You're not sure how you made it home, but you're not surprised at all. Ever since it happened that many hours ago, your body has been working on autopilot. Having almost no control of your movements, being led away almost immediately and going to places you're told to. Your brain, worked in a systematic manner, providing the officer from SIU with every single detail that led to the incident and the aftermath of what happened.

You're now sitting in the middle of your master bathroom, of your shared apartment with the brunette. Shit. You're rather unaware of many things at the moment, but you're sure you haven't contacted her ever since you're done with the interview. You shut your eyes tightly for a few moments before opening them and blinking several times, your vision fuzzy around the edges. You lean against the bathtub, hoping for the cold porcelain to sooth your skin, the cool floor tiles to keep you grounded beneath your bare feet. One of your colleagues probably dropped you off, but it's entirely possible that you walked home since you now live 15 minutes of walking distance away from the station. You're currently half way through a brand new bottle of whisky and too drunk to remember or care how you got home in this brutally cold and windy night.

You don't know how long you sat in the interview room going over and over, step by step of your actions. But you know it was long enough for doubt to creep in. How sure are you that the man was about to shoot the woman? Did your hand slip and your finger accidentally pulled the trigger? Deep down, you trust your instinct. Elaine Peck has always been telling you to trust your instincts. You knew for sure he was about to kill the innocent woman who happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time. But after the hours of interrogation, you're not sure if your instincts were right anymore. You're not sure if you did the right thing anymore. You know telling the SIU officer that you fired based on your instincts is not good enough to get you cleared right away.

Taking another gulp straight from the bottle, you hope the liquid will burn the feeling that has settled deep in your gut right after you pulled the trigger. You don't care if you're going to get suspended, or even get kicked out of the force. You don't care if the man had the intention of hurting the civilian, holding her at gunpoint. You don't care if his initial intention was to rob the store. Right now, you only care about one thing, you just killed someone. You took a man's life away, whether or not if it was the right thing to do.

It doesn't matter if you close your eyes or keep them open. You'd still see the images of what happened. You're still replaying everything in your mind. You'd press play at the beginning, then pause at a certain moment, rewind and replay that moment, and you'll keep up that cycle until the alcohol kicks in at full force. You're hoping it would happen any second now, not sure how much of this torture you can endure.

Warm and familiar hands settle themselves on both your knees, but you don't look up. You want to, but you can't. You know the second you lift your head up to look at her, you'll break. You're barely holding it together, but looking into those brown eyes you love so much will definitely be the breaking point.

You feel those hands move away from your knees to the hand currently clutching tightly to the bottle, trying to pry it away from you. You don't fight those hands. You give in.

You shudder slightly when those smooth and gentle hands touch your cheeks. They don't push your head up to look at the owner of those hands. They wait for you to do it yourself, but you don't. After a minute or so, you still don't. How can you look at the person who deserves everything in the world, who deserves light and joy in her life, to let her see a face so haunted, so dark? You killed someone. And she doesn't deserve to deal with this mess. To deal with you.

Hands stay on your cheek for what seems like an eternity before trailing down slowly to the sides of your neck, to your shoulders, down your arms. Hands that feel calming and inviting, like home. You exhaled a shaky breath, and it was like those hands' cue to pull you up onto your feet. You let them. Still, you don't look up. You let yourself be led into the bedroom and to the foot of the bed.

Tan hands slowly make their way to the bottom of your shirt, pulling it up and over your head with your eyes close. Then they unbutton your pants and slid them down your legs for you to step out of them. In just your tank top and underwear, you're being led to your side of the bed and you lay down as those hands instructed.

You don't face away from her side. With closed eyes, you wait for her to round the bed to the other side. When you feel the bed dip, smell the sweet familiar scent of dark brown hair and feel those hands on your face again, you finally open your eyes.

You were wrong.

You thought all hell would break loose once your blue eyes met her brown ones, that the storm brewing just behind your eyes would hit the both of you hard, but it's the exact opposite. You feel the weight lift off your shoulders and off your chest, but just a little. Thumbs are quick to wipe away your tears. You can see whatever she saw in your eyes, she's feeling it too. This is what you've been dreading. You don't want her to have to deal with this too. When you try to turn away, hands stop you, warm brown eyes pleading with you not to shut her out.

So you scoot closer and rest your head on her chest, hands already wrapping around you and the steady rhythm of her heartbeat already working to erase those images away. At least for now.

And you realize you should've opened your eyes the second you felt her hands on your knees.