A/N: Hey Guys, new story. Basically a lighter note at what could potentially be a dark situation. It's only going to have three chapters. None of the chapters are connecting. Rather they're stand alone. Each uses the same general plot and devices/some of the same characters/settings/you get it by now/one more for fun. Kinda like Groundhog Day, but the characters are not aware of the switches that occur. So like I said. Chapters are stand alone, but put into the same story for convenience purposes.
Rated M for situations which occur in later chapters, but this one is clean of everything except my swears. Surprise.

Disclaimer: I own nothing.

One Shiny Guinea

Chapter 1

Five Fingertips

The front door slams sticky in the late July humidity. Bulldozing the early arena of sleep she finally managed to enter. A headache, the worst she's ever had without a night of binging and boozing preceding it. Curls and nestles by the hearth in her left temple like a domesticated animal. Claws at the carpet, rips at the floorboards and pisses on the hardwood.

Twin booms. Boom boom. Door bouncing off the wall downstairs and then lodging in the frame, uneven in its coats of paint which expand in musty weather. Told him to be quiet. Begged him to be quiet. Sent him a text telling him on her day off she has King Kong climbing the interior skyscrapers of her brain and to kindly shut the hell up when he comes home because she's taken enough pills to bring down a bull elephant.

But no, boom boom and she's awake. Because, despite her text having everything save for an emoticon of two clasping hands, he's rampaging through their living room not unlike the bull elephant she's trying to tranquilize. Feels her patience slowly draining, leaking out of water clogged ears, dry nostrils, bloodshot eyes, bottom sides of fingernails. Imagines her rage is the thermometer hanging outside on the porch. Probably smashed on the ground with his destruction. Mercury pearls rolling every which way, beading down cranky porch steps.

Attempts to soothe with a deep inhalation even though King Kong is rocking those tom toms with a sweet jungle beat. Everyone else on Team One has the day off, but Sam had to go in for—so maybe he was too wiped to check his messages. She should just be glad he got home safe and—

Triplet bangs interrupted by a crash. Bang, bang, crash, bang.

"Okay." Rips the thin sheet off her legs and clear off the bed from where the edges tucked into perfect hospital corners. Floats harmlessly across the footboard, half slithering onto the floor. Slaps semi-sweaty feet to the tacky hardwood. Even if Sam's exhausted from his day of non-mobility, it's still no reason for him to zombie around the living room.

Slaps occur in succession, in a melodic beat with the bangs. Slap, slap, bang. Slap, slap, bang. The stairs increase the frequency of foot exploitation. Slap, slap, slap, slap, slap, slap, bang. Follows the curve of the banister to the landing. Middle and forefinger kneading her temple like bakery fresh dough.

"Sam, seriously don't you check your messages?" Croaks it out as her eye stretches and shrinks with flexing digits. "Shut the hell up, I've already got the Santa Claus Parade in my fucking skull. You smashing around like a drunk doesn't—"

Fingers solidify parallel to her face. Muscles and bone lock, all rivets and soldered joints. Because the man in her front room isn't Sam.


"What did he look like?"

"He was about five foot ten." Cotton flowers graze her lower lip. Words spill onto one of the kitsch kitchen towels. "Maybe six feet tall at the most. Medium build. Red hair. No facial hair. No tattoos. No scars."

"Uh huh." The cop, a burly man in his early fifties has a head that melts directly into his thick chest. Nods at her once with his entire torso. The brim of his hat shadows his tiny far set eyes, and the bridge of his wide, flattened nose. "Anything else that might help us distinguish him from a crowd?"

"Pretty sure I broke his nose." Compresses the balled floral towel to her leaking nostril. Syrupy nosebleed drenching all the good linens. Every time she removes it for a second, it's like the tap on a maple tree. "And I might have kicked one of his balls back into his stomach cavity by the way he was limping."

"All right." Cop seems less impressed with the second piece of information. Sympathy for the attacker through brotherly obligations and phantom limb contractions. "I'll contact the hospitals to tell them to be on the lookout for him."

"Great." Couldn't have been the left side. Kong and the elephant were in the left side. Now they're all over. She's going to need a double dose of whatever to get through this drum symphony. Basses, tom toms, bongos and snares. Rough and steady beats bounding ceaseless behind her eyes.

Cop ignores her sarcasm. Toddles away from where she sits on her couch accompanied by a kitchen towel already bloodied to her homemade version of a Rorschach test. Stretches his plump, cloven legs to step over where the suspect dropped his gun. Dropped it and ran when she sent at least one of his boys packing home. Hovers by the wall littered with pictures of her and Sam. "I called EMS for you too, Ma'am. They're on route."

Twists on the couch, body bouncing off the confining, full pillows. Blood tickles and trickles from her nostril. A bit swerves to the edge of her upper lip. "First off it's not Ma'am. It's Officer. I'm a cop, just like you. And I don't need an EMS. I'm fine. It's just a little nosebleed."

"Well if you're a cop, than you know it's protocol to call in EMS." Gains sass, hands almost on his hips buried beneath layers of fat. Movement only making him appear as a circular figurine.

"And I'm telling you I'm fine." Realizes the absurdity of the statement as she thrusts the ball of crusting maroon covered pansies and watering cans back into her nasal cavity.

"And I'm telling you, someone injures you, I gotta call in EMS. Plus there's blood, Officer." Stresses the title to piss her off a little bit more.

Left eyelid shimmies, twitches right in the center. He must catch it as he rounds her overturned coffee table because he clears his throat, baritone voice taking a gentler tone. Points a pen to her front door where his partner has been for the last fifteen minutes just staring with an open maw. Like chickens that drown from staring up into downpours. "The frame on your front door is broken, so you'll have to stay somewhere else for a few days until you get someone to fix it."

"Fine."

"Do you have anyone you want to call, or want me to call?"

"No."

"Not this fine young man in these pictures?"

"No."

"Looks pretty serious between you two. You don't think he'd want to know about—"

"Julianna?"

"Oh thank God."

Doesn't really care who it is because they know her name. Won't call her 'Ma'am' or 'Officer' in a condescending tone like she was asking to get robbed and then did something wrong by defending herself when things turned physical. Maybe they'll understand that her head is actually a stewpot of extreme agony, might talk soft and soothingly or have some sort of short term solution besides swallowing buckets of pills. Maybe they'll let her go pee, because she really has to.

"Who are you?" Huffing, round cop bounces on his feet and checks out the new guy as he enters her house. Nostalgia of being an on beat cop, of meeting people after something bad happened and spending the rest of the shift trying to make it up to them.

"EMS." Steve yanks at the emblem on his shirt. Her house is the hottest downtown club and only first responders with the right I.D. get let in. The cop slims his prickled eyes and nods to her with his whole body. She rolls her eyes, well at least one.

"My shift ended but I heard your address go in over the radio, I told them I had to take it." He kneels at her feet like some kind of domesticated animal. Not clawing the carpet or ripping the floorboards because some guy already did that. Opens his tackle box of medical goodness, layers of everything shiny and ready. "What happened, Jules?"

She shrugs, a little sentimental at an old friend caring so much for her. Rises on his knees and sneaks his fingers into her hand clumping around a dyed kitchen towel. Guides it away from her face carefully. His eyes flinch, pupils jostling a little in reaction to her injuries, almost a full facial expression, but he kills it for her sake.

"There was a guy in my living room. He got physical; hit me with the butt of his gun. I punched him in the nose, a—" Forefinger and thumb float tipsy over her eye, her cheekbone, her nose. The current laps at her skin with the idea of a touch. Air is an elephant rampaging on her face. "I punched him a few times, I think. I kicked him too."

"Why didn't you call the police?" The pad of his forefinger caresses the lower lid of her eye, a downy feather swaying in the non breeze of a stalled summer day. But her skin is like thin ice, frail with leagues of pressuring water beneath. She inhales, tries not to be noticeable, but it is. It's loud, it's deep, it shakes.

"I am the police."And it would be so much more intimidating if a small dribble of blood didn't drizzle out of her nose like a burp of ketchup.

His smile is warm, careful just like his hands, each individual finger. Slips to envelop the lower half of her palm, support and structure it back to her nose. "Why did you go downstairs?"

"I'm a cop, Steve." Sounds nasally, her voice sifting through a cold. Or the voice of a clown at a birthday party.

"I know you're a cop." Sighs, lips almost a perfectly straight line but carry the curved corners of his permanent grin. His brows slant, oppose the curve. Are more pronounced than the curve. Worry always is. "Why not just call 9-1-1 and wait? You were off duty right? Doesn't that make you a civilian?"

Squints her good eye at him. Lips pull up into the grimace she almost always wears because it was the emotion she was reared on. "You really bringing up off duty heroics right now?"

The events of a certain day concentrate themselves into a brief pause. Ice cream and spring dresses. Indian food and gun shots. Chemicals in a mosque. A promise not to stop singing, she so did. Steve chuckles once, the verbal equivalent of the awkward back of the neck rub.

"No, I guess I'm not." Single fingertip returns to the uncharted expedition of her eye. Her cheekbone sunken like a shipwreck or undiscovered underwater volcano. Knows exactly how much pressure to exert, how much is too much, how much will make her head explode within scuba gear.

"I thought it was Sam." Doesn't want to alienate, because they're all in unstable lines of work. Hell, their jobs are the nitroglycerine of all jobs. They all have follies, follow fumbles, create their own mistakes. None of them should be punished for it. "I thought he was tired from his class and was stumbling around downstairs. For a guy whose job and life depend on his stealthiness at home he's an ox."

Chuckles again, but this time it's viable. Truthful and meaningful. Glimmers in his eyes, and shudders in the neighboring laughing lines. Stoops to the side, reappears with a small square of snowy gauze. "Sam's taking a class?"

"There's going to be a Team Leader position opening up in a month." Gauze licks and adheres to her cheek. There must be a cut from the jagged metal molars on the gun. Can't feel it, that whole quadrant of her face. Hurts on an equal level simmering to numbness. "He has to do twenty-four hours of in-class assessment to make sure he has the proper authoritative training."

"Sounds exciting."

"Sounds boring as hell."

Results in the same sincere chuckle, the same bright grin. With his fore and middle fingers under her chin, tips her head up. Again lowers her hand from her nose, fingers scoping out her palm. Purging her of the second bloodbathed kitchen towel. Fingers linger, soft in her palm for a few seconds. Scurry away as he consciously blinks and clears his throat. "What did Sam say?"

"When?"

Forefinger courses the side of her nose, compacts her right nostril. Probably seeing if there's any sap left. "When you call—" undulates his spine forward, straightens his hunched shoulders. He's taller than her on his knees. She has couch legs and cushions and he's still taller than her. "Jules, you didn't call him?"

"He has an hour left in his class. He would've left and had to repeat one for leaving early, which means he wouldn't be done in time for the promotion." It's not the reason. It's a practical reason, but not the reason why she didn't call him. He would've overreacted. To everything. The cruiser and ambulance on the street. The broken door frame. The marauded living room. The spar. The blood on the towels. Her black eye. Everything. And he would've gotten angry about everything. "It's not worth it. I'm fine."

"I don't know Jules." Taps her right temple twice. Drums follow the syncopated beat. Slow for a minute from a frenzied garbled mess of noise to just above roaring twenties jigs. "You've got one hell of a shiner."

"Worse than that time I beat up Whitney P. in Grade 11 Biology?"

"I'd say so; this guy had some power behind his swing."

"So did Whitney. She wasn't a tiny girl, Steve."

Doesn't really listen because he's peeling the gauze away from her cheek. The gauze which masked and veiled over her skin and its crevices in perfection. It flops, flaccid and sneezed red. Like a pulse of crimson dust burst into the center. "You need to go to the hospital. The cut on your cheek needs stitching and—"

"I'm not going to the hospital for a cut on my cheek." However, she accepts the second piece of gauze he offers. Her fingers aren't so nimble, so dept and flawlessly artistic as his. They amble about on her cheek in an attempt to find the fabled cut.

He directs her left hand bungling over her face. Arm like a limp, less useful bulletproof vest. A human seatbelt. "You can ride in the front seat and the sirens will be—"

Dry throat squeezes out a cackle as her fingers chance leaving the gauze on its own. It stays pasted in place. "I'm definitely not going to the hospital in an ambulance for a cut on my cheek."

"What about your wrist?" Nods to the arm ensconced in her pajama bottomed lap. The pink heart pattern crumpled in wrinkles and flowing around her arm. Fist still clenched, knuckles five craggy hills, just like it was when he was here.

"It's fine."

"Let me see it." Hand supine in want with the absence of the grabby hyperextension of fingers. His face expectant as he relaxes back on his heels.

Didn't hurt hitting him. Punching him. Feeling the crack of cartilage under middle and ring fingers with the second swing. The first stunned. The second hurt. The kick to his boys made him flush, sweat, droop and waddle out of the house as fast as he could. It wasn't the physical fighting, it was before. The pinwheels of black and blue around the actual angles and arteries of her wrist. Before when—"No."

The constant slant of his brows turn inward. One heightens and the other slumbers straight under in confusion. Teeters forward on his knees, closer to her, shadow creeping into her lap and over her wrist. Supine hand steers forward again, flat like a waiter's serving tray. "Jules, if he hurt you you need—"

"No." Nudges his hand away with her own. Voice collected and her right wrist unconscious deadweight in her lap. Might get pin and needles when she moves it. "It's fine."

But he keeps her eyes. Not harshly, not with interrogation and gossip flocking conclusions. Not even with stark curiosity. Just concern. For a cut cheek. For a bruised wrist. "What did—"

"Can I help you, Sir?" Chunky cop rests idle in the front doorway like a tractor trailer in a field of wooden slivers. Might actually be wearing the doorframe.

"I live— Where's my girlfriend? Is she okay? What hap—"

Hears Sam's voice in its panicked cadence which many, most, would confuse for fury. He's not angry, not in the least. He's terrified, doesn't know what's going on, which translates to passion interpreted as rage. This is how the anger she predicted begins. But for some odd reason she finds solace in him right now. Thought his anger, panic, concern would just be more issues for her to deal with, but he asked for her. Lives here even though he still has his apartment.

The cop slaps his back with a laugh because he 'recognizes' Sam from the pictures. Tells him the 'Missus' is on the couch getting EMS attention and she'll explain everything. Also adds that he needs to find another place to stay for a few days while the door frame gets fixed. Then elbows Sam in the ribs with a wide, suggestive grin and what she only supposes are waggling eyebrows. At the same time Steve shuffles back an inch or two from her.

Sam's fakes out the cop, manages to actually enter their house. Steve scuttles at her feet, packing up his tackle box of medical goodies sans a lollipop and a bathroom break. Shifts and stands from the ground with a neutral to negative smile because he can sense what's coming as much as she knows. And she knows it must hurt him.

Watches the shades of emotion flicker off Sam's face like a dancing candle flame. The panic and fear evident when he first steps by the house bouncer. The immediate slackness when he recognizes her, and relief that she's intact, breathing, healthy and generally unharmed. Then the restringing of cords and tightening of screws because the right side of her face is not only directly aiming at him, but showcased by the living room pot lights.

"Jesus," mutters it. Not a curse, more so the remaining restraints on his composure cooling off his system, steam whistling from a pipe. Charges at her, that old ox she always hears downstairs finally in motion. Usually when he knows she's watching, he practices perfectly form fitting steps interpretive to her soul.

His hip and thigh collide with the firm couch back. Quake her body with impact. Hand contains her chin, fingers branching over the left side of her face. He doesn't examine her first. Like the cop did with an aggravated huff because now EMS had to be called. Like Steve did with concern because she's Jules, rough and tumble high school Jules who should know better than to be getting into scuffles in her living room.

Kisses her on the lips. Exhales all his worries and fears into her mouth, diving over her teeth, tumbling with her tongue. Plants a sloppy kiss on her forehead, her cheek. Lips smack against her skin like the light beat of butterfly wings.

"Sam." Hikes a shoulder to break contact. To garner his attention towards Steve, who reenacts the awkward back of the neck rub his chuckle embodies so well.

Sam either continues to ignore him, or is too focused on her to care. His brows knit dangerously low, hand cushioning her jaw, turning her face so he can inspect the damage. Dangerous eyes flash red waves in blue. Inherent violence in vendetta. "What the hell happened?"

"It's nothing." His thumb hooks in the cleft below her lower lip. Though his eyebrows angle in nothing but anger, she senses what he doesn't outwardly portray. The guilt, the fear, the brokenness at witnessing her in such a state, though he's seen her in much worse.

"This isn't nothing." Fingers droop from the back of the couch. Anger losing its momentum as his other emotions start to stain his decisions, his perceptions. She scoops them up in her left hand. "You're not nothing. Someone hurt you. That's something. A big something."

"There was a guy in the living room and things got phy—"

Rips his hand away. Sneakers squeaking over their hardwood floors like a kindergarten class in a gym. "Wait what? What?"

Not really sure why he wants her to repeat the sentence. If there's a certain amount of unbelievability to what she's stating, or if there's something in there that's specifically making him pissed because he's definitely re-escalated. Or if he's just pissed no one else is as angry as him about what happened. "There was a guy in the living room?"

Hands fidget. To his hips, across his chest, to his chin. "Where is he? Did they catch him? I don't even care. I'm going to kick his ass even if he's cuffed."

"Sam, I can take care of myse—"

"No. No." Points at her, eyebrows fighting to keep their dominant angles. Muscles beneath trembling with fatigue. But his voice is already dulcet at revisiting her injuries, lowers more than one octave and becomes sincere. "That's at work. This is different. You weren't at work. You weren't in uniform. You were in our house. You were just a woman to him. You're not to me Jules. You're not and this shit needs to stop."

Wobbles forward, knees sinking between the deep dips connecting the pillows. Feet hook over the front of the couch, toes burying under the cushion. Presses herself into the back of the couch, left hand resting on the edge as her right swings lifeless. "I'm still here."

"Yeah." Sam nods once, voice slowly scattering like wisps of smoke against a night sky. Trudges a large step, and places a gentle kiss on her forehead. Hand ghosting over the injured side of her face until it cradles the back of her head. "Yeah."

"I'm going to—" Steve, skin a blushing shade of pink, points to their fragmented front door, his tackle box in tow.

"Steve." Lips pluck from her forehead; thumb gives one reassuring brush before the embrace breaks. Sam circles the couch, his hand held out. "I'm sorry for—"

Steve shakes his head in automatic disagreement at any apology. Shoves the red box underneath his opposite arm and shakes Sam's hand. It's an honest exchange, Sam pats Steve's arm a few times. Steve grins genuinely. "No. No, it's understandable."

"Thank you, for helping her."

"I have a black eye, not the black plague."

"Actually she needs to go to the hospital."

"What? Why?" Newly forged friendship with Steve is forgotten. Bounds back over to her. Busy fingers trail over her face again because apparently he missed something during the first inspection. "You need a hospital?"

"I don't need a hospital"

"Jules, if you need stitches, you need to go to the hospital."

Narrows her good eye at Steve. Sam's fingers prod the peripherals of her face. When she slants her head away, he tilts it back. "It's a cut in my cheek, I'll live."

"What are you going to do? Pull it together with the duct tape from the kitchen?" He lifts one of the blood soaked towels from earlier. Doesn't unravel from drying in a cluster of reds and browns over petunias. "We're going to the hospital."


"What's wrong with your wrist?" Legs dangle off the side of a gurney as time jogs by in the faceless moonlight and nosedives off a bluff into the soft swashing waves below. Garish colored curtain in hues of purple, yellow, brown and green only mixed in nightmares shades them from fellow emergency room frequenters. People who play medical bingo with their internal organs and Russian roulette with their immune systems.

Wrist still ever a wrist. A pale switch cut from her favorite tree and placed in the flow of her pink heart bottoms. Limp and dead as ever. Eternal fist still clenching at a past moment. A moment, like Steve when he relived getting shot for valor. The convoluted idea of 'doing the right thing'. She keeps reliving the moment where that man in her front room grabbed her wrist. Pads and nails imprinted with unknown dirt and past. When he—

"Nothing."

Sam's leaning against the gurney, carries just a few inches more height than her. Carries much more burden from the whole night than her even though he wasn't present. Thinks the burden in grand chests and matching luggage tied to his back like a bull elephant is the direct result of him not being there.

Left cheek nuzzles against his shoulder, the jagged bone, the smooth hardness of the muscle under his t-shirt. The same one he came home in. Hasn't even had a chance to change. To eat. She still has to pee. His left hand holds hers, thumb circles indolently along the ridges of her knuckles, the cricks of her joints, the verticals of each of her fingers.

"You haven't moved it since I've seen you. Not when we were packing things for my place. Not in the car. Not in the waiting room." Each sentence followed by a reassuring brush of her hair. His right hand swims through her hair. Just like how they watch cheesy movies together. How they read the morning paper together. How they fall asleep together. Fingers so careful not to drop to damaged territory. Can feel them shrink, bones breaking back into his palm when they pace near her ear.

"It's fine."

Expects his now programmed response of 'none of this is fine'. Instead his hand slows, bangs billow free from his fingers, tickle her forehead in strands. "Can I see it?"

Without forethought she answers, "Yeah."

Wrist creaks and cracks, a door seldom opened. Bangs and booms. A door broken into. Drops his hand from her hair, burrows it near the jut of her hip. Left hand holds her right, like the beginning of an unforgettable ceremony sans any piece of jewelry or religious icon. Heats up her immobile skin. Blue from hypothermia. Blue and black from a bruise alchemized into fire frozen and tattooed onto the jutting bones of her wrist.

Docks capsized palm under hers. Her hand dwarves in comparison. His consumes in a completely desired, positive, loving way. Ripples his fingers, pinkie to thumb. Brows jump at her once. A challenge, an opportunity, a plea. She ripples hers back. Fingers playing against his like piano keys she knows the tune to.

Hand half turns. Thumb up in the air wiggling playfully. Copies the wide fingered stance. Balls of her hand stamped into his. Fingers find the slots between hers and entwine. A ball of flesh, muscles, bones and blood. Two hands, ten fingers, two wrists, only one bruised and throbbing.

"Your wrist is fine." Manipulates the ball so her hand lies on top, exposed but treated with nothing but respect. Fingers dainty, wrist supported as his lips anchor to her hand. Flex in a gentle kiss. Warm breath cementing it into place for eternity. "So what's wrong with your wrist?"

Would reply 'nothing', but what's the use? They know each other too well. Too well for her to lie about this, because it's going to continue to bother her until he figures out what's wrong. After being together this long, maybe it's time for her to actually share something with him before it becomes another bubble boiling away in her acidic personality.

"The guy. I told the guy to get out of the house. He aimed the gun at me, and then grabbed my wrist." Wrist sleeps in the phantom plunge where their thighs meet, the trompe-l'oeil where his thigh and her thigh could belong to a third person. His thighs and her thighs could come together and create a third person. His thumb courses over the violet veins which bifurcate smaller until they fully disappear.

Feels her eyebrows connect in a mass of muscles, quivering from overuse. From the rampant confusion. Feels the light dab of Sam's thumb pad on her tender skin. Feels the burning imprint of five fingertips like heated metal, belonging to someone whose name she still doesn't know. "He had this look on his face. This smirk. This evil smirk and he started pulling me towards the couch. I knew what he wanted. What he was going to do and that's when I hit him and he hit me."

Hand at her hip collects her body as she starts to sag to the right. Away from him and towards her injuries. Into the spiraling pit of 'what ifs'. Hesitates at his first beckon, pushes against his call. But the second tug, it's realistic, not soft, not caressing. Five real fingers not searing metal, powering through pink pajamas.

Realistic. Reality. Sitting on a gurney for thirty minutes beside her boyfriend who hasn't eaten since noon. Stomach growls when she nestles her head against his chest. His hand playing on the rise and fall of her ribs. "I'm not angry because you fought back, Jules. I'll never be angry because you fought back. I'm not angry at you at all."

Is so careful. So gentle when he rests his head on the crown of hers only for a second. Inhales deeply. Drops a lingering kiss in the wild tangles of hair stampeding. "I'm angry because people do this. Because this guy broke in. Because he hurt you even if you did kick his ass. Because I wasn't there"

"It's not your fault, Sam. It's the one day a week you had—"

"You think I give a shit about that class? About getting a promotion? About the job? About the house? They're all second when it comes to you. Everything is second, and I think I make the right choices and then I see—" Lips peck, barely peck, might just kiss the air above the swollen mass sprouting from her eye. "I see this and I think everything, except you, is all wrong."

"Hey." Hands release the side of her face; leave it cold and prone to the harsh jabs from the emergency room's central air. Keeps his eyes on the curtain of lurid colors. The kind found in an inward tumble when her mind gallops wildly over forking paths. His lips pale from force. Jaw muscles twitch in rough corners as pupils shrink and flex.

"Hey." Her palm fits perfectly under his chin; skin already bristled with a fine layer of fresh hair. "This isn't our fault Sam. You're not making bad decisions. If you were, I wouldn't stop telling you. I'm so proud of you. So proud."

"I'm the one who's proud. I know you can protect yourself, I just—I have a hard time remembering it sometimes." Hand devours hers, a disappearing act leaving her attended and comforted. Thighs rendezvous, every inch of them touching through cotton and denim.

"I know." Head returns to his shoulder, cheek finding the niche between the protruding bone and stiff muscle. Fingers strum through her hair, attempting to corral wild strands. "Sometimes it's easier to protect myself when I know you've got my back."


"Here." Thick legs obscure her vision of the TV, the highlights of tonight's hockey game Sam missed from spending eight hours in class and almost three in an emergency room so she could get eight stitches on the arc of her cheekbone.

Offered to clean up after their takeout burritos, just two plates, a few scraps of garbage and an empty beer bottle. Of course she can't drink against the doses of pain pills the doctor prescribed after Sam came on a bit too strong. Could easily make the short trek from couch to kitchen while he caught up on his scores, but the idea gave him the vapors. Settled her back down with a hand on her shoulder and told her to just relax.

A baggie full of ice cubes crackles into her expectant palm. Temperature only dulled a bit by a thin layer of plastic. Flexes her hand, tumbling it so she's holding it up by the zipped part. Sam steps in front of her, between the leather couch and the table, flopping back down.

She stares at him a moment, ice tearing in the baggie and numbing the muscles in her hand. His head leans back over the top of the cushions. Arms spreading at both sides like someone just dropped him there. Completely boneless like a beanbag. Quells the urge to lean over, undo his fly and shove the ice in.

"It's for your eye." Peeks at her from behind heavy lids, head slightly turning towards her.

"I don't need it."

"Just try it for a few minutes. Your eye is really swollen."

"I'm not supposed to get the stitches wet for at least twenty-four hours." Sets the baggie onto a coaster. Ice piles and slides off each other, perspires in the equally chilly central air of Sam's abandoned apartment. "It's fine."

He lurches forward, inflamed by some secret heat. His innate worry for her which keeps flaring up like matches being dropped into boxes of fireworks. Calm, then suddenly popping. Full of color, exuberance, passion. Suddenly everything because he remembers what happened. "Jules, your eye's going to—"

"Okay. Okay." Hand on the back of his neck, rough and coarse. The muscles and tendons tight and knotted like tree bark. Snatches the corner of the bag from the table and cautiously brings it to the eye she can barely see out of. A pinhole with the universe closing in around it.

Ice slaps bruised skin. Agitated, furious skin. Only proves to provoke more pain. Prods sensitive points. Creates fireworks behind her own eyes. Distorted chains of colors in ocean mosaics. Baggie clatters into the hollow between her crossed legs, ice clatters like a tossed pair of dice.

"That didn't feel good at all."

"Did you take your pills?"

Told her to take them while he cleaned. They should knock her right out. Should dissipate the pain in her swollen eye, her sewn cheek, her booming head, her empty nose with the easy flicking of a magic wand. But she can't take them. Can't be in a state of complete complacency after what happened.

"Jules." Body scoots next to hers. Hand scoops the baggie from in her lap, from between pink heart-patterned thighs. Arm hooks around her waist and she sighs, relaxes because he's still there. Outside of her right eye's new margins, but he's still there.

Hears the rattle of the bottle, six pills within. Enough for the three doses Sam scared out of the doctor. Drops two saucer-shaped white pills into her palm and balances her water bottle left over from dinner on her knee. "You should take them. They'll help you."

"I can't." Her hand knocks his. Wants to return the pills, but his closes. Retreats. "What if—"

"I'll be here." A whisper, an intense whisper. Like his voice was sieved until only the most pivotal parts remained. Shadows his chin to her shoulder, speaks it to her, floats it to her ear. Her right ear, her harassed side. Hands plant on her hips, palms warm, familiar and comforting. His nose brushes the side of her neck and when he speaks. The words solidify in his breathes. "I'm going to be here tonight and for a long time afterwards, Jules."

Knows. Just knows. About her wrist. About her having to pee and holding her place on the gurney while she wandered pajama clad through the emergency room. About her headache, sure she texted him almost twelve hours ago, but he kept the volume on the TV low, the lights to a minimum, keeps kissing her temple. About why she doesn't want to be incapacitated.

She knows. Knows he won't let a single thing happen to her while he's there. In the room, the building, the GTA, Canada. Probably wanted to leave class for her headache. Knows the guilt he feels and shouldn't is colossal.

She has a hard time trusting people, opening up to them. Sure, she trusts the Team. She has to; her life depends on it almost every day. But off duty, she doesn't trust most of them, not with the smallest of her intimate details. But Sam—stares at the two pills in her hand, knowing she could take them, finally sleep from the parade of subwoofers in her head. Stares at him, blue eyes and the slightest smile and trusts him.

Pills go down smooth with the water. Two gulps. They don't even get stuck over the hesitant bump in her throat. Sam coaxes with open arms, and they lay the length of the couch. Curling on her side, the uninjured portion of her face is padded by his t-shirt over his chest. Her whole body fluctuates with his over exaggerated breathes, something he does on purpose just to make her bounce. One of his arms snakes over her back and hip to slumber on her angled thigh. The other holds the baggie of ice to her exposed eye with a tolerable degree of pressure and the perfect positioning.

The cold temperature soothes the ache behind her eye, the straining muscles, and after a few minutes, two fingers break from the bag and massage the skin softly at her temple. In her head the rampaging elephant is on its side, trunk extended trumpeting for air. A very disinterested Kong slaps lazily at the drumset before him.

Wakens to a darkened room and a warm patch of leather underneath her. The blinds filter in distorted city light from downtown giving the room an ethereal haze along the wall. She leans up, one hand supporting her body, the other absently swatting her eye. Dynamite into a volcano as fireworks re-explode. Structuring arm shakes from the pain.

"Hey, you shouldn't be up." Another whisper hidden in the friction of his feet against hardwood floors and the creaking of their boards. Outline a charcoal gray against the pitch black that consumes the rest of the room. Neon glow from the windows doesn't permeate from beyond the TV.

"What?—What's?"

Tugs her exploring hand away from her eye as he sits in the spot radiating heat. Starting to remember some stuff now. A hospital. Some stitches. A hockey game. Where the hell are they? "You were getting cold, so I got a blanket."

Sam's apartment. Their house got broken into; she got hit, so they had to go back to his apartment. Natalie went to up to a cottage for the week with a friend so it was empty. Must be four or five in the morning now. They have work. "I should go get ready—"

"You're already in pajamas."

"That's not what—"

"Just lie back down."

Listens to him, because at times he knows her better than she does. Collapses against his chest, void of t-shirt now. Jeans exchanged for sweats. Shoulders feel the soft tickle of the downy comforter from his bed. A new baggie of ice lies on her eye.

"This reminds me of that one time we got lost at the turn off coming back to Toronto." Lips mime against her forehead and finish the sentence with a lingering kiss.

Laughs against his chest. His stomach ripples as he shares in the memory. "You got furious with me that day."

"You were so annoying that day."

"I thought you were going to throw me over the guardrails at the pit stop."

Fingers still from drizzling down her arms. Simple things he does that soothe and calm her into a welcoming sleep. Cranes his neck forward an inch so the bottom of his chin fills the curve of her nose. "I'd never hurt you."

"Uh huh, I'm pretty sure I had friction burns on my ass from the backseat of your car."

Corner of his grin grows against her forehead in the darkness. In her half conscious state, the thought, knowing he's smiling, makes her smile against his chest. "I channeled my anger in a more creative method."

"And you couldn't have done that today?"

"Jules, seeing you like this. In this state. In our house." Just as quickly it fades. Arm around her waist coils tighter as he exhales sharply, rustling a few strands of her hair. "It might physically hurt me."

"Sam, I'm still right here."

"I know but I can't help stop thinking about if—"

"No. No 'what ifs'. This is what happened and we're both alive." Eye slowly shuts. Hears the solid thump of his heart while his mind creates elaborate fabrications where their house was crashed into by a meteor. Or a land boat. Or a rampaging bull elephant being ridden by King Kong while he plays the tom toms. Hand spreads wide over the beat, finger pads caressing his skin. "It's enough."

Chest hammering and the arm strangling her waist relax. Takes a deep inhalation which bounces her. She grins against his chest. Feels the soft drop of a kiss on her exposed shoulder because the neck of her t-shirt has angled, then on her neck. Ends with a slight peck by her ear which erupts goose bumps on her skin. "It's all I need."