Author: Dazzling

Email: glitter_and_glam@hotmail.com

Disclaimers: Season 5 would not have happened had I owned them. Song belongs to Joanne, off her self-titled album.

Timeline: Set at the end of Season 4's finale 'Goodbyes', spoilers as appropriate. Mac POV.

Reviews and Feedback: Come on! If you review, I'll stop writing songfics…

I DON'T KNOW

You got the news today

Said I was happy for you

So you got to go away

And do what you gotta do

I always wondered if you'd leave someday. Especially after my…incident, after I discovered that small taste of freedom. I knew as soon as I met you that you weren't the type to be confined to an office job forever. You had your wings, and you wanted to use them. I guess I just never expected it to be now, so soon.

But in my mind I keep

Asking myself why

Why do I have to let you go

Why must I say goodbye

I'll be smiling on the outside

And wishing you well

But I'm dying on the inside

It's hurting me like hell

Don't know how to let you go

I just don't know

I watched as you said goodbye to everyone, stupidly hoping for a moment that you were just kidding, hoping that you'd walk in to see me and laugh about how you'd fool them all. I should have known that you'd never joke about something like that. Your eyes lit up when you told me, and despite everything, the way they sparkled like a little boy on Christmas made me smile too, cause I knew that you'd just received the best present ever.

I don't know what to do

And I don't know what to say

Don't know if I'll get through

Or if this thing will go away

Don't know if I can breathe

Just don't know what to feel

Cause I don't know anything but you

We made some small talk, something about watering plants, and I wondered if that's how it would become between us. Small talk. Hurried emails. One-or-two sentence letters covering the basic pleasantries. You'd be back with the old flyboys, king of the greenie board once more, and I'd still be here. Two worlds apart. I wonder if you ever realized that you were – are – my best friend, and the thought of that friendship disintegrating into two strangers obliged to keep in touch hurt me more than anything.

It's time to say goodbye

And I wish you'd just walk away

If you touch me one more time

I'll break down and I'll beg you to stay

Then we hugged, and that's when I really accepted that you weren't just joking. You were leaving, a thought I hadn't wanted to comprehend. That's when I started crying. I didn't want you to end up as just another person in my life who said they'd be there and then left me. I'd had enough of that. You wiped my tears away, and I tried to tell myself that you'd never be like that. I still don't know if it worked.

Now I'm letting go

My heart is breaking up in two

But I close the door and I turn around

I just want the best for you

I'll be smiling on the outside

And wishing you well

But I'm dying on the inside

It's hurting me like hell

I don't know how to let you go

I just don't know

As the elevator doors closed, I tried to picture the JAG offices without you. I couldn't. You were so much to so many people here that it doesn't seem right. But it is what it is, and I guess I'll just have to deal. I don't know when – or even if – you're coming back. All I can hope is that it'll be you coming back. My best friend. That we won't have just become two strangers obliged to keep in touch.

I don't know what to do

And I don't know what to say

Don't know if I'll get through

Or if this thing will go away

Don't know if I can breathe

Just don't know what to feel

Cause I don't know anything but you

Don't know what to do

Living without you

Cause I don't know anything but you

FIN