"Why the hell would it be the postman?" Juliet snapped, folding her arms tightly.

"Well, I just thought-" McNab stuttered on his words, trying to defend himself.

"Oh, did you?" She pushed a piece of paper across the table to him, jabbing her pen at the photo in the middle. "That is the postman, three houses away at the exact moment someone heard the gunshots."

"Sorry ma'am," McNab said, rubbing his head and studying the pictures she had put in front of him. "I will try to be better."

Juliet was about to say something else when she was cut off by Chief Vick coming out of her office.

"O'Hara, a word," she said sternly. She held out her hand for Juliet to follow her into her office.

Pushing herself up out of her seat across from her temporary partner, Juliet marched into the chief's office and sat down at her desk. She could feel Chief's eyes weighing heavily on her as she shut the door and sat down across from Juliet.

"Listen to me," Chief Vick said, cutting right to the chase, "I know that you are upset about this whole situation. I know that you want your partner back- believe me, we all do. But it is not your job to bring Lassiter's stubborn energy into this station. Nor is it your job to act like a child because things aren't going the way you want them to."

Juliet shifted her eyes down at her hands. It had been almost two weeks since Lassiter's stroke. Nearly two weeks since she had walked into this station to see her partner waiting for her at her desk. Two weeks since they had driven to a crime scene together or thrown ideas off each other until they found the right answer. Two weeks without her partner. Her person.

It had also been two weeks of her partner laying in a coma in that hospital bed. Her eyes had slowly begun to adjust to seeing him that way- laying in the bed with a tube down his throat and a heavy bandage over his indented head. She hated seeing him that way and she hated even more being used to it. She hated that it didn't shock her anymore. Scare her? Yes. Endlessly. But her brain had gotten used to this new way of seeing her partner, and it made her sick. When she closed her eyes, she pictured him as he was in the hospital first, no longer immediately jumping to an image of him commanding a room or doing paperwork at his desk across from her.

When she came back to work last week, she hadn't known what to expect. She had worked cases without Lassiter before, like when he went on vacation with Marlowe or that long week when he had been on leave because he had found himself the prime suspect in a murder investigation, but that was always temporary. And as much as she spent every day willing herself to believe that this was temporary and that one day her partner would return and they could go back to fighting the bad guys together, looking at him in that hospital bed made it hard to believe that it was going to happen any time soon- if ever.

"I just-" Juliet started to defend herself, but she couldn't. She didn't have anything to say. She knew she was acting childish. She knew that she was being too hard on McNab. He was so new at being a detective, and he was pretty clumsy to begin with. He was actually doing much better than she had expected. But he wasn't Lassiter.

"I know." Chief Vick said, and Juliet could see her eyes softening. "I know that you are worried about him, but taking it out on McNab who is just trying to prove himself to you is not the way to bring him back."

"There's nothing I can do," Juliet said quietly.

The words weighed heavy on her lips. There had always been something she could do in the past. Lassiter got shot, arrest the guys that shot him. Lassiter got framed, find the guy who really did it. Lassiter made a fool of himself, help him work it out, the right way.

This was different. Lassiter was fighting for his life because of something that had happened inside his brain. She couldn't shoot that. There was no revenge to be had. It just was. No matter how badly she wanted to fight someone every time she walked into his hospital room, she couldn't, because the only thing there was to blame was some stupid little clot in Lassiter's head that had managed to turn his whole life around in a matter of seconds. There was nothing she could do to fix that.

"You can do your job," Chief offered with a kind tone. "Juliet, you might not be able to fix him, and I know that you want to, but you are there for him. He knows that. He can hear you and feel you there. And when you're here, try to be here. You are one of my best detectives. And now that my head detective is gone, I need you to step up to the plate and prove yourself. Use what he taught you and lead this precinct to be its best. That's what you can do for him."

Juliet nodded, letting the words wash over her. If only it was that easy.

"It's almost time for you to leave," Chief said, standing up to open the door for her. "Go home now, get some rest, and come back tomorrow ready to be my head detective."

Her eyes glazed over, Juliet stood slowly and started walking towards the door.

"And Juliet?" Chief said, placing a hand on her shoulder, "Go apologize to McNab."

Juliet gave the chief a half-hearted smile and nodded. She walked back to her desk and grabbed her purse out of the drawer.

McNab jumped up to follow her.

"No," Juliet said, putting a hand out to stop him. "I am going home for the night. I'll be back in the morning."

"Oh," McNab said, falling back in the chair to go through the papers in front of him again.

"McNab," Juliet said, sighing to block out the sound of Carlton's voice telling her to never apologize, "I'm sorry I've been snapping at you."

"Oh, that's okay," McNab said, brightly, "You're going through a lot with Lassiter being out and everything. I know you are just frustrated. I don't take it personally."

How are you so positive all of the time? Juliet's cynical voice whispered in her ear.

"Well, thank you," she said, turning away to leave the station, feeling grateful that if she had to have a temporary partner, that it was McNab.

She walked out of the station into the chilly air. It was November, and even if California was supposed to be warm, the cool air from the ocean still chilled her Miami blood sometimes. She got into her car and pulled away on autopilot, eyes glazed over as her car carried her to the hospital.

Her mind felt completely shut down as she drove, images of her partner flashed through her head. But not just from the past few weeks. From before- weeks before, days before, even that morning. All the times they ran into a building, guns out. All the times they fell or got knocked over. Every time his head hit a wall, or even the top of his desk. What caused this? How did this happen to him? What could she have done?

It killed her to see him like this. The protective little sister in her had wanted to wrap him in bubble wrap since 2007 when he had inexplicably come into work with a broken collar bone and a massive sling. Watching him cringe every time he took a step too hard or hit a wall at a funny angle made her wince. But she had a feeling this was a whole lot worse than a broken bone that had ultimately healed in just a few months. This didn't feel quite so temporary.

It felt…

She didn't know how it felt. But it didn't feel like it was going to get better any time soon.

She looked up as the light she was about to fly through blared red. She slammed on the brakes to stop from rolling into oncoming traffic. She lunged forward before her seatbelt locked and slammed her back against her seat. She caught her breath and looked over to the passenger seat where the contents of her purse had spilled across the floor of the car.

Her heart stopped momentarily when she saw the pregnancy test sitting on top of the pile.

She had bought it before she went to work, but she had been so focused on her partner, or rather lack thereof, that she had completely forgotten about it when she walked into the station.

Not that she hadn't stopped thinking about the possibility. She still hadn't gotten her period, but with how messed up the chemotherapy had left her body, going months without one was not uncommon. Still, the possibility floated in her head, bouncing off everything else she had been thinking about nonstop since her partner ended up in the hospital.

"Go home," she told herself out loud, putting on her turn signal away from the hospital. Carlton wasn't going anywhere. But this, she needed to get out of her head.

Don't get your hopes up.

You're probably not pregnant.

It's impossible.

Thoughts still raced as she pulled into her empty driveway. Thankfully, Shawn wasn't home. Not that she didn't want him there, but she needed time to process this on her own- either way. She didn't want to get his hopes up again, nor did she want to let him down. She needed to be alone.

"Hello?" She called quietly when she opened the door, just to be safe.

No answer.

She had taken pregnancy tests before. A few times since she and Shawn had been married and once after an ill-timed period in high school, but she hadn't taken one since the last time it was positive. When Shawn held her hand and distracted her with horrible baby names as they waited the longest three minutes of her life. She laughed and let him kiss her hands. Let him tell her he loved her.

This time she was alone. She set the test on a paper towel on the counter and set a timer. There were no hand kisses. No silly baby names. She just watched the seconds tick down slowly.

Don't get your hopes up.

There's no way you are.

Beep! Beep! Beep!

Finally!

"Shit."