Belle & Jack

"Shit," he said aloud and got out of the car. He didn't know what else to do but he knew he didn't want her to be on her own any longer. If his phone had a signal then there was a good chance hers did too. She'd know the information was public.

He kept a set of binoculars in the glove box but he couldn't see her so he started out in the direction he'd last seen her.

***Belle***

Belle sat in the sand, ignoring the cold and the damp, digging her fingers into its softness either side of her.

She tried to focus on her breathing as a means of getting the thoughts and images that were flooding her mind once again, thoughts and images she'd hoped had been banished for good, under control.

She thought later it was probably this focus, combined with the noise of the wind and the waves, that caused her to miss Jack's approach and she was totally unaware of his presence until he sat down right next to her. She looked over at him and closed her eyes hard for a second, felt a tear run down her face, the first since Claire's call. And she saw his phone in his hand.

"So you get TMZ here too I guess, huh?" she said, turning her gaze back to the ocean.

"We do. Charlie sent me a link. I'm really sorry Belle."

"It's not your fault."

"I know that but... is there anything I can do for you?"

She thought about telling him that just his presence was already making her feel better, as it had done since the moment she'd met him, but she didn't have the energy for talking just then. Instead she just leaned her body over towards him and was grateful to feel him raise his arm to accommodate her, to feel it rest on her shoulder and pull her against him.

Even when the cold and wet of the sand become too uncomfortable to stay, Belle was reluctant to go. With Jack's arm around her, the warmth of his body pressing against her, she'd cleared her mind and felt a calmness and a peacefulness returning.

As they stood, she looked at her phone and started to wonder just how long she could ignore the world. Evidently, Jack noticed the look.

"Can I make a suggestion?" he said.

"What?"

"Turn it off. Leave it off. Until you're ready."

"I nearly threw it into the sea a while ago," she said, surprising herself with a chuckle.

"That's always an option," he agreed, returning her smile. She took his advice.

As they started their way back to the car, Belle was conscious that she was walking very close to him, her body craving the closeness and, totally without thought, her hand found itself slipping gently into his. He took it and held it.

***Jack***

Jack felt like his mind should be attaching some kind of major significance to the fact he held Belle's hand as they ambled their way slowly back to the car but, really, all he knew was that he was happy he was able to be of some comfort to her in an obviously distressing moment.

"So what do you think?" he asked as he pulled the car away from the beach. "Do you want to go somewhere else? There's a nice little museum not far. Or just back to the cottage?"

"Home," she said, smiling weakly at him.

"You're the boss."

There was silence at the beginning of their journey back to the cottage, but one totally unlike that which had accompanied their journey away from it that morning. Belle curled herself up in the passenger seat, angling her body towards him.

They were less than five minutes away from the beach when she started to talk. Jack knew there was very little for him to do or say, he knew he just had to listen. He didn't really know why she'd decided to tell him but he was glad she did. Not because he was now 'in the know' or had access to the kind of inside celebrity gossip many would pay good money for, but because, he reasoned, this was what Belle needed.

***Belle***

There wasn't a long, drawn out thought process before she spoke. It was a fairly instantaneous decision actually but as soon as she'd made it, as soon as she started telling Jack the story of her relationship with Brian from its very beginnings, she knew it was a good idea.

Claire had suggested counselling when it had happened first, when she'd seen the extent of Belle's distress and others, her family, her sister had encouraged her to talk about it and she knew, if she tried to look at it objectively, that of course it was better to talk about how she was feeling than to bottle it up and hope it just went away. But up to that point, the very idea had filled her with dread, as if even the thought of sharing how awful she was feeling, of re-living the pain of what had happened, would be just as bad as the event itself.

It was a little surprising to her that she'd decided to start at the beginning, particularly as she found herself smiling occasionally when she recounted how she'd been swept off her feet, falling more or less instantly in love with Brian. He was five years older than her and he seemed so worldly, so confident. He knew everyone you were meant to know, knew every club and restaurant you were meant to be seen in. She was glad that Jack even risked a smile when she told him how impressed she was that Brian had sent a bottle of wine back on one of their early dates after tasting it.

"I know, right?" she said. "He just seemed so... sophisticated. I guess I was just really naïve."

"You were young," Jack observed, "it's allowed."

For the first time with Jack she started to talk a little bit about her professional life, her career. About how Brian became a major influence on her, helping her choose roles and steer clear of the wrong directors and producers. And even when it started to become clear that her success, her renown was starting to comfortably outstrip his own, when award nominations and victories started flooding in, he never appeared jealous or sullen. He was the model of a supportive partner.

"That's one of the reasons why what he did is so hard to take, you know?" she observed. "You hear so many stories in our industry of famous men just not being able to handle it when their wives or their partners are more successful that they are, but I never felt anything like that from Brian. Honestly, I thought I was really lucky."

***Jack***

Her story continued when they got back to the cottage. It was still early afternoon and Jack lit the fire as Belle curled herself up on what had become 'her' chair in front of it.

Jack wondered if his instinct to start to edge her story towards what would obviously be it's more traumatic element was the right thing to do and ultimately decided to trust it. If talking about what had happened to her was going to be helpful, he concluded the bad bits would have to be dealt with sooner or later.

"So..." he began cautiously, turning from the lit fire and settling himself on the floor in front of her chair, "I take it, from everything you said that... that you never suspected..."

He didn't finish the question, unsure of how to phrase it and he was a little nervous that she seemed to cast her eyes down somewhat. But she kept talking.

"No... nothing, never. I'd hear about other people's relationships ending because of cheating or whatever and I used to think, my god, isn't that awful? Aren't I so lucky I have someone who loves me so much, someone who'd never do that."

She shifted in the chair and raised her head to look at him.

"But that's not the worst part. To be honest, I'm not sure I know what the worst part is but... the fucking... scale of it I guess has got to be a contender."

"What do you mean?"

"I mean... it's not that Brian cheated on me, right? Cheating is like, you know, he gets drunk at a party and one thing leads to another or, I don't know, he gets close with a co-star on set and things go too far one time, that kind of thing. Brian was fucking other women for the entirety of our relationship. It's like he just didn't give a shit about what being in a relationship means. The whole thing meant nothing to him."

Jack didn't respond. He was no counsellor and a part of him was a little fearful that he could do real damage if he said the wrong thing. He tried to avoid the temptation to give empty responses, stopping himself from saying 'that must be awful' and 'I can't imagine how that feels' and others like that more than once. Instead, he sat up and touched her hand gently and told her he was going to make them some tea.

***Belle***

Belle smiled again at just how prescient Jack seemed to be. When he suggested it she realized that tea was exactly what she wanted. Her long stint on the beach had chilled her to the bone and the fire had yet to really take hold. She was watching the flames when he returned a few minutes later.

"Can I ask you a question?" he said, handing her the hot cup and resuming his position on the floor in front of her.

She didn't respond instantly. She looked down at her cup and wondered if she really did want him to ask her a question. She had no idea what it would be. There were surely any number of things about the story she was telling he might want to clarify or explore. And it did occur to her that Jack was someone she barely knew. Was it really such a good idea to be spilling her guts to someone she'd known for four days? I was in a relationship with Brian for four years and I never should have trusted him, she thought. But she brushed the thought aside immediately. She recognized it for the trap that it was and she was desperate to avoid it, to avoid allowing what Brian had done, had done to her, to strip her of her instinct about people. And her instinct about Jack, every fiber of her being in fact, told her he was exactly the person she should be telling her story to.

She thought about the possibility that his question might open her wound further, force her to confront other elements of her pain she hadn't raised yet and decided that was just fine. She'd opened the gates herself and now she wanted nothing better than to let the whole terrible flood pour out of her, the more the better. She understood it would take time for her to fully recover from what had happened to her, that one brutally honest conversation with a practical stranger was not going to be some kind of panacea. But it was a start.

She looked back at Jack and nodded.

***Jack***

He wasn't entirely sure why this question was the one that occurred to him but it was nevertheless the one that had been rattling around in his head the most as she told her story.

"You and Brian were together for four years, right, and he was..."

"Fucking other women all that time, yes," she clarified helpfully.

"Right... so, I mean he must have been really fucking good at hiding it, right? I mean, you had no idea but... someone must have known, his friends or... I don't know but... someone."

"Sometimes I think I was the only one who didn't," she said and Jack could see that her face had turned more sullen, stern even. "There were rumors, sure, you know, passing comments you'd hear at parties, stuff like that but I never paid them any attention. I just figured people in Hollywood are like that, some people I mean. You get assholes everywhere who just want to cause trouble, right? But now that I know it was all true, it's not those assholes I care about, it's his friends. We were together four years. Brian's friends were my friends, you know? They were at our house all the time, we vacationed together, partied together, everything. They must have known. They had to know. And they still came to my house, ate my food, drank my booze, told me I was awesome. And they knew my boyfriend was fucking everything that walked. This feels like a weird thing to say Jack so please don't think I'm an asshole or anything but... in my... job? Someone in my position I mean, where you just have to accept that a lot of your life is going to be news, you know? You have to be very careful about the people you keep close, the inner circle. And it turns out the people I surrounded myself with, that I chose to surround myself with, Brian's half of it anyway, were all participating in an ongoing conspiracy to make a fool out of me. I don't care whether they meant to make a fool out of me or not, that's what they did. How can I ever trust people after that?"

Jack had half a mind that she'd meant it as a rhetorical question but the other half told him that it might be something that got fairly close to the heart of the matter, that he needed to try to help her answer it. The awfulness of being betrayed was bad enough but the thought that it might have that kind of long-term effect was worse. That you'd lose a part of yourself because of it, change who you were fundamentally because of it.

"I don't know," he said, glancing towards the fire, "but you obviously do."

"What do you mean?"

"Well... I mean... you trust me, don't you? And you've known me for about as long as a Fast and Furious marathon."

She chuckled gently and Jack felt he saw a chink in her armor of self-loathing and he knew he had to exploit it.

"What I'm saying is Belle, you just do. You trust your instincts. What Brian did do you was... horrible, despicable... I don't know, I can't think of a word bad enough for it, but it doesn't change who you are. Because he's the world's greatest prick doesn't mean there's something wrong with you because you didn't notice for four years. I think you came here because you wanted to hide, you didn't want to deal with it, you didn't want to talk about it, you just wanted to bury your head in the sand and... I don't know, maybe it would just go away on it's own. But I think you had to get this stuff out of you, in some way and somewhere inside you really wanted to. And you trusted me to listen to you. And I'm so fucking glad you did Belle. You were right to. I'll never tell a soul what you told me today, till the day I die, I swear to you. But you had to get it out of you. And maybe it was just luck or fate or fucking jesus or whatever that happened to put you and me together here but you knew you could trust me and you were right Belle. I swear to god you were right."

He hadn't even noticed himself sitting up as he spoke, rising to his knees right in front of Belle as she sat in the chair. They were looking at each other so intently and, for a moment, Jack worried whether he'd made sense and whether he'd struck the right note until Belle's mouth curled slowly into a gentle smile.

***Belle***

For much of the day up to that point, Belle knew that her emotional state could be characterized only negatively, swinging between anger and hate and self-loathing. So the wave of warmth and affection that she felt washing over her as Jack's eyes focused on hers came as something of a surprise, although a pleasant one.

"I know," she said and, worried that tears might return, she slid off the chair to join Jack on his knees and wrapped her arms slowly around him, savoring the movement like a fine wine, and felt his arms enfold her in turn.

"Thank you Jack," she whispered, resting her body against his chest, feeling his head turn and his cheek settle softly on the top of her head. You don't tend to remember a lot of specific hugs in life but there were a few that Belle recalled and she knew this one was right up there with the best of them. He didn't let go of her until he felt her loosen her grip and she had the feeling he would have let her stay like that, wrapped up in him, for as long as she wanted.

He settled back to sit on the floor in front of the fire again and her movement to join in there, sitting between his legs with her back resting against him, was natural and automatic.

"Can I ask you another question?" he said.

"In for a penny, in for a pound. You say that here right?"

"We have euros here Belle, pounds is that other crowd across the water."

"In for a euro then," she said, chuckling and thumping his leg playfully, "what's your question?"

"Do you feel better? Getting all that off your chest like?"

She sighed slowly as she thought about about it, gazing into the fire again.

"I do. I really do Jack. I know there's no quick fix to something like this. I know it's going to take me some time to... to work through it all but, you were right. I needed to start getting all this out of me and it feels good. I guess, for the first time since it happened I feel like I know there'll be a far side to it now, if that makes sense."

"It absolutely does. I'm glad Belle," he said and she felt his arms tighten very briefly around her. "Can I ask you another question?"

"Oh for fuck's sake Jack, just ask!" she said, chuckling.

"Did you remember it's your turn to make dinner? I'm getting a little peckish."

***Jack***

They made dinner together that evening as it happened, and finished off the second bottle of wine left over from the night before. Jack was glad that it was clear she wasn't just saying it, that the improvement in Belle's mood was obvious.

There was no more talk of Brian. Jack knew it was probably always bubbling under the surface but was happy that Belle seemed in control of it. He was ready to keep listening if that's what she needed and felt it likely there might be more long conversations like the one that had ended with her resting her body against him in front of the fire.

He thought it might be a good idea for them to do something after dinner, something to keep her mind away from the emotional quagmire she'd only just pulled herself out of so he suggested a movie. Of the handful he had downloaded to his laptop, he could think of several that wouldn't require a great deal of cognitive effort to enjoy and might be just what the doctor ordered after a day of strong emotional strain that he knew could be just as exhausting as any physical activity.

"It won't be exactly big screen or HD or anything like that, but I sometimes find an easy movie can be fairly relaxing," he said.

"I think it's a great idea, let's do it," she agreed readily.

He'd set up the laptop on the coffee table in front of the couch and had two suggestions ready when she returned to the living room having changed into her pajamas.

"So what'll it be? Buddy comedy or car chases and explosions?"

"Buddy comedy, no question," she said, chuckling as she flounced down on to the couch.

As the movie started playing, Jack's mind couldn't help thinking about how good it had made him feel when she'd rested her body against his earlier in the day, the same feeling he'd gotten as they danced the night before. And he couldn't help feel a little disappointed that she was sitting on the far side of the couch.

***Belle***

"No," she said, the movie barely started, "this isn't going to work. Screen's too small. I'm coming over there." She could tell Jack was about to get up to do something, adjust the angle of the screen maybe but he was stopped by her movement.

She slid herself along the couch towards him, settling her body along it and sighed as she felt her muscles relax, her head resting on Jack's thigh.

"Comfortable enough?" he said and she looked up to see him smiling wryly down at her.

"Very."

She was glad that he didn't seem to resist the natural movement of his right arm to rest on her and, despite the obvious emotional trauma of the day that she couldn't deny or ignore, she felt at rest.

She was glad too at the movie choice Jack had suggested. It wasn't particularly good but just funny enough to keep Belle's attention and she noted the fact that Jack didn't seem to be bothered by her well established habit of commenting frequently about a movie while she was watching it.

A brief post-mortem ensued when it had ended and Jack asked if she'd like to watch another. It was still relatively early. But Belle could see in his eyes that he was just as tired as she was and the realization set off a long, loud yawn.