It took Kerr only one day to realise he was a fucking idiot.
He'd left Ben and flown to Hawaii, where he'd secured probably the only hotel room in all the islands with a bad view (due to having only one window). He'd busied himself taping extra coverage over it - not content with trusting the block-out curtains alone, in case they moved - and then had spent the rest of the night tossing and turning on the bed, thinking. Through the hours, he'd ranged from complete despair and a certainty that he'd made a mistake to dizzying triumph and utter conviction that he'd made the only sensible decision under the circumstances. By the time the sun started to come up, he went to bed with a smile, having circled back and secure in the knowledge that he was doing The Right Thing.
Then he woke up alone.
The simple act of opening his eyes to an empty bed and empty arms brought a weight upon Kerr's chest so crushing he was held immobile, unable even to blink. As much time as he spent wishing the peculiar, hateful sensation gone, the second it left, he wished it back because the pain that filled every crevice between every atom in his body was worse. So much worse. He curled into a ball and rode that wave out, too, deciding when it ebbed that he'd been a complete idiot and very, very wrong.
He was punishing them. Himself and Ben. He didn't know why he hadn't seen it sooner but the clear light of a Hawaiian moon finally made him see that all of his noble motives and righteous gestures were little more than heartbreaking bullshit. He'd felt guilty and angry and the combination had somehow led him to the conclusion that both he and Ben deserved to be punished for their misdeeds and separating was the simplest way to go about it. But nothing about this situation was simple and him walking away from it wouldn't make anything better. The only way to set everything to rights was to actually stay and set it to rights.
Shame pooled in the void left by his heart when it lightened at the decision to return home. He felt a fool. He'd walked out, stayed away only part of a night and a day and then decided to go straight back. Would Ben even take him back or would he feel too betrayed and keep him at arm's length? Would he have had time to shake off his bewilderment and begin exploring his options with Saraekiel or would he have buried himself in work? Would he have sent Cain away or chosen to take his frustrations out on him? He wouldn't know until he got there but Kerr was braced for the worst, hoping for the best.
He took a commercial flight because it was easier than organising the jet to return but he got back to the city later than he'd have liked. He knew, once he got in the cab heading back to The Luminary that Ben wasn't home. He was in the east, at least, which relieved him. Kerr was torn, however. Travel home and drop his bags off or go straight to the east? He debated just long enough in telling the cabbie that his destination had changed that it added extra time onto his journey because switching routes wasn't easy when you were headed into the city on freeways that didn't have unlimited exits.
The cabbie got annoyed enough with Kerr's, "Just drive in that direction and I'll tell you more when we get closer," instruction that he had to soothe him into cooperating but he welcomed it. The need to focus another mind took attention from his addled one, the buzz of possibilities had been deafening him as they swarmed inside his head. By the time he pulled up at the Academy and stood at the front entrance with his big and small suitcases, it was heading for two thirty in the morning. Kerr didn't know what Ben was doing on the campus but he was grateful he was here and not at Penbrook (which he'd pondered when first realising Ben was in the east of the city).
Kerr headed for his office in the east wing, planning to leave his suitcases there and then hunt Ben down if that wasn't where he was but even as he thought it, another option clicked. Vincent. Ben was probably here seeing him. Would he tell Vincent about Kerr's stupidity? The Irishman certainly hoped not, this was humiliating enough without throwing the censure of someone he admired into the mix... but he kind of deserved that, too. He'd just have to see how it panned out.
Once he got to the offices, Kerr realised exactly where Ben was. He paused at the top of the stairs because he needed to catch his metaphorical breath, needed a moment to steel himself before he continued. He looked down at his sneakers, jeans, green tee and leather jacket and felt underdressed. He doubted he'd have felt more armed in a suit, though. There was no armour thick enough to protect him when his heart was already outside his body and sitting in an office not twenty metres away. He wheeled his suitcases along the carpeted hall and left them at the office before Ben's, wiping his palms down his jeans and leaving his hands perched there, at his hips, as if he was feeling his pockets to see if he had change to give a busker.
He walked into Ben's office slowly, watching his face, trying to gauge his feelings and unable to do it past the rain-on-a-pond plinking of his own bouncing around inside him. He stopped where there was a bit of space in front of Ben's desk, not wanting to be tangled in chairs, not game enough to sit. "I was wrong," he admitted, pausing to let that sink in. "It was stupid to go and I'm sorry. Can I come back?"
