I did kind of switch their personalities eh, I thought it would be interesting/fun/both. I'm glad a few of you are enjoying and I'm sorry a few of you aren't. Good news/bad news, we are over the half way point, so only a few more weeks of torture :) Thanks for reading and commenting. Have a nice week, see you next week, and stay safe out there

One night Holly shows up at Gail's, she knocks on the door, Gail answers. Holly, "hey."

"Hey. Did you forget your key?" Gail looks into the night, "did you want to come in? I'm just watching some tv."

Holly nods her head; she sheds her coat, unties her boots and joins Gail on the coach. Gail grabs them both a beer from the fridge, she looks over to make sure she's not dreaming, Holly sitting on her couch, Gail goes back to watching the tv. After the program ends, Holly turns to Gail, "so you're probably wondering why I'm here." They haven't seen each other in a couple of days, between opposite shifts and Lisa being weirdly needy, Holly doesn't know why she keeps putting up with Lisa, she's still quite annoyed with her friend from University, she said she forgave her, but... So, Holly and Gail have only been texting. Also Holly needed to make up her mind, she felt the only way she could ultimately do so was if she stopped spending all of her available time with the blonde detective.

"Yes and no, we do spend a fair bit of time together and you are sharing a house with Chloe, so I just assumed you're trying to avoid her, I know I would," Gail turns off the tv, turns towards Holly to fully focus on her. Gail's not really sure where Holly stands with Trish and in all honesty, Gail doesn't think Holly knows where she stands with Trish either. Sure Holly and Gail have been hanging out a lot more lately, and the two have been getting slightly more intimate with extra little kisses here and there, but Gail doesn't want to go too far into it with Holly until Holly verbally says 'I gave back Trish's engagement ring.' But in reality, Gail can only hold off for so long, eventually she's going to give in to her urges, she's only human.

Holly smiles at Gail's comment on Chloe, she likes Chloe, but sometimes the officer can be a bit much. "Trish keeps showing up, trying to talk things through, trying to convince me that her and I can be together again, and that we can make it work." Holly shakes her head, "it's just…all my forced conversations with her aren't what they were. I don't know why, but talking to you and being with you is so easy. It has never been easy for Trish and me; we worked to make it work. But with you and I, we just click. It scared me at first, how well you and I got along. She kept bringing up…stuff, and I would just sit there and think about you. It wasn't fair to me, to her, or ultimately to you." Holly pauses, here comes the hard part, she looks over at Gail, "we've been hanging out a fair bit, and I don't what you want to count them as, but I don't really know if you can consider us as only friends or what, but-" Holly pauses. "I was hoping we could revisit a topic from a couple of months ago." Gail's quiet, letting Holly do the talking. "You've been kissing me on the cheek a lot lately, and I really like it and it makes me blush, probably more than it should but-" Holly closes her eyes and leans in to kiss Gail, who leans in too. After the first sweet kiss, Holly sighs. It feels right. She kisses Gail's lips again. She smiles, this is what she wanted. She brings her hand up to Gail's face; she runs her fingers through the blonde's short hair, loving the feel. She kisses Gail a little more urgently. She pulls back slightly, thinking she should slow things down, not wanting to rush her or Gail. She waits for a kiss from Gail; she ends up getting pulled on top of Gail. Holly giggles.

Damn, Gail thinks as she reconnects their lips, Gail would do anything for that giggle. She pulls back just slightly to ask one very important question before they go too far, "what about Trish?"

"I gave her back her ring," Holly smiles.

That's all Gail wanted to know as she kisses Holly forcefully, Holly keeps pace. Gail's phone rings, "ignore it," says the blonde. Holly has moved her kisses down to Gail's neck, Gail moans. The blonde's phone starts to ring again. Holly kind of snickers, of course when they finally have no reason to stop, something comes up, Gail groans, "one second." She reaches for her phone, but it has stopped ringing, "just my brother," says Gail as she tosses her phone back onto the coffee table.

"Do you need to call him back?" Holly questions.

"I'll call him back tomorrow," Gail smirks.

Holly smiles and moves to kiss Gail again. About two minutes later there is a knock at the door. Gail flops her head back against the couch's arm rest, "now what?"

Holly laughs and moves to get off of Gail, knowing the detective will get up to answer her door.

Gail looks through the door's window and opens the door hurriedly, "what do you want Steven?"

"Hello, dear sister," he says with a smile, "I tried calling you, we need someone to watch Leo."

"I have company," says Gail, "we're kind of in the middle of something."

Gail looks behind Steve and sees Leo grabbing his bag from the car and saying goodbye to Traci, he walks up to the front porch. Steve says a bit quieter so Leo can't hear, "Traci's mom is in the hospital, we are heading there now."

"Oh, ok, text me the details," says Gail.

Steve nods his head.

"Hi Leo, I hear you are spending the night with me."

"Yeah, Grandma's sick, mom and Steve are going to go check on her," he walks past her and into the house; Gail ruffles his hair on his way by.

"Thanks," says Steve. Just realizing what his sister previously said, he furrows his brow, "who's your company and what were you up to?"

"Hi Aunt Holly!" Leo says from within the house.

"Oh," says Steve and gives his sister a look.

"Shut it, wish Mrs. Nash my best, give Traci a hug for me," she waves to her friend in the car.

"I will, thanks again."

Gail shuts the door and looks at the two brunettes sitting on her couch, "who's ready to play hide and seek?" Leo lets out a little gasp, "I'm it, I'm counting to forty," Holly laughs, Gail makes some serious eye contact with her, "you're hiding too Stewart." Gail closes her eyes, "one, two, three…"

Even though it was past Leo's bed time, she knew the boy wouldn't have fallen asleep, so after multiple rounds of hide and go seek, she could see the five year old was getting tired. She ushered him upstairs, got him ready for bed and read him a bed time story. After Leo was tucked in she went into her own room and flopped on her bed.

Holly walks into the doorway and looks at the blonde; she joins Gail on her bed. "That was fun," says Holly.

Gail turns her head to look at Holly, "it's not the fun I thought we were going to have," she wiggles her eyebrows.

Holly smiles and runs her hand through Gail's hair, "true, but it was still fun." Holly continues to stare at Gail's face, "you have beautiful eyes."

Gail smiles, "thank you." Gail can see Holly's thinking about something, something is turning over and over in that head of hers, "what's on your mind?"

"I've been starting to see a future for us, I really like spending time with you, and I want there to be a future for us and I don't want to mess this up. And I think I love you. And I want to give us a chance and I don't know if I can do that just yet or if you want that, and…yeah."

"Oh." Gail pauses thoughtfully, giving Holly time to think and adjust to her revelation. "That's okay."

"It is?"

"Yes," Gail draws Holly towards her; Holly stretches out so she's lying on top of Gail. "I love you too, and I've waited this long, I think I can wait a little while longer if you don't want to jump into a relationship relationship."

"You will?"

"Of course."

Holly rests her head on Gail's shoulder. "Thank you." She sighs, happy to be here with Gail, happy to be in such close proximity and not feel uncomfortable about it. "Can we stay friends?"

"Friends who kiss," Gail clarifies.

Holly chuckles, "sure."

"Shall we seal it with a kiss?"

Holly lifts her head and pecks Gail's perfect lips, she rests her head back on Gail's shoulder, "you're insane."

"Sure, but you like it, actually it has recently been brought to my attention that you no longer just like it, but you love it."

Holly laughs again, she does love it and she doesn't know why it took her so long to admit it to herself. "So we can stay friends or whatever you'd call us, for a little while longer?"

"Yes, but just so you know, I don't normally hold my friends like this or tell them I love you."

Holly smiles, "that's okay, I can wait for that."

"Good, 'cause I don't make exceptions, no matter how beautiful they are."

Holly laughs lightly, "and I don't want you too." The two lay there in quiet, happy to be in the other's company. "Could I stay here with you tonight? I don't want to be alone in my hotel room right now or go back to Chloe's; I think she's upset with Dov about something."

"Of course, whatever you need friend." Gail continues to hug Holly, enjoying the weight of Holly on top of her, even if it wasn't the way she hoped for, soon though, she tells herself. "Did you want some sleep clothes?"

"Does that mean we have to move from our positions?"

"Yes, I don't know how you could get them on any other way."

"Then I'm fine like this."

"We could change and come back to this?" Gail offers.

"No," says Holly, "then it'll become a whole thing."

Gail chuckles, "whatever you want nerd."

Holly shows up at Gail's house the following day after work. Mrs. Nash is still in hospital and since Dax is out of town, Leo is still at Gail's house. Mrs. Nash was hanging some holiday decorations and fell off her step stool, she sadly broke her hip, because it wasn't too bad of a fall, she should make a speedy recovery. Traci thought about inviting her mom to stay with her and Steve, but since their house has stairs, it logistically wouldn't work out, so Mrs. Nash will be recovering at a retirement home before she heads back to her own house. Holly knocks on Gail's front door, she can hear Leo yell to Gail that there's someone at the door. A few seconds later Gail opens the door, she's babysitting Leo again, "Holly, hey." She immediately smiles. "Why do you keep knocking? I gave you a key."

Holly shakes her head.

"Something wrong?" Gail furrows her brow; she hasn't known Holly to be speechless.

"Hi Leo," greets Holly, "I just need to talk to your aunt on the front porch for a second."

"Okay, then you want to play cars or hide and go seek? That was fun yesterday!"

Gail looks at Holly, curious what they need to talk about, "did you want to stay for dinner?"

"Sure," Holly shrugs her shoulders, she really has nowhere else to be, she pulls Gail outside and shuts the door.

"What did you want to-" Gail can't finish her question; Holly's lips are already on hers. This keeps happening to Gail, unable to finish her thoughts, keep getting interrupted by Holly's lips, she's not complaining though.

Holly sighs, she missed Gail's lips, she missed Gail, even though they woke up together and they've really only been apart for maybe ten hours. She presses their foreheads together, "I didn't know if you wanted me to kiss you in front of Leo, since we are friends that kiss," she smirks.

They easily snake their arms around each other. Gail hums and rocks them side to side; she's not sure how that works either. Gail opens her eyes and looks over Holly's face, the woman of her dreams, "I should head back inside, I don't want to leave him unsupervised for too long."

"What, do you think he'll choke on a car or something?" Holly asks quizzically, in a slightly joking manner.

Gail slightly nervous now opens the door, "Leo," she calls out, "are you choking on a car?"

"No?" the boy responds.

"Why does it sound like you're not sure?" Gail asks.

"Why would you think I'm choking on a car?"

"Your aunt asked me if you were, so I was just making sure you weren't, we'll just be another minute," Gail shuts the door again.

"Wow," says Holly with a smirk on her face, "you just threw me under the bus."

Gail just shrugs her shoulders.

Holly laughs.

"I need to go check the food in the oven, make sure it's not burning." Gail brings their lips together again; she kisses Holly once more, a kiss that hopefully conveys all the emotions she doesn't feel comfortable saying just yet, she opens her eyes to watch Holly's flutter. She hears the brunette groan, bringing a smirk to the blonde's lips. Gail can't help herself as she brings their lips together once more; she leaves a lingering kiss on Holly's lips.

"You don't play fair."

Gail laughs.

Holly still has her eyes closed, "I'm okay with burnt food."

Gail pecks Holly's lips and releases her hold and heads back indoors, leaving Holly outside in the cold air.

"Where's Aunt Holly?"

"She'll just be a minute," Gail smirks.

Gail and Holly continue to take it slow. The blonde is hopelessly in love with Holly, she truly wants what's best for the doctor. So the two continue to hang out at the batting cages or the Penny or Gail's house, Holly even convinced Gail to go to another sciency thingy.

But today, Gail had a shit day, her shift got extended, it's now three am and she wants to go see Holly, she doesn't know why, but she has the need to see her. She feels like she hasn't seen the brunette in forever since they've been working opposite shifts…again, and haven't been able to connect with her, always being the wrong time of day to call, but no one likes unexpected visitors at three in the morning. Her shift was taxing, mentally and physically, it pulled at all the right heart strings and Gail feels like if she doesn't push the thoughts too far away, she's going to end up crying in her car, and she doesn't want to impair her driving. She finally pulls into her driveway, she sees Holly's car parked there. A sad smile crosses Gail's face. She gets out of her car and enters her house through the front door. She had a late lunch and doesn't want dinner anymore, she's past being hungry. She just wants to see Holly and to sleep. She makes her way into her bedroom, she quickly sheds her clothing and slips on her pjs, she lifts the covers and slips into bed. Holly turns around to see Gail. Gail asks, "is everything ok?" Holly doesn't normally sleep at Gail's let alone be there when the blonde isn't.

"Yeah, I was hoping to watch a movie with you tonight."

"Oh, sorry, I had to work."

"I know," Holly can see the moisture in Gail's eyes, the light from the alarm clock shining perfectly in Gail's face alerting Holly to Gail's glistening eyes. "Is everything ok with you?"

"Yes, no, maybe. I was hoping to see you, but I didn't think I should go to Chloe's house at this hour."

Holly looks at the clock and sees the time, "it's a good thing I came here then."

"It's a good thing I gave you a key and that you finally learned to use it." Gail shifts closer to Holly.

Holly shifts closer to Gail, "can I hold you?"

Gail moves even closer to the doctor and curls into her, "I don't want to talk, I just want to sleep."

"Okay." Holly wraps her arms around Gail. She can feel the stress in Gail's body. She listens to Gail's breathing. She can start to feel the tension leave Gail. Holly has no clue what hurt Gail today, but she's glad she was here now to help her though the night.