Chapter Text
“Stop trying to protect me, Tim!!,”
Lucy spits at him but it feels like there was a diaphonous wall between the two drifting lovers. As those words reached Tim he felt a wave of nausea wash over him and he was only capable of telling her the words he knew would push her away even further or completely,
”I’m sorry, but I can’t, I-I-I can’t do this... if you don’t trust me on this one, I think it would be best for both of us if one of us leaves, you deserve better than me, ”
Tim explains to Lucy without being able to look into her chocolate-coloured eyes that used to be full of joy and desire but are now filled with frustration and desperation.
She doesn’t even dare to think about words to come up with knowing that he has already drifted too far away from the shore, his safe space, Lucy, and lets the intrusive thoughts take over.
She feels like watching a stranger take over her body, making her walk out the door into the freezing night, only the goosebumps all over her arms bring her back to reality and to the realization of what just happened, there is no more Tucy, no more bear hugs and no more dewy eyes and a cute smirk at work.
*
As soon as he hears Angela’s front door shut, he regrets his words and runs after her but hesitates before laying his hand on the doorknob and instead rests his pounding head on the cooling wood.
What did he just do?
Tim flinches when he hears a car door slammed shut and doesn’t waste another second before tearing the door open and sprinting after her, but it was already too late and of course his fault.
It’s always his fault, first at home with his abusive father, then in Afghanistan, with Isabel, and now with the love of his life.
He is miserable and broken, he is the reason for every bad thing happening to his loved ones. As his eyes start to fill with his water of regret, something sparkling catches his sight and he bends down to pick it up. It is Lucy’s necklace, the one he gifted her and loved to gaze at on her beautiful chest.
Every time he saw her wearing it, his heart softened a little more and it made him realize how lucky he was to have her in his life. Now had, but he still has a little hope and puts it into his chest pocket, close to his now shattered heart in case she ever wants to put the pieces back together for him.
*
Lucy knows that she is going way over the speed limit but doesn’t care about it, the only thing or person she can think about is Tim.
She shouldn’t, he broke her heart, but she still loved him, she never not loved him, from the moment their eyes locked in roll-call for the first time they saw each other.
All of a sudden, she feels her hands beginning to shake and knows what’s about to come. She had those since she was a teen and knew how to calm herself down, but right now everything was blank.
A panic attack on the road is the worst thing that could happen to her and that scares her even more. The wheel starts to move on its own but Lucy’s instincts keep her from going off the road and her foot presses on the breakes, only that it misses and instead hits the gas.
She is now going so fast that it feels like slow motion to her and her breaths start to shorten while she can redirect her tingling and shaking foot.
This time she doesn’t miss and her car stops so abruptly that the seatbelt is cutting into the bear skin on her shoulder and keeps her from slashing through the windshield, but instead slams her head into the airbag, and then everything goes black.
*
Tim pushes himself up again and tumbles back into his friend’s house only for him to see that they are all already asleep including Tamara. It reminds him of his childhood, when he used to lay in bed awake, while his parents pretended like nothing happened and just went to sleep and left him alone, most of the time crying. He grabbed the keys to his truck and left.
*
Lucy slowly started to regain consciousness and felt a terrible pounding on both sides of her head. With her right hand, she pushes herself back into an upright position as she opens the seat belt with her left and becomes aware of her surroundings.
She realizes that she is currently on a quiet road, with no vehicles or houses in sight, and doesn’t seem to be injured. And then she remembers how she ended up here and how Tim basically broke up with her.
Lucy’s breathing starts to get heavier and faster as she hears the heart beating in her chest. She opens the car door with shaking hands and steps out into the cold, making her shiver.
She begins to hyperventilate, it feels like there is a rope tied around her neck, with each breath the knot tightens and there is nothing she can do to make it stop.
It’s too much for her, her legs give up under the weight and Lucy crawls to the other side of the car, now leaning against the cool metal car door. She can’t breathe and her whole body is now trembling, the low oxygen blurs her vision and she has no more control over herself.
Lucy closes her eyes thinking that she is going to pass out but snaps back into reality when she feels her body tingling and her shaking hands locking up in fists.
She is going to die.
She wants to get up but her body won’t move and she tastes salty tears in her already tingling mouth. He broke her. He broke her heart and the unbearable pain in her chest begins to spread across her whole body, as her fists tighten, making it impossible for her to reopen them.
The anxiety overtook her and Lucy doesn’t know how to make it stop, but deep down she doesn’t want it to because for some reason she feels like she deserves it. Nausea. Pain. Shaking. Short of breath. Hell. One minute is an eternity.
She is for one hour and thirty minutes in this condition.
Usually, Tim is the one calming her down during her episodes, but Tim isn’t her person anymore. All she is left with is herself, the same feeling she got when her parents abandoned her for persuing her dreams.
She starts to do the breathing exersise Tim showed her.
Inhale, one, two, three, four.
Hold, one, two, three, four.
Exhale, one, two, three, four.
And again, one, two,...
Lucy’s breathing starts to slow down, her fists aren’t seized up anymore, but the shaking in her hands continues.
The spinning trees begin to look like trees again and not like bushes and as she continues with the breathing exercise she is lost in her thoughts about Ray, Tamara and again, Tim .
One, two,...
Due to being in fight-or-flight mode, her adrenaline is now crashing drastically, making it hard for her to even move, she is tired and mentally drained.
One more time one,...
All she wants to do at the moment is forget everything and let loose, even if it’s just for one second.
two, three, four...
*
Tim is on his way home, but it’s not home anymore since Lucy is now gone. Lucy became his safe place, but he had pushed her away.
After he had rolled into the driveway he just sat there and stared into the dark void in front of him. Kojo’s echoing barks snap him back into reality and he slowly opens the car door, filled with dread.
When he reaches the frontdoor he begins to replay some of his favorite memories with Lucy and how he carried her through this exact door after their second first date.
The day, she told him about having grandkids with him.
But it was all gone now.
He pushed the key into the lock and twisted it open finding Kojo with a wagging tail and Lucy’s sock in his mouth. The dog’s ears settle, once he didn’t smell the scent of Lucy, but welcomed Tim by licking the tears from his swollen face.
He was tired.
Not because he was running on five hours of sleep, but because his joy was taken from him. He didn’t want to shower or sleep knowing there would be an emptiness next to him and he could smell Lucy’s floral scent still in his bedsheets.
Gosh, he loved her so much.
He knows it’s a mistake, but he walks towards the shelf in the kitchen, where he keeps his backup bottle of whiskey. It’s a bad habit, he slipped into after Afghanistan and partly got out of since then, but never fully.
He doesn’t even bother to fill it into a glass and instead places the tip of the bottle right on his dry lips. The burning in his throat calms him down, as he settles on the couch.
As the liquid continues its way through Tim’s body, he feels the throbbing pain in his chest release and lays his head on the backrest of the couch, staring at the ceiling, wondering what Lucy might be doing.
*
...four.
Her head is throbbing and her knees shaking, while she is walking, rather crawling, to the driver's door.
She manages to get back into the car, but doesn't hit the gas for another ten minutes, until she is actually capable of driving on the road again. This time she was lucky, but just the imagination of her dy...
What were the last words she said to Tamara?
No!
She can't think like that...
She shuts those words out and starts driving towards the center of LA, the place where she could let herself go, stop her mind from spiraling and give her thoughts a break.
She pulls up at the first bar and steps into the crowded dimmed room.
All she wants to do is let loose, so she settles at the bar counter and orders a shot of tequila. Which turned into two, then four, and then she lost count and emptied every glass like water. Her throat didn’t burn anymore and all she could feel was the void in her heart.
“Another, please!”
she managed to get out but the room was already spinning and her vision was blurry.
“Sorry, but you had enough, here’s your tab,”
the bartender places the paper in front of Lucy, but she couldn’t read it, the alcohol numbed her body and made it impossible for her to look at the same spot for a second.
She fucked up.
She still manages to get some cash out of her jeans pocket and just hopes that it was enough. As she stands up, she puts the money on the counter and signals the bartender with a waving hand that she had paid.
But as soon as she places the second foot on the ground her legs give under and she was basically passed out laying at some bar in the middle of the night.
She is only able to identify shapes, but then a familiar face appears in her vision, Chris.
Chris fucking Sanford!