Please see Prologue for general info and disclaimers.

*~*

Four days earlier…

"Dammit!" Will screamed, slamming the cordless phone onto the countertop.

Sydney, who'd returned to her apartment and opened her front door just in time to hear Will's outburst, rushed to the kitchen with her heart pounding furiously in her chest. "What's going on?" She glanced back and forth from Will, who'd dropped into a chair and covered his face with his hands, to Francie, who was standing in front of the sink, washing some dishes. She didn't see any sign of blood. That was good.

"Will was mugged," Francie whispered, as if lowering her voice would prevent Will from hearing her.

"Oh my God," Sydney gasped, hurrying to her friend's side. "Are you are okay?" Images of a scuffle that involved fists and knives and a bleeding Will lying on the cold ground flashed through her mind as her breathing grew shallow.

"No! Wait! Yes, I'm fine. No, I wasn't mugged," he corrected, raising his head to shoot Francie an annoyed look. "I was kind of, sort of…pick-pocketed."

Relief swam through Sydney, weakening her knees and forcing her to grab onto the top of Will's chair in order to remain vertical. Relax, slow down, she commanded her heart. No one's dying. Not today. "'Kind of, sort of'?" she asked out loud in confusion. "You're not sure?"

"I— There—" He exhaled slowly and tried to regain his calm. "You know that credit card I keep for emergencies or big ticket items?"

"The platinum one?"

"Yeah, that one. Well, apparently, someone stole it out of my wallet. I had no clue it was gone until I received a statement for it today informing me that I'd maxed out the card and was being charged a penalty for going over the credit limit. The bill is huge! I almost passed out looking at that thing."

"Did you call the credit card company and tell them what had happened? Are they still holding you responsible for the charges?"

"Yeah, I called them. That was them I was on the phone with just now and they were…surprisingly understanding. I guess this sort of thing happens a lot. I don't know. Anyway, they looked at all my previous purchases, compared them to the ones listed on the current billing statement, and saw that the most recent purchases were bought at places I'd never shopped at before. Some of the stores are even miles from here. So they're going to send me a new card and aren't making me pay this bill. But, it's just… Ugh," Will groaned dramatically, his face contorting into an indignant grimace as he shuddered. "The thought of being violated like that…knowing that there was someone who spent a whole month pretending to be me, flashing my card everywhere he went…"

"Oh, get over yourself," Francie sneered from her post at the sink.

"Hey!" he yelped, springing upright in his chair. "Victim here! How 'bout a little sympathy?"

"Sweetie, I was feeling all kinds of sympathy for you, but then you started behaving as if someone walked into your room and pissed all over your clothes!" She swung her body to face him, her soapy hands clenched into fists as they dribbled water onto the floor. "Someone stole one of your credit cards, Will. It happens to people all the time. Get some perspective."

Taken aback by the fury in her roommate's voice, Sydney stared at her with wide eyes. She opened her mouth to put an end to her friends' sniping before one of them said something he or she would later regret, but Will spoke before she had a chance to intercede. "Look," he began, his voice echoing the amount of anger that had been in Francie's, "I think I have every right to be as outraged as—"

"No, you look!" Francie yelled, which caused Sydney to recoil in shock. "I've maxed out a credit card before and been penalized for going over the credit limit and had to figure out a way to pay all that money back without totally screwing up my credit rating. So why don't you just consider yourself lucky and stop bitching and moaning about it?"

"What?!" Will screeched. "I can't believe you're comparing those two situations! They're like apples and oranges! You can't—"

"Uh, guys," Sydney timidly attempt to interject.

"Hey, if you don't like what I have to say, then you can just leave!" Francie countered. "This is my apartment, so why don't you get out?"

"What the hell is up your butt, Francie?" Will demanded, leaping to his feet as a vein over his left temple began to pulsate. "Is it that time of month or something?"

Sydney squeezed her eyes shut and cringed as Will's comment drove the kitchen to a deathly silence. "Go to hell," Francie hissed a few seconds later, her previously overt rage giving way to one of quiet tones. She stalked to her room and contemplated slamming the door behind her, but ended up only easing it shut.

"Okay, what the hell just happened?" Sydney asked, her eyes trained on her roommate's closed bedroom door.

"You were here. You saw how she attacked me," an obviously still upset Will attempted to instigate.

"Will…"

"No, I mean it! You saw how she jumped down my throat for absolutely no reason!"

"Stop it," she ordered as she rose to her feet with the intention of going to Francie's room. "Just sit there and…not talk."

"But—"

"Will!"

"Okay, okay. I'm sitting, not talking…"

"Thank you." Leaving Will behind in the kitchen, Sydney crept down the hallway and hesitated outside Francie's door as she strained to hear something – anything – coming from the other side. There was only silence. "Francie?" she called out, gently knocking against the door. "Is it all right if I come in?" Still only silence, so she took that as a 'yes' and let herself into the room.

Francie was by her desk, fiddling around with some loose sheets of paper as she kept her face hidden from view. "I'm fine, Syd," she declared without waiting for the inevitable 'How are you?' question.

"Really?" She wanted to say more, but suppressed the desire to do so. Francie crossed in front of her on her way to pick up a book from off the floor but continued to hold her face out of her view. This worried Sydney more than anything else did.

"Yes. I… It's nothing. Tell Will I'm sorry I yelled at him." She traveled to yet another corner of her room and wished she'd fought a little harder for the larger of the two bedrooms when she'd moved in.

"You can tell Will that yourself, but— Okay, stop." Sydney reached out and grabbed hold of Francie's shoulders when she crossed her path a second time. "Stop buzzing around here like a bee because it's freaking me out. Here." She maneuvered both of them to the edge of the bed, where they sat down. "Look, I don't care that you flipped out at Will. But I do care that you're saying it had to do with nothing. That's one of my lines and I know you never believe me when I say it, so I'm definitely not going to believe you when you say it. What's going on, Francie? What's this all about?"

Francie dropped her head and stared at her hands as one second passed and then another and then another. Finally she admitted, slowly, "Before Will found out all that stuff about his credit card, we were at the supermarket and he…he told me that he thought it was a bad idea for me to give Charlie a second chance. Actually, I think his exact words were 'You'd have to be stupid to even think about seeing that guy again.'"

"Oh, Francie," Sydney sighed as she placed an arm around her roommate's shoulder and give her a sideways hug. She knew how much Will's words must have stung.

"I didn't say anything back to him then because…well, I didn't know what to say. But it was all I could think about for the rest of the shopping trip and on the drive back over here and during the whole credit card thing. I just… Am I making a huge mistake taking him back?" Francie implored, her moist eyes desperately searching Sydney's face for the definitive answer.

"Francie, I don't—"

"Am I being an idiot for taking him at his word and believing he's changed? He's promised me that he's different now, that he's grown up and realized how much he screwed up before. He swears that— God, Syd, I need to believe in this. I need—" Her voice cracked as she dropped her head once more. "I am being stupid, aren't I? I've been here before. I know how this ends. Why do I— What makes me think it's going to be any different this time around? God, I'm such an idiot."

"Hey, stop it," Sydney urged. "Will said what he did because he cares about you and he doesn't want to see you get hurt again. But that doesn't mean you automatically become an idiot if you disagree with him. You're…an optimist, Francie. You want to believe people can change for the better and that happy endings are possible. I don't think that's necessarily such a bad thing. Maybe more people should try to be that way," she added as an afterthought, thinking about herself.

"I don't know…"

"How about this then? I'm gonna take you and Will out to dinner and you two are gonna kiss and make up. Then you and I are going to come back here, drink way too much wine, eat way too many of those peanut butter-chocolate chip cookies you made, and spend as much time as we need hashing this thing out."

"Really?" Francie cracked a smile at the suggestion before recalling something. "But weren't you planning to work on your thesis tonight?"

"Eh, I can do that some other time. This is more important."

"Thank you, Syd. You're the best," Francie gushed as she threw her arms around Sydney's neck and pulled her close. "Sometimes I…I really think I'd go crazy without you here."

"You'd be fine," Sydney proclaimed, returning the hug as her eyes drifted to a framed photograph on Francie's dresser. It was a picture of the two of them from Halloween their sophomore year in college. They were dressed as M&Ms – she in red, Francie in green – with their arms draped across each other's shoulders. Friends forever, she thought to herself as she allowed the memory of that wild and crazy night to wash over her. But out loud, what she said was, "You're a lot stronger than you give yourself credit for."

"I think we both are," Francie asserted as she pulled back and looked intently into Sydney's face.

This time it was Sydney who shifted her eyes away. "Yeah, sure," she replied nonchalantly, but she was already on her feet and headed for the door. "What do you say we let Will know he's out of the doghouse?"