The bullpen was unusually quiet, the team busy with the more mundane tasks the job required—filling out paperwork, clicking through online trainings sent by cybersecurity, answering miscellaneous phone calls.

You were bored out of your mind, the words on your computer screen starting blur together. Glancing over at your daughter—who joined you at work today due to a lice outbreak at her preschool—you saw she was deeply concentrated on the coloring book in front of her, her tongue just barely sticking out between her lips as she did her best to color between the lines. You knew, at this point, there was no saving your attention span if a four-year-old was more focused than you.

As your eyes looked around for a distraction, scanning over the objects on your desk—the framed photo of you and your wife, the half-empty mug of coffee Penelope dropped off earlier this morning, the miniature Doctor Who phone booth figurine Spencer gave you before he left—a stack of bright pink sticky notes caught your eye, and an idea popped into your head.

After quickly scribbling a few words onto the Post-It, you softly got your daughter’s attention. “Hey, munchkin.”

“Yeah?” Frannie looked up, the marker stilling in her hand.

“Can you do me a favor and bring this to mommy?” You held up the folded piece of paper for her to see. “It’s very important.”

“What is it?” Her nose scrunched as she squinted at the doodled “E” that adorned the outside of your note, and you knew she could tell it was nothing work related. Sometimes she was too smart for her own good.

“It’s a question,” you explained, lowering your voice. “It’s a secret, but do you want to see?”

“Yes!” She exclaimed excitedly and bounced off her seat.

Unfolding the sticky note, you leaned down to show your daughter the writing.

“What’s it say?” Frannie frowned, her excitement dimming just slightly as she remembered she couldn’t yet read.

“It says, ‘I like you. Do you like me? Yes or no?’” you read as let her take the note and examine it. “Mommy will then check one of those boxes, and we’ll find out if she likes me back.”

“You have a crush on mommy?” She looked up at you with awe like she’d just been let in on the biggest secret in the world.

“Shhhh.” You put your fingers to your lips, causing Frannie to do the same. “It’s a secret.”

“Sorry, mama,” she whispered as she moved closer so she was standing in between your knees. “I won’t tell. I promise.”

“I know you won’t, sweet girl.”

“Mommy definitely likes you back.” Frannie covered her mouth slightly to ensure no one could hear her or even read her lips. She was in a room full of FBI agents after all.

“You think?” You bit your lip, pretending to be nervous but actually biting back a smile.

She nodded emphatically, her loosely tied pigtails bobbing up and down. Carefully, Frannie refolded the note and tucked it in her pocket. “Where’s mommy?”

“She’s in her office, upstairs.” You pointed towards your wife’s office, where the door was shut but the blinds were open, and you could see her typing away on her laptop. Knowing her like you did, you knew she could use a break right about now. “Do you want me to come with you?”

“No, mama, I’m a big girl,” she replied before quickly turning on her heals and scampering away from you.

“Walk please,” you called after her, causing her to slow her footsteps. As you turned your attention back to your computer, you watched out of the corner of your eye as Frannie crawled up the stairs, her tiny legs too small for the steps in a federal building, and you stifled a giggle.

“Hi, sweetie.” You heard JJ’s soft voice address your daughter. “Are you going to find your mommy?”

“Auntie JJ!” Frannie paused her climb and threw herself into the blonde’s arm. Luckily, JJ was prepared for the toddler and caught her with ease. “I go find mommy!”

“You are?” JJ hoisted your daughter onto her hip and walked up the remaining few stairs. “Do you need help finding her?”

You saw Frannie pause, looking over her shoulder back at you, as if asking for help was against your rules. Continuing to type away, you kept your eyes trained on the screen in front of you, knowing the idea of peripheral vision was too complicated for a four-year-old.

“Yes please, JJ,” she admitted quietly, burying her face into JJ’s neck. “Can you help?”

“Of course, honey.” JJ gave your daughter an encouraging smile as she carried the young girl over to her mother’s office.

“Knock, knock.” She tapped her knuckles against the unit chief’s door, doing the best she could with a toddler on her hip and a handful of paperwork in between her fingers. “You have a visitor.”

“Hi mommy!” Frannie squirmed in JJ’s arms, causing the blonde to set her down. As soon as she was free, she ran over to her mom.

“Hi, baby!” Emily greeted, matching her daughter’s enthusiasm as she immediately shut her laptop and lifted the young girl by the armpits and into her lap. “What are you doing here?”

“I have something for you.”

“You do?” Emily gasped before sparing a questioning glance over to JJ, who remained in the doorway and could only shrug with amusement and ignorance.

“Mhmm,” Frannie hummed as she leaned closer to her mother. “But it’s a secret.” She peeked over at JJ, not wanting to share your secret in front of her.

Knowing the language of toddlers all too well, the blonde chuckled and pushed herself off the doorframe. “I’ll leave you two to it. Bye, Frannie.”

“Bye bye, JJ.”

“Can you say thank you to Auntie JJ for bringing you here?” Emily encouraged quietly, her question more of a suggestion.

“Thank you, JJ!” Frannie called out, waving her small hand goodbye.

“You’re welcome, sweetie,” JJ said with a grin before closing the office door halfway behind her.

“So–” Emily slightly shifted her daughter in her lap– “what did you bring me?”

As an answer, Frannie reached into her pocket and pulled out the pink sticky note, which was still folded up but not without a few crumples in it. “It’s from mama,” she said as she held it out for Emily to take.

Emily raised a brow, amused and also curious, and accepted the piece of paper. Despite knowing what it said, Frannie maneuvered herself around so she could see the message as it was unfolded.

Reading your neat but loopy writing, Emily chuckled, her eyes rolling fondly, which was missed by the four-year-old in her lap, who was taking her task quite seriously.

“Mama asked you to give me this?”

“Yes.” Frannie leaned her head back so she could look up at her mother. Her little body was vibrating with a mix of anticipation and excitement. “You like her too, right?”

“Well.” Emily, always one for dramatics, kept her daughter hanging and reached over to grab a pen. Frannie followed her mom’s movements with her doe-eyes, which widened in horror as Emily checked the “No” box.

“Mommy!” She cried as she tried to grab the pen. “Wrong! You do like mama!”

“Frannie, we don’t grab things from people.” Emily craned her neck so she could make eye contact with the miniature version of herself. “I wasn’t done writing with my pen. If you want to use it, you can ask nicely.”

“I’m sorry, mommy,” Frannie said, pouting, her eyes glossy.

“Apology accepted.” Emily gently wiped a stray tear from her daughter’s cheek and pecked a kiss to her temple. “Now, do you want to see what I was going to write?”

“Yes, please.”

Emily did her best to fit her reply on what little room was left on the Post-It, but your note was clearly not meant for an open-ended response. Setting the pen down, she held up the piece of paper so Frannie could grab a hold of it.

“What’d you write, mommy?”

“I wrote, ‘I love you.’”

“Love?” Frannie gasped, her eyes lighting back up with excitement. “You love mama?”

Emily’s heart melted at the innocent eagerness radiating off of her daughter. Oh, to view love through rose-colored lenses.

“I do,” she said softly.

Frannie grinned, exposing her mosaic of baby teeth, and clutched the note to her chest like it was her most prized possession.

“I have to tell mama!” She squealed as she tried to slide off of Emily’s lap.

“Hold on, munchkin,” Emily laughed, tightening her hold playfully. “What happened to keeping secrets, hm?”

Frannie stilled, her tiny hands curling in the fabric of Emily’s blouse. “But it’s a good secret,” she reasoned. “And mama will be so happy!”

“Alright, alright,” Emily relented, releasing her daughter not without a kiss on the top of her head. “Go on, chérie.”

Trotting towards the door, pink sticky note in hand, Frannie waved over her shoulder. “Bye mommy!”

“Bye baby,” Emily called after her, the corner of her mouth quirking up as she watched her daughter march off with pure determination.

As soon as the toddler was out of the room, Emily swiveled in her chair to face the bullpen. Her eyes scanned past the rows of agents until they landed on you, still pretending to work, though she could tell from the not-so-hidden grin twitching at your lips that you’d been watching everything.

Resting her chin on her hand, she gave you a knowing smirk accompanied by a wink. You caught her gaze and lifted a single brow, a gesture half way between challenging and smug.

Emily chuckled under her breath. How you had roped your daughter into your playful antics, she didn’t know, but nonetheless, she was absolutely charmed.

As Frannie approached your desk, you quickly minimized the window on your screen, images too graphic for a toddler to see.

“I did it,” she whispered as you lifted her into your lap. “She wrote back.”

“She did?” You took the note with a mask gasp, like you weren’t watching the whole interaction from your desk. “What’d she say?”

“Read it,” Frannie insisted, tugging on the sleeve of your cardigan as you unfolded the sticky note.

As your eyes landed on the page, your chest tightened at the three words written in all-caps your wife had squeezed beneath the check boxes: I LOVE YOU.

No matter how many times Emily had said—or written—those words to you, they never failed to make your heart flutter. Biting your lip, you tried to suppress the stupid smile threatening to overtake your whole face. Frannie, meanwhile, looked absolutely thrilled.

“She loves you,” she repeated emphatically, as if you hadn’t just been swooning over those three words. “That’s even better than ‘yes.’”

Wrapping your arm around her, you pulled her tightly into your side. “You’re right, sweet girl. It is.”

“Does that mean you’re gonna kiss?”

You choked on a laugh. “Excuse me?”

“If you love each other,” she said slowly, like she was the one explaining something to a toddler, “then you’re supposed to kiss. That’s what happens in Tangled and Frozen and the one where the dogs eat spaghetti.”

“Lady and the Tramp?” You provided, thoroughly amused.

Frannie nodded with grave sincerity. “So, are you gonna kiss mommy?”

You stole a glance up towards your wife’s office, and sure enough, Emily was still watching, her signature Prentiss smirk dancing on her lips. You knew all too well that she could hear your conversation with your daughter, and your suspicions were confirmed when she lifted her brows just enough to say: “Well?”

“Maybe,” you whispered conspiratorially as you tucked the note into the top drawer of your desk for safe keeping. “But you didn’t hear that from me.”

“I won’t tell anyone,” Frannie agreed, then tapped her finger against her lips.

“That’s my girl.” You nuzzled your nose against hers playfully before lowering her down onto the ground so she could go back to her coloring book.

Just then, your phone pinged with a text message from your wife.

Do you want to kiss me? Yes or no?

Your cheeks warmed, and you felt like a teenager all over again. Immediately, you typed out a response: Yes. Always a yes.

As soon as the message delivered, you heard the telltale sound of Emily’s boots clicking against the linoleum floor as they descended the stairs. You watched as Emily approached your desk, her expression composed and professional, but you could see the smugness shining in her eyes.

“Mommy?” Frannie looked up from her coloring page, her head tilted slightly.

“Hi, sweetheart.” Emily crouched beside her. “Can you cover your eyes for a second?”

Frannie gasped and dropped her purple marker, not even bothering to put the cap on. “Are you gonna kiss mama?”

Emily lifted her gaze to meet yours, playful and daring. “That okay with you?”

You could only nod, any words you could say lost in your throat. Standing up from her squat, Emily leaned over your desk and kissed you. The kiss was slow and soft, both of you still aware you were at work and your daughter was sitting a mere two feet away.

When she pulled back, you wore matching grins, and you were sure you looked like a love-struck idiot.

Frannie peeked between her fingers. “Ewww, gross!”

“Gross?” You laughed at how quickly a four-year-old could change her mind.

“Kisses are yucky!”

“Yucky?” Emily gasped as she pushed herself off your desk and kneeled back down in front of your daughter. “My kisses are yucky?”

Frannie nodded, scrunching her nose.

“Are they yucky now?”

Before Frannie could respond, Emily’s lips were everywhere, soft little pecks on your daughter’s cheeks, her forehead, the tip of her nose. Frannie squealed with delight, wiggling every which way, trying to escape the tickling but clearly loving every second.

“Mommy! Stop!” She giggled, her laughter echoing through the bullpen.

Emily relented, pressing one last kiss under Frannie’s chin. “Never. You’re my little choupinette.”

“Alright, munchkin.” She stood back up, brushing a stray strand of hair from Frannie’s face. “Time to get back to your coloring before Mama and I get in trouble for playing too much at work.”

As if she wasn’t the boss.

Frannie nodded, still glowing, Emily’s lip gloss decorating her face. Catching your wife’s gaze one last time, you smiled softly and pulled open your drawer, glancing down at her handwriting on the sticky note one last time.

Her hair still frames your face, preventing her from properly gauging your reaction. Until your hands on her hips heat up through the denim as you gently shove her off. More of a prod that she willingly gives into, guilt greasing the stalling gears in her head.

You’re already slipping into one of her coats and out the bedroom, and fear sinks in her stomach like a weight. A familiar anchor parting waves, similar to the nightmares she’s been having of you out at the bay, fighting to the surface as cement drags you back down—nightmares of when she sat in her living room, oblivious to the fact that you were somewhere dying.

Emily is up, scrambling after you. She stubs her foot on the bed post, grunting as she nearly takes out the wavering door, stumbling into the living room. Adrenaline churning inside wanes the pain, keeps her going.

But you aren’t at the deadbolt, you aren’t gone just yet. You’re staring at her from the balcony, cigarette cold on your lips. Confusion knitted in your brows.

Here. You’re still here.

She has to find your face in the dark, feels at the flesh surrounding the orange paper filter, the only warmth being your soft puffs hitting her jaw.

“It’s cold,” you whisper, fruitlessly trying to push her back inside. She’s always been stronger, days or years apart. Maybe that’s why you give in so easily, wrapping the stolen garment around her shivering shoulders and tugging her close.

Maybe it’s the depth to your gaze, the leaden pause weighing on her skin whenever your gaze falls across. Lurking, something passive and gentle that you refuse to say aloud.

Maybe that is why you dust kisses along her brows, with a mouth that has conspired and lied and corrupted—and why not a single one drifts down her temple. Only soft little noises accompanied by the cigarette being tenderly tucked behind her ear.

“Don’t leave,” Emily whispers, the irony sour on her tastebuds. A similar plea, hollow in her cranium now, had left your lips so long ago. Same as the cigarette, with love.

You don’t let it tumble down like she did, crushed beneath boots no longer owned. A firm finger presses to her outer ear, chilly against pulsating heat gathered in the shell. “Emily,” you murmur.

“She didn’t—it was a second, just long enough to see what you were wearing.”

“Emily,” you repeat, louder, tapping your thumb on her cheekbone. “I’m not leaving.”

Emily stares, dark eyes searching yours. Tentatively cataloguing every detail, the steady drag of your own. You distract her with your touch once you’re sure she’s gotten her fill, separating her mouth with hardly any effort. She gasps into your palm, and you catch the next with a kiss that doesn’t properly chase away the cold.

“I’m staying,” you say into her mouth, probably hoping the words translate better directly. Emily thinks so, her mouth moving to absorb them without any thought. “I won’t survive losing you again.”

She thinks about you on her doorstep, spilling yourself everywhere. Staining the concrete with your presence, your liveliness to be scrubbed away the next morning on her hands and knees. Emily isn’t sure if she’d survive it either, had she seen your face on the news instead of a murky peephole.

She came so close to losing you forever and didn’t even know. How stupid she’d been, before. Letting you go so easily.

“I just needed some air,” you continue, trying so hard to be better for her. God, she knows you are. “Bum a few cigs while I’m out here. You kinda owe me.”

She presses her face into your chest. Enjoys how her perfume mixes with your natural scent, how it scratches up her voice. “Yeah?”

“Yeah,” you say, plucking the dart from her hair, replacing the cigarette with your hand. “Just a little. Won’t even miss them.”

Emily doesn’t argue, nor does she reach for the flimsy packet, edges browning from transferring pocket to pocket. She’d rather them gone—she doesn’t think she’ll miss anything like she’ll miss you.

Piling under the comforter, you try to make up for scrambling her. Blankets deepening your embrace, mouths lazily finding each other in the wool layers just to be lost again when Emily dozes first.

Mumbles smear along your clavicle, exhaustion soft and wet.

Soaking through to your bones, seeping under your skin and weighing you down. Dreaming doesn’t always come so simply, but with her it’s different. Comfort wasn’t hard to spoon out, flowing so easily from the crevices.

It’s been years since you’ve been able to succumb, and you have a theory Emily feels the same. She sleeps heavier than she did before, lets herself melt into nothing important for the few mellow hours spent together.

And she snores now. A quiet little cadence, light and vulnerable as it caresses your skin. Breaking between exhales only, yielding to nothing.

It’s a persuasive little lilt, convincing you to submerge yourself also. Coaxes your defenses down, lets your mind drift. Loosens the screws and bolts to fall when her phone begins incessantly blaring. She doesn’t twitch, not a single muscle springing out of place as the grating ringtone wears on the little patience you possess.

Your dulled subconscious guides you to grab blindly, fingertips lacking any logic as they skirt across the screen. Voice sodden with sleep, you murmur into the receiver something close to a greeting.

Baited hesitation parses resounding silence, rousing your brain just as a warm body drapes across your back. Her heat shields your insides from the sharp lurch of your heart, preventing the organ from battering its surroundings.

Emily snakes the phone from your sleepy grip, locking it under her jaw so she can steal your hand too. Stopping you from sinking your teeth into the supple flesh, thumbing at softness there.

The softness that wasn’t there before, the doughiness she’s molded you into so easily. You would never have made that mistake before.

Between whatever the person on the other end is saying, she’s blearily pressing kisses against your face, guiding your pulse back to its natural rhythm.

“I’m on my way,” she says, lifting from you.

An awful part of you wants to beg her back down. Willing it away is easy, something you’ve mastered over the years. But it leaves a bitter taste in your mouth as she slips from the sheets.

Watching her go is nostalgic and a bit nauseating. Because it’s the first time you’ve fallen back to a bad habit, letting Emily leave.

There is a black sedan at the end of the street. Idling. A low purr throbbing inside the engine, revving inside your head. Louder than the winding in Sergio’s small chest as you run your fingers through his fur absentmindedly, blood rushing fast yet ice cold.

You watch from a blind spot, eyes beginning to strain after the first hour. By the third, you’re kissing two fluffy ears while stuffing a weapon into some sweats you stole out of Emily’s drawers. The drawstring pulls taught, irritating the scarring along your midsection as you step out into the cold.

Adrenaline makes each inhale frigid as you approach the all too familiar vehicle, your fingers shaking as they grasp at the handle. It budges, already unlocked. A chirp rings through your bones when the door seals shut behind you, leather sweating, palms smearing across the creases.

Even with the windows tinted black, you aren’t surprised by the face that greets you. Obscured in the dark, you catch glimpses in the rear view as he fiddles with the radio dials.

“…Walk kinda funny for a ghost,” your handler says, eyes catching the reflection of yours.

“How did you find me, Igor?” you hiss, sitting forward—as much as you can while still hiding behind the passenger seat.

He digs around without turning, tossing a file over his shoulder. The folder hits you square in the chest and spills between your thighs, gathering at your feet. You spot a familiar face in the fluttering pages, the one you’ve been waking to every morning for the last few months, and arteries snag tight around your heart.

“Never found your body,” he says, simply. “Call it a hunch.”

“How did you find her?”

“Took a few favors, more than I wanted. But—” Igor adjusts the rearview mirror and you hate how spooked you look. “—Going and dying doesn’t make everything disappear, kid.”

You shakily grab at the scattered mess, palming through the censored intel. More sweat gathers, sheets sticking to your fingers. The blood rushing through your ears makes you strain to hear the rest.

“They think it was a mole,” Igor continues, rubbing the stubble along his jaw. “…Would explain how the safe house was leaked.”

“A mole?” You pause. Years spent with that team, under that alias. Unending months lived vicariously through hands that didn’t feel like they belonged to you, avoiding mirrors that never looked quite right. “No. That isn’t possible.”

He nods anyway, rapping his fingers against the steering wheel. “We’re still looking into it.”

“Well, it doesn’t matter.” Tossing together the documents, you shove the file back towards him, letting it flop onto the console. “I’m done. I’m out.”

“That’s it?” Igor asks in disbelief. You can see him physically struggle not to whip around and face you. He directs his aggression towards his seatbelt, gears straining as he yanks on the strip. “Yeah? ‘Couple weeks of sunshine and you want out?”

“I told you to pull me out months ago,” you snap back, heart pounding in your chest, in your ankles. Instinctively, you shake your foot to rid the crumbling concrete, but there is no rope, no cement blocks. “Way before I ended up out on the bay. Damn it, Igor, he fucking shot me.”

“And when they find you?” A lilt begins to paint his words, coloring the sharpened edges. Tinting them with frustration. You’ve only ever caught his real voice a handful of times, and not one of those moments had you not been close to death.

“They won’t.”

“I found you. And her.” Igor smacks the steering wheel twice in emphasis. “How much longer do you think it’ll take them?”

“You owe me more than a few favors,” you growl, lunging over the passenger seat to manually unlock your door. “Figure it out.”

This time, you let the door slam behind you, and you let the finality vibrate and settle in your gut.

Sometimes, there is ice beneath your feet when you wake alone. Freezing, volatile water begging to consume you behind a thin sheet of cold. And sometimes, it’s slushy, giving more and more under each breath. Frothy with fear and uncertainty, creeping into your socks.

You’ve been trained how to die, but never the part that comes after. The unease of surviving a life that was not yours. Nothing new, you have shed your skin dozens of times before. But this is different, the radio silence is different. You haven’t had alone time in years, especially not with a hypothetical bounty sitting on your head.

Your hand slips out from blanketed layers, cocoon splitting as you grasp the burner phone Emily provided you. Habitual, even as your fingers shake, you navigate to the email app and open the drafts tab. There is one left unsent, just as you knew there would be.

An itemized grocery list with a few words tossed on at the end. Dinner tomorrow night. Meat in freezer might go bad. The weather is unpredictable.

She’s expecting to be home soon.

The translation comes to you like breathing, even after so long without. You spent a good portion of your earlier years trying to learn every nuance of Emily’s second speak, how she warps reality with metaphor. Still, with anxiety roaring low in your chest, you’re thankful the message is relatively straight forward compared to some of the riddles she’s put you through.

Icy hot nerves soothe over, your eyelids sticky again, sleep warming your numb fingers as they go slack against the screen.

Emily is a distraction from yourself and every other person that exists within you. She always has been. There’s many parts of you, but there’s not a single one that disagrees with that fact, that doesn’t crave her like water or food.

It’s why you’re so easy to distract, why you’ve been sloppy. Why you picked up the phone when you knew better. Because you don’t know anything when she is around.

Maybe that’s why you let her go so easily. Your odds of survival could only heighten without her skewing every thought.

That’s what you tell yourself, what you fool yourself with when the memories begin to soak through, mixing with guilt and regret and agonizing want.

It almost works this time too, your burner hitting the rug below when the front door latch slides out. You jolt up, disoriented, fumbling for footing as you stagger, pillow falling behind you.

The lock is tough, and a little wonky, but Emily knows it’s sweet spot well, always tries to teach you too. Whoever’s shadowed footsteps are seeping from under the door is struggling to bypass the sticky gears. They jostle the knob roughly, the key catching on metal.

Sleep softens your joints as you slip around the corner, ready to dart for the fire escape. Scaling the bars will only get you so far, but you’ve already mentally digested the fall months ago.

Just as you step out, the light pours in. You sink back into the shadows, calculating silently.

“Emily, it’s not that big of a deal,” a man says, his tone dripping with concern. Your shoulders droop a little, adrenaline quieting enough to listen. “Doc’ said you can’t be alone. I’ll take the couch, seriously.”

“…S’fine,” Emily, your heart recognizes with a delayed beat, says. Relief is short lived, the slight slurring lighting up your nervous system. “Gonna be fine.”

“You won’t be if I leave you here.” He shifts, and you can see their outlines are blurred together, his arm slung under hers. You’re more attentive to his other hand drifting to the light switch. “What kind of partner would I be…”

This time, you really don’t have a choice. Stepping out, light douses your legs, face carefully obscured in the dark. His hand freezes on the plate.

“Emily,” you call, so syrupy you almost don’t recognize yourself. She snaps to attention, and you catch the glint of a dazed smile. All teeth. “What’s going on?”

“Oh,” he breathes out, arm falling as Emily wrangles herself inside, duffle bag putting up a fight. She grasps the door, and you know even as unaware as she is, she knows this conversation needs to end. “I didn’t realize you had company.”

You think he almost sounds disappointed.

“Thanks, Derek,” Emily says. You file away his name. “But I’m—well taken care of.”

Whatever delay to your heart rhythm she caused before, she now sends skittering from your ribcage. You have half a mind to try and catch it. But then you’d miss her lazy approach once the door is locked, her hands drifting up your side and disappearing into soft cotton. Wandering touches raising goosebumps along your sides.

You brush away her bangs, finding the gauze wrapped tightly around her head. They must’ve escaped from their bindings during the drive. “What happened?”

“Fell,” she mumbles, lost in her nails on your skin. “Bad.”

There’s doubt on your tongue but she leans in to take it from you, her mouth clumsily molding on yours. You laugh into the kiss, blindly coaxing her towards the bedroom. “Can you sleep?”

“Not f’long,” she says against your lips, frowning when you pull away towards the dresser. “Hey, c’mon.” She drags out the last syllable, coming up behind to press against you.

“You need to change,” you argue without any intent, digging through her sleepwear. “I bet you can’t shower. We should have some wipes somewhere.”

Emily grumbles but lets you tend to her reluctantly, cooperating as long as you keep the kisses coming. You’ve never seen her so lax and docile, her eyes dragging to follow your movements as you begin to turn in for the night.

You only check the window after cutting out the lights, ensuring she doesn’t see you spot the creeper car still lurking.

She seems to mistaken your sudden absence as something permanent, her hand reaching out heavily, and the initial reassurance sitting behind your teeth fails to come as easily as it has the last few times. You interlace your fingers with hers, slipping into the covers.

“Stay,” she murmurs, eyelashes struggling to flutter for you.

After a moment, you respond. “I am.”