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I stayed in bed for fully a day and a half. Thirty-six hours. Didn’t eat, only kind of slept, drugged myself any time I was conscious enough to think too much. Just stayed in bed. I’m the most pathetic creature in the world when I’m depressed. I honestly don’t know what I would’ve done if I’d been left alone for too much longer. Probably just stayed in bed and died.
But, y’know, maybe I’m lucky that way. Maybe there are people out there whose friends will just leave them to their own devices, when they’re in a tough spot. Let them get through it on their own, and stuff. Not my friends. Turks don’t have the sense to leave well enough alone, I guess.
Going into my thirty-seventh hour of bed, huddled in a little pile beneath the blankets, wondering whether it was worth it to crawl out of bed and get more drugs, when my bedroom door was broken down. Literally, broken down. And then there was Cyr, standing in the doorway, little bits of plaster falling off the walls where the hinges had been.
“I said we were going to talk,” she proclaimed, stalking into the room. “And what do you do? You cower in your room for two days! I thought you might’ve died!”
I was a little shocked to see her, especially given how violent her entrance had been. “C-Cyr…”
She clambered up onto my bed and grabbed my blankets. “Don’t you ‘Cyr’ me, buddy. What the hell is wrong with you?” she demanded, eyes blazing.
“W-well, I…”
Cyr pushed the blankets aside and pinned me firmly to the bed. “Are you sick?” she demanded again, pressing the back of her hand against my forehead and pulling my eyelids open to get a look at my eyes.
“I’m not …”
“You don’t look sick,” she declared, easing off and sitting back on the bed, as opposed to my stomach. “Well. You don’t look well, but I don’t think you’re sick. What the hell are you doing in bed?”
“I don’t feel good.”
Rolling her eyes, Cyr pounded a fist on the bed. I think she may have busted a few of the springs. “What is the matter, Reno? Tell me now, or I swear by every god and goddess I hold dear, I will beat it out of you.”
“I…” And that’s as far as I got before I got so choked up I couldn’t even say anything, for fear of absolutely breaking down.
Cyr stared at me for a few moments, then made a soft, sympathetic noise and gave me a hug. She’s only about six years older than me. But it does feel like a lot more, sometimes. Or, maybe it’s that she’s the type of person who makes you feel younger than you are. “Oh, honey, I think I know what this is…” she murmured.
“Nhgn.”
“Well, this whole affair is just stupid, dear, it’s as simple as that,” Cyr explained.
“I know.”
Cyr sighed and pulled back a bit. “Then you know what’s going on?” she questioned, concern in her tawny dark eyes.
She was referring to the idea of Rufus and Rosalind being “together.” There were implications to that which went beyond the trampling of my hopes and dreams and were, in some ways, a lot more serious. “I know well enough.”
“And you’re as worried as we are?”
“I’m a bit beyond worried, Cyr, I’m to the point of ‘stay in bed and never come out again.’”
“Well! That won’t do anyone any good.” Cyr got up and clapped her hands together brusquely, going over to my closet and grabbing a robe. “Put that on. Gods, you look thin. I don’t think I’ve ever seen you half-naked before; you’re practically a skeleton. Have you eaten recently?”
“Not for two days, at least.”
Cyr sighed heavily. “Come on out and I’ll make you something. Two days. It’s no wonder you’re so thin. Well, get dressed.”
She left the room and I crawled out of bed. I suppose it was lucky. I was hungry and sore as all hell. Bed for two days isn’t healthy. I found a t-shirt on the floor and pulled it on, then grabbed the robe she’d tossed on the bed. Then I stumbled out of my room and into my living room, which was, incidentally, full of Turks.
I was just in the middle of switching apartments. There were boxes all over the places, only half my stuff was unpacked and everybody was in my living room. Rafe, Samantha, Rude, Tseng, St. Andrew, Rodney, sitting wherever there was a clear space, and Cyr, over in the kitchen. Well, I guess that’s not everybody, but it’s more people than I want catching me in my shorts after a small bout of depression. “Ahh…shit.”
“G’morning, sunshine,” St. Andrew commented dryly. “Or afternoon, whichever.”
“Why the hell are you all here? If this is an intervention, Cyr, I’m going back to bed.”
Cyr sighed and rummaged around in my cupboards. “It’s not an intervention. Sit down somewhere, we have to talk. And where’s your garlic?”
“Those are those white, onion type things, right?”
“Oh god,” Cyr muttered. “Never mind, never mind. Sit down and shut up. Tseng, go ahead and start, I’m listening.”
Tseng was setting up his laptop and a small projector, aiming it at a blank wall above the TV. “Ahh…yes, just give me a minute, half a minute…”
Tseng always has his laptop. I seriously don’t know what he’d do without it. Some people draw things or make notes when they’re trying to solve problems. Tseng interfaces. He sits at his laptop and creates spreadsheets. Or presentations. Or websites. Or flow charts about whatever the problem is.
“There we are!” Tseng said triumphantly, and an image flashed up on the wall. “Can everyone see?”
“Come sit down, Reno,” Samantha called, shifting over on the couch and sitting on Rodney’s lap. Apparently, he’d managed to convince her that Rufus wasn’t such a prize after all.
I sat, wedged a little uncomfortably between Rafe, Samantha and Rodney, but I’d survive. So long as Rodney didn’t try to stab me.
“St. Andrew, could you get the lights?” Tseng requested. “And, Rude, if you would move just a little bit down, your head is blocking the projection…”
Sure enough, there was a head-sized black dome in the corner of the image Tseng had projected on the wall as the lights turned off. Rude grunted and slouched in his armchair.
“All right! So. The problem,” Tseng began, taking a laser pointer in one hand and his mouse in another. A slide flashed up on screen, a blown up picture of Rufus Shinra. I didn’t want that on my wall. “The problem is Exhibit A, Rufus Shinra. Does everybody understand why Exhibit A is a problem?”
“Because he’s hers,” Samantha muttered. So apparently she wasn’t quite over it.
Tseng cleared his throat. “For those of us who don’t understand the actual breadth of the problem, I’ll elaborate.”
The screen changed and displayed the heading “The Problem – A Comprehensive Study.”
“The problem; Tseng has too much time on his hands,” I muttered, rolling my eyes.
“Quiet.” A point flashed up on the screen beneath the heading. “Item one,” Tseng began, underlining the point with his laser pointer. “Rufus Shinra is a notorious letch, a user of women, and an all around lousy guy. Not the sort of person we want someone like Rosalind to be with.”
Well, he does get right to the heart of things.
“Second point.” Another bullet flashed up on screen. “Rufus Shinra does not typically date girls like Rosalind. Some of his previous conquests have included lingerie models, strippers, and the trophy wives of executives. Rosalind does not fit this profile.”
Of course she didn’t. Not in the slightest. Rufus dated whores, not sweet, pretty, wonderful girls like Rosalind.
“Which brings me to our first sub-point. Why has Rufus selected Rosalind? If she does not fit the profile, then there must be something outside of the profile, which has made her a worthy candidate.”
He changed slides again and a picture of Rosalind appeared on screen. I didn’t know when it had been taken, I didn’t recognize it. But, god, all of a sudden, I missed her. I hadn’t seen her for almost two days. I don’t think I’ve ever gone that long without at least seeing her. She was wearing a knee length, light green dress with a pattern of tiny flowers near the hem and a pale pink jacket, leaning over a railing and cradling a flower in the palm of her hand. She wasn’t looking at the camera, so maybe she didn’t know the picture was being taken. “Where was this taken? And…when?”
Rafe spoke up. “The Midgar National Conservatory, yesterday, approximately three-thirty PM.”
“Rafe’s been tailing the pair of them,” Tseng informed me, circling his laser pointer around a hand, presumably Rufus’s, resting on Rosalind’s shoulder. “But anyway. Slide three, qualities which would make Rosalind a potential target for Rufus.”
I was expecting things like her eyes, her smile, her laugh, the way she fusses with her hair when she’s nervous, but Tseng had come up with different things. “The primary reason we’re looking at is her status as a Turk,” he said. “She has a predominant talent with firearms, was recently promoted, performed admirably in Junon, and has a good, clean record.”
“So…he wants her to do something for him?” I guessed. “Some sort of business thing?”
Tseng nodded. “That’s our main theory, yes. The other is that his tastes have changed, but that’s less likely. However…” he changed the slide again. “What he wants Rosalind to do will likely be under the table, against company policy, illegal, and very likely dangerous.” He punctuated each point with a line of text on the screen. “Which is why he can’t assign it to her legitimately.”
I hate to say it, but I was glad that he had ulterior motives. And that they probably had nothing to do with sex. Deep down, more than anything, I’d been afraid that he really had a thing for her and was going to do everything in his power (and he has a hell of a lot of power) to ensure that he got her. When you get right down to it, looking at pros and cons and everything, I don’t really stand much of a chance against Rufus Shinra.
“This is all well and good,” Rude spoke up. “But what’s the plan of action?”
“Ah,” Tseng held up a hand and smiled. “You see, Reno, while you’ve been lolling around in bed, we have been busy. This is a problem for our organization and we must do everything in our power to nip it in the bud, while causing as little pain as possible for Rosalind. And so. This is the plan.”
He turned the projector off and closed his laptop, as the lights went on again, coming around to stand in the center of the room and resume his presentation. “I have addressed this problem to Commander Veld, and he agrees it is best to handle it internally. He has also written up a set of orders that will keep Rosalind as busy with patrols as is legally possible. This will minimize the time she has to spend with Rufus.”
“But she’ll still manage to get some time in,” St. Andrew interrupted. “So that’s…”
“Quiet, St. Andrew,” Tseng said sternly. “Who’s giving this presentation, you or me? Me. So be quiet. Yes, she will manage to have some spare time and yes, it is likely she will occupy herself with Rufus during that time. But that’s where St. Andrew comes in.”
St. Andrew jumped up and clapped his hands brusquely. “Right! Now, y’see, Rufus Shinra’s an important sort of guy, right? And what do important sort of people always have?”
“Bodyguards,” Tseng answered immediately, evidently wanting to keep the presentation moving.
“Aww, Tseng, you’re wrecking it…”
“Shut up and get on with it.”
St. Andrew rolled his eyes. “Yeah, yeah…all right. So the deal is, Rufus has bodyguards. Being that I’m a former bodyguard myself, I know most of these guys. There’s a network, y’know what I’m saying? So, seeing as I’m such a nice guy, they’ve seen their way clear to keeping us informed of Rufus’s plans and movements.”
“Which will allow one of us to be around whenever he goes out with Rosalind,” Tseng finished. “Thereby ensuring that nothing bad happens, until such time as we can discover his motives and blow the whole thing out of the water, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Any questions?”
“Tseng?”
“Yes, Reno?”
“This was your idea?”
Tseng shrugged and went to pack up his laptop. “I suppose so. Everyone else is helping too. But if you’re asking if it was my initiative, then yes, I suppose it was. It’s a company problem.”
It wasn’t, really. Trust Tseng to turn something as small as this as a company problem, and solve it the only way he knew how. “Would your wife take severe offense if I kissed you?”
“Probably. I’ll just appreciate the sentiment,” he paused. “I think.” Glancing at his watch, he cleared his throat. “Everyone else is dismissed. Rude, I believe you’re going to be following them to the opera this evening?”
Rude grunted and stood up, nodding. “Yes, sir.”
“Report to my office before you go for a briefing. See you then.”
Cyr came over and handed me a plate of something she’d thrown together. It would probably be the best thing I’d eat for quite a while, but Cyr just cooks like that. “The thing of it is, though, Reno, your hands have to be off, all right? Because you will screw this up.”
“But, I…”
“You will,” Tseng agreed, shouldering his laptop bag. “You know you will. We just want you to stay back and take things easy, all right? Let us handle it.”
“Aww, but…” I trailed off, thinking of what I would do if I happened to run across Rufus and Rosalind together again. I’d probably try to kill him. So Cyr and Tseng were probably right in keeping me out of this. I trusted them enough to handle everything properly and make things right again, but it did sort of depend on my keeping out of things. “Well…all right.”
“That’s a good boy,” Cyr approved. “And don’t worry. We will take care of it.”
You know, I think I’ve said this before, but when it gets right down to it, my colleagues are probably the closest thing I’ve ever had to a family. I don’t really know what else you would call a bunch of people who live together and work together and watch out for each other and care about each other. People (well, except for Rodney) who you can trust, no matter what the circumstances are. Even if it’s not quite right, “family” has to be pretty close. And I guess I’m thankful for that.
*
Of course, I got progressively less thankful as time went by. It had been two weeks. I don’t know why, but I hadn’t imagined it would take quite so long. People kept telling me to be patient, to keep waiting, that they were working on it. I appreciated it, yeah, but it was different for me. Every second of them being together was agony. What’s worse, Rosalind was avoiding me. If I was in a room when she came in, she’d turn around and walk back out. If I was on the elevator, she’d take the stairs. She’d taken to staying in her apartment, instead of being out in the lounge. Eventually, I’d just started trying to stay out of her way, to make things easier on her.
I’d also stopped sleeping. Or stopped sleeping well, at least. There was just too much weighing me down at night to get a proper sleep, so most nights I just stayed up, occupying myself in one way or another, working more of the piddly little patrol shifts that are supposed to be reserved for breaking in the lower class recruits. I just needed something to do, to keep my mind off how much I wanted to crawl under my bed and die.
Being that I’d stopped sleeping, I’d taken to spending the nights when I wasn’t working in the lounge, just doing whatever came to mind. I reorganized the entire bookshelf along the south wall one night. Of course, when I reorganize things, I usually group them by color. So, while it was very pretty, it was essentially useless unless you happen to feel like reading a pink book.
Cyr came into the lounge at around two in the morning, in her housecoat and slippers. She stood watching me for a while, then came over to the table and sat down. “What are you making, Reno?” she asked, sounding kinda weary. It was another one of those nights where I was off work and didn’t have anything to do.
“Car bomb.”
“Who for?”
“Rufus.”
“Go to bed, Reno.”
“I’m almost done.”
Sighing heavily, Cyr picked up a pitcher of water from the table and dumped half of it on my beautiful little car bomb. I’d been working on it all night.
“Hey!” Then she dumped the rest of it on my head. “Cyr!”
She put a hand on my shoulder. “I know you’re taking this very hard,” she told me gently. “But high explosives are not the answer.”
“Aww…it’s just…”
Cyr waved a hand. “I know, I know…we all know. She’s just young. But these things must be handled very carefully, or she’ll be very badly hurt by the whole thing. You understand, right?”
Stupid Cyr always makes things hard. “Well…yeah…but…”
“And you know that this is one of the occasions that we need you to keep your hands off, understand?”
“I’ll only…”
“You’ll only go in and shoot your mouth off, say a bunch of things you’ll regret, and hurt her. You won’t mean to, but you’ll do it,” Cyr said firmly. “Leave it to us. We’ll handle it, all right?”
“Could you…could you handle it soon? I mean…shit, Cyr, this is killing me.”
She sighed and rubbed a hand over my back. “I know, dear. And I’m so very sorry. But…these things take time. Please, just be patient.”
Again and again and again with the “be patient.” Patience is hard, especially for someone like me. Especially when it had to do with something like this. But what could I do? I didn’t want to hurt her. And, I guess comparatively, my suffering wasn’t so bad. “Yeah…I’ll try. It’s just hard.”
I don’t believe in jinxes. I don’t believe in fate. I don’t even really believe in luck, except in Junon. Being that those are my beliefs, I’d kind of like to think that the conversation I’d had with Cyr wasn’t an omen of something really bad to come. Because I sure as hell didn’t pick up on it.
The night after was another one I’d devoted to spending awake and despondent, being that I’d finally just crashed the day previous. Under the pool table, incidentally.
But I had company this time, because St. Andrew was hanging around in the lounge, out of pity, I figured. I’ve mentioned how abysmally pathetic I am, when I want to be.
It was around nine at night and St. Andrew was watching TV, while I flipped through a newspaper, not really looking to read about anything in particular, just sort of skimming it.
And then the elevator stopped at our floor and Rosalind came breezing out, distracted and humming to herself in a black cocktail dress and heels. She looked nice—beautiful, even, but it didn’t seem right. I don’t think black is Rosalind’s color. I also didn’t see how, if she was uncomfortable in the dress she’d worn to the party, she could be comfortable in something short, tight, and strapless. It didn’t suit her and it made my blood boil to think that Rufus was dressing her up like a doll. But I couldn’t really say anything.
St. Andrew, being the twit that he is, waved at her. “Hi, Rosalind!” he called cheerfully.
“Good evening, Andrew,” she answered politely, stopping halfway across the room and adjusting the purse she had over her shoulder. She ignored me.
“Nice dress. Rufus buy it for you?”
“Yes, he did. But, if you wouldn’t mind, I’m kind of going somewhere…”
“Ah,” St. Andrew nodded vigorously. “I gotcha. Sorry. Carry on. I’ll see you around?”
Rosalind nodded, but she was already drifting down the hall to her apartment. “Yes…of course.”
St. Andrew seemed to have the sense not to say anything once she was gone and I had the willpower to keep myself from throwing up, so we just sat in silence, except for the sound of the game on TV. And then she came back, changed into something more casual, but no less modest, adjusting her sidearm in its holster as she walked quickly across the room.
“Where’re you going?” St. Andrew questioned.
“Target practice,” Rosalind answered shortly, pressing the button for the elevator and stepping on.
“Bye, Rosalind!” St. Andrew called as the doors slid shut behind her.
I sighed heavily and put my newspaper away. “She’s looking well,” I remarked morosely.
Andrew shrugged. “I dunno. Personally, I think she looked like a bit of a slut.”
“Watch it, Andrew,” I warned, bridling a bit.
“Well, what? She does. It’s not right, not her look. You can tell can’t you? Rosalind doesn’t dress like that, ergo; somebody else is picking her clothes out for her.”
“Fucking Rufus.”
St. Andrew chuckled. “Well, that’s exactly what we don’t want, so hopefully not. But yes, he’s probably been sending her clothes and of course she’s been wearing them.” He leaned back against the couch. “Actually, there’s a natural progression to these things. It escalates, as it were.”
“Escalates? What the hell do you mean, ‘escalates’?” I questioned, a little worried. “What’s that mean?”
Andrew shrugged. “It means that, if he bought her a skanky little cocktail dress like that, the next thing he’s going to be sending is lingerie and a plane ticket up to one of his little getaways. And then there’s gonna be some ‘target practice.’”
“You’re not serious!”
“It’s how the Don used to do it,” St. Andrew explained. “Well, depending on the girl. Sometimes, he’d just go straight for the kill, other times he’d work up to it, slowly. He always got what he wanted, though.”
“Shit…I never even thought…I thought it was just some kind of business thing, I didn’t think he was actually gonna…”
“It might be how he plans to get her to do what he wants,” Andrew pointed out. “I remember that this one time, the Don needed some money to fund this project he had going on and the woman he wanted it from was a bit of a frigid bitch. Now, as I’m sure you’re aware, the Don Corneo isn’t exactly the first guy a woman thinks of when she wants a roll in the hay. The old bastard’s not completely stupid, he’s perfectly aware of the fact that women only sleep with him ‘cause he does something for them, so instead of him going, he sent me over and I…”
“Andrew, I really don’t think I need one of your cute little ‘sexual adventure’ stories right now,” I told him shortly, slumping in the armchair I was sitting in and closing my eyes. Which turned out to be a bad idea, because the first thing I saw in my mind’s eye was Rufus and Rosalind together and that was the last thing in the world I needed, so I snapped my eyes open again. “God, it’s just…I mean, it’s…well…and the pair of them are probably upstairs right now…ugh…target practice, god only knows…shit.” I paused and glanced over at Andrew. “Hey…if you could…I know this isn’t exactly part of whatever Tseng’s plan is…but…could you go up there and make sure they don’t…you know, mess around? Just…please?”
St. Andrew stared at me for a few moments. “You’re really getting bent outta shape about this, aren’t you?” he remarked. “Well, damn. If you’re that worried about it, then of course I will. Shit.”
“It’s just, I don’t want…”
Andrew held up a hand and got languidly to his feet, adjusting the holster around his waist. “Hey, anytime. Hell, I know I don’t want the bastard laying a hand on her; it only stands to reason that you wouldn’t. I’ll muck things up for him as best I can, all right?”
“Yeah.”
Whistling to himself, Andrew drew one of his guns and headed over to the elevators, pushing the up button.
“Hey, St. Andrew?” I called, as the elevator door slid open. “Thanks for this.”
Andrew grinned and winked. “Hey, no problem. I was in this business for a while, keeping the Don’s girls outta trouble. It’s like being home again. But you’ll owe me fifty gil.”
I laughed at that. “Yeah, yeah, sure. No problem.”
He vanished behind the elevator doors and headed upstairs. Andrew’s a good guy. It’s funny. There’s not really so much difference between Andrew and Rufus. I mean, Andrew is a letch and Rufus is a letch, and Andrew can be a complete and total asshole when he wants to be and Rufus is pretty much always a complete and total asshole. There’s a lot of things that I hate about Rufus that crop up again in St. Andrew. And yet I don’t hate St. Andrew. I guess it maybe has to do with the fact that, deep down, I know Andrew’s a good guy. He’s displayed on more than one occasion that, despite all evidence to the contrary, he’s got a conscience.
So I waited. More waiting. I trusted St. Andrew to handle this, and to handle it properly, but every minute was just hell. Well. As much hell as any minute where I know that she’s with him is. So I just tried to distract myself as well as I could until he came back, about fifteen minutes later, grinning like an idiot.
“I,” he announced, practically bouncing up and down, “am such a bitch. Samantha Hartigan has got nothing on me, because I am, like, the queen of bitches.”
“Well. This comes as a bit of a shock, Andrew, but I suppose I have to respect your lifestyle choices.”
“Oh, shut up,” St. Andrew grinned, vaulting over the couch and bouncing up and down. “There’s not gonna be any trouble tonight. He finally got fed up with me and left.”
“How’d Rosalind take it?”
St. Andrew winced a bit. “Not so great. When I left she seemed kinda pissed.”
To demonstrate this point, the door of the stairwell flew open and Rosalind stormed out, slamming the door behind her.
“And, if it’s all right with you, I’ll be taking my money and going now,” he muttered. “She looks about ready to tear somebody’s arms off and I’d rather the pair she gets her hands on aren’t mine.”
“Yeah, sure. Thanks.” I dug in my pocket and handed him fifty gil.
“What are you doing?”
It was the first thing she’d said to me in a very long time, but I couldn’t really be happy about it, because she was mad. “Uhh…”
“You’re doing this!” she accused, glaring at me, green eyes blazing.
St. Andrew had conveniently disappeared and left me to face Rosalind alone, which I suppose was only fair to him. I suppose this whole thing had to come to head sometime. “And what if I am?”
Rosalind stamped her foot angrily. “You’re ruining everything!”
“I’m just looking out for you.”
She flared again. “I don’t need you to look out for me! I’m twenty-three years old!”
“That has nothing to do with it,” I answered shortly, forcing myself to stay calm. “You’re also one of the most naïve, emotionally immature, socially irresponsible girls I’ve ever met, and if I’m going to be in charge of you, then I’m going to be making sure you don’t screw around with assholes like Rufus.”
“Rufus is my boyfriend!” Rosalind retorted, looking outraged.
That one stung a little, but I reminded myself that she was young and didn’t know any better. “For god’s sake, rookie, can’t you tell he’s using you? Everybody
else knows it, how come you don’t? I don’t know what the hell he wants from you rookie, but rest assured, it’s not gonna be good.”
“How dare you…” she began, then folded her arms across her chest. “How would you know?”
I laughed a bit coldly. “Have you asked Rufus about the women who’ve been in his life before you? D’you know what kind of people they’ve been? Strippers, super models, debutantes…and he’s only after them for the sex! You’re not the kind of girl he would want, rookie.”
She flinched a bit at that, and I immediately regretted the statement, but she bristled again quickly. “You wouldn’t know!” she declared. “You don’t know Rufus! He’s the sweetest, kindest, most intelligent man I’ve ever met. He cares about me more than you ever will!”
Ohh, man. That one struck a nerve. Lucky I’d gotten so practiced at not letting her know how I felt about stuff, or she might’ve been able to tell. “Christ, rookie, you really are naïve if you honestly believe Rufus cares about you. Did you know that Rufus has inherited every single one of his father’s bad tendencies? When he looks at you, he’s thinking the same damn thing that his father is. He just covers it up better, that’s all. And if you continue to let him fool you, you’re just gonna get yourself hurt.”
Rosalind shook her head. “Shut up! You don’t understand! How can you even pretend you know these things?”
“I do know these things,” I answered, maybe a little more sharply than I should have. “You don’t understand. If you never listen to me again, rookie, listen to me now when I say he’s going to hurt you. I don’t know what he wants. But it’s not you.”
“No! You don’t understand anything!” she shouted, stamping her foot on the ground again. Her eyes were bright and her cheeks were flushed, and her hands were clenched so tightly that her palms must have been bleeding. I’d never seen her so angry before. “At least…at least Rufus can pay attention to me for more than three minutes!”
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” I demanded, bridling defensively, then kicking myself for reacting angrily. I couldn’t get angry at her. I was making things bad enough already, I couldn’t make them worse by getting hostile.
Rosalind seemed to sense that this was something touchy and there was a gleam of triumph in her eyes. “My father was right about you,” she said loftily. “There was a reason they held you back! You wouldn’t be where you are now if it wasn’t for me!”
“Don’t go there, rookie.” It was as much of a plea as it was a warning. I didn’t know if I could stay civil, if she started digging into the places that hurt.
She hesitated for half a moment, but merely changed tactics slightly and pressed on. “Rufus loves to listen to me. He’s smart and charming and he takes me to all sorts of wonderful places. Operas and symphonies and art galleries! He’s the smartest person I’ve ever met. He took me to a gallery downtown, and told me everything he knew about the artists and painters…he’s so cultured. It wasn’t the sort of thing that you would understand,” she finished contemptuously.
This wasn’t right. This wasn’t like Rosalind. I would never have imagined she could be so cruel, not in a million years. This hurt. Maybe that’s the problem with letting people close to you. They’re the ones who learn exactly where it hurts. And there’s really only one way to react. “You know what? I don’t need to listen to this. Maybe I’m the only person who really does give two shits whether or not Rufus hurts you, but if you’re gonna be like this, maybe I’m gonna stop caring. So when Rufus decides to rape you and leave you in a ditch somewhere, you do me a favor and remember that I don’t care.”
Rosalind was a little bit staggered by that, I think. Sure, she’d never been that cruel to me, but I’d never been like that to her either. She forced herself to recover though, even though there were tears brimming in her eyes. “S-see, I knew you didn’t care about me!” she managed.
That. That right there was an opening. It was the sort of place where I could’ve just stopped. And apologized. And told her I did care and that was why I was so goddamn upset. And maybe made things better. But, I’m kinda stupid that way. “Well, right about now you’d be right.”
Which was all a blatant, horrible lie, of course. But it had the predictable effect. “Then I don’t care about you, either!” And with that, she turned around and ran down the hallway to her apartment. And I was left standing in the middle of the lounge, feeling very hurt, very lonely, and very, very stupid. I half-collapsed on the couch and buried my face in my hands, feeling a now familiar ache spreading through my entire body.
And then St. Andrew and Cyr both came swooping in out of nowhere and made everything worse.
“Reno, what the hell is with you?” St. Andrew yelled, coming out of the hallway he’d disappeared into, as Cyr stalked out into the lounge.
“What did you just do?” she demanded. “I told you to stay out of this! This is exactly what we didn’t want!”
“I told you she was pissed off! Hell, couldn’t you have at least tried to cover your ass? Pretended you didn’t know what was going on? Said we’d been gambling, for chrissakes! Said you owed me money! Anything!”
“You go and drive the poor girl to tears…what in gods’ name were you telling her? Naïve, childish, socially irresponsible…why would you call her that? Why not just come right out and tell her she’s worthless? Gods!” Cyr fumed, burying her fingers in her hair.
“Yeah!” St. Andrew agreed. “Jesus Christ, of all the people you had to go and blow up at, you have to make it Rosalind. Damnit, you know she’s not like Cyr or Samantha! She’s sensitive, she’s young, she cries at the drop of a hat…she’s vulnerable! Where the hell d’you get off doing that to her?”
Cyr slammed a fist down on the table next to her. “And after all we were trying to do, all the manipulating, all the sneaking around, trying to make sure she didn’t get hurt…two weeks of that, and you go and wreck everything! Didn’t I tell you this would happen if you didn’t stay out of it? Gods, Reno, you just…”
“Stop it!” I interrupted finally. I was surprised she even heard me, given how loud she was yelling. But it shut the both of them up. “Jesus, Cyr, just stop! Stop talking like this is all my fault! What the hell did you want me to do? It’s been two weeks, two long, goddamn weeks of watching! I can’t do it anymore. I can’t see them together. I can’t stand around and watch her getting closer and closer again, and just wait for him to do something to hurt her. I can’t, okay?”
“But, Reno…” Cyr began.
“No, Cyr. Y’know what? This whole damn time, it’s been hurting me. I don’t think one of you has even stopped to just think about the fact that maybe I’m over here, staying out of it, like I was told to, and suffering because of it! This is hard, Cyr. It hurts. And it hurts even worse now. Yeah, you knew I’d do this. You knew I’d go and shoot my goddamn mouth off, even if I wouldn’t mean it. And I didn’t mean it. I didn’t mean a single damn thing I said, but that doesn’t matter. Yeah, I guess I wrecked everything. And you go right on ahead and blame me, I don’t care any more. Just…just leave me alone, I’m going to bed.”
Neither of them tried to stop me. I think I’d kind of shut the both of them up and that was good, because I felt like if I tried to say anything else I’d choke to death. It felt like my throat was closing up. I was dizzy and my eyes were burning. Everything hurt. I hate that more than anything, the way that every single muscle and organ and bone in my body feels like it’s on fire.
I got myself back to my apartment and made sure the door was locked behind me, and promptly started tearing the place to pieces. I knocked boxes over and kicked their contents all over the place, I overturned furniture, I went into the kitchen and started smashing dishes, I tore down strips of wallpaper. I don’t remember actually doing any of this; I was in too much of a frenzy when I was doing it to remember exactly what I’d done, but I do remember waking up the next morning and discovering the consequences of my actions.
One thing I do remember, after I’d worn myself out from smashing things, is going over to the cupboard where I keep all my liquor and dumping every single bottle down the sink. And then going into the medicine cabinet in the bathroom and emptying every bottle of pills I had down the toilet. I hadn’t been manic like this for years and years, but I was still lucid enough to be absolutely terrified that I’d do something really, really stupid.
And then, that being done and because I was both emotionally and physically exhausted, I sort of collapsed in bed. Kind of. Bed was sort of a tricky affair, because I’d taken out one side of the bed frame, but I managed in the end. And even then, exhausted or not, it was a very, very long night.
*
I woke up late the next morning, sick and tired and so incredibly remorseful I could barely think straight. Knowing she was mad at me was worse than anything. Given how much pain this whole affair has resulted in, it’s hard to explain exactly how much this hurt. I felt like she hated me. Suffice to say I felt like somebody had beaten me within an inch of my life with a crowbar and if things went much farther I’d just up and die. I longed for the days when it had just been me, loving her and not saying so. They were almost blissful by comparison. Even when she’d been ignoring me, it had been better than this. I could live with her ignoring me. I could live with the fact that she wouldn’t ever know how I felt about her. I might even have been able to live with seeing her in Rufus’s arms every day for the rest of my life, if only she didn’t hate me. Nothing else could possibly be so bad.
I had to apologize. It was as simple as that. But…no, “apologize” isn’t quite strong enough a word for what I felt I had to do. “Drag myself over to her place, throw myself on the ground, and beg for forgiveness” was probably closer. About all that I really had going for me is the fact that I’m so damn pathetic.
So I crept out of my apartment and across the thankfully deserted lounge to her place. I had to stop for a few minutes outside her door to get myself calmed down. It didn’t matter if I was right. It didn’t matter that she was wrong. It didn’t matter if she’d hurt me just as badly. This just couldn’t go on any longer. I wasn’t nearly proud enough to handle it.
Once I managed to work up the courage, I knocked on her door a few times and waited a few moments. There was no response. So I knocked a little harder. “Rosalind?”
No answer. I couldn’t very well stand there pounding on her door, though, and she must have heard it the next time I knocked. Maybe she was waiting for me to say something. “Rosalind…uh…listen, I just wanted to…to tell you I…”
I stopped. I couldn’t do this through a door, to someone who might be in bed or in the shower for all I knew. So I stood there for a little while longer, feeling sort of stupid. She might’ve been ignoring me. Which was totally understandable, I had been a complete ass. But she couldn’t ignore me forever. I just had to be around to beg for forgiveness when she was forced to stop. After all, I figured she’d have to come out sooner or later and I could throw myself on the ground and grovel when that happened. Then, because there wasn’t much else for it but more waiting, I sat down against the wall outside her door and proceeded to wait.
*
For two days. I think I’ve said before that, if I’m left to my own devices, I have an uncanny ability to devote every waking minute my time to stupid things. Well, sitting in a hallway for forty-eight hours straight is approximately one of the stupidest things I’ve ever done. Everybody pretty much ignored me, figured I just needed some time, I guess. But by the end of the second day, I think I was starting to worry people, because Rude and Cyr showed up with the maintenance guy.
“Reno, do you know how long you’ve been here?” Cyr questioned tiredly.
“Umm. Few days. Dunno for sure.”
“And have you eaten anything?”
“Nuh uh.”
“Had anything to drink?”
“Nope.”
“Slept?”
That, I had done. “Yeah, I slept a bit.”
“What exactly are you trying to prove?” Rude asked, arching an eyebrow at me.
I rapped my knuckles on the door behind me. “She’s gotta come out sometime. Eventually she’ll run out of food.”
“Before you die of starvation?”
“I knew my odds were bad going into this thing, all right?”
Cyr rolled her eyes, grabbing my arm and pulling me to my feet. “Has it occurred to you that she might not be in there?”
“She hasn’t come out. So she’s gotta be in.”
“I think you’re dehydrated,” Cyr grumbled, pushing me away from the door. “Veld has been calling her all morning, trying to give her an assignment. She’s not answering her home phone and her cell phone must be off.”
“Maybe she just thinks it’s me calling.”
Rude shook his head as he watched the maintenance guy unscrew the card key panel beside the door. “No. Rosalind is too responsible for that. She would’ve had the sense to screen your calls and block your number.”
That was true. “So…what?”
Cyr shrugged. “So Tseng sent us to find out if she’s okay…or if she’s even here.”
“If she’s okay…what, you mean like she might be hurt?” I asked, starting to feel a little sick with worry. I didn’t know how upset I’d made her. I know when I’d gone home, I’d had to deal with the dark and lurking fear that I’d do something to hurt myself, but Rosalind didn’t seem like the type to try something like that. Of course, being that she wasn’t the type, she wouldn’t have expected it of herself and therefore wouldn’t have taken the necessary precautions against it.
“She might just have gone out,” Cyr amended hastily, seeing my reaction.
“She hasn’t left in the time I’ve been here. And for two whole days? Jesus Christ, Cyr, what if…”
“Reno,” she interrupted. “Hush. Don’t talk like that.”
“But…”
There was a soft beep and the door unlocked. Rude pushed it open without hesitation, stepping inside. Cyr followed. I didn’t understand how they could be so calm about it. I was absolutely terrified, but I forced myself to catch the door before it closed and step inside.
It was dark inside her apartment, and quiet. Neat and tidy, too. And it still smelled like her. I felt a rush of longing and slumped against the doorframe wearily. I was scared. Two days with no sustenance and very little sleep will turn a person into a bit of a nervous wreck. Well, more than usual.
Cyr came out of the bedroom. “She’s not here,” she declared. “I don’t think she’s been here for a while, either.”
I suppose I was relieved, but in the same breath, this presented a whole new set of problems. “She’s not here? You’re sure?”
Rude came out of the laundry room and shook his head. “No, she isn’t here.”
“Then where is she? How could she have left?”
Cyr shrugged. “I don’t know. She might have been gone before you started your foolish little vigil.”
“Well, that’s not good! She’s been gone for two days, we don’t know where she is, she isn’t answering her cell phone…she could be anywhere!”
Rude’s cell phone rang, disturbing the stillness in Rosalind’s apartment. He answered it promptly. “Rude. Uh huh…yes, sir, we just looked through. She isn’t here, sir. Do you have…pardon? A travel voucher…to where, sir? No, sir, I don’t have any idea where she might have gone…have you asked Rufus? …oh, I see. Understood, sir.”
“What is this about Rufus and a travel voucher?” I demanded, once he’d hung up. “Where is she?”
Rude shrugged. “Tseng doesn’t know. Evidently Rosalind was given a travel voucher. We don’t know from whom or to where. He wanted to know if I might. Do you know?”
“Of course I don’t know!” But I was fairly sure I knew who did.
The last thing I heard from Rude was, “Reno, come back here!” before I was out the door and halfway across the lounge, throwing open the door of the stairwell and running up the stairs. Rufus’s office is on the fifty-eighth floor, ten floors up. I was already two floors up by the time I heard Rude get into the stairway, and still going strong.
I was furious with myself for being so stupid, for not having the sense to know she hadn’t been there the whole time. After what St. Andrew had told me, so many days ago, about how pretty soon Rufus was going to be sending her up to one of his stupid getaways, I should’ve expected this.
The fifty-eighth floor is home to some of the company’s minor exec, and Rufus is nestled cozily in a corner office with a view of the eastern cityscape. His secretary sits outside, waiting around, taking calls and giving her boss a roll in the hay when he feels like it. She couldn’t really do too much to stop me kicking open the double doors of his office and storming inside. “Where is she?” I demanded of Rufus, stalking up to his desk and glaring at him.
Turks are dangerous people. I was riled, so I was probably a little more dangerous than most at the moment. Rufus had to be either very, very stupid or very confident to sit there coolly and do nothing more than arch an eyebrow at me. I’d like to think it was because he’s stupid, but he’s smarter than I am, so the latter is probably true. “Whatever do you mean? Are you talking about Rosalind? I haven’t seen her for a few days, I could ask you the same thing. Shouldn’t you be keeping track of her? I thought you were her superior…”
“Don’t play dumb with me, Rufus,” I growled.
He chuckled. “Oh, but I thought you would be more comfortable if we played one of your games.”
I would’ve decked him, then and there, if I hadn’t noticed Rude come in and decided I had better address more important matters before I was forcibly removed from the room. “Shut up, Rufus. Where’s Rosalind? No one’s seen her for two damn days. Far as I know, you saw her last.” I actually made that up, but it was probably true. “Where the hell did she go?”
“Well, I’ve told you I don’t know. I can’t even begin to guess why you’d think I would…”
The Commander cleared his throat. I hadn’t noticed him, standing alongside Rufus’s desk, with Tseng. I’d been kind of focused on not tearing Rufus’s arms off. Tseng gave me a warning look and made a slashing motion across his throat with a finger. You kinda have to take it seriously when he does that. “Rufus, it is a matter of moderate concern to me that one of my agents is missing. She hasn’t been seen in two days and is out of range of contact. Two days ago, records show that you ordered a helicopter to make a trip to Gongaga. Did you send Rosalind to Gongaga?” Veld questioned.
Rufus shrugged. “Well, now that you mention it…yes, she did come see me a few mornings ago…the poor girl was terribly upset. I comforted her as best I could, but evidently she’d had a rather traumatizing argument with somebody…” He looked at me with something that could only be contempt. I was going to kill him. I think I’d been pretty sure of the fact going into the office, now I was absolutely concrete on it. I just had to wait for the right moment. “She said she needed some time to herself. I suggested that she might take some personal time, and gave her a blank travel voucher. I suppose she must have taken the chopper I ordered and gone to Gongaga.”
“She didn’t apply for leave,” Tseng pointed out. “It’s standard protocol to apply for personal time and wait until the request is granted before taking it.”
Rufus shrugged again. “Well, she was terribly upset. She might not have thought of it. Or perhaps she was afraid you would refuse.”
Tseng paused. “I suppose that’s a fair explanation,” he conceded grudgingly.
I didn’t believe what I was hearing. “Tseng! No! It’s not a ‘fair explanation.’ Rosalind would have applied for leave, upset or not. Protocol is everything to her; you know it as well as I do! If she wanted to take some time off, she would’ve applied for it. Or, she would’ve reported to somebody she trusted to inform the proper authorities.” I glared at Rufus.
“She just told me she wished for some time alone,” Rufus answered, spreading his hands helplessly. “I didn’t consider it my business to pry into her personal affairs.”
“Shit, Rufus. Who the hell do you think you’re fooling?” I demanded furiously. I was getting awfully sick of all his smooth little arguments. “You know what I think you’re trying to pull, you sick bastard? I think you sent her away to one of your goddamned little sex nests, and, after messing around here for a few days, you’re gonna go and…”
“Reno,” Veld interrupted sharply. “Be silent. Cooler heads than yours must prevail at times such as these,” he ordered and I grudgingly shut up. He glanced at Rufus. “Tell me. Why Gongaga? Rosalind is unfamiliar with the area, she doesn’t have any family there…it’s a rundown little town, with nothing to attract a young woman like her. Why Gongaga?”
Rufus shrugged. “It’s…quiet,” he hedged. “I may have suggested Gongaga as somewhere peaceful and away from the hustle of civilization…”
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