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It had been a long day for Carol. In and out of meetings for hours, shareholders breathing down her neck about these contracts, Coast City traffic, and to round the day out dinner and drinks with a man whose company she didn’t particularly enjoy. She wrestled with her keys to unlock the door and entered the darkness of her apartment.
Ever since Kyle had dissap- been killed, she had been working 24 hours a day to keep herself from falling into despair. Keep her head clear of the bad thoughts. The thoughts that if she entertained at all...would eventually consume her. The healing process was a delicate matter that had to be dealt with the utmost care. Losing someone you loved, she had come to learn, wasn’t like any other heartbreak. It was volatile, and unmovable, and torpid all at the same time.
So she worked to forget it, drank to soothe it, and practiced autonomy to repair it. That’s what this dating was suppose to be. Not to find someone else to replace him, but to find a piece of herself to put in the space he had left.
Carol made her way to the kitchen and flicked on the recessed lighting. She wasn't particularly fond of recessed lighting but Kyle had insisted it looked better. And how could she trust herself, the person who hadn’t had art in apartment for years, over him, the artist. Immediately, she went to open the fridge fully intending to find that bottle of wine she’d been saving. Stopping though, when her eyes lingered a little too long on a picture pinned to fridge.
It was a polaroid of her in the restroom at some high society function, sticking her tongue out at the camera. Carefully she pulled it out from under the magnet that was holding it there and examined it closer. She remembered this. This was years ago, before Kyle, before Parallax, before any of that.
“I always loved that picture.” A male voice said from behind her. She spun around and was met with something she hadn’t seen in a very long time. Hal Jordan, out of uniform, sitting on her kitchen counter.
“Hal! What the fuck are you doing here?” Carol exclaimed, her words sounding just as accusatory as she meant them. He hopped off the counter and took the picture out of Carol’s hand without saying a word. “This is breaking and entering y’know. I could call the police on you.”
“Carol, I am the police.” Hal said without a second thought. She bite back the words she wanted to say. Something really bitchy, but she wasn’t in the mood to get in an argument with Hal of all people so she let him have this one. He turned the picture over where there was a date scrawled in blue ink.
“We were nineteen when this picture was taken, do you remember?”
“Not as clearly as I could have. We were both pretty buzzed by that point.”
“That was some good champagne. Your dad had been slipping it to use all night.”
They stood in silence for a moment both thinking about that night. The past was a funny thing, especially for her and Hal. They had been through so much together. At some point it became difficult to separate the good from the bad. It all just ran together and they were left with this strange beast of theirs.
“So, are you going to tell me why you’re here?” She said while leaning against the counter behind her.
“I don’t know. It seemed like a good idea.” Answered Hal. Carol’s face burned hot as a million things ran through her mind. Why was he this way? Always doing things without thinking. Always finding new and different ways to piss her off.
“You can’t just do things because they ‘seem like a good idea,’ Hal!” She stormed out of the kitchen into the living room where the porch door had been left open by Hal. The blinds were still open from when Carol had gotten up this morning, and the lights of Coast City cast themselves across the dark room.
“Okay, okay!” He shouted. “I came because I wanted to check on you, is that a fucking crime? To want to see if you’re friend who just lost someone she cared about, is okay?” She turned back around and looked Hal straight in the eyes.
“I’m not okay.” She admitted as she fought back the tears that were sprouting in the corners of her eyes. As much as Hal didn’t listen to a thing she said and frustrated her to hell and back, he was a good man. He cared about her deeply as she did him. So when he enveloped her in his arms she didn’t do anything but accept it. Pressing her face to his chest, she cried. It wasn’t the first time since Kyle had died but it was the most cathartic.
Carol and Hal could build a cathedral with their history. A glorious one, with high ceilings and ornate vaulting. Smooth wooden pews, and marble floors. There would be gargoyles, ugly and snarling. But also beautiful stain glass windows lining the walls, telling the story of their lives.
They stood like this for some time until eventually Hal pulled back spoke. “Gonna have to take this to the dry cleaner.” He said, referencing Carol’s tears and snot that had rubbed all over the chest of his button down. Carol glared at him. “C’mon, Carrie. It was a joke!”
“Harold Martin Jordan, if you ever call me Carrie again, your life will be a joke.” She said pulling away and pressing her finger to his chest threateningly. She had missed this, their rapport. Hal smiled and pulled her into a bear hug, resting his face in her hair and took at deep breath.
“I missed you, Carol Ferris.” He said, his voice muffled by her hair. She didn’t reply just hugged a little tighter and the next thing she knew Hal had leaned her head back and was kissing her. It took a few seconds for Carol’s brain to process what was happening and even then she didn’t know how she felt about it.
Hal was a good kisser. Always had been, and as he slipped his tongue past Carol’s lips she almost lost herself in it. Everything that she had been wrapped up in for the past five months, the investors, the shitty dates, Kyle...
“Mmmph...” She leaned pulled away suddenly clasping her hand over her mouth. Hal opened his eyes lazily.
“Now I know my breath isn’t that bad.” He said jokingly. Abruptly, she pushed him away.
Kyle...she couldn’t do this. Not to Kyle. Not to herself.
“Carol?” He sounded genuinely concerned.
“I’m sorry Hal...I just...I can’t. Not right now.” Carol said, almost in a whisper. Hal had begun nodding before she was even done speaking.
“That’s okay...it’s okay, Carol.” He grabbed placed his hands on her shoulders. “You got your ring with you?” Carol looked up at him and nodded.
“Yeah. Why?”
“Wanna go flying?”
* * *
Things are different in space. Space doesn’t care what your history is, what you’ve been through. It doesn’t matter if the man next to you is your ex or your boyfriend or your bestfriend. When it’s just you and someone you love unconditionally, among the stars...that’s when the sky is best. That’s where you feel most at home.