Archive of Our Own ^beta

Sam walks into the meeting hall and looks around. She’s here, he notes with a sigh of relief. He wasn’t even sure where she went, or if she still went to these meetings. It’s been a while, after all.

The seat next to her is empty and he sits there. “Hi,” he says quietly. “Remember me?”

She starts. “Sam,” she says quietly, looking around. “Is there…?”

Now he feels bad. He should have known, even though it’s been years, that he would scare her. “No,” he says. “I’m just…here for the meeting.”

Her eyes narrow. “You skipped town years ago,” she says, “so, what are you doing here?”

He shrugs. “I…came back. You talked about these meetings and I decided to start and…it was stupid, but I wanted to see you. It was probably a stupid idea. I’m sorry. I can go.”

He moves to stand but she catches his arm. “Stay,” she says, so he sits back down.

They’re quiet for a moment, but then she breaks the silence. “How have you been?”

He almost laughs. It’s been as horrible as ever, since he left her. But he doesn’t say it. “Okay,” he says.

“What made you decide to come to meetings now?” she asks. “Last time we talked, you were pretty…did something happen?”

Sam shakes his head. “I’m clean,” he says. He hesitates, but he figures he came all this way to see her for a reason. She was the first person to talk to him about this. “My brother’s new strategy for proving he’s not an addict is to remind me of how much of an addict I am,” Sam says quietly. “I just…needed some support, and I’m not exactly getting it there, and I thought…I know it’s been years, but I thought of all that you said, way back when.”

She smiles at him. “I’m glad you came, then.”

The meeting starts then, and it’s as weird as Sam thought it would be, but there’s also about thirty people around who have all struggled with something close enough to what he has, and the support is exactly what he wanted. He can feel Lindsey watching him, looking for his reactions.

When the meeting is over, she takes his phone and puts her number in. “Call me next time you’re coming to a meeting,” she says. “We’ll come together.” She then kisses his cheek and walks off.

Sam looks after her, then looks at the number in his phone when she’s out of sight. He smiles, and wonders if he can make next week’s meeting.