Good Trouble Fanfiction: Davia and Dennis

I Can't Make You Love Me

DISCLAIMER: These characters don't belong to me; I'm just borrowing them for a while. :)

SURPRISE! Everything in chapter 1 after *** is one of those "what-if" moments that didn't actually happen. Tee-hee.

So everything goes according to episode 12 where they argue and Dennis eventually agrees with Davia that he needs help. So they go to the support group. This chapter begins after Dennis has been going there for a few weeks. Erin gave me some suggestions about where to go from where I left off in chapter 1. So some credit goes to her for the basis of this chapter. :)

Dennis had been going to the grief support group for a few weeks now. He truly did want to go, but originally didn't believe it would actually help him. He felt that maybe if he went, he would at least feel like he tried. Plus, Davia's pleading made him think that maybe this would alleviate some of his co-dependence on her to get through each day. Even though things had been rocky between them as of late, his feelings for her hadn't changed. And he could see the toll all of this was taking on her.

Davia and Dennis were leaving from the grief support group meeting one night. Davia was truly happy that Dennis wanted her to attend the meetings with him. Stef was correct; she needed him to need her. While they hadn't re-approached certain aspects of their argument before he decided to get help, they were once again spending a lot of time together. It was almost as if that fight never happened.

The pain and anxiety of not knowing how Dennis actually felt about her continued to linger, but she was able to put that aside for now. That way, she could focus on being as supportive to him as possible. Taking the step to go to a grief support group wasn't an easy feat for him, and a part of her was actually shocked that he decided to go to a meeting the evening they originally fought. However, that shock paled in comparison to Dennis actually wanting her to come into the meeting with him. She remembered the first time she took him to a group after his release from the psychiatric hospital; how he told her he needed to do it alone, how he proceeded to leave the meeting and go home. This was a complete 180.

However, she cared enough about Dennis working through this and getting as better as one who has lost a child possibly could. Tonight, she knew she needed to tell him he needed to start trying to go to the meetings by himself. As much as it pained her to think about not accompanying him, it had to be done. She remembered how he cried in the car after the first meeting, almost as though he was going through this again for the first time.

But the next couple of weeks were getting easier. If she were his partner or in the position of Jennifer, this step wouldn't be necessary. But she was just his friend, and it didn't feel appropriate to continue going with him. Friend was probably not the right word to describe her relationship to him, but she couldn't really find a better one that described their complex relationship.

It was the evening of Dennis' support group. While she didn't want to spring this on him at the last moment, she also didn't want to give him a lot of time to reconsider going if she wasn't going to be in there with him.

Davia was in her loft listening to music, trying to decompress after a rough day at work. She knew there were a couple hours before Dennis had to be at his meeting, so she figured she'd head down to his loft in a little while to talk to him. However, she soon heard a knock on her door.

When she answered the door, it was Dennis.

"Hey...sorry, I know It's a little bit early," Dennis apologetically said when he saw Davia, who looked a bit frazzled.

"That's ok, come on in," she replied.

"Are you ok?" Dennis asked. He could tell that she wasn't herself.