Title: Ever Wanted
Author: Noa
Category: JC/JCM, Romance
Spoilers: For Lockdown, I guess.
Rating: MC, for Major Cheesyness. That's what happens when people let me watch teen movies.
Archive: Yes for The Greatest of Loves, drop me a line for anyone else.
Feedback: YES! sharlot12@hotmail.com
Disclaimer: If I was the owner of those characters, would I be writing -fanfics- about them getting together? Good, thought so.
Thanks/Dedications: Major thanks to Lino for editing and beta-ing. Love ya, babe ::blows you million Luka's and Pat's:: And dedicated to all the Jinters around the world, and mostly to my fellow FF Jinters. May the ketchup be with you!

Summary: Sometimes love is a stranger. And sometimes it's someone you've known all your life.

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It was over. And as much as he hated to admit it, he knew it was bound to end as quickly as it started. In fact, he was quite surprised that it lasted this long, almost one month. Fantasies, he knew now, were never meant to come true. They were good and perfect as long as fantasies was all they were, but once the line was crossed and they'd become reality - It wasn't what one has ever wanted. It wasn't what one had always wanted. It was different, suddenly not so perfect anymore.

He was even taking it quite well. Or at least, he thought so. Apparently, the nurses and other people he had snapped at today didn't think so - especially not a certain Asian doctor, whom right now was the only one he cared to know whether he hurt or not. But being him, with all this damned pride, he couldn't even bring himself to apologize for snapping at her earlier that day. Not that it was anything too significant, but it was there - He had snapped, he had yelled, he had called her Dr Chen. He had never called her Dr Chen to her face, not that he could remember. And while to others, the name issue didn't seem important, it had been to them. They'd never officially announced it, but they always called each other by first names... Because they went to medical school together, he figured.

And, as it was most times after they argued, she was the one to find him. He was doing charts in the lounge when she approached him, trying to minimize human contact that day. "John?" she called out as she entered the lounge, and he spun his head around to look at her. "Do you have a minute?" her voice was soft and gentle. She wasn't mad, he noted to himself - One step in the right direction.

Pushing the pile of charts aside; he nodded, "Sure. What's up?"

"I... I need to talk to you," she replied somewhat uneasily. "Not here, somewhere private."

"Roof?" he suggested, and she simply nodded. They made their way out of the lounge and to the rooftop, stopping by the admit desk on the way to notify Randi.

"What's wrong, John? You seem... Out of it today," Deb started when they made it to the roof. She figured asking him directly, and hopefully getting a reply, would be better than going around and around the subject, trying to get some information.

John sighed. "We broke up, Abby and me." Deb looked at him, trying to study his face, figure out what he was feeling. He didn't seem angry or sad, just disappointed - but not the kind of disappointment you'd expect to see after a break up. "Last night... We had a long conversation, and decided that we are better off apart, as friends."

"Oh." She said, taking a pause to try and think of the right answer. "And now you're not sure it was the right thing to do? That's why you've been snappy all day?"

"No no no no," John replied, shaking his head firmly. "I mean, at first, maybe, but now... No, I know it was the right thing to do, that we -are- better off as friends. It's just... Two years of waiting, and it wasn't even close to what I ever wanted."

"You seemed to be happy when you were with her," she stated dryly.

John shrugged his shoulders, "I was, for a while. But she was lying to me; I was lying to myself... It wasn't meant to work out."

"She lied to you? About what?" Deb inquired, raising an eyebrow.

"Feelings," he replied. "She told me that she was over him, over Luka... She told me she loved me... But she wasn't, she told me that last night. She told me that she tried to love me more than a friend does and that she tried to stop... Loving him, but neither worked."

Deb brought her hand up to his arm, rubbing it comfortably. "I'm sorry, John." And she indeed was, partly. Even if she secretly hoped that one day he would stop obsessing over Abby, that one day he just might notice her... She wanted him to be happy first. And like she just told him, he did seem to be happy in the month or so that he dated Abby. For the past month, she constantly had to pretend - happy on the outside, jealousy eating her from the inside. For so long, almost from the first day they met, she craved to be loved by him. She learned to settle for their close friendship, the occasional flirting, and heck - she even dated from to time - but that feeling, the hope for his love, never left.

"It's okay," he shrugged it off. "I should've known to not go any father, to leave it to a friendship. I mean... That's the whole point of fantasies, right? To want the one thing you can't have, the one thing that seems so perfect but really isn't?"

Deb turned to look at the city, leaning on the wall. "Yes, I guess so," she finally said with a sigh.

For a while they just stood there quietly, each tangled in his or hers thoughts, staring blankly at the city. It was at least 10 minutes, give or take a few, before John finally broke the silence. "And what about you, seeing anyone?"

Deb chuckled, "No, I decided to save the men of Chicago the trouble of having to date me," she replied playfully.

"Too bad... You're depriving them of quite a date," John replied, grinning teasingly at her. That was always easy, to tease each other. They could be serious if they wanted, as they often did, but there was something much safer in sticking to teasing, they could say all sorts of things and cover it with the 'just joking' mask... Just like they were doing right now.

"Right," Deb replied in the most sarcastic tone she could come up with.

"I mean it, Deb," John said, no mask on this time around. "Anyone who wouldn't want to date you must be a fool. You're a wonderful woman, and a date too, I'm sure."

Long pause, no one really knowing what to say. And this time it wasn't even one of their easy silences, the one that were there just because they had to... It was awkward, somewhat even annoying.

One of them had to break it, Deb thought, and it didn't seem like she was about to do it. Now or never, she muttered under her breath. "John," she said, "Come here."

He gave her a puzzled look, but walked towards her anyway. Deb smiled softly before she lifted her ankles up, stood on her toes, and let her lips find their way to John's. It was a soft, sweet and a long awaited kiss. After what seemed like forever or even more, they parted - and surprisingly enough for Deb, she was the one who initiated the parting. Looking into his deep dark eyes, she asked, "Was -this- everything you ever wanted?"


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If you want to,
I can save you,
I can take you away from here.
So lonely inside,
So busy out there,
And all you wanted was somebody who cares...

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