Lancaster Green Chapter 7
It was almost surprising when James realized he didn’t remember the last time he’d gotten absolutely fucking drunk. Smoked, definitely. That was a regular part of his life now, for better or for worse. But – and it was probably a good thing- it had somehow never occurred to him to drink during his medical leave.
But he wasn’t on medical leave anymore and he had tonight and tomorrow off. He was home alone. Graham had been planning to meet his sister halfway between Leominster and Great Barrington to help her with something. But James hadn’t talked to him since this morning, so he didn’t know if those plans had changed. Or if Graham was furious with him for yelling at Madelyn earlier.
Regardless, he was alone, he didn’t have to work, and he could spend tonight getting wasted and feeling sorry for himself if he wanted to. Not worrying about what he’d do if he left the Foundation, how badly he’d fucked things up, or how he was going to answer the cheerful text his mother sent earlier while he was panicking at work.
That plan was interrupted about three hours and far too much alcohol in when there was a knock at the door. James sighed and stood up from where he’d been sitting on the couch, only somewhat wobbly as he went to the door to kick out Amelia or Gabriella.
But no, Madelyn was standing outside his door, looking around the hallway as she waited. James’s heart dropped and he opened the door. “Hi,” he said, holding onto the doorframe for support as the carpet lurched under him.
“Hi,” Madelyn said, looking nervous.
“Graham isn’t here, he’s meeting Clarissa at…fuck, I don’t remember. But he’s gone.”
“I know,” she said, leaning on her cane as she looked up at him. “I came here to see you.”
James sighed. “Madelyn-”
“Can we please talk?” she asked. “I really, really don’t like this.”
James didn’t either. He and Madelyn had never fought before. This wasn’t even a fight, it was just…weird. “I’m drunk,” he said with a shrug. “So there’s…that.”
“Just for a few minutes?”
Sure, it wasn’t like he could mess things up much worse. “Yeah,” he said, waving her inside and almost losing his balance as he did so. “Just please be honest with me. Please.”
There was a pleading note in his voice that he hadn’t intended to let out. Madelyn nodded solemnly. “I’m sorry,” she said. “It’s just that… I don’t want to be afraid of you.”
James sat down on the couch, too aware of the fact that he was still almost as tall as she was standing when he was sitting. “It’s not right,” she continued, sitting down next to him. “It wasn’t your fault. And I thought I wasn’t. I mean, I wasn’t before you got back, I swear.”
“Of course you weren’t,” James said. “I was fucking sedated the whole time.”
“James-”
James held up a hand to stop her, blinking hard to clear his head a little. “No, Madelyn, I’m being serious. I understand it, okay? I was scary. I was dangerous. And then I wasn’t. And now I’m…me. And that’s closer to what I was when I…”
He cleared his throat. “I know it wasn’t you,” Madelyn said, before he had to figure out what to say next.
“But it’s hard to reconcile that with the fact that it was my voice and my body?”
She was crying now and he tried to make his brain think up the best thing to do in this situation. He took another long sip of his drink, though that probably wasn’t it. “Do you want some?” he asked, motioning toward the whiskey bottle and the open can of seltzer on the coffee table. “I’ve got more. And seltzer or, um…”
“I can’t,” she said, wiping her eyes and trying to smile. “My medications.”
Right.
They sat for a few minutes in the strangest awkward silence James had ever felt. He pressed a hand to his forehead with a nearly silent groan as the alcohol sloshed in his head. He wasn’t mad at her and she wasn’t mad at him. But there was a chasm there between them that had never been there before.
Add to that the fact that he wasn’t her workplace superior anymore. He might not even be her coworker anymore, he was still deciding that.
“What do you need?” James asked finally.
Madelyn looked at him. “From me,” he clarified. “What do you need from me?”
“I don’t want you to leave,” she said immediately, and James wasn’t sure if he was relieved or not. “I mean it. I want to fix it.”
“I don’t know if there’s anything to fix, though,” James said before he thought about it.
But she just nodded, looking across the room toward the dusty bookshelf beside the TV. “You’ve always been so respectful to me,” she said as James looked at her, with her slightly stooped posture and the livid scar over her eye. “I mean, with my injuries and disability and all of that. You’ve never acted like I was…less or wrong or anything. You always treat me like I belong there. And I wanted to do the same for you. And I blew it, I’m sorry.”
“Of course you’re scared of me, though.”
They were quiet again as James remembered visiting her in her hospital room after that first lifesaving surgery. They’d been alternating waiting so that someone was always at the hospital and at headquarters. He and Robin had been in the waiting room with Madelyn’s silent mother when the doctors said she could have visitors. Once Mrs. Arroyo had been in, she offered for them to see her.
Madelyn had looked so tiny in that hospital bed, unconscious with so many wires and tubes surrounding her. James hadn’t known what to say and neither had Robin. Instead, they’d both taken one of her hands and sat silently for the ten minutes they had with her.
Madelyn turned to him. “Can you tell me what it was like for you?”
James jerked himself back to the present, blinking hard to refocus on Madelyn’s face. “What?”
“That day. You weren’t in control, but I know you were there. Can you tell me what it was like?”
He’d done the same thing just a couple weeks ago, hadn’t he? Asked Bradley the same thing in an attempt to contextualize what he was feeling.
“Yeah, okay.”
“I’m sorry,” she said quickly. “I shouldn’t ask right now, I know you’re drunk. That’s not fair, we can wait.”
Give me that, I’m not high enough for this conversation.
“No, I…” James laughed. “I think I’d rather do it now.”
He thought back, intentionally this time. “I felt…like this was exactly what I should be thinking. I was still thinking about things like work and rent and all that, but it was all so overshadowed by whatever-”
He wished he was wearing his gloves, even right now at home. “Whatever Adele wanted me to do.”
Madelyn watched him carefully and James was relieved not to be sober for this conversation. His eyes burned, but he ignored it. “The only thing that mattered was keeping the Foundation from finding her,” he continued, staring down at the carpet in front of the TV. “And I was terrified. And she told me not to sleep and I kept forcing myself to stay awake when my body just couldn’t, and it was so hard to think. When you mentioned her stand, I was desperate to keep her safe. Like if she was harmed, there was nothing else left to me. Or the world, because she was all that mattered. And I knew-”
Maybe he shouldn’t have done this now. Maybe he should have waited until he was on the edge of alcohol poisoning instead. He wiped harshly at his eyes. “Nothing else mattered as long as I followed her commands,” he finished. “I was so angry and I was so scared and…”
“James.”
He was gripping a throw pillow tightly in his lap, rocking back and forth as his heart raced against it. He hadn’t even realized he was doing it.
“I’m sorry,” Madelyn said softly.
“No,” James shook his head. “No, I’m fine.”
“You’re really not,” she said. “I’m sorry, I should have…I think part of it was that you were back and, like, consciously, I know you aren’t fine. If anyone should know you aren’t fine, it’s me. But you were back at work and maybe things were getting normal again. And I keep connecting you at work with what happened and I know that’s stupid and wrong. And I really didn’t want to, and I didn’t want anyone to know. It wasn’t you attacking me, it was both of us being attacked by her. And I know that. And that’s why I said I wasn’t scared. But I should have known you’d know I was lying.”
His gloves were on the coffee table. James reached over for them and once they were on his hands, he felt the tiniest bit better. His neck was still exposed, but he’d probably gag if he had a turtleneck pressing against his throat right now. But his blue scarf – one he rarely wore – was hanging by the door and suddenly that seemed to be exactly what he needed.
“Where are you going?” Madelyn asked as James stood up, letting the pillow drop from his lap.
He didn’t answer her as he stumbled across the room and got the scarf, draping it messily around his neck. As he sat back down, Madelyn reached over to adjust it.
“You aren’t a monster,” she said, looking into his eyes as she gently untangled the soft fabric. “Okay?”
Her fingers brushed against his throat and James held back tears. “Okay.”
He wasn’t fully sure he believed her, but the silence that followed was more comfortable as it stretched on after that. Madelyn didn’t seem like she was in a hurry to leave, even if James was terrible company tonight.
It was only about nine o’clock, but James was completely drained, especially after sleeping so weirdly yesterday and drinking so much tonight. He was probably going to fall asleep out here on the couch if he didn’t move soon. But he couldn’t make himself get up as he thought about nothing in a vague cloud of relief.
“Do you want me to leave?” Madelyn asked after a little while, and James realized he’d closed his eyes at some point.
“Hmm? No, it’s fine.”
He woke up some time later with the start of a hangover creeping in and a cramp in his neck. When he looked over, Madelyn was asleep at the other end of the couch. He had vague memories of something similar happening before, but was asleep again before he could think of what it was.
***
It was light out and James had a hangover. When he finally surrendered and opened his eyes, he realized he was still in the living room, lying on the couch. Madelyn was gone and there was a thick red blanket draped over him that he didn’t recognize.
He forced himself up. The hangover wasn’t that bad, Madelyn had gotten there before he could truly ruin his entire day off with it. But the ensuing head rush and the throb in his temples made him want to give up and try again later.
“Good morning.”
Graham was in the kitchen doorway, holding a bowl of cereal. “You know,” he said, taking a thoughtful bite. “I’m getting a little tired of walking into rooms to see you sleeping with my girlfriend.”
James laughed weakly as he stood up. “What’s this?” he asked, putting the blanket on the couch.
“Clarissa’s girlfriend’s mother made it for her last Christmas,” Graham said. “She hates it, so oh no, it ended up with my stuff.”
He couldn’t feel the fabric that well with the gloves he was still wearing, but James touched it. “It’s nice.”
“It’s ours now. Enjoy.”
“Thanks.”
He walked past Graham into the kitchen to get some water. “Madelyn said you guys talked?” Graham asked, glancing at the scarf that was still wrapped around James’s neck.
“Yeah. When did she leave?”
“A little after I got home last night,” Graham said. “Are you alright?”
James shrugged, then drained his water and refilled it. “Me and her? I think so.”
“Good. Are you working today?”
“No. I’m going back to bed.”
“Do me a favor,” Graham said, motioning toward an enormous tote bag on the counter. “Eat some of this. Or find a way to get rid of it that doesn’t wreck my conscience.”
James laughed, though he knew what Graham was doing. And maybe the hangover was intensifying his frustration at being handled yet again. He took a roll out of the bag and took a bite as he made his way back to bed with a quick thanks. It was fine, it was just a roll from Clarissa. It would sop up some of the alcohol and he would be fine.
He ate half, then set the other half on his bedside table, hiding it behind his lamp so he couldn’t see it.
