A/N: A re-vamp of my previous work, "Moments of Their Lives." I hope you enjoy, and don't forget to review!

The steering wheel creaked in protest as Juliet O'Hara slammed her palm down once, twice, three times. She ignored the redness that slowly spread across her skin and rested her forehead against the back of her hands. Still, she did not feel any better after her assault on her car; rather, her hands were starting to ache. She blew out a gusty breath and closed her eyes.

Why did her mother always bring this up? Their visits were brief enough as it was; was her mother trying to shorten them even more? She'd raised Juliet; surely she knew that her daughter would storm out of the house before the conversation was finished?

And yet her mother would continue, pushing the subject until Juliet exploded.

It had started that morning, when her mother had arrived from out-of-town for a brief visit. Juliet was already on edge, as visits from her mother usually didn't end well. This one would prove to be no exception.

Things had come to a head at dinner. After a rather tense main course, her mother had finally set down her napkin and asked the one question Juliet had been expecting.

"Are you in a relationship?"

She'd had to answer with the truth (no), because her mother was an expert at ferreting out lies. As she'd answered, Juliet had remained stiff in her seat, mentally warning her mother against her course.

But her mother, from whom Juliet had received her stubbornness, would not be swayed.

"Why not?"

Juliet had cited multiple reasons (work, can't find the right guy), but she could see in her mother's eyes that she wasn't really listening. Her first few questions had been probing attacks, merely to see the weaknesses in Juliet's argument. Next came the battle, full of sweetened suggestions and veiled accusations, all hidden under a pretense of help.

Juliet was sick of it. At one point in her mother's spiel, in which she was trying to suggest that Juliet's job was the entire reason for her singleness, Juliet had opened her mouth and cut her mother off mid-sentence.

"I'm not in a relationship, Mom, because I don't need one. I know who I am. A man won't make me complete. I've worked my ass off to get where I am, all on my own. I can do whatever I want because I have the ability to get myself there. You tell me to find a man, because I need one? You thought you needed one, and look where that got you. Alone, trying to raise two children by yourself, because your husband ran away. I will not make your mistakes. And if that means remaining single for the rest of my life, than dammit, that's what I'll do!"

That was the point at which Juliet stormed out of the house. Which led her to beating on her steering wheel.

Part of Juliet wanted to go back, to apologize to her mother. She'd said some awful things she knew her mother hadn't deserved to hear.

But the other part of her knew that if she returned, she might end up saying something even worse.

She needed to be somewhere else. She needed to cool off, and return when she was more level-headed. But where would she go?

The answer came to her immediately. Who was the master of distraction?

None other than Shawn Spencer.

She stuck her key in the ignition and pulled out of her driveway, letting her mind drift as she did so. She really shouldn't have said what she did about her father. That was uncalled for. But everything else…she wouldn't take back. No. She couldn't. That's what she believed, and she wasn't about to recant only to please her mother.

As she drove, her mind began to focus on what her mother had said. That it was her work that was scaring men away. Who would marry a detective? She intimidated people. Men wanted pretty, gentle women, not ones who dealt with murder and deception on a daily basis. She was jaded and cynical, and no man would ever measure up to the impossibly high standards that she set.

Juliet did not want to believe her mother's words. She wanted to push then aside and forget them. But they continued hovering in the air, pecking at her like vultures waiting her an injured animal to die.

She started as she pulled into the Psych parking lot. She wondered for a split-second if Shawn would be at home, but dismissed the thought immediately. Shawn was almost always at his office, and very rarely at his apartment. She could almost guarantee that he would be here.

She turned off the ignition and stowed her keys in her pocket, growing nervous as she reached the door. She'd decided to come here on a whim, when she hadn't been thinking clearly. What if Shawn turned her away? What would he think of her coming over, with no police business?

She stood on the doorstep, hand half-raised as if to knock, when the opening of the door answered her questions. Shawn stood in the doorway, dressed in jeans and a green polo, looking so familiar that she nearly burst out crying.

"Juliet? What is it? Do we have a case?"

She took a deep breath and attempted to look normal. "No, Shawn, it's just me. Um, I was wondering if I could come in?"

"What? Oh, yeah, of course. Sorry. Make yourself at home." He gestured around the office. "Have a seat."

Juliet sat in one of the typical brightly colored armchairs. Shawn took a seat across from her and studied her face. "Look, Jules, are you alright?"

She waved aside his concern. "I'm fine, I'm fine. I just—needed somewhere else to be tonight."

"And here was the first place you thought of, as it should be," Shawn finished for her. "Unfortunately, I will be your only host tonight, as Gus is—" Shawn broke off to look around the office, "—nowhere to be found. So." He stood up quickly and strode to a bookshelf behind his chair, next to the television. He rifled through the shelves briefly before returning to Juliet. "Pick your poison." In his hands was a choice of four different video games.

She scanned them before picking a first-person shooting game that she felt she could lose herself in. One that would distract her.

"Ah, yes. A wise choice," Shawn said. "Although, I should warn you, I am an unbeatable master at this game."

"Bring it on, Spencer," she challenged. Already she could feel her spirits lifting.

Two hours and five lost matches later ("How can a full-time cop who is such a good shot in real life be so bad in a video game?" asked Shawn, earning him a boxed ear), Shawn switched the game off.

"I know you came for distraction, but it's probably time for you to resolve that argument with your mother."

Juliet felt her jaw drop as she wondered how he could have possibly known what she had been running from.

He merely touched his finger to his temple and smiled at her. She closed her mouth and shook her head ruefully, wondering at his abilities. He would never cease to amaze her.

She was almost out the door when she stopped. She turned back and looked at Shawn, who had taken her in with no questions asked, and had asked nothing, even when he'd already known what was upsetting her. "Shawn," she said quietly, not even knowing what to say.

"I know," he replied, and somehow, she knew he did.

Quickly, before she even realized what she was doing, she was stepping into his arms and hugging him. And wrapped in his arms, she understood. She understood why her mother had always pushed the issue of a boyfriend.

Her mother wanted to make sure she was loved.

And standing in Shawn's arms, breathing in his scent of detergent and pineapple hair gel, she could almost begin to understand what that might feel like. What it would feel like to have someone waiting for you when you got home, to tell you that everything would be okay when it wasn't, to kiss you and hug you and to give you all their love.

Standing in Shawn's arms that night, Juliet began to understand her mother's message. Even though her mother's argument had been filled with disguised insults, Juliet could see the meaning behind it.

Her mother merely wanted her to be loved, and to love in return.

Standing in Shawn's arms, Juliet could almost taste it.