A/N: That's right, another brooding, romantic John fic. (Well, technically it's the same fic, different chapter, but anyways...) Enjoy. Please Read and Review!!

Everything is quiet since you're not around,
And I live in the numbness now,
In the background.



It wasn't for a while that John realized he hated New York without her. Maybe even a month. Since Alex died, he knew something was different, and unpleasantly so, but it wasn't for a while that the realized that he hated everything about New York unless she was there. Even if they had only spent one night together, it was that one night that he would remember forever.


I do the things we did before,
I walk Haight Street to the store,
And they say where's that crazy girl,
You don't get drunk on red wine, and fight no more,
I don't see you anymore,
Since the hospital,
The plans I make still have you in them.

He did everything the same as he had before that night, not letting on to anyone that he and Alex had spent her last night together. Not even Fin, although normally he would have flaunted it to Fin, whom he knew to be attracted to the beautiful lawyer. Of course, no one could not be attracted to Alex. She was so beautiful, so elegant, and so brilliant. She was the type of person that you never knew exsisted except in fairy-tales, until she walked into the room, and even then, she was a dream. The way she walked, talked, smiled, cried. John had seen it all from her, and he could remember everything she'd said to him that night. Every word was important to him, now more than ever.


'Cause you come swimmin' into view,
And I'm hanging on your words like I always used to do,
The words they use so lightly, I only feel for you,
I only know because I carry you around,
In the background,
I'm in the background.

The hours laying with her in her bed, allowing her to cuddle him, even though he hardly ever did that after sex. With her, it only seemed natural to have his arm around her and her head on his chest, her warm breath keeping him awake. And not minding that he couldn't sleep, because she was there for him to look at. He didn't sleep a wink that night, because he had better things to do. Watch her dream. Run his hands through her hair. Hold her. Comfort her when she woke up crying that one time, around two in the morning. And the way she had just cried into his shoulder, not even questioned the fact that he was there... it made him feel as if he always should have been. Why did it take him so long to tell her that?


Girls they come and memories all repeat,
I lift your head while they change the hospital sheets,
'Ey, I would never lie to you, No,
I would never lie to you, No,
I felt you long after we were through,
We were through,
The plans I make still have you in them.

Sometimes he forgot that she wasn't there anymore. Sometimes he would wake up, after dreaming that night all over again, and wonder where she was. Why she wasn't laying in his arms. When that happened, everything felt so hopeless. He would look out the windows, and realize how much he hated this place, this city. It had been his home for so long, but now without her, now that he'd had her, it all seemed too abyssmal to bother trying to save it. Hell, he could barely see the sun through the smog in the morning. How he wished he could be somewhere with Alex, sitting on a porch swing, watching the sun rise, or set, or both. It didn't matter as long as he could hold her again.


'Cause you come swimming into view,
And I'm hanging on your words like I always used to do,
The words we use so lightly, I only feel for you,
I only know because I carry you around,
In the background.
'Cause I felt you long after we were through.

He could still feel her lips kissing him, her hands running through his hair, and her silky hair laying, spread out, across is chest as he held her. He could still see her laughing above him with that same hair billowing over her shoudler, her sincere gentle smile when he asked her to dance, and the way she lifted her chin proudly when he argued with her, with that soft look of uncertainty still twinkling in her baby blue eyes. He could still taste her tears as he had kissed them from her cheeks, and smell that soft vanilla that she always smelled like. It was so soft and subtle that at times, he thought he imagined it, but he couldn't have. It was so vividly remembered that it had to have been her. Who else could it be?


When you come swimmin' into view,
And I'm hanging on your words like I always used to do,
The words they use so lightly, I only feel for you,
I only know because I'm way, I'm way,
In the background,
I'm in the background.

But still, John went to work every day, ignoring the temptations to run away from the damn city that he was always drawn back to. The city that he had spent his childhood in, vowing to move away from the hopelessness of it all, but still being sucked in. He didn't, of course, run away. He knew he wouldn't have made it very far. If Alex had been with him, he would have run, though, because if she was with him... there was no point in coming back.