Title: And Then You Go On With Your Life
Author: Sarken (sarken@gmail.com)
Rating: PG-13
Disclaimer: NBC and Warner Bros. own the characters and no money is being made from this.
Author's Note: First written in the spring of 2003, so it diverges from canon immediately after "The Price of Nobility."
"You show up, you offer some talk show advice, and then you go on with your life. I hope you feel good about yourself, but did you help?" - Audrey, Castles of Sand
---
Faith's heart began to race as she stepped into the precinct house. The fast pace of shift change reminded her of how badly she had missed this job, but also made her wonder if she was ready for her first day back. Plastering a smile on her face, she quickened her pace and headed toward the locker room, barely acknowledging the welcomes back coworkers threw her way.
She hesitated just outside the locker room, wondering if, maybe, she should just turn and leave. Faith pushed the feeling aside, knowing that one more day of rest could easily turn into one week. She would never feel completely ready for this day.
Taking a deep breath, she opened the door, and the very first thing she saw surprised her: there stood Bosco, not only early, but also in uniform. The last she had heard, he'd been floating around Anti-Crime while she spent her days in a hospital bed.
"Hey, Yokas." He never looked up from tying his shoe.
"Hey," she replied, but a yawn distorted the word until it became unrecognizable. When she tried opening her locker, the combination didn't work. Shaking her head to clear it, she tried again and the door swung open.
Seeing this, Bosco brushed off his pants and took a few steps toward her. "You good?" The question held an accusation rather than friendly concern.
"I'm fine," she said, ignoring his tone. Setting her purse on the bench, she continued, "Just the first day jitters."
"Yeah, well, maybe I don't want to worry about my partner having the jitters and not having my back." He raised his voice a bit, but stayed where he was. A few of the other cops shifted their gazes toward him.
"Excuse me?" Her eyebrows shot up and she turned to face him. "You don't want to worry about whether I have your back? That's great, Bosco."
All eyes turned to Faith as she matched Bosco's tone.
"You lied to me and I hated you, but I still had your back. You lied, but I still went into that fucking hotel to cover up you and that dead bitch's corrupt police work. I got shot for you and you think that I won't have your back because I'm tired? After nine--no, ten--ten years, I'd think you'd have learned one thing: I've got your back, asshole."
As if watching a tennis match, their eyes turned to Bosco, awaiting his reaction.
His voice was quiet, emotionless. "I got shot because of you, too." Abruptly, his voice became louder, angry. "Remember that, Faith, back when you wouldn't tell me you had cancer and you didn't have my back while we were chasing that scumbag who killed his wife and kids? So don't go into that whole Saint Faith the martyr shtick. You're not the only one around here who's gotten shot."
"I didn't say I got shot because of you. Maybe if you listened to me just once, you'd have realized that. I said I got shot for you. I chose to be there, in front of Cruz's gun, because you meant that much to me. You were shot--in the vest, unlike me--because you didn't listen to a word that I said. You were too blind to see that I was sick. You didn't see it after I told you I was sick; hell, you didn't even see it after I puked up my guts during the chase. It's your own fault you got shot that day, so don't even try telling me different."
Her mouth went dry as she noticed her coworkers staring, hanging onto every word she had said, every word she had never wanted them to hear. Faith took a deep breath. "Maybe you're right," she snapped at Bosco. "Maybe I shouldn't be here." She couldn't make it to the door fast enough.
"Bye," Bosco taunted.
Faith paused at the door, her hand gripping the silver handle tightly. Looking over her shoulder, she said, "You know, I hope you get shot."
---
Near four o'clock, Faith returned to the precinct, sweaty and annoyed as hell. She'd forgotten her keys on the locker room bench, and she'd had to turn around and walk back to the precinct because her money and her MetroCard were in her purse, right next to her keys. Nodding to the sergeant on desk duty, she went into the locker room to retrieve her things. At least this time she wouldn't have to walk home.
When she stepped back into the corridor, she found herself amidst chaos. People were scrambling in every direction, creating a sea of blue uniforms. A flash of the lieutenant's white shirt amongst the blue caught her eye, and she asked, "Lieu, what happened?"
"A 10-13 just came in on the radio. It's Boscorelli; he's working alone today." Swersky's voice grew fainter as he hurried toward the precinct doors.
Hearing Bosco's name, Faith dropped her belongings to the floor. "I'm coming with you," she said, taking the stairs two at a time to catch up to Swersky.
Outside, they slid into an RMP and sped off, lights flashing and sirens wailing as they drove toward Bosco's last known location. Faith stared blankly out the window as Swersky kept his eyes glued to the road and his foot planted firmly on the gas.
"I'm an idiot," she said, chewing her thumbnail. "We had a fight, Lieu, in the locker room, and I told him...God, I told him I wanted him to get shot. What if he dies, thinking I meant it? I should have been out there with him."
Swersky looked into the rearview mirror, studying Faith for a brief moment. "Don't think like that," he told her, his eyes again on the road.
The car skidded as Swersky hit the brakes suddenly and forcefully. The tires had barely stopped spinning before the car doors were thrown open. Swersky immediately headed for a cluster of officers who were among the first on the scene, and Faith had only taken two steps before Swersky gestured over his shoulder and barked at her, "Yokas, stay in the car!"
"No, sir," she said to herself, forging ahead despite orders. She would worry about the consequences later. In that moment, all that mattered was finding Bosco. And if she did that, there would be no consequences to worry about.
A group of officers had stormed into an abandoned apartment building a few moments ago and Faith glanced around, making sure no one noticed her, before slipping inside. Hearing the other officers' voices down the hall to her right, she snuck down the corridor on the other side of the entranceway's staircase. Mostly hidden by the staircase's shadow was small walkway that, on first glance, seemed to lead to a dead end. Drawing her off-duty gun, Faith followed the passageway several yards and discovered a secondary hallway that extended to the left. She crept down the hall, passing three boarded up doorways before coming to one that was open.
Prepared to shoot, she swung around the doorframe and into the apartment's gutted kitchen. A quick inspection showed no evidence of Bosco or his attacker, so she quickly exited, pausing a just past the doorway to try to quiet her heavy breathing.
Great, she thought as she lowered her gun to her side. Bosco would be proud, Yokas: you went in without backup and against orders. Swersky's going to have your ass nailed to the wall. Aloud, she whispered, "Not after I --"
"Find him" turned into a surprised, muffled shriek as she felt a hand clamp over her mouth and a fist connect with the bend of her elbow. Her gun dropped from her hand and clattered across the linoleum floor. Another hand quickly pressed the cold metal of a knife to Faith's throat.
Instinctively, Faith grabbed at her attacker's arm, trying to pull it away. She leaned back to gain some leverage and felt herself pressed against a decidedly female figure.
"Don't move, don't talk, don't do anything or I swear to God I'll slit your throat, Officer Yokas," the woman warned, dragging Faith back into the very apartment she had declared empty. Faith hadn't noticed the small corridor that veered to the right just inside the doorway, but now she found herself being jostled down it and into a small bedroom.
Faith's eyes quickly adjusted to the room's dim light. In the far corner of the room, she saw him. "Bosco," she breathed, seeing the blood surrounding him.
"I said keep your mouth shut," the woman growled, grabbing Faith again and pressing the knife to her throat. "What don't you understand about that, slut?" Aggravated, she let out a snort of air and shoved Faith toward Bosco.
Faith stumbled and slipped on the blood before clumsily falling to her knees by Bosco. She turned to get a better look at her assailant and her eyes widened as she realized who the woman was. "Audrey." Faith blinked in confusion before refocusing and turning to Bosco. "What did you do to him?" She didn't expect an answer and began searching for Bosco's injury, running her hands over each of Bosco's arms, feeling for the telltale wetness of fresh blood.
When she felt a slight twitch of his right hand, Faith immediately looked to Bosco's face. His eyes were open, just the tiniest bit, and she breathed a small sigh of relief.
"Sorry...to disappoint," he said, his voice barely audible and his breathing labored. He was doing his damnedest not to cry or slip into unconsciousness from the pain. "Not shot...stabbed."
Faith felt tears build up, burning behind her eyes and nose. Quietly, she asked, "Where?"
"Right side." His voice was rough. As he felt her hands search for the wound, he said, "You know her...how?"
"You remember Claire, the domestic dispute with the lamp that hit the RMP?"
Bosco inhaled sharply as Faith's found his stab wound. "There," he managed.
"Okay, okay." She pressed down, trying to stop the bleeding with her hands and quickly realizing she would need a bandage. Looking at her shirt, she knew the material would be too thin to help. She'd have to use a piece of Bosco's shirt. "All right, I need you to put some pressure on it. Can you do that you do that for me, Bos?" She took his hands and pressed them against the wound. She untucked his shirt and tore it into a bandage.
"Now's not the time for that, Faith," Bosco joked. His voice was too tired and strained for it to be funny.
"Bosco--"
"Shut up." Audrey gave Faith's hair a sharp tug, knocking her off balance. "Get over there," she instructed, using a gun--in the dark, Faith couldn't tell if it was hers or Bosco's--to gesture to the opposite corner. "Now I see why you dropped out of college: you're really fucking stupid. When someone with a gun tells you what to do, you listen. So shut the hell up and get over there now."
Faith cast a worried glance at Bosco before looking back to Audrey. She bit her lip, trying to gauge the chances of getting herself shot if she didn't listen right away. Not liking the odds, Faith crawled to the other corner. "They're gonna find us, you know." She directed the words to Audrey but meant them to reassure Bosco.
Audrey's footsteps made no sound as she approached Faith. Audrey crouched next to her, much too close. "I'm counting on it," she whispered, caressing Faith's cheek with the back of her hand. Faith could feel the smooth wedding band against her skin.
"And when they do," Audrey continued, "they'll see your partner bleeding to death, and you..."
The sentence went unfinished and the caress became a firm grip on Faith's jaw.
Faith jerked away. "Why are you doing this?" she demanded.
"Why?" Audrey laughed as though the answer were obvious. "You slept with my wife!"
Faith shook her head. "No," she said. "No, Audrey, I never--"
With a force that belied her size, Audrey hit Faith across the face with the butt of her weapon. "Shut up!" Audrey climbed to her feet and stood over Faith. "Shut up. You screwed my wife fifteen years ago and she never forgot you because of it. I had to live with you for years! Do you know what that's like? And then...and then you just showed up one day and took her away from me, as if I'd ever had her. You took away the one good thing in my life and you...you were so fucking proud of it, you home wrecker."
Faith's head throbbed and her vision swam. Blood gushed from her nose and she could feel it on her fingers, mixing with tears. At best, she would have one hell of a black eye; at worst, her cheekbone was shattered. Either way, it hurt like hell, but she tried to speak through it. "Then why," she began, but had to stop in order to catch her breath. "Why did you hit her if she was your one good thing?"
"She would talk about you all the time," Audrey said, and Faith couldn't tell whether she was being answered or ignored. "She'd talk about the time you went to see Dirty Dancing, the day you met, the month she spent making that painting of you, that, that, that..." Her hand clenched into a fists, nails digging into her palm as she struggled for the words. "Avant-Garde, abstract, impressionist hell! That thing hung in our bedroom every day we were together and it was supposed to be okay because it didn't really look like you. How do you think that made me feel?"
"Like a lousy lay." Bosco's labored voice came from across the room, trying to pull Audrey's attention away from Faith.
Audrey spun to face him. "You're damn right," she snapped, her voice cracking. She pulled herself to her feet and stood so she could see both Bosco and Faith. "You must know," she said to Bosco, a definite challenge to the words. "Is she really that good, Officer? Is she really that unforgettable? You must have screwed her at least once, so tell me, what was it that Claire missed? What am I missing?"
Bosco smiled through his pain. "She's the best," he said, struggling to sit upright. "Like no one else. And believe me, I've been with a lot of women."
Faith would have laughed if her head weren't throbbing. Even with blood pouring from a stab wound, Bosco couldn't pass up an opportunity to brag about how many chicks he'd nailed. It was made the situation feel less out of control.
"She's got this thing she does, you know?" Now he leaned back against the wall, his hands still pressed to his abdomen to slow the bleeding. "But I guess she couldn't do it with another chick." He tried to shrug, but had to stop halfway through the gesture. "I don't know why your old lady kept her around."
Scowling, Audrey turned her back to Bosco and tucked her gun into the waistband of her jeans. She closed the distance separating her and Faith in one stride, and pulled Faith onto her feet. Roughly, she grabbed Faith's face between her hands, her fingers gouging into Faith's still-forming bruises.
Faith's vision faded in and out as the pressure increased, and she couldn't see Audrey drawing closer until it took up almost her entire field of view. Then, almost before she could realize what was about to happen, Faith felt it: Audrey's lips on hers, forceful, demanding. Not at all like Claire.
Audrey slid her left hand down Faith's side, over her hip. Her other hand knotted in Faith's hair, forcing Faith into the kiss as her left hand continued roaming.
Faith felt Audrey's tongue against her lips and saw the opportunity. Her arm slid around Audrey's waist, her hand groping, as she opened her mouth to Audrey. Faith wanted to gag as Audrey's tongue moved past her lips, but she fought it, let Audrey invade her further, until she couldn't stand it. She bit down on Audrey's tongue as she grabbed for the gun.
Audrey jerked back, her hand flying to her mouth. Despite the searing pain, she managed to wrap her tongue around the words, "You bitch!"
Faith spat a mouthful of Audrey's blood onto the floor and trained the gun on Audrey. "Yeah, if I were you, I wouldn't want to say that again." She glanced over her shoulder. "How you doing over there, Bos?"
"Great," he said, and Faith could see the sweat forming on his forehead. "Get me out of here."
"Right. I can do that." She slowly backed toward the door, keeping the gun leveled at Audrey. "Someone!" she yelled, hoping her voice would carry out of the apartment, let alone done the hall. "Help! I found him! He needs to get to the hospital." And so do I, she thought, the pain in her face growing worse with each word she yelled.
She thought she heard a muffled response, but a moan from Audrey made it almost impossible to tell. "Shut up," Faith growled, emphasizing it with a jerk of the gun. She started yelling again. "Hello?" She wished she had her purse. She'd dry swallow half the bottle of Tylenol that was in it. "Someone, help! We've got an officer down in here!"
"Yokas?" It sounded like Davis's voice. "Yokas, where are you?"
"The hall past the staircase, the little opening! We're in the first open apartment." She glanced at Bosco again. He was still sweating, and Faith could see he was getting too weak to keep enough pressure on his wound. "Hang in there, Bosco. They're coming."
"Keep talking," Ty called. "We'll follow your voice."
"Hurry up!" She shut her eyes for a second, trying shift her focus from the pain. "I can't talk much longer; I got hit in the face. And Bosco...Bosco's stabbed, Ty. He's lost a lot of blood."
"Is he conscious?" His voice was getting louder and clearer. He was definitely close.
"I--I think so." She looked toward him. "Bos?"
He tried to wave at her. "Yo," he muttered.
"Yeah, just!" She could hear heavy footsteps by now.
"First apartment?"
"Through the kitchen, to your right." Faith slumped against the wall, still watching Audrey, whose hand was over her mouth and smeared with blood. Faith brought a hand up to her own face, trying to determine if her nose was still bleeding. She was starting to feel lightheaded. Seeing a few drops of blood on the back of her hand, Faith half-laughed. "God, I want to shoot you," she said to Audrey.
"Mutual." The word was barely recognizable. Audrey moved her hand away from her mouth and spat some blood in Faith's direction.
"Faith?" Ty stepped into the room, followed by several other officers and two paramedics. He placed a hand on Faith's shoulder as the paramedics rushed toward Bosco.
"Davis, thank God." She closed her eyes and leaned more of her weight against the wall. Nodding at Audrey, she said, "Either arrest her or let me kill her."
Ty caught Faith as she lost her strength and began to slide down the wall.
---
Faith walked unsteadily down the hospital corridor, one hand against the wall to keep her balance. As she approached Bosco's room, Faith could hear a ballgame on the television and knew he was awake. "Hey," she said, stepping inside.
"Hey." He turned the television off and studied her carefully. " You look like hell."
"Says the man in the hospital bed." She gingerly touched the bruise that covered most of her face. "Hurts like hell, though. Even with the Vicodin." She gripped the bedrail like a lifeline. "Dizzy, too, but that's the drugs."
"And they let you out?" Bosco watched as she shuffled toward the bedside chair and all but collapsed onto it.
She shrugged. "Just some bruising. All they could do was give me some painkillers and send me on my way." Leaning her head back against the wall, Faith closed her eyes to block out the fluorescent lighting. "Bosco, I'm so sorry. I didn't want you to get stabbed."
"No, you wanted me to get shot." He meant for it to be a joke, but he was too quick and too sharp with the retort. Seeing Faith's pained expression, he sighed. "It wasn't your fault, and the doctors say I'll be okay. Don't worry about it." He ran his fingers over the buttons on the remote. "It's probably better you weren't there. It was just supposed to be a suspicious odor, you know? So I went in, looked around, and the next thing I know, I'm bleeding and getting shoved down this hallway. She was hoping I'd be you. That Audrey chick really hates you for screwing her old lady. You must've been something else."
Faith bit her lip, trying not to smile at the memory. "Yeah, what you said about that? About me being good?" She eased herself forward on the chair and rested her forearms on the bedrail, studying Bosco closely.
"About that thing you do?" He smiled at Faith. "I meant it."
"Did you hit your head or something?"
"I just meant as a partner, you know?" Bosco chuckled, though it made the stitches in his side pull. "And, hell, for all I know, maybe you are like that in the sack."
A grin spread across Faith's face as she realized that was the highest compliment Bosco could give her. "Thanks, Bos."
He turned his attention to the remote control, which he rolled over in his hand several times as he thought. "So," he said, not making eye contact, "shot and stabbed. Are we even now?"
"I guess." Faith slid back in her chair. The molded plastic felt like the most comfortable seat in the world. "Until one of us does something stupid again."
Bosco looked up at her, startled. "We're not that bad," he lied, quickly looking away. He knew Faith had seen the lie, but he also knew others were worse than he and Faith could ever be. "Speaking of stupid, what's happening to Audrey?"
"Technically, I think that would be crazy, not stupid." Faith shifted in her seat, resting all her weight on one side as she turned toward the window. "She's going to plead not guilty. Insanity or emotional distress or something."
"Think she'll get convicted?"
"I don't know. Maybe. They're going to have Claire testify, so we'll have to see which story she tells." Faith paused, considering the possibilities. Claire was an unknown, and anything she said could change the outcome. "Perjury never really seemed like her thing, though, so if she was pushed and you were stabbed, I guess it looks pretty good for us."
"She got you, too, Faith." As if he needed to remind her. "How're you holding up?"
"My face hurts," she said, and it wasn't an answer to his question. "Can we not talk?"
"Not talk, or not talk about this?" Only Bosco could manage that particular tone from a hospital bed. "Faith, she--"
"She kissed me, Bosco. It saved both our asses and it's not a big deal. Now, my face hurts, so can we please not talk anymore?" If she waited long enough, she could take another pill and make it home before the pain kicked in again.
Bosco raised his hands in defeat. "Whatever." His hands dropped back to the bed, and he picked up the remote. It was the bottom of the eighth and the Yankees were up by one. It would be a close one, but Bosco knew they could pull it off.
:end: