You are all so very beautiful with your reviews! I didn't think I'd be one of those "please review!!!" kind of authors, but I'm very appreciative of everything that has been shot at me so keep them coming! Also, kudos to those who connected "Your Ex-Lover is Dead" by stars, I felt it was a very accurate song when it comes to Naomi and Emily, especially for this story, so those that don't know it should listen. Thank you all very much for the lovin'!


Naomi's stomach sank as soon as she realized who the message must have come from, but she let out a laugh of disbelief. Surely, if it was who she thought it was, she still had those same guts. Moving the phone between her hands momentarily, she pondered what the correct response would be. Surely, they weren't friends so anything friendly was out of the question, but since Emily had taken the time to message her with just a simple word, she could hardly be so rude and not respond. But what was she to say? She hadn't planned to run into her father, she didn't even like fucking taxis in the first place. Emily knew where she had gone when she left their hometown and yet it was still ironic? She surely wasn't the one that was interfering on what Emily built in her absence! It was the other way around.

Half a bag of crisps later and she had only opened the message, spun her chair around and clicked through a few more e-mails but still didn't think of a proper response. Fucking ironic, it wasn't ironic. She wanted to text Emily back and tell her that she got her words wrong and really it was just silly, or stupid, and to go back home to England and leave her and her life alone. It wasn't perfect, but it was hers and it was what she built after the fucking destruction of what they had. Naomi had left Bristol a completely different person than she wanted to be. Before Emily, she had been content to be alone and even found it comfortable. But when everything corroded around them, she felt alone when she was Iwith/I Emily and she knew that was worse. One shouldn't feel alone when they're in love with someone. She'd taken into account the fact that sure, Emily probably felt alone too. She had lashed out and treated Naomi the way that she believed Naomi deserved and it was fine. Naomi believed she deserved it too, for a while, then it was just hateful. There was nothing ironic about them being in New York, just a stroke of bad luck. So that's what she sent.

Bad luck, I reckon.

After the message was sent, she regretted it. Sure they had ended poorly, but it didn't mean they had to continue to drag it out. So it happened, so she ran into Rob Fitch . She ran it over and over again, still failing to see the supposed irony. Obviously, it wasn't her day to actually complete any work, but going home to Cook and being questioned wasn't something that Naomi particularly wanted to endure, not today after all that she'd already endured. It was a shock to the system, Emily being flung into her life after the years of burning and drinking her away. She tucked the phone into the pocket of her cardigan and slid more paperwork into her bag and vacated her desk, passing her supervisor with a mumble about research on the outskirts. What that meant, she really couldn't be bothered to decipher and her supervisor didn't really seem to care either. She needed to be out of the office, it was sucking all of the life out of her body and she felt like she was suffocating while she waited for the elevator. Her phone buzzed as the door's open, only tightening her chest even further.

Maybe not so bad.

Well, what the fuck. Slumping against the wall of the elevator as it descended, she rubbed the bridge of her nose. What the fuck was she supposed to respond to that with? Was this really Emily messaging her? It didn't seem like the bitter girl that she'd last seen, the messages, however brief, didn't project the hatred that had settled between them, the mutual disdain that they had left that last Christmas they had seen each other in a loud bar. If it hadn't been for Cook and the girl Emily was obviously fucking, there would have been more than a few slurs hurled at one another. A sigh escaped Naomi's lips at the memory of it. She was still unsure why there was so much irritation, but it was something about that thin line between love and hate. Frankly, Emily had hurled them over the hateful side when they were seventeen. Thought, admittedly, Naomi had started it. She had grown enough in the time they'd spent apart to be able to accept her part of their demise. But it hadn't been something that Emily had been willing to accept. She may have lit the match, but Emily had fanned the flames until they burned everything. Maybe she had hoped Naomi would catch fire. The way she had acted towards Naomi, the blonde didn't think that thought was really so absurd. Pushing off the wall as the doors opened, she was hit with a wave of anger.

Who the fuck was Emily Fitch to still make her chest hurt so bad. She no longer reserved that right, not after she had fought so hard to regain control of herself. And really, why was her luck so bloody awful? She again was at a loss with what she was supposed to respond with, but now was also faced with the dilemma of where to spend the rest of her day. The beginning of spring meant warmer weather, but also warranted everything far too wet to spend her time in the park. And since it was still before noon, it was too early to head to the pub. She scoffed as the thought even passed her mind, she wasn't a child anymore. She was 23 and an adult. With a sound that was similar to a whine, she resigned to head back towards her flat, though her mind was still glued to the brick of a phone that inhabited her pocket. She might as well have made sure it was Emily before letting herself get too wound up over it, she wasn't even sure if it was her former lover or maybe someone she'd drunkenly given her number. That tended to happen a lot when she let herself relax too much while tending bar. She typed out a message quickly and quickened her pace.

Stalking me overseas now, hey?

It was meant as a joke, of course, and she hoped it came across that way. They surely couldn't have that same level of hatred. If it wasn't Emily, the joke would just make her look like a fool and at this stage, she was okay with that, as long as it clarified the situation. Maybe, if it was in fact her ex-girlfriend, the joke would lighten the tension between them that Naomi still felt, even through text messages. She blindly fished through the contents of her bag as she walked, finally gripping onto the pack of cancer sticks that would hopefully easy her nerves. With the flick of her lighter and the first drag, she felt the nicotine coursing through her system and the tension lift just barely from her muscles. This, like the rest of her day of course, was ruined by the buzzing of her phone in her pocket. The dreadful vibration moved against her side and not even a deep, long inhale of smoke could make her forget it.

Still annoying as ever. ;)

And then it was confirmed, with a fucking smiley winky fucking face. She swore as she climbed the stairs in her building that she had read over the message at least ninety times before she reached her door. Even read it over as she fumbled with her keys in the lock, obviously enough for Cook to hear her and whip the door open. She watched his confusion transform into that priceless James Cook grin and then slide back into confusion again and wondered what she looked like. Was it possible for just a few hours of a morning to run someone down, enough to make Cook look at her like that. He looped an arm around her shoulders and pulled her into their shared space, pushing the dog aside gently with his foot. He didn't question her until he had shut the door behind them, dropped her coat and bag to the floor and sat her onto the couch, all while she let him, phone still gripped in her hand.

"Naomikins, you look like you've seen the ghost of Christmas past or some shit. What the fuck?"