May I: Beautiful Disaster

After lunch, he dropped Emily back at her car— knowing that even though there was a pile of work and a couple of cases that needed his attention, but even he knew that wasn’t going to happen until he had made sure that Gillian was okay.

Emily leaned her arms against the open window, gazing towards the Lightman group building; the place that had become a second home for all of them. “You know, she could be in there.”He knows in an instant who she’s talking about.

Reaching up, he patted her cheek, grinning deeply; his English accent thick. “When did I get a grown up for my daughter, hmm?”

She doesn’t answer his question directly. “I know enough to know that what happened to Gillian wasn’t right. But dad, who I saw in there this morning, wasn’t her.” She watched him momentarily, dug the keys out of her pocket and leaned back against the car.

“I wish it were that simple, Em. Gillian and I don’t have that same relationship that you and your mates have.”  He gestured, throwing his hands up wildly into the air.

She looked at her watch, then back at him. “Yeah, about that—I’m considering why you ran out of her office this morning.”

He pushed her forehead with his hand, feigning irritation. “Now I know you have somewhere to be.” Keys jingling in her hand, she rounded the corner of the car. He rolled down the passenger side window, leaning to the side. “When do you expect to be back at home?”

“Not until late. Hayley and I were going to start working on our history project that’s due in a couple weeks—then go catch a movie with a couple friends.”

“Define friends.”

Emily sighed, knowing what he was getting at. Are there going to be boys? His eyes seemed to ask that exact question. “Hayley and I are meeting up with Kelsey and Delanie from school. We’re going to the mall in Columbia.”

“Fine—but you know how I feel about you staying out too late.” He pointed out with warning, leaning to the side.

“I promise, we’ll head home right after the movie is done.” Emily called back over her shoulder with a smile as she leaned through the passenger door window. They exchanged a glance and then she walked over to her car.

Before he knew it, he was watching his only daughter drive away.  She was now seventeen and he wondered every day how he had grown up so quickly. Then again, he also wondered when it was that the person who had become a second mother to his daughter and his best friend would also crash and burn.

He had seen the look on her face, the wear in her emotion; the purple bags under her eyes. She hadn’t been sleeping, and he knew the best way to make her go home would be to keep her off the case. But what he couldn’t accept was that she had taken a taxi home instead of her own car.

With that thought, he started the engine. Sending Loker and Torres on the other case would keep them occupied for awhile; enough that it would keep their prying questions—that had no doubt had been forming—away from Gillian.

Fifteen minutes later, he pulled up to her townhouse that she had bought after she had divorced her husband. It was located in a quiet place, just the way she liked it.

Getting out, he let the car door close with a short thud. He climbed the stairs, for once ignoring the line. He hadn’t seen her since earlier this morning, when he had rushed out of the room, intending to meet with Mrs. Cole at a different location.

From the moment that he had laid eyes on her, he was filled with concern. But he had ignored it, because Gillian he had asked him to. But what he had read from the expression on his daughter’s face, he understood fully, without a doubt, that things were getting worse with his best friend.

Bringing his fist up in mid-knock, he looked through the window. Gillian was lying on the couch, on her side; body curled into a ball. Hand on her forehead, as if she had stopped mid action from rubbing at it.

With a further glance, he noticed her jerk slightly as if she were in the middle of some nightmare. It wasn’t hard to put together that was the reason she hadn’t been sleeping.  With every minute that went by, things were starting to make a bit more sense.

He pounded on the door, while peering in the window. He watched as she jerked again and then jolted up from her place on the couch. He pounded on the door again and he lifted his brow up when she finally turned her gaze towards the window.

Her eyes, were wide and filled with sleep as she stood up slowly; wavering slightly as she walked unsteadily to the door. She unlocked it with a sigh, apprehension all over her expression. There was plenty that he could have seen. When she opened the door, she knew by the look he was giving her that he already knew too much.

“Cal.”She sighed, not exactly loving that he was there. She couldn’t excuse what had happened earlier. Anything that happened in her life—was her life. There was a reason there was a line.

“Screw the bloody line.” He mumbled more to himself, but upon reading her expression. She looked at him with a slight glare, hand on the door. 

“You know I hate when you do that.” Her voice was soft, guard high. “Did you need something, Cal?” She asked pointedly, trying to keep calm. However, he could see her straining to stand—let alone, trying to breathe.

  

In fact, he wasn’t just noticing the bags underneath her eyes anymore. He was noticing the sweat glistening just above her hairline and brows. Her face a shade paler than her usual color; lack of redness in her cheeks.

Her usually curled hair was flat; random pieces were plastered to her face.  He noticed immediately that she was grasping the edge of the door so tightly that her knuckles were turning white.

She released her grip slightly and he met her eyes.  “I saw you get into the taxi earlier. Thought you might be having a bit of car trouble.”

 So that’s why she felt like she was being watched, but her mind felt so jumbled that she could hardly think and didn’t think to put it all together before she left. “If I was having car trouble,” her brow rose; voice softened in order to push her point across. “I would have called you.”

 Nodding, Cal stepped onto the ledge so he was standing next to her, and gave her a thoughtful look.  How long have you been running a fever?” She looked at him, like he had magically sprouted two heads as she furrowed her brow in confusion—so he clarified what he meant. “Your body is radiating heat.” With that note—he slipped past her into the house.

Closing her eyes, she sighed in an irritated fashion and closed the door. Her hand went up to feel her forehead, before she cursed his ability to read her.  Placing her arm back by her side, she leaned against the door.

He cocked his head towards the folded brown blanket that was sitting on her couch. Opening her mouth to ask him for the real reason that he was there, she quickly closed it when she noticed the disapproving frown on his face. He looked back at her, back to the couch and to her again.

Okay, now that I did deserve.”  He pointed out as she crossed her arms in front of her chest; mostly to keep herself balanced, but also growing quite irritated that he was reading her again.

“Cal—” She warned him, sighing again. Eyes flickering back at the couch for a different reason; which happened to be that she just wanted this to be a dream, and she wanted to go back to sleep so she could wake up from it.

Not that she didn’t ever want him there, because this house had become new grounds for the both of them: for their relationship. But when he crossed the line—that was another story for the books that she didn’t want for the record.

“The real reason you’re here.” She prodded, knowing that he hadn’t come just because he had seen her leave in a taxi. He wanted to know why, just as badly as she wanted to know the real reason he was there.

“I wanted to see it for myself, love.” He offered with a nod. No explanation. No details—just eight little words, before he walked into the kitchen.

“See what?” She trailed off as she watched him disappear around the corner. Then it dawned on her to why he was there. Using the wall for leverage, she watched as he took a glass out of the cabinet and then closed it. “You’re checking up on me.” She laughed, clearly with disbelief as she shook her head.

He gazed over at her as he filled up the water. “No, but I do need to clarify a few things.” She thought he was filling it up for himself, he stepped forward and handed her the glass and two extra-strength Tylenol.

“Other than the fact that you already put your nose in my personal life—” Swallowing back the bile that was rising in the back of her throat, she could feel her blood pressure rising; hands starting to shake. “I think you’ve already done enough.”

“You want to know why I’m really here, love?” Setting his glass on the counter, he closed the distance between them. “Three days ago, I held my best friend in my arms, who just happened to be lying down on the pavement; shaking and scraped up from a near brutal attack. Now I’ve watched her go through hell and back again, and I’m no bloody fool to see that she’s been sleeping---no, not even sleeping—on her couch in her office since then.”

She laughed bitterly, her body wracked with fever; body temperature surely rising from the anger that she was feeling. Her breathing was erratic. The surroundings around her, started to spin.  There was half of a lost thought in the back of her mind, to put the glass down as her hand shook and her grasp on it slowly slipped.

He noticed her tense, and reached to take the glass. She didn’t object as he took it and put it hastily on the counter. In fact, she didn’t react at all—and that was alarming enough—but as he turned back around, he watched all remaining color drain in her face; her knees buckled, and he caught her before her body could hit the ground.