#tim and lucy in every episode of TR | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

starseneyes · 1 year

Text

Chenford REWIND- Lucy Chen / Tim Bradford - The Rookie - Season 5 - Ep 2, 3 & 4

Sitting here in a slight bit of disbelief that I'm writing another one so soon, but there have been pockets of time that have opened up in my life, and I'm going to take advantage before I run out, again!

Combining a little, here, because where we had 19 minutes plus of screen time in Episode 1, the number goes down considerably for a few episodes to off-set and focus on some other story lines/characters.

SPOILER ALERT: While I'm primarily writing these as though I were watching the episode for the first time, I will definitely spoil these episodes and MAYBE a little more (there ARE some nice points to reference as we go forward). Consider yourself forewarned!

Can Tim and Lucy untangle the mess of last episode's impulsive near-boinkfest? Let's dive in to find out.

Labor Day

"I'm positive your Sergeant will approve it?" "Yeah, he would, for sure. It's just, um, I have some things going on in my personal life right now."

There is so much to unpack, here. Let's start with Lucy's absolute surety that Tim would approve her going to the Undercover Academy.

When she first thought about pursuing Under Cover, Tim was totally against it. Yes, he has his own history regarding his ex-wife, but he also wasn't sure that Lucy could handle it.

Obviously, he under-estimated her, and he's repeatedly remarked on her doing a good job every time. "Not bad." "I thought she needed rescuing." "You're really good at this." Tim will approve it. No question.

The second is "I have some things going on in my persona life". Because, Chris immediately assumes he's the only roadblock to her happiness, at this point (and, Chris, honey, you are a roadblock... just not the one you think you are).

If you watch to the end of the episode, though, this isn't the only thing on her mind. Tim is, too. Not Sergeant Bradford, but Tim... the man.

They didn't get to finish their moment, and there's no way to take it back. In the flash of a moment, Lucy had to acknowledge her cheating ways and then register that the man she was cheating on was dying on her couch.

And what if that drove Tim away forever? What if that was her only chance, and now it's gone. What if it could have meant something, but she'll never have the chance to know?

Yeah... this is messy.

"How's Lucy?"

Hold the phone right there. Angela is asking Tim Bradford about Lucy.

In the past (especially post DOD), it was always Tim asking others about Lucy. He was the one on the outside who wasn't as close. Now, he's the mouthpiece for Lucy's state of being... and that's huge.

Tim has been in contact with Lucy. Maybe a call, but more likely text messages. But, however he's done it, he's been the one to check on her directly instead of going through someone else.

"Are you checking up on me" is now Tim reaching out to Lucy about Lucy. And that's huge.

"Uh, she's still a little shaken. Taking some time to get Chris settled." "Remind me what you were doing at her apartment... when you found Chris bleeding out."

Hermana! You are not giving this man any leeway and I am living for it!

Look, gossip gets around, but Angela's the only one who knows Tim's caught feelings for Lucy. It's unlikely any of the others would think Tim, who never stops seeing his Boots as Boots, would even consider boinking a Boot.

But Angela's different. She knows her Man of Honor better than most, and she has a feeling there's a reason behind Tim's presence in Lucy's apartment. "Search your feelings, you know it to be true."

"Just dropping her off after we got back from Vegas."

He leans into the truth. Honestly, that's the best thing you can do in a situation like that. But he knows she is fishing and he is hoping she will bite onto his lure away from the truth.

"Mmhmm."

Yeah, she's not biting, Tim.

"What are you implying?" "What do you think?" "I was just dropping her off." "Mmhmm."

Tim narrows his eyes at her, frustrated that she's now going along with his half-truth. Because, for goodness sake, this is messy.

Imagine Tim and Lucy don't get interrupted and they go through with it. Who would ever know? Tim goes his way. Lucy goes hers.

And then they'd have to deal with the inevitable emotional fall-out... but neither of them was thinking past that moment. They certainly never thought they'd have to explain it to others!

A Knock At The Door

Melissa O'Neil has some beautiful physicality to this scene, as she leans up to look out the peephole and sees Tim standing there. Gosh, is that indicative of her life, right now.

She has Chris. He's right here on her couch. But she wants Tim, and all she can do is glimpse him from outside her world. He's right there, but he's not inside... He's back on the other side of that threshold.

"Hey, what are you doing here?" "Just checking in. How you feeling?"

Look. At. Lucy. Her face screams, "Are you seriously doing this?!" This is likely the first time she's seen him since that horrible moment... the first time she's seen him wearing his own clothes and rocking his own hair (slicked back Tim was sleezy, I'm just sayin').

"Lucy's taking great care of me." "I have no doubt."

Tim's voice is so soft on this. I'll later come to identify it as his Velvety Voice... because he's talking about Lucy, the natural caretaker. The one who watches out for others. The one who sends food to her TO to help expedite his recovery.

Lucy is a beautiful caretaker, and a part of him wishes he was the one receiving her affection, right now.

Everything in him is aching to reach for her to offer comfort, right now, because he can see she is hurting. But his hands are firmly in his pockets, and have been since the second he stopped knocking.

"Can we talk?" "Yeah, sure."

He motions his head to the hallway, drawing her back out, across her own threshold. His voice is almost hesitant, and she doesn't know what they might discuss, but I think they both know their "almost" is going to come up.

She leaves the door open, probably to keep herself in check. And as she steps out, she and Tim are now standing in almost exactly the same positions as the last time they saw one another... standing at a threshold prepared to go in.

But, now they've both stepped back out.

"So, I, uh, I hear you're on the fence about going to UC school." "Chris called you?" "Yeah, which was expected. He wanted me to talk to you."

I love his little smirk on that. Not so long ago, his girlfriend called Lucy, and she wasn't phased a bit. But this is different for Tim.

Tim has feelings for Lucy, and that's making things complicated enough in this moment. Now, her "work in progress" is calling him to get him to nudge Lucy in the right direction? Because Chris trusts Lucy will listen to Tim.

Tim is Lucy's person. Man, these people are so bloody dense.

Because Lucy is standing before the man she truly wants to be with, and she's aghast that her stand-in cardboard cut-out is reaching out to the leading hunk in her life.

"It's not the right time." "He's gonna be fine. You owe it to yourself to go." "I know, but-" "What happened to him isn't your fault."

This is important. We're hearkening back to post DOD when Lucy ensured Tim understood Caleb wasn't his fault. But, the problem is that Chris isn't the only thing on Lucy's mind.

"We were about to." "But we didn't. We didn't."

Tim's shaking his head as he's speaking, volume dropping to barely above a whisper, pain in the assertion. I've thought a lot about this... and Tim's trying to assuage Lucy's guilt. He thinks she feels guilty. He thinks that is what is holding her back. Guilt.

But Tim is as wrong about Lucy as she was about Tim when he tried to talk to her in the hotel room. Lucy has had time to think about everything that has happened, and even as she is nursing Chris back to health, she's been thinking about Tim.

Yes, in that moment, they were both going for sex. But, here's the thing, Lucy thinks she's revealed herself to Tim. She thinks he's onto her feelings for him. And right now, she's trying to have the same discussion he wanted to have in the hotel room.

But they have this bad habit of not listening and instead assuming.

"Are you trying to get rid of me as your Gofer?" "No. No. I'm trying to look out for you."

Listen to how Tim's voice breaks. Look at how his face crumples. This is killing him. But he truly believes Lucy feels guilty about what almost happened. Maybe he worries his conversation in the hotel pressured her in some way.

But no matter what, he doesn't believe for a second that Lucy Chen has feelings for him.

He's had time to think this over, and over, and over. And every time he comes to the conclusion that she doesn't feel anything for him, and that she really wants to be with Chris. And Tim wants whatever makes her happy.

Lucy, in the meantime, is breaking. Tim rejecting sex was one thing. But now, as she's trying to talk to him about them, he's pushing her away. That's how she sees it, at least. Tim's pushing her to UC school. he's going to replace her as his Gofer. "Tim doesn't want me."

"It's time for you to move on." "And some time away would be good." "It's a great opportunity, Lucy." "Mmmhmm." "You should go for it."

She thinks he's using US school as a prop to reject her, to push her away, to separate them. And it hurts.

Lucy looks up to Tim's eyes, searching them for something to tell her that she's wrong, something that'll make her believe he means this for her good, truly. Something that says, "I'm not rejecting you."

But Tim turns away. Because this burns. He glances inside to see Chris on the couch, through that threshold Tim thinks he will never cross, again.

He barely glances back at Lucy... because the tears are already brimming in his eyes... and he can't let her see.

Lucy stands in the hallway in pieces. Because she wanted to talk to him. She had time to consider their actions, and she needed to know why he crossed that threshold. Was it just physical? Is there something more there for him, as there is for her?

But they're still talking past one another. Time will tell if they learn how to have an actual conversation.

Dye Hard

"I'd like to congratulate Officer Lucy Chen for successfully completing the DEA Covert Operations Training Academy, which is no small feat."

Tim is watching her the whole time, smiling at her accomplishment. It's no longer, "Your accomplishments are my accomplishments". Lucy did this all on her own.

And Tim is going to support Lucy however he can. Because, in his mind, that's all he can do, now.

Look, 5x01 was all over the place for Tim, emotionally. But in 5x02, he had time to consider what happened, and he has determined that he is Lucy Chen's biggest mistake.

Think about it. He knows how heartbroken she was after her ex cheated on him, then married the girl. From what he knows, Lucy has never cheated, and we know that he never has, either.

So, he has to think about what went wrong, and in Tim's mind... it was him. We know that's not right. We know how these two feel about one another. We know it was a lapse in judgment, not an absence of emotion.

But Tim grew up in an abusive household, with a father who likely blamed him for every beating. He was never good enough... maybe he questioned if anything about him was good.

He puts himself in harm's way every day to protect people, to help people, to put some good out in the world. But what did he do with Lucy? He led her down a path that left her guilt-ridden.

We know that's not true! But, Tim is keeping his distance from Lucy, now, in an effort to protect her... and himself. It's such a mess.

He doesn't even walk over to congratulate her. For all he know, he hasn't texted her since she left for UC school. They're both stuck in their heads thinking the other needs/wants space. A simple conversation would solve everything... but they're too hurt to even start it.

"He hasn't replaced you, yet, so he's happy."

Ouch. Lucy gives us quite a bit of insight into her head right now. She thinks Tim's unhappy, so Tim replaced her... and is avoiding her.

Her eyes land on him across the room, and he can feel her gaze. He looks back, but he has no idea what to say. Lucy breaks the eye contact, feeling even more lost than she did before.

"When did you last hear Chen on the radio?"

It's Lucy's first day back on the job since leaving for UC School, and Tim's hyper-aware of that. He's keeping a listening ear out for her, even if he would never admit it.

He jumps into action, immediately, to go rescue Chen... Chen... He said "Chen", didn't he?

In the past, Tim stuck to "Boot" or "Chen" with Lucy nearly all of the time. "Lucy" was a rarity. But, in 5x01, that's all he called her. He uses her name at the end of 5x02 during their breakup scene (thank God we got that out of the way...).

But once they're both back on the job, he's gone formal as a way to protect and distance himself. But that was before his woman was in possible danger.

"Chen? Chen!" "Yeah. Yeah, I'm in here!" "Hang on. The door is stuck." "No kidding." "You okay?"

Tim is looking at her not entirely like an SO, but more like an... SO. Oh, you know what I mean. He looks her over to make sure she's alright, and there's this softness to it that reminds me of how he looked at her in her apartment before they found Chris.

This is their first interaction since he encouraged her to go to UC school. And it's him rescuing her, again.

Getting to say, "You okay" is the first opportunity he's had to gauge how she is directly in weeks, and her brain is already firing on the Rosalind angle.

This episode is the peak of their era of discomfort. And we needed it. We needed to see how it looks when these two are pining and aching for one another, but not knowing the other wants them, too.

Sure, they could have skipped this era, but this is a huge transition for these two. Every step of this relationship has been earned. There are times he was in the wrong, and times she was in the wrong, and now they're both wrong.

The Choice

"I'd like to stay, too, and make sure Bailey's never down there by herself."

Tim glances back at her as she says it. Rosalind's acolyte... another... trapping another woman in a hole. But one thing I love about this is how Tim never once tells her to sit it out, or acts like she can't handle it.

Lucy once said if she couldn't handle Rosalind in a cage, she shouldn't be a cop. She also said that she knew Tim would help her if it got to her head. (and he protested... but... c'mon, we all know he's going to do it).

"Is John there? Lucy, where's John?"

Lucy looks up to Tim, unsure how to answer. He feels her glance and he kneels down, taking over. "If you need a cop, tag me in" comes to mind.

"Chen." "I'll go down." "No. There may be more traps. It's too dangerous. Just be ready to follow if it's clear." "Okay."

I get both perspectives in this moment. Lucy wants to help in every way that she can. She survived one of Rosalind's acolytes. She wants to do everything she can to help Bailey.

But Tim's not about to lose Lucy to Rosalind twice. He already has his gear in hand as he preps to go down. And he can't look at her.

Tim can't meet her eyes as they're arguing here about who should go down. The last time they were on opposite sides of an issue they were in the air and she kissed him out of nowhere. It's still too fresh.

He settles into position, and as he does he can't help but look up at Lucy—to find her staring back at him. And then neither can look away.

Because they both know that if there are more traps, this may be their last moment looking at one another.

It's the risks they take for their job, but sometimes when you face your own mortality directly (and I have a few times), you consider all the things left unsaid. These two have a lot left unsaid.

In classic YA romance style, Lucy seems to hold her breath until he disappears from sight, when she starts breathing, again.

The rest of the episode isn't Chenford-heavy (this episode isn't about them), but the fact that Lucy was the one to bring Bailey back? Oh, I'm in tears. Because not only did Lucy beat Rosalind's acolyte once by cheating her Day of Death, but she did it twice by saving Bailey.

Stopping here with these three. I feel like we really needed this episode for Tim and Lucy, though. This is the first episode they're working together, again, after things started to get weird. And they easily found their rhythm of leaning on one another, again.

They needed that. They needed to get here so we could get what we see in the rest of the season. If the avoidance had lasted too long, I fear it would have gotten tired and frustrating. Yes, Tim and Lucy aren't yet ready to talk about them, but they're talking, again. Even if it's only work-based, they're talking, again.

And that gives us what we need to get into "The Fugitive". But that, quite literally, is another Meta.

As always, thanks for reading!! This has been a lot of fun!j

#Chenford #Lucy Chen #Tim Bradford #The Rookie #Meta #Melissa O'Neil #Eric Winter #Lucy x Tim #Tim x Lucy

66 notes · View notes