They make it two full months of traveling the world together before Natasha realizes she can't live with a blind boyfriend. Or maybe any boyfriend. Or maybe just him.
Auggie doesn't overanalyze this point too much, mostly because he gets frighteningly drunk and stays that way for days on end. He tells the front desk at the hotel to put another month on his credit card for the room, so time doesn't matter to him anymore. It's not like he has responsibilities anyway. No, he did a great job of running away from all of that.
They had a pretty good run, he thinks one night over a cold chicken sandwich washed down with a bottle of room service whiskey in his unmade hotel bed. They had done the stereotypical touristy things in DC for a week before jetting off to the Alps. Natasha always did like the cold, and December in Switerland had allowed her to get her fix. It's probably worth noting that Natasha spent most of her days on the slopes while Auggie did freelance website development in their cabin. But they were happy. Honeymoon period happy, he realizes now.
They went east through Northern Europe to see the sights and drink vodka and dance, in Natasha's case; he wasn't a big fan of dancing. They dropped down to Turkey for two weeks, Dubai for four days before the Arabic makes Auggie's nerves stand on end in memory of Iraq, then Sri Lanka for Auggie's preference of warm beaches and soothing ocean waves.
He should have seen it coming. Natasha had been on edge since declaring she felt too cooped up and tied down in Dubai when Auggie refused to go out, irritable when Auggie didn't automatically agree to go to her hometown next, frustrated at Auggie's insistence that a former CIA operative who was a big player in the Belenko shit show should not be anywhere near Russia for awhile.
Auggie had forgotten how she demanded her freedom with the same intense manner that she demanded everything else: her way.
Natasha leaves him in the middle of the night when they're at their beachfront hotel in Sri Lanka. The irony isn't lost on him. This is where it all ends for him. This was where it all began for Annie. What's with Sri Lankan beaches and significant others (lovers? loves of their lives?) racing off without a word in the middle of the night?
To be fair, Natasha did send a text message the next morning, after she had already boarded a flight to wherever her life led her next. She turned his phone on silent so he wouldn't wake up to the sound and try to stop her. Of course, Auggie tried to trace the exact location that she had sent the text from, so he could find her exact flight. Nothing. He managed to hack into every airline's system in a time so long his former self would be ashamed. Still nothing.
Either Natasha wasn't using her real passport, which was a distinct possibility, or she paid off someone to let her on board without record, which is a bit more complicated but still something she could do, or she hacked the airline after she got on the plane to erase her existence. The final option was most logical. She beat him at his own game.
It was hardly his own game anymore, though. He hadn't hacked anything since he tossed his resignation papers on Joan's desk and offered a shy, almost apologetic smile at her pleas to reconsider. Auggie had balked at her immediate and insistent begging. Yes, Joan Campbell had begged. He had shaken his head and thought of Deckard's words of not letting his life be filled with regrets. Natasha was his future, not the CIA, and he had told Joan as much.
Auggie realizes, during one of his few stark sober moments, he didn't have anything. He said his goodbyes and burned his bridges. He has nothing and he is nothing.
I can't do this, Auggie. It's too complicated.
And with that, it was all over. A simple enough note. Natasha knew how to stay hidden when she was on the run from several governments. She wouldn't have a problem hiding from him, and he is well aware of that fact.
Minutes or weeks later, another note flashes through his mind, one he had never seen, but one he was too familiar with. Suddenly the pain is fresher than the alcohol-infused vomit on the floor next to his bed, but Auggie can't stop laughing. It's always complicated.
Forgive me. The truth is complicated.