Hello hello! So, a quick "summary" is in order, or so I believe…first of all, I'd like to formally apologize for putting 'Making Memories of Us' on hiatus, but hopefully with some sort of burst of inspiration from this, I can carry on with it. In fact, some of you may see tinges of that story in this one, but this one is going to be much much longer, and (hopefully), completed.

Also, this is based off of the 100 moods challenge on LiveJournal that I dug up from long ago. I'll probably be changing some of the moods, but until then, here goes nothing!

Enjoy!

060. Lonely

How they had wound up in this position was disputable. According to Annie, Auggie had been the one to lead them up his stairs, through his apartment and up another set of hidden stairs.

Auggie's side of the story said that Annie had spurred him on with her overwhelming sense of complete lonesomeness and that he couldn't have helped but shown her his thinking spot.

Up on the roof of his building, amongst several signs warning against "trespassing the premises", they found themselves lying against the hard cement of the roof.

"The signs say we shouldn't be up here Aug…" she whispered, partly afraid to wake up someone at this ungodly hour and the other part terrified to ruin the magic of Auggie's secret spot reserved for the most private of thoughts only.

"There are a lot of things we shouldn't do. And it's beside the point. The landlords let me break all the rules. They won't mind this one being broken either." Auggie said out loud, and quite loudly.

"Shh!" Annie insisted, trying to preserve the feeling of this secret place.

"Oh Annie, no one will hear us. I've gone up here after drinking binges, and nobody's ever bothered to shush the blind guy."

Annie stayed quiet, thinking about his choice of words. Auggie would make jokes about his permanent "condition" as he called it; he refused to see it as a disability despite the eagerness of most people to combine any and all deviations from the norm as a disability. However, these jokes, albeit funny, would sometimes make Annie feel as uncomfortable as she was when she had first realized he was blind.

The innocent jabs made Annie consider his place in life – how he was so easily accepting that he would never be able to see anyone in his life, not even his possibly future wife.

"Annie? I'm sorry, did I go too far?" He asked after her moment of silent consideration.

"It's not that. I don't know some days. I've been in such strange moods lately." Annie admitted honestly. And the truth, it was. Nothing major was going on at work, just the usual missions that went off without a hitch in the carefully construed plans, yet Annie was feeling anxious.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

"That's the thing. There's nothing in particular to talk about. I'm so confused by these feelings too. But…I don't even think I can put it into words."

"Lately I've gotten the sense that you're….lonely, I guess is the best word for it…" Auggie said tentatively, as if afraid to step on Annie's toes or possibly, maybe hit a tender spot in Annie's mysterious psyche.

"Hmmm…." Annie perused his choice of such a particular word. "I…guess that…maybe you're right." That's all she said on the subject, so he knew better than to push it and upset her. Against her better judgment on intimate touches, she reached upwards and ran her hand through his hair.

Annie mussed it, soft touches not only comforting Auggie, but also bringing a sense of calm and relief to her own muddled mind. Auggie could only let his eyes close as Annie's lean fingers ran through the tendrils of his hair, back and forth, fiddling with certain pieces.

She stared up at the sky contemplating Auggie's previous words on her so-called loneliness. She wanted to comment, but she wasn't particularly sure how to go about it. Intimacy was difficult to establish with her, especially after Ben had taken off with some of the most personal things she cherished. Perhaps she was lonesome and she couldn't admit it to herself…an act of self-denial wouldn't be unusual considering her past.

Despite being in the city, something about Auggie's rooftop seemed to light the stars on fire as they twinkled and teased. Although so many of the stars looked so close, Annie knew better. People could appear as one thing, close in nature, but at a second glance, they were completely different than what was first expected, much further away.

If she was truthful with herself (which she was, in all honesty, trying to establish), Ben wasn't the only thing on her mind, nor was the path that had led to this particular moment in her life. Here she was, star-gazing and establishing closeness with her coworker and all around best guy friend, but wasn't it all too much? Annie could only be doubtful of where she and Auggie were headed.

They had established their friendship the moment Annie's dark pumps had hit the marbled floors of the CIA as a complete newbie to the way things worked, and Auggie couldn't help but take in the blonde beauty under his wing. Of course, at that moment, he had been completely unaware of her looks. He had only likened to her because she smelled nice and the clicking of her heels seemed a bit frantic and erratic, as if she was completely lost in the hustle and bustle of the secretive building.

From there, it wasn't difficult to maintain a friendship. Although it was discouraged between handlers and their agents, something about Auggie and Annie was completely different. It actually worked. They never brought the problems that possibly littered their friendship into the workplace, let alone unto missions that could be life or death.

Nevertheless, here was Annie, at a stalemate of sorts. She was lonely, she finally admitted to herself, but surprisingly, it wasn't something that particularly bothered her. Her quiet ministrations had continued during her internal and quite personal monologue, so much so that Auggie's body language had completely shifted in the meantime.

He was leaning now leaning into Annie's touch, eyes still shut, breathing slowed. Annie hadn't notice to what extent they had changed in their own personal quiet time, but when she whispered his name and received a quiet murmur in response, she realized that he was half-asleep.

She gave him a second, and sure enough, he stirred. "Sorry Annie….what did you want to say?" He said back in a whisper this time. Perhaps he was afraid to break the moment, for sometimes, there are few opportunities like these to get people to open up. But perhaps, he realized that Annie needed the softness to be able to actually talk to him about her problems. Either way, he wasn't going to ruin this when he was about to gain a piece of Annie that not too many people saw, or so he presumed.

"…I just…you're right…" Annie started. A small smirk fell upon Auggie's lips without him thinking, and Annie let out a soft chuckle. "Don't go getting a big head now about your newly discovered and somehow amazing intuitive powers…"

His smirk faded into the night, and he wanted to urge her to get on with it. A quiet pause and she clicked her tongue against her teeth, gathering the courage to continue.

"But…I am lonely. And…what's even stranger is that I love it. I love being alone. I crave it. People talk about how they can't stand being alone, or how they need people or somebody to love. I need all that too but…damn, I also need my alone time. To gather my thoughts, gather myself. I need weeks, sometimes months of solitude and I don't think anybody could handle that. I'll smother you with love one week and then be the most distant stranger the next. Why? I don't know…"

Auggie thought about the sudden onslaught of emotions and thoughts pouring directly from Annie's mind. He had always known she was much more complicated than she let on, but this was something completely revolutionizing. It changed the way he saw her, and made him reinvent the idea of who Annie was and who he thought she was in his mind.

"And in all honesty, there hasn't been too much time for me to be able to disappear with work, but I've needed it. I've missed it…" Annie stopped talking, and Auggie knew that that was all he was going to get out of her for tonight.

After a quiet moment together, Auggie reached his hand over her unoccupied one and linked their fingers together. "I know this is strange, but…perhaps…maybe, just maybe, we can be lonely together."

And even though Annie knew that Auggie wouldn't see her soft nod, he felt her lightly squeeze his hand in hers.

With a soft whisper, she concluded their newly established intimacy.

"I'd like that."

A/N: Do me a favor and tell me what you think?

Best Regards,

Audrey C.