Good-Night Kiss

A red haze. That's all Abberline could remember of the events of the previous night. He'd been very angry about something, very inebriated, and someone had gotten badly hurt. Aside from a blurry outline dotted with a few vague details, he could recall nothing. He supposed he should thank his blessings.

But then he thought about it a little bit more, almost against his will. He didn't expect his findings to be pleasant. Events which he could not remember due to extreme drunkeness rarely were, and he'd just as soon forget about the whole damn thing and go back to sleep, but he couldn't stand not knowing what had happened. Not this time, especially.

As he sipped the hot, strong tea Godley had prepared for him, it slowly began to seep into place. Pieces began to shift, the smoke began to clear, and for the first time since it had happened, Abberline saw the constable's limp body, sprawled on his back across the floor of his office and covered in black ink from his head to his chest. He looked like a dirty rag doll that had been thrown onto trash bin, for that was exactly what Abberline's office had resembled. Loose papers, glass bottles in varying stages of emptiness, spent matches and cigarette butts littered the floor and all surfaces eye-level or below. He never bothered with tidying the place, and his home looked even worse. Why should he clean when he lived alone? Thus was his reasoning. Godley was the only one who visited him now, and though the man used to try to encourage Abberline to at least clean up after himself, he'd long since given up, and always remembered to take a deep breath of comparitively fresh air before he went through the door.

Abberline stared into the pool of dark liquid in his mug as though he were trying to pull his memories from its depths. He remembered feeling very dizzy and exhausted, and hearing shouting coming from the hallway. It couldn't have been anyone but Godley, for that was who'd been there when he'd awoken that morning. Well, early-afternoon, but that -was- morning to Abberline, if he had anything to say about it. Yes, he must have passed out shortly after he heard the voice and the footsteps outside his office door. That would account for the splitting headache that made his temples throb. That and the excessive drinking he'd done, earlier the previous day. He knew he shouldn't drink so much, or so often, but it was the only thing that helped to numb the pain. He couldn't stand to be sober any more, but he couldn't really afford to be drunk, either. It was killing him, not that he cared.

He sighed and clutched the warm mug in his hands more tightly. Blurred images, loud noises and feelings were what came back to him in large stabbing shards, quite similar the recollections of dreams which haunted him in the night. He bitterly recalled the nights when sleep had brought release instead of the prolonged anguish it delivered, lately.

The fragments of last night that were returning to him were quickly beginning to make him feel ill, so he tried to put the jumbled images and muted voices out of his mind until further notice. He hadn't gotten out of bed yet, so to distract himself, he decided to get up and find Godley. He knew the man was around, somewhere, as it had been he who'd woken him up about an hour or so, before and it wasn't like Godley to leave his friend in such a state. He'd been too disoriented and angry at having been woken up to have thanked the man properly for once again pulling him out of the gutter, so to speak, so he figured that now was as good a time as any. He appreciated all that the older man did for him, yet part of him wished that for once Godley would just leave him to rot. It would certainly be easier on the both of them.

He passed the dusty mirror above his wife's old vanity table as he made to leave the room and scowled at the reflection staring back at him. He looked horrible, but not as horrible as he felt. If it weren't for the stomach-churning images from last night (or perhaps it was just the tea that was upsetting his stomach) that kept popping into his head, he'd go back to bed and stay there until he coudln't stand it any longer. He was used to losing sleep on account of being disturbed. It was The Job, and, more recently, the death of his dear wife and child. But bright sunlight was streaming in through the off-white lace curtains, and he doubted if he'd be able to sleep even if he tried. Might as well talk to his friend.

It didn't take long for Abberline to find Godley. He'd been prepared to pick his way around the books and dirty laundry that littered the staircase and look for him in the living room when there was a low murmur from the spare bedroom...the room that had been intended for his son. He pushed the door open with one hand and nearly spilled his tea down his front when he saw who was inside.

Ichabod Crane lay on the small bed beside the window, bundled up in blankets and propped up by more pillows than Abberline knew he owned. Godley was seated on a chair beside the bed, a damp cloth in his hand. Ichabod's face seemed paler than usual, or perhaps it was only due to the contrast provided by the dark ink stains on the left side of his face. They were faded and purple now, where last night they had been jet black, but though Godley had tried his best, the stains would not be coming out for at least another few days.

"What th' bloody Hell is -he- doin' here??" Abberline growled, confused and outraged that the man he most despised should pollute his home at such a time as this...or at all. The man in the bed gasped and immediately began to tremble at the sound of his accidental host's gruff voice. He looked as though he was about to faint when Godley placed the damp cloth on his forehead and tried to get him to calm down. When he turned to look at Abberline over his shoulder, his expression was stony, his eyes, cold.

"I won't be gone a minute, lad," Godley assured Ichabod, who'd brought the blanket up to his chin with shaking hands. He held it there as though it would protect him from anything wishing him harm. He did not seem to like the idea of his guardian abandoning him, and was even more upset by the sight of Abberline's form darkening the doorway. He was reminded of his father, huge and menacing. He was so frightened that just as Godley laid a firm grip on Abberline's shoulder and dragged him out into the hallway, he fell back into the pile of soft cushions and passed out, cold.

Godley had resisted the urge to grab Abberline by the ear and yank him around by it with some difficulty. He was not at all happy with his young friend, and immediately his repremanding voice, sharpened by years of parenting lovely but slightly rambunctous children, switched on. "I see you've finally decided to get yer arse outta bed."

Abberline said nothing, only frowned down into his cup of tea, which was rapidly becoming more appalling as it grew colder. "Do you have -any- idea what happened last night? Do ye?"

Abberline shook his head of medium brown limp curls and muttered, "Not really, no." He hated being scolded like this even more than he hated his loose grip on the situation, yet for some reason he allowed it. Were anyone else speaking to him in such a condescending manner, he would have surely slugged them in the jaw, or at least attempted to stand up for himself. Godley was the only man whose words held any water for Abberline anymore. Everyone else was just full of hot air. It was probably because Abberline knew that Godley was really the only person in the world to give a rat's ass about him, and that he couldn't afford to lose him over some stupid argument. And there had been many of those, lately. Whatever the cause, he simply stood there like a sullen child, shoulders slumped, eyes downcast and blank.

"Do ye even care te know?" Godley pressed, releasing his grip on Abberline's arm but sustaining the hold he had on the other man with his stern eyes.

"What I want te know is why the fuck that man is in my house," Abberline replied, raising his voice slightly above Godley's and jabbing a finger at the closed door beside him. He would listen to his friend, yes. He would even put up with a bit of scolding, but he wouldn't do it without putting his two cents in.

"Well, shut yer mouth an' I'll tell ye!" Godley spat.

+++

If Abberline had been nauseated before, it had been a mere prelude to the sickness he felt, now. Yesterday's alcohol had mixed with that morning's tea and was threatening to become good friends with the rug. He swallowed the bile bubbling up into his esophagus and swept a cold hand over his flushed brow. Of course everything Godley had told him was true; even if the man had cause to make up such wild stories as the one he'd just heard, he wouldn't dare. His words had brushed the tattered ribbons of Abberline's memories of the night previous and were slowly and painfully being stitched together with the dull needle of grim realisation.

He didn't know what to say. What does one say in a situation such as this? He couldn't just shrug this one off. It was far too heavy. The weight of Godley's eyes on him wasn't helping to lighten the load. The sergent's last few words hung in the air like brittle leaves being blown about, determined not to hit the ground. But soon, everything that goes up must eventually come down...and try though he might, the lump in Abberline's throat was much too persistant. He hadn't liked the old rug much, anyway.

+++

Ichabod awoke with a small gasp. Had he not known any better he would have thought he'd just been dunked in a freezing lake, clothes and all. But he'd awoken drenched in a cold sweat more times than he could count on both hands, and though this was no new experience, the familiarity of it all didn't make it any less disconcerting or unpleasant.

His eyes darted frantically about the room, searching for some explanation why he was where he was...and where was that? He thought to cry out to someone, anyone, if there was even anyone there. He felt alone and tiny, despite the blankets wrapped around him being warm and soft and the room not very big, at all. He took a deep breath and tried to calm his nerves. It worked for a moment, but only that. He was able to stop fretting long enough to grasp a vague idea of where he was, but this discovery didn't do much to comfort him. He would have much rather been in his own bed, in his own home, but he assumed that Sergent Godley hadn't known where that was, and so he'd been brought here, instead.

He was sore all over, as though someone had mistaken his body for a cut of meat that needed tenderizing. But there was another brand of soreness south of the border which was completely unfamiliar to him and thus all the more uncomfortable. He tried desperately not to think about it, but the more he tried not to, the more he did, and the more he did, the more he asked himself "why?" It was no secret that Inspector Fred Abberline hated Ichabod with a passion that never seemed to die...but Ichabod definitely hadn't seen this one coming. He was usually quite clever, always aware of his surroundings, constantly analyzing and questioning (sometimes to a fault), but this...neither man had expected it.

Ichabod sniffled into his blanket and closed his eyes tightly against the images that appeared uninvited, before them, but it was no use. They were burned into the backs of his eyelids and he couldn't escape them, to his dismay. He gave a small muffled cry as the pain in his backside came to a sudden sharp point and gradually decrescendoed into a dull throbbing annoyance. He could have lived his entire life not knowing the sensation of a hard, seven-inch-long object thrusting cruelly into a tiny hole which was meant only to expell waste, not to incur it. He shuddered and his entire body shook. His lower lip wobbled and his nose began to tickle, but he blinked back the tears that threatened to spill down his pallid cheeks. It would have been perfectly acceptable to cry, and no one was watching, but he'd done enough of that in the past twelve hours to last a lifetime. There was no need for more.

Pursing his lips and trying to let his mind drift to more pleasant thoughts (anything was more pleasant than that), he snuggled down into the pillows until he was as comfortable as he could manage and closed his eyes, hoping that Godley would come back, sooner than later, hopefully to take him home.

+++

"Well?" Godley was staring at him expectantly. He hated when the man did that. He was used to being put on the spot by his superiors, but with Godley he was actually compelled to not disappoint.

"Aren't ye at least goin' te apologise?"

But what the hell do you say to someone in this situtation? He asked Godley as much and didn't quite get the reply he'd hoped for.

"How the bleedin' hell should -I- know? Look, Fred, this is not my problem te deal with. Ye should be thankful I got ye out of there when I did or ye may've killed the poor bastard. Had te knock ye upside the head te calm ye down."

"Ye say that as though ye feel sorry about it," Abberline muttered, a half-formed smile tugging lazily at one corner of his dry lips. "Anyway, I wouldn't'a killed 'im," he said, though before that day, he would've said the same thing about raping him. He wasn't so sure that he wouldn't have gone that far, considering, and he could tell by the pregnant silence that his friend shared his opinion but was too considerate to say it.

"What ye did was more'n bad enough. I tried te ask him what happened between you two but he couldn't stop whimpering long enough te get more'n a few words out, at a time."

Abberline winced. For the first time in his life, the thought of Ichabod Crane crying and being his usual pathetic self didn't produce the smug and masculine urge to laugh at him. Instead, it invited the shadow of remorse to creep into his awareness, and he suddenly felt the desire to comfort the boy. He shook his head firmly, trying to dispell this strange and anachronistic urge. It worked, but the usual feeling of satisfaction at making the constable's life miserable remained absent.

He swallowed hard and set his jaw. His fists clenched and unclenched at his sides. He couldn't just ignore the fact that it had happened. Perhaps if he'd intended to do it, if it had been premeditated and malicious he wouldn't have acknowledged it...but it had been an accident. One huge mistake in the midst of many other minor ones. He'd done a lot of stupid things in his lifetime, many of which took place while he was in various levels of a drunken stupor, but this took the cake, the plates -and- the silverware. He'd never done anything to harm another human being as much as this thoughtless, heartless act had done. His wife would have vehemently disapproved. His mostly dormant conscience (which seemed rather partial to taking Lillian's form of late), hadn't seemed to put up much of a fight whenever he and Crane got into one. Physical and verbal abuse had never really been a problem, before. But at the realisation of what he'd done, he began to think along the lines of ever being able to forgive himself, not to mention forgetting the whole thing ever happened. That was seemingly out of the question. And what was worse, it was up to him to do something about it.

Had Ichabod not shown up, nothing would have happened. Abberline probably would have simply drunken himself unconcious in his desk chair and wound up sprawled over his desk, or laying on the floor, with nothing more than a hangover to deal with in the morning. He silently cursed the stupid boy for ever having bothered him, in the first place. But then the rational side of him took over and he wondered where the hell it had buggered off to. He could have really used it, last night.

Suddenly, he became angry that she'd had to die in the first place. That his poor tiny son hadn't even gotten the chance to even fathom the idea of life. That their deaths had such a devastating effect on him. That he was barely half the man he used to be when she was alive. He got angry at everything all at once, letting it build until finally it came bursting out, all at once. Godley had been watching the wheels in Abberline's head turning, and jumped slightly as the rusty machine sparked, sputtered and eventually exploded before him.

"Dammit!" he cursed, slamming his fist ineffectually down onto the bed, beside him. "I know I 'ave te say -something- te him..." he said, more to himself than to Godley, "...but -what-...I can't jus' say ''m sorry' an' be done with it..." He felt ridiculous just thinking about it.

"Lillian would know what to do," he said with a bemused chuckle.

"Aye," Godley agreed, turning his hat between his hands. This startled Abberline, as he hadn't even been aware that he'd spoken the words, aloud. "'A course...if she were still with us, ye wouldn't be in this awful mess te begin with."

Abberline snorted and nodded in agreement. He'd been in nothing but a mess since she'd left him.

Finally, after forcing back the creeping tendrils of memories of his wife, he sighed and stood. "I'll go talk to 'im," he announced, and immediately began rifling around in the drawer of his night table.

"What're ye lookin' fer?" Godley asked, craning his neck to try and see what his friend was doing.

"No' lookin' for; found," he replied a moment later, a small, tarnished metal flask in hand. "Ye didn' 'ones'ly think I'd be able ter do this sober, did ye?"