A/N Wait what a new chapter already? It hasn't even been a week! Fortuanlty for everyone this chapter was written before my last computer bit the dust and was waiting for the last chapter to finally be completed. Even better news the next chapter was also written and the following chapter is in the process of being written. I'll upload the next chapter in the next few days. Enjoy!

Chapter 38

Greenlee sat silent as the first snowflakes dropped softly to the ground. The wind howled as the people of Pine valley prepared for the first storm of the year. Greenlee pulled the jacket tighter around her frail frame, more out of habit then for warmth. Her body was numb to the world around her. She had come here hoping to feel something, other than the terror that constantly consumed her. She had come to the place that had been so special to her, a place that gave her hope. Even after he was gone coming here helped her see she could still live, even if it was without him. For the first time, as she sat in this sacred place, she couldn't feel anything but hopelessness.

Greenlee knew she wasn't supposed to be there, despite her pleas to be let out for just a few hours, Angie had adamantly refused to release her from the hospital. Greenlee knew she should have stayed in the hospital but the white walls, the sad look in the nurses' eyes, the quite dripping of IV's, the despair in Angie's voice when each test came back with the results they were dreading; it was all beginning to be too much for her. She wasn't sure what was worse; the cancer that was slowing killing her from the inside, or the way the hospital was slowing killing her spirit.

When her pleas had little effect on Angie she had turned her attention to the two unexpected people in her life; JR and Amanda. They had both fought cancer and had to know what it was like to sit in a hospital bed day after day slowly wasting away. Despite her assurance that she would be ok, that a few hours wouldn't change anything, they had refused to go against Angie's orders.

Greenlee watched as the loan boat on the lake slowly rocked back and forth with the slow moving waves. Soon the same lake she and Leo had swam in just days before they were married would be frozen over. Greenlee couldn't remember how she even got to the boat house. One moment a nurse was leaving with yet another sample of her blood, and the next she was climbing the old wooden steps wearing the same jeans and sweater she had worn when Angie admitted her to the hospital; of course now the clothes that had once fit her perfectly were falling off her thinning frame. She didn't know if she had walked here or if she had called a taxi. How she got here hadn't mattered she just knew this is where she had to be.

The quick flashes of a women walking slowly from one side of town to the other were replaced with the memories of arguing with JR the night before. Life had become routine for the two of them. She sat alone in a hospital room until he left work. He had long since stopped going back to the mansion. Before she had been readmitted to the hospital he had all but moved in to her place. Now when he left Chandler Enterprises he went straight to the hospital. They ate dinner together and tried to talk like life was normal. There was always the elephant in the room that reminded them of where they were and why they were there, but they tried to be as normal as possible. He told her about the latest dealing of Chandler and gave her updates on Fusion. To most people they appeared to be a normal couple, except they weren't a couple. The kiss they nearly shared the night before Jack and Erica's wedding had never been brought up, and both refused to tell the other what their hearts were feeling.

Last night was different, Greenlee was feeling sicker than normal and was barely eating anything, Angie had told them both that if they didn't find a bone marrow donor soon she was risking being too weak for them to be able to do the transplant.

Both JR and Angie had teamed up against her begging her to pick up the phone and call Jackson, to tell him how sick she was. JR had tried to convince her that she wasn't being selfish and that Jackson would want to know what was wrong with her. As hard as she was fighting them to give her a few short hours out of the hospital, that was how hard they tried to change her mind about keeping her father in the dark. And, just like she wasn't getting the answer she wanted, she refused again and again to let her father back in.

Every time she came close to picking up the phone to call Jackson, the memories would flood her mind. She remembered the night before she almost died on that motorcycle, the night before she was going to marry Ryan, "I wish you all the happiness that you desire, the caring that you deserve, and the knowledge that there's more than one guy in this room who loves you unconditionally", and then she would remember the last time he talked to her and the last words he had to said to her in over a year, "You may be biologically my daughter, but you'll always be Roger Smythe's little girl."

He had promised to love her unconditionally but when life got hard for them he had proven those had been empty words, in the heat of anger he had shown her his true colors. And now, she was so scared that even if she told him the truth he would turn a blind eye towards her, and leave her to die alone in a hospital room, with people who weren't her family to hold her hand and say goodbye.

Despite the internal battle she waged, she knew she was going to have to tell him, and soon, if she hoped to beat this Cancer. She knew Jackson and Erica would be back from their honeymoon any day now, it was almost Thanksgiving and Jackson had to be with his family on important days like that. Greenlee swore to herself as she sat alone in the boat house that she would ask Jackson for help after Christmas. As much as he hurt her she didn't want to ruin his holidays, she didn't want him spending what should be a joyous month, worried about her.

Between the loud roar of the wind and the deepness of her thoughts, Greenlee never heard the stairs call out that she had a companion. It wasn't until she felt the warm body sit next to her that she knew she wasn't alone anymore.

"Greenlee?" She looked up into his bright blue eyes, the look of worry they held were the first thing she noticed.

"JR?" She looked at him confused. "What are you doing here?"

"What am I doing here?!" He looked at her bewildered. "What am I doing here?" He repeated again, "I show up in your room and find your bed empty and no one knows where you are.

"I called Amanda and Angie. I went to your apartment and you weren't there. I had no idea where you were. Do you know how scared we were? How scared I..I" His voice caught… "I was? What the hell were you thinking?"

She saw the he fear and sadness in his eyes, and turned away from him, focusing on the rocking boat on the lake. When she left the hospital she wasn't thinking of what it would do to him, only what she needed.

"I'm sorry JR….." she started timidly.

"You're sorry! You're sorry!" He interrupted her, "Do you realize how dangerous it is for you to leave the hospital! Do you even care that you could get sick?"

"I am sick." She answered back trying to avoid eye contact with him, knowing that his eyes held more hurt then she was prepared for.

"Fine! Sicker then! Why would you leave the hospital Greenlee? Why would you put your life in danger like this?" He tried to control his anger, not wanting to upset her, but he was angry and scared. He was terrified that he was going to lose her that he would never get a chance to tell her how special she really was.

"I had to get out of there JR….you wouldn't understand…you don't know what it's like…." She looked down at her hands as her fingers instinctively picked at her nails.

JR paused for a moment before answering her, "I know better than anyone else what you're going through Greenlee. I know what it's like to be alone in the hospital, and not know if you're going to see tomorrow. I know what that fear is like." His voice softened, he remembered the nights of sheer terror that you might go to sleep and never wake up again. He of all people knew what she was feeling.

"Then why wouldn't you help me?" she countered.

He looked at her confused, "Why wouldn't I help you? I've been with you through everything! I held your hand through chemo. I was with you every time the doctors gave you more bad news. I would do anything if you didn't have to go through this."

"No!" She interrupted him this time. "If you know what it's like then why would you leave me there? I needed to get out of there, if only for a little while. Couldn't you understand that?"

"Greenlee." All the hurt and terror he felt was instantly gone. He placed his hands softly atop hers, ignoring how cold they were, and waited until she looked up at him. "Can't you understand that we….that I just want to keep you safe.

"Over the last few months I've watched you fight so hard, harder than most people would have ever fought. When most people would have given up you kept fighting. You created a product line that honors Sadie's life and is helping save hundreds of people's lives every day. The whole time you've been silently fighting your own battle with cancer.

"Don't you realize how strong you are…..how special you are? I would love nothing more than to take you as far away from the hospital. To take you somewhere that doesn't have lonely white rooms. I would take you anywhere you wanted if I thought it would make you better. Every day I sit by helplessly as the doctors stick you with needles and pump you with poison that's supposed to make you well, only to watch you get sicker and sicker. I would give anything to make you well again. But I can't...I can't do that. So no I wouldn't take you away from Angie and the doctors because, because….because if anything happened to you…" His voice caught again as he felt his eyes filled with tears, "Greenlee if anything happened to you I would never forgive myself."

"JR…" the anger she had been feeling slowly melted away with each word he poured out. She looked into his eyes, the same eyes she had looked into so many times over the last few months. Those eyes offered her more care and concern than most people had shown her in a lifetime. But, tonight there was something more to those familiar eyes and to the words he spilled out. This was the same look he gave her the night he spun her around the dance floor, the night she almost kissed him.

Their eyes locked on one another, neither blinking. "Greenlee…I love you" he softly whispered, without another thought or hesitation his eyes moved closer to hers. The world seemed to stop around them as their lips met.

JR felt her soft lips on his for the first time, for just a moment he worried that she would pull back and give him a famous Greenlee slap across the face.

Greenlee had watched as his lips slowly approached hers, hoping this time no one would interrupt them. She felt the timidness in his first touch as their lips met. In spite of all the concerns racing through her mind she gave into him.

The kiss lasted only a few moments before they both pulled away and looked at on another. Looking into each other's eyes they both knew the other didn't regret the kiss. Without a second thought their lips met again this time, there was more fire and passion. Neither had realized how much the other wanted, needed, the other.

When they finally pulled away from each other her dark brown eyes met his deep blue ones. His words played in her mind over and over again, "Greenlee…I love you". For months she could only dream that he would say those three little words, words that meant more than any other three in the English language.

He looked back her hoping for a response, hoping she didn't think he was some school boy enjoying a "summer romance". She had to know that those three words weren't words he had used lightly, that they gave from his heart. He looked in to her eyes hoping to see something in them that told him she felt the same way.

In the quiet of the place she had once shared with her one true love she was face to face with a man that she would never love the same as Leo, but knew it was the kind of love that she had been craving for since he fell over the falls.

"I love you too." She finally said, the smile on her facing moving up to her eyes, and he knew she meant those words the same way he did.

He pulled her next to him enjoying a quiet moment together before he had to take her back to her own personal hell. "She's going to beat this, I won't lose her" JR promised to himself as she laid her head on his shoulder.

The two sat together in silence, not needing anymore words to convey how they felt about the other. They watched as snowflakes fell to the ground, slowly covering the park with a soft blanket of snow.

Greenlee's eyes slowly closed as she inhaled his uniquely JR scent that had become a scent of comfort these past few months. She wrapped herself into his embrace finding comfort in his strong arms once again. She sighed softly as the world around her disappeared and the darkness overtook her.