Didn’t quite trust me, huh? 🙂

It’s OK. I’ll explain.

In any new relationship you’re always trying to put your best face forward at every moment. Same for Steph. This is a new relationship and she’s trying hard not to make the same mistakes she made with Joe and Dickie, but she’s making a huge one anyway: She’s become defensive.

She’s trying to protect herself because her history is that whenever she makes herself vulnerable, she gets hurt. She expects to be let down and disappointed. Ranger has the power to wound her deeply and she wants him to love her but she doesn’t want him to see the warts. She doesn’t want him to see how hurt she’s been in the past, so she’s passing off fault for all her bad decisions. Ranger has seen, and rescued her from, enough bad decisions. The last thing she wants to do is admit to more in her past.

Unfortunately, Ranger’s always been a man who took responsibility for his actions or inactions, from a very young age (ie. The flan story at age six.) Note the way he refused to allow Susan and Steven to attack Armando. The buck stops with him. He won’t allow anyone to attack his leadership, even his men. So Steph’s excuses will always sound hollow to him.

This is a place where they will clash and clash hard.

By becoming defensive, she’s withholding from Ranger, wanting him to make all the effort until she decides it’s safe to trust him. She can’t do that and it’s not fair to Ranger. He’s giving her what she asked for, making the commitment to her, but she’s testing him as if he’s suddenly untrustworthy.

(Bobby) “You two need a challenge, a test to see if you really can communicate and negotiate with each other.”

“The past four years haven’t been enough?” I (Steph) ask.

“You were both solo operators. Relationships require give and take.”

–Chapter 116: Brown’s Lost His Fucking MIND!

[Again, Bobby called it. Makes you hate him, doesn’t it?]

The past four years of trust and friendship have been wiped away because of her history and it’s not fair. As Ranger said, you either trust your partner or you don’t.

Love is about making yourself vulnerable, allowing that other person to see the parts of you that aren’t perfect or great and believing that they’ll love you anyway. Ranger’s doing that for Steph, most notably by explaining to her how his attitude to relationships was affected by what he saw around him, how the breakdown of other Rangers’ marriages left them alone and married to the job. He didn’t have to share that with her. He doesn’t have to talk. He doesn’t have to trust her. He doesn’t have to explain but he loves her so he’s giving her what she needs to be in a relationship with him but she’s not reciprocating.

More importantly, this goes back to my statement about their communication skills. Ranger made a completely ambiguous statement then left, leaving Steph frustrated and hurt. He returns and, instead of asking him to clarify that statement, she refuses to speak to him and stews over it instead. Ranger’s statement could have been improved by three words (‘to marry him’/’to divorce him’) but he said exactly what he thought and he didn’t make a joke of it. Steph didn’t ask him any questions to determine what he meant by what he said and attacked him. Result? Ranger proves that he does understand, having been in the same situation, but that he won’t be treated like Morelli or Dickie. She won’t yell at him and blame him for her life. He won’t accept it.

That puts their relationship on life support because he called her out. He told her that if she doesn’t trust him, he’ll walk away from her. Before, Steph did all the walking. She put Dickie out of their bedroom in a fit of pique and she ran back and forth on Joe all the time. Ranger’s not having it. If she doesn’t trust him, then the relationship is over. There is no relationship if there’s no trust.

This is why I cautioned everyone not to confuse Steph getting trained and working for the company as her making an effort for Ranger. It’s not, as the beginning of this road trip clearly demonstrates. How does knowing how to escape handcuffs and locks help her right now? How is rebuilding NYC helping her personal relationship with Ranger right now? The two situations are separate and have to be treated as such, in the same way that BLT can be appreciative of the fact that Steph rebuilt the company for them but still be disappointed in her personal behavior.

[Side note: If you’ve seen the movie Flight, it’s the same concept in action. Denzel Washington’s character (Whip) is a brilliant pilot who saves nearly everyone on his plane from an almost certain death in a crash. However, it’s discovered he was drunk and high out of his mind when it happened. The co-pilot loses his ability to walk and he’ll certainly never fly again. He’s angry, but still believes that he owes his life to Whip, so he agrees to lie about Whip’s being drunk when he’s questioned. Whip owes his professional career to a man whose personal and professional life he’s destroyed. The story hinges on the question: How far are you willing to go to cover your personal demons? Can you really function professionally if your personal life is such a shambles that it has the power to ruin the lives of others?

I watched this movie and saw a clear parallel to this story.]

Is there more to Steph and Ranger’s relationship than sex and work? It’s the same question Connie asked herself months ago about her relationship with Steph. Was there more to her relationship with Steph than men and work? The answer was yes. They found common ground, which goes back to Chenae’s point about female friendships. Ranger, Bobby, Les, Tank, and Hector are tied together by more than just work and women (especially since Hector has no interest in one of those!). There’s an entire history there, hardship, struggles, being there for each other. They’ve had each other’s backs in the worst of situations and they’ve remained brothers. They’ve remained strong.

Tank and Lula? Lula knows Tank isn’t perfect. She’s seen the ugly side of his temper in the way he treated his brother for years. She knows the hurt he feels from his father’s betrayal and his family of leeches. She knows how nasty he can be to family watching the way he makes his paternal relatives beg his mother for anything they get from him, since they spent years denying that he, Wilma and Thelma were his father’s children. Tank knows about Lula’s family and how her mother uses her for a story instead of talking about her own demons. She confessed her past with Trenton PD to him, showing him the Lula that wasn’t strong and yet she was to survive that. They know these things about each other and yet they still love each other.

Steph and Ranger? (author shrugs) We’ll see, but only if Steph steps out of her ‘bubble’ long enough to be truly vulnerable to Ranger.

Some of you may ask, why shouldn’t he walk? At this point, why is he even bothering? Answer? Because when it’s good between them, it’s fabulous. When Ranger’s not acting mysterious and Steph’s not being defensive, they have a ease and love between them that’s beautiful. Think of the way they interacted in Miami, during the first trip to see Julie ‘graduate’. Remember how easy that time was between them? The two of them interacting beautifully until Hector was shot. Even then, until Ranger opened his mouth and revealed he’d held something back from her, the two of them were in sync.

That’s why Ranger stays and that’s why he waits. He knows that it can be really good between them. He knows they were made for each other. He’s waiting for Steph to accept that, because she already knows. They both agreed that they were ready for Someday but Steph needs therapy to break bad habits. Ranger has to learn to communicate.

Ranger’s illusions about Steph have been stripped away by his bros over the past month. Between BLT pointing out Steph’s deficiencies to him and Steph’s own actions, he’s starting to look at who he’s in a relationship with. Steph’s not perfect. Neither is he but, again, BLT did him a favor. He’s had more time to absorb what’s been pointed out. He can react calmly in these situations, which is good because, as noted and seen, when irritated Ranger swears like a drill sergeant.

“You guys really like to meddle in other people’s lives, don’t you?”

“No. But will we help our brother when we see he needs it? Yes.”

–Chapter 116: Brown’s Lost His Fucking MIND!

The Brotherhood in action. It’s helped Ranger prepare for this moment. It’s helped him prepare for this roadtrip.

Bobby and Les, especially, have prepped Ranger for this moment through their frustration and irritation with her, starting with Les’s frustration at breakfast in SA. Ranger now sees what they saw and he understands their frustration better because he shares it. As Tank said  in We Come to One Accord:

‘She’s not done testing him and I’ll guarantee you he’s not ready. Hec and I are agreed: he’s basking in winning the dick-measuring contest right now. He’s happy Joe’s out of the way. He hasn’t really considered what it will be like to live with her […] I can’t wait for him to realize he’s not going to get his way on everything.”

Is BLT in the middle of their relationship on Ranger’s side? No. They’ve expressed their own frustration with Steph and her words and actions and, in doing so, have prepped Ranger for this moment. The things they saw that he didn’t want to accept he now sees. He sees who he’s getting as a partner and right now Steph doesn’t trust him. He’s trusted her for a very long time. There’s a crater in their relationship right now and he can’t fix it. It’s a decision she has to make and she has to make it soon.

Steph doesn’t have a sisterhood she can turn to because she doesn’t trust her friends at that level, not even ML. She’s never been fully honest with anyone except Ranger, so she’s going to have to muddle through this alone. Hector’s not there for her to run to and he’s made it clear he’s staying out of her relationship with Ranger. Tank asked her, point blank, why she chose to ask him a question she should have asked Ranger. If she’d called her girls, they would have bashed Ranger (to make her feel better), then tried to help, but is that the right thing to do? That pulls extra people into her relationship that don’t need to know and your friends find it a lot harder to forgive a wo/man than you do. They remember the hurt and anger you felt and they’ll never forget it. They don’t understand why you forgave her/him and went back.

Bobby put them together for a week and are forcing them to talk and get to know each other. He said it himself: They’ll either come together or split apart.

Fucker. 🙂

Everyone understand? Again, human nature being what it is, it’s not that the author doesn’t like the character. It’s that the author both understands this character and human nature.