Title: Harm and Mac Songbook: Emotions

Author: Rising Sun

Rated: PG

Classification: JAG Story/Angst

Summary: Mac and Harm are estranged. Will they divorce? Or will they reconcile?

Disclaimer: JAG characters portrayed belong to JAG, CBS and Paramount Television. No copyright infringement intended. All other characters depicted are purely fictional and any similarities to actual people are purely coincidental.

Performing in this saga:

"Emotion" (depending upon your generation) is sung by Samantha Sang or by Destiny's Child

Feedback: Would be nice.

Author's note: The HMS series is written in a manner that allows for each story to be read as a self-contained story or as part of an arc. This story is part of a possible quintet:

* HMS11a: It Wasn't Me

* HMS11b: Lady Love

* HMS11c: Emotions

* HMS11d: Last Night I Didn't Get to Sleep At All

* HMS11e: Survivor

WARNING: If you can't handle infidelity among your fav characters then DON'T READ THIS!

Story Written - 2001

***************************************

It's over and done

But the heartache lives on inside

And who's the one you're clinging to

Instead of me tonight?

And where are you now, now that I need you?

Tears on my pillow wherever you go

I'll cry me a river that leads to your ocean

You never see me fall apart

===========================================

IT IS THE YEAR 2008

2200 LOCAL

BOQ

The room felt like a cell.

{Am I mad?} He though. {Of course I am. What in hell could have possessed me to not only go to bed with Renee but to take her home to do it?}

Brumby's words of eleven years past suddenly popped into his head, "You stray, she will forgive you. You will pay but she will forgive you."

Mic was right. He was already paying.

Mac was the master of mission planning, when he was ready to rush in where angles feared to tread she was always logical and precise. Now, instead of ranting and raving as any other woman would and had the right to Mac had shut down. She had left him to inflict punishment upon himself, which was a far worse retribution than she ever could administer.

The question remained was it over and done? Could He get his family back? Could he get Mac back? Had she turned completely from him? {I wonder ... who's the one she's clinging to instead of me tonight? Would she do that?} Harm was tormenting himself into the mad house.

===========================================

In the words of a broken heart

Its just emotion that's taken me over

Caught up in sorrow, lost in my soul

But if you don't come back

Come home to me, darling

Don't you know there's nobody left in this world

To hold me tight

Don't cha know there's nobody left in this world to kiss goodnight

Goodnight, goodnight

===========================================

ONE MONTH AFTER THE DISASTER

1200 LOCAL

NEIGHBOURHOOD PARK

He was at the park with the kids. In the one month since Mac had caught him in bed with Rene he had made no progress with her. She let him see his children but maintained her distance. If he were

truthful he looked awful. He looked like a zombie; he had lost weight and was not getting enough sleep. Mac didn't look any better either.

"Daddy, I'm hungry." Catherine penetrated Harm's woolgathering.

He smiled at the tiny replica of his beloved wife and scooped her up. "I have no idea where you get that appetite from."

"Mom of course." David answered. "Dad when are you coming home?"

"I hope soon son. I hope soon."

"Mum's really mad at you huh?"

"Yep. I messed up big time." Harm admitted to his son. "But that doesn't mean we don't love you guys cause we do. We'll always be there at your sides, part of all the things you are and hope to be. Remember that. No matter what happens remember that."

"Daddy, I'm hungry." Catherine repeated.

"OK OK what will it be?"

"Beltway Burger!!" Both kids squealed.

Harm definitely knew where they got that taste.

===========================================

I'm there at your side,

I'm part of all the things you are

But you've got a part of someone else

You've got to find your shining star

And where are you now, now that I need you?

Tears on my pillow wherever you go

I'll cry me a river that leads to your ocean

You never see me fall apart

===========================================

TWO MONTHS AFTER THE DISASTER

1800 LOCAL

LA JOLLA CALIFORNIA

BURNETT RESIDENCE

Harm's mother collapsed into the nearest patio chair she could find. "You did what?! I CAN-NOT believe you did that. After five years of pinning for that woman and seven years of marriage you went and had an affair! Oh Harm!"

"It wasn't an affair mom!" He protested.

"Affair, one nightstand, telephone love it hurts Harm ... and she caught you! Mac must be devastated." Trish said.

"She is." He admitted.

"Harmon."

He knew that tone. His mother used it and his full name only when she was deadly serious. Today she was in Medusa mode.

"You are my son, I love you dearly and like the rest of us you have your faults and demons. Through it all I have been amused, exasperated even annoyed but never ashamed until now. I expect many things from you. I even take the unexpected from you. I never expected infidelity." She said sadly, then, "I suppose she kicked your six something awful even left you?"

"Actually no."

"No?" Trish was puzzled. "So what's happening?"

"Nothing. She hasn't ranted, raved, thrown stuff. She has made a strategic withdrawal. In case she never told you Marines don't retreat."

His head rocked back. His mother had slapped him with every ounce of strength she had in her being. "Consider that a down payment on what Mac will deal. I can count on one had with fingers remaining the number of times I have hit you. This is one time you needed it. So, you going to divorce her for this floozy?"

He could only look at his mother. She had never taken the woman's side against him, until now. If he ever needed evidence that Mac was family he had it. A hell of a way to gather evidence but there you go such is life. "You are stronger than you look mom." He rubbed his cheek. "Woman to man or mother to son, although you sound like you would disown me at the moment; tell me how to get her back. I will be damned if I will roll over and let Mac divorce me. I sure as hell am not going to file. Despite evidence to the contrary I love my kids and I need my wife. Help me mom. "

===========================================

THREE MONTHS AFTER THE DISASTER

SUNDAY - 1700 LOCAL

RABB'S RESIDENCE

Harm felt like he had been romancing a stone but he persisted. The serenading at the Roberts' House the weekend didn't seem to make a dent in Mac's resolve.

In-between trying to win Mac back he continued to see his kids. Of that she had never denied him. Harm had had the kids for the day. The extroverted three year old announced their arrival. "Mommy

Mommy Mommy – where are you!"

Harm felt like he was an outsider watching a movie as he observed his wife intercept their daughter. "Right here pumpkin!" And she scooped Cathy up.

There was something different about her tonight. As Harm struggled to place his finger on what it was that exactly was tugging at the corner of his mind; the introverted five year old also spotted the difference and asked, "You not mad anymore Mom?"

Mac deliberately locked eyes with Harm, as she replied "No."

"Oh good. Can Dad come home now?"

Again she locked eyes with Harm, as she answered the little interrogator "Yes. Now take your sister to the kitchen for a glass of milk." To Harm "I assume that you fed them on some rabbit stuff."

"I fed them." He confirmed he was admitting to nothing else. Those kids eat rabbit food? HA! He dared to ask, "Were you serious? I can come home?"

He got the answer he'd prayed for three months for. "Yes. I was serious you can return to the house to the kids and to my bed. One day we will talk about this Harm; but not today and not tomorrow."

"OK" He would agree to anything she stipulated.

And she did. She stipulated the following: "I catch a repeat performance and I WILL shoot you. She ... I will let walk. You... I will kill."

Harm nodded for he knew she could and would.

===========================================

In the words of a broken heart

Its just emotion that's taken me over

Caught up in sorrow, lost in my soul

But if you don't come back

Come home to me, darling

Nobody left in this world

To hold me tight

Nobody left in this world to kiss goodnight

Goodnight, goodnight

THE END