Authors note- here's part two, hope its alright, I'm not sure whether its right to italic the characters thoughts or if I've done it right, but it looks ok to me. Let me know if there's anything I can improve on please. Enjoy!

Part two- After all this time

The knock on the door made her jump, even though she was expecting him. She opened the door a little, to check. It was him. He was looking down at the floor, but looked up quickly.

'Hey' she greeted him softly with a smile.

God, look at her, wrapped up in her dressing gown, her hair all mussed up...

'Hello Abby' he hadn't said her name in a long time. Abby, Abby, Abby, it rolled nicely off of the tongue.

'I know its strange, after all this time, just calling up in the middle of the night, but I needed some place to stay, for tonight, and well, I thought you would understand that.' He paused. 'I hoped you would.'

She made a face, and opened the door properly, standing aside for him to come in.

Is she hurt? He wondered, oh I shouldn't have come.

'Sure, Carter, we're still friends. But since tonight I haven't heard from you in weeks, spoken to you in months, we haven't REALLY talked, you know properly, since well... you know'

'I shouldn't have come, god why did I do this? I'm so sorry, I should have gotten a motel room.' He looked distraught, focusing on the door, he thought about leaving, but for some reason he didn't really want to. She regarded him curiously, he's acting rather strangely, is he drunk?

'Maybe you should have Carter, but you didn't. And you're here now, so I'll make some coffee okay?'

'You can call me John you know.'

She knew she could have, but she didn't like his tone. Compared to how close they used to be, he seemed like a stranger to her, and it wouldn't be right, would it?

She looked up at him, with her 'not now' look in her eyes, and he flinched. It seemed he could still read her like a book, and sometimes she could still read him in that way too.

'Sorry, that was harsh of me. Yes, please, I would love some coffee.'

He threw his bag down and took off his shoes. Hung his coat on the hanger.

She put the kettle on and prepared two cups, before sitting down on the couch beside him. She looked around, didn't know what to say. She noticed his stuff on the floor, as he had chucked it down, his keys had slid out of his bag and were lying there on the floor. She was staring at them. He noticed what she was looking at and froze. Oh shit, will she ask me why I pretended to be locked out? Will she think I have some kind of hidden agenda? What the hell am I doing here?