Fiction: Moving

[kethni]

Name: Moving
Pairing: Matt/Sandra, mentions of Matt/Mohinder
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: Reference to rape
Note: Testing series



Wake up shaking and sweating, alarm blaring. Turn off the alarm, get up, check on Molly, check the doors and windows. Okay, all good. Shower, dress, wake Molly, duck, make breakfast. Check the doors and windows.

Molly isn’t talking to me again. Okay, well, it’s nothing personal. It’s not a judgement on me. She’ll get over it. It’s time, that’s all, it’s just time.

“Don’t forget we have an appointment this afternoon.”

She rolls her eyes and looks at me over her cereal.

“You promised the therapist you’d work on talking to me, Molly,” I say quietly.

“I hate him.”

“You hate everyone,” I suggest.

“Why do you hate Mohinder?” she asks quietly, stabbing her spoon down into her bowl.

I catch her hand and she glares at me. “I don’t hate Mohinder. It’s not my fault he can’t come home.”

She yanks her hand free and stands up. “You could make them let him come home.”

“It doesn’t work that way,” I say, following her out of the door. “Look at me.”

Molly yanks on her jacket and picks up her bag. “You could make it.”



She scowls all the way to school.

“The wind will change and your face will stick like that.”

“We’re inside the car,” she says looking at me like I’m an idiot. “There’s no wind.”

“I can wind down the windows,” I suggest.

Molly tries not to smile but she can’t quite make it.

“Don’t be late, okay?” I say. “After therapy we can go for waffles.”

“With ice cream,” she says firmly.

“Only if you’re nice to me,” I say winking at her.

“If strange men offer me goodies so I’ll be nice, I’m supposed to tell a teacher,” she says with a smirk.

“Smart ass.”



Another day, another bite of my soul, or what’s left of it. They keep telling me that Primatech’s different; it’s warmer, fuzzier, friendlier. With Angela Petrelli in charge? Yeah right.

I have an office, which is nice I guess. Depressing though. I was supposed to be full detective by now; a proper detective working cases, didn’t even have to be homicide, and going home to Janice and a parcel of kids. I wasn’t supposed to be waking up every two hours or... stop it. Stop it. Not helpful, not healthy, move on.



Coffee, coffee, coffee. Must have coffee. Check the windows, lock the door behind me. I still can’t believe they have coffee machines here. What the hell kind of evil, secret organisation is this anyway? Surely there should be... I don’t know, ninja coffee-making assistants or something.

There’s a woman by the coffee machines, trying to pick up the contents of her bag. All ash blonde curls and long flowing clothes. Kind of bohemian sort of look but classy.

“Hey, let me help you,” I offer, bending down.

“Oh, thank you, I swear I didn’t put half these things in my bag!” she laughs.

She has a soft, southern accent and is pretty but in the normal way with little crinkles at the corners of her eyes as she smiles and laughter lines around her mouth.

“Mrs Bennet, right?”

“Sandra, please,” she says, standing up. I wait for the slap, or worse, but she just hikes her huge bag onto her shoulder and looks at me thoughtfully.

“Matt Parkman,” I stammer. “I uh...”

“I know who you are,” she says with a nod. “Believe it or not I don’t get taken hostage by that many people.” She smiles at me thoughtfully. “Noah explained, and then Claire told me the truth.” We both laugh a little at that.

“Are you looking for him? If he’s not in his office I can maybe find him for you?” I offer.

She shakes her head, and pushes the hair back off her face. “I just saw him. Hey, you know what you could do for me?”

She saw him and he’s let her wander around rather than walk her out of the facility? The man’s a liar, a kidnapper, and a manipulator but I never figured him for bad manners.

“No, but I’d like to.”

Am I flirting with Bennet’s wife? I must have a death wish.

Must remember to pick up something nice for lunch.

She takes my arm and the sudden contact makes me tense. Stupid, stupid, relax, just relax. She’s hardly a threat is she?

“Take me somewhere with some real coffee?” she suggests.

“It’d be my pleasure, Sandra.”



I manage to get us a table away from the windows and the door. No non-fat, skim-milk, decaffeinated fake coffee for Mrs Bennet; she gets a huge mug of hot chocolate with marshmallows, whipped cream, and a chocolate flake. Wow. That is a thing of beauty.

“I must admit I’m a little surprised to see you at Primatech,” she admits, taking a sip of her drink. “They kidnapped you, twice right? Experimented...”

- Hiding in the bathroom with Daphne. Eyes closed and trying to think of anything, anything but him. She’s whispering softly and touching me gently and all I can see is his face, smell his sweat and come on my skin.

“Mr Parkman, are you alright?” Sandra asks, her hand resting gently on top of mine.

“I... sorry.” I scrabble in my pockets for the bottle. Two little blue pills that I don’t take as often as I’m supposed to. “I’m good, I’m good.”

“Uh, huh,” she says dubiously. “That would be ‘good’ in the meaning of ‘very, very bad’ would it?”

“You can call me Matt,” I say, dry swallowing the pills and picking up my coffee.

“Did I say something wrong?”

I shake my head. “Bennet... your husband didn’t tell you?”

She sits back and sips her hot chocolate. “Noah and I mostly talk through our lawyers now. I was just at Primatech to drop off the last of his things.”

I feel myself gaping at her. “You’re... really?”

She smiles and shrugs. “I’m surprised you hadn’t heard. I imagine Noah showing some sign of vulnerability is quite the hot topic of gossip.”

I’d have thought it was one of the signs of the apocalypse.

“It probably is,” I admit. “I’m not really... I keep to myself mostly. I’m really sorry.”

“About Noah and me?” she asks. “Don’t be. Things happen, people change.” She smiles at my expression. “No, not him, me. He’s exactly the same as he ever was and I guess that’s the problem. I am too old and too ugly to be lied to and manipulated by someone who thinks I’m made of porcelain.”

“Old and ugly?” I ask bemused. “Not two words that spring to mind.”

“Oh I feel old,” she says. “Some days I feel about a hundred years old.” She pushes her hair out of her face. “I am not a spring chicken or a supermodel and that’s a cold hard fact.” She pulls the flake out of the hot chocolate and sucks it. “But who the hell wants to be twenty anyway? My god, when I was twenty I was miserable!” She leans forward and lowers her voice. “And I could not get laid for love or money!”

I’m laughing so much I have to put my coffee down.

“What do you think, Matt? A couple of wrinkles and a little less bounce is worth being a hell of a lot less stupid and a lot happier. Don’t you think?”

“Oh absolutely,” I say honestly. “Are you happier?”

“Honestly? Most of the time I am happier. I miss Noah; I’d be lying if I said otherwise. But I realised that he always treated me like... a child, not like a partner or an equal.” She frowns and takes a sip of hot chocolate. “It took me a long time to realise that I didn’t have to be that.”

- You’re dead weight; entirely incapable of caring for yourself in any meaningful fashion.

I shift on my chair. “People try to make into some image they have in their head. But...but it’s nothing to do with you. They don’t even see you, just see the fantasy in their mind,” I say quietly.

“Yeah, yeah I get that,” she agrees, looking at me like she can read my mind.

“How come you’re talking to me?” I ask. “I took your family hostage, I shot your daughter. God, you must hate me.”

She sighs and shrugs. “I won’t lie and say I couldn’t have happily knocked your damn fool head off your shoulders.” She bites her lower lip. “But you were desperate and panicking. People do stupid, stupid things when they’re desperate.” She reaches forward and pats my hand. “Also, those flowers you sent were absolutely gorgeous. So come on, I’ve told you all about me. How the heck did you end up working at Primatech after everything they did?”

I look away and shrug. “I need the money. I got canned and beside I’m not really in a fit state to find regular work.”

“My little sister takes those little blue pills,” she says after a couple of seconds. “She was in a bank robbery a few years ago. She still has nightmares about it.”

“They’re for anxiety,” I say, looking back at her. “I was attacked.”

There’s this expression people get when they know, when they realise, and she has it. People aren’t normally that quick on the uptake.

“Primatech know?”

I snort and nod. “Oh yeah, under their auspices. Mohinder Suresh... he tested this serum on himself. He was already a little... unbalanced I guess, and the serum completely pushed him over the edge.” I pull myself together. “But uh, I got away, and they gave him an antidote.” I jerk a thumb vaguely in the direction of the Primatech building. “He’s in a terrible state, knowing what he did.”

Sandra moves her chair closer. People don’t do that. “My god, and he’s running around at Primatech?”

“No, he’s in a huh, a padded cell. He was trying to get people to help him kill himself.”

She raises her eyebrows. “You’ve seen him since it happened?”

“Yeah, the first time because I needed to. I needed to look him in the face.” I play with my cup. “Does that make sense?”

“Oh lord, yes,” she says, patting my hand. “I’m talking to you aren’t I?”

I can’t help but laugh at that. “Yeah, you are. I really appreciate it.”

“It’s not the same,” she says with a shrug. “What you did wasn’t the same as what he did. I’d rather have a gun waved in my face any day.”

“I threatened your kids,” I say quietly. “If someone threatened Molly I don’t know what I’d do.”

She nods. “Yeah. When you shot Claire, I think you took twenty years off me. If she’d been really dead you wouldn’t have got out of there alive.”

“I have absolutely no doubt about that.”

“Can I ask why you went back after you saw him the first time?” she asks mildly. “I don’t think I couldn’t done that.”

I didn’t even think about it. “I don’t know. He was just so... damaged and hopeless.” I play with my cup. “What happened didn’t just happen to me, it happened to him too.” She looking at intently, listening closely. “It wasn’t just... it wasn’t a thing and then done. They had me in a lab for a couple of days while he... a couple of days. It does things to you. It did things to him. Other people wouldn’t understand.”

Sandra brushes a lock of hair behind her ear. “You said he’s in a bad way?”

“He remembers what happened. He can’t seem to get himself clear of it,” I explain. “It cheers him up when I visit though.”

“I can’t even imagine what it must’ve been like for you, or for him.” She rests her hand on top of mine. “I doubt there are many as brave as you are.”

“Who, me? No, no.” Geez, I’ve just been going on and on. “Wow, I’m sorry. I’ve just been talking about myself. How are your kids dealing with the divorce?”

She laughs and shakes her head. “Better than we are. Claire’s... well she’s a teenager. They think they know everything.” She rolls her eyes. “Excuse me, they know that they know everything.”

“I hated being a teenager,” I admit. “You?”

She tilts her head and rests her chin on her fist. “I adored being a teenager. Concerts, boys, the freedom, the excitement.” Sandra smiles and twists a lock of hair around her finger. “To be honest I had a happy childhood and mostly a happy marriage.” She shrugs. “I had a completely boring, completely normal life right up until I met Noah.”

“Well thank god he rescued you from that that, right?”

Sandra tosses back her head and laughs lightly. “Oh thank god!” she agrees. “You were married weren’t you?”

“Yeah, yeah to Janice.” I shrug. “I could blame all of it on this.” I tap my forehead. “But that wouldn’t be true. Things had been bad for a while. It was just the tin lid.”

She gives me a sad smile. “It wasn’t till I started divorce proceedings that I realised just how hard it is. Such a huge part of my life, you know?”

“It feels like a failure. Like you invested so much of your life and now it’s all down the toilet.”

“That’s it,” she agrees. “That’s it exactly. She plays with her cup. “When did you to start dating again?”

“Me? Oh, never?” I shrug. “I was never that... that guy. The charismatic, suave guy beating women off with sticks.”

“Oh stop,” she says rolling her eyes. “You’re a good looking guy.” She tilts her head and looks me up and down. “I would.”

Blushing, very mature Matt. After everything, a woman flirts and I start blushing. “I’m not sure that I’m ready for a relationship. I do... I want... you know... but I don’t think I can cope with anything serious.”

Sandra leans forwards and lowers her voice. “Can I say something completely shocking, Matt?”

“Absolutely,” I whisper back.

“Do you want to go back to my hotel room and... see what happens?” She waggles her eyebrows at me. “We can get pizza on the way.”

“I’d... I’d like that.”