This is set as a one-shot unless there is a demand to keep going. Thank you for r&r. Enjoy!

-Rachel

Nightmare

Adrian was standing on a pier, balancing on the banister, however unlikely that would be in real life. Natalie stood in front of him, screaming as loud as her lungs would allow.

"Adrian!" She cupped her hands around her mouth, but he wasn't hearing her. Why wasn't he hearing her?

"Stop! Please," she begged.

A shot sounded in the air and then complete and utter silence. She looked behind her to see Lieutenant Leland Stottlemeyer standing directly behind her with a gun gripped tightly in his hands. There was smoke coming through the barrel and she looked down at her chest, expecting to see blood oozing out of her shirt, but it was clean.

She whipped her head around and saw Monk losing his balance, a perfect red circle widening in the center of his shirt.

Natalie's eyes widened, and she ran as fast as her feet would take her to the railing, but it was too late. Monk locked eyes with her as he placed his hand over the gunshot wound and fell gracefully back into the black ocean below.

Natalie jolted awake. She shot upright in bed, finding herself surrounded by a pool of sweat. Her breaths were coming in short raspy spurts and her hand felt around her face, finding wetness on her cheeks. I'm crying, she realized.

There was a sudden urge to call Mr. Monk and she picked up her cell phone. In a flash, she had dialed his number and put it up against her ear.

It rang and rang, but no answer. A sick feeling grew in the pit of her stomach. Natalie rubbed at her eyes, whisking away the tears and just before her call went to voicemail, she ended it and threw herself out of bed.

There was banging on Adrian Monk's front door. He groaned loudly as he climbed out of bed, slipping on his pristine robe and slippers simultaneously.

"I'm coming, I'm coming," he mumbled, shuffling closer to the door. He peered through the peephole to find a disheveled Natalie Teeger on the other side. Her hair was lying haphazardly on her head and her nose was beet red. She had been crying, he realized.

He opened the door abruptly, worried as to why she was outside of his door in the middle of the night in such a state.

"What's wrong, Natalie?" He asked hurriedly, leading her inside by the elbow as he quickly surveyed their surroundings outside to make sure she wasn't in any immediate danger.

As she stumbled through the threshold, he took in her whole appearance. Her bare feet were perfectly polished, but bare. She wore a thin tank top and cotton pajama shorts, revealing a slit of her toned stomach and long tanned legs. Monk had never seen her clad in such little clothes. She looked…beautiful. Natalie looked like a beautiful mess. Monk shook his head and led her to the living room.

It had been weeks since his faked death and the closing of the most recent Biderbeck case. Monk still had not fully understood how hard she took his supposed death, though Leland had taken him aside and tried to tell him.

"Monk, the poor girl cried every time I saw her. I've never seen her like that. She was an absolute wreck," Leland reasoned. "Look, why don't you spend some time with her just as a friend? I don't think she's slept a wink since you left." Natalie stood on the other side of the one-sided mirror. Leland and Monk were discussing the situation in the privacy of the interrogation room. Monk could see Natalie wringing her wrists, nerves still shot. "She hit me when she found out I kept the truth from her. She didn't handle it well Monk."

Now Natalie stood before him, her eyes red rimmed and puffy from the tears. She swiped the back of her hand across her nose and sniffed. She still was not handling it well.

"Nothing's…well…yeah, nothing's wrong," she shifted on her feet uncomfortably. "It's just…I needed to see you Adrian," she looked down at her bare feet as if ashamed. She looked so girlish as her short golden hair hung over her face.

Monk smiled at her using his first name. It was rare that she used it. He suddenly furrowed his eyebrows in confusion, coming back around to the matter at hand. "Why…why did you need to see me, Natalie? It's the middle of the night and you…you don't have shoes on."

Natalie sniffled again and looked up to lock eyes with him. She felt so vulnerable. "I had a," she tucked her hair nervously behind her ear, annoying Monk as she did so. Monk pondered, observing her mannerisms. They were annoying, but he also found them incredibly endearing. "I had a nightmare," she stated finally.

"B-But why did you come here?" He held his hands out, palms up, in confusion.

She looked up at him sheepishly. "Well, it was about you, Mr. Monk." She gingerly took a step, narrowing the space between them. "You were just…gone. You fell, and I couldn't stop you."

Tears welled up in her eyes and she wrapped her arms around his midsection, ignoring his twitches and jerks in protest. She rested her head against him, listening to his heartbeat. It was calm and steady. It was strong, despite his demeanor.

Monk held his arm out and ever so slowly wrapped it around her petite frame, the other hanging awkwardly by his side. She felt impossibly small against his body.

"I'm okay, Natalie. You're okay. We're okay." She tried to take a breath, but it came in a hitched gasp. "Shh," he whispered into her hair. It smelt of sweet vanilla.

Natalie blinked through her tears and saw his bare hand. She wrapped hers around it, locking fingers with him. She felt him stiffen and decided to relent.

She removed a wipe and dragged it over his hand slowly. She stared at it in quiet contemplation. Her hand fit perfectly inside his. She looked up to find Monk's eyes boring into hers. She followed his hair line to find an imaginary smudge on his cheek. "Here, you've ah-got, you've got a smudge on your cheek." She rubbed at it gently and leaned in closer, simply finding an excuse to feel closer to Adrian Monk. As the fake smudge disappeared beneath her cloth, she suddenly realized how close she was able to get without him flinching away in disgust.

"Adrian?" She whispered in question, but discovered she had nothing else to say. Maybe on some subconscious level, she was asking permission for what she was about to do. There was no response. Her breath hitched in her throat, but she did not lean back. Rather, she gingerly leaned in closer until there was little space between them and her lips parted hesitantly until she placed a single soft kiss on his cheek.

Monk was silent and unmoving. Her lips, so soft and supple, were placed on his cheek. His cheek. He marveled at the thought. She had shown him affection many times, through hugs and gentle arm squeezes, but this was different. This felt – intimate. He couldn't process his thoughts or feelings, he didn't know how. This was new to him and quite unnerving. Why wasn't he pushing her away? What about Trudy? Was he betraying her? This felt like a form of betrayal.

Her thoughts were running a mile a minute and she felt dizzy at the revelation that she had no control over her body, it was purely running on instinct as she turned her head ever so slightly so that they were nearly face to face.

Monk had no time to rationalize the events that were taking place and he sputtered, "Nat-Natalie, what are you…" before losing his voice again.

Her nose brushed his with the movement and with her eyes still closed, she risked everything. She pressed her lips against Adrian Monk's. Like a child kissing someone for the first time, her lips barely made contact but slowly, and with no protest coming from Adrian, she leaned in closer and meshed her lips against him fully. She moved one hand to his upper arm and the other to his neck, feeling the stubble that resided there.

He began to move his lips in poor sync with hers, but she was quick to guide him into the rhythm. Monk was taken aback as something happened in him, something awakened. He shifted suddenly as an uncomfortable feeling filled his body and he jerked back, causing Natalie to stumble and break from the trance she was in. She backed up as fast as her feet would take her, her heels catching and tripping her. She caught herself on the counter and heat flooded her body.

Her cheeks turned crimson and she touched them, finding something wet there. She suddenly realized she was crying again. "Adrian – Mr. Monk," she corrected herself and she looked into his wide, fearful eyes. "God, I – I'm so sorry. I don't know what got into…" she whispered the last part, knowing she didn't need to finish. Instead, she grabbed her keys and purse and ran to the door, leaving a dumbfounded Adrian Monk behind.

Thank you for reading! Let me know what you think.