In the initial days after his demise, she felt that if someone breathed in her direction, she’d shatter. It wasn’t because they were being mean. It was because they were being kind. In some cases, too kind. With every kindness they showed her, she felt more alone than she’d ever felt in her entire life. Even in the hours between escaping Guillermo’s safe house in Argentina and making the phone call to Triumph, a call that ultimately saved her life, she hadn’t felt as alone as she did now.
Triumph had backed off as well, but she knew it was because he sensed her distancing herself. If he had asked her why back then, she wouldn’t have been able to tell him. Now, she understood that he, and they, had known that and were allowing her the time she needed to come to grips with how her life had changed. Time to adjust to this new normal, where no one expected anything from her other than to be who she was. To figure out what she needed. To simply be with them as their friend.
Did she have flashbacks? Yes, there had been triggering moments, but she breathed through them and reset herself.
Did she have bad dreams? Yes, but they weren’t nightmares.
Did she have setbacks? Yes, but she’d worked through them with the therapist Francesca had recommended, and talking with the former FBI agent about her own trauma had also helped.
With each passing day, she sensed that those things would occur less and less often.
A little over a week ago, she finally broke free of her frozen state.
There had been no great moment of epiphany. No catalyst to push her forward. While she was talking, her brain simply reminded her of Triumph’s promise that she didn’t have to feel this wayalone. No one expected her to wallow in grief. No one expected her to wear her silent strength like armor. They didn’t expect anything at all but for her to cope as she needed to, and that when she was ready, they believed she would let someone help her carry it.
She let go of her braid, swishing it behind her shoulder.
Tonight, she would do that in the only way she knew how.
When the show was done, she remained where she sat, staring at the empty stage.
She thought of hands running through a mop of shaggy brown hair, a little-boy smile, and bright blue eyes.
She saw him in an Argentinian hotel room as he held her hand.
In the glow of the moon in the back of a pickup truck as he talked about Tilly.
Across a table in a Colombian room for rent, trying new food.
As they lay in bed together, loving through a rainstorm.
In a farmer's house in the Darién Gap as he surrendered a leather cuff in payment for braids.
As he’d made love to her and made her his.
And despite all the horror of that last night, and in the two months since, he’d given her what she needed, just like he promised.
He’d treated the gift of her as precious, fragile, important, and beautiful, even when she had treated it as cheap, worthless, insignificant, and ugly.
He’d given her the space to grieve when she couldn’t give it to herself.
He’d sheltered her in his arms each night when she couldn’t find a place to land.
He’d tried to help her carry the load, and when she threw it back at him, he gave her his friends in his place.
She was his.
But now? Now it was time to make him hers.
All around her, the labyrinth was silent. The music from the arcade and the Big Top had been turned off. The closing announcements had long since stopped. There were murmurs here and there as employees picked up stray glasses and trash, but they gave her a wide berth. She sat alone under the work lights of the small stage.
Something caught her eye in the doorway, and she turned to see Triumph, shoulder against the doorway, arms crossed over his chest, one foot crossed over the other, with the toe propping him up next to the foot flat on the ground.
“Ready to head up?”
It was all he said. No frustration in his voice. No pleading in his eyes to open up to him. Just his soft voice and charm.
She stared at him for a moment. “What does a spy do when she gets cold?”
