Tim Bradford, Lucy Chen: S4 Moments

Moment 11

Tim POV

He did not want to be there. Understatement of the year. It was fucking killing him to be there. He was screaming at himself. Get the hell out of here! He was beyond pissed. He was angry. He was so many words that he didn't know which one to start with. So he didn't.  He never had. What was the point of getting loose now? 

Do it for Genny.

Pretend it's just a random construction job. So he walks in, spewing off information he gleaned from Nolan. Before he can even realize it, demo-talk turns to a reminiscing between Chen and Genny. He just cannot deal. He knows he'll get angry if they push it. He does not want another close call to a blind rage episode as he had earlier in the week. So he cuts them off. 

"No more reminiscing. This is about fixing up the house and selling it. That's it." 

No more bringing up memories that remind me of other things that I don't want to remember. This is about fixing up this house of horrors and throwing it to the first ignorant buyer we can beguile. That's it, is what he really meant. He could feel Chen giving him that look. He couldn't quite pin it down. It was a mix of confusion, pity, and definitely judgment. Of course, she wanted him to get over it. She was still so innocent sometimes. He couldn't hate her for that. He just thought that with all her annoying-ass psychology shit, she would be able to somewhat understand why he couldn't. To actually understand, he knew, she would have to face the monster himself. It wasn't anything he'd wish upon his worst enemy. 

For once, he couldn't stand the silence. He needed there to be some sort of power tool running, some sort of tool smashing in a wall. If it got quiet, even for a second, the horror started raging in his head again. 

Even Chen talking was better. Thank goodness she seemed to have grasped enough sense to stay away from words like "closure." 

Then he found the gun. 

Lucy POV

She knew she was pushing it. She had been pushing it since the moment she had begun talking with Genny. Well, technically, she had been pushing it from her first rookie day. But she'd been pushing a whole new line in a whole new territory. Tim's personal life. She couldn't help wanting them both to hopefully gain something from the whole process. But he clearly wasn't having any of it. He shut down anything that wasn't related to the renovation process. 

He was jumpy. And among other things, completely out of character. She would catch him zoning out on parts of the home. Upon her own personal inspection, there would be obvious damage done to the area. It didn't take any effort to realize that this was just another spot that he had been slammed against. He'd catch her staring, grunt out, "what?" then turn and refocus his attention on whatever he was tearing down. It truly horrified her as the number of these occurrences increased. It had happened close to 20 times? And that was literally just in the kitchen. 

She was still holding onto the foolish hope that this would help both him and Genny. Confronting the problem. Besides, wasn't that the way Tim dealt with things? On the completely other hand, it was cute watching him and Genny interact. She had sort of assumed Genny was older. But now she could totally picture Tim as the eager younger brother who loved his sister who stuck to her side like glue until they reached the teen years and he grew slightly detached, but still keeping a wary eye on her from a distance. Then came that moment when they reconnected as young adults. Maybe a boy had broken Genny's heart and big brother was there to comfort her and turn around and beat up the other guy to a pulp and... okay the hypotheticals were getting a little carried away. 

She knew the moment was broken the moment Tim pulled the gun out of the wall. He was looking at it... his eyes filled with questioning and horror. Meeting her and Genny's eyes, she could see the anger that was starting to choke him. She could hear it in his voice.