Spoilers: Right up to Play With Fire
A.N. This has been percolating for what feels like forever. It's a post ep (and very post at that), and I started writing it before PWF was even over. Some things I made up, some I made more convenient, and some might have actually happened more than twice. My bad. Thank goodness it is off my chest.
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~Third Time's A Charm~
It seemed sometimes that everything happened twice .
She'd pulled up her life for him twice. After graduation from Harvard, she had turned down a job in Boston, the city she had made her home, to work in Los Angeles. Then, just when Los Angeles was starting to feel like home, he had called her again and she had answered him by moving to Las Vegas and beginning anew. She had been happy in her work in both places, and didn't really mind moving, but it was the principle of the thing that irked her.
He'd dated someone from the lab twice. The first had fallen through because of Pink Floyd and his own hesitation and reserve. He still wasn't sure what had gone wrong with the second. Conflict of interest, he supposed. Terri could separate work from life, and he could not; it was that simple. And that complicated.
She'd investigated Warrick for him twice. At first, she'd been eager to settle the problem, and wanted to see Warrick fired, but she didn't know any of them yet. She'd been angry that he didn't pay attention to her report, but she knew now that he had acted in his own way. The second time she had been truly sorry. Nothing had ever been so hard as finding that tape, and having to hand it over. Again, it was handled in his own way, and she was glad at the way he had done it.
He'd held her and made sure she was all right twice. When he thought of her, in that skirt and make-up, so decidedly not his Sara, walking up and down the aisles of that grocery store, he could feel his blood boil. In more than one way. She had been so determined, and he had been so angry, but afterwards, when it was all for naught, he had touched her and told her he would fix it. After Greg had been loaded into the ambulance, he had looked over his shoulder and saw her sitting on the curb, and he had gone to her again. This time there wasn't much he could do save for calling a paramedic, but he needed to be there for her just the same.
She'd almost left him twice. Well, once and a half at least. The first request for leave slip had been signed by both of them, and then torn up upon the delivery of a laconic orchid, and burned after four simple words and a pile of ice. The second sat in a plastic folder in her locker, unsigned and undated, but ready for use at a moments notice. She didn't want that moment to come, but on days like today, she feared that it would, and that it would sweep her away when it did.
He had heard her say 'I do' twice. The first time her voice had been so vibrant, so full of excitement and the rush that came with finding the initial cause that spun out the Newtonian string of events. She knew the first cause, and he did not, and she loved being the one to tell him. The second time her voice had been dead, the only life in it was the breath on her vocal cords, and even that was tinged with regret. She knew the answer, and he did not, but this time she had no information to volunteer
She had asked him to do something that the HR handbook deemed "unwise" twice. The first time she'd been trying to make a point, trying to make him see how much the case was killing her. Eight excruciating seconds later when he still hadn't answered, she knew that she had probably made it worse, but then he'd produced the cadaver, and the nightmares stopped, or at least the intensity lessened. The second time he had answered, and her world stopped for a lot more than eight seconds. She didn't like either resolution very much.
He had almost been caught by her twice. The first time was after the Haviland case, when she asked him why he didn't just answer Marjorie Wescott the first time. He'd answered that he was making sure the jury really understood the question, and she'd nodded and changed the subject, but he knew she didn't buy it for a second. The second time was just before the explosion. He had caught her reflection in one of the glass windows, but hadn't turned around to talk to her. It was only afterwards that he realized she had been trying to talk to him, but was making sure he could hear her first.
She had read upside down for him twice. The first time she had triumphantly announced that she could, enjoying the look on his face when he realized again that she was one in a million. The second time she had said nothing, instead waiting to see why he was going to see an audiologist, and why the number was used enough to be in his rolodex. She had a fairly good idea, naturally, but she was damned if he would hear it from her. She wondered if he forgot, or if he had never registered it in the first place. If the look she had taken as a compliment really meant that he thought her too quirky to be comfortable. Pot and kettle, a pair for eternity, but always picking each other apart.
It seemed sometimes that everything happened twice.
And if the third time was the charm, it couldn't come soon enough.