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Miller watches Hardy as he squints down at his paperwork. He rubs at his face, scowling.
As ever.
It’s gone eight at night. Their latest case concluded two days ago, and now they’re lost in the endless wrappings of red tape. Miller closes the file in front of her, calling time. “This can wait until morning. We don’t get paid enough to lose our eyesight over this.”
Hardy gives her a dirty look.
“Well — I certainly don’t,” she snaps.
“Maybe if you’d taken that DI promotion a few months back you’d have less to moan about.”
“What? And live without your sunny disposition every day? Wouldn’t know what to do with myself.”
They settle into a stony, stubborn silence. It’s nothing new. She’s convinced by now that their friction holds them together when any other partnership would have fallen apart long ago.
Hardy doesn’t give in. He stares hard at the page, even though his eyes are clearly out of focus.
“Tell me the last sentence you just read,” Miller says, on the edge of amused and irritated. It’s familiar ground for her.
Hardy thinks on it. Doesn’t reply.
“Fine. Well I’m calling it.” Miller gets up, swinging on her coat. “Goodnight.”
“Oh, fine. Fine.” Hardy slams his file shut. “You’ve proved your point. I’m done too.” He gives her a penetrating look. “What’ve you eaten today?”
Miller can’t look at him as she replies. “Kit-Kat?”
Hardy sighs heavily.
Miller folds her arms. “Oh, and what have you eaten today then?”
Hardy’s know-it-all glare drops. He frowns in confusion. “Nothing.”
Miller can’t help but grin, which makes him scowl.
Hardy gets up, puts on his coat. “Dinner, then. I’ll cook.” He throws the command out like any other, and Miller automatically nods in agreement, moving to leave, before her brain catches up. When it does, she freezes at the door.
“What?” Hardy asks, exasperated.
Miller frowns. She’s about to protest, when her stomach rumbles as if on cue. “Two days ago you wouldn’t even come to the pub with me. You’ve changed your tune.”
“What can I say, I’m an enigma.”
“A pain in the arse is what you are.”
“You coming or not?”
Miller nods. “Kids are taken care of. Just no salad.”
“Aye, and no bloody Kit-Kats.” Hardy flicks the office lights off.
“Wanker,” Miller whispers, and flashes him a smile. In the dim office, it’s hard to tell, but she’s sure she spots the side of his mouth twitch before he puts a stop to it.
. .
Hardy cooks them pasta, except it isn’t like any pasta Miller has ever seen before. There’s no cheese, for one, and there are… leaves in it. Fresh tomatoes too. It’s basically warm salad. Prick.
It’s nice though. She can’t remember the last time someone cooked for her. The girl in the chippie excluded, of course.
“Wine?” Hardy grunts, waving the bottle over her freshly empty glass. His sleeves are rolled up. He’s even undone the top button of his shirt.
Miller nods. He pours a distinctively Scottish portion for them both.
“This is nice,” she says, before taking a drink.
“Good,” he says, hardly listening. He’s wolfing down his food. She’s never seen him like this. Usually it’s a tentative spike of the fork as he examines the underside of things.
Miller watches him, puzzling him out. She’d never tell him so, but it’s sort of her favourite pass-time. “So, it isn’t food you don’t like, it’s just food cooked by other people.” It isn’t a question. It’s so typical of him. Bloody control freak. She finds herself biting back a smile. “And it isn’t drinking you don’t like, it’s public places.”
He glances up, then back to his plate, unperturbed. “Well, you just never know,” he tries through his food, “what goes on in those bloody kitchens. It’s always behind closed doors, isn’t it? Always made to a timeframe.” Chew chew chew. Huge gulp of wine. “And drinks at the pub? That’s just not me. This is me. Take it or leave it.”
“Guess I’ll take it.”
They raise their glasses in a half-arsed toast.
. .
After doing the dishes, much to Hardy’s protest — ‘you’re going to leave streaks, let me—’ ‘oh piss off!’ — they decide to go for a walk. It’s what she used to do. With him. In her old life. It feels like another world to her, now.
The wind is sharp on her face, but it’s nice. Familiar. For a moment she closes her eyes and it feels like a hundred times before. Even before it all burned to the ground.
“Ready?” Hardy says, and he’s by her side. The stars are out above them, with a bright half-moon at their core.
“Ready.” They contemplate the hill, hands deep in coat pockets. The town is sleeping. Nothing moves but the wind and the waves. The sight makes Miller’s heart ache. Everything is so familiar, like the grooves of an old record. Except now she feels every last scratch and skip.
She wants to hear the song one last time.
“I’m going to ask you something, and you’re free to say no, but you just can’t be a twat about it, OK?” Miller says, quick and quiet.
“Alright?”
She sighs. It was such a stupid impulse. Shouldn’t have said anything at all.
“Miller?”
“Can I link arms with you?” she mutters to her feet. Her cheeks are already burning. She forces herself to look up at him. She’s achieved the impossible: Hardy is actually speechless. His mouth is hanging open in that crooked way. He isn’t even blinking.
Has she broke him?
“What?” he asks, eventually, staring out somewhere over her head.
“Just to the top…” She shakes her head. “Doesn’t matter. Let’s get going.” Miller opens the gate and sets off, like maybe she might out-walk her embarrassment. But Hardy — insufferable, blood-smelling Hardy — is by her side in a matter of moments, all pasta-powered.
“Shut up,” Miller says, looking dead ahead.
“I haven’t said anything!”
“You don’t need to!” She swings her arms so fast the swishing of her orange coat drowns out even the waves.
Hardy pulls at Miller’s arm. Not hard. But firm. Enough for her to stop and almost tumble back into him.
“You shit!” She goes to bash against his chest, but he catches her wrist and gets her into position.
Before Miller even knows what’s happening, they’re linking arms.
“Just to the top.” Hardy nods up the hill to the cliffs. “Let’s go.”
It’s awkward at first. A bit weird. But it’s exactly what she’s been missing. The chaos in her head, the hurricane made of booming voices and — worse — cold whispers she can never quite decipher has stopped. For the first time in months — years, maybe — there’s harmony in her head. Peace.
Music, even. Just like there used to be.
Miller slows her pace and Hardy matches it without a word. She can hear herself breathe. Hear Hardy breathing beside her. From chaos to blissful silence. It takes all she has not to sigh in relief.
Is it wrong, to miss a life you had no idea was broken? It’s something Miller struggles with every day. It isn’t him she misses — never him, the thought turns her stomach — but the shape of the life they carved out together. Every facet was built for two: their bed, their meals, their quiet evenings. Their night time walks, with her arm linked with his, and the breeze in her hair, and the precious silence.
They’re soon at the top, and Miller steps back. She can’t quite look Hardy in the eye.
They reach the top and look down at the black waves below. It always astounds her how something so beautiful in the daylight can become something so foreboding at night.
“I think I need more wine,” Hardy says in a soft, uncharacteristic voice.
“That’d be nice.” They watch the white cresting waves battle below. She can taste sea air on her lips. Wonders if Hardy can too. He must be able to. Wonders what that might taste like—
Miller shakes her head to rid herself of the thought. “Let’s head back. It’s cold.”
“Isn’t that cold. We just got here. hey—”
Miller walks away, head down. Hands in her pockets. It’s just the past, and this stupid walk, and everything spinning into one in her head. Doesn’t mean anything. It doesn’t.
“Miller!”
She stops dead before her mind has even decided on action. She expects another sparring match, a battle of words, and maybe that would be easier; normal. But it doesn’t come.
Hardy walks to her calmly, eyes shining in the night. “We didn’t have a nice beach to walk beside, back then,” he says, clearing her throat. “Back when I was married. But we did walk through town. We used to hold hands.” He offers his hand for her to take, and her eyes go too wide. “Just to the next lamp post.”
Miller nods. Takes his hand. It’s warm and rough and strong, and she hates how right it feels. She’s never let herself think this way before. Not really. Not seriously.
OK maybe once or twice, but that’s natural, isn’t it? When you’re alone. When he’s the only friend you have in the world? Perfectly normal. She’s almost certain.
Of course Hardy knew what she was asking of him. He’s a bloody detective after all. And he knows her. He knows her past, and her demons, and everything she’s ashamed of. Everything she can never change.
He knows, and he understands, and he even relates. So now it’s her turn to play his ghost.
Their hands sway between them as they walk. After a few steps, he laces his fingers through hers properly, and they fit together. In all their time together, this is the most they’ve ever touched. Miller wonders if it even counts, if they’re thinking about other people.
If he is, anyway.
They don’t talk. There isn’t room in her head for words. What would she even say? Is this how your wife used to walk? Am I doing it right?
What the hell were they doing?
They pass the lamp post, and without a word Hardy takes his hand back. Their walk down memory lane is over, just like that. A part of her is even relieved.
. .
They take off their coats and Hardy picks up the wine. He looks to the couch, then stops. He slings the tartan throw over his shoulder. “Outside?” He nods to the front door.
Miller nods. Picks up their empty glasses. Follows him out.
They sit on the swinging wooden bench outside his front door. It’s built for two. Hardy pulls the throw around their shoulders, and they move closer together.
“Wine?” Hardy asks.
“Wine.”
He pours out the last of the bottle into their glasses. “So why didn’t you take the promotion?”
It takes all she has not to groan. “Not this again.”
“Seriously. You gave me so much shit for stealing your job, I thought there’d have been a Miller-shaped hole in the wall when you got the call.”
“I told you, it wouldn’t be the same without you,” she says, light and sarcastic. It doesn’t take him off the scent.
“But you’ve earned it. More than earned it.”
Miller nods. It’s a touchy subject. It sits like a bruise inside her. She isn’t even sure why she said no — not really. She only knows that every bone in her body screamed in protest at the mere thought of it. So she’d declined.
“So why?” Hardy asks, quietly.
“You’re like a dog with a bloody bone aren’t you?” Miller huffs.
Hardy doesn’t reply. But she can feel his eyes on her. He’s waiting for an answer. Stubborn bastard would wait all night if that’s what it took.
“I’m almost happy again.” Miller sighs. Picks at her wine glass. “Well. Not really, but happier, at least. Less like my life is made of shattering glass. And it’s taken so long just to get to this point.”
“So?”
“So. I don’t want to meddle. I’m leaving well enough alone. Everything might…” The words stick in her throat, and they suffocate her. She has to fight to free them. “Everything might fall apart again. And I can’t… I couldn’t… I couldn’t survive that again.” She chances a glance to find Hardy staring at her, frowning.
“But it wouldn’t fall apart.”
Something snaps inside, her temper, maybe. Though it hurts much more. It’s absurd — childish — but she feels it all the same. It feels like she’s being dumped. “Do you want shut of me, is that it?”
Hardy shakes his head, eyes wide with shock. “No. Never.”
“Then what?”
He shakes his head in exasperation. Trust him. Trust him to be frustrated with her when he’s pushing the subject in the first place. “You’ve no idea, have you?”
“What?” Miller asks.
“No bloody idea.” He shakes his head at her again.
“What, Hardy?”
He turns to her. “How strong you are. Everything you’ve been through. You astound me every single day.” Hardy grimaces at his words.
“I’m going to get you drunk more often,” Miller says, and she can’t stop a smile spreading on her face.
“I mean it.”
“Well thanks.” She can’t help it. It comes out of nowhere, and before she can stop it, she’s wracked with it. Miller bursts out laughing.
“What?” Hardy frowns deeper, and it only sets her off again. “What?”
Miller shakes her head in disbelief, wiping at her eyes. “Oh… That might be the nicest thing anyone’s ever said to me.”
“And that’s funny for some reason?”
“The nicest thing anyone’s ever said to me, and it came from you. From shitface!”
He scowls, but he can’t keep it up. “Can’t believe people call me that.”
“You can’t?”
They laugh together, then. Their voices swim in the air together, in harmony. Like Music. Miller basks in the sound.
“Why haven’t we done this before? It’s nice, isn’t it?” she asks.
“Bit weird, as you’d say.”
“Well. Maybe we are weird,” she says into her glass before drinking. “What’s so wrong with that?”
Hardy takes a drink too. He pulls the throw tighter around them, leaving his hand on her shoulder. “Nothing. Not a sodding thing.”
Soon the heat of their laughter dies down, and things come into focus for the first time. “Hardy…”
“Miller…”
“Is this… Is this like before?”
“What the hell are you on about woman?” he says, without any of his usual bite. His fingers make patterns on her shoulder.
“When we held hands before. It was us, but it wasn’t, was it? We were thinking about our past. About what we had with other people.”
His hand freezes. He grunts in agreement.
“So this… Now. Is this like that? Just two lonely people dancing with ghosts? Or is this us?”
Hardy takes his hand back, as subtly as he can, to rub at his eyes. But Miller feels his retreat all the same. “You’re making my head hurt.”
“Don’t avoid the question.”
“Why does it matter?”
“It matters.”
“Why? Why can’t we just be two people, sitting here, sort-of getting along?”
“Because.”
“Because…?”
Miller takes a breath. “If this is just us reliving the past, then it’s fine. It’s lovely. It’s sad — but lovely. doesn’t mean anything. Like before didn’t mean anything.”
He nods, and she can see the thoughts trying to align behind his eyes. He’s almost there.
She says, all in one breath, the words falling into one another before she can chicken out. “But if it isn’t like before, then this really is you and me — us — sitting on the porch, staring at the stars, drinking wine under a blanket telling each other how much we mean to one another.”
Hardy’s eyes go wide as he understands. If Miller’s heart wasn’t pounding so hard, she might have laughed. He scoots away, and the silence takes them once more. But it isn’t comfortable this time. It’s baited breath.
“So… tonight.” Miller whispers. And promises herself: after her third breath, she’ll ask him. The thing that might shatter her life all over again. She counts. Three, two one… “Is this me, or someone like me? In your head I mean.”
“Well, you’ve made this awkward, haven’t you? We were actually getting along for a while back there. Knew it couldn’t last.”
“Don’t change the subject,” she says in a quiet voice.
“So what do you want me to say, Miller, eh? That for the first time in months my head is clear? That for a moment back there, I felt like a normal human being? That I enjoyed cooking for you tonight? That I enjoy spending time with you?”
“If that’s the truth, then yeah.” Miller’s breath catches in her throat.
They stare one another down, too close under their blanket. She can feel the heat coming off his body, feel his breath in her hair.
“Can I kiss you?” he asks, voice rasping with anger.
“What?”
“You heard me. Can I?” He bites off each word, sitting too straight.
“As me, or someone like me?”
He rolls his eyes. She shoves him.
He scowls. “You, Miller. Bloody hell! Yesterday, today, tomorrow. You. You you you. Jesus!” Their eyes lock, and it’s so intense Miller doesn’t dare move.
Then he gives up. He stares at his hands, the moment gone. Silence takes them.
“Then… yes,” she says, before she can stop herself.
He looks back at her, gaping. “Yes?”
She nods. She has to grip her glass to stop her hands from trembling. This could be the end of everything. No more ghosts to hide behind.
Hardy moves closer, and for a moment, she thinks he’s going to kiss her, but he freezes mid-way. She can’t even be mad. It feels like the earth is shaking beneath her.
But then… well… they can’t stay in limbo forever, can they? No matter what happens. It’s better to know. If she’s learnt anything, it’s that.
Miller rolls her eyes. “Bloody hell, what are you waiting for, a countdown?”
Hardy tuts. “Do you have to ruin every single moment, Miller?” And just like that, they’re themselves again. It’s just Hardy: infuriating, stubborn, safe Hardy. And she knows she has nothing in the world to worry about. He’d never hurt her. Never in a million years.
“Wanker,” Miller whispers. She grins.
His hand finds her cheek, and his rough thumb strokes the line of her bottom lip. His eyes burn as they meet hers. Hardy leans in, closing the gap between them. Their lips meet. They kiss.
Hardy pulls her closer, hands in her hair. Their blanket slips as she pulls at his shirt, desperate to feel more of him.
They break apart, breathless.
“Bloody hell,” he whispers. “Inside?”
“Inside.”
They’re up, hand in hand, and before Miller can think, she’s following Hardy inside. The door closes behind them. And she doesn’t wait this time. She kisses him again, catching him off guard, and it thrills her, that she could surprise him.
“Is this really happening?” she asks, as he pulls off her top.
“I think so.” He kisses her neck, tracing her collarbone with his thumb, sliding her bra strap down.
She unbuttons his shirt with shaking fingers, taking much too long. She wants to see him now, even the score, feel his skin on hers.
Hardy walks backwards, leading them to the couch.
“Oh no. No way,” Miller says, between kisses. She gets pissed off with the stupid buttons and pulls the shirt over his head. There. Much better. “I’m not shagging you on the couch, like some teenager.”
Hardy laughs — actually laughs — and it’s so beautiful. He pulls her in for a hug, holding her tight against his chest. She can hear his heart, feel the heat between them.
He kisses the top of her head, then her cheek, then her lips again. “Shut up, Miller.” He takes her hand and leads her to his bedroom.