Chapter Text
I was the only one waiting for you, dark time
from Pablo Neruda's "Appointment with Winter"
The wind erupts on the coast and over takes. Winter seems morose with short, interspersed moments of sunlight, and then the setting of the sun behind the hill crest.
Days are short, and emotional reserves are even shorter.
Beyond the landscape, there is a body, and surveyors. When Hardy returns to the CID, it isn’t to thunderous applause. Instead, people stare and gawk for a moment. His presence still feels unwelcome.
CS Clarke asked him to return to his post when a robbery developed into an assemblage of hidden espionage. A classic “whodunit” mystery that Hardy and Miller were a class act at filing and finishing together. It seems that their minds function like connective tissue. One manages to know how to ask the right questions while the other knows how to answer those exacting questions.
“Didn’t think I could do it on me own.” Miller muttered under breath when Hardy returned to Miller's watery eyes. She isn't quick to admit she missed him, but she did.
“Nah. We work well together. You and me.”
Ellie wasn’t expecting the praise, but nevertheless, she responded with a smile and a nod. Still not handshakes or physical gestures.
Nothing was the same after Danny’s death and then Joe’s acquittal. It was like Broadchurch and everyone near and dear to her had been painfully ruptured open, and she was splintered with it. How long do wounds fester?
She was making a recovery, albeit a slow recovery. Naturally, she worried about her boys and what sort of world she was building for them.
However, things changed.
“Mind if you pick up Fred? Have to pop over and check on dad.” She blushed at the question and the insinuation in the question, and reddened even further when Hardy’s mouth popped open.
He thought about asking about Beth and what sort of role she still played in Miller's life, but that was seemingly forbidden territory.
“I let his school know about you. That, er, you can pick him.” Miller quickly spelled out, in case that wasn't spelled out for him.
“What should I do with him?”
Oh, that sounded rich coming from Hardy.
“Bloody take him to my house! I’ll be there! You—“ she huffed, her voice a few notes lower in timber and expression. “Knob,” she added for good measure.
These familial habits then became customary wherein Hardy found himself running an errand for Miller or, previously on occasion and now more habitually, Miller popped around his with take out or a coffee.
Talk spread as Hardy's Volkswagen was often spotted in line at Fred's school or Hardy stood sidelined at one of Tom's football games. Fred dashed to the car, chittering away about his day, and Hardy learned what to stow away in his vehicle for Tom's football games. He quickly learned the rules of the game, when to clap, and that it was okay to strip himself of his blazer once the oppression of winter was fading.
“You know I can’t have that,” once referring to the coffee on a well-lit sunny day.
“I got you decaf.”
He noticed remnants of her around his home. A mug. A favorite pen that Miller occasionally chewed on when she was anxiously thinking. A worn out jumper that she had left at his place. A pair of shoes.
Gradually, painstakingly, he wondered when they invaded one another's lives. Like calamitous planets colliding.
He looked around his home and saw Miller there. He wondered if she saw him at her home, too.
It is time the stone made an effort to flower
time unrest had a beating heart
from Paul Celan's "Corona"
The date with Zoe wasn’t a regrettable interaction, Hardy reasoned. In fact, despite his social discomfort, it felt worthwhile to take this major milestone in his life.
Or so he reasoned.
The heightened revelation came that there wouldn’t be another date, so he softened his finger against the touch screen phone and deleted the app. Bloody twitter, bloody tinder, bloody world, after all. Why bother dating when he could barely interact with people in the so-called archaic sense of his understanding?
It was all-too much to ask of himself to look someone in the eyes and respond to said person in a sensible, thoughtful manner. What he had learned is that, ultimately, people are unknowable. That under layings of the human psyche and reservoir, humans hide their deepest, darkest secrets, and perhaps, he didn't want to get to know these ghastly revelations.
Understandably, Daisy wanted to know how the date went, but worse, he ran into Miller who just so happened to be out strolling the streets in the dead of night when rapists were on the loose.
Miller, he thought, shutting the door to his home, was the last person he wanted to discuss his insubstantial love life with. He was about to give her a long lecture on her behavior, walking the nighttime streets of Broadchurch, but he couldn’t help staring at her.
Her curls were coiled and drawn back with a hair elastic. Her orange anorak was particularly bright and terrible.
Hardy surveyed Miller for a moment; Zoe was beautiful in the conventional sense, but Miller— was something else.
When the silent one comes and beheads the tulips:
Who wins?
Who loses?
Who walks to the window?
Who’s the first to speak her name?
from Paul Celan's "Chanson of a Lady in the Shade"
Spring emotes love sickness when Miller asked Hardy for a drink at the pub, and almost on autopilot, he said no. Miller refused dejection; it was often customary for colleagues to grab a pint after a strenuous case as a sort of build up to camaraderie. So, Miller persisted, and Hardy resisted. Several times, she asked, and several more times he responded with a firm, “no.”
“Ach, Miller, how many times do I have to tell you?” He wheeled his chair around from his monitor to face her. On occasion, his "nos" were jovial, and at other times the creases in his eyes begged frustration or annoyance.
Hurt isn't decorating her face. More like confusion.
“Fine.” She returns his definitive answer with pursed lips, sealed shut together in a knowable way. A way of frustration that he recognizes.
Hardy is a scholarly, astute detective, knowing where to look and how to ask questions, but in the ways of women, he would fail that course repeatedly.
For her part, Miller respects the distance with additional barriers of her own. Barriers that eventually rattle and confuse Hardy.
She appeases him and doesn’t ask again. Instead, he finds out from word of mouth, a tripping of the tongue, that the CID crew go out together, but when everyone else calls him “Shitface,” Miller abstains.
I
Life forges on, and Hardy and Miller drive the back country roads together, interviewing a swath of farmers. These types of petty crimes-- livestock and tractor thievery-- are conventional for the region. Hardy doesn't hate it, but it feels pedantic.
Miller is kind and cordial, albeit drawn into herself. She knows how to smile on cue.
During one such drive, meandering through the byroads, Miller asked him if misses Scotland. Hardy is quiet, thinking about how best to answer Miller's invasive question.
“There’s nothing left for me there.”
They drive in peace from one point to another, Miller learning to embrace the silence.
I
July, the peak tourist season in Broadchurch, arrives with its own upheaval of torments. It is unusually hot, and the lines for 99s are expansive, and the beaches are enveloped with a multitude of rainbow colored umbrellas.
Hardy is walking the pier, dressed in his drab wrinkled suit, hands dipped deep inside his pockets when he scouts her. Sweat and heat clings to his body underneath his clothing.
He’s not sure he’s ever seen Miller in a dress, and this is a green sundress with capped sleeves and buttons that show an appropriate amount of skin.
She’s wearing brown leather sandals, too, with polish on her toes. New adornments that Hardy has never seen ornamenting Miller.
Her hair catches the bit of forlorn wind off the sea coast that ebbs and flows. The boys are with her, Fred holding her hand, and Tom apparently with some friends.
It’s a wonder Miller doesn’t see Hardy gawking at her, his eyes wide and open.
Hardy knows Miller is beautiful, but when the sun encapsulates her in that singular moment, he reluctantly wishes he had taken her up on that drink. His stomach twists into a coiled knot with reluctance and desire. Want and yearning long since buried deep inside of him.
It's at this present moment, Hardy's eyes on Miller, that he notices a tall man with a textured haircut come alongside Miller and give a quick peck on her lips. She smiles at the man, aware of Tom and Fred's presence, before she kisses this mystery man again. Hardy’s stomach sinks all the way to what feels like the pier pavement.
My love was infinite, if spring make’ it more
from John Donne's "Love's Growth"
Shielded inside his home, Hardy breathes a long held sigh of relief. Thankfully, or perhaps regrettably, Daisy is with Tess all weekend so Hardy feels the familiar tug of work. He pulls out stacks of files, fielding them across his dinner table.
But, his mind wanders towards images of Miller.
Cerebral synapses flash of Miller in her sundress reel through his mind’s eyes. In his mind, Miller's smile shines a bit brighter. Her rowdy mouth, obnoxious in everyday occurrences, doesn't irk him as much. He shuts his eyes tight, trying to focus on the case at hand. It's a simple "whodunit" farm case, but nothing to peak his interest minus the fact that it is his job.
He gets up, grabs his mac, and heads out the door for a walk. Not that he needs his mac; it's a scorching 32 degrees out.
"Miller, what have you done to me?" He chides just loud enough as a reprimand more to himself than any esoteric Miller.
He walks hard and fast, letting his feet sink into the earth. The sensation roots him to the ground, just as the weight beds him to a sense of reality.
Miller is moving him on, just as he ought to, too. He reminds himself that he hasn't been picking Fred up from carpool, and Miller hasn't asked him to attend any of Tom's games. Perhaps these are coincidences-- he picks up his gait, his long, lean legs shaking under the weight of physical and mental labor-- but then again, perhaps this relationship is serious.
So many "maybes" that he can't keep up.
He doesn't walk in the direction of the pier. That would be silly. Istead, he walks towards the dunes, his mac whipping about his long body.
I
Ellie didn't notice Hardy on the pier during their first major family outing with John, but Fred tugs on his mum’s hand, insisting that Uncle Alec was at the pier getting a 99. When Ellie had looked around, her best friend was nowhere in sight.
It was for the best, she mentally tells herself, ignoring the ache in the pit of her stomach that has become all-too familiar for her to ignore.
Best mate, she chides herself, settling on the sofa. Was the progression of their relationship ever beyond work colleagues? What a painful topic of conversation in therapy, she reminds herself.
For a moment, Ellie’s heart seems to perform metaphorical somersaults, or to think of it in terms of medical care, the poor organ is racing in her chest cavity. Hope, she was envisioned, although she wouldn't allow herself to envision Hardy in a position he couldn't be. When he rejected her evening out at the pub, she knew she had to move on despite her personal hangups.
John smiles at her, walking in from the kitchen, presenting four glasses of what appear to be lemonade. Besides, she reasons with herself, repositioning herself so she can help John with the glasses; she's quite happy with this new fella in her life.
“Mum,” Tom whispers. He isn’t squeamish about John, per se, but about his mom snogging anyone, especially in public. Tom glances at his friend Sean who doesn’t seem to care one way or another.
It's only been recently that John, Ellie's partner, has gone out on family outings with them. There was lunch, which went about as well as she could imagine, and now a walk to get 99s at the pier.
Never mind the sleepovers. Ellie expected a skirmish with Tom, and a disagreement she did get.
Tom is only thirteen, Ellie must remind herself, and there are realities that no child wants to face about their parents. When Tom explodes, and Ellie internally counts to ten, she reminds herself that Tom is dealing with other hang ups that other teenagers don't deal with. A murderer-paedophile for a father, for example.
Even poor, tender-hearted Fred has been different, insisting he sleep in mum’s big bed. A new, frequent development when Ellie and her new partner are beginning to become intimate, and they hear a tiny, uncertain knock at the door. Fred is quite insistent that he sleep cozied up to his mum, arms firmly wrapped around her middle, too.
John has been great about these insecurities in her boys. A widower with two grown children, he insists he understands, although Ellie is mistrustful. Why, she can't explain to herself, even in therapy sessions where her therapist reminds her that Ellie's behavior is perfectly normal.
But, but, but, Ellie becomes inflamed. "I don't want this to be normal!"
That's the thing isn't it?!
When Fred insisted he saw Uncle Hardy, and attempted to drag her across the pier, she wondered if it would be different with him.
And she doesn't just want to just disengage and return to Hardy, which is her modus operandi. Hardy is a known presence, and Hardy is safe-- she hates this, she reflects in a hasty bout of frustration and anger with herself.
John is good in bed; patient and understanding. His hand reaches to clasp for hers, but in those interludes, flashes of another face reel through her mind, and insipid anger bubbles up.
"Ellie," John pauses.
Ellie gasps, hoping to play off the red blotches of anxiety blooming across her chest and face. She reaches up to kiss him, hoping that these sensations will bypass and this moment can continue. Hoping that her brain and body will forget about Hardy, and that this world she is curating for herself will continue on.
I
Monday rolls in and brings with it a blustery summer storm that forms off the coast. Foul moods operate at high volumes in the office that day like the electric charge in the air. Hardy is in the kitchenette, and Miller corners him with a question about his whereabouts.
“Freddie thought you were at the pier this weekend.”
Hardy unmistakably begins to sweat, although he tries to keep his cool. He can always blame the weather for the beads of sweat dappling his forehead.
“Might have been.” There is no point lying.
"What were you doing at the pier?"
"What were you doing at the pier?" Hardy begins to wonder why he is nervous. This is Miller, for christ's sake.
"I asked first." She stirs her cuppa with a spoon that has seen better days.
"I was out for a walk. Getting a bit of fresh air. You?"
"Out with my family." Miller is thinking, and Hardy can tell. Silent interludes have developed between the two of them over the years, and both have come to recognize these patches of thought. "I met someone."
Hardy isn't necessarily taken aback that Miller told him; they have a history of friendly intimacy. At least, from his perspective, they do.
"The boys are struggling with him. Tom is, at least. Not sure Freddie likes him too much. He keeps asking about Uncle Alec." Miller awkwardly laughs at this, and Hardy worries that Miller is about to cry.
"Is he--"
"John's been great with the boys. He has two daughters. They're away at uni. But-- I don't really feel anything for him." She anxiously looks away, tears now forming in her eyes. "I think I've been prolonging the inevitable. He's such a good bloke. But the boys--"
Hardy nods, his throat suddenly tight, his stomach obliterated. He wants to touch her hand or her arm or her shoulder. Anything to show signs of comfort.
"Want me to pick up Fred after school?"
She quickly rubs the tears away from her eyes. "Would you?"
He nods before Miler clears her throat and quickly steps out of the kitchenette. Just then, an onslaught of rain batters the kitchen window.