Lone eagle

Joe seemed icy cold, and unnaturally controlled.

“I'll call you, Kate,” he said quietly. He didn't know what else to say to her. He thought she hated him. And she didn't know how to tell him she hated herself. In spite of all the fire and debris she threw at him, he was still the one she loved. But it would have been hard to convince Joe of that. She had said such terrible things to him, and been so unkind to him that for the first time he was beginning to wonder if they would ever find each other again. And the guilt she had engendered in him only made him want to escape.

He stayed in L.A. for a month, and ran the company from there. He even had Hazel fly out so he didn't have to go home. It was nearly Thanksgiving when he finally came back. He opened the door gingerly when he came home, and was startled when Reed flew into his arms.

“Joe! You're back!!” He was happy to see the boy. The children were one of the things he loved most about Kate, particularly these days, and he missed them when he stayed away.

“I missed you, ace,” Joe said with a broad grin. And he had missed Kate too. A lot more than he'd expected to, which was why he'd come home. “Where's your mom?”

“She's out. She went to a movie with friends. She does that a lot.” Reed was five, and he thought Joe was the best. He hated it when Joe was gone, and his mom cried all the time. She had for a long time. Stevie was only three, and asleep by the time Joe got home.

And when Kate came back from the movies, she was surprised to see Joe. She looked calmer than she had when he left, and he cautiously took her in his arms. He never knew when she was going to attack. They hardly ever spoke on the phone anymore when he was gone.

“I missed you,” he said, and meant every word of it.

“Me too,” she said as she clung to him and started to cry. She seemed better this time, as though she were slowly coming back from the terrible place she had been.

“I missed you before I left too,” he said, and she knew what he meant.

“I don't know what happened to me…. I must have hit my head harder than I thought.” She had been through a lot. The accident, losing the twins, it all seemed too much. And her mother was constantly whipping her up. He wished Kate would stop talking to her, but he knew it was something he couldn't ask."

"She was much better this time, and they both finally began to relax.