horizon line (shetland | rhona & jimmy)

[fiachairecht]

horizon line. shetland, rhona & jimmy, rhona/phyllis. old rituals, new conversations, and the questionably there desire to move on. 1k words, rated t. ladiesbingo round 6, northern/southern lights.

The moon is long vanished by the time Rhona picks her way down to the shore. The wind is still, almost eerily so, but the night still somehow manages to feel even colder than mid-November warrants.

The flask at her hip is half-empty, despite how easily she feels she could drink enough to put a man twice her size under the waves permanently. No point pretending there's a chance she'll need to have enough to share, even though this is the first time in longer than she cares to remember that Phyllis isn't here to share her whisky, steal the blanket, stare at her instead of the Northern Lights and whisper, warm mouth right against Rhona's ear, that if they were back in Glasgow or even her on the mainland any other night, there would be much better ways of keeping warm.

She'd made a game of watching the auroras on her own, once upon a time, remnant childhood fancies letting her trace roads in the auroras - there, it's that shite bit of the A90 right before the speed cameras start in Dundee, maybe Phyllis is there, maybe she'll come -

But Phyllis isn't coming back anytime soon, and over the past few weeks Rhona's had to face the fact that she has no real desire to go chasing after her. They'd both known pride would get in their way eventually, but the particulars - well, decades in the fiscal's office hadn't prepared Rhona for them, and she's not sure she'll forgive Phyllis for knowing exactly what could happen and ignoring it.

Well. Not forgiving her anytime soon, at any rate. Something about the remoteness of the farmhouse is starting to get at her, now that she's resettled there, come to terms with the idea that she'll continue to be there on her own for the foreseeable. Rhona's never fancied herself someone who gets lonely, not even on the island, and isn't sure lonely is even the right word now, but something's ... shifted.

And Jimmy keeps finding more bodies.

A thin band of green where the ocean meets the sky at the edge of her vision is all that's visible yet, and still it gives her some measure of comfort. The auroras were a part of her own private rituals long before she shared them with Phyllis, anyway.

Rhona feels the sand shift at her side before she sees Jimmy, slinking into her peripheral with a casualness like he didn't mean to run into the only soul past the seawall. He's dressed worse than she is, doesn't meet her gaze. The silver-green at the water's far edge is climbing higher.

"Waiting for someone?"

Rhona tips her head back, studies the constellations peeking out from the clouds at the midpoint of the sky, you know the answer, numpty.

She knows exactly how many days it's been since the last time Cassie texted him. "Brought anything to drink?'

He shrugs, raises a bottle. "Filched it from Duncan's."

More than half a truth in that, Rhona thinks, though she's happy to leave the rest of it unexplored. "Better than whatever Phyllis would've brought."

If he's surprised she's the one to bring her up, he doesn't show it, and Rhona thanks the still-low lights for that one mercy. "Didn't say I was sharing."

But they both know he will, just like they both know she'll be buying the next few rounds at the local when they manage to find the time. They lapse into comfortable silence as they get settled, kicking off their shoes and passing the bottle back and forth. By the time the lights have shaded to pale greens and aquas and the whisky has warmed even her fingers, Rhona starts wondering if the silence is all they'll need for the night.

By the time the bottle is half done, though, Jimmy clears his throat, as if he'd just been waiting. "I, ah. Saw her. Last week, when I was down signing my statements."

Rhona inhales deeply, lets the scent of peat and saltwater flood her mind in a dizzying sweep not unlike the lights' dance. It's not enough to wash away the image of Phyllis, tall and bright and improbably steadfast against the swarm of life and lies that Rhona had given too much to. "Alright, then."

"Just so you know. I thought you'd - want to know. Before you go down on Saturday."

He's right, for all she pins him with her best withering stare as she downs another mouthful. She's not yet numb to the burn: small mercies. "Long as you don't expect me to know what to do with that just yet."

He doesn't believe her, she's seen that look in his eyes too many times, but he's kind enough not to push it much further. "She's there. You're here. You'll figure it out."

As if it was just a matter of train schedules and CalMac's ability to dock a ferry at a reasonable speed. "It's not that simple."

Jimmy takes the bottle back with surprising speed, ignoring her indignant noise of protest. "It could be. If you wanted it to."

Rhona swallows hard, fixes her gaze on one bright star amidst the shimmering purple curtain of light and resolutely does not wonder if Phyllis is somewhere down in Edinburgh, looking at the sky, missing the lights.

Everything would be much easier if she knew what she wanted, other than for Phyllis to never have done such a thing in the first place, for her son to never have done such a thing, caused such pain. All of their plans, and now the only thing in front of Rhona is the sea, and she doesn't even hate it as much as she thinks she should.

"Maybe later," she says, and it doesn't even feel like ducking the question, to push it off so far. She'll see Phyllis, or she won't. The farmhouse will be there, for her or for both of them.

Jimmy doesn't respond, not even when she takes the bottle back before he's had a sip. And as she leans back against the wall and lets her eyes unfocus in front of the sky's kaleidoscope, the only sound the crash of the incoming waves, she thinks, perhaps, she was wrong earlier.

This sort of silence could never be lonely.