A/N: Well, that season finale was a beautiful thing...except for the last minute and a half. What gives, ABC Family? Since Melissa & Joey is getting a Christmas special this year, and they seem rather close in the preview, this is my attempt at explaining the aftermath of the season finale and bridging the gap between now and Christmas, and try to tie up a few loose ends. May also count as some of the sloppiest writing I've ever down, since most of this is just me emoting on the page.

Disclaimer: None of this is mine. The title comes from "Follow You Down" by the Gin Blossoms.

Summary: Mel and Joe deal with the aftermath. Major spoilers for 3x15, "What Happens in Jersey, Part 2." One-shot, complete.

Anywhere You Go, I'll Follow You Down

Countdown (Part 1)

48 hours before…

"This is definitely one of the weirdest things we've ever done," Mel Burke mutters to the man beside her, but follows anyway as he strides into the building, the tinny bell over the door jangling at their arrival.

The graying man behind the counter smiles at them, and Mel tries to smile back. Why did I agree to this again?

The man beside her shares no such reservations. He gives the other man a charming smile. "We're looking for wedding rings."

The man looks them up and down, from Mel's clinging sheath dress in blue to Joe's comfortable jeans and sweater. "It's for a play we're in," Mel hastens to add, and the slight crease between his brows clears, and he nods in understanding.

"This way," he beckons, and slides three feet down the glass display case that doubles as the pawn shop's counter. Joe moves as well, but Mel lags behind, once again wondering what she was thinking, agreeing to this crazy plan. Then Joe turns to jerk his head towards the counter, giving her a slight smile, and she remembers.

Joe is wearing his old wedding ring this weekend—which is really weird when Mel thinks about it, and she tries not to think about it—but her one-time engagement ring was sold years ago, so she needs another to look the part. Joe didn't dare ask Tiffany for her ring back—he knows she already sold it for the best price she could get.

Mel moves up to stand beside Joe at the counter, taking in the flash of gold and silver jewelry without really seeing any of it. She taps her fingers against the glass, until the warmth of Joe's hand over hers silences her. She looks up in confusion, and he gives her that little smile again, one that is coupled with the slight downward drag of his eyebrows, his silent question clear: You okay?

She nods her affirmation, and Joe taps the glass over his chosen prop. "That one." They don't pay much for it, but Joe doesn't take it out of the bag until they're in the car.

"It's just so sparkly!" Mel gushes in her Tiffany voice as Joe takes her hand. He doesn't smile at her imitation, but just watches her, his dark eyes intent.

"Mel, you'd tell me if you didn't want to this, right?"

"Is it too late to back out?" Mel jokes in her real voice, and Joe's grip on her hand tightens.

"Is that what you want? Mel, look, I really appreciate you doing this for me, but if you change your mind, I can just tell Nona Tiffany got sick…"

"No!" Mel protests, wiggling her fingers in invitation. "I said I'll do it, and I'm doing this. Put a ring on it, Longo!"

Joe does so, but he only gives a ghost of smile in response to her joke. His gaze is intent on her hand, and he seems to have trouble meeting her gaze. His fingers are warm against her hand, and for a moment they both watch mesmerized as the gold band sparkling with diamonds slides onto her finger to nestle against her hand—the perfect fit.

Mel looks at the man across from her and sighs, resigned to an interesting weekend. I'm doing this for you.

24 hours before…

Mel fidgets in the passenger seat for the fourth time in an hour, and Joe gives her a look from where he sits behind the wheel. "Mel, you okay?" It hasn't escaped his notice that she's been restless ever since they crossed the state line into Jersey.

"Yeah," she admits slowly, touching a hand to her hair-sprayed hair, the cheap gold bangles rattling on her wrists. "This is just weird, Joe."

"I know," Joe replies soothingly—they've had this conversation three times during the trip already. The kids are asleep in the backseat, but they keep their voices down anyway. "It'll be okay. Ma, Theresa-they all know the truth. The only one you have to fool is Nona."

"What if we can't?" Mel's voice is quiet, but he hears the trepidation. She gestures to herself. "I don't really look like Tiffany."

Joe chuckles. "I don't think you understand how bad Nona's eyesight is."

Mel doesn't look convinced, and so Joe reaches over with his free hand to squeeze hers where it rests between them on the console. "It'll be okay, Mel. One weekend, and we'll never speak of it again, I promise."

This gets a laugh out of Mel. "I'll hold you to that, Longo." Pleased he managed to reassure her, Joe squeezes her hand again. He tries not to think about the fact that the hand in his bears a wedding ring—one that he purchased and put on her hand himself. Someone who was prone to over-thinking things would find too much symbolism in that. But he doesn't over-think things like that.

At all.

That night…

That night, they go from the earth to the moon and back. Several times, if she's being honest (and she is, for once). It may have begun in a haze of rabbit-infused liquor—or something like that—but at some point, she recognizes what they're doing. And she thinks that maybe, this is what she's wanted all along.

That night, they go from the earth to the moon and back. He hadn't had as much Brew of the Rabbit as Mel, so he isn't quite as drunk. Still, he thinks for a brief moment what happens after they discover the door is locked might be a drunken fantasy, but then Mel's lips are on his and finally (finally!) he can reciprocate with all the pent-up passion of the last three years, and he wraps himself up in Mel, only Mel, because she is what he wants most.

The aftermath…

Then it all goes to hell in handbasket. Joe might have been fine with his mom walking in on them and Lennox finding out, because the mortification from those two events was salved by Mel's whispered, Why do you have to be so good? Those words are a very nice boost to his ego, but more importantly than that, something warms in his chest at the rich purr in her whisper, and he looks at her even as they desperately try to act like nothing happened when around others, and he thinks that maybe, maybe this is what they need to try to start something.

But it still goes downhill: Mel swears a deathbed oath she then denies she meant, his Nona—God, his Nona—is dead, and Mel leaves just as he tries to talk things out.

Things are not going well. But his mother always knows best, so he bundles the kids into the car and breaks several traffic laws trying to get home to Toledo.

Home. That house is home to him, that woman is home, the two kids he would give his life for are his home now.

Lennox is asking questions he is finally ready to answer, and her affirmation is everything he needs. Emboldened by her confidence, he walks through that door…

And finds that his sense of home is slightly skewed, that the pieces of his life are not quite done falling in around him.

He stares at the sight of Mel with Austin just behind her, stunned beyond the simple utterance of the other man's name. He looks at Mel, and those pleading blue eyes, that gaze that tells him that she is confused and unsure and doesn't know how to handle this, that decides him.

He turns around and leaves.

A/N: Reviews are appreciated!