
It was painful for Charlie to smile knowing that he had to take a decision very soon so Colby wouldn’t get hurt even more. He got up, thankfully shook Megan’s hand and started making the bed and ordering his room, just in case Don or his father had the idea of coming up.
“So why is Don here? His date was horrible? Or maybe he ruined it? ‘Cause it seems that it kind of runs in the family,” Charlie asked, trying to make his comment sound like a joke, even if it hurt him to do that while feeling so miserable.
Megan responded, “I don’t know anything about his date except that he had to leave at the middle of it. Amita’s kidnapper escaped from prison…”
“What?”
“We still can’t believe it. And what’s worse, apparently he’s determined to hurt the people Amita loves, and you’re at the top of the list…”
“I see.”
There was a moment of tension and worry. But Megan said, “It’s not only Don who’s here. He brought Amita from her house, she was about to go to the airport. Don insisted that he would provide her some protection until we find the criminal. David arrived a few minutes ago. And your dad just came from yoga class. Don asked him to, he wanted to be sure he’s ok.”
“Oh… ok… I’ll be down in a minute.”
Charlie watched Megan leave and then, while he finished making the bed, he felt the panic building inside him. He ran his hands through his hair, put on some other clothes so Don and his dad wouldn’t suspect anything weird. Before going downstairs, he swallowed hard and tried to calm his mind from ordering his body to scream.
All the risks were there in front of his eyes, waiting for him to face them. He would have to be very aware of everyone’s movements and words to prevent them from becoming the source of new problems.
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The song I chose for this chapter...
ROXETTE - "YOU'RE BRINGING ME DOWN TO MY KNEES"
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