Haven Fic: Time (Has Numbered My Days) - Chapter 09/?? [Nathan/Jordan]
Author: siricerasi
Fandom: Haven
Characters/pairings: Nathan/Audrey, Claire Callahan, Duke Crocker, Jordan McKee (Nathan/Jordan?)
Rating: M
Warnings: Past rape and assault
Spoilers: Through 3.06 (Real Estate)
Story Summary: It’s all so fucked up, so far from where they’d started, so far from where they should be. And she’d take all of it back, she’d forgive everything, if he could just be here right now.
Chapter: 9/?
Word count: 3322
Chapter Summary: He really hates this town sometimes.
Author's Notes: Written for my hc-bingo prompt "disappearing"
I apologize for the super long wait, the holidays ended up being a lot busier than I expected. This chapter has also been giving me grief, so I decided to stop fiddling and just post it already. Seeing the promo for this week (IS IT FRIDAY YET???) I'm rather terrified to see what they're doing with Jordan's character, and I suspect this might become wildly AU but well. Look at all the fucks I do not give! I love Jordan and I'm not even sorry.
Song for this chapter is "Roll Away Your Stone".
roll away your stone, i'll roll away mine
together we can see what we will find
don't leave me alone at this time
for i'm afraid of what i will discover inside
cause you told me that i wouldn't find a home
within the fragile substance of my soul
and i have filled this void with things unreal
and all the while my character it steals
(and you, you've gone too far this time)
Nathan had intended on avoiding Audrey for the day, giving her time to cool off, but he hadn’t even made it back inside the station when she nearly bowled him over, murder in her eyes. She hadn’t said a thing other than, “My car, now,” her voice so dangerous he’d momentarily feared for his life. And then they were pushing 60 on a tiny Haven street and he didn’t have the courage to ask her a thing, just prayed he hadn’t done anything else to make her this angry.
It’s only when they get into Claire’s office to find Jordan with her bare hand gripping the doctor’s neck, the other grasping at Claire’s scalp, that Nathan understands. Audrey’s anger and urgency, at least. But Jordan? What the hell is she doing?
Audrey screams at Jordan to release Claire, threatening to shoot her, and Nathan finds himself echoing her words. Because whatever he’d thought Jordan was, it wasn’t this. Could he have misjudged her this badly? The woman he’d been kissing only half an hour ago, she’s not here. Jordan may have been devious and brusque but beneath that there’d been compassion, a deep empathy for others she’d masked with her cynicism. A painful vulnerability, an innate insecurity she’d concealed with her gloves.
But this Jordan? She has none of that. Her face is a mask of rage, a predatory smile twisting her mouth, her eyes glaring daggers. Nathan could swear they’re tinged red, tells himself he must be imagining it. He must be.
This Jordan apparently has a sense of self-preservation, though, because she drops Claire carelessly. The therapist collapses, so white she looks like a corpse, her body convulsing so painfully on the floor Nathan feels sick. Audrey rushes over to her, and Nathan finds himself faced with another stranger.
He remembers the cemetery, the way Jordan’s eyes had glassed over, her face had turned to stone. She has that same look now, like she’s not even inside her own head, and his stomach twists sickeningly. The blank expression on her face is almost more terrifying than the rage. When she finally looks at him her eyes are back to their normal brown, wide and confused and haunted.
“Nathan?” she whispers. She looks at her bare hands, at Claire on the floor, and covers her mouth. “Did I… did I do this?” And she’s all Jordan again, mask gone as she stumbles backwards with a choked sob. “Oh god, not again, please not again…”
Nathan steps forward to catch her when she trips over a chair leg, gripping her shoulders tightly. She flinches, cries out and tries to jerk away from his touch, but he holds fast, carefully pulling her towards him. She looks at him, eyes so full of anguish and self-hate he feels nauseous. He wants to hate her, to judge her, to demand to know what the hell she’d done, but looking at her now he doesn’t think she has any idea. Any control.
He really hates this town sometimes.
So instead he pulls her to his chest, wraps his arms tightly around her as she starts to sob. Her fingers claw at his shirt, digging into his skin and he doesn’t feel it, he never feels a thing.
Don’t they just make a perfect, fucked up pair.
He doesn’t say a thing, not for a long time, because what the hell is there to say? They’ll need answers, at some point, but right now she’s too hysterical to even breathe. He buries his fingers in her hair, strokes the dark locks gently as she shakes and shakes because he can’t bring himself to blame her, not here. Not in a place where she was raped and she was the one who’d ended up cursed. Not when she’s so terrified, so damaged, when she has no idea what the hell she’s done.
It’s not until long after Audrey leaves with Claire that Jordan starts to calm, her arms loosening their grip just a little. Nathan carefully guides her to a couch, whispering to her when she whimpers at the movement. “It’s okay, shh, just come sit. It’s alright, Jordan. It’s okay.”
“I- I don’t know what happened, Nathan,” she chokes. “Did I hurt Claire? I don’t… I don’t remember, I…” He cups her face gently in his hands, her skin shock white and cold, eyes wide and watery and so lost.
“I know you don’t,” he soothes, grabbing a blanket to wrap around her. She’s started to shake. “Shh, I believe you. We’ll figure it out, okay?” And he does believe her. He has no idea what the hell had just happened, but he believes that the woman with him now could never do what that… that stranger had done.
So he sits beside her as she gulps down air, her trembling hands twisting knots in her lap. “My gloves,” she stammers. “I need my gloves, please, I need…”
Nathan reaches over to grab them off the floor, helping her steady her hands enough to slip them on. “It’s okay,” he murmurs again. She rests her head in her hands, rocking back and forth a little, until he places a hand on her back and she stills. Shudders once, then takes a deep breath.
“What happened?” she asks him, voice low. “What did I do?” He falters, not sure what to say. “Tell me, Nathan,” she snaps, raw and aching like she already knows, just doesn’t want to believe it.
“What’s the last thing you remember?” he asks instead. She hisses a breath, teeth grinding so hard he can hear them.
“We were at the cemetery,” she states monotonously. “We were… you said you wanted to ask me something. And then…” Her whole body shudders, every muscle convulsing. “I don’t remember,” she whispers. “It’s just… just black and white and red, just…” Red eyes, Nathan remembers. “And then I was here with you and Audrey pointing guns at me and Claire on the floor and…”
She bolts, stumbles to the nearest trashcan and retches. Nathan’s right behind her, pulling her hair from her face, feeling the minute changes in pressure as her body convulses even if he can’t feel her skin.
“I hurt her,” Jordan chokes. “I hurt her, didn’t I, I…” Nathan grabs some tissues from the desk, gently wipes her face.
“Jordan, look at me,” he murmurs, cupping her cheek with one hand. “I don’t know what happened, but it wasn’t you. I’ve seen you, I know you. You don’t like hurting people, you wouldn’t do this.”
She’s not breathing right, short gasps that make his lungs ache. “But I did,” she sobs. “You saw me, you saw me, Nathan, I was standing right over her, and my hands…” She stares at them like they’re foreign objects. Nathan reaches out carefully, wraps his own fingers around her trembling covered ones.
“It wasn’t you,” he says again, firmly. He doesn’t know why he’s so sure of this, or why it matters so much to him. Maybe because she has no one else to stand up for her, to believe in her. Maybe because she’s so self-degrading, so much like him. So sure that her curse makes her less than human. A freak.
“You said ‘not again’ earlier,” he continues steadily. “What’d you mean?”
“I…” She pulls her hands from his, rocks back and covers her face. “I can’t, I can’t…” She’s still not breathing right, and Nathan feels utterly helpless. This has never been his strong point, talking. Comforting. Audrey’s always been the one to talk people down, reassure them, understand them. (Except him, why can’t she understand him anymore? Why doesn’t she even want to try?) But somehow he doesn’t think Audrey will want to do much for Jordan.
So he takes her hands, gently pulls them from her face. “Jordan, look at me,” he says again, softly. He can hear her panting as she glances up, eyes stark with fear. Guilt, disgust. It only strengthens his resolve to make this right, to do something good for her after using her so blatantly. It won’t even the score, but it’s something.
“I know this is hard, but I need you to explain it to me,” he orders, as gently as he can. “If we can figure it out, we can keep it from happening again.” She swallows, eyes glued to the floor. “I know you didn’t mean to hurt Claire,” he soothes. “I believe you. But I need you to help me understand it.”
She takes a deep breath, then another, and nods. He stands, pulls her up with him and resettles them on the couch. “This has happened before?” he asks. He keeps his voice carefully measured, non-judgmental. As non-threatening as possible. She nods again.
“After I…” She swallows, stares up at the ceiling for a moment. “After my trouble was… triggered, I was…” She shrugs, and he feels his stomach turn with rage, hatred for the man who’d done this to her. “I was a wreck. I felt so… so helpless, powerless. Over everything, my trouble, what’d… what’d happened.” She folds her hands in her lap, so carefully covered. “I couldn’t… I wouldn’t even leave my house, I was so scared.” Nathan feels nauseous. “My friend Grady, he convinced me to let Claire see me. They were the only people I’d talk to, for a long time.”
She pauses for a moment, eyes closed, and every cell in Nathan’s body aches to comfort her. Touch her. Even when he knows it’s probably the last thing she wants right now. She starts speaking again, voice so small he can hardly hear. “And then I heard that he… that he was going to get off with no charges, nothing, and I just…” She shrugs desperately. “I snapped. I don’t remember the next three days, all I remember is coming to in the bastard’s house, standing over him with Grady screaming at me. I went to see Claire the next day, because I had… I had no idea what the hell was happening to me, and when I got there she started asking me about him and if I’d hurt him and it all came back, the helplessness and I…”
There are tears streaming down her cheeks again, breathing erratic. “I don’t remember what happened after that. I was just standing in her doorway with her staring at me from the floor looking at me like I was a monster, and I just…” She covers her mouth with one hand, eyes pressed closed.
“I ran,” she whispers. “I just ran. I didn’t know what else to do, how to… how to level out. I knew enough about the Troubles to know they’re triggered by emotion or trauma, so I just… I had to get away. From everything. So I didn’t hurt anyone else. Grady took me to a cabin, miles from anyone else. It took a few months, but… I’ve known him all my life, I knew he wouldn’t hurt me. More importantly, I wouldn’t hurt him. I…” She sighs, shoulders sagging wearily. “I’ve been stable since then. Until…” Until today.
She chokes off and he can’t help it, reaches out carefully to touch one gloved hand. He hears her breath catch but she doesn’t pull away, lets him wrap his fingers around hers. “I’m sorry,” he murmurs. The words are monumentally inadequate, but it’s the only thing he can think to say. She smiles tightly, eyes glued shut. He forces back the bile that chokes him, the rage and concern that nearly paralyze him. “Okay, so part of your Trouble is… rage blackouts.” She laughs.
“It sounds so normal when you put it like that.” She opens her dark eyes, watery but her.
He squeezes her hand. “Your eyes were actually kind of… red.” She raises an eyebrow.
“Seriously?”
“Seriously.”
She chews her lip, taking her hand back and running her fingers distractedly though her hair. “I guess that… all I remember when I try is red. I…” Her forehead furrows. “It’s just… flashes of black and white, like old photos, but…”
Nathan shakes his head. “You don’t need to remember,” he tells her gently. “That’s not what’s important right now. We need to find out how the blackouts are triggered and how we can stop them, okay?”
She smiles again, mirthlessly, stares at the ceiling. “Just like that? You’ll just forget about everything else?”
“It wasn’t you,” he states again.
“Pretty sure Claire would have something different to say.”
Nathan rubs his eyes wearily. “Look, we can argue semantics later. Let’s just focus on stopping them right now, alright?”
“Just another case.” She sounds so… so hopeless.
Nathan nods tightly, echoes, “Just another case.” Because it is, really. They’ve dealt with similar cases, people who had hurt others unaware. Hell, most of the Troubled they’ve helped have had no idea what they’re doing, don’t believe it even when it’s explained to them.
“Okay, so they’ve only happened in connection to…” Hell, he doesn’t even know the bastard’s name. “And when you don’t feel in control.” Jordan’s teeth clenches so hard Nathan’s jaw hurts, but she nods. “But… that can’t be all. Claire talked to you about it, in the Holloway house…”
“I had a gun,” Jordan explains wearily. “I was in control.” She presses her hands to her eyes with a frustrated growl. “Honestly, I thought I was… past it. There’ve been so many times I could’ve…”
Nathan blinks. “The man in the diner the other night. You could’ve let him touch you.”
“But that would mean he’d touch me.” Her voice is hard and there are so many levels of meaning behind the words it makes his head hurt. The only thing that can protect her is the one thing that can hurt her so badly, the one thing she can’t have, the one thing she craves as much as he does.
Yeah, he hates this town sometimes.
“This shouldn’t have happened,” Jordan states quietly. “Boyd (so he does have a name…) will never hurt me again, I know that. And Claire… I was already so confused, so scared, I think her… I thought she’d tell someone. I thought they’d lock me up somewhere, and that…. I guess it triggered whatever this is. To protect me. But that was years ago, and I’ve been stable since I came back.”
Nathan cocks his head a little. “You’ve thought about this a lot.” She nods.
“It was all I had to do, for months. I didn’t want to come back until I could be sure…” She starts to sound a little hysterical again. “I don’t even know what I did to Claire the last time, Nathan. Or this time. Maybe I should be locked up…”
Nathan shakes his head sharply. “If we used that logic half the town would be behind bars,” he tells her steadily. “And you haven’t even killed anyone.” He winces the moment the words are out of his mouth, but she smiles a little. Even a sad smile is better than none.
He touches her hand gently when she looks away. “I know you didn’t want to hurt Claire,” he says quietly. “This is no different from any other dangerous Trouble I’ve dealt with. You can’t control it.”
“I’m dangerous.” There’s a detachment in her voice that scares him, so he carefully brushes at the bare skin on her arm.
“Not to me.”
With a desperate sigh she leans toward him, resting her forehead on his shoulder. He automatically loops an arm around her, feels her trembling. “What was different today?” he asks, as gently as he can. “Why would it happen again now?”
She doesn’t answer, just takes a strangled breath, and it hits him.
It’s him.
“Oh.” It’s all he can choke out. Then, “God, Jordan, did I…”
She pulls away, shaking her head wearily. “I don’t know.” But she does, they both do. It’s the only thing that makes sense.
As though he hadn’t already felt guilty enough about this entire thing.
It still doesn’t make complete sense, though. There’ve been a thousand times she could’ve gone off, just since he’d met her. There’s something he’s missing, something connecting him and Claire and Boyd…
Oh. “You knew Boyd,” he says softly, before he can think. “You trusted him.” He’s pretty sure Jordan actually stops breathing.
“Yes,” she whispers. She doesn’t elaborate, and he doesn’t push, because it’s really not important for the purpose of the case. (For his own purposes, though, he wants to dig. Then find the man and torture him some more.)
“And the same with Claire,” he continues steadily, pretending he can’t feel her arm shaking where it’s pressed against his. “And…” He hesitates, not sure he really wants an answer to this. “You trust me?”
She nods and it breaks his heart, for some reason. It’s not that he didn’t expect it, not after they’d made it through that house together, not after he’d just thrown his own trust of Jordan in Audrey’s face. But somehow he still feels like a traitor, like he’d tricked her into caring for him and then flipped it around back on her to trigger… this.
Except they both know the situation now, and for some reason he’s still here, they’re both still there. Despite everything. Maybe because of everything. (He likes it that she needs him more than he needs her.)
But for now, that actually makes things pretty damn simple. “So it happens when you think someone you trust betrayed you, put you in a situation out of your control,” he states in a careful monotone. She shivers. “That’s actually good news, Jordan.”
She makes a noise. “I really don’t see how.”
“Because you know who can trigger you. And I’m guessing it’s a pretty short list.” She smiles a little at her hands.
“So what, give everyone a heads up not to screw with me or I’ll go all Hulk on them?” Nathan actually laughs a little. (How long has it been since he really did that?)
“Yeah, something like that.” She’s still staring at her hands, but seems a lot calmer, and Nathan feels a strange sense of warmth tingle in his chest that he’d actually helped her. Audrey has always been the one to fix things, while Nathan’s trailed along always feeling one step behind, always feeling like he’ll never be enough to really help anyone. (Never be enough to really help Audrey.)
Jordan twists her fingers together. “Why don’t you hate me?” she asks quietly, eyes glued to the floor. “How can you not hate me for this?”
Nathan suddenly feels very tired.
“There’s enough hate in this town already,” he answers dully. Audrey is going to hate him for this, he knows that. He’s not entirely sure why she has such a dislike for Jordan (okay, he does, he just isn’t sure he’s ready to face the fact that Audrey Parker is jealous), but after their conversation (argument) this morning he knows his partner will give him hell for letting Jordan go.
Maybe he deserves her hate. But Jordan doesn’t, no more than any of the Troubled they’ve worked with, and Nathan isn’t going to let Audrey’s resentment ruin Jordan’s life. Not after everything the woman has been through.
There’s a pressure against his hand and he glances down, startled, finds Jordan’s bare fingers twined through his.
“You’re a good man, Nathan Wuornos,” she murmurs. There’s a desperate ache in his chest at that, because once he might have wanted to agree but it’s not black and white. Because he’s doing things he never would have dreamed he could for a woman who no longer seems to care. Because everything is so fucking gray that he can’t tell one thing from the next, can’t feel anything out and his only anchor has left him stranded in this fog of gray.
Gray and red.
(darkness is a harsh term don't you think?)
and you, you've gone too far this time
you have neither reason nor rhyme
with which to take this soul that is so rightfully mine
it seems that all my bridges have been burned
but you say, "that's exactly how this grace thing works"
it's not the long walk home that will change this heart
but the welcome i receive with every start
Fandom: Haven
Characters/pairings: Nathan/Audrey, Claire Callahan, Duke Crocker, Jordan McKee (Nathan/Jordan?)
Rating: M
Warnings: Past rape and assault
Spoilers: Through 3.06 (Real Estate)
Story Summary: It’s all so fucked up, so far from where they’d started, so far from where they should be. And she’d take all of it back, she’d forgive everything, if he could just be here right now.
Chapter: 9/?
Word count: 3322
Chapter Summary: He really hates this town sometimes.
Author's Notes: Written for my hc-bingo prompt "disappearing"
I apologize for the super long wait, the holidays ended up being a lot busier than I expected. This chapter has also been giving me grief, so I decided to stop fiddling and just post it already. Seeing the promo for this week (IS IT FRIDAY YET???) I'm rather terrified to see what they're doing with Jordan's character, and I suspect this might become wildly AU but well. Look at all the fucks I do not give! I love Jordan and I'm not even sorry.
Song for this chapter is "Roll Away Your Stone".
roll away your stone, i'll roll away mine
together we can see what we will find
don't leave me alone at this time
for i'm afraid of what i will discover inside
cause you told me that i wouldn't find a home
within the fragile substance of my soul
and i have filled this void with things unreal
and all the while my character it steals
(and you, you've gone too far this time)
Nathan had intended on avoiding Audrey for the day, giving her time to cool off, but he hadn’t even made it back inside the station when she nearly bowled him over, murder in her eyes. She hadn’t said a thing other than, “My car, now,” her voice so dangerous he’d momentarily feared for his life. And then they were pushing 60 on a tiny Haven street and he didn’t have the courage to ask her a thing, just prayed he hadn’t done anything else to make her this angry.
It’s only when they get into Claire’s office to find Jordan with her bare hand gripping the doctor’s neck, the other grasping at Claire’s scalp, that Nathan understands. Audrey’s anger and urgency, at least. But Jordan? What the hell is she doing?
Audrey screams at Jordan to release Claire, threatening to shoot her, and Nathan finds himself echoing her words. Because whatever he’d thought Jordan was, it wasn’t this. Could he have misjudged her this badly? The woman he’d been kissing only half an hour ago, she’s not here. Jordan may have been devious and brusque but beneath that there’d been compassion, a deep empathy for others she’d masked with her cynicism. A painful vulnerability, an innate insecurity she’d concealed with her gloves.
But this Jordan? She has none of that. Her face is a mask of rage, a predatory smile twisting her mouth, her eyes glaring daggers. Nathan could swear they’re tinged red, tells himself he must be imagining it. He must be.
This Jordan apparently has a sense of self-preservation, though, because she drops Claire carelessly. The therapist collapses, so white she looks like a corpse, her body convulsing so painfully on the floor Nathan feels sick. Audrey rushes over to her, and Nathan finds himself faced with another stranger.
He remembers the cemetery, the way Jordan’s eyes had glassed over, her face had turned to stone. She has that same look now, like she’s not even inside her own head, and his stomach twists sickeningly. The blank expression on her face is almost more terrifying than the rage. When she finally looks at him her eyes are back to their normal brown, wide and confused and haunted.
“Nathan?” she whispers. She looks at her bare hands, at Claire on the floor, and covers her mouth. “Did I… did I do this?” And she’s all Jordan again, mask gone as she stumbles backwards with a choked sob. “Oh god, not again, please not again…”
Nathan steps forward to catch her when she trips over a chair leg, gripping her shoulders tightly. She flinches, cries out and tries to jerk away from his touch, but he holds fast, carefully pulling her towards him. She looks at him, eyes so full of anguish and self-hate he feels nauseous. He wants to hate her, to judge her, to demand to know what the hell she’d done, but looking at her now he doesn’t think she has any idea. Any control.
He really hates this town sometimes.
So instead he pulls her to his chest, wraps his arms tightly around her as she starts to sob. Her fingers claw at his shirt, digging into his skin and he doesn’t feel it, he never feels a thing.
Don’t they just make a perfect, fucked up pair.
He doesn’t say a thing, not for a long time, because what the hell is there to say? They’ll need answers, at some point, but right now she’s too hysterical to even breathe. He buries his fingers in her hair, strokes the dark locks gently as she shakes and shakes because he can’t bring himself to blame her, not here. Not in a place where she was raped and she was the one who’d ended up cursed. Not when she’s so terrified, so damaged, when she has no idea what the hell she’s done.
It’s not until long after Audrey leaves with Claire that Jordan starts to calm, her arms loosening their grip just a little. Nathan carefully guides her to a couch, whispering to her when she whimpers at the movement. “It’s okay, shh, just come sit. It’s alright, Jordan. It’s okay.”
“I- I don’t know what happened, Nathan,” she chokes. “Did I hurt Claire? I don’t… I don’t remember, I…” He cups her face gently in his hands, her skin shock white and cold, eyes wide and watery and so lost.
“I know you don’t,” he soothes, grabbing a blanket to wrap around her. She’s started to shake. “Shh, I believe you. We’ll figure it out, okay?” And he does believe her. He has no idea what the hell had just happened, but he believes that the woman with him now could never do what that… that stranger had done.
So he sits beside her as she gulps down air, her trembling hands twisting knots in her lap. “My gloves,” she stammers. “I need my gloves, please, I need…”
Nathan reaches over to grab them off the floor, helping her steady her hands enough to slip them on. “It’s okay,” he murmurs again. She rests her head in her hands, rocking back and forth a little, until he places a hand on her back and she stills. Shudders once, then takes a deep breath.
“What happened?” she asks him, voice low. “What did I do?” He falters, not sure what to say. “Tell me, Nathan,” she snaps, raw and aching like she already knows, just doesn’t want to believe it.
“What’s the last thing you remember?” he asks instead. She hisses a breath, teeth grinding so hard he can hear them.
“We were at the cemetery,” she states monotonously. “We were… you said you wanted to ask me something. And then…” Her whole body shudders, every muscle convulsing. “I don’t remember,” she whispers. “It’s just… just black and white and red, just…” Red eyes, Nathan remembers. “And then I was here with you and Audrey pointing guns at me and Claire on the floor and…”
She bolts, stumbles to the nearest trashcan and retches. Nathan’s right behind her, pulling her hair from her face, feeling the minute changes in pressure as her body convulses even if he can’t feel her skin.
“I hurt her,” Jordan chokes. “I hurt her, didn’t I, I…” Nathan grabs some tissues from the desk, gently wipes her face.
“Jordan, look at me,” he murmurs, cupping her cheek with one hand. “I don’t know what happened, but it wasn’t you. I’ve seen you, I know you. You don’t like hurting people, you wouldn’t do this.”
She’s not breathing right, short gasps that make his lungs ache. “But I did,” she sobs. “You saw me, you saw me, Nathan, I was standing right over her, and my hands…” She stares at them like they’re foreign objects. Nathan reaches out carefully, wraps his own fingers around her trembling covered ones.
“It wasn’t you,” he says again, firmly. He doesn’t know why he’s so sure of this, or why it matters so much to him. Maybe because she has no one else to stand up for her, to believe in her. Maybe because she’s so self-degrading, so much like him. So sure that her curse makes her less than human. A freak.
“You said ‘not again’ earlier,” he continues steadily. “What’d you mean?”
“I…” She pulls her hands from his, rocks back and covers her face. “I can’t, I can’t…” She’s still not breathing right, and Nathan feels utterly helpless. This has never been his strong point, talking. Comforting. Audrey’s always been the one to talk people down, reassure them, understand them. (Except him, why can’t she understand him anymore? Why doesn’t she even want to try?) But somehow he doesn’t think Audrey will want to do much for Jordan.
So he takes her hands, gently pulls them from her face. “Jordan, look at me,” he says again, softly. He can hear her panting as she glances up, eyes stark with fear. Guilt, disgust. It only strengthens his resolve to make this right, to do something good for her after using her so blatantly. It won’t even the score, but it’s something.
“I know this is hard, but I need you to explain it to me,” he orders, as gently as he can. “If we can figure it out, we can keep it from happening again.” She swallows, eyes glued to the floor. “I know you didn’t mean to hurt Claire,” he soothes. “I believe you. But I need you to help me understand it.”
She takes a deep breath, then another, and nods. He stands, pulls her up with him and resettles them on the couch. “This has happened before?” he asks. He keeps his voice carefully measured, non-judgmental. As non-threatening as possible. She nods again.
“After I…” She swallows, stares up at the ceiling for a moment. “After my trouble was… triggered, I was…” She shrugs, and he feels his stomach turn with rage, hatred for the man who’d done this to her. “I was a wreck. I felt so… so helpless, powerless. Over everything, my trouble, what’d… what’d happened.” She folds her hands in her lap, so carefully covered. “I couldn’t… I wouldn’t even leave my house, I was so scared.” Nathan feels nauseous. “My friend Grady, he convinced me to let Claire see me. They were the only people I’d talk to, for a long time.”
She pauses for a moment, eyes closed, and every cell in Nathan’s body aches to comfort her. Touch her. Even when he knows it’s probably the last thing she wants right now. She starts speaking again, voice so small he can hardly hear. “And then I heard that he… that he was going to get off with no charges, nothing, and I just…” She shrugs desperately. “I snapped. I don’t remember the next three days, all I remember is coming to in the bastard’s house, standing over him with Grady screaming at me. I went to see Claire the next day, because I had… I had no idea what the hell was happening to me, and when I got there she started asking me about him and if I’d hurt him and it all came back, the helplessness and I…”
There are tears streaming down her cheeks again, breathing erratic. “I don’t remember what happened after that. I was just standing in her doorway with her staring at me from the floor looking at me like I was a monster, and I just…” She covers her mouth with one hand, eyes pressed closed.
“I ran,” she whispers. “I just ran. I didn’t know what else to do, how to… how to level out. I knew enough about the Troubles to know they’re triggered by emotion or trauma, so I just… I had to get away. From everything. So I didn’t hurt anyone else. Grady took me to a cabin, miles from anyone else. It took a few months, but… I’ve known him all my life, I knew he wouldn’t hurt me. More importantly, I wouldn’t hurt him. I…” She sighs, shoulders sagging wearily. “I’ve been stable since then. Until…” Until today.
She chokes off and he can’t help it, reaches out carefully to touch one gloved hand. He hears her breath catch but she doesn’t pull away, lets him wrap his fingers around hers. “I’m sorry,” he murmurs. The words are monumentally inadequate, but it’s the only thing he can think to say. She smiles tightly, eyes glued shut. He forces back the bile that chokes him, the rage and concern that nearly paralyze him. “Okay, so part of your Trouble is… rage blackouts.” She laughs.
“It sounds so normal when you put it like that.” She opens her dark eyes, watery but her.
He squeezes her hand. “Your eyes were actually kind of… red.” She raises an eyebrow.
“Seriously?”
“Seriously.”
She chews her lip, taking her hand back and running her fingers distractedly though her hair. “I guess that… all I remember when I try is red. I…” Her forehead furrows. “It’s just… flashes of black and white, like old photos, but…”
Nathan shakes his head. “You don’t need to remember,” he tells her gently. “That’s not what’s important right now. We need to find out how the blackouts are triggered and how we can stop them, okay?”
She smiles again, mirthlessly, stares at the ceiling. “Just like that? You’ll just forget about everything else?”
“It wasn’t you,” he states again.
“Pretty sure Claire would have something different to say.”
Nathan rubs his eyes wearily. “Look, we can argue semantics later. Let’s just focus on stopping them right now, alright?”
“Just another case.” She sounds so… so hopeless.
Nathan nods tightly, echoes, “Just another case.” Because it is, really. They’ve dealt with similar cases, people who had hurt others unaware. Hell, most of the Troubled they’ve helped have had no idea what they’re doing, don’t believe it even when it’s explained to them.
“Okay, so they’ve only happened in connection to…” Hell, he doesn’t even know the bastard’s name. “And when you don’t feel in control.” Jordan’s teeth clenches so hard Nathan’s jaw hurts, but she nods. “But… that can’t be all. Claire talked to you about it, in the Holloway house…”
“I had a gun,” Jordan explains wearily. “I was in control.” She presses her hands to her eyes with a frustrated growl. “Honestly, I thought I was… past it. There’ve been so many times I could’ve…”
Nathan blinks. “The man in the diner the other night. You could’ve let him touch you.”
“But that would mean he’d touch me.” Her voice is hard and there are so many levels of meaning behind the words it makes his head hurt. The only thing that can protect her is the one thing that can hurt her so badly, the one thing she can’t have, the one thing she craves as much as he does.
Yeah, he hates this town sometimes.
“This shouldn’t have happened,” Jordan states quietly. “Boyd (so he does have a name…) will never hurt me again, I know that. And Claire… I was already so confused, so scared, I think her… I thought she’d tell someone. I thought they’d lock me up somewhere, and that…. I guess it triggered whatever this is. To protect me. But that was years ago, and I’ve been stable since I came back.”
Nathan cocks his head a little. “You’ve thought about this a lot.” She nods.
“It was all I had to do, for months. I didn’t want to come back until I could be sure…” She starts to sound a little hysterical again. “I don’t even know what I did to Claire the last time, Nathan. Or this time. Maybe I should be locked up…”
Nathan shakes his head sharply. “If we used that logic half the town would be behind bars,” he tells her steadily. “And you haven’t even killed anyone.” He winces the moment the words are out of his mouth, but she smiles a little. Even a sad smile is better than none.
He touches her hand gently when she looks away. “I know you didn’t want to hurt Claire,” he says quietly. “This is no different from any other dangerous Trouble I’ve dealt with. You can’t control it.”
“I’m dangerous.” There’s a detachment in her voice that scares him, so he carefully brushes at the bare skin on her arm.
“Not to me.”
With a desperate sigh she leans toward him, resting her forehead on his shoulder. He automatically loops an arm around her, feels her trembling. “What was different today?” he asks, as gently as he can. “Why would it happen again now?”
She doesn’t answer, just takes a strangled breath, and it hits him.
It’s him.
“Oh.” It’s all he can choke out. Then, “God, Jordan, did I…”
She pulls away, shaking her head wearily. “I don’t know.” But she does, they both do. It’s the only thing that makes sense.
As though he hadn’t already felt guilty enough about this entire thing.
It still doesn’t make complete sense, though. There’ve been a thousand times she could’ve gone off, just since he’d met her. There’s something he’s missing, something connecting him and Claire and Boyd…
Oh. “You knew Boyd,” he says softly, before he can think. “You trusted him.” He’s pretty sure Jordan actually stops breathing.
“Yes,” she whispers. She doesn’t elaborate, and he doesn’t push, because it’s really not important for the purpose of the case. (For his own purposes, though, he wants to dig. Then find the man and torture him some more.)
“And the same with Claire,” he continues steadily, pretending he can’t feel her arm shaking where it’s pressed against his. “And…” He hesitates, not sure he really wants an answer to this. “You trust me?”
She nods and it breaks his heart, for some reason. It’s not that he didn’t expect it, not after they’d made it through that house together, not after he’d just thrown his own trust of Jordan in Audrey’s face. But somehow he still feels like a traitor, like he’d tricked her into caring for him and then flipped it around back on her to trigger… this.
Except they both know the situation now, and for some reason he’s still here, they’re both still there. Despite everything. Maybe because of everything. (He likes it that she needs him more than he needs her.)
But for now, that actually makes things pretty damn simple. “So it happens when you think someone you trust betrayed you, put you in a situation out of your control,” he states in a careful monotone. She shivers. “That’s actually good news, Jordan.”
She makes a noise. “I really don’t see how.”
“Because you know who can trigger you. And I’m guessing it’s a pretty short list.” She smiles a little at her hands.
“So what, give everyone a heads up not to screw with me or I’ll go all Hulk on them?” Nathan actually laughs a little. (How long has it been since he really did that?)
“Yeah, something like that.” She’s still staring at her hands, but seems a lot calmer, and Nathan feels a strange sense of warmth tingle in his chest that he’d actually helped her. Audrey has always been the one to fix things, while Nathan’s trailed along always feeling one step behind, always feeling like he’ll never be enough to really help anyone. (Never be enough to really help Audrey.)
Jordan twists her fingers together. “Why don’t you hate me?” she asks quietly, eyes glued to the floor. “How can you not hate me for this?”
Nathan suddenly feels very tired.
“There’s enough hate in this town already,” he answers dully. Audrey is going to hate him for this, he knows that. He’s not entirely sure why she has such a dislike for Jordan (okay, he does, he just isn’t sure he’s ready to face the fact that Audrey Parker is jealous), but after their conversation (argument) this morning he knows his partner will give him hell for letting Jordan go.
Maybe he deserves her hate. But Jordan doesn’t, no more than any of the Troubled they’ve worked with, and Nathan isn’t going to let Audrey’s resentment ruin Jordan’s life. Not after everything the woman has been through.
There’s a pressure against his hand and he glances down, startled, finds Jordan’s bare fingers twined through his.
“You’re a good man, Nathan Wuornos,” she murmurs. There’s a desperate ache in his chest at that, because once he might have wanted to agree but it’s not black and white. Because he’s doing things he never would have dreamed he could for a woman who no longer seems to care. Because everything is so fucking gray that he can’t tell one thing from the next, can’t feel anything out and his only anchor has left him stranded in this fog of gray.
Gray and red.
(darkness is a harsh term don't you think?)
and you, you've gone too far this time
you have neither reason nor rhyme
with which to take this soul that is so rightfully mine
it seems that all my bridges have been burned
but you say, "that's exactly how this grace thing works"
it's not the long walk home that will change this heart
but the welcome i receive with every start