Participants:
| Scene Title | Nothing Else To Say |
|---|---|
| Synopsis | It ends much like it began, in an unlit and unheated apartment. |
| Date | July 01, 2010 |
Peter's Apartment
The weather was warming, finally moving towards the summer weather it should be. The electricity was back up, allowing people to move back to their homes again. More importantly the cellphone towers were up again, allowing people to communicate again. Life as slowly working it's way back to normal. mostly.
Well, for most of them.
It had been weeks since Kaylee went home and left a message where Peter couldn't have missed it. It had taken everything in her to wait patiently and give him time. Having a rather demanding puppy help keep her distracted some of the time. Yet, he hadn't come to find her, nor had she received any messages when her phone came back up.
Finally, Kaylee couldn't wait any longer, she had to admit that maybe it was over. There were no more excuses that she could give herself as to why he hadn't tried to contact her. She couldn't drag her feet, she had to go get her things.
Asking some of the residence of Grand Central to keep an eye on Missy, Kaylee struck out to the apartment so that she could get this painful chore done. Picking a time of day Peter is normally working, the young telepath snuck into the apartment. There was a moment when she first approached the door that she was worried her key wouldn't work anymore, but to her relief the key turned in the lock and let her in.
That had been sometime ago, now the young woman is sitting on the edge of the bed, drawers still open, her dufflebag partially filled with clothing. Now distracted by a photo, all work has stopped as questions run through her mind.
Why had it still been there?
Maybe he forgot to get rid of it?
Wonder if he'd miss it?
The photograph is clutched in one hand, the other busy wiping at the moisture at the corner of her eyes. Sniffing a little, Kaylee swallows back the lump at the back of her throat. She had done so well, until she saw that photo. She attempted not to look at it, but next thing she knew she was holding it and fighting back the emotions that brought with it.
She never realized just how much she had held back while tucked away underground, just seeing a picture of them happy, reminded her what was lost and how it was lost.
She really hated being such a girl sometimes.
The creak and click of the door behind Kaylee isn't an expected noise, given how quiet the apartment is. But Peter Petrelli's presence in his own home is at least a warranted thing, she's the one, arguably, tresspassing at the moment. He has no idea she's there, though, from the sigh he offers to the air and the clatter of his keys on the table by the door.
Slow, clunking footfalls resound through to the kitchen, followed by the noise of the refrigerator door opening and Peter's tired sigh coming out. From the looks of things in the bedroom, he hasn't been sleeping here, that the bed is made at all is a small miracle, but the whole place has the feeling of being forgotten.
The sound of the door opening reaches Kaylee's ears and she freezes, a hand still raised in the act of wiping at her red rimmed eyes, but it too holds. Even as she holds still her heart gives a flip of fear and starts to beat wildly. She didn't think he'd be there… now she was caught.
Teeth bite at her lower lip as she carefully reaches out to make sure it is him, cause it wouldn't be the first time someone else was in the apartment when she was.
A brush of telepathy, unfelt by the man in the other room confirms it and small stab of panic hits her, as she tries to think of there is anyway she can slip out. Standing suddenly, the photo slips from her fingers to clatter on the hardwood floor.
She freezes again, her eyes fall to it, breath held… no way of hiding now. So instead she tires to act like nothing is wrong as she bends down to pick up the photo, placing it on the dresser again, before going back to packing.
Maybe if she doesn't look at him, it won't be so bad? She had no faith in that idea, but she's a novice at all this.
"Kaylee," Kaylee, is a whispering voice not like Peter's that echoes up from the shadows behind the bedroom door. A silhouette of a man stretches across the bedroom floor after that, inky black and unearthly alive, stretching to her feet. "I… I didn't expect to see you here," here. Peter's shadowy form slithers up the opposite wall after darting under the bed, and from its surface like a door perfectly cut for Peter, he emerges from the shadow a whole man, dressed in his paramedic uniform, but looking like a far more broken man than the one Kaylee left last she saw him.
He's lost close to twenty pounds, dark circles under his eyes and beard grown in, hair disheveled and longer than she recalls. He looks tired, unhealthily so, and his movements are slow and lethargic looking. "Sorry if… if I started you."
A shin it painfully bruised on the open drawer, when the stretch of shadow startles the telepath and she stumbles back into the sharp corner. It's not so much the shadow that startles her, it's the fact it isn't Richard Cardinal in that shadow. There is a grimace and she quickly turns away as he steps out of the shadow, though she's seen how bad he looks. Shoulders are hunches forward as she pushes the drawer shut slowly, and lets a hand drop to rub at her leg.
She's unable to really think, brows drop to furrow in worry that he can see. "I — ah — I'm sorry. I didn't think you were going to be here." She murmurs softly, hands settle on the top of the dresser as she forces herself not to look at him, eyes locked firmly on the scuffed surface. "I'm…" Her voice catches of it's own accord and she bites her lip hard, trying to stop the emotions. When she speask again, each word is said carefully, "I'm almost done, I'll — I'll be out of here soon." She moves to another drawer of her things and hooks fingers into it to open it. "Sorry…" She adds much more softly.
Reaching into the drawer she pulls out a pale pink shirt, once she has it, Kaylee hesitates, not wanting to turn around. So she stands there fidgeting with it. "You…" She takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly. "You should be taking better care of yourself. There are other paramedics out there that can work just as well as you can." Her head turns to the side a little, as if she's going to look at him, but she doesn't, just adds. "You need a break, clearly."
"I'm fine," Peter dismissively states, looking down to the floor as he steps away from the wall more, walking around the foot of the bed before looking up to Kaylee. There's silence in Peter's expression, one that wordlessly expresses the awkwardness of this meeting and the weariness in his person. "You… don't have to leave," is a bit of a misleading thing to say as he comes to sit on the corner of the bed, hands folding between his knees as he slouches forward.
"I uh…" Peter turns to look over to Kaylee, offering a faint smile. "Abby's… having me move in with her, ah— at her apartment." That last bit is awkwardly tacked on at the last moment. "She… she's got some problems right now, needs someone there to look out for her and just sort've… be there, I guess?" He doesn't sound entirely certain of himself, and given that he can't quite make eye contact it seems even harder for him to be able to make this conversation less awkward.
"I'm sorry…" Peter quietly admits without any quantifier, likely because it's something he thinks she wants to hear, rather than actually knowing what he's sorry for.
"No… your not." Kaylee says firmly, still not moving. "And… yes I do." The news he's moving in with someone else, makes the young telepath flinch, her head dropping somewhat in defeat. It gives her the strength to finally turn and tuck the shirt into the duffle back.
"I can stay at one of the safehouses until I get on my feet and find a place." Kaylee says with false confidence, her chin tilting up slightly as she turns back to the dresser. "No reason for me to stay, where I am not wanted or to draw this out." That last comes out much more bitterly then she in tended, she falters somewhat as a stack of shirts are pulled out, arms wrapping around them.
"There — there is nothing to be sorry about. You — you and I…" Her voice catches again, but this time she makes a soft sound in the back of her throat, she just can't say it. Teeth catch and hold a quaking lip, biting it sharply enough to leave indents in the tender flesh.
Taking a shaking breath she shakes her head and moves to shove clothing into the duffle bag, not caring about how messy a job she's doing, she just needs to get out of there before she makes a fool of herself.
But the intense emotions, are clear on her face, her thoughts leaking through whispering at the back of of his mind.
I should have known better…. should have never left that message…. I knew…. I was too stupid to see the truth…. I miss him though…. He'll never accept me for me…. He'll never understand…. He doesn't care….
Each thought bleeds into the other as if he's hearing the chaos of her thoughts as they happen, she's totally unaware as a flash of memory dances through his head, the first dance they shared.
Was it really love?
Peter rises up quickly off of the bed, a chill running down his spine and his eyes falling shut in the motiton of standing. There's a tension ont only in his posture but his voice as he wipes one hand over his mouth, breathing a sigh into his fingers. "Maybe you're right…" Peter shakily admits, his head dipped down into a nod and brows furrowed worriedly.
Swallowing tightly, Peter forces a smile and looks askance at Kaylee,, not maing eye contact still before he steps away from the bed, hands folded behind his back and shoulders slouched. "I'll— I can pack later. Uh, you— you should…" there's a sense of discomfort in Peter's voice, unspoken regret that has his eyes closing and his head hanging, lips pressed together tightly as he takes a few steps towards the french doors leading into his bedroom, lingering on the treshhold in silence with his back to her.
For all that he looks run ragged, there's a certain coincidental timing to his ragged state and the argument he has with Kaylee. Not withstanding all of that is that he seems to have acquired Cardinal's ability at some point between now and then. He slouches, almost like he's deflating, and rests one hand up against the door frame, his head coming to settle on his forearm in that silence that hangs between the last words he said and what finally comes to fill the silence.
"I missed you," seems so awkwardly out of place, but it might well have been the most honest thing Peter's had to say this entire time. Then, almost immediately after he murmurs, "I'm… sorry." For saying he missed her, or for throwing her out; that much is hard to say.
Those words tear at Kaylee's heart, a sob escaping her, immediately stifled by the dark blue sleeve of her turtleneck as she presses a wrist to her mouth. A hand presses to her forehead as she turns away from him, fighting with her own emotions before she says something stupid.
Why did he have to say that?
"You say that… But I waited for you Peter." The words hiss out, as the telepath finally turns around hands dropping. "I worried… I — I…." She shakes her head, hands lifting to presses fingers to her temples. "I missed you so much." The words are choked out, with so much emotion behind those words. "And — and nothing." She doesn't know how close it was that he came to her, she only knows he never showed up.
I waited… cried when others couldn't see it.
A part of her feels somewhat embarrassed about what she did, writing on the mirror… waiting. She moves to start pulling the rest of the shirts out of the drawer. "I wanted you take me back, but… maybe that's a bad idea. Being with me means taking the bad with the good."
He'll never accept what I do…. He'll never accept what I am.
"You made it clear, you only wanted the good, but it's a two way road." The clothes are shoved into the bag, harshly. Holding on to the anger, trying so hard not to just give in and run to him. Last thing Kaylee needed was more heart ache. Her hand tugs harshly at the zipper on the bag. While outwardly, she acts angry, what she's really feeling colors the mental whispers in his head.
Why does it have to hurt so much?
"Yeah…" Peter awkwardly admits with a bob of his head, swallowing noisily as he does. When eyes fall shut, his head turns, towards Kaylee's direction, but not looking at her. His fingers curl against his palm. Reaching up to the back of his neck, Peter scratches his hand over the scruff there and starts walking away from her, each footfall slow and ponderous. "I can't— " he doesn't finish that sentence. "You should do what will make you happy, and I shouldn't hold you back from it."
It's dismissive sentiment, and one that Peter doesn't deliver easily or with any sort of expected ceremony, just a heavy heart. "If… if anything happens," is something of a loaded thing for Peter to say, "you can go to my mother's, she'll— take care of you, keep you safe… something." Opening his eyes to stare down at his feet, Peter just shakes his head, then begins to sink into his own shadow in the floor, slowly flattening out to a pool of darkness vaguely analogous to the shape of a man.
"We both made our choices," our choices, "and I think this'll be safer for you in the log run…" slithering across the floor, Peter glides ephemerally towards the door, his voice a whispering echo from the corners of the room.
"I don't know what else to say," to say.
Legs give out and Kaylee sinks to the floor as his voice floats away, as the hum of his mental voice starts to fade. Turning, she drops to sit on the floor, back against the bed as her shoulder roll forward as the first heart breaking sob escapes her, face buried in her hands, hair falling like a curtain to hide her shame.
This is why she didn't want to face him, why she tried to avoid it. Kaylee was, literally, feeling sick to her stomach from the emotional pain, and she can't help but wish she could hug him, to be comforted.
"You made me happy."
The words are watery when her hands drop away, whether he's there or not… they echo through the apartment as she raises a shaky voice, finally just saying what she needs too. The world a blur as she blinks through teary eyes, little gasping sobs follow each breath.
"You and them. I was happiest I had ever been, when I had both in my life." Her head lifts, hands moving to prop up her weary head, fingers laced through her hair. "They give me purpose and hope, but you… you gave me family… and love." The last whispered, eyes closing.
"I… love you." She huffs out a soft laugh, the irony of it all hitting her. She was her mother all over again. Arms curl around her stomach, her emotions doing a number on her. "I miss you, so much… enough so I got a dog." She smiles a little, a corner of her mouth ticking up just a little, thinking of the highly demanding puppy waiting for her at Grand Central.
"It's lonely without you." The words trail off, eyes closing against fresh tears. "I… don't know what else to say, either. Maybe, you'll be happier — you know — not having to worry about me." Her lip starts to tremble again, her hand moving to cover her mouth.
Does it hurt him this much? Am I alone in this?
"It's lonely with me too…" is Peter's hushed answer from the shadows, his ghostly form gliding across the floor towards the door before sliding beneath it like a piece of unanted mail. It's the coldest exit he could give, but only for lack of wanting to succumb to his own emotions, things Kaylee feels on the fringes of her telepathic senses, hearing the dissonant chorus of shame, guilt, want and anger all voicing each other's concerns in his mind's eye.
But he's gone too quick for her to latch on to any one individual thread, just enough to hear the conflicting emotions that say stay and go in so many different ways. Ultimately it leaves Kaylee alone in the unlit and unheated apartment, much as they found it together when Peter first moved back in after Operation Apollo. A beginning and an ending starting all in the same point.
Except in that time, in that beginning, no one was crying.
The same can't be said for either of them now.