missingthekeep | Christmas Eve [for Meredith]

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Christmas Eve [for Meredith]

Sean's so nervous, he thinks he might pass out. He was expecting to be nervous, of course, he was anxious as sin the last time he tried something as insane as this with the last woman to cross his path, but this... this really goes above and beyond. Fortunately, in the years since his last proposal of marriage, he's gotten a hell of a lot better at hiding how nervous he is, so the only outward show of it he allows is some fidgeting with the ring in his jacket pocket. It doesn't help much.

It's a good ring, he thinks. Fancy and pretty without overdoing it. He'll want something a little more personal than what he could scrounge from the Pond woman's stash for the final things, but as an engagement ring, it does nicely. Would that he were so confident about the rest of this, especially when he has every reason to be. This isn't about how lousy everything else in his life is right now, this is about him and Meredith, nothing else. And they're good. They're better than good, occasional hiccups aside. He wants this, she wants this, and they're great, they're solid. How could this possibly be the wrong thing to do, the wrong time to do it?

It isn't, he tells himself for the thirtieth time. Besides, it's already been weeks since she told him she was ready, that she was finally and fully ready to marry him. How much longer does he really have?

Right.

Right.

"Nice night, innit?" he asks with a smile, trying to keep up the charade that he dragged her out to the snow-covered beach for nothing more than a walk on Christmas Eve as long as he's able.

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"Ye, ye've nothin' t'apologize fer, acushla," Sean says, pressing a kiss to her hair, his cheeks still wet. He didn't pick this fight, probably the first time in their relationship that he's been able to say that, but the rest of the blame lays squarely on his shoulders for letting it all get to this point in the first place. For daring to think he could make a life for himself again. "It's jus' a rotten situation all 'round."

It's the pet name that's the last straw, a delusion she's clung to so dearly for so long. To hear it in this context with these thoughts beating against her skull sets her sobbing, distantly aware she's verging on hysterical in her irrationality and not able to do much about it. "You love her so much," she says, almost incoherent. "You — I knew that, I always — I should have known that, but you love her so much and I can't... I'm not, I'm —" She shakes her head, lips pressed into a line as she tries to keep it all in, words and tears and breath, until she can get her heart to beat right again.

Hearing her lose it like that sets Sean off again, but he draws back anyway, just enough to look her in the eyes, reaching up to cradle the side of her face with one hand as his breath hitches in his chest. "Ye're nae what?" he asks, since he certainly can't disagree when it comes to his loving Maeve (not well enough, though, never well enough), and he can't disagree with the rest of it until he knows what it is she's thinking.

Meredith stares back, breath catches as she tries to regain some measure of control. "I'm not her," she says, hating herself for letting it out. This isn't something that gets better. There aren't true answers she wants to hear. There's no reason to torture them both, but she can't not answer. "I'm not her. I'm never going to be enough, am I?" But then, that was true long before he came into her life.

Red-rimmed eyes go wide as Sean lets that hit him like a sack of bricks, although it really shouldn't come as that much of a surprise. He knows her, he knows her insecurities, it makes horrible sense in a way, but he still can't help the way it catches him off guard. "I dinnae want ye ta be her. Meredith, she'll always be a part o' me, but ye, ye're me whole life."

Meredith shakes her head, looking up, trying just to breathe for a few moments. She isn't, she can't believe that, not when the memory of his wife does this to him, not when he's been miserable for months because of his daughter, when she's been unable to make any of it okay. It just isn't true. "You wouldn't be here," she says when she can look at him, when she can speak, "if she were still alive. I wouldn't be anything."

"Ye cannae think that way," Sean says, almost frantic himself as he tries to talk her to her senses. "If she were still alive, I'd be a different person, I, I... What counts is that ye an' I found each other, remember? It's all hypothetical otherwise, an' there's no sense in askin' 'what if' when the two of us bein' here an' now're what matters."

It didn't seem to matter all that much to him a few minutes ago, Meredith thinks, knowing it's unfair before she's even done. "But if she were here," she says, a little calmer outwardly but still weighed down. She shouldn't push this, but she can't stop either and leave this inside her head to fester. His being right doesn't make her wrong. "If she showed up tomorrow, you'd still pick her. Wouldn't you?"

It takes an enormous effort to keep from closing off at that, but Sean owes it to her not to do that. She can't know about the potential agony that question has held for him for years, can't know that less than two months earlier, he walked into a cloud and learned that the thing he fears most in the world is a miracle. So he owes it to her to keep calm and stay rational, even if it goes against his every instinct.

"I cannae answer that," he says, his voice strained as he shakes his head and fights to quell his rising panic. "I cannae think about that. An' it's got nae t'do wi' yerself, I figgered out in me first week on this rock that I cannae think that way. I can't. I'd go mad. It's nae 'bout who I'd pick, I jus'... I cannae answer that."

It's not an answer and for a moment, Meredith balks against it, needing more, but considering she was expecting the same old response — she's my wife — it still comes as something of a relief. She can at least pretend she has a fighting chance. "Okay," she murmurs, trying to steady herself, wiping her eyes. "Okay. I... I know I shouldn't ask what if. It shouldn't upset me that you miss her, of course you miss her. Of course you love her. I just... I get jealous. I don't want to lose you. I don't want to feel like... like you belong to someone else."

Sean shakes his head again, more fervently this time. He doesn't bother to try straightening himself up any; while he's a little more in control of himself now, he can tell it's not all out of his system yet. "She's dead, Meredith. Ye cannae be jealous of a dead woman, it's... ye're nae gonna lose me. I'm yers, ye know that." She has to.

"I know. I know you are. Most of the time I don't think like this, I don't, but sometimes..." Meredith leans forward, head against his shoulder again, as much embarrassed as hurt now, still holding onto him so tight. It isn't just stupid and irrational to be jealous of his wife, it's a little bit horrible, too, and it's already one thing she wishes he didn't know about her. "You should be able to tell me about her," she says. "To talk about her if you want to, without me... doing this."

"It's okay," Sean says, inasmuch as it really isn't. "It's fine, it's, it's prob'ly me own fault as much as anythin', if I'd done it more before maybe it wouldnae be such a big deal," he says in a rush, his words running together, crying again and doing his damnedest to ignore it. "I cannae ignore her anymore, though."

In spite of all his reassurances, that still stings for reasons Meredith's not sure of. "What does that mean?" she asks, shaking her head as she looks up. It's so hard to see him this way, the hurt of that mixing in with everything else as she lifts a hand to touch his cheek.

"I don't know," Sean says, ducking his head in shame, unable to meet her eyes right now. "I jus' know she deserves better'n that, than bein' some... artifact from me past, best left there." She always deserved better than he could provide, though. He just never dreamed his own fortune would cost her so much in the end.

Meredith glances down, hand falling to his shoulder, and doesn't know what to say. She can't disagree with that, though she sometimes wants to pretend the woman never existed at all. It's hard to compete with a memory; they aren't as difficult to handle as she can be, not for him at least. Raw as she still feels, aching and stiff and weary, she forces herself to look up even if he won't. "I'm sure she does," she says, voice still rough, but steadier now by a little. "And you should. You should remember her. Just try not to let the past get in the way of now, okay?" What she's saying, she thinks then, is really more like Please don't realize you still love her better, but she can't bring herself to actually use those words. She's done enough tonight. "Maybe if you... talk about her — maybe you're right, maybe it wouldn't be such a big deal."

It's too late for that, it already has gotten in the way of now. The now Sean had planned for is buried under an ocean of frigid water, and that not something he's ever going to forget, either. Try as he might. "Maybe," he says, noncommittal as he gives a small shrug. She'll have to forgive him if he's not particularly inspired to start right now, though. "I love ye."

There are moments when Meredith realizes she still doesn't understand how or why that's true. She rubs her hand over her cheeks again, but musters a smile that is, however faint, at least genuine. "I know," she says. He ought to know that; she ought to remember it. Leaning forward, she kisses him, soft but slow. "I love you, too." She smiles a little wider, almost laughs. "Even if it turns me into a crazy person."

She touches him and it hurts. She kisses him and it hurts. She smiles and God, why does everything hurt so much? Sean can't even let himself think about the possibility that he's changed her, and not for the better. "Please," he says instead, as dismissive as he can (which isn't actually saying all that much), "ye're nae the one still blubberin' like an' infant." This has gone from sad to just pathetic in a very short time.

"You have a reason," Meredith says, shaking her head, and she hates that she still feels she doesn't have any right to be upset by all this. He got mad at her over a ring from a man she doesn't love anymore, not the same way, and he dragged his wife's motorcycle home; she has a right, she has just cause. Even if there's been some mild reprieve, it's still too fresh a hurt for the ache to have really died down, but she can fight it now. She has to. She passes her thumb along his cheek, like that helps any with the crying. "You miss her and this place... You can't just be okay with that, I know. You have a reason. I'm just... me."

"Ye've a reason, too," Sean says, closing his eyes at that simple bit of contact. He's not entirely sure what her reason is, mind, but that's mostly because when the lion's share of his concern is being spent trying to keep from turning into even more of a gibbering mess, empathy is unfortunately one of the first things to go out the window. "Ye're perfect."

"I'm not." The response is so easy, so swift and emphatic, because it's so fully believed. Maybe she thinks better of herself these days — is, at least, not so hard on herself — but Meredith is a mass of conflicting flaws, she knows that. By now, he has to, too. She's been anything but perfect tonight. "I'm really not," she sighs. "But I'm trying to do better. I will try."

"We'll try together," Sean corrects her, wanting more than that, but unwilling to push it. He wishes she could see for herself all the things he sees in her, but the fight's gone out of him (and Lord, wouldn't Maeve be disgusted in him for that) and he'll take what he can get.

"Okay," Meredith says, nodding slowly. "Together." She doesn't even know what it means, really, though she's too worn down still to pretend he couldn't stand to improve, too. "And whatever you need to do to deal tonight — talk or not talk or cry or... whatever... don't feel bad for it, okay? Do what you need to do."

It only makes it that much more emasculating, having her give him permission to act this way, but he bites his tongue and doesn't say anything no matter how much it galls him. It's just not worth it. "I'd be happy wi' sittin' back down f'r a spell to start."

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