This story has been in my head for a very long time and after a long long long drive today where I had time to flesh something out, I had to put this down. I'm not even sure that I haven't written something similar before, as it's been something I've thought about. It goes back to knowing how the media is... and how they might have covered the Messers. You would think they would have asked for interviews and you know Lindsay would not want to do it. So here's my take. Hopefully I haven't written this before.

I seriously miss the Messers. I can't write or think of them as I once did, but I miss them.

Not my characters, but enjoy.

If she was in interview she wanted the double sided glass mirror, the darkened room and to be on the side of the table near the door. She wanted to be the one asking the questions.

Instead, Lindsay Messer was in what had been Stella's office and was now her's and Danny's, with the bright winter sun streaming through the window. Her desk was cleared off, more to protect the files. Her computer monitor was off, as her pictures that rotated through were her own. Her picture of Danny, of Lucy and the gift from Stella were all that remained.

Lindsay stared at the quote. She'd spoken to Stella that morning, because Stella had known and had remembered, that Lindsay would hate being in the hot seat today.

You and Danny give everyone a little hope. Remember that.

"So, Detective Messer. Tell me how you and your husband met."

Lindsay barely glanced at the reporter across from her before her eyes flicked toward the glass wall and down the hall where her husband was sticking around. She had not told him to, or asked him to, but there was some comfort that he was near. Better still, she wished he were here for the interview, then he could answer the questions and talk about his, or rather their life.

She did not like talking about herself. It had taken Danny months for her to open up about the barest details of her personal life, and none of that included her childhood friends or the shooting, even though he'd known at times that there were things that kept her up at night.

She took a deep breath and focused herself. "At the Brooklyn Zoo. Next to the tiger exhibit."

"Oh," the reporter lifted an eyebrow. "So you met off the job?"

"It was the job. I arrived in New York the night before and reported to the lab, where I was instructed to head to the zoo. Danny was there."

She drew her lips tight and waited, mentally chastising Mac and Sinclair. She shouldn't blame Mac. He had only delivered the orders. Sinclair felt like she should be open and free in the name of the department. The public, apparently, was interested. It would be good press. Her husband, her family, had been in the news over the last year too many times—first when Danny was shot and then with Shane Casey. It was fodder for the media.

And maybe, she relented, a little for the hopeless romantics out there. Since she was one of those, she told herself she should be more forthcoming.

But old habits and protective instincts were in place for a reason.

"Love at first sight?"

The laugh escaped easily. "No."

"No?"

"I needed to prove myself here. Or I definitely felt like I did. And he was … typical."

"He didn't appreciate a female partner?"

"No, Danny had a female partner before me. I was from Montana. He's from New York. For him, nothing is better than New York. I could have been from another city, and it wouldn't have mattered."

He'd called her Montana to remind her at first that she wasn't New York, but it had become an endearment. It had been more than a year since he'd said the name. He'd started saying it again after the shooting, for a short time. They'd needed the levity, she supposed, and the simple reminder of who they were.

But that little piece of information was their own.

"That obviously changed. From those I've talked to, you both had a lot of respect among the force working together. Was it hard?"

Lindsay frowned. She didn't like the fact that the reporter had been asking around about her, talking to others about her. Who had she spoken to? To Flack? Surely he knew not to …

No, she knew exactly what Flack would say. He wouldn't share the personal stuff. He would make a joke.

She compartmentalized the feelings, because that was the job—according to Sinclair. So she thought back. "I think, for us," she said slowly, "it made it easier. We got used to each other, we were okay with being in each other's personal space—even before we were together."

"He was your superior. Did that cause problems?"

"No. I was grateful for the job. I was working it the New York City Crime Lab, under Mac Taylor. I was so grateful. I knew what an opportunity it was. I always knew Danny had my back as my partner. He's always been protective, even if he didn't play it off that way." She thought about that first year and what it had been like, about the things she'd written to her friend Lucy in her journal. Most of those things she wouldn't share.

Danny had learned his lessons hard, and those went into his personnel file. Maybe there was something she could do about that.

"Danny is smart. Smarter than he gives himself credit for. He's got a mind for the psychological. You can bat around ideas with him. We used to be in an eight by eight foot office down the hall, with two full size desk wedged inside. And we could sit and talk a case and a profile for hours, hashing out details. That might have been what made it so easy. It was so easy for us to talk through a case. And he'd seen a lot more than I had on the job and he had experienced criminal life in different ways than I had."

"You both come from very different backgrounds."

"Some would say. We similar interests. Football, for one."

"But relationships are not easy," the reporter interjected. "Surely it got in the way at times."

"It could have, but this is a big lab. We had our own space. We were always careful to be professional. Overly careful."

"No hanky panky in the broom closet?"

"No."

"Off the record?"

"No. We work in a world of glass walls—figuratively and physically. And we both have reasons that the job is the job."

That didn't mean that the feelings weren't there. Lindsay knew how to read her husband. She knew what he wanted and when, but he kept it toned down and not because of her.

"We don't get to see a lot of each other outside of the job. Before we were anything more than partners, we were friends. And that friendship is still right there out there. If we did something—if we didn't walk that line—we could lose that, this time."

"You had a violent episode in your past."

Lindsay cringed at the word episode. The images of her friends flashed. The recent appeal from Daniel Katums ran through her mind.

It was their lives. Not an episode.

"I have a report that Danny flew to Montana to support you during the trial of Mr. Katums."

That surprised Lindsay. It wasn't anywhere close to where she thought the reporter would go. She watched as the reporter took out a photograph that a reporter had snatched of the two of them walking out of the courthouse, down the three steps out front.

His hand was holding hers. Her knuckles were white next to his. She must have been squeezing his hand so hard.

He was looking at her—the way he was looking at her—it made her smile. It made her nearly tear up. She hadn't seen that then.

Her mind had been racing. She felt free—free because he was there, that he knew enough and he was still there. She didn't have to tell him everything. He wouldn't expect and he wouldn't ask her for the details, as some had. He wasn't backing away.

She'd been thinking of her friends—of Lucy. She was thinking of what she wanted to tell him—because suddenly she wanted to tell him something. For the first time since losing Lucy she had someone she wanted to tell, maybe not as much as her friend and it wasn't as easy as it had been back then, but she wanted to find something to tell him.

And she wanted to tell him about Lucy. Her best friend, Lucy. Something.

Her mind had been racing, spilling over details, wanting to find him the right one. She'd wanted to give him that, something she hadn't been able to tell anyone since losing her.

Then the reporter across from her pulled out two more photos.

Lindsay stared. The other two were of when Danny stopped in the middle of the sidewalk, thinking they were clear of the reporters, and he'd kissed her. Both hands were in her hair, her hands were on his leather jacket.

It was cold outside. Freezing, she remembered.

But she hadn't been cold.

The second picture was of another kiss, further down the street.

Lindsay didn't blush, but she couldn't hide the smile. It had been so easy back then. They'd been so… in love. Neither one of them had thought it yet, but it was there for downtown Bozeman to see.

And apparently for New York City now, too.

She knew the reporter wanted a response, but she didn't have one to give. Those were private moments. Those were hers. That was when Danny helped her help her friends. Nothing in her life had been more important. He'd done it even when she hadn't been able to be honest with him.

Those were her moments because she'd been thinking of Lucy. Even when Danny kissed her, she'd been thinking of Lucy.

And him. After a moment she hadn't thought of anything except him.

"You can have them, if you want them."

Lindsay looked up and saw the look in the reporter's eyes. She'd given a response even if she hadn't meant to. The photographs had throne her off guard, had taken her back. She hadn't needed to say anything.

Without a word she picked them up and carefully stacked them together, sliding them into her desk drawer.

"You mentioned earlier that Danny was very much a New Yorker. How did he take to Montana?"

Lindsay smiled, softened a bit by the photos, but her memories were still her own.

"Was it what he expected?"

"He expected wheat fields, but it was January, so he saw snow. He saw the mountains. He wasn't there long."

"Did he meet your family?"

"Yes."

"Did they suspect that there was going to be a future between you two?"

Lindsay thought of her father and his silent and gruff greeting. He'd said very little. When Lindsay returned, seven months pregnant so her mother—who at the point was on an oxygen tank—could see her pregnant, her mother had said that she'd known. That they both had.

Her father had been a little tougher to read. She knew he didn't want her in New York. He'd been very vocal about that. She knew he didn't like her job.

But her mother had said that her father was glad that Danny was with her daily, that Danny could understand more than maybe they could, and had never been able to.

"I've looked up the price for a ticket to Montana and factoring in what had to of been a fairly quick turn around, I know your parents had to of known that it was a significant move on his part."

What could she say? Danny walked and used the subway whenever possible. He shopped in thrift stores at times and spent cash. He wasn't opposed to shelling out money on his bike or a leather jacket, but he was very picky about doing so. He complained about steep prices, but part of that was because he was smart. He knew to spend money where it counted. The raised prices around Valentine's Day would never count to him.

And even though she gave him a hard time, she saw no reason to shell out their hard earned cash for something he was more than happy to show her in different ways throughout the year.

He had softened with Lucy—their Lucy—but even when he'd arrived unannounced in Montana she'd known what a gesture it really was.

She didn't bring up the second time. That time, because of the suspension, he'd come—not because he'd had the time off, but because he'd missed her.

They'd taken the train home instead of flying back, which meant she'd left Montana a little earlier than planned. She'd been ready to go. She'd been ready to spend some quiet time with her husband.

Again Lindsay noticed the reporter taking notes and she realized she had said more with her face than she could have said with her words.

She inwardly sighed. There were more questions, possibly tougher questions. She was asked about the last year, about Danny's time in the hospital and the response from the public and the force. On that, she did speak, because she was grateful. Sitting in the hospital, receiving visits from so many officers she'd worked with and that had known only Danny, she had felt their love.

They'd raised a lot of money to cover bills and supported them with food and items for their baby. They still asked after Lucy.

She remembered Officer Myers who had come by with his son Peter, who hadn't been more than six years old. She wasn't sure if he had just heard his parents talking or if he had heard about it on the news, but he had wanted to give Lucy a teddy bear like the one his father had given him.

That teddy bear was never going anywhere, even if Lucy tired of it. There were nights Lindsay held on to it.

And Lindsay kept tabs on young Peter Myers. With the way he looked at his father, she figured one day he would follow in his father's footsteps.

She spoke of Danny's family. After the bar shooting, his mother and aunts and cousins and neighbors from the old neighborhood had been a continuous flow in and out of their apartment and the hospital. They had watched Lucy, they had made sure Lindsay had time with Lucy. They had done so much. Maybe she could let them know how much it meant to her that she was part of their extended family.

Even after Shane Casey—which the reporter asked extensive questions on as she had just received that medal—did what he did, she never had to go back to that apartment. She didn't return to that crime scene as she had to the diner. She didn't need to.

After it was cleaned, they packed and moved and unpacked.

She didn't talk of Shane Casey. She didn't talk of the pain. But she did talk of the people.

Not that the reporter didn't press her for more details. Then she asked for more. Where was their first date? Where were their favorite New York hot spots? Where had she gone first upon arriving in New York, as a tourist?

Of course, she never found out and did not ask about Lindsay's first trip to New York, after 9/11. She didn't know about why Lindsay was drawn to New York, that it was because of Lucy.

And even though she had obviously read about Katum's trial, she didn't ask about the link between her friend Lucy and her daughter.

For that, Lindsay was grateful.

After a while Lindsay caught site of her husband walking down the hall. He turned to head into the AV lab, but stopped when he caught her eye.

He was hers, she thought. He was a little older. He'd gotten rid of the glasses. He'd done so, he said, because he was tired of waking up and needing to find his glasses to see her clearly.

They'd been trying to work things out, but even then she'd known it hadn't been a line.

Now, he smiled at her and she could see his eyes so clearly. He knew she wasn't one to open up to anyone.

She glanced at the time, relieved to see they were well passed the hour time limit Sinclair had ordered she give. Noticing her glance, the reporter sighed. She packed her notes away and stood.

"Detective Messer, I do have to say that this has been a pleasure."

Lindsay took her outstretched hand and shook it, even though she stayed silent.

Later that night, their shift over and with some time on their hands (as Danny had arranged for his parents to watch Lucy), Lindsay motioned for Danny to sit in her chair and she settled in his lap.

It wasn't hanky panky, as the reporter might have said, and it wasn't something they did regularly, but she wanted this moment here, where their lives had crossed; she wanted to feel his warmth, the rough edges of a day's growth along his cheek.

She wanted to feel him as she opened up the past.

He said nothing even though the move wasn't something she did willingly, though she doubted it was unexpected. Since the therapy had ended, since receiving the medal, she'd opened herself a little and she'd needed him. The nightmares that hadn't happened in years returned, though not as dark or as rough.

It was easier to turn to him now, much easier than it had been back then.

For both of them, she thought.

She opened the drawer and pulled out the stack of photographs.

"Wow," Danny said, and she felt him chuckle. "Look how young we look, then."

"I don't think I've aged a bit."

"No," he said, though too agreeably to pull it off. "Has Mac seen these?"

"I don't know. But I suppose he will," she said. "Danny do you still have any allusion that Mac knows you went to Montana."

Danny pressed a gentle kiss to her forehead. "I don't guess so. Are you okay with this."

"No," she said easily. "But it wasn't so bad. And her article might be because of the bad, but it isn't about the bad. It was good to go back, to remember," she ran a finger over the photograph, "somethings. A lot of things. We have a lot of good memories. We do make sense."

"I told you we did."

You and me? We make sense.

Lindsay smiled. "You know, as she asked all of those questions about our early days and when we felt what we felt, how we worked together, I realized, I don't think I ever questioned that."

She felt his lips on her brow.

"We should head out," she said and stood, carrying the pictures to her messenger bag. "I've been starving all afternoon for a little Italian from Marcos, or maybe one of those one pound burgers from that place off of seventh—"

She turned back and found him smiling at her. They hadn't been there in years.

"It's still there. I saw it a few weeks ago."

"Yeah, its still there. We weren't even together when we went."

Lindsay reached for his hand. "After today, I may have to argue that point. I think we were together. We've been together a long time Messer. Longer than we knew."

I guess this was a little different, so I'd love to know what you thought if you want to leave a little review.

Thanks for reading! I hope you enjoyed.