#shavince

      "I knew he'd slip up…!"

      He reached for one of the clenched fists in her lap, missing when she pulled away from him. "Sharon, you sound like a broken record."

      As if her physical recoil hadn't been enough. Sharon turned that white hot, steely glare on him, nostrils flaring and the vein in her neck throbbing; his wife had sailed past "mad." But her eyebrows sank low over her eyes the longer she stared at him. "You're too calm, Vince," Sharon ground out.

      Vince licked his lips but didn't respond.

      "You've been this way the last several days—no, weeks—and I don't get it!" She shook her head. "I don't understand you. Especially since, when Bode first came back, you—you—were his worst critic, Vince. …now it feels as if you and I traded places."

      Her phrasing gave him pause, but he nodded, because Vince agreed. In slightly different words, this wasn't the first time Sharon had brought this up.

      She huffed and rested an elbow inside the passenger side door, and Sharon rested her chin on her hand. "Say something, damn it."

      "Well, you're not wrong."

      Sharon stared at him anew. Her eyes, clear like storming skies, were wide again, but her anger had cooled to confusion.

      Vince met her eyes briefly and nodded again, a smaller gesture this time. He fiddled with his keys in hand, not turning the engine over while he said, "You're not wrong about how things were with Bode at the beginning. You were the one with the highest hopes for him. Now…now I'm carrying that hope for you, Shar."

      Her lips parted, perhaps with an interruption on the tip of her tongue, but Vince kept on.

      "I'm…beginning to think maybe we can't both risk having our hearts broken at the same time," he confessed, his voice cracking just a hint in his admission, and he rubbed that spot on his chest for good measure; even talking about it, a dull ache throbbed where he rubbed. Vince glanced again at Sharon. "We've gotta carry hope between us like a hot potato when it comes to Bode. He's our kid, Sharon, and it's not easy to raise or to love a kid. That's usually why people try to find a partner to do it with."

      This time, when he reached for her nearer hand, Sharon was receptive to his affection. Vince internally sighed with relief as he held her hand in his.

      "But, yeah, I believe in him. I have hope that there's something we don't understand at work here—maybe something Bode needs help with that has nothing to do with drugs or with his addiction at all. Maybe he needs us now more than ever, to have hope for him…"

      When he didn't continue, Sharon dragged her thumb along the back of his hand and eyed him warily. "Just hope?" she asked. "You're not gonna mingle in things in an official or an unofficial capacity?"

      Vince shrugged. "We'll see. But, for now, Bode's made his choice to say those particular words, for whatever reason, in front of the parole board. I don't believe for a minute he relapsed, but you don't have to believe that right now. Right now, you can be angry, you can grieve him being back behind bars, and you can focus on getting strong enough to receive Luke's kidney. When you're ready to hope again, you let me know."

      For several beats, they sat together, still and in the quiet of their truck, watching friends, family exit and head home after the hearing, taking note of the disheartened expressions the others wore, too, after what had transpired. Eventually, Sharon nodded, and she pursed her lips to hold back a fresh wave of angry or hopeless tears…

      …but she squeezed Vince's hand and held on tight as he turned over the ignition, pulled out of the lot, and got them on the road home.

Done for the 5, 10, 20, 50, 70, 100 Fandoms Challenge as well as the If You Dare Challenge (for prompt #208: firefighters) in the HPFC forum on FFN. Ngl, Fire Country quickly became one of my new favs this past TV season, and my father (papa mew) and I enjoyed s1 from start to finish—but we did kinda see that inevitable return to jail coming for Bode, bc if Bode's a free citizen, that would be too easy/would make the series feel a little pointless?? *eyes* HOWEVER, I am v angry with that Mel for talking to him without his public defender there bc…legit wtf; sincerely hoping friends and fam discover and push this in s2 bc that's not legal, regardless of the threat Mel put before Bode. AGHHHH. But I write about the Leone parents for my first FC fic outing! When the show debuted, I was just…ah, Philip Stroh from The Closer/Major Crimes and Megan Reeves from NUMB3RS and Dan Espinoza from Lucifer! X'D Legit, their actors drew me to this series, and I stayed for the fam (both real and found!) feels, even tho sometimes the melodrama is a leetle much for me (but then you gotta *lol*). This series is fun, and I look forward to s2 a lot.

Thanks for reading, and feel free to leave an anon/unsigned review via the FFN link or comment via the AO3 link at the top of the post, especially if you enjoyed this!