Despite her wanting to stay awake, sleep took over Lisbon when she lay down after calming Beth and making sure she went back to sleep. Lisbon had only meant to rest her back, but she'd closed her eyes and forgotten to open them again.

Jane chuckled as he watched Lisbon fight to keep her eyes open before she lost the battle. He returned to the kitchen to finish up the cleaning. All that was left to do now was wipe off the oven and fridge door. And so he got to work, humming to himself.


Teresa watched as a belt flew through the air and collided with her little brother's back. James whimpered and covered the back of his neck. Teresa looked at the counter and sink. There was evidence left out. He was drunk again. She saw him raise the belt again, and ran across the kitchen and flung herself on top of her twin brothers.

She felt the pain on her back. Once, twice, again and again. She lost count.

After what seemed like hours, Teresa stopped receiving new stings of pain, and a belt clattered to the ground. She stayed crouched over her brothers for a few minutes to be safe, and then rushed them to the basement and locked the door behind her. She handed the twins off to Tom, made it to the back room and passed out.

Lisbon's eyes flew open. She was surrounded by darkness, and found herself completely terrified. How long had she been passed out? Her back still stung, though not as bad as she expected. Now her job was to get up and join Tom in calming their little brothers down. She got up and felt her way towards the door and was surprised to find it open. Why were the lights off? Surely the boys hadn't gone upstairs?

Lisbon spun around several times before noticing a light down the hall. ...Down the hall? The basement didn't have a hallway... She cautiously headed towards it and poked her head through the door.

"Good morning, Agent Lisbon!" said a cheery voice from the table.

Lisbon blinked several times and looked at the consultant.

"You are awake, aren't you?" Jane asked.

"...Yeah, yeah," Lisbon said, shaking her head and putting a palm to her forehead, "I'm up."

Jane got up and walked towards the agent. He grabbed her shoulders and looked her directly in the eyes. "You're up, but you're not awake," he declared. "Tell me where you are."

Lisbon was coming slowly back to reality. "At the office... in the kitchen," she replied.

"What day is it?"

Lisbon stopped eye contact with the consultant briefly to look at the time displayed on the microwave. 2:30 AM. "It's Thursday."

Jane grinned and returned to his seat. "Welcome back to the real world! You woke up. Your nightmare is over."

Lisbon fell into a chair at the table across from Jane and dropped her head into her hands. She pulled a hand through her hair. It was short, just at her shoulders. She wasn't thirteen. She was a full grown CBI agent spending the night at the office for a little girl. James and Jack were at her apartment, not in a basement. A sigh of relief rushed out of her.

"What was it this time?" Jane asked, taking a sip of tea.

Lisbon responded by glaring at Jane. He noticed the bags under her eyes were darker than they had been when she fell asleep. "How long was I sleeping?" she asked, pushing herself up.

"I don't know if you could call it sleeping." Jane replaced his teacup onto it's saucer before continuing. "For the past hour and a half all you've been doing is talking, kicking, and thrashing."

Lisbon's eyes widened. "What was I saying?" She was honestly surprised. She thought she'd stopped talking in her sleep when she was 16.

Jane didn't say anything for a moment. Then he picked up his saucer and cup and headed towards the sink. "Not anything that made sense," he lied. Well, it wasn't a complete lie. It wouldn't have made any sense to anyone else on the team. They hadn't made dinner with the Lisbon twins.

Silence fell over the kitchen. Jane was studying Lisbon for at least three minutes before she noticed. "What?" she said irritably.

Jane looked at her a good thirty seconds more before responding. "How long ago did Tom die?"

Lisbon snapped into a rigid position and fixed her suddenly flaming eyes on Jane.

"How old were you when your mother got hit by a drunk driver?"

"Good night, Jane!" Lisbon snapped furiously before getting up and leaving the kitchen.

Jane sighed and sat back down at the table. She'd be waking up again. 45 minutes later, she proved him right. He saw he shoot up in her sleeping bag once again, wiping her face off with the back of her hand. He flipped his head back to look at the clock. It was 4:30. Jane watched Lisbon slowly fall back into her sleeping bag and decided to let her try sleeping once more before repeating the previous morning's activities.

Sure enough, Lisbon popped up once more at 5:15. He offered to drop her off at her apartment, and to his surprise, she agreed and got up.


I know! It's really short! I'm sorry! :(

Please tell me what you thought of the chapter, anyway! It will be greatly appreciated! I'll smile, and respond to your review, I promise!!! :D