xx
Meet me on the battlefield, even on the darkest night,
I will be your sword and shield, your camouflage, and you will be mine.
Echoes of the shots ring out; we may be the first to fall.
Everything could stay the same, or we could change it all.
Meet me on the battlefield.
xx
Battlefield | Svrcina

epilogue.

"What would you consider your number one fear?"

Rachel shifted on the couch—she already had her legs crossed and her hands sandwiched tight between them, but now she hooked her foot around the back of her other ankle, as close to a human pretzel as she could get while sitting up. "Vulnerability, I suppose."

"Okay. What scares you about being vulnerable?"

Pressing her lips together, she jammed her hands down further and shrugged. "It's always been dangerous. I had no choice but to protect myself."

"In the past?"

"Yes."

"What about now?"

"Now…" She thought of Tex, thought of Tom, thought of the idea of walking down the street by herself, alone. "In some instances, I might be safe, but it feels wrong to let down my walls. Feels like a mistake."

"What's the worst case scenario?"

"With the people I trust… that they might change their minds, leave me or decide to hurt me."

"Then what?"

"Then I'd know…" The other woman watched her in silence, waiting, and Rachel finally went on, "That I was right. It was a mistake."

The other woman continued to watch her thoughtfully, tapping her pen slowly on her notepad, and Rachel stared down at her lap. "Your mistake?" she asked finally, and Rachel nodded.

"Yes. Of course."

"Your fault."

"Yes."

"If someone you trusted decided, out of nowhere, to insult you and reject you, you would blame yourself?"

Well that just sounded awful, but Rachel nodded.

"Why?"

"I let them in. I gave them the opportunity to hurt me. If I'd been stronger, it wouldn't have happened."

"Vulnerability is weakness."

"Yes."

"What is strength?"

Rachel hummed to herself, staring across the room at the pattern on the wallpaper as she thought. "Ideally, preparation and recovery. Prepare to be hurt, so that you can recover from it, and lose nothing in the process. Working is strength. Accomplishing things that are objective. My instincts tell me that being alone is strength. Relying only on myself."

"Have you ever found that vulnerability was strength?"

"Yes." She paused. "Recently. I'm still looking over my shoulder. It could all come crashing down at any moment."

The woman nodded, looking down at her pad and scribbling a few words and then tapping her pen again, staring at what she'd written. "It's scary to be vulnerable."

"Yes."

"Being alone is easier."

"Yes."

"Then…" She looked up, cocking an eyebrow. "It requires more strength from you, doesn't it, being vulnerable?"

Rachel laughed, shaking her head, and uncrossed her legs, planting her feet on the floor and leaning her forearms on her thighs. "Yes! I'm a coward."

The woman smiled in return, shaking her head too. "Try to remember that courage is not the absence of fear, but action in the face of it. Which, from what you've told me, is exactly what you've been doing. Should we meet again in a week?"

When Rachel walked out into the waiting room, Tom was slumped in a chair, holding a magazine open in front of his face, but he looked up and smiled when he saw her. She stopped at his side as he replaced the magazine and stood up, then grabbed for his hand, holding it tightly in both of hers as they walked out to the elevator bank.

Neither of them spoke until they'd stepped onto the elevator, the doors closing behind the two of them, and then Rachel said, "She's good. She gets it."

He smiled down at her. "Good. I'm glad."

As they stepped out onto the sidewalk, Tom wrapped his arm around her shoulders and she turned her body into his, tucking her face against his shoulder and opening her eyes when she could bear it, closing them when she couldn't. She'd returned to work, which was fine; the lab was safe, mostly, and the people in the lab seemed safe. Being out in public was still hard.

Much as it had pained her to admit it, she hadn't been ready to move out on her own, so she was still living with Tex and Kathleen. Nobody could ever, ever know that she slept with a body pillow tucked into one of Tom's t-shirts. They had sleepovers once a week, and some nights she cried out of pure frustration at the slow, slow pace of her recovery.

Her sling was gone, but the scar she saw in the mirror every day was puckered and ugly, a permanent reminder. She was still working to regain strength in that arm, still in pain most of the time. Her bones ached, her muscles sore, and the scar itself would send jolts of stabbing pain at random.

Still, she went to work and spent her days feeling capable, useful, came home to dinner with Tex and Kathleen, called Tom before bed to talk for an hour or two about everything and nothing, pretending he was right beside her. They would have lunch some days, dinner others, and once a week she fell into his arms and let him inside her, let his physical strength hold her up and his love fill her up.

She couldn't lean on him all the time, not emotionally or physically even though he would let her and be glad to do it, but once a week she could demand exactly what she needed and get it, lay her fear and her pride at his feet and be free of it for one night, sleep in his arms and feel like she was exactly where she was meant to be.

The progress was slow but it was real, and when she lost sight of it her family was there to remind her. Her family. Those words still shook her up but just like I love you and I'm not going anywhere, she felt the truth of them deep inside.

Her appointment had been on a Tuesday afternoon, and both she and Tom had taken the afternoon off. Soon, Tom would be seeing a different therapist in the same office, and they would continue to take this time together. For now, they headed back to Tom's apartment, and he unlocked the door and followed her in, waiting for her to perch on the couch before he sat down beside her and let her crawl into his lap.

He wrapped his arms around her and she ducked her head under his chin, sighing against his chest. He didn't ask and neither did he seem like he was waiting for her to offer. He just held her and let her decompress in silence, her body relaxing in his arms.

After a while, she said, "I would like to bake a pie."

He shook a little, his abs contracting against her side, so obviously suppressing a laugh that she smacked her hand lightly against his chest and he pressed a kiss to her hair. "Okay," he said. "Make me a list and I'll go out."

She sat up, pressing a kiss to his lips before she clambered off his lap and got to her feet, heading into the kitchen to rifle through the cupboards and the fridge, making a list of what she needed and sending him off with another kiss. Once he was gone, she put some music on and paced in circles, kitchen living room foyer kitchen, trying to keep her thoughts under control until he got back and she could set to it.

Even before all of this, she'd found therapy in starting a pie from scratch, mixing the dough and rolling it out, chopping fruit and preparing the filling, pressing the dough into the tin and then laying the top over it all, sealing the edges until she had a neat little self-contained pastry, and then baking it. The steps never changed, each part of the process requiring her full attention, and she had often found herself coming back to it in times of trouble or confusion.

She'd learned the recipe from her mother, a long, long time ago.

It was something she had to do alone, and Tom seemed to understand this, sitting down at the kitchen table with a book and letting her work. Funny, wasn't it, that she could be alone in his presence? She filed that away for later consideration, letting herself get lost in the recipe. She hadn't done this since before, and there was a learning curve, her right arm still a bit weak for things like mixing a dry dough and rolling it out in sheets. Her crusts were uneven, and she had to turn and re-roll them more times than ever before, letting out a low growl of frustration each time.

She got it, though, sighing out a relieved breath when the completed pie looked more or less the way it should. She slid it into the oven, set the timer, and peeked through the window at it before straightening up and tilting her head back, stretching briefly.

Then she crossed the kitchen with a quick stride, sliding onto Tom's lap and wrapping her arms around his neck.

He set his book aside, resting his hands on her waist, and smiled. "Hi."

"Hi," she said back, smiling at him quietly for a moment before leaning forward to kiss him, her chest pressing up against his, one arm hooked around the back of his neck and her other hand smoothing over his hair. She tilted her head, tugging with her arm and grinding down on him, and she was suddenly reminded of a similar but extremely different scene, laughing through her nose.

He laughed too, automatic, and broke the kiss, resting his forehead against hers and saying, "What's funny?"

She scratched her nails through his hair, pressing her hip between his legs and feeling him half-hard beneath her, and as his breath caught she said, "Just thinking of another time I was sitting on your lap in this kitchen."

He laughed again, breathless, and said, "Long time ago."

"Mmhmm," she hummed, rocking against him, his hands tightening on her waist. "Lifetimes ago."

"Lifetimes," he echoed, moving to shift her off his lap, but she kept her arm hooked tight, reaching her other hand down to undo her pants, and he tipped his head back, groaning. "I should be so lucky, to have lifetimes with you."

She hummed her agreement, pushing her pants down and off her legs before swinging one leg over to the other side of his lap, whimpering when she came into contact with his jeans. She went for his belt, undoing it and his pants and tugging them down as far as she could, thanking science for birth control pills as she moved her hands up to brace on his shoulders, pushing up and letting him use his hand to guide himself inside of her.

As she eased herself down, whimpering, she wondered if this would ever get routine, ever get boring. There was something like familiarity to it, an ease, but still it felt almost like the first time, filling her up and almost overwhelming her.

Almost could be a magical word, sometimes. It was almost too much, almost more than she could bear, but she bore it and it was all the more potent for those almosts.

Something incredible. Something beautiful.

Love.