Blocked and routed at every turn, the temptation to despair was great. He held on to the knowledge that Molly trusted him to do what was right, and he fought off the doubts that plagued his waking and his dreaming states. He would not yield. He would not lose his confidant and best friend to the whims of the destroyer of the light. Connor Ridley, Shadows Fall
He was glad that he had taken a moment to find amusement in the Wyatt Walsh situation. It had passed quickly enough, and the less lighthearted points that had been touched upon were once again paramount. Of all the items up for discussion during the course of his conversation with Anna, it was the part about the kids that was getting to him the most. He figured that they wouldn’t appreciate it if he ever called them that out loud within their hearing (the look he imagined on Lia’s face was particularly interesting), but Anna was correct. They were just kids. They were kids who had both had to grow up a little faster than they should have, but wasn’t that all the more reason to keep them out of things that had the potential to syphon away more of their childhood?
He didn’t like to admit it, but perhaps it was just as well that his father’s edict had him carefully watchful of any time that he spent with Anna at the office. The sort of in depth talking that they had indulged in today left them vulnerable to detection (and his father was not the most worrisome of the possibilities). Someone at RR had let enough information slip to the wrong person at some point along the way -- otherwise, Meredyth wouldn’t even know that Glimpse existed. Whether it had been an accident or an intentional divulging was something that Connor didn’t know, and he couldn’t afford to take chances with anything filed under that category.
They had been too caught up today, and they hadn’t been paying attention to time or keeping an eye out for unexpected visitors (at least he hadn’t, and he didn’t think that she had either). Anna had been venting, and he had been attempting to console (and stall her from implementing crazy plans). He couldn’t regret Anna getting to get some of that out of her system (he had been far too responsible for much of her stress and worry to begrudge her that). He just suspected that they shouldn’t have gotten into it in the setting that they had. He was going to have to watch out for that in the future.
Potential security breaches aside, there was also the fact that such sessions with Anna always seemed to end poorly for his mental state. He wasn’t entirely clear why that was, and he wasn’t going to waste time exploring it.
He had put on a front for Anna or maybe he hadn’t been putting up a front at all. He had, quite frankly, been too focused on other things when Anna had expressed her continued disapproval to let the reality of what he was asking Kyle and Lia to be up to to sink in today. He had dismissed her concerns and cut off the conversation (although now that he thought about it, maybe she had cut off the conversation when she brought up destroying Glimpse). It wasn’t that he hadn’t thought of it before; he just usually chose not to dwell on that particular short coming. His inability to find viable alternatives notwithstanding, he couldn’t take time to ponder the Kyle and Lia situation. It was already what it was. They knew what they knew. He couldn’t take that back.
That did not mean that it was always easy to shake off thoughts tending that way. Now that he was sitting by himself with nothing left to distract him (meaning that nothing of a crisis level emergency was screaming for his attention loudly enough to pull his thoughts away from the topic at hand), he would have to say that any thoughts in the direction of the two of them and what they were doing left him feeling rather sick to his stomach. If he made it much longer without developing an ulcer, then he would be vastly surprised.
He envied Anna her coping mechanisms. They seemed to work beautifully. Anna brooded then she vented at him (he would use the preposition to there, but at him really was vastly more accurate). Then, she went about her business and accomplished whatever was on the agenda to accomplish. It must be nice to let all of the doubts and concerns have an outlet on a regular basis. The internalizing that he did with his really wasn’t pleasant. He, however, didn’t have any other options.
He tackled the problems facing him in whatever way made the best of his current circumstances, and he lived with the fallout. It was how he functioned. Then, he moved on to the next problem. He didn’t have the luxury of taking time out for venting, and to whom was he going to vent? Anna? It wasn’t like she wasn’t having enough issues of her own without tacking his on top of them. Today had made it abundantly clear that there were even more issues than he had been aware of swirling through her head.
Besides, it wasn’t like him venting was an untried circumstance. He had tried that once. It hadn’t been intentional. The words about Meredyth and what he believed she was truly capable of had come pouring out of him in a weak moment. He hadn’t felt better. He had felt guilty for the shadows that had shown up in Anna’s eyes. She insisted that she had needed to hear it. He wasn’t so certain that she had.
Somehow, nothing managed to be simple these days. Maybe it never really had been. Just listen to him. He was such a baby. He needed to get over himself. He was the leader. He needed to lead. There wasn’t any time for anything else. If he was feeling buried, then it was obviously because he wasn’t working quickly enough to keep up with everything. He needed to step up his game. He needed to be prepared with enough ammunition that even his father wouldn’t be able to sway the board -- because Anna turning into the sacrificial lamb in all of this was not going to be an option.
His mindset being what it was in that moment made seeing Meredyth Lawson calmly strolling down the hallway one of the worst possible scenarios available for the keeping of his temper in check. Sadly, that was exactly what he was seeing as he turned the corner. He couldn’t name exactly what it was that possessed him. His mind seemed to go momentarily blank. The next thought that actually registered in his head was the fact that he had, in fact, sprinted down the hallway and placed himself between her and the elevator.
The logical conclusion would be that he said something expected for the situation at hand -- “why are you here” or “what are you doing” came to mind. Nothing like that actually came out of his mouth. Logic seemed to have deserted him from the moment he had spotted her.
“I’m going to stop you,” he said with a calm confidence that belied the turmoil rolling through him in waves. She wasn’t fooled by the tone. He could tell. She knew him too well, and she could see the tension. He knew because he knew her equally well. He could see the way she was relishing this altercation in her eyes.
“How very melodramatic and clichéd, Mr. Ridley,” she observed with her bearing a perfect picture of carefully controlled calm. He knew that he didn’t look nearly as composed. “And what is it, pray tell, that you will be stopping me from? Getting on the elevator?”
The look in her eyes hardened, and he knew that they both knew that she was not talking about the elevator. “Annoying, naturally,” she conceded. “But I can always use the stairs. I’ll still get to where I’m going – it might just take me a little longer.”
“It’s wrong, Meredith,” he wasn’t sure why he was trying, but he did it anyway. “You know it is.”
“As touching as your dedication to my personal fitness is . . . ,” she trailed off with a small shrug of her shoulders.
“You know what I’m talking about,” he needed to stop talking. This wasn’t accomplishing anything. He needed to walk away. Unfortunately, he could not seem to make himself listen.
“Do I?” She questioned. The fact that she sounded as if it was a legitimately sincere question momentarily distracted him. She sounded far away for a moment before her gaze focused sharply on his face. “Because I don’t think you do,” she informed him. “I’m doing what needs to be done, and the history books will laud me for it.” The smile on her face as she stepped around him and through the elevator doors was one of th
e most disturbing things that he had ever seen.
It had not been his brightest move. He knew that. He was willing to admit that he had let his temper get the better of him. He and Meredyth had been walking some bizarre line where he knew what she was up to and she knew that he knew something, but they both avoided each other and kept mum about the fact that there was any knowing going on anywhere.
It hadn’t been intentional, but the pattern had seemed to make sense when he had fallen into it. It wasn’t like he should be tipping her off that he intended to actually fight her. It would be better if he had any advantage that he could get via means of surprise. Part of him wished that something in him had remembered that when he was chasing her down the hallway. It was too late for that now. He would just have to live with knowing that she had gotten to him that badly. Moreover, he would have to live with knowing that she knew that she had gotten to him that badly. The second of those was harder.