As the door of lakefront cottage slammed shut, Niles reflected on the damage he'd done over the course of one afternoon. He glanced at his partner-in-crime. Roz gave him a tired, resigned look.

"Well," Niles said.

Talking to the middle distance, Roz said, "Yeah."

"Seems like all love's losers have done is made their wounds deeper," Niles admitted by way of filling the silence. Anything would be better than silence, surely? "Looks like we'll have to do some real licking tonight!"

"God, Niles!" Roz hands rose to her head as she walked to the sofa, as if she wanted to cover her ears. "You don't have any idea how that sounded, do you? Please tell me you don't."

She dropped into a sitting position with a groan and turning her head to look at him as he hurried round the other side of the couch to join her.

"What are you saying? Roz, I'm not sure I ever expected for you be so cryptic. In fact it has left me so shocked that my marvellous powers of deduction have ceased to work. In other words, what on earth are you talking about?"

Roz crossed her arms. "Give it a minute," she told him patiently.

"Oh." Niles covered his mouth with his hand and considered what this might mean about his frame of mind and certain desires. With a whirlwind of thoughts whipping around his head, what his brain actually chose to communicate with his vocal chords was another, slightly weaker, "Oh."

"Yeah," Roz repeated. "So…"

Niles stared at her, agitated with her for leaving the thought dangling. His brain tried to help him but all it gave him was images. Strangely enough, the direct translation of these turned out to be an echo of Roz's words.

"So…" Niles sighed. "At least I know you weren't being cryptic. Our joining forces hasn't inverted reality that much."

"Watch it or I'll be running up the road to join the others at that bed and breakfast. Then you really would be on your own, Mr Roz-Can't-Be-Intelligent-Or-Attrictave-Without-The-World-Being-Wrong."

"Dr," Niles corrected her, finding as smile as he did so.

"Yeah, 'Dr'." Roz agreed, shifting a little bit closer to him on the sofa as they shared an unsettled look. "Hey Niles, just so you know, you're not the only one finding this weird."

"What do we do about it?"

"I say we have two choices: Get over it or give up."

Niles nodded in agreement. They sat there for a while until Niles, not quite believing or acknowledging to himself what he was doing, took Roz's hands in his. He began to stroke her left hand slowly with his thumb. Niles smiled at Roz again, feeling a smidgen of hope that he couldn't quite explain and certainly didn't plan to share with anyone except perhaps Roz herself. Roz, for her part had slipped her hand round the back of his neck. She was gazing at him with the furious fire in her eyes he'd seen her directing at her previous conquests when they were yet to be conquered. With his head still not entirely caught up with his actions, Niles leaned in to kiss her.

"I need to move on, don't I? Climb out of this slump I've descended into. I have to accept that Daphne is with someone now and I've missed my chance."

Niles Crane sounded like he didn't quite trust his own words, speaking slowly and unenthusiastically. Frasier, however, leapt at this chance to encourage and reassure his younger brother.

"Niles, I can honestly say that's the best thing you could do. Here's to moving on from Daphne and from Maris too! You are a single, unattached man and I say you should enjoy it."

He held up his glass in a toast and watched as it gleam as it caught the rosy light glittering from the chandelier.

"Cheers," Niles said, raising his glass and then drinking to his brother's words. "And here's to no more of my sitting around feeling down in the dumps about - Daphne! How dare he bring her here!"

"Niles, what are you talking about - oh…" Frasier turned his head as he spoke and saw Daphne and Donny, holding hands near the door, speaking closely as they waited for their table. Obviously this was the sight that had so angered Niles. He could see Niles had frozen, staring at the pair with such intensity that he might have thought that would drive them apart. Frasier tried to placate him. "Now come on, Niles. You promised you were over her and now you can prove it to yourself."

Niles took a breath. Then another. Then he appeared to stop his breathing all together. There was a frightening, jealous glint in his eye that put Frasier on edge. He never really thought of Niles' obsessive infatuation with Daphne as being dangerous, at least not in this way. It may be incredibly frustrating, not least for Niles himself, and highly annoying to Frasier at times and upsetting at others when his little brother sank to depressing lows. Yet it was a fact of life. Niles would always be pursuing Daphne. He was the same with Maris, in his way, but Daphne was infinitely warmer and more personable than Maris and this was what Niles had needed all along really. Unfortunately, with the way things were going, it seemed he would never truly have her

Frasier patted his brother's hand. "Don't let it get to you Niles."

Niles reanimated himself purely to make a jibe at the words Frasier had honestly meant to be encouraging. "Don't let it get to me? Do you have any idea what you're saying? It already got to me the moment he stole Daphne from under my very nose."

Daphne and Donny were brought to the table behind Frasier, giving Niles a clear view of whatever they were doing. The fates could not have arranged it better if they'd sat down together for a meeting to discuss plans for spoiling the evening of some small, insignificant human by the name Dr. Niles Crane and, by association, his equally insignificant brother. At this moment Frasier's main annoyance stemmed from Niles' second by second commentary, both whispered and mumbled in increasingly agitated tones.

Frasier let Niles stew until the food came. He'd known Niles hadn't been prepared to give up on Daphne, despite his announcement. It was in part because of his making it into a grand announcement that Frasier had known Niles' heart wasn't sold on abandoning its hopeful love and sadly he had to admit to himself that Niles would be pining for Daphne for a long while yet. It was unfortunate that Daphne had been seated so close tonight because Niles' toast to moving on had been a start, albeit a small and now probably scuppered one.

"I think you should see someone, Niles."

"I don't which definition of 'seeing someone' you're using," Niles interrupted sternly, "and, frankly, I don't like either of them."

"I meant you really should think about dating, at the very least to take your mind off Daphne. I know that doesn't sound like an easy thing, and it won't be, but I truly think it might help."

Niles made a small sound of despair in the back of his throat. He caught himself in time but was forced to make his confession to the table rather than his brother as a result. "It hurts, Frasier. Really, every single day, it hurts. Even if suddenly I begin to realise that I might be a little interested in a asking certain woman to join me for, perhaps, a coffee or two, I couldn't help but be worried my feelings for Daphne would get in the way of me really trying with the relationship."

"Well, it's clear that you've never considered this in the slightest," Frasier said, the sarcasm present in his voice but his tone gentle. Carefully, he asked his brother who this young lady was who he might possibly want to invite for a coffee.

Niles shook his head. "I'd really rather not say. It's delicate, I suppose. It might not happen, even if I do ask and she does say yes. As this is assuming, as you clearly have done, that we are discussing a real lady and not a hypothetical woman…"

"Niles, you're blushing."

"I am not!" Niles replied in an over dramatically appalled voice that Frasier took note of.

They were able to share a smile at the absurdity and concentrate on their meal and debate the merits of several operas they were yet to watch but were due to come on their calendar very soon. Niles seemed to be sufficiently distracted from Daphne. He even, Frasier thought, had a kind of far away look that could mean he was seriously considering asking out this supposedly hypothetical woman he clearly had a soft spot for.

Indeed, Frasier hadn't realised quite how surprisingly smoothly things had been going until Niles glanced up and made a disgusted face in the direction of Daphne's table.

"Look at him, shovelling forkfuls of food down her throat as if she can't feed herself," he muttered bitterly. "Then, if her food's anywhere near as lifeless as mine, he might be force feeding her so he can drag her back to his cave all the quicker. I've offer them some of the Pouilly-Fuissé to wash it down, but I wouldn't wish this monumentally overpriced atrocity on anyone, least of all someone someone as lovely and unassuming as Daphne."

"Niles! I'm going to tell you to stop this right now. If your food is honestly that bad, you will complain to the waiter and if you feel the wine is unpalatable, I shall call the wine steward over at you can tell him so yourself. You will not use it as an excuse to rant to me about Donny and Daphne and certainly not within their earshot."

Niles attempted to argue, but Frasier raised a warning finger and told him they would swap seats if he couldn't stop torturing himself by watching them. Immediately, Niles stood up to make the swap. Of course, no sooner had this move been executed, than the table now in Niles' line of sight was suddenly occupied by his ex-wife and an escort who was at least half the age she most often claimed to be.