Jeremy couldn't remember when the convention became that the whole office met for breakfast on Monday mornings, but he'd come to appreciate, possibly even enjoy, the ritual. He'd have preferred to eat alone, but come 8:15 he would be pulled into the break room by Betsy or Mindy, or whoever, to listen to the inane chatter than would have ordinarily filled the bull pen as he ate at his desk.

As the de facto boss he thought it was good practice to participate. He liked to be considered approachable, and he found it useful to keep his ear to the ground about happenings amongst the staff. He alone suspected that Betsy was thinking of moving home. And he'd known long before it became official that Tamra and Morgan were seeing each other on the sly. Not that anyone ever asked him. He wouldn't have engaged anyway. Gossip isn't good for morale.

Once again the first person in the office, he decided against shutting his office door as he started sorting messages compiled over the weekend and updating his calendar for the week. He allowed himself to get a little wrapped up in his Monday morning routine, but he noticed when 8:15 passed without anyone trying to drag him away from the desk. According to his calendar Betsy had a vacation day, and he suspected she was taking job interviews back home. Peter was never on-time, let alone early, and God alone knows what Tamra and Morgan were up to this morning. He watched the hands on his watch spun past 8:20, then 8:30 and still no one came to his door.

Curiosity piqued, he smoothed his trousers and re-buttoned his jacket as he pushed away from his desk and stood, then made his way to the break room. He found Danny and Mindy, heads together, bowed over a newspaper speaking in low voices. He cleared his throat politely.

"Hey, Jeremy!" Mindy's high voice lifted into the air with a touch of surprise. "Danny and I were just talking about how stupid he is."

"Hey!" Danny's voice was gruff, offended, but only a fool would look at him and see anything but the smile that played around his lips, and the soft way his eyes searched on Mindy's face, darting to her lips and back to her eyes.

"It WAS stupid, Danny." Mindy returned Danny's little smile and continued brightly, "How in the hell did you think Catfishing me was going to work?"

"It was a bit foolish, Danny." Jeremy interjected casually. Now that the waivers were signed he was a little less nervous about the turn this had taken, but he could not for the life of him understand how Danny thought lying to the woman he supposedly loved was a winning idea.

"I was doing 'You've Got Mail'," Danny retorted indignantly. "I did the thing from your favorite movie, and you act like I was purposefully trying to deceive you!"

Jeremy's lips twitched. "You kind of were, mate."

Mindy nodded in agreement. "Danny, 'You've Got Mail' is romantic because they were two people, completely unalike, who learned how to be friends when Joe got over his ridiculous prejudice about Kathleen's outer optimism and responded to the inner her."

"Which is what I was doing! I was trying to get you to see the inner me!"

"So you're Kathleen?" Mindy asked skeptically.

"No! I'm Joe. I knew I was wooing you, and you didn't know."

Jeremy opened the refrigerator and grabbed a pot of yogurt. "You could have just told her, Danny. You could have just said 'Mindy, I love you.' It would have saved a great deal of drama and quite a bit of money to the solicitors."

"Hey, they're called lawyers in this country."

Jeremy scowled at Danny's tired reply. "I'm just saying. Why not be straight with her?"

"I tried! I told her I loved her. She said she didn't believe me." Something like sorrow clouded Danny's eyes, making Jeremy briefly regret piling on.

"Danny," Mindy said softly, "You told me you loved me after you'd already done the Andy thing. You didn't say it until you thought you'd lost me. Why'd you wait?"

"I don't know," Danny replied honestly.

Feeling this was time to duck out before he had to witness an intimate moment between them, Jeremy moved as quietly as possible toward the door. The silence between them was too thick, too pregnant though, and as he always did, Jeremy made the mistake of trying to cut the tension with humor. "Please don't break up now, I'm out of waivers for you to sign."

Mindy turned to Jeremy, capturing his gaze fully, returning it solemnly. "You don't need to worry about that."

Jeremy's stomach clenched uncomfortably.

It had been a long time since Mindy had looked him in the eye like that. He remembered the last time, once upon a time when she'd told him that she was having real feelings for him and that they had to either stop sleeping together or start doing other things together. He'd broken it off immediately, knowing that he wasn't ready for a commitment, and that even if he didn't love her he respected her enough to let her go and try to find someone who would. Which apparently she had.

Danny had gone about it the wrong way, and surely he knew that. Jeremy couldn't say for sure that he knew what it was like to really love someone, but when Mindy met his eyes he felt sure that a woman who can look you in the eye like that, speak honestly to you like that, and open herself up for you like that, surely deserves honesty in return.

Mindy had been hurt back then when he was honest with her and let her go, but she'd deserved no less. He felt his fist clench involuntarily at the thought of Danny's deception, no matter how well-intentioned his behaviors had been. Danny had a lot to answer for and Jeremy hoped that Mindy demanded it from him.

Jeremy nodded at her and turned away. As he walked away he heard Danny's voice, soft and low, filter through the door. "Mindy, I love you."

The fleeting irrational thought that he deserved her more than Danny did forced Jeremy to stumble mid-step. Jeremy shook his head to clear away the nonsense, and stepped into his office. And slammed the damn door.

Author's Notes: Title and chapters are from music that would more or less have featured in the life of a young Jeremy Reed. Forcing myself to start this now so I have to finish the story, so all apologies for random mistakes.