66. A First Day to Remember

I picked my way down the concrete steps with a tight grip on the railing. This particular stair was not near any of the waterfalls, but a rain had fallen earlier in the day and moisture lingered in crisp autumn weather like this, making the steps slippery. The sun was shining now, though, which was why I had taken the chance to sneak out for a few moments to myself. There couldn't be many beautiful days like this left before autumn started in earnest.

I reached the bottom of the stairs and stepped into a small clearing. The damp grass clung to my slippers; I wished I had worn my boots instead, but doing up the laces was still too much for the crippled fingers of my left hand. The fresh smell of wet grass was pleasant, though. I breathed it in deeply as I approached the tiered waterfall on the other side of the lawn.

Two weeks; that was how long I had been at Cliff Resort. As soon as it was safe to move me, Reno had insisted I continue my recuperation under the watchful eyes of the other Turks. It hadn't been a choice, really – where else could I go? – but I couldn't complain. The medical staff were skilled and friendly, the scenery was breathtaking, and for now I valued my safety more than my privacy and independence.

I slipped my right hand in between the top two buttons of my cardigan and rubbed the round dot of uneven skin just above my left breast. The bullet wound had healed, leaving nothing but a small memento. My left arm was improving. The fingertips itched; the nails had begun to grow back a couple of weeks ago, right around the time the potion treatment ended. The arm still wasn't pretty to look at – I was told it never would be, after all the complications. I still had to wear a special arm-length glove, to minimize the pain and the infection risk, but mobility was nearing seventy percent. My strict taskmaster of a physiotherapist had made sure of that.

I came to a stop by the edge of the pond beneath the waterfall. The clearing was enclosed by the cliff and suffused with the gentle patter of water descending from above in silver streams. A solitary tree stood near the water; its branches drooped almost far enough to touch the pond's gently rippling surface. A white wooden bench sat at the foot of the gnarled trunk, but I had never seen anyone else use it. The clearing had become my own, my little sanctuary away from prying eyes.

I stood still and soaked up the atmosphere. The sun held little warmth, but its rays made the spray shimmer with the colors of the rainbow. A slight breeze tickled my face, but it would be another month or two before it would tousle my hair again. I sighed as I stroked my good hand over the half-inch of fuzz on my scalp. It made a poor imitation of the sensation.

Seconds later I felt another hand repeat the action. I flinched and twisted sideways, and found myself staring into Reno's face.

"Sorry," he said with a sheepish grin. "Couldn't resist, yo."

I looked him over. He was on extended recovery leave, but my own convalescence had been swallowed up by burn treatment, physiotherapy, counseling and utter exhaustion. We'd had no moments to ourselves for weeks. I hadn't even seen him at all for the past couple of days; a mild fever had put him under strict observation, in case of a relapse of his pneumonia.

It still felt like a novelty to see him dressed in something as casual as gray sweatpants and a t-shirt. A fluffy Cliff Resort bathrobe, its belt fastened around his hips with a careless knot, protected him from the chill. His scuffed boots completed the look, laces undone and tongues flopping over the feet. Maybe I should have thrown caution to the wind and done the same. In his case, I suspected he was averse to bending his right knee. The bones had fused back together just fine, he had told me, but the joints, aggravated already by old injuries, were slow to recover.

Reno looked well, considering. The limp was noticeable as he moved in beside me, but there was a spring in his step and the nip in the air had brought a rosy hue to his cheeks.

"I thought you weren't supposed to be out of bed yet." I tried to keep my voice steady. My heart was racing, from more than just the little scare; I could sense a charge building up in the air between us. Reno had followed me here for a reason.

He shrugged.

"I guess, but my bed has a problem with it."

"What's that?"

The look in his eyes told me the answer before he spoke it.

"You ain't in it."

Finding his gaze too bright, I turned my face toward the waterfall.

"I'm pretty sure you're not supposed to do that yet, either."

"Since when have I done what I'm told?"

I snorted and shook my head, then steeled myself with a deep breath.

"Reno, I... I can't just go back to the way things were. I thought I could do the no-strings thing with you, but I was wrong. I'm sorry."

He said nothing, just averted his face. My heart sank.

"I... like you, a lot, I really do." Such an insufficient word, yet it was the only one I could muster the courage for. "Too much," I added, with a pathetic attempt at a laugh. "I guess that's the problem. The whole weekend lover thing, jumping into bed with you each chance I get because I never know when I might see you again... I can't do that anymore, not when everything in my life has gone upside down. I need to figure out my place in the world, find my feet again. Find something I can hold on to."

The tension didn't fade. I put a stop to my rambling and pulled my sweater tighter, afraid I had said too much in my haste to soften the blow. I didn't want more awkwardness between us.

"Well..." He slid his hands into the pockets of his bathrobe. "Maybe if we added some strings, you could hold on to those."

I froze, and shot him a wary look. A faint smile had appeared on his face. Was he joking? It sounded like one of his jokes.

"Look," Reno continued when the silence stretched on. "I really miss ya, all right? I dunno nothin' about this... relationship stuff. Hell, I got no clue how it's s'posed to be done right, but maybe, y'know... Maybe you can help me figure that out."

He wasn't joking. The possibility had crossed my mind, of course, but I had never given it much thought. I had just... dismissed it.

Avoided it, perhaps.

"I... miss you too."

"That a yes or a no?"

I flinched as an unpleasant prickling shot through my half-healed thumb. It had reached for my ring finger. Funny that the old habit would remain, so many months – years? – after I had given up the ring.

That unpleasant sensation settled down into my gut.

"It's, um... Are you sure about this?"

Reno was quiet for a while. When he spoke again his voice was subdued, but not indifferent.

"I know I've let ya down. I never meant to, and I wish I could take it all back, but I can't, can I? You said once that what's done is done. Remember that? You're right. We can never go back, none of us can. But that don't mean we can't go forward."

"Learn to let go and move on, huh? Isn't that what you said, once?"

"Yeah, and I also said it ain't easy. Hell, I dunno if I can ever manage it myself, but, y'know, when I'm with you... I feel like I got a reason to try. Somethin' to aim for, instead of just runnin' away from all the bad shit I've done. I wanna try. I know I'll prob'ly fuck it up again, but..." He faltered, then let his head fall back with a frustrated groan. "Ah, fuck, I'm no good at this."

"I wouldn't say that," I mumbled.

"Then what would you say?"

A warmth had blossomed in my heart, spreading farther with every word.

"I'd say that..." I toyed with one of the buttons of my cardigan, twisting it back and forth. My stomach was twisting, too. "...you're not the only one with regrets. I've been an idiot too at times."

His slight smile returned.

"Sometimes, yeah."

"I can forgive. I already have. I think you have, too."

"Why do I get the feelin' there's a 'but' comin' up?"

I took a few moments to phrase my thoughts. It was hard to make them sound right.

"Friends are easier to forgive than lovers."

"Yeah, well... The way I hear it, nothin' worth doin' is ever easy."

"You really think it's been worth it?"

Reno's gaze dropped to the ground, and his smile began to fade.

"Don't get me wrong," I hurried to add. "There have been good times, plenty of them, but... looking back at everything we've been through, everything we've put each other through..." I gave him a wary look. "Do you honestly think we can make it work?"

"Well, I don't think either of us has much faith in happily ever after. That's a start, ain't it?"

His tone was joking, but he gazed out over the pond with a distant look in his eyes.

"Happily ever after." I snorted, shaking my head. "I don't know if we can even manage a happy year."

"We could work our way up to it. Y'know, start with a day, then a week, a month. See how far we get."

"You make it sound so simple."

He shrugged.

"Maybe it is, maybe it ain't. Won't know 'til we give it a go, right?"

After everything life had put him through, after everything he had done and been forced to do, Reno was still an optimist. It never ceased to amaze me.

"Don't you even wanna try?"

The answer to his question was clear: in the way my heart reached for him in his absence, in the way my body awakened in his scent, in the way he could make me lose my train of thought with a single look or touch. It scared me. I was terrified of giving someone that kind of power over me again; yet this man had stolen it before I had even realized what was going on. I didn't know how to get it back.

Reno had lifted his head and was looking up at the waterfall. To think that I had found him unreadable when we first met. His face was carefully blank, but his hands were tight fists and his chest rose and fell quicker with every breath. I could read him now, could see the need in him. The vulnerability.

Reno hadn't stolen anything, I realized with a jolt. It had been a fair trade.

Let go of the past. Move on.

With a shaky breath, I stepped up to him and brushed my fingers across the back of his hand. He glanced down and opened his fist, tilting it toward me. I clasped his hand with both of mine, a shy smile on my lips.

"Well, I do know one thing. It was pretty damn impossible to be happy without you."

He was silent for a while, watching our linked hands.

"That a yes, then?"

When I had first asked him to stay, on that first night in Kalm, it had been for so many wrong reasons. Selfish ones. Fearful ones. Maybe I didn't deserve a chance to choose him for the right reasons, but, well... Life wasn't always fair, was it? My smile grew wider.

"Yes. I want to try."

Reno let out a slow breath. When he raised his face, he showed a timid smile of his own. He cupped my face with his palm, then slid it down to caress the side of my neck. His warm touch sent a tingle down my spine.

"Ain't no one I'd rather be happy with," Reno murmured to me. "We both know it ain't gonna be all rainbows and unicorns. Shit's gonna hit the fan sooner or later, that's just how it goes." He brushed a thumb up along the line of my jaw, drawing a sigh of contentment from my lips. "And when it does, and we're screamin' at each other, tryin' to deal with the mess... Remember that there's no one I'd rather be unhappy with either. You can hold on to me, Fitz. You can hold on to us."

As he bent down to touch his lips to mine, I decided it was the most romantic thing anyone had ever said to me.

A/N:

The last chapter – by complete coincidence, posted on my birthday. :D

A huge thank you to everyone who's stuck with Tess on this long journey! We have reached the end, and I do plan for this to be the end of this series... though I won't be surprised if Tess decides to pop into other stories of mine in the future. ;) Who knows, I might even do a few one-shots featuring her and Reno and others. (If there's something you'd love to see, feel free to drop a comment or a PM with your ideas!)

Special thanks to Mr. Stompy, who not only proofread every chapter of this story, but offered never-ending encouragement whenever I fished for it. To fellow ficcer U, who live-blogged reactions from every single chapter of both of Tess's stories. (Whoa!) And to each and every one of you wonderful readers who left a comment or a favorite, especially those of you who came back again and again. I won't list names because I'm paranoid I might accidentally leave someone out, but you and I know who you are!