Here is the conclusion to this story, and I have another one I'm posting very soon!
Hunted Part Eight
Rated: R (Conclusion)
A few days later…
Nadine carried a large bouquet of fully blossoming, fragrant, vibrant, varicolored flowers similar to the ones she had given MacGyver as an anonymous gift after his hospitalization for the bullet wound inflicted by James Mondragon. This time, they wouldn’t be an anonymous contribution. He would know exactly who they came from and remember. She had attached a thick note explaining everything, hoping it would be enough but at the same time knowing that words alone could never express or convey what she was feeling, the pain and the difficulty of her decision. He was asleep when she entered his room, still recovering from the process to detoxify his body of cocaine. She smiled when she saw him, approaching him quietly, brushing back his hair and stroking his cheek. She kissed him lightly on the lips. He didn’t stir. Pete had visited him earlier and told her that Dr. Strobel believed he would make a full recovery, an excellent prognosis given the grim and uncertain circumstances days earlier.
She placed the heavy crystal vase on the windowsill and looked down over the city that spread beneath her, looking peaceful from that height. Her composure left her and she choked back a sob, holding her hand to her mouth. Tears formed in her eyes and she closed them, allowing them to roll down her cheeks. She grabbed the note that she had tied neatly around the vase and ripped it from its ribbon, clenching it in her hands, balling it up. Glancing back at MacGyver’s sleeping form, she knew she couldn’t simply leave him a goodbye letter. It was heartless. Beyond that, it was cowardly. She couldn’t leave him with something so impersonal after all they had suffered and endured together, especially now that he was still so sick and weak. He needed to hear it directly from her. Tugging at the crumpled paper in her sweaty hands, straightening it back out, she began to tear it into tiny scraps, invalidating it and the words written upon it. She dropped the pieces into a nearby wastebasket and then turned away from MacGyver again, staring out the window, sobbing occasionally, allowing the tears to flow, working up the nerve to speak to him, gripping the window sill tightly as if trying to prevent herself from falling out the window and plummeting to the streets below.
“I know why you’re here,” MacGyver’s distant, faint voice said behind her, startling her.
She was not expecting him to awaken so suddenly, not prepared yet to tell him what she knew she must. She turned to face him, wiping her face. He looked small, pitiful, and fragile in his hospital bed, bundled in linens so that only his head and arms showed, his skin pale, his dark eyes glazed and bloodshot. He stared pleadingly up at her, blinking sleepily.
“You’re going to testify, aren’t you?” He asked, his voice still quiet, barely filling the room.
“Yes Mac, I have to,” she said, approaching him and taking his hand. She sighed. “After seeing what he’s done to you…of course it isn’t just that. I want to stop his drug empire before he creates more victims.”
“It’s the honorable thing to do. You’re doing the right thing.”
Nadine gently patted his hand with her other hand. “You do realize what this means, don’t you? What will happen?” She asked.
MacGyver nodded slightly.
“We can never see each other again.”
“I want you to be safe.”
“I’m just afraid,” Nadine said, fighting back tears. “I wish I could take you with me, but I have to become someone new, someone else…a fresh start somewhere. I have to sever all ties with the past—including you. I don’t know if I can do it, if I can bear it.”
MacGyver lightly squeezed her hand. “I know,” he said, “but you’ve done it before.”
“I’ve had to—to survive.”
“You’ll do it again. I know it will be hard, but you’ll persevere. You’ll do it, Nadine.”
She pressed her face closely to his, wanting to be beside him, wanting to feel him once more before all she had left were memories. She closed her eyes and sobbed, clinging to him as best as she could.
“I love you,” she whispered.
“I know. I love you, too,” MacGyver said.
“I won’t forget you. I promise. I’m dedicating my new life’s mission to you.” She opened her eyes and stroked his cheek again. “Did Pete tell you? I’m going to become a nurse.”
MacGyver smiled. “I think that suits you well,” he said.
“After seeing the destruction James caused to others…it’s time to heal, time to redeem myself. I’ve lived a shallow, artificial existence, MacGyver. I need substance and meaning, and I know I will find purpose when I help others. You’ve inspired me, whether you realize it or not. That night I rescued you…well, I just knew my life was about to take an important new direction.”
“I think you’ll do some great things, helping others,” MacGyver said, “but you have to remember that you were always worth more than you thought. You don’t have to justify your life to anyone. You’ve always been a decent person trapped by unfortunate circumstances beyond your control. Now you have control over your life, and I know you will use it. I have confidence in you. You’re strong. You’ll do the right thing.”
“I just wish I had more control over our relationship. I wish we could stay together. I could always refuse to testify, but that would be selfish. James could, through expensive lawyers and technicalities possibly become a free man again without my evidence against him, and I can’t allow him to roam the streets again, harming others. Even if I did spare him in that manner, he wouldn’t be grateful. He’d still come after me, no matter what. I can’t escape him. Besides, I could go to prison myself as an accessory. I knew what he was doing, Mac, but I remained silent about it, did nothing.”
“You were scared.”
“That’s no excuse. What I did was wrong. It’s just as criminal as what he was doing. I have to do this— I
want to do this, but if there was some way we could figure out how to stay together…” her voice trailed away and they were silent, both knowing there was no way, that they were spending the last few moments together that they would ever have. The clung to each other desperately.
“Look, now is all we have,” MacGyver said, reaching up and touching her cheek. “We can’t waste it. You’ll remember me through the positive deeds you’re about to do for others, and I think that’s how it should be.”
Nadine kissed him, long, slow, and passionately. He responded, and they held each other in that embrace for a long time, saying nothing.
“I’m glad you’re going to be all right,” she said at last. “I won’t forget you. Maybe someday when you hear about a nurse named Julia Strauss, you’ll think of me.”
“Is that going to be your new name?” MacGyver asked, thinking back to how she had used that name as an alias when she had disguised herself as someone else before, trying to protect him.
Nadine nodded, biting her lower lip, trying to keep it from trembling as she was on the verge of tears again. “Pete has already arranged everything,” she said. “It’s set for after the trial. Nadine Easton will cease to exist. I’ll assume a whole new life, a new identity. I’ll take the proper training courses and certification to begin my new career. I know I can adjust and adapt. I have done it before. There will just be one thing missing, one very important part of my life—you. That’s how it has to be. I know you would never abandon your life for me, and I would never ask you to make that sacrifice. This is something I have to do on my own. I understand that.”
MacGyver kissed her and pulled her closer toward him. Once again, he was losing someone he loved and there was nothing he could do.
“Strauss,” he said, smiling. He looked at Nadine. “That name is very German.”
Nadine returned the smile through her tears. “Yours is very Scottish,” she said.
They kissed each other again and when Nadine released him this time, she saw a single tear sliding down his cheek.
The End
"If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer."
--Henry David Thoreau
brains+brawn+beauty+personality=MacGyver
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