Saving Grant Ward

Chapter Fifty-Six

By the time I got to the kitchen, Grant had already made us both sandwiches.

"Here you go," he said, sliding my plate across the counter to me.

"Thank you chef," I said, catching my plate but not touching my sandwich yet. I needed to talk to Grant first.

"Everything okay?" he asked.

"Yup. I wanna talk to you about something though."

Grant sat down and leaned forward, all his attention on me.

"Shoot."

"What if we took a break from SHIELD?"

"What do you mean?" asked Grant, his eyebrows knitting together.

"I mean, what if we left SHIELD for a little while, just until all this crap with Garrett is over?"

Grant paused, and I could tell he was going crazy, back and forth in his head. Finally, he spoke.

"Doesn't the team need us?"

"I already talked to Coulson, and he said they could manage without us."

Grant nodded slowly, then spoke up again. "I think... I think that sounds perfect. I don't want to leave SHIELD for good, but a break might be good right now."

"That's what I was thinking. I don't want to be gone forever either, but we need a step back." I didn't tell Grant that I wanted to get him far, far away from Garrett because I didn't want to embarrass him, but I got the feeling he understood.

Grant took a deep breath. "Let's do it."

"Alright. I'll go tell Coulson our decision."

"I'll start packing." He pushed off the counter, and I picked up my sandwich to take with me to Coulson's office. Packing wasn't going to take long, since we only had whatever our team had brought for us, and then we would be just about ready to go.

I headed back to Coulson's office to tell him our decision. He understood and it honestly seemed like he was expecting it. After talking to him, I went to go find Grant.

"Hey," I said, swinging into the room. He was zipping up our bags. "You ready to go?"

"Yeah. I am." He looked relieved, and I realized I was, too. SHIELD meant the world to me, but it would be nice to take a break from all the danger and deceit crap and just be with Grant, like normal people.

"Alright. Then let's go." I took my bag, and we walked towards the door. We were going to walk into the nearest town, and then go from there.

When we got to the door, we found the whole team waiting for us. Even Koenig!

"You didn't think you could leave without saying goodbye, did you?" asked Skye.

"Of course not." I smiled and pulled her into a hug, dropping my bag by the door. I couldn't hug properly if I was trying to hold a duffel bag.

"I'm going to miss having you around," said Skye.

"Same here. This isn't forever though. This is just goodbye for now."

Skye nodded and I pulled away. She had a sad smile on her face as I turned to Fitz and Simmons.

"I'm going to miss you guys so much," I said, pulling them both into a hug.

"We'll miss you too," said Simmons.

"So much," added Fitz.

I gave them both an extra-tight squeeze, then pulled away.