Alone
by elfin
I married the wrong man. I know that with such crystal clarify
that it amazes me I haven't seen it before.
In all the time I've been married to Brian - and it hasn't been all that
long - I've fooled myself into believing he was the man I wanted to spend
the rest of my life with.
I was so wrong. And it's too late.
Before I married, in the week leading up to our wedding, I had so many
doubts. When Robbie stole that dance in the empty hall of Eckie's
Tango club, I wondered briefly if that as the reason for my doubts.
I knew I wasn't in love with Robbie. But was I giving up the chance
of finding someone better for me?
A terrible thing to think, I know. Brian and I had been together
a year, had been happy - for the most part. I loved him, and I was
sure I was in love with him.
How could I have been so very wrong?
I didn't realise at first.
When Michael was murdered - those terrible few days between him being
thrown off the Innis case and our arresting Kennedy - I was living in a state
of confusion, later in a state of shock.
I barely had a moment to think after his death, after seeing his body
lying in the wet sand and burying him in the cold earth of Glasgow's central
cemetery.
Only when I got home, and the silence of the house closed in around me,
did I break down.
It was all over.
Michael was gone.
Never again would I see him smile, look into those deep, big blue eyes
and see the affection shining out of them, I would never hear his voice
again. No more private conversations borne of knowing one another
for so long.
I cried myself to sleep the night, and when I woke, my mouth tasted like
a birdcage and my neck hurt from sleeping in the armchair.
Brian came home that morning, but I didn't want to speak to him.
For reasons I hadn't yet grasped, his missing the funeral was the worst
thing he could have done.
He tried to console me, but I didn't want to know.
I left the house, walked away from his pleas for me to talk to him.
I went to the bridge at Langbank, where Michael had spent his final living
minutes. I leaned out over the low wall, staring at the tideless
shore.
I looked back on all the time I'd had with him, thought about every smile,
every hug. When it came, the realisation that I loved him wasn't
the earth-shattering revelation it should have been. I knew, without
a shadow of a doubt, that I should have been with Michael all these years,
that I was so deeply in love with him that his death had the power to destroy
me.
Knowing that, how could I go home?
I couldn't stop the tears from gathering in my eyes or running over my
face. I couldn't go to work because even if I'd been able to cope
with the sympathy, I couldn't face the ghost of DCI Jardine which would
live for so long in that place.
I went to the only other place I knew.
When he opened the door, my heart broke anew.
Robbie looked like shit. He'd been crying for hours by the looks
of his eyes. Usually meticulously dressed, he wore a shredding blue
sweater over old, dark jeans.
He had a heavy crystal tumbler, of what looked and smelt like JackDaniels,
hanging from the fingers of one hand, but his expression was clear, and
he didn't appear drunk.
He looked tired.
And utterly shattered.
He stared at me for a long moment, as if trying to decide whether he
wanted to share his grief. And the he let the door swing open and
padded back towards the lounge.
I stepped inside and shut the door. Despite my own devastation,
I'd been moved by the state of him and couldn't work out why he looked worse
than I felt.
He dropped into the corner of the black leather sofa as I walked into
the room, and he vaguely indicated that I should sit down. I wanted
a hug, I needed to know that I wasn't alone. But I felt as if our grief,
which should have brought us closer, was going to push us apart.
"I think I was in love with him," I blurted out suddenly, the need to
tell the world too great. ('I've made a mistake,' I wanted to cry up
to God, 'give me a second chance, please!')
He stared passed me for a long time before he finally spoke. "I
know I was in love with him, "he said quietly, "And I know he was in love
with me. And now, nothing'll ever be right again."
fin
elfin
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