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Phoenix is seeing ghosts.
Normally, it wouldn’t be that concerning; his best friend is a spirit channeler, after all, and while it was, well, alarming at first, it’s kind of old hat by now. Maya turns into her sister and other dead people sometimes; no big deal, Phoenix has learned to kinda just roll with the punches at this point. Hell, he has a magic little rock that helps him see lies in the form of locks crossing over people’s chests - believability kind of got thrown out the window a few months ago.
Except. Maya’s not around, and neither is Pearls, and Phoenix listened to Maya complain about the whole main family slash branch family drama for, like, six whole hours a few weekends ago so he knows that those two are the only ones who should be able to channel anything in the greater Los Angeles area.
So, the only logical conclusion: Phoenix is seeing ghosts.
Or, more accurately, a ghost. Singular.
Anyways, it all started in December.
Well. It properly started in December. Phoenix has seen this particular ghost before, although rarely outside of his dreams and never anything more than a flash at the corner of his eyes, a flicker of grey and magenta that causes hope to spike in his chest until he realizes he has to be mistaken. A lot of people have grey hair, after all.
He thinks it’s that, at first. Thinks his brain is overactive from the exhaustion of more trials, from the inherent stress of coming up on an anniversary that Phoenix wishes he could do nothing but forget.
The thing is, he’d already done the denial stuff last February, back when Gumshoe had told him about the note and Phoenix had, well. Broken, a bit. Started seeing glimpses of Miles Edgeworth around, flickers at the edges of his vision that haunted him to the point where he’d almost felt afraid to go outside.
…Maybe he hasn’t dealt with the denial as well as he thought he had - Phoenix is familiar enough by now with the five stages of grief that he knows it’s nothing close to linear.
For a while, he writes it off, tells himself that, no, Edgeworth wouldn’t be in the courthouse, get it together, Phoenix, you’re just seeing things because the anniversary is coming up, and continues going about his life as if he isn’t still mourning people he wasn’t able to save.
Come February (just in time for the anniversary from hell), Phoenix doesn’t think he's seeing a ghost at all. He thinks, almost manically, that this outcome might be worse. Because he’s starting to see Edgeworth for longer than flickers, longer than the blink of an eye, and the first time it happens, he has to go back to the office and have a panic attack because of what it might all mean.
Best case scenario: Phoenix is crazy, or seeing things, or something, because he’s still not over Edgeworth killing himself a year ago, and he’s slowly getting closer to completely cracking.
Worst case scenario: Edgeworth isn’t dead, after all, he just didn’t care enough to tell Phoenix that he’s been back in Los Angeles for… however long he’s been here.
Maybe he has those backwards. He considers it, for a second, and then the idea that Edgeworth’s been back for months and just hasn’t told him forces him into a mad dash for the bathroom as he coughs and chokes. So, yeah. Not backwards.
A few more months, and Phoenix tries to forget about it - a laughable idea, really, that he can just forget the person he’s been largely fixated on since he was nine years old. Forgetting Edgeworth means forgetting an intrinsic part of himself that, regardless of how hellish the past year’s been, Phoenix doesn’t want to lose. Even if the guilt swallows him alive.
And then, the awards show. The Gatewater. Will Powers inviting them out for a drink and Phoenix willingly walking into what turned out to be the absolute worst night of his life.
And then, because every trip to rock bottom needs a cherry on top, Miles Edgeworth shows up and is, decidedly, not a ghost or a channeling, but alive and well and smirking.
If Phoenix nearly punches him in the face, that’s his own business, and if Pearl hadn’t been standing next to him, eyes wide and wet with tears and clenching onto Phoenix’s arm with a strength belying an 8 year old, well. Maybe it would have had a different ending.
(“It would have been better for everyone if you never came back from the dead, Edgeworth!”
…Yeah. Phoenix isn’t super proud of that one.)
After the case is over, after Maya is back and Pearls is found and all of them have collapsed into a pile of tears in the center of the defense’s waiting area, they go back to the Gatewater, with Powers offering the invite again as a joint apology and celebration.
Phoenix had wanted nothing less; personally, if he never saw the Gatewater again aside from the glimpses of it outside his office window, he’d be pleased as punch. But Maya had given him puppy dog eyes, which didn’t work, followed by Pearls doing the same with tears, which did, and so they’d all followed Powers over to the banquet hall once more.
Phoenix didn’t let Maya or Pearls out of his sight the whole time. He kept both of them in front of them, held Pearls’ hand unless she ran ahead to hold Maya’s, and gritted his teeth when they walked by a too-familiar bellhop. Or, manager now? Phoenix doesn’t really care.
The girls had also wanted to get a room at the Gatewater; he’d staunchly refused. $400 for one room for a single night? Absolutely not. At least, not until the Global Studios check clears. Plus, he’s seen enough of that place for a lifetime. He isn’t even incredibly thrilled about having the celebration dinner back there, even if the food was amazing and Powers was footing the bill.
(He could barely eat, anyway. Everything had turned to sawdust in his mouth.)
Franziska had been the first to leave, followed shortly by Edgeworth. Phoenix had been perfectly pleasant when he returned Franziska’s whip to Edgeworth, pretending as though the conversation at the station hadn’t happened. He’s not sure how successful he was at keeping his tone light; Maya had kept giving him weird looks when Edgeworth had finally departed, but correctly read the look on his face saying that he really, really didn’t want to talk about it.
(Phoenix knows it’s just buying him time; Maya will push for the full story eventually, but at the very least, he won’t have to dredge it all up again tonight.)
Finally, Gumshoe leaves, and all the food is gone, and Phoenix finally has an excuse to get out of that dumb hotel. He makes a silent promise never to return as they cross the threshold, thanking WP for the meal and rattling off a number of niceties about staying in touch and how none of this was his fault. (It really, really wasn’t - Phoenix feels bad that WP’s beating himself up about it this much, but he doesn’t really have the energy to be that adamant about it. He can worry about it in the morning.)
Pearls snuffles against his neck, halfway to an actual snore, and if Phoenix wasn’t so tired he thinks his heart might have melted. The walk back to his apartment is quiet; he only lives a block or so away from the office for convenience’s sake, so the bike hadn't been necessary.
Maya unlocks the door for him and he thanks her with a nod, carefully stepping inside with Pearl still in his arms. The girls have commandeered his room for the night - he’s only too happy to sacrifice his bed to them, even if the thought of sleeping on the pullout makes his back ache. He nudges his bedroom door open with his hip and maneuvers around the clothes and suitcases on the floor. His apartment always feels full of life when the girls are over - little pieces of the Feys scattered around his place that Phoenix can’t help but smile at.
He lays Pearls down on the bed, pulling the covers up to around her waist as he waits for Maya to join her cousin on the bed. Pearls’ breathing doesn’t even hitch, cheek falling softly against the pillow as her chest rises and falls. Phoenix takes his time pulling the beads and elastic out of her hair, not wanting to wake her up.
On the other side of the room, Maya returns from the bathroom in a pair of sweatpants that are too big for her (they have to be Mia’s) and one of Phoenix’s old Ivy U shirts. She’s quiet as she crawls into bed and sits up, crossing her legs as her side rests against the headboard. Her back faces Phoenix; he gives Pearls’ head one last pat and goes around the side of the bed, sitting on the floor and leaning back against the futon. Maya’s knee is brushing his shoulder, and Phoenix doesn’t move, silently letting her know that he’s here.
She doesn’t look at him, staring down at her hands clasped together in her lap. She seems so young. Phoenix’s heart aches.
After they’d finally found her, Maya had barely stopped moving - hugging Phoenix, hugging Pearl, thanking Gumshoe for helping, joking with Franziska (a strange sight to be sure, made stranger by the fact that Franziska didn’t seem to detest it like she does everything else), interrogating Edgeworth about his whereabouts for the past year (Phoenix had tried not to listen to that last one). She was the light of the party, brushing everyone’s concerns aside and not letting them see the cracks. Phoenix, of course, could - Maya did a good job of hiding them, but he knows her too well by now, and the way her hands shook anytime she picked up a fork was a tell.
But Maya hadn’t wanted anyone to fuss over her - Phoenix didn’t need to be told to see that that was the case. It was so Mia that it made his heart hurt.
“Um. Nick?” Maya finally says, and when Phoenix glances up at her, she’s fiddling with a loose thread on the sheets and still not looking at him. “I - I know I’ve said this a bunch, but. Thanks. I, um. Don’t know what I’d do without you.”
Her voice is hoarse and quiet; her eyes are hidden by her bangs, but the curve of her shoulders is immediately recognizable as exhausted. Mia had sat the same, legs crossed as she slumped into the couch in the office after a long day of investigating.
“I don’t know what I would do without you either, Maya,” Phoenix says and stands, only letting out a slight groan as he straightens his back, and sits next to her, letting her lean against his shoulder.
They sit in the quiet for a bit.
“I’m sorry,” Phoenix eventually says, because it’s been a day filled with apologies but he doesn’t ever think he’ll be able to say it enough. “I should have -“
Maya shoves at him. “Shut up,” she says, watery. “You didn’t do anything, I’m the one who ran off -“
“ You shut up,” Phoenix says, and as far as comebacks go, it’s a weak one. “This isn’t your fault, Maya, you didn’t -“
“I shouldn’t have just gone off with someone and not brought one of you with me, we knew something was going on and -“
“I should have come with you,” Phoenix counters, “that guy was super sketchy, we should have -“
“No, it’s not - if I hadn’t gotten kidnapped, you wouldn’t have had to defend a murderer, Nick, and -“
“I thought Engarde was innocent too, and I would defend another murderer if I had to - it was my fault you got taken, because de Killer -“
“If you blame yourself again, I’m telling Will Powers you want a pinup calendar of him outside of the Steel Samurai suit,” Maya says, and her eyes are blazing as she glares at Phoenix. “It was my fault I -“
“It’s not your fault, I would love that pinup poster, and if you say it was your fault one more time I’m not buying you burgers for a week,” Phoenix counters, and Maya puffs out her cheeks, crossing her arms over his chest.
“That’s a low blow, Wright.”
“Just meeting you where you are, Fey,” he says, and Maya sticks her tongue out at him. “Oh, real mature.”
“It’s not your fault!”
“It’s not yours, either!”
“Fine.”
“Fine!”
They both settle for glaring at each other in lieu of further arguing; Phoenix breaks first, nearly bending in half as he claps his hand over his mouth to stifle his laughter. Pearls twitches a bit where she lays, and he tries to be quieter.
“God,” he says when he can speak around the laughter. “Mia would be so disappointed in us, those arguments were terrible.”
Maya’s laughing too, shoulders shaking as she nods. “She would,” she gasps out, “god, she would.”
The laughter is like a balm; it’s bordering on hysteric, the both of them cackling like madmen after three days of blinding terror. Eventually, they both settle down, leaning back against the headboard on a bed that barely has enough space for two, let alone three.
“I’m really glad I met you, Nick,” Maya says, slumping down a bit.
“You’re the best co-counsel I’ll ever have, Maya,” Phoenix says, pulling her into a tight hug.
She slumps into him, and they just sit there for a while. Phoenix rests his chin on her head. He doesn’t know how long they’ve been sitting there for when Maya’s shoulders start trembling. Her sobs are quiet, muffled by his shirt, and Phoenix just hugs her tighter. ‘A lawyer can’t cry until it’s over’, indeed; neither can a Fey, it seems.
Growing up, he never had any siblings. Larry was the closest he’d had, but Larry was more like… a tapeworm, or a leech, or some other type of borderline parasitic mite that grabbed onto you and never let go even when you tried to shake it off.
Maybe that’s not fair to Larry. But Phoenix is tired; he doesn’t have the energy to be discerning. The point is, he thinks Maya might be the best sibling he’s never had, not just the best co-counsel.
Maya cries herself to sleep eventually, or at least close enough to it, and Phoenix gently lays her down next to Pearl, who’s still sleeping soundly. Thankfully, neither of them had woken her up with their conversation or their laughter (somehow), and Phoenix leans down to press a kiss to her forehead before he pulls the covers up over both of them.
“Night,” he whispers, and doesn’t get a response.
His eyes drift to the tickets sitting on the bedside table - train tickets, for tomorrow morning. Back to Kurain.
Phoenix doesn’t really want them to go - he wants to hold them both close so he can reassure himself that they’re both there, that they’re okay, that he hasn’t completely fucked them both up by not keeping a closer watch.
He stands, grabbing an extra pillow so that he can take the couch for the night and let them rest.
The door is shut with a gentle click, and he takes a moment to just stand in the hallway and breathe before heading toward his couch and the pullout that awaits him. He drops the pillow on the side of the bed and sighs, burying his head in his hands. All of the adrenaline and anxiety have crashed around him, leaving him exhausted and, frankly, done with the entire day as a whole. He swears softly under his breath, and resolves to take the next week off. Maybe he’ll even join Maya and Pearls on their train ride tomorrow, get away from the city a bit.
(Maybe he just doesn’t want to let them out of his sight.)
The clock on the wall ticks regularly, the only thing that signifies any passage of time as Phoenix sits, feeling defeated and a little bit lost, in his apartment. The brief stint of energy he’d won back from the laughter has drained away; he just wants to go to sleep, but he feels so tired that he doesn’t know if he’ll be able to.
He runs a hand over the side of his face and up through his hair, feeling the days-old gel sticking in the strands. Exhaustion pulls at his shoulders and he lets himself fall back, shaky hands resting on his stomach as he stares up at the ceiling.
God. It’s been three days. He hasn’t slept more than a few nightmare-filled hours for three days. There’s a part of him that’s terrified that this is nothing more than a nightmare, too, giving himself false hope before he wakes up to another day of desperately rushing to save Maya. He beats that idea back with a broom; he’s too tired for a crisis at the moment, thank you very much, and he’s sure he’ll have enough time to freak out about the hell that has been the past three days once the girls are gone.
He’s so drained. He just wants to go to sleep and experience one night of peace, if that’s even going to be granted to him. His eyelids flutter shut, pillow and sheets completely forgotten on the mattress next to him as he wills his body to sink into the calm abyss of an REM cycle.
Somewhere, there’s a very cruel god laughing at Phoenix’s misfortune, because within a minute there’s a gentle knock at the door, a quick rap that’s loud enough for him to hear without being overbearing.
He swears under his breath but then straightens up until he’s sitting and glances at the clock. It’s not a completely irrational time for someone to be stopping over, he supposes, although he’ll be the first to admit he doesn’t really have the best sense of when appropriate visiting hours are.
He pulls the door open and all his thoughts grind to a halt.
Miles Edgeworth is standing there, dripping with rain and looking a bit like a drowned cat.
If Phoenix was being honest, he’d almost forgotten about him being back amidst the chaos of the day and the conversation with Maya. It’s a novel experience, actually; he can’t remember a time when Edgeworth wasn’t hovering, wanted or not, near the forefront of his mind. But he’s here - he’s real, standing on Phoenix’s doorstep in his dingy hallway in an apartment complex that probably costs less than Edgeworth’s entire salary, looking awkward as all hell.
Phoenix is too tired to pretend like this is normal, and then everything comes rushing back to him and his fingers tighten on the doorknob. For a moment, he fantasizes about slamming the door in Edgeworth’s face. (He thinks Edgeworth might understand.)
The door stays open. They stare at each other under the dim lights overhead, and Phoenix tries again to reconcile my apartment with right, Edgeworth’s not dead, and he’s standing in a puddle of some weird liquid and not even looking disgusted, and I thought he’d just leave again.
“Hello, Wright,” Edgeworth finally says, breaking the silence. It could have been a minute or it could have been an hour, but the greeting finally brings Phoenix's thoughts back to Earth. “I thought we…” he trails off, looking uncharacteristically lost for words.
Phoenix lets him stew in it for a minute; he feels a kind of vindictive joy at seeing Edgeworth finally be the one who’s on the wrong foot. His joy fades, dimly, when he notices the dark circles under Edgeworth’s eyes, and he remembers that the man ran himself ragged trying to uncover de Killer before any harm could come to Maya.
“Thought we…?” Phoenix prompts, and then gives Edgeworth an out, because, god, it’s Miles Edgeworth, and he’s apparently alive, and Phoenix still doesn’t know what to do when faced with Edgeworth on his doorstep. “Did you want to talk?”
Edgeworth gives him a grateful look, shoulders still set with tension and nerves, but some of the anxiety bleeds off his face. “Yes, thank you. I’m sorry -“
“Come in,” Phoenix says, cutting him off before he can get the apology out. He doesn’t want to hear it. Edgeworth is smart, and he may not be great at the social side of things most of the time but he’s not completely incompetent. There’s a little twitch to his lips, slightly pulling them into a frown, that lets Phoenix know Edgeworth picked up on getting intentionally cut off. His mouth opens for a moment, as though to question it, but then he just steps over the threshold.
Miles Edgeworth in his apartment. Phoenix thought it would feel… different, a year after he thought Edgeworth was dead. It mostly just feels weird; Edgeworth looks out of place, because he always does when juxtaposed with Phoenix.
(He… tries not to think about why that makes his chest ache with something long, long abandoned.)
A ghost is in his apartment. Edgeworth looks the part too, as pale as he is, dripping rain onto Phoenix’s shitty carpet.
“You can sit,” Phoenix offers. “Do you, uh. Want some tea? I think I have some left over from when Mia would come by, but it’s - yeah, it’s definitely expired.” God. He isn’t completely sure about the rules of hospitality when someone who you thought was dead, someone you cared about more deeply than you ever wanted to examine, suddenly shows up alive in your shitty apartment that might actually be a health hazard. “Or - or coffee? Water? Uh - soda? It’s Maya’s, but she won’t care if you take some.”
“I’m fine, but thank you,” Edgeworth says and, bafflingly, takes Phoenix up on his offer to sit. Looks like he’ll be staying a while, at least.
He perches, jacket and all, on the recliner in the corner. Phoenix doesn’t wince at the water that soaks into the fabric; Larry has spilled everything, up to and including soy sauce and gochujang and hot sauce and, one very memorable time, an entire soda bottle’s worth of bleach, onto it. A little rainwater isn’t going to hurt it.
He’s distracted by thinking about how gross the recliner is and how much he absolutely can’t tell Edgeworth about any of it without him jumping up like a startled cat to realize that Edgeworth is talking to him.
“Sorry,” he says, even though he doesn’t actually feel apologetic. “What was that?”
Edgeworth blinks at him. “I was asking after Maya,” he says, and Phoenix nods as though he’s been listening. “I - I know that she seemed fine at the dinner, but I know how traumatic events can sometimes… take a while to truly hit you.”
A flash of an elevator grinding to a halt and a gunshot echoes through Phoenix’s mind and he swallows. “Yeah, she,” he starts, and then pauses. Maya’s tears still haven’t dried on his shoulder, but if Edgeworth notices, he doesn’t say anything. He pitches his voice lower with a concerned look toward the bedroom. “I mean, hell, she was basically starved for three days just so a hired assassin could ensure his client got off without any trouble. She’s not okay, but… I think she will be. She’s a strong kid. Well, not really a kid, but - you know.”
Edgeworth hums, a faraway look in his eyes as he leans back in the chair. “I suppose I do,” he says, fingers drumming on the edge of the chair.
Phoenix takes the moment to look at him - really look at him, the way he hasn’t been able to since the first time they ran into each other at the station.
Edgeworth looks more or less the same. Phoenix doesn’t know how to feel about it. There are a few more lines on his face, crinkling around his eyes and his mouth. He’s holding himself differently, too, almost like he’s lighter, Phoenix realizes. It’s different from the Skye case; Phoenix remembers the resignation letter and the exhaustion that had pulled at Edgeworth until he’d seemed so… small. The guilt that had weighed him down back then, so obvious to Phoenix and Ema, is - well, not gone, but less, and Phoenix realizes that Edgeworth has changed, irrevocably, in the year since they’ve seen each other.
Phoenix wishes he hadn’t missed it.
“How is Franz - Prosecutor von Karma?” Phoenix asks, if only to try to get away from the roiling regret that sits, uncomfortable, in his gut.
Edgeworth sighs and leans on his arm, staring out of the window that overlooks the street. “Proud,” he says, and the regret in his voice is palpable. “She has also been through a… particularly trying time. She’ll be returning to Germany for a bit and working as an international prosecutor. Apparently, the Los Angeles legal system is too foolish for her endeavors.”
Her words, Phoenix assumes. He can’t really blame her for the sentiment.
“...Edgeworth… thank you,” Phoenix says. It burns on its way out of his throat, a bitter, complicated sting. He just - he doesn’t know how to deal with Edgeworth being back and saving Phoenix, this time. “I - I really owe you, you know. For finding de Killer and helping to save Maya.”
Edgeworth frowns. “We didn’t. Detective Gumshoe told me that they called the search for him off about an hour ago.”
“You know what I mean, just… take the compliment,” Phoenix says, aiming for light-hearted and missing by a mile.
“A- ah,” Edgeworth says, a half-stutter that he tries to recover. “I’m glad everything worked out, in the end, and that Miss Fey is doing well.”
The clock on the wall is still ticking. Edgeworth coughs under his breath.
They lapse into another awkward silence; it’s hard to find space to breathe around the very obvious elephant in the room. Phoenix doesn’t really know what to say, and it seems Edgeworth doesn’t either. For all his preparations - and Phoenix knows he prepared, he wouldn’t be surprised to see Edgeworth pull out little cue cards just so he doesn’t forget a point that he’s brainstormed - Edgeworth seems just as lost, just as uncertain, as Phoenix is.
(Phoenix’s uncertainty, though, comes with a side of anger, raw and hot and burning under his skin as he thinks of months of almost-glimpses and what they mean. He’s never been good at math, but adding it all up in his head is child’s play - it’s just that the picture it makes leaves a sour, bitter taste in his mouth.)
Edgeworth clears his throat, opening his mouth as though he has something to say, and that, for some reason, spurs Phoenix into action.
“I knew you weren’t dead.” He says it before he can think better of it, and Edgeworth starts.
“…I’m sorry?”
He doesn’t say it like an apology; he says it like he’s confused. Phoenix leans against the back of the couch and considers all the different ways this conversation can go, decides he doesn’t fucking care, and continues. “I mean. I wasn’t certain, I guess. I didn’t know for sure. But, uh, looking back? A lot more things make sense now.”
Edgeworth blinks at him once, twice. “Wright, I don’t -“
“Did you think it was funny?” he asks, because, a lot of the time, his mouth opens before his brain can stop it, and he’s never been good at self-preservation.
Edgeworth still looks confused, and shakes his head as if to clear it. Phoenix knows he isn’t being that clear, is tangling thoughts together without context, but he doesn’t feel that badly about it.
When Edgeworth responds, he speaks slowly, as though Phoenix is going to snap at any word. Maybe he’s right. Maybe Phoenix is strung as tightly as a tenuous thread, and the wrong words will be the ones that make him finally break. “Did I think what was funny?”
Phoenix leans back and doesn’t look at Edgeworth. The anger that’s been burning in him ever since he ran into Edgeworth at the station is spreading through his veins, filling his chest. It feels good. “Me seeing you, for the past few months. You didn’t call me, you didn’t even, you know, deign to tell me you weren’t six feet under, you didn’t… what, think me worth notifying? Fine if I saw you in court or at the, fuck, I don’t know, grocery store? But god forbid you tell me you were back and, contrary to popular opinion, not dead.”
Edgeworth’s jaw works. “I wasn’t aware that you had -“
“Seen you?” Phoenix cuts him off. “Yeah. Never for more than a second. Flashes in the courtroom, whatever. Maybe in the detention center one or two times. Kinda thought it was just wishful thinking.”
“Wishful -“
Phoenix doesn’t let him finish, again. It feels like giving Edgeworth a taste of his own medicine. Cutting things short has always been his specialty, and Phoenix might not be able to wield it as intricately as Edgeworth can, but it still gives him a rush, barreling through and letting all of his ugly emotions spill onto the floor in front of them.
“Yeah, because it couldn’t have been you, right? For a second I wondered if Maya was channeling you -“ Edgeworth looks even more confused at this, but Phoenix doesn’t stop to explain. “- but then I remembered she wasn’t even in town, and there was no one else who could be the one doing it. Ended up thinking your ghost had come back to grace the courthouse, and I was the unlucky bastard you’d chosen to haunt.”
“I… hadn’t meant -“
“Hadn’t meant to what?” Phoenix says, because all the anger and fear and guilt is rising in his chest, suffocating him until he can barely breathe. “Hadn’t meant to make me think you were dead? Hadn’t meant to make me think I was - god, having grief hallucinations because I was stuck in the denial phase a year after I thought you’d -”
He cuts himself off. His hands are clenched into fists on his thighs, knuckles white with tension, and his voice is starting to get too loud. The last thing he wants is for Maya or Pearl to hear him shouting and wake up. They’ve been through enough, today, they don’t need to listen to Phoenix having a complete breakdown.
“I didn't mean to -“
“You never do,” Phoenix says. “You know, I was there for State v. Skye, I remember what it did to you. I was the one trying to talk you down from resigning, the one who was there for the aftermath, so don’t act like you didn’t know how much I -“
“You have no idea how I -“ Edgeworth snaps, a rare moment of lost composure before he v isibly calms himself again. “I understand if you’re angry with me for the note -”
“ God. I’m not mad about the note, Edgeworth!” Phoenix retorts, standing up. For all that he’s been exhausted the past few days, the conversation - the argument, if Phoenix is being fair - has energized him, finally given him a chance to let the anger and the guilt and the grief uncoil from where it’s sat for the past year. “I would never be mad at you for - for that. How could I be? I’m - I grieved you, okay? I spent a year of my life thinking that, god, that you’d been suffering alone and I hadn’t helped and -“
“It wasn’t about you, Wright,” Edgeworth doesn’t rise to meet him. Phoenix wants him to. Instead, Edgeworth presses his finger and thumb to the bridge of his nose and inhales. “That’s not - I did not come here to argue with you about last year. I simply wanted to acknowledge my actions and apologize for any hurt I caused.”
“And what if I do want to argue?” Phoenix hisses, because he’s been spoiling for a fight ever since he’d run into Edgeworth at the station. He wants to have it out, wants to finally lash out with all of the pain that’s built up in his chest.
Edgeworth glares at him, and it finally feels familiar. “This,” he hisses back, “was not something you could have saved me from! I know that you have an overwhelming hero complex, Wright, but I was not intended as your pet project to save while I dealt with my entire world imploding.”
“That’s not what I -“ Phoenix starts, and Edgeworth finally rises.
“Isn’t it?” he says. He’s close enough for Phoenix to see the flecks of light silver among the grey of his eyes. “You’re angry I made this decision because it meant you failed.”
“What - I’m mad that you sprung this on me! It’s been an entire year, you -“
Edgeworth laughs. It’s an angry, bitter sound, and Phoenix revels in finally bringing him down to his level. “I’m sorry, then, that I did not give you twenty four hours notice before leaving a suicide note, Wright.”
“That’s not - Edgeworth, I’m not angry about that! It would be hypocritical of me, one, and two, I’m not that much of a jackass!”
The glare Edgeworth fixes on him now is withering. “What are you angry about, then, Wright? If not the note and my - my decision?”
“I’m angry you didn’t tell me you were alive!” Phoenix confesses, and hates how plaintive it comes out, how pained. His voice cracks, and he twists his fingers together as he looks away, unable to bear whatever expression is on Edgeworth’s face. “Not about the note or - or any of that, god. Obviously, I would have helped you if I’d known, hell, I would have done anything if I thought it would have even helped the slightest bit, I -“
He cuts himself off with a grimace, and chances a glance at Edgeworth’s face. Edgeworth still looks angry, but there are fractures in the expression, now slowly spreading, and Phoenix has to look away.
“I’m not angry about your decision,” he says again, biting his lip as he fixes his gaze on the wall and tries not to let the tears welling up in his eyes fall. “I’m - I’m upset with myself because I didn’t think I was able to save you, but I never blamed you for it, and I was never angry for what you chose. I just - it’s been a year, Edgeworth. A year of me thinking you were dead, and that all I had were glimpses of you that I thought had to be fake. And then you show up, after I’m already breaking, a grand reveal, and… god, Edgeworth, you being alive was all I wanted, so why didn’t you tell me you were back?”
In the corner of his vision, Edgeworth freezes, a deer in headlights silhouetted by the light of the moon. The other man looks shocked, mouth slightly hanging open at Phoenix veritably ripping his heart out and handing it to him on a silver platter.
His jaw works; his hands shake at his sides, as though he’s desperately searching for something to do with them. It’s a rare sight, Edgeworth lost for words.
“I…” he starts, trailing off into nothing as he bites his lip and looks off to the side.
Phoenix takes a deep, shuddery breath, hating how exposed he feels. It’s a turnabout, one of his specialties, except this time he doesn’t think he’s won anything. “It’s a simple question,” he mutters, giving up on saving any face with Edgeworth. “I thought we at least were -“ He cuts himself off, terrified to finish the sentence. Terrified that he would be right, that the past tense would be the death knell of something he never realized he wanted.
Edgeworth doesn’t speak; he’s looking at Phoenix as though he doesn’t know how to read him. As though this line of conversation is unrecognizable. Maybe it is - Phoenix was the one who went off-script first, the one who took a look at the massive elephant in the room and decided to bring it into the light just to stab it.
“I didn’t realize,” Edgeworth eventually says, still looking lost more than anything else, “how strongly my - leave of absence - had affected you.”
Leave of absence. It would be funny if Phoenix didn’t want to scream. He laughs instead, hollowly; Edgeworth tries to cover up his flinch. Phoenix catches it anyway. “You didn’t realize. Right.”
It’s - it is funny. Kind of. That Phoenix could change his entire life trajectory for Miles Edgeworth based on less than a single year of elementary school and a fucking newspaper photo, and Edgeworth just… completely didn’t realize that Phoenix cared about him. God.
A single drop of something wet splashes onto the back of his hand, and Phoenix glances down, almost surprised. He brings his fingers to his cheek, rubbing gently over the trail that the tear had left. He’s always been an easy crier, angry or frustrated or sad or overwhelmed or whatever, and he’s a mix of all of them right now, and a few more, and it’s… just, a lot.
When Edgeworth speaks again, his voice is soft. His voice is too soft for how angry Phoenix wants to be at him. How angry Phoenix is - a little bit at Edgeworth, a little bit at himself. More at the latter, now, with the absence of Edgeworth arguing back.
“I… am truly sorry, Wright,” he says. “I wasn’t aware that you had… noticed me, over the past few months. It was - it was never my intention to… maliciously deceive you.”
Anger can turn to self-hatred on a dime, and Phoenix wipes at his eyes again as he takes a step away from Edgeworth.
“Could have fooled me,” he mumbles, voice thick.
“I didn’t think that informing you of my return would be…” Edgeworth’s mouth does a funny little twist, and Phoenix blinks at the unfamiliarity of it all. “… welcome.”
“In what world do you think I wouldn’t be overjoyed to see you?” Phoenix asks, a confession that he never meant to surrender.
The funny little twist stays, a sardonic, self-immolating little moue that Phoenix hates seeing on Edgeworth’s face. “In the one where you tell me that it would have been better if I’d stayed dead upon seeing me for the first time.”
Phoenix reels back, chest aching at the resignation in Edgeworth’s eyes that he hadn’t quite been able to hide. His biggest fear - or, god, one of his fears, Phoenix isn’t that egotistical - had been Phoenix hating him. And Phoenix had - quite loudly and angrily - confirmed his fears, that day in the station.
He doesn’t know how to respond; Edgeworth has managed to pull off another miraculous turnabout of this conversation, in his own way. The fight has drained out of him and Phoenix both, turning to nothing more than dying embers, and they’re both left standing silently in a dim room, refusing to look at each other.
The anger is still there - Phoenix thinks it will be a while before it truly fades, before the betrayal (as irrational or valid as it may be) stops leaving a bitter taste in his mouth every time he’s reminded that Edgeworth is back in LA.
Edgeworth takes a step away from him, and it’s a testament to how exhausted Phoenix is, how off-kilter he feels, that he doesn’t even notice until Edgeworth is moving toward the door, farther away from Phoenix, with the saddest look in his eyes.
“I think I should go. You - your feelings on the matter have been made... quite clear, Wright. I only came here to…” Edgeworth trails off. His hand raises for a moment and then falls to his side.
Phoenix is terrified to hear him finish the sentence at the same time he desperately needs to hear what Edgeworth was going to say. Edgeworth doesn’t elaborate, for better or worse.
“For all it’s worth - I am sorry, again, for… all of it. I won’t take any more of your time.” It’s barely louder than a murmur as Edgeworth takes a step back toward the door - he never did end up taking his coat off. He looks smaller, somehow - not chastised, really, but regretful in a way that Phoenix had never expected to see from him, even after the resurgence of the DL-6 case. “I’ll only be in town for a few weeks. If - I won’t speak with you, if that’s what you would prefer.”
The idea that Phoenix would never want to speak with him again - the idea that Phoenix, who chased Edgeworth down and saved him and grieved him for a year after he thought the other man committed suicide, to the point of not letting anyone say his name… it’s laughable, or would be in any other circumstance. Phoenix has learned to live without Edgeworth this past year, has learned what life is without him, and it’s not something he wants to repeat.
(He feels like he’s spent his life missing Edgeworth, waiting for them to finally be on the same page the way that they were when they were kids. Irrational, probably. But Phoenix has always been an idealist.)
Edgeworth waits, longer than he probably needs to. And then he swallows heavily, nods, and turns to leave. And something in Phoenix shatters - the part of him that’s screaming about how every time he sees Edgeworth walk away from him, it might be the last time before Edgeworth disappears for good.
He stands and moves without thinking; two steps forward and a vice-tight grip on the back of Edgeworth’s suit jacket is all it takes for the other man to immediately pause.
“Wright?” he asks, quiet, and Phoenix takes a deep breath.
“That’s not - I don’t want you to leave again,” he says, and his admission almost sounds too loud in the quiet din of the room. “Not like this.”
Edgeworth doesn’t turn; Phoenix doesn’t know if he wants him to.
“What do you want?” Edgeworth asks; it’s carefully flat, and carefully non-accusing, and Phoenix closes his eyes. He’s tempted to let himself fall, to sway forward until his forehead meets the back of Edgeworth’s neck and just stays there for a while, but he reins himself in.
What does he want? Maya safe, check. Pearls okay, check. Engarde in chains, check. de Killer arrested… in progress. Edgeworth back ? It’s been a pipe dream for so long that Phoenix doesn’t really know what to do with it now.
“ God,” Phoenix says, shakily, wiping at his eyes and dodging the question the way he knows best. “I don’t want to be pissed at you.”
It’s not not a lie. It’s a little bit a lie. Because Phoenix doesn’t want to be pissed at Edgeworth, but there’s so much between them, and he’d thought that he’d at least - god.
(It doesn’t matter. It really doesn’t, and Phoenix is being a baby, and he never was entitled to knowing more about Edgeworth’s life, he just - he just. It stings, sometimes, when he remembers that.)
What he wants is to be able to just talk to Edgeworth, and pretend that the past year hasn’t happened, and maybe become something close to friends with the man again instead of looking at him and remembering that, yesterday, Phoenix was mostly convinced that he was dead.
He’s still holding onto Edgeworth’s jacket. The fabric flutters back into place as Phoenix lets it go.
Edgeworth finally turns around, and there’s an unreadable look on his face and a barely-there hope in his eyes.
“I wish I could forget all of this,” Phoenix says, “and just go back to us being friends again, or - or at least becoming friends again. I’m so tired of arguing, Edgeworth, I just - you’re back, you’re alive, I just - I think I’m going to be upset about you not telling me for a bit?”
“Of course,” Edgeworth says immediately, and Phoenix sniffs, rubbing his arm over his eyes as he feels the tears finally starting to lessen.
“I’m sorry,” he mumbles, “for what I said. In the station. It - with Maya being kidnapped, and seeing you again… it’s not an excuse, but. I wasn’t in my right mind. Not really.”
Edgeworth doesn’t look like he knows what to say to that. His eyes are wide, and Phoenix realizes that he’s gone off script again, and Edgeworth is having to do some recalibrations.
It’s such a familiar look that it almost hurts. Phoenix hadn’t really realized how much he’d missed it. So much of the year of Edgeworth being gone (and, god, even having the man in front of him and alive doesn’t do much to ease the ache that the past year had brought) had been Phoenix missing the big things.
He’d forgotten about stuff like this. About watching Edgeworth process things, about watching the gears turn in his head and nearly being able to see the logic leaps that he’s making as he proceeds doggedly through a problem or a premise.
God. Phoenix is so glad he’s back.
Edgeworth eventually blinks, and then considers him for a long moment. “I forgive you,” he says, and Phoenix has to do a bit of thinking to remember what he’s referring to. “And I apologize, as well, I - I never meant to make you feel as though I didn’t want to tell you I was back. It was just - finding the right time was… difficult. If I’d known you were aware, I - I would have spoken up sooner.”
“Thank you,” Phoenix says. “I - I know you weren’t trying to hurt me, or lie, um. But thank you, for saying that, I - I think I really needed to hear it.”
Both of them lapse into silence again, but this time it’s finally comfortable; the tension and anger has largely dissipated, and even though it’s not gone entirely, Phoenix is just thankful that they can exist together in this space without snapping. It’s still a little awkward, but nothing like before, and Phoenix knows that they will get over this, together.
“… Hey. I missed you,” Phoenix murmurs, and if his smile is a little watery, Edgeworth doesn’t comment. “I’m glad you’re back.”
Edgeworth looks a bit conflicted at that, a little bit awkward, and Phoenix’s stomach sinks down to the floor.
“What?” he asks, and Edgeworth bites his lip.
“I’m leaving in two weeks,” he says, a bit hesitant. “But - I should only be gone for a few months. One of my contacts in Spain is asking for assistance on a case, but I should be back in California by…October, at the latest.”
“Okay,” Phoenix says, and it’s - it kinda is, and it kinda isn’t, but. He’ll cope. “Okay, that’s - yeah, okay.”
Edgeworth’s eyebrow raises an infinitesimal amount. “Did you have any other words of wisdom?” he asks, and Phoenix blinks for a moment until he realizes that Edgeworth is teasing him. And, just like that, the last of the tension bleeds out of the room. Not like it’s never been there, but like it’s comfortable, now, and it doesn’t feel so suffocating and awkward. It helps Phoenix think that the two of them can come back from this; pick up the broken pieces and create a tentative peace.
“Maybe just… pick up when I call?” he asks, and then sheepishly rubs the back of his head. It sounds so silly, out loud. He and Edgeworth aren’t - they’re kind of friends, or at least Phoenix wants them to be, and it’s not the weirdest request, especially considering the last year. But still. “Or, at least text me, I mean - I’m not a picky guy. I’d be fine with a call or a text or - do you do email? I have one, you can send me something, or -“
“You’re asking if I’ll stay in touch?” Edgeworth asks, cutting him off, and Phoenix nods, gratefully. Mia always told him he was bad at shutting up when he really got going.
“If you - want to?” It comes out as a question; Phoenix knows what he wants, which is Edgeworth not dropping off the edge of the world for another year while Phoenix sits there wondering if he’s okay. But he doesn’t know what Edgeworth wants, even if he can make a solid enough guess, and he’s trying to be better about not being… overbearing.
The silence doesn’t do much for his already-thin nerves. If he didn’t know that Edgeworth wasn’t intentionally a cruel man, he’d think that he was making Phoenix wait around like this as some form of punishment.
“I would… be amenable to that,” Edgeworth concedes, and Phoenix can’t hold back the shocked noise that erupts from his chest. He claps his hand over his mouth and glances toward the door to his room; the only sound he can hear is Pearl faintly snoring, so he thinks they’re good. (He has no idea how the girls haven’t woken up, but he’s not one to question the blessings he gets.)
“You don’t have to sound so excited about it,” Phoenix says. It’s a half-hearted tease, at best; Edgeworth has a small little smile on his face, and Phoenix knows that his own grin is too obvious to hide.
“Perish the thought,” Edgeworth murmurs, and Phoenix nudges him in the shoulder.
(It’s - it’s weird, for things to feel this normal, after everything.)
Edgeworth’s phone beeps, and he pulls it out of his pocket while Phoenix watches on. His brow furrows at whatever message appears on the screen, and it’s harder than Phoenix thought it would be to resist reaching out and smoothing the lines on his forehead.
“Detective Gumshoe,” he says, by way of explanation, and Phoenix gives a little hum of curiosity. “Apparently, Franziska has sent him a final list of instructions from the plane and the good detective is begging for my help deciphering her orders.”
By the way Edgeworth’s lip pulls down into a frown, Phoenix is pretty sure that ‘good detective’ is nothing more than a temporary status. Phoenix leans forward a bit, delighted to see Gumshoe using emojis, and then the time catches his eye. “Wow. It’s nearly midnight?”
Edgeworth looks up at that as well, and Phoenix realizes that his leaning forward means that he and Edgeworth are even closer together, faces much too close for comfort. He stumbles back with a sheepish grin, rubbing at the back of his neck and thanking whatever god exists for it being dark enough in the apartment that Edgeworth probably can’t see his blush. Edgeworth raises an eyebrow but doesn’t say anything else, and Phoenix busies himself with messing with some of the blankets on the pullout as a cover.
“It is quite late,” Edgeworth says, and gives Phoenix a once over. “I’m sure you’re tired after the past few days.”
“Haha, is it that obvious?” Phoenix says, gesturing to the dark circles under his eyes. “You don’t look much better, Edgeworth. Get some rest?”
Edgeworth inclines his head. “Please tell Maya that… I’m glad she’s doing alright.”
Phoenix nods. “Sure. And, um. Maybe we can - I don't know, get… lunch, or something? Talk about all this when we’re not both on the edge of passing asleep?” It sounds silly the second it’s out of his mouth, and Phoenix drops his head into his hands. “Sorry, that was - you’re not, like, obligated or anything, I don’t know why -“
“I’d like to,” Edgeworth says, and he never does stop surprising Phoenix. “We can figure it out with that texting thing you seem so fond of. But for now, I’m afraid, I do need to get some sleep. The Prosecutor’s Office is horrifically busy with a number of high-profile cases, and I’ll need to have my wits about me tomorrow.”
“Hey, ouch. And second, I mean, you could crash here,” Phoenix says, laughing at the disparaging look Edgeworth gives him.
“While the offer is appreciated,” he says, not even trying to sound sincere, “I’d much rather sleep in a bed than on your armchair.”
“Oh, come on, Edgeworth,” Phoenix says with a grin. “The floor is surprisingly comfy. Or you could try sharing with the girls. Pearls snores and Maya kicks, though.”
Edgeworth just rolls his eyes and steps out into the hallway, not even dignifying it with a response. Phoenix can’t blame him - he’s missed this, though, riling Edgeworth up, and he thinks that maybe they’ll be okay, after all this.
He hands Edgeworth his briefcase before the man forgets it at Phoenix’s place, and gets a quiet, murmured thanks in return. He rocks back and forth on the balls of his feet while they both exchange goodbyes, and then Edgeworth is walking out of his door, shitty hallway lights casting deep shadows against the walls.
“Hey, Miles?” Phoenix can’t resist calling after him, leaning against the side of his doorway. There’s still a smile pulling at his lips, and he casually shoves his hands into his pockets as he watches Edgeworth walk away. “Don’t be a stranger.”
His voice is casual, but the look on Edgeworth’s tone says he understands it’s anything but.
“You should upgrade your phone, Phoenix,” is all he says in response, and Phoenix laughs, fishing his trusty Nokia out of his pocket.
“Not a chance,” he calls back, and Edgeworth gives him another small smile before raising his hand in a final wave.
He turns at the end of the corridor, moving toward the stairs instead of waiting at the elevator. Phoenix watches the space where he disappeared for a moment too long. There’s still a sick little twist in his gut as he watches Edgeworth walk away from him, but he tamps it down with the belief that Edgeworth will be true to his word.
Not everything is better; Phoenix isn’t foolish enough to think that one conversation will be enough to mend the many shattered pieces that lay on the metaphorical floor between himself and Edgeworth. There’s too much that’s been left unsaid; too much that they still need to clear the air about. Their scars have healed wrong, and it’s going to take more than a single late-night argument for them to figure all of this out and move past it.
But, Phoenix realizes, quietly closing the door and locking it with a faint, soft smile on his face, it’s a start.