Till the Gravity's Too Much

by missparker85

Brenda knows what it's like to want someone else to pick up the pieces. Follows "I Will Stand Here and Burn in my Skin"

"And all we are is skin and bone
Trained to get along
Forever going with the flow,
But you're friction"

Treacherous - Taylor Swift

---

Brenda is in Atlanta when she gets the call. She's at home, cleaning up after dinner. It doesn't much feel like home, though it's the house her parents have lived in for thirty years. It's just with her mama gone, it's as if whatever made the place home is gone now too and it's just the house where her father lives, where she and her brothers are staying like it's high school all over again.

And she's expected to cook and clean and bring beers into the den during football games. She misses her mama, loved and respected her, but Brenda does not know how she did this day in and day out for her adult life. She's so bored she could spit nails. She misses L.A., she misses work, she misses… well, she thinks about Fritz, calls him every day though she'd be lying to herself if the space wasn't a sort of relief. Things have been tense since he'd gone to work for the L.A.P.D. and she knows it's not fair to blame him for picking up what she'd had to put down, but it rankles.

She squirts some of the lemon scented dish washer detergent into the trap and clicks it closed. She kicks the door up with her foot, latches it, and starts the cycle. There's still the pots and pans, though. So when her phone rings, buzzing across the ceramic tile of the counters - this kitchen could use a remodel - she lunges for it, grateful for any port in the storm.

Her phone says that it's Lieutenant Flynn which is strange but not that strange. He's been sending her little updates on the colossal shit storm that is the Philip Stroh case. Her boss had practically ordered her to go on vacation because the legacy of what Brenda had done to Philip Stroh still echoed behind her. And in front of her, it seems. Lieutenant Flynn usually texts or sometimes emails but she's not sure he's called her in years. Probably the last time he'd called her, she'd been his boss.

"Lieutenant Flynn," she says. "What a surprise!"

"Hiya Chief," he says. "Sorry to interrupt your vacation-"

"Oh heavens no, no, you aren't interrupting a thing, I have time, just go on right ahead," she says and then winces at how excited she sounds. He's obviously not calling to chat about old times.

He chuckles. "Having fun in Atlanta?"

"It's certainly not L.A.," she says and then, "What is it, Andy? Did y'all find Stroh?"

"Oh," he says. "Sorry, no, it's not that." She frowns, takes a seat at the little breakfast table over by the window. Spring is starting to take root here in the warm southern states. She's grown accustomed to desert life, to dry air and little rain and so the fact that everything here is already lush and green and wet is off-putting. She can't ever seem to get warm. "I'm actually calling because of Sharon."

"Captain Raydor?" Brenda says. She sits up straighter, a tendril of worry creeping up her spine. Andy has been keeping her in the loop but she hasn't heard from Sharon since she'd left California. Which is fine - she is on vacation and she's only been here just over a week. She'd scheduled three weeks, something nearly unheard of when she'd been with Major Crimes but now that she works for the District Attorney's office, it's surprisingly easy. She has an assistant who takes care of her schedule. She has plenty of time saved up. All she has to do is use it. "Is she okay?"

"She's… trying to adjust," he says. "She misses the kid."

Rusty's witness protection relocation had been an unfortunate side-effect of D.D.A. Rios's blatant incompetence and one Brenda is still trying to decide how to deal with. Rios is benched for now, suspended with pay and until Brenda finds a better alternative to the murder she'd like to commit, Brenda is inclined to just let Emma rot.

"What happened exactly?" Brenda says.

"Well, the short version is she basically told Chief Taylor, in not so many words, to bite her," Andy says. "You know how Sharon can be."

"Terrifying?" Brenda asks.

"Taylor suggested Sharon take some time off, see, to deal with the emotional fall out of becoming too close to the Stroh case-"

Here, Brenda snorts.

"Sharon told him to butt out and he put her on leave," Andy says.

"For how long?" Brenda asks.

"Until she apologizes, I think," he says.

Brenda chuckles. "Until hell freezes over."

"That's what I'm afraid of. I know you're with your family, Chief, but I thought maybe since you are friends now, you could give her a pep talk?" Andy asks. "She, uh, she seems not to want to talk to me."

"She's hurtin'," Brenda says. "But I don't know if I can advocate for anyone to apologize to Taylor. Ugh, that man!"

"I just… You know what it's like when your job is the only thing holding you together, don't you, Chief?" Andy says. Brenda runs her nail along the wooden edge of the kitchen table, tries not to let that comment needle her any. "She's just lost Rusty for who knows how long and now she can't come to work and I'm worried."

"Now I'm worried, too, Lieutenant," Brenda says. "Tell you what, you just leave it to me, okay? You concentrate on catchin' Stroh and I'll see what I can do about Captain Raydor."

"Thanks, thank you," Andy says. "I'll, uh, I'll talk to you soon."

"Bye now," she says.

She's looking up flights on her phone when her brother, Clay Jr., comes in holding a nearly empty bowl of pretzels. He shakes it at her when she doesn't immediately acknowledge him.

"Where are the pretzels, Bren?" he asks. The older he gets, the more he sounds like their daddy.

"You just ate dinner forty five minutes ago," she says, her attention still on her phone. There's a red-eye that leaves just before midnight. If she packs now and gets Bobby to drive her to the airport, she could make it home by morning. She'll gain time, even, headed west.

"Brenda!" Clay Jr. says. "Where?"

"For the love of the lord, Junior, they're in the damn pantry! Where do you think the pretzels are?" She books the flight, tries not to wince at the extra three hundred dollars tacked onto the price. "Where's Daddy?"

"In the study, I think," he says. "You gonna leave these dishes in the sink?"

"Your hands broke?" she asks, slipping her phone into her pocket once her confirmation email comes through. "Wouldn't kill you to help out every now and then."

She leaves her brother standing in the kitchen and climbs the stairs to find her father. He is in his study though it's mostly full of trophies from when the boys were young and the different animals he has killed and stuffed over the years. A few medals in a shadow box on the wall from his army days. A television only slightly smaller than the one downstairs.

"Daddy?" she says.

He looks up, studies her for a few moments.

"It's been nine days, Brenda Leigh, that must be some sort of record for you," he says.

"I'm sorry," she says. "Someone in L.A. needs my help. A friend."

"No," he says. "It's all right. That's a noble reason and I'm glad you came."

He smiles at her but it's the sad one, the only one she's seen since her mama passed. She gives the same, tired smile back.

oooo

It's just after six am in Atlanta when she lands at LAX - by the time she gets her bags and hails a cab, it's nearly four am local time. She realizes, when the driver asks her where she wants to go, that there are parts of this plan that she hadn't thought through. Like telling Fritz she was leaving Atlanta. She can go home, of course, but she thinks of the questions he'll ask, the wounded way he'll look at her like he does when he's upset she hasn't run every single solitary life choice past him first. How dare she leave Atlanta without informing him first? That's what he'll feel.

She gives Sharon's address.

If anything, she can just sit in the lobby of the building until a more respectable hour.

But when she arrives, wheeling three weeks worth of clothing behind her, her tote on her aching shoulder, she's so bone weary that she takes her chances and rides up to the eleventh floor. It's embarrassing to show up somewhere like this uninvited and unannounced. It's bad manners and she hopes her mama isn't looking down on her with disgust. She hopes that if her mama can see her, she can't read her only daughter's thoughts as she reaches up and rings the bell.

The door opens surprisingly quickly for the late hour. Sharon looks tired. She doesn't have her glasses on and she's wearing a dark green robe belted tightly around her slim waist. She's got dark circles under her eyes and Brenda can see the eerie blue of the flickering television in the dark interior of the condo. So the Captain hadn't been asleep and probably hasn't been sleeping well for some time.

Sharon stares at her, with obvious surprise.

"I heard you told Taylor to kiss your ass," Brenda says, finally.

"I may have suggested that he mind his own business," she says tucking her hands into the pockets of her robe.

"How much time do you have off?" Brenda asks.

"That remains to be seen," Sharon says. "Brenda, what are you doing here?"

"I thought you might want someone to talk to," Brenda says.

"At five in the morning?" Sharon asks and then glances at her suitcase. "Oh my god, you are supposed to be in Atlanta!"

"I was and I just got back," Brenda says.

"Brenda!"

"It's fine, it's fine," Brenda says. "I just wanted to make sure you were okay." She tilts her head. "You okay?"

Sharon shakes her head; steps aside to let Brenda in.

oooo

Brenda wakes up on the sofa, a cashmere blanket over her, one of the throw pillows under her head. She doesn't remember falling asleep but she remembers the plane ride, the cab, the way Sharon had touched her elbow as she'd crossed the threshold from the hallway to the condo, stepping into Sharon's home for the third time. This is her second time sleeping on this sofa but it hasn't gotten more comfortable in the last couple months. She sits up, the blanket slipping down to her waist. It feels late but the clock on the microwave says it's only been a few hours and it's just past eight.

She has to pee and feels like she can't even remember the last time she brushed her teeth. The condo is quiet and so she takes her tote and goes into the guest bathroom. She pees, digs her toothbrush out of her bag - she always travels with it in easy reach. She used to keep a spare in her desk for late night rollouts that turned into long, drawn out days but she doesn't work those kind of hours anymore.

She brushes her teeth and tries not to think about the last time she was in this bathroom. How the truth had just started bubbling up and out of her like she was the criminal and Sharon was the master interrogator. But Sharon hadn't done anything except save her blouse from ruin and listen to her confession, color high on her pale cheeks.

She looks at her phone before she goes back to the living room but it's dead. Her charger is in her big suitcase, mixed in god knows where with god knows what. She hadn't exactly packed carefully - she'd just shoved everything in. Dirty clothes mixed with clean ones, shoes, make up all wadded up together.

When she emerges, feeling slightly more human, she realizes that Sharon isn't in bed but is out sitting on the patio. Brenda opens the door slowly, sliding it careful as not to startle. Sharon doesn't react, not even when Brenda sits in the seat next to her. It's cool up here, a little breezy and thankfully, dry. The air isn't as sweet or clean as it was in Georgia, but it feels like home at any rate.

Sharon dabs at her face with her sleeves.

"Please don't tell Andy," Sharon says, her voice thick and watery.

"Why would I?" Brenda asks.

"He's why you're here, right? He called?"

Brenda nods. "He called but he didn't ask me to come out. Don't blame that on him."

"Why are you here?" Sharon asks. "Really?"

"I didn't want you to be alone," Brenda says. "I may be an awful colleague, but I'm still tryin' to be a decent friend."

"I just… I promised him I would keep him safe, you know, and then he had to go away anyway." Sharon shakes her head, forces a smile even though fresh tears well and it's the most heartbreaking expression Brenda has ever seen on Sharon's beautiful face.

"Well," Brenda says. "Let's look at the facts."

Sharon nods.

"He's safe. He's goin' to a good school, I hear, gettin' a good education. He's got round the clock protection," Brenda says.

"It's all true," Sharon agrees.

"And when we do catch Stroh and put this mess behind us, and we will-" Brenda realizes that she's not exactly part of the 'we' anymore, but soldiers on with her pep talk. "Then Rusty comes on home again."

"I know."

"It's hard to lose someone you love," Brenda says. "But he's just out of town for a bit. Not gone for good. He's still your son."

Sharon tips her head back, closes her eyes. Her hair is bright in the sun, more red than not. She looks like a different person - not the wicked witch from Internal Affairs, not the bitch who stole Brenda's life out from under her, but more like the person from the bathroom that night. The woman who had listened to Brenda's half confession, their knees bumping together, a little drunk and a lot scared. A woman, a friend.

"You're going to have to pull yourself together," Brenda says. Sharon's eyes snap open and meet hers and Brenda offers a thin smile. "But not today."

"No?" Sharon asks. "Do you have a plan, Chief?"

"In fact, I do, Captain," Brenda says. "We are going to wallow."

"Well," Sharon says. "You have a little catching up to do."

oooo

Brenda takes Sharon's car. Sharon finally goes to bed at Brenda's urging and Brenda changes her clothes, knotting her hair back. She could use a shower but that can wait. She takes the car and goes to the supermarket that her phone's navigation app directs her to - the closest one is a Whole Foods. Sharon would shop at Whole Foods, Brenda thinks; quinoa and kale chips and gelatinous tofu wiggling in a plastic container. Brenda turns up her nose as she parks and then tries to talk herself down from being so judgmental. Maybe Sharon and most of the greater Los Angeles area are snobs, but she's being snobby about them being snobs. Not everything can be fried okra and cornbread, she understands that. Different strokes for different folks.

Still, finding junk food in a Whole Foods is challenging. She has to go about it another way - buying expensive cheese instead of Cheetos, soy ice cream, two bars of decadent dark chocolate. The wine selection is just fine and she buys both red and white and a bottle of cranberry juice because she saw a bottle of vodka when she and Fritz had come over for dinner last. She buys some prepackaged dinner options - a rotisserie chicken and a tub of already mashed potatoes; a loaf of bread and a dozen eggs. A container of organic green grapes and five bananas in a bunch.

When she pays, she uses her credit card without thinking much about it. Signs her name and pushes her paper sacks of groceries out to the car in the little cart.

Getting the three bags up to the condo again is a challenge and her arms ache when she sets everything down to unlock the door. She'd just taken Sharon's keys and not thought much about it - the car key was easy to distinguish and she recognizes the key to Sharon's office well enough but she has to try a couple to find the right one that turns this lock. She'd locked the handle behind her when she'd left.

She puts away the groceries to the best of her abilities - cold things in the refrigerator and then the dry goods she just left sitting on the counter near the stove top. She'd rather leave them out then put them away wrong.

She manages to get the coffee pot going and is feeling rather domestic indeed when her phone chirps. It had charged a bit in the car - and she knows it's Fritz.

How's Atlanta?

She scrunches her nose to read it, squinting. Where are her glasses? In her bag somewhere. She holds the phone away from her face and manages to peck out her response: fine before setting the phone down and searching the cupboards for mugs.

Things have been uneasy between her and her husband and when they're together, she sort of compartmentalizes it away. When they're together, she can actively work at the marriage, reminding herself of the good things about her husband, the reasons she'd decided to go ahead and marry him in the first place. It's when they're apart that concerns her.

She just doesn't miss him all that much.

She pours two mugs of coffee and then, rather boldly, carries them to the closed bedroom door. Maybe Sharon is asleep but she just doesn't think so. She'd heard the toilet flush when she was putting groceries away and when she pokes her head into the bedroom, she can see that Sharon is lying in bed but she's on top of the covers and she turns and looks at Brenda as soon as she comes in.

"You want some coffee?" Brenda asks.

"Sure," Sharon says. She sits up and Brenda perches on the edge of the mattress, hands her a mug. She'd given Sharon the white mug with the delicate, scrolling handle and kept the chunky brown one that seems indestructible for herself.

"You get any rest?" Brenda asks. Sharon sips at her coffee - Brenda had doctored it up with sugar and a splash of almond milk and if it's not to Sharon's taste, she bites her tongue about it.

"Some," Sharon says.

"No use lyin' to me," Brenda says.

Sharon shrugs one shoulder, takes another sip of coffee. Distantly, from beyond the room, they both hear Brenda's phone blip again.

"How about some breakfast?" Brenda says.

She has this strange, pressing urge to take care of Sharon. It's foreign; it feels heavy on her shoulders. She barely manages to keep her own life together and in her personal life, Fritz is overwhelmingly the caregiver between the two of them. He does things like set up the coffee pot at night, pays the bills, sends thank you notes after Christmas. They joke a lot that he's the grown-up, even if she has always been a little more successful professionally. On paper, she still is, though it doesn't feel like it anymore.

"I'm not sure I could eat," Sharon says.

"I bet you could," Brenda says. "I bet once you start, your body will remember how."

Sharon makes a funny expression, smooths her hair away from her face and clears her throat.

"I might take a shower," she says.

"Go on," Brenda says. "I can manage on my own."

She can fry an egg. She's even in the habit of cooking after her week in Atlanta - she'd been making several meals a day. She puts some bread in the toaster, washes the grapes. Cuts a banana in half. Sharon has pretty dishes, sturdy and cream colored and they all match. All her flatware looks the same too, it's only the mugs that are mismatched.

She's just sliding the eggs onto toast when Sharon comes out, her hair wet and her face completely clean. She has on a tank top and those kind of soft pants that aren't exactly sweat pants but nothing you'd wear out into public. They have a drawstring at the waist but she hasn't tied it, they just hang loose. Brenda feels even grubbier in comparison in her ratty old jeans and the shirt she put on she suspects came from the dirty part of her suitcase, not the clean. It doesn't smell like her mama's detergent, it just smells like suitcase and sweat.

"This looks very nice," Sharon says. "I'm… thank you, Brenda. Thanks."

Brenda knows what it's like to want someone else to pick up the pieces. Fritz had tried when her mama had died, but she'd needed another woman, maybe, and the only woman she'd been close to was the one who had gone.

"So," Brenda says as they settle into the breakfast. "How are things goin' with you and Lieutenant Flynn?"

Sharon has broken the yolk of her egg and is letting it seep into the toast below. She glances up at Brenda , one eyebrow a little higher than the other.

"Fine," she says.

"You two still seeing each other?" Brenda presses.

"No," Sharon says. "Yes. I don't know. It's not… it's just friendly."

"Ah," she smiles. "Playing a little hard to get."

"I am hard to get," Sharon corrects. "I'm his boss, I'm recently divorced, and I just had to pack Rusty up and ship him off because both your office and mine royally fucked everything up!"

The silence after Sharon's outburst might have gone on forever if Brenda's phone hadn't blipped again.

"I see why Andy called," Brenda mutters, reaching for the phone. Two texts from Fritz, both asking her to call him. She texts back instead, tells him she'll call in a little while. She doesn't offer an excuse, doesn't lie. Just puts it off for a while longer.

Sharon cuts up her half of banana with the side of her fork and eats the pieces methodically. When that's gone she looks back up.

"I'm sorry."

"It's all right," Brenda says. "It's probably better that you yell at me than at Taylor or Will."

"I never see Chief Pope any more," Sharon says. "I think you were the main attraction to him at Major Crimes."

"Maybe you run it so well he doesn't need to micromanage," Brenda offers in return and they exchange small smiles.

"What are we supposed to do today?" Sharon says.

"Whatever you want," Brenda says. "We could go shopping or go see a movie or just find a dark bar and stay in it all day. We could stay here."

"I don't know if I want to go out," Sharon says.

"We can watch movies here," Brenda says. "It's fine."

"Okay," she says.

"I can even leave," Brenda says. "I mean, if you want to be alone, Sharon, it's fine, but I wanted you to know that I'm here, so-"

"I don't want you to leave," Sharon interrupts. "Not yet."

Brenda nods. "Just say when."

"Maybe when we catch Philip Stroh," Sharon says. She tries to have it sound like a joke but it doesn't come out that way, not at all. Brenda wonders exactly how long Sharon had been alone before Rusty had fallen into her lap and her life. She wonders if Sharon doesn't want to go back to that solitary way of life.

Sharon offers the shower to Brenda after breakfast and Brenda is so relieved. She gathers some things from her suitcase, which is still in the living room and is still crouched in front of it when Sharon says, "Just take it in the bedroom."

"Sure," Brenda says. But when she's halfway down the hall, Sharon says, "My bedroom!"

Sharon's eyes flit nervously to Rusty's room, probably a no man's land now. Brenda nods. "All right."

"My shower," Sharon says. "There's not much in the guest one anyway."

"If you're sure," Brenda says.

"Why wouldn't I be sure?" Sharon says, and goes back to cleaning up the breakfast dishes.

Brenda walks through the bedroom where the bed is still rumpled. There's some pictures on the dresser, some of what must be her kids. The daughter looks just like her. There's one of her and Lieutenant Flynn at some formal affair, which Brenda finds interesting. Just friends indeed. She bets Andy doesn't know Sharon has this picture in her bedroom.

The shower in the master bathroom is much nicer than the guest bathroom. The same subway tiles that make up the backsplash in the kitchen line the walls of this oversized shower and instead of a curtain it has big glass doors. It even has a dual shower head - one fixed to the wall and a hand held one. She looks over the counter and even peeks inside the medicine cabinet. Who could resist? Inside is nail polish, a bottle of remover, moisturizer, her toothbrush and toothpaste. They use the same brand which strikes Brenda as funny.

In the top drawer under the counter is all Sharon's expensive looking make up and make up brushes. It's beautiful but all wrong for Brenda's skin, all those dark red tubes of lipstick. Brenda might be the blonde but Sharon has much fairer skin.

Brenda folds up her clothes and sets them on the closed lid of the toilet, turns on the shower, steps under the spray. She makes it hot as she can stand, letting in pound into her shoulders and wet her hair through.

She's idly contemplating the merits of that hand held shower nozzle when there's a light knock on the door and then it opens a crack.

"Brenda?"

She crosses her arms across her chest and angles herself so her back is to the door.

"Yeah?" she says.

"I forgot to give you towels," Sharon says. She doesn't come in, Brenda never sees her face, but an arm appears and two folded mossy green towels land on the counter and the door closes again.

"Thank you," she calls.

She uses Sharon's fancy salon shampoo and conditioner, shaves with her own razor. There's a perfect little ledge to rest her foot when she's shaving and it's obvious this shower was designed by a woman. She feels a rush of affection for Sharon, of empathy for how she's feeling these days. She remembers just fine how she felt about Sharon when they first met - hostile and suspicious and so frustrated but that had melted away with time and she thinks that it's how they're managing to be friends now, that rocky beginning. There was never any phoniness - they were always direct with their hatred, then direct with their tenuous agreement to work together and then direct with their alliance and when they'd decided to be friends, they'd been direct about that too.

Hell, Brenda had basically admitted to Sharon that she found her pretty enough to kiss. Brenda chews of the skin around her thumbnail while the conditioner sets and feels a twinge of embarrassment over that. It had seemed important at the time to tell Sharon but it had been awkward for a while afterwards. They'd pushed through it, but she knows Sharon finds her a little silly, a silly, bored woman who is letting her boredom infect her marriage.

Out of the shower, she wraps a towel around her hair and one around her body and pushes open the bathroom door, letting some of the steam escape into the cool bedroom. Sharon is on her bed again, curled up, looking at her telephone.

"Sorry," Brenda says, feeling uncertain now.

Sharon waves her hand in the air. "Don't be." But she doesn't move. Maybe this is normal? Brenda hasn't has many female friends, not since college, and maybe women are just supposed to be intimately comfortable with one another. "Your phone rang."

"Did it, now?" Brenda says, crouching down to her suitcase again, holding the towel around her tightly.

"I do believe it was Chief Howard," Sharon says.

"You can call him Fritz when he ain't here," Brenda mutters, searching for a pair of clean underwear. There's a pink pair she is certain she never wore and she refuses to do a sniff test with Sharon watching her.

"Brenda," Sharon says.

"What?"

"Does your husband know you're here?"

Brenda finds the underwear, drops them by her foot, and resumes her search for her soft, gray t-shirt.

"Does he know you aren't in Georgia?"

She finds the shirt and her black bra and she can just put the jeans she had on back on again. Oh heaven, where is her deodorant? She keeps digging.

"I wasn't supposed to be back for another two weeks," Brenda says. "So what does it matter?"

"I know why I'm hiding out, sulking," Sharon says but it's not sharp. She's heard the woman be sharp, select her words for maximum damage and this isn't that. "But I don't know why you are."

Forget the deodorant. She'll use Sharon's. "'Scuse me," she says, grabs her bounty and retreats back into the bathroom.

oooo

She finally gets Sharon to get some real sleep, in her bed, door closed. They'd spent the morning watching mindless television and Sharon had let the issue with Fritz drop. They'd chatted about superficial things. Brenda had talked a little about Atlanta, her daddy and her brothers and how they'd all sort of expected her to take care of them. Sharon had snorted.

Sharon had even mentioned her own children, the boy and the girl. She'd talked about how the boy was some sort of computer genius and the girl was a dancer but when Brenda asked why they weren't here now, Sharon dismissed it. "They have their own lives, I have mine," Sharon had said.

Now, Brenda is thinking about a midday glass of weekend wine when someone knocks on the door. She rushes to answer, not wanting to wake up her exhausted friend and it's Lieutenant Flynn.

"Chief?" he says. "What are you doing here?"

"What am I doing here?" Brenda asks. "You called me!"

"Yeah, but I thought… I thought you'd text her or something." He creases up his brow. "Is she okay?"

"She's asleep," Brenda says. It's Saturday afternoon now and Brenda realizes she hasn't even been here twenty-four hours yet. "You wanna come in?"

"Sure," he says. They're obviously between murders. It's always convenient when work cooperates with personal life meltdowns. That never happened for Brenda, but she assumes it would be nice. Andy has on khaki pants and a casual short sleeved button down shirt. No tie. Leather bomber jacket. He looks older than how she thinks of him when she remembers him, but it isn't bad. They're all older, now.

Across the room, her phone rings.

"Come in, have a seat, help yourself to anything," she says. She knows it's Fritz and she can't avoid it any longer. "I gotta take this. Don't wake her up, I just got her down."

She takes the phone to the patio and closes the door behind her before she slides the bar on her phone and says, "Hi, Fritzi!"

"Hi, honey," he says. He sounds not quite right. "How's Atlanta?"

She doesn't want to lie. She also doesn't want to explain this situation to Fritz. He'll ask why and she doesn't know why she felt like she had to drop everything and check on Sharon except for that Sharon basically dropped her entire career to carry Brenda through the last few years of her time with the L.A.P.D. and this is the absolute least Brenda can do in return. Because Brenda knows what it's like to lose someone you love from right out under you, because Brenda is a grown woman and is tired of checking in with her husband. She's tired of it.

"Oh," Brenda says. "You know the south."

"Yeah? How's the weather?" Fritz asks.

"Spring-y," she says.

"And your brothers, what are they up to?" Fritz presses but his voice has gone cold.

"What do you care about my brothers?" she asks.

"Because your family is my family," Fritz says, but doesn't elaborate. "There's nothing you want to tell me?"

"I miss you," she says. "How are things in L.A.?"

There's a bit of a pause.

"Fritz?"

"Everything is fine here," he says. "Look, I'm gonna have to work this weekend so I'll try to call when I can."

"Okay," she says. "Be safe."

"I'll try to call when I can," he says again.

He hangs up and she looks at her phone. She knows when he's mad, she knows when it's her fault. Maybe he knows she's back in L.A., maybe he'd called the house phone when she'd started ignoring his cell. She doesn't care. Damage is done.

oooo

Lieutenant Flynn has been hanging around for two hours watching home improvement shows with Brenda when Sharon finally wakes up and comes out of her bedroom. They look up at her from the couch and she stops short, one hand trying to smooth her bedhead away.

It's a telling gesture. Maybe not just friends after all.

Lieutenant Flynn stands and says, "How are you feeling?"

"Did we catch a murder?" she asks. "No one called."

"No," Flynn says. "And I'm pretty sure you won't get a call until…"

"I know, I know," she says. "I'm still thinking about it."

"I just wanted to… I didn't realize Chief Johnson was here," Flynn says. Sharon's got on a big sweater and she holds it more tightly around her body.

"You called her," Sharon points out.

"Sittin' right here," Brenda says under her breath.

Sharon gives the whole situation a pained smile.

"I think I will, at the very least, take Monday and perhaps on Tuesday, if I feel up to it, I will speak with Chief Taylor," Sharon says. "But otherwise, I am fine."

Brenda rolls her eyes.

"Good," Flynn says. "Good."

"Lieutenant Flynn and I were just talking about dinner," Brenda says, not looking away from the television. "Maybe we could go out?"

"Maybe," Sharon says.

"Or just the two of you if you'd rather," Brenda offers. "I can stay here or… or go home if you're ready for that, Sharon."

"Don't go home," Sharon says. "Please."

Brenda nods. "All right."

It's early for dinner, but Brenda insists they go on without her. Flynn seems relieved and Sharon perplexed but she goes along with it.

"I'm just so tired," Brenda tells her. "Jet lag and all."

"Okay," Sharon says. "Sleep in my bed though. Not the couch. You won't get any rest there."

Brenda can read between the lines there - stay out of Rusty's room.

She nods. "Have fun."

Sharon's mattress is amazing. The woman knows what to spend her money on, how to choose the right luxuries. Expensive shampoo, well tailored clothing, a bed that is like sleeping on a damn cloud. If you're going to spend your life in high heels, spend the money on the good ones that won't break your back in the end.

Brenda lies on the opposite side of the place she'd seen Sharon curl up. It seems the respectful thing to do. But she still gets under the fluffy down comforter, still burrows in as deep as she can moaning, "Oh my God." It makes the old mattress she shares with Fritz seem like a dorm room futon.

She wants to text Sharon about the religious experience she is having with this mattress, but she falls asleep before she can.

She wakes up to darkness, to muffled noise from the living room. The clock on the nightstand on the other side of the bed says it is 9:06 and she knows she should get up, concede the comfortable territory and go back to the sofa. But whatever is happening out there isn't about her so she stays put, scared enough to do the wrong thing that she does nothing at all. Her feet are so warm and the pillow smells sweet and clean and her eyes droop closed again.

The bedroom door opening wakes her a second time. She sits up to glance at the clock - 9:43 - and she can see quite clearly Sharon slip into the room and cross it quickly to shut herself into the bathroom. Brenda listens hard but the rest of the house seems quiet and dark. No more Lieutenant Flynn then, and Sharon has turned off all her soft, warm lamps. Closing up shop for the night. Brenda is still tired, a little hungry, and worried now. All she can hear from the bathroom is the fan that comes on with the light and the sound of water through pipes.

Get up, she tells herself. Get out.

She doesn't go, lowering back down to the bed again. When the fan stops and the door opens, Brenda closes her eyes and feigns sleep even though her heart is hammering and she can feel the hot rush of blood buzzing in her ears. She has to work to keep her breathing deep and even. Sharon moves a little in the dark bedroom and she hears the soft muffled noise of fabric falling into the hamper, of the wooden scrape of an opening drawer.

Changing for bed, Brenda tells herself. Is she just going to… is she just going to slide in beside Brenda? They can sleep like sisters, she thinks. The mattress is a queen and they're slim women. There can be inches of space between them, it'll be fine. In the morning, Brenda will apologize. She'll call her husband, she'll tell the truth. She can be truthful and loving and she can make right what she has wronged.

She swallows the saliva that seems to have pooled in her mouth with her nerves as Sharon lifts the linens and gets into bed, hoping it covers the constricting sound of her throat.

Sharon lies still for a few moments, flat on her back before she shifts again, moving onto her side. Brenda keeps her eyes closed but she can tell from the sound of Sharon's breathing that she's facing Brenda. Brenda can feel that she's being watched.

Sharon's arm moves toward Brenda and she feels the woman's fingers bump her arm under the blankets, her fingertips ghosting down the bare skin until she finds Brenda's fingers and then she's holding Brenda's hand loosely.

Brenda turns her head, meets Sharon's eyes in the dark. No sense in pretending anymore.

"I…" Sharon says. "I did something."

Brenda squeezes the cool fingers back.

"Are you okay?" Brenda asks and her own voice sounds low and gravelly like when she first gets up in the morning, before coffee and before a shower and before she's completely prepared for what any given day is going to throw at her.

"Yes," Sharon says. "But I don't feel good about it."

"What did you do?" Brenda asks. Sharon isn't wearing her glasses and though it's dark enough for sleep in the bedroom, Brenda's eyes have long adjusted and the light from the window - streetlights, mostly - is plenty enough to see Sharon's face. She wonders if Sharon can see her just as well or if being backlit makes Brenda just a voice that Sharon can confess to.

Sharon not wearing her glasses is something Brenda has seen only a handful of times.

"I kissed Andy," Sharon says. And then she breathes out harshly and Brenda can feel it, the movement of air across the bridge of her nose. It smells like mouthwash, minty and cool.

"And you haven't done that before?" Brenda asks.

"No," Sharon says.

"I don't think it's all that bad," Brenda says. "He obviously cares a great deal for you."

"I thought… I thought it would make me feel better," Sharon says. "I thought it would help. Like a distraction."

Sharon's hand tightens on hers and Brenda shifts so they're holding hands for real, palm against palm. Like little girls on the playground hold hands, like families at the dinner table, like strangers in church. Sharon's hands, Brenda has noticed, are the only place she shows her age and Brenda lets her thumb worry at the skin on the back of Sharon's hand. It's loose and feels paper thin.

"Did it?"

"No," Sharon says. "I didn't feel anything. It was fine, it wasn't bad but I didn't feel… what I thought I would feel."

Poor Flynn, Brenda thinks. He is going to get his heart broken.

"I like him. I thought it would translate, I guess," she says. "And now I have to figure out a way to untangle everything."

"Affection and attraction ain't always the same," Brenda says.

Sharon smiles a little and Brenda says, "What?"

"When you go home, you come back to L.A. with a thicker accent," she says.

"I didn't know it ever faded," Brenda admits.

"No one is ever going to mistake you for a local," Sharon says. She pulls her hand away. Brenda takes it as a sign and moves to sit up and Sharon says, "Just stay."

So she lies back, flat on her back at stares up at the ceiling.

"Some of the best sex I've ever had has been with people I thought I hated," Brenda says.

"Hate sex gave me two children," Sharon says. "Well that and Catholic guilt."

They both snicker into the darkness.

"All I wanted to do when he left was tell Rusty I finally kissed Andy," Sharon says, her tone sobering. "I didn't even know… I mean, I thought we were just getting dinners after work and seeing movies and Rusty was the one who told me that we were probably more than friends, you know? He was invested in Lieutenant Flynn and now he's gone and I've totally fucked it up."

Her voice catches on the expletive.

"No," Brenda says. She doesn't know what to say but she can't just let that hang in the air. "It's okay. You're okay."

"Do you still hate me?" Sharon's voice cuts into the darkness. The question makes Brenda's stomach flip. "I remember so clearly when you just couldn't stand me."

"I'm never going to hate you again, don't you worry," Brenda says. "Goodnight, Sharon."

"Hmm," Sharon says, but she does roll over and falls asleep.

oooo

Brenda wakes up alone, though she can hear the shower running. She gets up, uses the guest bathroom, wanders into the kitchen to find the coffee pot half full and a clean mug on the counter for her.

Her phone is plugged in on the counter, but there's no texts or calls from her husband. She feels both relieved and wary. She can see through the sliding glass door that the tops of the trees are swaying so she doesn't go out onto the patio. She takes her coffee back to Sharon's room and sits in front of her suitcase to sort the clean from the dirty. She'll ask to do a load. She's already made herself at home.

She allows herself a little fantasy of staying forever, of staying until Rusty comes back at least. The real fantasy is having a life where she could pick up and make a change like that with no one to answer to, where this little condo can be home.

She knows that playing house with Sharon Raydor is temporary and probably not very good for either of them. They're hiding out here together but for each day they stay here, the bigger the mess outside gets.

The shower stops.

Brenda sips her coffee and tries to think tactically. She could go home; she could bring Sharon with her. Would Fritz yell at them both?

She thinks maybe he would. After all, he outranks Sharon now. Brenda doesn't want to implode Sharon's professional life just because her own personal life is in ruin.

The bathroom door opens and Sharon's wrapped in a towel, her wet hair dark against pale shoulders.

"You're awake," she says. She's squinting - no glasses - at the pile of clothes surrounding Brenda.

"Yeah," Brenda says.

"There's laundry in the hall closet," Sharon says.

"Thanks," Brenda says.

Sharon's closet is just large enough for her to walk into and she does. Brenda can hear her, can hear the towel drop to the carpet, can hear Sharon rummaging around in there. Brenda keeps sorting the laundry and tries not to think about the way Sharon's fingers had moved against her skin the night before, how casually she'd let Brenda deeper into her home, her bedroom, her bed, her life.

Brenda wonders how deep she can get before Sharon tires of her.

She reappears in jeans and a tank top. Brenda can see the strap of a plum colored bra and Sharon has the towel in her hands now, rubbing at the ends of her hair.

"What do you want to do today?" Brenda asks.

"Go somewhere," Sharon says. "Do you want to go somewhere?"

"Somewhere?" Brenda asks. "Where?"

Sharon shakes her head. "I don't care. Shopping? The beach? Disneyland? Out of L.A. maybe."

"I've never been to Disneyland," Brenda says.

Sharon chuckles. "It's awful actually. I'd never go on a weekend."

"What do you usually do on a Sunday?" Brenda asks.

"Go to church," Sharon says.

"Oh," Brenda says uneasily.

"Don't worry," Sharon says, dryly. "I don't have any intention of making you set foot inside a church. You might burst into flames."

"I might," Brenda chuckles. "Okay. Just let me… get dressed."

"No rush," Sharon says and heads back into her bathroom. But she leaves the door open and when Brenda hears her start blow drying her hair, she gathers up the pile of dirty clothes and carries them into the hallway. Shoves them into the empty washer. Sharon uses those little laundry pods, so she drops one in and manages to start the cycle on her own.

The clean pile is slim pickings. No more clean jeans but she has a little cotton skirt and a clean white t-shirt. She can always borrow something warmer if she has to - Sharon is bigger than she is, taller and more imposing but her sweaters will fit well enough.

She puts on a pair of clean underwear, a white bra that isn't that dirty and manages to get herself covered before the sound of the blow dryer stops. Her own hair is clean enough to twist up and back with the beige elastic from her wrist.

Sharon finds her in the kitchen looking at her phone with no messages. Brenda looks up to see that Sharon has shiny, clean hair and makeup on, pretty earrings and a seafoam green sweater over her tank top.

"No!" Brenda says. "Not fair."

"What?" Sharon asks.

"You look beautiful and I look like something the cat dragged in!"

Sharon cracks a rare smile. "Nonsense, Chief," she says. "You're always the prettiest girl at the ball."

"I'm gonna put makeup on, give me ten minutes," she says. "You decide where we're goin'."

Her makeup is a mess, tossed into a too small travel pouch. She uses the master bathroom and doesn't do much more than put on some mascara, a pink lipstick, some powder but she does feel better and wipes of the counters before she zips everything back into the pouch and leaves it in there.

When she emerges again, Sharon has a purse on a shoulder and car keys in her hand.

"Let's go," she says.

oooo

They drive south. It's warm enough to crack the windows, even on the freeway. Brenda is just burning up with wondering where they're going but she doesn't ask. They don't take the Crown Vic, but a little gold Honda with a community college parking sticker in the corner of the windshield.

She really hopes they're not going to Disneyland. She's wearing flat sandals, terrible for all-day walking. But they drive right past Anaheim, past Orange, past Irvine until they veer off the 5 and head toward the coast. By the time the pull off the freeway and into Laguna Beach, the air has turned salty and the tight lines around Sharon's eyes have relaxed a little. She's been quiet, letting the sound of adult contemporary radio fill the space between them. Now that they're on city streets, she rolls down her window the rest of the way and lets her elbow hang out of the car while she drives.

"This is beautiful," Brenda says, looking out across the sparkling ocean. They drive slow - lots of pedestrians - and Brenda pushes her sunglasses up onto her head to get a better look at everything. It's not even lunch time yet, there is still so much day left and Brenda feels her own face relax a little.

"Let's stop and find some breakfast," Sharon says. They're in the heart of it all and so when Sharon spies a space along the metered street, she parks. Brenda digs around in the bottom of her bag and finds a few quarters. Sharon takes them, though she looks like she wants to press them back into Brenda's hand. She puts them in the meter and then adds a few more coins from her own pocket.

"That gives us two hours," Sharon says. The sunlight on her hair turns it a deep burnished bronze and Brenda feels glad to be here with her. It's chilly out of the car, though, in the sea air with her little blue cotton skirt and white t-shirt.

She shivers and Sharon notices. "Are you going to be warm enough, Brenda Leigh?"

"Fine, fine," Brenda says. "What are you, my mother?"

"I have something in the car, I think," Sharon says, ignoring the jab. "I should've warned you."

"I can always buy something," Brenda says. But Sharon is already popping the trunk and rummaging around. Finally she pulls out a navy windbreaker that says L.A.P.D. on the back in big yellow letters. Brenda's heart sinks like a stone. "Don't take this the wrong way, but I'd rather freeze."

"Sorry," Sharon says. "I thought I had a black sweater back here."

"I just… it don't feel right," Brenda says.

"No, I imagine not," Sharon says. "You want my sweater?"

"Oh honey, no," Brenda says, looking around, They're about three shops down from a busy looking cafe. "Why don't you go put our name in and I'll go across the street to that little boutique and spend $80 dollars on a sweater."

"You sure?" Sharon says.

"Yes, yes, I'll be back in fifteen minutes." Brenda waves her off and jogs through a crosswalk in order to get past a line of idle cars. The shop is just opening and she's the first customer but it's a break from the wind.

She spends $125 on a cream colored sweater that ties at the waist. Puts it on the credit card and figures, hey, splurging on something she can wear more than once will help her remember this rare day.

Sharon is still waiting for a table on a wooden bench in front of the cafe when Brenda finds her. Sharon reachers out, wraps her finger around Brenda's elbow and feels the fabric.

"Nice," she says.

"Thank you," Brenda says. She'd declined a bag, had torn the tag off in the shop and it's still in the pocket of the sweater.

"Probably another twenty minutes," Sharon says. "Are we in any rush?"

"I'm not," Brenda says, sitting next to her, close enough that they brush along their arms and their thighs. Brenda has an urge to touch her head to Sharon's shoulder but she doesn't do it. It's best not to give in. But just as she's thinking that, Sharon bumps her shoulder into Brenda. Brenda nudges her back.

oooo

They go to a winery that is run by a Canadian who gets the grapes from upstate but as suspicious as all of that is, the location is beautiful and wine is wine.

"Why Captain," Brenda says as they enter the tasting room. "You tryin' to spoil me?"

"Spoil us both, maybe," Sharon says. "Though it's my first time to this winery so don't hold me in too high esteem quite yet."

"For as much as I like a glass of wine, I'm not much of a snob," she says. "We're just tasting it."

They find seats at the tasting bar and try three wines each. Brenda sticks with reds and Sharon whites and in the end Brenda buys three bottles of Merlot and a bottle of Pinot Gris that had medaled at the county fair for Sharon to keep. They don't drink much - Brenda a little more, maybe, because she's not driving. After their tasting is done, they put the wine in the truck and walk around the grounds a bit, letting Sharon sober all the way up.

"I know I was kidding, but we could actually go to the beach," Sharon says. "It's half a mile from here."

"What would we do?" Brenda asks.

"Do?" Sharon says. "Nothing. Sit in the sun. Look at the water."

"Nothin'?" Brenda says.

"For a little while," Sharon says. "While I think about what to do with my life."

"That sounds awfully dramatic," Brenda says. "But I can't remember the last time I went to a beach that didn't involve lookin' at a corpse."

Sharon winces and says, "Yeah."

The parking lot close to the water is busy that they park along the highway and walk several blocks through neighborhoods down to the sand and the water. It's crowded and they are clearly unprepared for a day at the beach. No blankets, no umbrellas, no swimming suits. They stop to remove their shoes and carry them toward the water, find a clear patch of sand and sit down. Brenda tucks her skirt between her knees and shields her eyes, looking out across the water.

"No surfers," she says.

"Surfers surf in the early morning or at twilight," Sharon says. "It's too crowded now."

"You surf?"

"My son," she says.

"And your daughter is some sorta ballerina?" Brenda asks.

"Some sort," Sharon agrees.

"Talented kids," she says, impressed.

"I did the best I could," Sharon says. "Considering."

"Considering what?" Brenda prods.

"Considering I was alone," Sharon says. "And if Jackson did show up, which almost never happened, it was just to make another mess for me to clean up."

Brenda digs her toes into the warm sand to shield the pale skin of her feet from the sun. Sharon's toenails are painted a pretty bronze color.

"My first husband was a lawyer," Brenda says. "Every argument was like being on trial."

"What happened?" Sharon asks.

Brenda shrugs. "It was a bad match. Real bad. My daddy helped me file the papers. No lectures about marriage being hard. He just helped me get free."

"Makes you want to swear off men for life," Sharon says.

Brenda huffs and runs her fingers through the sand between her and Sharon. "You've no idea."

"I had this teacher in college," Sharon says. "My English Literature professor my sophomore year. She must've been barely thirty at the time now that I think about it, but when I was nineteen she seemed very worldly and exotic."

Brenda laughs. "Thirty. Remember when?"

"Barely," Sharon says. "But it was my favorite class and she was my favorite professor and I just… I thought the world of her. I must've made a fool of myself over it. It must've been really obvious because the next semester I applied to be her teaching assistant and she turned me down."

Brenda lets another handful of sand fall between them.

"She told me that she thought hiring me would be complicated because of my feelings which apparently were very obvious to her. She told me that she didn't date students," Sharon says. "And I remember thinking about how absurd that was."

"Absurd," Brenda says.

"I was mad because I thought that you should be able to… to love someone without it being sexual or romantic," Sharon says. "And she made me feel like I'd done something wrong."

Behind them, a baby starts to cry and it pulls their attention away. They both look over their shoulders, see a woman in a black one piece pick up a small girl and twist her body back and forth, trying to comfort her.

"What if she hadn't said that?" Brenda asks, her knees feeling a little sweaty and warm.

"Pardon?" Sharon asks.

"I mean would you have been upset in the same way? Was it because she assumed you were gay or was it just the rejection that stung?" Brenda asks.

"That's not the point," Sharon says. "That wasn't my point."

"Well what is?" Brenda asks.

"When you call your husband and tell him where you've been all weekend, what is he going to think?" Sharon asks.

"What?" Brenda asks. "What does Fritz have to do with this?"

"You can't expect your husband to understand you shacking up with me," Sharon says. "It's the assumptions people make that I find upsetting. That someone like you and me can't just be friends. No strings attached."

Brenda shakes her head. "You and I are nothing but strings," she says. "All tangled up."

Sharon stands suddenly, takes a step back. "We should head home."

"Sharon, wait," Brenda says. "Come on."

"You're starting to burn, Chief," she says, pointing to the bridge of her own nose and then wipes sand off her jeans.

Brenda doesn't know what to do or what to say so she follows Sharon back to the car.

oooo

When they cross back over into L.A. County proper, Brenda says, "Why don't you drop me off at home?"

Sharon sighs, tightens her fingers on the wheel. "All your stuff is at my place."

"I know," she says. "I can get my own car, come back and get it in the morning."

"You don't have to do that," Sharon says.

"You ought to apologize to Taylor," Brenda says. "We wallowed. Can't wallow forever."

Sharon glances up into the rearview and then pulls off the road onto the dusty shoulder.

"What? Brenda says, twisting around in the passenger seat to look behind them but nothing is there. She whips back around to look at Sharon. "You okay?"

"I am concerned," Sharon says.

"Concerned enough to pull over?" Brenda demands. The Honda is small and every time a car passes, SUVs and trucks, the little car they're in seems to shudder.

"We agreed to be friends, we agreed not to overthink it and now look at us!" she shakes her head. "I'm sorry."

"Sorry?" Brenda parrots. She feels lost. She hates feeling lost. "You were right. I'm hidin' out with you and it's not right. I should go home and come clean."

"You don't have to," Sharon says. "You can stay with me."

"I think he already knows," Brenda says. "I'm not sure how, but I think he knows I'm in L.A." But as she says this, she does know. "The credit card."

"What?"

"I bet he looked at the credit card statement. Saw the flight and the groceries and, and the take-out." She worries at her bottom lip with her teeth.

"Come home with me," Sharon says. "If you want, you can get your things and I'll take you home. I'll be your buffer."

"I don't know why I'm like this," Brenda says. She tucks her hair behind her ears. "My whole adult career has been built around finding out the truth but when it comes to me and choosing the truth or a lie I almost always pick the lie."

Sharon puts on the turn signal and pulls back into traffic, stepping on the gas to get their speed up quickly and then easing into the flow of the cars around them.

"Do you lie to me?" Sharon asks.

"Captain Raydor, I've lied to you about a hundred times I'm sure," Brenda says.

"Well, obviously," Sharon says. "But I just meant this weekend."

Brenda thinks back. Showing up on her doorstep, coffee on the balcony, their fingers touching under the blankets.

She shakes her head.

"I've lost Rusty," Sharon says. "Things with Andy aren't going to be great. I just can't afford to lose you too, Brenda."

Her usually meticulously controlled voice doesn't sound so controlled at the moment.

"Why did you tell me about that college teacher of yours?" Brenda says gently. Brenda knows why she told Sharon about her college roommate, knows that looking at Sharon is like looking at some part of herself that she's not real proud of. The part of herself that she keeps secret and never planned to let into the light of day. The part of her that wants things she's not ever going to get.

What does Sharon want?

"Because," Sharon says. "She was southern."

Brenda blinked, thought about that for a few long, quiet moments. And then says, "The first time I ever met you, I pulled rank."

She nods. "You did."

"That's why you were so hostile to me?" Brenda says now, feeling a little resentful of some stupid, young English professor who didn't know a good thing when she had it. "Because I reminded you of someone who rejected you?"

"Not the only reason," Sharon says.

There's that rare and ominous smile again.

oooo

Brenda is pulling her wet clothes out of the washer and pushing them into the dryer when her phone rings for the first time all day. She'd forgotten about the clothes before they left for Orange County and now they have that metallic wet smell of being damp all day in a small space but she's not going to rerun the washer. She's going to dry and hope for the best.

Sharon is holding her phone out to her and mouths, "Fritz."

"You answered it?" she exclaims and Sharon shrugs and walks away when Brenda takes it and puts it to her ear.

"Hi, honey!" she says.

"I knew you were back, but I guess that answers my other question," Fritz says. When Brenda doesn't respond he says, "Sharon Raydor?"

"I can explain," Brenda says.

"I don't have time right now, frankly," he says. "I need you to go check on Joel. I've been at work since five this morning and probably won't get home until tomorrow."

"Everything okay?" she asks.

"Critical missing," he says. "I have to go. Please clean out the litter box, too."

"Critical missing!" she says. "Did they roll out Major Crimes?"

Sharon looks up from the sofa, suddenly interested, like she wasn't already hanging off every word.

"Bye," Fritz says and hangs up.

"I cannot believe you answered the phone."

"Look at your texts," Sharon says, crossing her legs and leaning back. "It was beeping and beeping and I just glanced at it. By the time he called…"

She scrolls through her messages - six from Fritz in the last hour.

Call me now

Brenda, please call me ASAP

I know you're in L.A., it's about Joel

I'm not mad, just call please

She looks up at Sharon. "I have to go feed the cat."

"You can take the car," Sharon says. "Needs gas, now."

Brenda puts her hands on her hips and thinks about how if it were Fritz, she'd just bat her eyes a little but how with Sharon, that's probably not gonna work.

"You could-"

"No."

"We could get dinner after!" Brenda says. "Come on, have you ever even been to my house? I'm halfway livin' in yours."

"Once," Sharon says, picking up a magazine and flipping idly through it. "You'd just shot Philip Stroh."

"Oh," Brenda says. "Right. Yeah. I'd… I'd forgotten about that."

"Go start the dryer," Sharon says.

Brenda sulks away. She has nothing to be scared of - she can certainly manage to find her way home by herself from Sharon's place and she does miss Joel. Fritz won't even be there - it's not like him to lure her home with a lie and then surprise her. That's more her own style, actually. It's just that leaving and going home is like popping her little vacation bubble. She really ought to still be in Atlanta and if not there, then here with Sharon and going home seems so final. So permanent. Even if she does come back, Joel will know she's home and Fritz, too.

When get goes back into the living room to find her shoes and her purse, Sharon has a jacket on and is pecking something into her phone.

"Really?" Brenda asks hopefully.

"I'm seeing if I can get a reservation for that Mexican place on Sunset," Sharon says squinting down at her phone. "El Compadre! That's it."

"You wanna go to Hollywood for tacos?" Brenda says. There's a good Mexican food restaurant on every corner, practically.

"Margaritas," Sharon says. "And the food is good. And I like the place. You want me to come or not, Brenda?"

"I do, I do," she says hurriedly. "We can go wherever you wanna go."

Brenda puts on her trench coat and is surprised when, in the elevator, Sharon hands her the keys. Sharon did drive to Orange County and back today, Brenda supposes, but Sharon is also quite particular about her things. But when they get to the parking garage, they don't go to the Honda. Sharon points to the Crown Vic.

"Am I even supposed to drive it anymore?" Brenda asks.

"My personal insurance covers the vehicle when I'm off the clock," Sharon says. Brenda has no idea whether or not that's actually true but she's learned long ago not to question Sharon Raydor where the rulebook is concerned.

It's strange to be sliding back into a police vehicle and as soon as they're strapped in and she starts the engine, she reaches over to turn on the police scanner purely out of habit. Brenda stares at it a moment, surprised at herself, and then Sharon reaches out to turn it off again.

"I can't do anything about Major Crimes until tomorrow morning so I'd rather not torture myself if it's all the same to you," Sharon says.

"Sorry," Brenda says. "Sorry, Sharon."

They make it to Brenda's apartment in 18 minutes and she'd never realized how close they were. Anything under 20 minutes in L.A. is a miracle, so they're practically neighbors. Brenda pulls into Fritz's empty parking space under the carport provided for their apartment. Her own car is still parked in the second space they rent. She should take it, probably, if she goes back with Sharon.

She wants to go back with Sharon, she wants to rather badly.

"I could wait here," Sharon offers.

"No, no," Brenda says. "Come with me."

When she unlocks the apartment and flicks on the light, she can immediately smell the litter box, but other than that, everything is tidy. More than tidy, the place looks clean and good. She's not even embarrassed to have Sharon see it. Of course, she's hasn't been there to leave a trail of shoes and sweaters and empty mugs and dirty plates and bobby pins in her wake.

This is Fritz without her weighing him down.

Joel runs out with a yowl and throws his little body against her legs.

"Hi baby," Brenda says, scooping him up. "You hungry? I bet you're just starved. Come on, then." She drops a kiss to his furry head and carries him into the kitchen. "Have a seat, if you want," she says to Sharon who perches on the sofa uneasily.

Brenda puts food in Joel's bowl and then dumps the little bit of water left in his water bowl and fills it fresh in the sink.

"I'm just… gonna do the box, I'll just be a minute," Brenda calls. She thinks she hears Sharon say something but she can't quite make it out. She cleans out the litter box, her nose wrinkled up in disgust. It's always a toss up between what's worse - cleaning out this box or having to walk a dog all the time. Fritz is a dog person - he'd never made much of a fuss about Kitty and he certainly loves Joel but he'd had dogs growing up, not cats, and they both knew it.

She runs out to drop the bag of Joel's business in the dumpster and then comes back in and washes her hands.

Sharon is still on her sofa, looking around uncomfortably. Brenda hates that she can feel so at home with Sharon in her condo, but Sharon being here, looking around at the life Brenda has with Fritz, looks as uncomfortable as a fish out of water.

"Okay," Brenda says.

"That's it?"

"Cat fed and box cleaned," she says.

"You don't want to grab anything?" Sharon asks. "You have everything you need?"

"I mean," Brenda says. "I have enough to tide me over until my vacation days are up."

She feels off as soon as she says it, like she's made a misstep. Like she's invited herself past the point of graciousness and placed the burden of rejection onto Sharon's shoulders. But Sharon's face doesn't look anything other than open and relieved.

"Though," Brenda says, giving her an out anyway. "You're planning on going back to work so I can stay here, too, you know. Come get my stuff later. Tomorrow maybe."

"You could," Sharon says. "But we have reservations."

Brenda had forgotten about dinner. Parking on Sunset was so difficult that it didn't even make sense for Brenda to bring her own car and it did make sense to bring the unmarked cruiser. They could park easier in a police car, even an unmarked one.

"Let me just change, then, into something a little nicer," Brenda says. She's already too cold in the light skirt she'd worn to the beach. She pushes into the bedroom - the bed is made and tops of the dressers clear from debris. No candy wrappers, no loose earrings. Her side of closet is a little emptier without the clothes she'd taken for Atlanta and because the hamper she keeps in there isn't overflowing. She shucks what she's wearing and drops it in and pulls out a black dress with long sleeves. It's nice enough for going out to dinner but plain enough that if where they end up is more like a taco stand than a restaurant, she won't feel overdressed. She puts on boots with a low heel, twists her hair and clips it back and then rushes out to find Sharon still sitting exactly where she'd left her, like the apartment will bite.

"That's pretty," Sharon says.

"Thanks," Brenda says. Joel is now asleep in the recliner, happy and full. Brenda pats his head as she walks by him, locks the door, and says, "Let's go."

She wants to get away from here as fast as possible.

El Compadre is not overly fancy, but it's certainly more than a taco stand. They park behind the restaurant - a block into the little neighborhood there and walk. Brenda had driven again with Sharon offering directions and that had worked out just fine. It's Sharon who pulls open the heavy wooden door and allows Brenda to enter the restaurant first. It takes a moment for her eyes to adjust. The place is dark and lacks windows so that even if it were high noon outside, it'd still be dark. She steps farther in and looks around at the hanging lights, the warm sconces along the walls. Even though the place is crowded, the layout makes everyone seem isolated. Big deep booths swallow up parties and take them out of sight. There's also a dark bar, but it's isolated from the rest of the diners.

"Smells good," Brenda says.

Sharon touches the small of her back as she leans past her to say to the host, "I called ahead for two. Sharon."

"Un momento," he says, waving someone over. A pretty young waitress with a bright pink carnation in her dark hair comes over and picks up some menus.

"Follow me, please," she says. They're seated at a table, not a booth, but Brenda doesn't complain. Fresh chips and salsa appear before them and waters. Sharon orders a margarita and when the waitress asks if she wants the famous flaming margarita, Brenda answers for her saying, "Yes! And I'll have a coke."

Sharon looks at her, eyebrows raised. "You trying to get me all liquored up?"

"I'm just trying not to drunk drive in your police car, Captain," Brenda says. "And if you get a little tipsy and cuddly, well that's just gravy."

"Cuddly?" Sharon asks, though she's not looking at Brenda, rather she is peering through her glasses at the basket of tortilla chips glistening with grease and salt. She makes her selection carefully and bypasses the salsa all together. Brenda files that away in her database of things she's learned about Sharon. No spicy salsa.

"Your mattress is like sleepin' on a cloud," Brenda says, dunking a chip in the salsa with some gusto. "I don't want my invitation revoked."

Sharon chooses another chip and then looks at Brenda over the rim of her dark glasses.

"You seem afraid, Brenda Leigh, that I'm forever on the verge of kicking you out," Sharon says.

Brenda's mouth tingles with the heat from the salsa and it's hard to hold her poker face when Sharon has cut right to the quick of things. That's Sharon; it's what she'd bristled so hard against at first before that determination and focus had been shifted to help Brenda instead of hinder.

"I know how I can be," Brenda says. And she does, she knows she's not easy to live with. She drove her parents crazy, her first husband hasn't spoken to her since they signed the papers (which is exactly how she wants it, thank you very much) and every time she leaves a dish in the sink or her sweater on the back of a chair, Fritz sighs like she has set the house on fire. She knows that she's selfish, she knows that she's absent minded, she knows that she cares more about her job than the average woman. She knows that she's a mess. But she's always been a mess. She always will be.

"No," Sharon says. "What you know is how your husband has made you feel for the last several years. Just because he doesn't like the way that you live doesn't mean the way that you live is wrong." Sharon gives her a motherly smile. "I like you how you are, you know. Warts and all."

The urge to cry is harder to suppress and she's glad when their waitress returns with a cocktail tray of drinks that include her coke and Sharon's margarita. By the time the display of lighting the margarita on fire is over, Brenda has found a little composure. Sharon smiles at her drink and then blows the flame out before taking a deep pull through the straw.

Brenda is still sitting quietly, trying to decide what to say.

"I know I can be a handful," Brenda says. "I know it, Sharon, but I do try."

Sharon shakes her head. "The things that make you difficult," she says with a smile, that smile that she gets when she's talking about something hard, "are the things that make you great. The things that you don't like about yourself, maybe, are the things that have given you the skills to be this wonderful public servant. I wouldn't trade it. I wouldn't."

"Stop," Brenda says, covering her face with her hands. "I can't."

"Okay," Sharon says, leaning back. "It's okay. Our waitress is coming, so figure out what you want."

As soon as the young woman takes their order and walks away again, Sharon leans forward again and says, "You can stay until you don't want to anymore and if… when Rusty comes home, you still don't have to go, okay?"

Brenda nods.

"When I was in a bad marriage, I had two little kids and no place to go and all I wanted was for someone to tell me I had a safe place to land and I didn't have it but I can be that for you, Brenda Leigh. We can be it for each other. A safe place."

"Warts and all?" Brenda manages.

"Warts and all, honey," Sharon says, and clinks her margarita against Brenda's glass of coke.

oooo

She thinks Sharon is almost asleep, but then she shifts a little and Brenda latches onto the opening. She's been agonizing over what Sharon had said at dinner, at the effort she'd put into making sure Brenda knew that she was welcome. She appreciates it, she does, it had made her heart swell up like nothing had in a long time but she also feels guilty that Sharon had to reassure her at all after Brenda had come to make Sharon feel better, not the other way around.

"Sharon?" she says, timidly.

"Hmm?" she says, a small little sigh in the otherwise quiet room.

"I came to help you out and all you've been doing is holding me and my stupid marriage together," Brenda complains. "I don't know why I do it. I don't know how I make everything about me. Fritz is right."

Brenda's voice breaks and she sobs into her hands. She hadn't meant to cry. She'd meant to reassure but whatever tender spot Sharon had poked at dinner was still hurting now. She feels Sharon shift beside her in the darkness and Brenda swallows the next wave of tears, forces it back down. She can hold it together for Sharon, she can.

"Brenda," Sharon says. "You are like staring into the sun."

"What?" Brenda says.

"When you walk into a room, you just… you shine and we all get caught up in it and it's not anything you do on purpose, it's just what happens," she says.

"Well lookin' right at the sun is bad for you," Brenda complains.

She can almost hear Sharon smile. "It can be," Sharon concedes. "But it's a good hurt."

"Are you tryin' to tell me not to put my light under a bushel?" she says, laughing a little through the tears pooling in her eyes, slipping out and down her temples to dampen her hair and wet her ears. She wipes them away before that happens.

"I'm trying to tell you that you're the bushel. You're the light. You're all of it and I don't want you to apologize to me anymore. Or to anyone." Sharon's voice is firm.

"I know I'm good at my job," Brenda says. "But personal stuff… that's never been my strong suit. Especially friends. I mean boyfriends or whatever, sex, you know, that I'm always good at but just friendship is tricky for me."

"Me too," Sharon says. "The last close girlfriend I had was… gosh, the kids were still in elementary school."

"What happened to her?" Brenda asks.

"She died," Sharon says. "She had cancer. She went to my church. She was Emily's godmother and when we lost her… I mean, I was so devastated. I changed churches, even. I couldn't face it."

"That's terrible," Brenda says.

"It was. But time marches on," Sharon says.

"Why do you wanna be friends with me again?" Brenda asks, only sort of teasing.

"Why do you want to be friends with me?" Sharon shoots back. "Besides my mattress."

"And your pretty hair?" Brenda says.

Sharon snorts.

"And your moral compass? And your lovely fashion sense? And your willingness to put up with me? And your big ole heart?"

"Yes, besides all of that," Sharon says.

"I don't meet a lot of other women cops who are as smart as I am," Brenda says. "We gotta stick together."

"Agreed," Sharon says, though the word is almost swallowed by her yawn.

"Go to sleep," Brenda says.

"You really think my hair is pretty?" Sharon asks, rolling away from Brenda and snuggling down deeper under the blankets.

"Like a Disney princess," Brenda says.

Sharon laughs. Under the blanket, Brenda feels Sharon's foot move and touch the bare skin of her calf - just a gentle nudge and then, the foot is gone.

oooo

Sharon returns to work on Monday instead of waiting another day. She puts on one of her expensive, dark suits and her pointy shoes and Brenda watches her from the bed and whistles low.

"The wicked witch is back," she says.

"I may have to go apologize," Sharon says. "But I don't have to mean it."

"Amen, sister," Brenda says, pumping her fist into the air.

"And what will you do today?" Sharon asks, though she sits on the edge of the bed and looks gentle.

"Well," Brenda says, drawing it out. "I know I gotta talk to Fritz."

"Yeah," Sharon says.

"I mean, the fact that I don't want to go home is… and when he sees you back at work, he'll know it's… it's me and not you," Brenda confesses.

"He will," Sharon agrees. "If you get ready now, you can ride it with me."

"I don't know," Brenda says.

"You'll talk yourself out of it if I leave you here alone," Sharon warns.

"Yeah, that's my plan," Brenda laughs. "Okay. Okay, I'll hurry up."

Brenda doesn't have work clothes, really, because she didn't pack any for Atlanta, but she figures she's not going to work, just going to see her husband. She has a pair of black pants and a nice enough sweater with three quarter sleeves, something that won't be too warm, hopefully. She twists her hair into a low bun at her neck and brushes her teeth. No time for make up.

"You keep the keys," Sharon says in the car. "You can just pick me up after work or I'll get Andy to take me home."

"Have you talked to him?" Brenda asks. "Since the kiss?"

"I told him I was coming in," Sharon says. "Guess we both get to have some uncomfortable conversations today."

"How are you supposed to tell someone that your love isn't what you thought it was?" Brenda asks as Sharon parks the car.

"If you figure that out," Sharon says. "Text me."

They part ways in the elevator. Brenda knows where Fritz's department is, though she's hasn't actually been to his office since he joined the L.A.P.D. because she hadn't wanted to come back, hadn't want to see what she'd had to leave behind.

Someone stands when she enters, someone she doesn't know and she gives them a disarming smile.

"Fritz Howard?" she asks.

"Chief Howard isn't taking meetings today," the officer says, crossing his arms across his broad chest.

"Oh, I have an inkling he'll see me," she says.

"And who are you?" the office demands. But then someone else stands, someone Brenda does recognize. Commander McGinnis is Fritz's second in command and a good officer if Brenda's memory serves. Fritz has spoken fondly of her, and Brenda relaxes just a bit.

"This is Chief Investigator Brenda Johnson from the D.A.'s office," McGinnis says. "And Mrs. Howard."

Brenda winces but the officer steps aside.

"Well," Brenda says.

"Let me go see if he's available, ma'am," McGinnis says. Brenda is made to stand and wait. She leans her hip against an empty desk and the rude officer watches her like he still doesn't believe her story. Maybe Fritz talks about her as much as she talks about Fritz these days. She feels her palms get sweaty, her stomach churn with nerves. She wants to bolt and hide but it's not to be. McGinnis appears from around a corner and waves her forward.

Permission to speak to her own husband.

Fritz is at his desk when she comes in and McGinnis touches her arm lightly as she leaves. Fritz says, "Thanks, Ann."

Brenda closes the door.

Fritz's office is nicer than the one in Major Crimes. Brenda had been hired in at Deputy Chief but she'd never really been one of the big boys which had suited her well enough. All she'd wanted to do was catch the bad guys. If she'd been in conference with the rest of the chiefs it would have been politics and fundraisers and board meetings. But this office is nice - windows and a conference table. More like the one Pope had before he'd fallen into being Chief of Police. And Fritz does look like he belongs here in his uniform and his stars.

"Well," Fritz says. "Welcome home! How was your flight?"

Brenda isn't in the mood for this, just sinks into one of the vacant seats across from his desk.

"I'm sorry you found out the way you did," Brenda says. "But I don't think tracking the credit card is very honest either."

Fritz furrows his brow and then shakes his head. "I didn't… I didn't do that, Brenda. Christ. I called your dad when you wouldn't pick up your damn cellphone and he asked if you'd gotten home okay."

"Oh," she says, chewing her bottom lip. "What did you tell him?"

Fritz shakes his head, rubs his face.

"Anyway," she says. "Shar- I mean, Captain Raydor is coming back to work today. She's here, actually, now, so I thought maybe I'd come see you."

"Oh did you and Sharon arrange that?" Fritz asks in faux surprise. "Are you two just on the same page about that?"

"Stop it," Brenda says. "I'm here. I'm tryin'."

"As always, you try when it suits you, not when I need it," Fritz says. "How do you think it made me feel to know that you came back to L.A. and had zero desire to come home to me, your husband who loves you?"

Brenda shakes her head, looks out his huge window at the morning sky. It's hazy today, all that smog is settled low over the city, turning everything murky and brown.

This is their problem. Fritz loves her in a way that hurts. Fritz's love comes with all sorts of expectations - dinners at night, phone calls, a family. Fritz gives her his love with the expectation that he'll get what he needs in return, even if what he needs feels like poison to Brenda.

"I'm going to stay on with Sharon for awhile," Brenda says, finally, when the silence has stretched on for so long that it's started to burn. She doesn't shout, doesn't ask. Just lays the information out for him.

"That's it?" Fritz says. "Don't I get a say?"

"No," Brenda says. She shakes her head. She has to bite back an apology. What should she be sorry for? And apologies are practically admissions of guilt and she's not willing to give him that.

"So what, you're leaving me? That's it?"

"I'm taking a break," Brenda says.

"You're a piece of work, you know that?" he says.

"I know that," she says. "I do."

"Good," he says. "Because I put up with a lot of your bullshit but even I can't wait around for you to grow up forever."

Brenda doesn't like threats. She feels herself go hard, a cold, detached feeling spreading through her.

"I'll talk to you later," Brenda says.

She doesn't wait around.

Instead she goes back to the car, walking at such a brisk pace that her thighs and lungs burn. She manages to text Sharon to say she's heading home and then, before she pulls out of the space, sends a text to clarify that she means Sharon's home.

Good. The reply is quick.

You back on? Brenda asks.

Rolling out now.

Brenda knows what that's like and drives on home.

oooo

By the time Sharon gets home, Brenda is long asleep. She wakes up when Sharon flips the switch on the bedroom wall to turn on the lamp that sits on her dresser and then sees Brenda sit up.

"Shit, sorry," Sharon says and turns it off again.

"S'okay," Brenda says. "Turn it on."

The light comes back on. Sharon looks tired, rumpled and worn.

"You okay?" Brenda asks.

"Not really," Sharon says. "You?"

"Not really," she says and they exchange grim smiles.

"I'm going to shower and come to bed," Sharon says.

Sharon shrugs off her coat as she passes the shower and hisses, her pretty face going white in the low light.

"What?" Brenda demands. "What is it?"

"Nothing," Sharon says but she's more careful now, deliberate in her movements and when the coat comes off, there are bright purple splotches on her bicep - both sides. They're shaped like fingers.

"Jesus," Brenda says, getting out of bed.

"No," Sharon says. "It's okay."

"It's clearly not," Brenda says. "What happened?"

"Our murderer got ahold of me in the hall," she says. "Shook me up a bit."

"Just your arms?" Brenda asks.

"My head hit the wall," Sharon says. She's still wearing her slacks, the sleeveless cream shell she'd put on in the morning.

Slowly, giving her plenty of time to stop her, Brenda lifts her hands to Sharon's head and murmurs, "Let me feel."

Sharon's hair is still clipped up and Brenda pops the clasp carefully and frees the metal from the soft strands of Sharon's hair. The thick mane falls and Brenda's fingers probe gently around her warm scalp. It's easy to find the knot there and Sharon closes her eyes when Brenda touches it.

"Any blood?" Brenda whispers. They're so close now.

"Just a headache," Sharon says. "It was my fault. Andy and I… had just spoken and I was distracted and I should've…"

"Shh," Brenda says. "Let me help."

"I'm just sore," Sharon says.

"You need a bath, not a shower," Brenda says.

"No tub in there," Sharon says. Brenda's fingers are still in hair but she's left the knot behind and now just cradles the contours of Sharon's skull. She feels Sharon relax against her hands just a little.

"There is down the hall," Brenda says. "He wouldn't mind."

And then something breaks, she can see it in Sharon's face, and her arms snake around Brenda's waist.

"Oh," Brenda says, letting her arms come around Sharon's shoulders. "There now." Brenda lifts to the balls of her feet so that they're more evenly matched in height and they hug - Sharon tucks her chin into Brenda's shoulder and Brenda does it right back.

Sharon shakes silently and Brenda holds on tight.

"Sorry," Sharon says after few moments. "I'm not myself."

"I'm gonna go run it for you," Brenda says. "Okay?"

Sharon nods and sinks wearily down onto the edge of the bed to take off her shoes.

The tub is sparkling white. Sharon's been cleaning this bathroom even if no one has been using it. Brenda pulls back the curtain and then lifts it so it hangs over the bar and out of the way and lets the water run clear and get hot before she stoppers up the drain. There's nothing but shampoo and conditioner and a bar of white soap, so Brenda doesn't bother with bubbles, just lets the water run and goes to check on Sharon. She's still in the bedroom, still dressed, though she's managed to get her shirt untucked.

"I can't," Sharon says shaking her head. "There's a button that I can't reach."

"Let me help," Brenda says. Sharon hesitates for just a moment and then nods, stands, gathers her hair over her shoulder and turns around. The cream shell she has on has a little pearl button at the base of her neck and Brenda undoes it.

"There," she says. Sharon lets her hair go and Brenda grasps the hem of her shirt boldly. "Can you lift your arms?"

Sharon is quiet for a moment and then slowly raises her arms, sighing with the hurt that goes along with the stretching of her poor, tired muscles. Brenda reveals impossibly pale skin with a smattering of light freckles that travel up Sharon's spine and then the band of her white cotton bra. She has to ease the shirt over Sharon's head and shoulders and when it's free of Sharon's body, Brenda smooths her hair back down.

Sharon's voice sounds low when she says, "I can do the rest."

Brenda can't help herself - she reaches out and lays a warm hand against the bare skin of Sharon's back and says, "Okay."

Sharon shudders - Brenda can feel it in her hand, just under Sharon's skin. Brenda smooths her hand up the plane of Sharon's back, traveling up her spine to rest on a shoulder blade. Sharon breathes in so quickly that it sounds like a gasp.

"You're bruised here, too," Brenda says, using her finger to circle the faint purple mark on the back of her shoulder. "This where you hit the wall?"

"Yes," Sharon whispers. Brenda makes an unhappy noise low in her throat and then lets her fingers lightly touch the darker splotches on Sharon's biceps. The right side and then her fingers drag just above the band of the white bra to inspect the left.

"You want me to get this clasp for you?" Brenda says, tapping her finger against the bra where the hook and eyes are holding it together. "Your bath must be getting full."

When Sharon doesn't respond, Brenda slips her fingers under the band and tweaks the connection. It comes easily apart. Sharon's arms reach up to hold the bra in place but she doesn't move, doesn't turn around to look Brenda in the eye.

"Go on now," Brenda says.

After only another moment of indecision, Sharon goes.

oooo

Brenda knows she's gotta go back to work. She has another week, but sitting around Sharon's condo worrying isn't good for her either. It was fine when Sharon was there too but she's back to work and so if Brenda really is going to try this out, this break from her husband, this port in the storm that Sharon has offered, then she's gotta go back to work and keep living her life.

She calls her office on Thursday after Sharon has gone and speaks to her assistant, tells her she's back early.

"I'm thinkin' of coming in tomorrow," Brenda says. "Catchin' up with email so that Monday isn't such a mess."

"What happened to Atlanta?" her assistant asks, genuinely curious.

"Oh, you know how family is," Brenda says dismissively. "You can't really ever go home again. Not for too long, anyway."

Brenda calls a cab and has it take her back to the apartment. Her personal vehicle is there, a little red Prius they'd purchased when she'd had to give her Crown Vic back to the motor pool. They'd bought the hybrid used but it still isn't too old and Brenda likes it, likes how quiet it is, likes the built in navigation. Fritz still favored big SUVs and they'd settled on the hybrid to try to offset the small fortune he put into gassing his SUV up every month.

She unlocks the door, stands in the living room. Joel comes out and she picks the orange cat up and murmurs, "Sorry buddy. Wish I could take you with me."

Sharon, as it turns out, is possibly the most selfless, generous friend Brenda has ever had but she's not gonna push her luck by bringing home a cat. She's not stupid.

There's a big black suitcase under the bed and she hauls it out and goes about filling it up. It's bigger than the one she'd taken to Atlanta, it's the other piece of the set. His and hers but they'd been a gift from Brenda's parents so she doesn't feel guilty about taking them both. She focuses on work clothes - suits and dresses and shoes. She also takes the rest of her things from the bathroom. Her good shampoo and conditioner, her hair products, her big blow dryer, not the little dinky one she travels with. The stockpile of new blades for her razor, her big bottle of moisturizer that smells like summer blossoms in the south. The rest of her make up.

There's a picture of her parents next to her own wedding portrait with Fritz. She takes her mama and daddy and leaves Fritz and herself behind.

She hauls the suitcase down to the Prius and shoves it inside the back.

Inside she cleans out the litter box, makes sure Joel has food and water. What else, what else?

It's amazing all the stuff she has, that they have acquired over the years that she she realizes she can just live without. She takes one of the canvas sacks they use for groceries and walks around the apartment, tossing things in. Her extra phone charger, her spare set of glasses.

As she's taking her diplomas off the wall she realizes that even if she doesn't stay with Sharon for very long, she's probably not coming back here. She's, for the first time, glad her mama isn't alive to see her now. To see another failure on the long list of failures that is Brenda Leigh.

When she gets back to Sharon's building she sees a familiar car outside with a familiar face behind the wheel. She pulls up beside it and waves. It's Andy Flynn. She parks a little ways up the street. She forgot to bring a gate opener with her so she's going to have to drag her suitcase up through the lobby instead of taking the elevator through the parking garage. For now, she leaves everything in the car and meets Andy on the sidewalk.

"Everything okay, Lieutenant?" she asks, shielding her eyes against the glare of the sun.

"Just a pit stop," Andy says. "Sharon broke a heel at our crime scene."

"How's she doing?" Brenda asks. "In your opinion? I mean, I tried to get her to stay home today, but she wouldn't."

"She's okay," Andy says. "A little quiet, but she seems okay."

"She was pretty shook up last night," Brenda says. "And her arms…"

"He got her good," Andy says. "He was just going from one room to the other because there was something wrong with the microphone in the first interrogation room."

"That's why he wasn't cuffed?"

"He was walking ten feet," Andy says.

"Captain Raydor says she and you were talkin' and she was distracted," Brenda says. She wants to know what they were talking about, wants to know just exactly what is going on between the Captain and her Lieutenant these days. Brenda likes Andy, she does, but she feels strangely possessive of Sharon Raydor now that she has gotten to know her so much better. When Brenda looks at Sharon, her heart constricts with an emotion she can't quite yet identify.

But Andy looks at her with narrowed eyes; he knows her tricks. He watched her interrogate people for the better part of a decade, after all.

"Captain Raydor was fine, ma'am," Andy says. Brenda knows that if they were really in an interrogation room right now, Andy would be asking for his lawyer. "The perp just got the jump on us."

Brenda shrugs, gives him a smile all sweetness and light. "Okay."

There's a few beats where they both watch for the door, hoping that Sharon will appear but then Andy crosses his arms and says, "You're still staying here?"

"For a bit," Brenda says, looking back at her car.

"What about when Rusty comes home?" Andy asks.

"I will stay as long as Sharon needs me," Brenda says. "Or wants me."

"Kid will want his room back," Andy says. And because Brenda feels a little threatened, a little unkind, she looks at him with hard eyes.

"I'm not stayin' in his room," she says.

Sharon emerges from the lobby still wearing her cream dress but with a black blazer now instead of her purple one and a pair of black shoes. She's lovely, the sun turning her hair copper and when she smiles at them both Brenda can finally identify the emotion that looking at Sharon Raydor evokes in her. It's the emotion that makes her stay in this condo when she has a husband to go home to. It's the emotion that made her drop everything to fly back to Los Angeles in the middle of the night. It's the emotion that made her want to touch the warm, bare skin of Sharon's back.

It's the emotion that makes her taunt Andy Flynn now with their sleeping arrangements, that makes her revel in the surprised and hurt look on his face.

Desire.