One Sunday a month after the party, Rosalie was busy packing suitcases in Alan's hotel suite. She neatly folded her sweaters, skirts and jeans, and zipped them into the three cases on the bed. Her laptop bag was on the bed too, as well as her dress from the party. She brushed it down gently, smiling slightly remembering the fun they'd had.

"I thought you'd be done by now," Alan said as he walked into the room.

"Last few cases and I will be. Back to New York for a few days, square myself up, and then Vive La France." He stood back, watching her and nervously tapping his hands.

"Can I take you for dinner?"

"Of course, I'm not leaving till tomorrow. We're not parting on bad terms Alan. We're just…"

"Done."

"Not done. An open pause."

Alan sighed. He'd known it was coming but he'd ignored it stubbornly for a few days, postponing the inevitable. They'd settled into a comforting routine over the last month – she would work all day at the library, he would be in the office, then in the evenings they'd get a late dinner at a restaurant, drink good wine, come home and fall asleep next to each other with her head on his chest. On Friday nights they would go with Denny for a meal for father and daughter to spend time together and then Alan would sleep over, with Rosalie returning to the hotel to give them space. Saturdays they would go for long walks, harbour boat trips, shopping, watching old movies at the theater or going to museums. Sundays were spent lazily, usually with breakfast in bed and a crossword often followed by an afternoon of lovemaking. It was strange how he'd come to think of it as that; he had always drawn a line between sex and love, but somehow it had become blurred now. Rosalie had blurred everything. The way she would spontaneously dance with him in the middle of the bedroom in the morning with her nightdress smooth against his chest, the furrowed concentration on her brow when she woke up early with a sudden thought about work, the way her laugh relaxed him after a long day in court. He supposed he probably did love her, in his way. Her leaving was causing him pain.

Rosalie could feel Alan watching her as she packed the last of her non-essential items. There was a small lump in her throat as she thought about getting on the plane the next day. They had fitted so easily into each other's lives, just being together in the same spaces and knowing when to give distance. They'd argued of course, but never without making up. They had talked about many things; their marriages, jobs, childhoods, politics, books, dreams, her father… It gave her solace to know that he and her father would have each other whilst she was away, of course. The two were inseparable, lascivious bordering on lecherous, full of schoolboy antics, and they doted on each other. She trusted Alan implicitly to care for Denny in her temporary absence. Her father had even told her that if she wanted to be with Alan, they had his blessing. But they had never discussed how they felt about each other. She thought she loved him, but it had been a long time since she'd been in love and she wasn't honestly sure she could remember what it felt like. With Larry it had been different. They were happy enough once, but there was never the spark she felt with Alan when they touched, and she never felt fully settled in her marriage. Unsurprising really, given that he subsequently cheated on her and left her. Perhaps she could unpack her thoughts better in France, without feeling Alan's gaze on her. She felt a flush creep up her neck.

"You're watching me."

"I'm more thinking about moving those cases off the bed and throwing you onto it."

"I look like a slob!" She chuckled, turning around and pulling at her jersey sweatpants and an oversized Boston Red Sox sweater she had bought as a souvenir one afternoon.

"You look perfect," Alan replied. "I wouldn't change a thing." She sensed a change in his demeanor and walked over to him, putting a hand on his cheek.

"Remember you said we should focus on the time we have? We still have time." She looked into his eyes but couldn't detect the emotion he was feeling. "I won't be gone forever, the dig is only three months long."

"You won't be coming back, Rosalie. You'll need to go back to New York, work on your research… Maybe you'll visit Denny in the office one day and we'll cross paths, and it will be nice, maybe we'll promise to go for a drink, we might even manage to have it, maybe we'll even have sex, but we won't have this again."

"Why are you so adamant that you can't be happy?" She moved her hand from his face in exasperation and walked back to the bed to move the cases off. "Life isn't like the law Alan, there's not just a giant set of scales somewhere that says for one person to be happy another can't be." Alan sighed and moved to sit on the edge of the bed.

"I am happy, now. But I don't believe it will come back once you're gone, because whenever a thing is good, something always ruins it." Rosalie sat next to him and put her head on his shoulder.

"Then don't let it. Enjoy your life whilst I'm gone, and then let me know if there's still space in it for me when I get back. I'm not asking you to commit yourself, I just want you to know… I will come back. And not just for Dad." She kissed his shoulder softly and he rested his head atop hers, snaking an arm around her waist.

"You do look perfect right now you know."

Alan took Rosalie to their favourite burger joint for her last meal. They drank beer and she dripped cheese down her chin, and they laughed and talked and held hands on the table. Walking home Alan had his arm around her and nearly tripped over on the sidewalk. It was, to an onlooker, a fairly mundane evening for a couple of their ages. The onlooker would probably have assumed that they'd got a babysitter for the night and travelled in from their home in the suburbs of Boston for some date night nostalgia of places they went when they had first dated, just after college or similar. Moreover, the onlooker would think they looked happy and contented. That same onlooker would see them go up to the hotel and imagine that they were celebrating an anniversary or birthday with a night away in a junior suite with a bottle of champagne. Once they returned to Alan's suite however, for the first time there was an awkwardness between them. They had never had the pressure of knowing it would be the last time before. They had a glass of scotch each and smoked on the balcony, before going into the bedroom to get ready for bed and lying next to each other.

"This feels weird," Rosalie said simply after a few minutes of silence.

"It does."

"What do you think we should do?"

"I think that right now, I would like to hold you." Rosalie shuffled over and took her usual place underneath his arm, her head a little above his heart. His arms comforted her and after a little while she heard him making the regular breathing noises of his sleep. She gently kissed his chest and closed her eyes, letting his heartbeat lull her to sleep.

At 3am, Rosalie shot up awake at the sound of screaming. Alan was having his first night terror for months and was stood looking panicked in the centre of the room. She scrambled out of bed as he made a beeline for the dormer windows and started to unlock them, she threw her arms on his shoulders in terror.

"Alan, sweetheart, come back to bed. It's all okay, I'm here and you're safe. It's me, Rosalie. Shhh, calm down and come back to bed with me," she whispered soothingly to him, feeling his ragged breath begin to steady. "Nothing will hurt you while I'm here, come and lie down with me again." Slowly, Alan retreated back to bed, climbing under the covers with Rosalie next to him. She gently stroked his hair and face, shushing quietly, and murmuring.

"That's right… it's all okay now… you're safe here and I love you." Without thinking about what she had just said, she cuddled up to him and placed her arm around his waist.