Interlude

[ravenless]

Fandom: Succession
Pairing: Roman Roy/Gerri Kellman
Rating: Teen
Words: 278
Crossposts: AO3

“I’m uh, I’m pretty sad.”

“Uh-huh,” She doesn’t look at him.

“I mean, I’m actually, right now, totally numb, but theoretically you would say that I’m—yeah—that I’m sad.”

Gerri keeps her eyes on his shoes. “Roman, I’m sorry for y—I’m sorry.”

Two seconds. Three. Four. Not a full breath from either of them.

“I still think,” Roman empties his lungs with a small whimper, “some piece of shit on that plane is gonna call and tell us he made it, and that he’s—he’s getting up and asking for a fucking Scotch. Fuck, I don’t know. I just didn’t-” he wrings his hands, puts them on his hips, over his eyes, through his hair.

“Yeah.” She really has no choice but to look up now, but when she glances at him, his eyes are closed. They’re teetering dangerously on the edge of something Gerri cannot let them plummet into now.

Stiffly, she puts her shoes back on and stands up. At the same time, Roman takes a step forward, then a nervous half step back. He’s open and red-eyed. She aches. Some terrible, self-destructive part of her wants to take him into her arms. She settles for a hand on his bicep.

“We’ll talk later?”

“Yeah,” He chokes on it, looking down. One tear hits the carpet, gunshot-loud.

“Well,” Her throat burns, “the room’s all yours.”

She gives his arm another little touch as she brushes past, tries to fill that second of contact with every single thing she can’t say. He turns around, reaching for her. His fingers just barely graze her sleeve, but it feels like come back, it feels like I’m sorry.