Continued from here.
The transformation taking place in front of his eyes lasts less than a couple of seconds. One moment, Gordon is looking almost fragile, the next, his expression has shut down and he’s gripping the edge of the table with steel in his gaze.
Albert flinches automatically, his fork clanging against the plate. Feels the nervous tension in his gut solidify as Gordon starts to speak. His one, admittedly feeble hope - that Gordon would come back on his threat from last night, would acknowledge Albert’s pain and admit he’d gone too far - shattered against the raw edge of the man’s anger. A united front. It would be hysterical if it wasn’t so damn pathetic, and the thought that Gordon is looking at him to resolve this, is expecting some kind of capitulation or confession or whatever else it will take to placate him now, is enough to make the last remaining shred of his composure fall away.
At some level, he’s aware of Gordon’s eyes on him, but he’s no longer even sure if Gordon is still talking through the persistent ringing in his ears. He blinks down at his barely touched breakfast plate, bile flooding his throat at the sight, and for a moment, he’s horrifyingly certain he’s about to lose what little he put in his stomach just now.
He gets up, slamming his knee against the table, swallowing a curse as he backs away. Wonders if Gordon can see the despair in his face. “Tell Tammy -” He shudders. “Tell her whatever. Tell her I overslept. I - can’t - do this right now.” Blindly, he turns his back on Gordon, realizing he has no idea where to go. Back to his own room would take too long. Bathroom? Too cramped. Street? No privacy. Hotel courtyard then, if he can remember how to get there - but everything feels strangely muted, and his breathing’s all wrong, and… There. Set of double doors at the back of the breakfast room, down a long corridor, through another door, and he’s outside, bursting out into the daylight. There’s a bench a couple of yards away, and he stumbles towards it like a drunkard, hoping to God there’s no one else here to see.
His gut twists and he sits down, head between his knees, but nothing happens except for a weak, strangled heave. His chest hurts and he can’t get enough air, but he presses his palm against his ribcage, trying to focus on breathing. Knowing, at some level, that what he feels is irrational, but still struggling to get his body to take that cue. He couldn’t name the last time he had a panic attack in his life - only that he had them in the months after they lost Cooper - but it’s just as ugly and shameful as he remembers it to be.
God, Cooper… His Cooper, the Cooper he knew, still lost in who knows what nightmare, and who can say if they’re any closer to finding him than they were twenty-five years ago. Only now Albert has hope again - flimsy, feeble and probably false as it is - and it’s killing him breath by painful breath.
This time, he’s not even surprised when the waterworks start. He still fights it, more out of reflex than anything else, elbows on his knees and a fist pressed against his mouth while he tries to keep his shoulders from shaking. Not that it matters. He’s alone, anyway - just like he’s been from the start.
@paydlrt
Albert bumps the table as he stands up, sending silverware clanging loudly against ceramic dishes and a glass to shatter on the floor, and shoving a sonic knife through Gordon’s brain.
“God damn it Albert–What the hell–!!”
He cringes and yelps in pain, his hand jumping for the dials to turn down his volume device as his hearing aids throw feedback into his ear drums. By the time he’s regained enough control to look back up, Gordon has officially lost all patience with this insubordination, but Albert is already on his way out, having just excused himself for the rest of the day from their work like that was something he could just decide for himself without Gordon’s permission just because he was upset–like HELL Albert was going to think he could just drop his duty to this case and skip on this Hastings business–he wasn’t going to accommodate this self-pity any longer when they had work to do, if Albert didn’t want to work with him on this, then he won’t work on it at all–
Gordon pulls his napkin off his lap, throws it onto the table, gets up, barks unnecessarily at the waitstaff that they weren’t to touch a DAMN thing on that table until he came back–walks out of the breakfast room, rubbing painfully at his ears–looks to his left, and sees Albert disappearing into the courtyard down the hallway. He grabs his cell phone out of his pocket, and dials Tammy’s number, smoothing his hair over in agitation with his free hand while he waited for Tammy to pick up the damn phone–
“TAMMY, ALBERT AND I ARE GOING TO BE LATER THAN EXPECTED! GET STARTED ON THE BRIEFING!” A brief pause and then he cuts her off. “YES, EVERYTHING’S FINE! WE’LL BE THERE IN A BIT!” He barks at her, with enough force that he’ll regret it later, and then hangs up and follows Albert out into the courtyard, about ready call his own bluff and make good on his threat to take Albert off the case–
But what he sees stops him in his tracks immediately–Albert with his head bowed between his legs, shaking and weeping on the bench alone across the garden. Gordon blinks, trying to process what he was seeing, and finally realizing there was no self-pity here. It was nothing but brokenness.
His anger softens almost immediately into something protective and tender and reaching. There’s a part of Gordon that still feels responsible for Albert, despite how much their relationship has changed since when he had first taken him as his (resistant) protege over 30 years ago–despite the fact that Albert seemed to act these days like he was the one responsible for Gordon. That sense of mutual responsibility was something Gordon had leaned into without even realizing it–without knowing how much he needed it when it first arose between them, after Jeffries and Chet and Cooper were lost, after everything in Blue Rose had fallen apart in his hands in that span of just a few years. When exactly it had appeared was uncertain–sometime after Cooper disappeared–but it had entered their relationship so slowly and gradually that the change had almost been unnoticeable, until Gordon woke up one day and realized he saw Albert like an equal. Like a partner. Like the first person he felt he could truly trust with his life’s work since Jeffries. Like they were… responsible for each other.
He’s seen Albert rage and storm, but he’s never seen him cry. Never seen him broken like this with his own eyes, even after Cooper disappeared. Gordon knew Albert had taken that loss in devastation, but it was not something that Albert had ever allowed him to see, or even something they had ever really talked about, partially out of their mutual desire for emotional privacy from each other. Compartmentalization, but also just professional boundaries, as Gordon had been very much his superior at that point in their lives. Now, Albert was his subordinate only on paper, and Gordon had assumed Albert had understood that it was just paper. That he needed Albert in this. That lying to him for so long was not just a jeopardizing of the Blue Rose, it was a severe breach of trust, both professional and personal. And that it was, on that personal level, something that defied compartmentalization because it was so completely, unfathomably, intolerable.
He feels like he should still be angry. That Albert’s behavior, for so many reasons, some personal, some professional, some literally an issue of national security, cannot and should not be excused. But watching Albert break like this…
“Albert… ” He says softly to himself sadly, as he watches him from across the courtyard for a long moment, rooted in place and still holding the door open.
Finally he looks down, fiddles with his hearing device to turn up the volume again, and then walks over slowly to stand in front of Albert. Looking down at Albert, his arms hanging down loosely at his sides and his shoulders at a slight slouch, he looks very tired, and very… old, and nothing like human blizzard that had just forced a grown man–no, not just any grown man, but Albert Rosenfield–to go cry alone in a hotel courtyard.
“Albert…” He says again quietly, regretfully, shaking his head back and forth slightly, feeling so responsible for Albert that his heart aches.
I’m worried about you. I’m worried about Coop.
“Albert…” He puts a soft hand on Albert’s shoulder once again. He wants to know that Albert still feels responsible for him, too. Even if Albert made a mistake that was so massive and obvious and stupid that it felt like it could only be adequately explained as betrayal. Even if he lied.
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