Diane — though I would quite like to believe in the better nature of nature itself, I must admit that there is very little that truly is what it seems.
[ She's slumped against the passenger door of the sedan, the hood of her sweatshirt pulled over her head (her eyes ache in the back of her their sockets, right against the optical nerve). At first it seems like she's going to just leave it, but— ]
[ Who's Diane anyway? And in an instant, those words are preserved, caught right before Dale turns the tape recorder off. (Diane will get a kick out of it, he's sure.) ]
She's my secretary, [ he says easily, glancing first at Martha and then back at the recorder with something close to fondness. ] Has been ever since I was assigned to the Pittsburgh office. I'll admit that sometimes the tapes are just for my own reference, but it's always been a comfort to me to feel like I'm talking to somebody.
I'm somebody, [ Martha says moodily and it's hard to tell how much of that is self-consciousness, defensiveness, or the migraine talking. She's not really one for conversation most of the time (she's too busy sleeping or glaring or dazing) but part of her, too close to the surface, too busy bristling rather than listening, thinks I am a teacher I am a leader I am a— ]
[ That earns a bit of a smile. (He likes it better when she's moody than when she doesn't talk at all. He likes the cadence of her voice better than he does the silence.) ]
Old habits, [ he tells her, almost in passing. It's not quite an apology, but it isn't self-justification, either. ]
[ Shitty. Confused. Angry. Where are we? Tired. Tired. Tired. Are we safe now? Martha shrugs and says nothing at first. ]
I'm fine, [ she insists, the words snapping shut like a trap. (Defensiveness, definitely defensiveness.) ] Same as last time you asked. [ That's a lie. ]
[ Sometimes you need all cylinders firing and sometimes you just have to wait. Dale Cooper likes to think he knows how to distinguish one from the other, and in this particular case, he suspects it's best not to push, best to give her some room. So, instead: ]
[ Time is strange for Martha, who seems to experience it back to front, front to back and in starts and stops. Sometimes she's in the rent-a-car with Cooper and sometimes she's back in that barn in the mountains, her face pressed into some natty bit of carpet and the tips of her fingers and toes all numb and sometimes she's watching blood pool on a hardwood floor and sometimes—
Once, she'd woken from a daydream with a start and found herself in a hotel instead, the road long behind them for the day, and Cooper shaking her awake. Martha had broken the bedside lamp after that, having brought it up and against the side of Cooper's face and sometimes, when she looks at him, she thinks she can still make out the bruise. (I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm really really sorry—)
Martha's silent for a while. ]
Are we far? [ She doesn't clarify from what or from whom. (She shouldn't have to.) ]
Her perception of time seems nonlinear and sometimes he thinks he knows what that feels like. (He remembers doppelganger and he remembers that gum you like is going to come back in style but he doesn't know how to express any of that to her. There isn't much that makes talk of a red room or a backwards dwarf particularly comforting, and there's nothing like I know how you feel, conversely, to put a person off.) ]
Yes, [ is the simple answer. (He keeps his eyes on the road.) ] We are.
[ (No, it's not okay. It's really not. Cause some wounds don't.)
Martha shifts her weight, burrows it harder against the resistance of the passenger door. She wants to tell him that they'll never be far enough, that it'll always be with her, that he's inside her, inside her head and no matter what she does, she can never manage to pour him out. Behind her lips she bites her tongue. Bites until the muscles of her jaw aches and she tastes copper. ]
Tired? [ Because sometimes Martha remembers that Cooper's a person too. ]
[ They're alike, in that way. A little bit broken, a little bit off. (She'd been right, of course: some wounds never heal. But that doesn't mean there isn't always the potential.) ]
I'll be fine. [ He'll be fine just as long as she need shim to be. That's what Dale Cooper is: an anchor, a lighthouse, reliable. Dale Cooper is a good man. ]
[ Sometimes Martha wonders if Agent Copper is a liar.
No one is that helpful, that clean or that good. And if he's that good, no goodness comes without a price. (Martha had paid her debts to the man the mountains, only to realize he'd been a liar too.)
She ignores his question, turning now in her seat, pressing her back flush against the door so that she can stare at him in profile. One of Martha's hands reaches up and pulls back her hood so that he can see her staring, her brow lowered over her eyes in vague suspicion. ] No one's fine all the time, [ she says, not realizing the hypocrisy of it. ]
[ No goodness comes without a price. Caroline had died for Cooper's goodness, Audrey had been kidnapped, Annie nearly killed, Twin Peaks almost ravaged. No goodness comes without a price and Dale Cooper has paid his debts twice over. He is good, now, because in truth, there is no debt inherently owed and there are people like Martha who should never have paid that kind of price to begin with. He is good because he believes in things like goodness and love and because someone has to. He is not a knight in shining armor, no, but he is good. ]
I never said I was, [ he answers, just as matter-of-fact in his response as he always is. ] I just said I was fine for the moment.
[ Martha narrows her eyes at him across the small space that separates them, every tiny bump and asphalt seam jostling against her spine on the door. No one is that good. No one is that good. And sometimes she wonders — when the dreams are worst, when she wets the bed, when she tears at her hair and shrieks over and over again we have to leave — did she make him up in her head?
(Sometimes the answer is yes and sometimes it's the worst and sometimes it's the best.) ]
[ Sometimes, you can't leave, and other times, something else can't quite leave you. Dale has left Twin Peaks but it hasn't left him. (He'll return some day, maybe, but there is — perhaps irrationally — a guilt rooted deep in his heart. These people were hurt because of me. So, in his waking hours, there are times when he thinks he smells Douglas firs or hears the lilting voice of one of the best men he's ever met, and in his dreams, he sees the smile — as bright as the sun — of a girl with dark hair and a beauty mark, and on the worst nights, echoes of things long past, she's dead, wrapped in plastic, and worst of all, I did not kill anybody.
Sometimes he wonders if he's still stuck there.) ]
[ She should say no, and maybe there's a part of Martha that kicks herself for not just up and admitting it. How long had she been in the world and how much of that time had been spent lost and listless and without focus (and how much of the time had been spent unlost but pointed in the wrong damn direction)? Martha can hardly handle her own shit, how could she be expected to deal with his baggage, too?
But she doesn't say no. (She should, she really should.)
[ She says maybe and he has to be glad that it isn't no. Maybe means that maybe she puts a modicum of something akin to trust in him. He will tell her of what ills follow him, but he will not give them to her, not if he can help it.
He asks if she's hungry and she doesn't say anything, but he pulls into the next diner they come across anyway. ]
You want to go in? Or would you rather I brought something out?
[ It's getting late and so the sun is sitting low in the tops of all the distant trees, the half of it disappearing already over a distant ridge, large and fat like an overripe orange wedge. Martha squints into it through the latticework of her fingers and seems to ignore Agent Cooper's question. The sun seems larger than it did yesterday and maybe that's because it's closer than it was the week before, which means whatever's behind them is even farther and wouldn't that be nice.
Laying the crosswork of her fingers over her face, she concentrates on the dull throb against the back of her eyes. ] You got something for a headache, [ she asks and then realizes it's been how long since she allowed herself to eat. ]
It might have a little to do with hunger, [ he remarks, with a shrug that comes off as apologetic. Then, his previous questions rephrased: ] Do you want to stay in the car? [ All things considered, he'd rather that she come with him (he wouldn't put it past her to run off should something strike her the wrong way), but he leaves the choice up to her. (It's important to have a choice. Especially so, he thinks, for someone who isn't necessarily used to that principle. And besides, even if she does run, then – as ominous as it sounds, he doesn't mean it that way — he'll find her again, because that's his job. To protect her. To keep her safe. From what haunts her, and from herself.) ]
No, [ she says, a little defensively, as if she's actually offended by the suggestion of leaving her by herself. She's confusing like that, a contradiction. (Martha wants to be left alone, she wants to be kept safe, she wants to go back to the house from the mountains and wants to run far far away, even though she knows she'll never be free. She needs her space, she needs arms around her, she needs to be smothered, that suffocating press and if only Agent Cooper would put both hands around her throat and squeeze maybe, just maybe, she'll get there and—)
Martha shakes her head abruptly and frowns. More decisively: ] No, I want to go in.
[ Cooper beams. He is used to contradictions, and this particular one, he doesn't mind.
With a spring that hardly belies the long hours they've spent in the car, he gets out, striding up to the door of the diner and holding it open for her. It's a small place, but nice enough, with checkered cloths over the tables and matching salt and pepper shakers at each little station. (Feels warm. Feels like home.) He waits for Martha to pick a place to sit before following her, shrugging off the FBI windbreaker he's been wearing and folding it up as he hails the waitress. ]
[ There's something about his cheerfulness that grates on Martha's nerves sometimes — something about his smile when it's at its broadest that reminds Martha of Lucy, of her sister, and how disingenous the thought of her feels in Martha's mind. She had thought she'd be able to save Martha, too, and they all saw what that had earned her, hadn't it? (Martha hadn't said anything when the car had pulled over, when Ted had put on the blinkers and the SVU had found the curb and that man she'd seen on the lake and come out and run over and wait, no—)
The thought makes her blink, makes her realize that both Cooper and the waitress (Cheryl, her nametag says; HI MY NAME IS CHERYL) are staring at her in expectation and how long had she been there, in the back of that car, how long ago was that, and where were they now.
Martha frowns and realizes her hands are knuckle white around her menu. ]
Are you— are you waiting for me? [ She flounders for a moment, unsure if she should be scared or angry and she looks at Cooper (how long was I gone) before she lifts her shoulders and shoves her shoulders down and buries her face in her menu as if no one is looking at her at all. ]
[ The car had pulled over and Ted had put on the blinkers and at the end of it all it had been Agent Cooper who'd gotten Martha out. (Really one for the damsels in distress, aren't you? Albert had asked. Cooper hadn't graced the statement with an answer.)
He buys her a few more moments, now, to look over the menu as he places his own order. (I'll go first. Get me a grilled cheese — wheat bread will do just fine, and yes, American — and then a slice of your best pie. Cherry? Sounds great. And coffee. Black.)
Most of the time, Cooper wears the same things, and among them: a smile, that cheerfulness that she sometimes finds so unsettling. But sometimes, when they stop for the night, it fades as if worn down by the day, and all that remains is a thin line, framed by the angle of his jaw. It's a reminder, perhaps, that he is human, too. ]
[ Maybe it's terrible and maybe it's selfish, but Martha likes it when they stop for the night and the day's posture gets stripped from Agent Cooper's shoulders, hung up alongside his camel trench and his black blazer like another article of clothing (something he dons instead of is, proof that he is only human). He's a man of ritual and there's an order to things — the way he folds his clothes and brushes his teeth and talks to his recorder and calls it Diane. But at the end of all rituals, before he shuts off the bedside lamp and rolls over onto his side with his back facing the wall, that's when he lets himself smile a little less and that's when Martha thinks — just maybe — it's possible they're not so different after all.
He takes his time as he places his order, which means Martha's more herself when the waitress turns her large cow eyes back towards her, peering at Martha over her glasses, the tip of her pencil tapping her scribbled notepad. ] Fries, [ she says shortly and pushes the menu away. ] Just fries and— [ Martha glances at Cooper. ] —and pie.
[ The waitress asks her which kind and Martha says pecan just to be difficult. She almost forgets to tack on a: ] —thanks.
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( VERSED )
Who's Diane anyway?
no subject
She's my secretary, [ he says easily, glancing first at Martha and then back at the recorder with something close to fondness. ] Has been ever since I was assigned to the Pittsburgh office. I'll admit that sometimes the tapes are just for my own reference, but it's always been a comfort to me to feel like I'm talking to somebody.
no subject
no subject
Old habits, [ he tells her, almost in passing. It's not quite an apology, but it isn't self-justification, either. ]
How're you feeling?
no subject
I'm fine, [ she insists, the words snapping shut like a trap. (Defensiveness, definitely defensiveness.) ] Same as last time you asked. [ That's a lie. ]
no subject
We've just got an hour or so left on the road.
no subject
Once, she'd woken from a daydream with a start and found herself in a hotel instead, the road long behind them for the day, and Cooper shaking her awake. Martha had broken the bedside lamp after that, having brought it up and against the side of Cooper's face and sometimes, when she looks at him, she thinks she can still make out the bruise. (I'm sorry, I'm sorry, I'm really really sorry—)
Martha's silent for a while. ]
Are we far? [ She doesn't clarify from what or from whom. (She shouldn't have to.) ]
no subject
Her perception of time seems nonlinear and sometimes he thinks he knows what that feels like. (He remembers doppelganger and he remembers that gum you like is going to come back in style but he doesn't know how to express any of that to her. There isn't much that makes talk of a red room or a backwards dwarf particularly comforting, and there's nothing like I know how you feel, conversely, to put a person off.) ]
Yes, [ is the simple answer. (He keeps his eyes on the road.) ] We are.
no subject
Martha shifts her weight, burrows it harder against the resistance of the passenger door. She wants to tell him that they'll never be far enough, that it'll always be with her, that he's inside her, inside her head and no matter what she does, she can never manage to pour him out. Behind her lips she bites her tongue. Bites until the muscles of her jaw aches and she tastes copper. ]
Tired? [ Because sometimes Martha remembers that Cooper's a person too. ]
no subject
I'll be fine. [ He'll be fine just as long as she need shim to be. That's what Dale Cooper is: an anchor, a lighthouse, reliable. Dale Cooper is a good man. ]
You want to stop to get something to eat?
no subject
No one is that helpful, that clean or that good. And if he's that good, no goodness comes without a price. (Martha had paid her debts to the man the mountains, only to realize he'd been a liar too.)
She ignores his question, turning now in her seat, pressing her back flush against the door so that she can stare at him in profile. One of Martha's hands reaches up and pulls back her hood so that he can see her staring, her brow lowered over her eyes in vague suspicion. ] No one's fine all the time, [ she says, not realizing the hypocrisy of it. ]
no subject
I never said I was, [ he answers, just as matter-of-fact in his response as he always is. ] I just said I was fine for the moment.
no subject
(Sometimes the answer is yes and sometimes it's the worst and sometimes it's the best.) ]
Yeah, but would you tell me if you weren't?
no subject
Sometimes he wonders if he's still stuck there.) ]
Would you like me to?
no subject
[ She should say no, and maybe there's a part of Martha that kicks herself for not just up and admitting it. How long had she been in the world and how much of that time had been spent lost and listless and without focus (and how much of the time had been spent unlost but pointed in the wrong damn direction)? Martha can hardly handle her own shit, how could she be expected to deal with his baggage, too?
But she doesn't say no. (She should, she really should.)
She says maybe, and Martha doesn't know why. ]
no subject
[ She says maybe and he has to be glad that it isn't no. Maybe means that maybe she puts a modicum of something akin to trust in him. He will tell her of what ills follow him, but he will not give them to her, not if he can help it.
He asks if she's hungry and she doesn't say anything, but he pulls into the next diner they come across anyway. ]
You want to go in? Or would you rather I brought something out?
no subject
Laying the crosswork of her fingers over her face, she concentrates on the dull throb against the back of her eyes. ] You got something for a headache, [ she asks and then realizes it's been how long since she allowed herself to eat. ]
no subject
no subject
Martha shakes her head abruptly and frowns. More decisively: ] No, I want to go in.
no subject
With a spring that hardly belies the long hours they've spent in the car, he gets out, striding up to the door of the diner and holding it open for her. It's a small place, but nice enough, with checkered cloths over the tables and matching salt and pepper shakers at each little station. (Feels warm. Feels like home.) He waits for Martha to pick a place to sit before following her, shrugging off the FBI windbreaker he's been wearing and folding it up as he hails the waitress. ]
no subject
The thought makes her blink, makes her realize that both Cooper and the waitress (Cheryl, her nametag says; HI MY NAME IS CHERYL) are staring at her in expectation and how long had she been there, in the back of that car, how long ago was that, and where were they now.
Martha frowns and realizes her hands are knuckle white around her menu. ]
Are you— are you waiting for me? [ She flounders for a moment, unsure if she should be scared or angry and she looks at Cooper (how long was I gone) before she lifts her shoulders and shoves her shoulders down and buries her face in her menu as if no one is looking at her at all. ]
no subject
He buys her a few more moments, now, to look over the menu as he places his own order. (I'll go first. Get me a grilled cheese — wheat bread will do just fine, and yes, American — and then a slice of your best pie. Cherry? Sounds great. And coffee. Black.)
Most of the time, Cooper wears the same things, and among them: a smile, that cheerfulness that she sometimes finds so unsettling. But sometimes, when they stop for the night, it fades as if worn down by the day, and all that remains is a thin line, framed by the angle of his jaw. It's a reminder, perhaps, that he is human, too. ]
no subject
He takes his time as he places his order, which means Martha's more herself when the waitress turns her large cow eyes back towards her, peering at Martha over her glasses, the tip of her pencil tapping her scribbled notepad. ] Fries, [ she says shortly and pushes the menu away. ] Just fries and— [ Martha glances at Cooper. ] —and pie.
[ The waitress asks her which kind and Martha says pecan just to be difficult. She almost forgets to tack on a: ] —thanks.