It had been a week since she pressed her hand to the glass window on the bus, saying goodbye to Bosco as he stood on the sidewalk near the bus, a forced tiny smile that barely broke through the sadness that was etched over his face.

She tried to comfort him with her own smile, but it proved extremely difficult for her facial muscles to allow her lips to turn upwards. Even if she could have smiled, they both knew that it wouldn't have meant anything. He would have seen the sadness in her eyes. He always could.

Now, sitting at her desk in the small office she shared with Jelly who in normal circumstances would be referred to as her partner, but because of the extreme bond she and Bosco had shared the entire precinct still referred to him as her partner in those rare moments that they brought him up, she fought to focus on the open file splayed out in front of her. She started to read the same page over for the third time. She had been seeing the words but not really reading them, not really taking them in. Faith's fingers played with the top corner of the pages, gently curling it upwards absentmindedly as she tried to read.

She managed to remind herself every few lines that she was supposed to be concentrating, and her focus would spark up again. By the time she was halfway through the page she realized that her plan wasn't working. She was only picking up every other word and that made trying to solve a murder quite difficult.

So she stopped trying.

Faith let her mind wander away from work and fall on Bosco. She couldn't help the girlish grin that formed when she thought of their last night together.

He had been sweet and loving and passionate. Things that she had always known he was, even when he didn't show it, but it was completely different getting to experience him entirely first hand.

The way he moved over her, caressing her face as they watched each other showed her that he could still surprise her, even after no many years. She had never imagined he would be so gentle and nothing but loving during sex. The way he made sure she was comfortable and satisfied when he wrapped his arms around her as they snuggled up to each other made her love him even more.

Faith had to fight the giggle that crept in her throat when she thought about what she had done with Bosco. She had only ever been with one other man before and in all of those years with Fred, she had never ever experienced anything like the night she had spent with Bosco.

She was mentally kicking herself for not pulling him to the bedroom when he had first kissed her as they stood standing in his kitchen. They hadn't talked about if and when they would be together completely, but it was pretty much expected that they would take things relatively slow.

He knew he would be the first man she would be with since her divorce. She knew that he wanted her to know that it was going to be different with her. It wasn't about sex. It was about love and passion definitely, but sex could wait. They had already waited for almost fifteen years. A few days or even weeks or months wouldn't have killed them.

Picking up a pen, Faith began to doodle distractedly on the side of a page of notes she had written up regarding a case she and Jelly had spent the past three days working on. Well, Jelly had done most of the work. Faith had spent most of the time alternating between daydreaming about Bosco and trying to fight off those long moments where all she felt was intense loneliness that seemed to stretch on for an eternity.

As the pen slid along the margins of the white sheet of paper already filled with writing, Jelly called Faith's name for the third time, finally getting her attention making her head jolt up.

"What? Sorry," she said quickly, dropping her pen and forcing the smile from her face at the complete seriousness in his tone.

"You've been livin' on another planet all freakin' week, Faith. What the hell happened with Boscorelli?" he asked as he drained his mug of the cooling coffee.

It was common knowledge around the station that Faith had gone to see Bosco. When she had requested her first vacation time in almost a year, the questions started but she didn't need to answer them. Her excitement was evident in everything she did in the days and weeks leading up to her trip.

Everyone had a message for her to give to him. Evidently, Faith was the only person that he had kept in contact with. If it hadn't been for that, everybody would have thought he dropped off the face of the earth. She didn't have the heart to tell them all that their hellos and demands for a call or a letter had been completely forgotten in all of the private moments that she and Bosco had been caught up in. Instead she had smiled her first day back to work and told them how happy he had been to hear about them and that they should hear from him soon. Only a few eyed her suspiciously, remembering that it was Bosco they were talking about. The rest seemed content with her words.

"Nothing happened with Boscorelli," she answered defensively. She didn't want to hide what had happened with Bosco, but she wasn't entirely ready to climb up on her desk and scream that they had had sex.

She didn't even know what their next move was going to be.

"I'm just tired," she added quietly looking back to the work spread out in front of her. Jelly scoffed and shook his head, knowing better than accepting her excuse.

"I'm gonna go get some lunch," he said, reaching for the keys that sat on his desk. Faith looked up at him with an eyebrow raised.

"You just had lunch."

He thought about her words while he was walking past her desk through the door. She turned in her seat and watched him with a grin.

"That was like, pre-lunch. Besides, I can't work on an empty stomach." With that he winked and turned to leave.

"I'll be here," Faith said with a laugh, facing her desk once more. Sighing as her laugh faded away she looked at the phone contemplating whether or not she should call him. Taking a deep breath, she fought the urge and got up to fill her mug with fresh coffee.

They had spoken only a few hours earlier. She could wait until she got home from work. She wasn't a love-struck teenager who had nothing better to do than think about the new boy she liked. Laughing at herself because really, she was exactly like that, she took her black coffee back to her desk and started sifting through a new stack of files that had been waiting all day for her attention.

The rest of the day would be a struggle, even though she had been called out on several runs throughout the afternoon. The minutes felt like hours. Faith regretted deeply not taking those few minutes while Jelly was gone to call Bosco. Maybe then she wouldn't have been as anxious to get home to call him, to hear his voice. She studied her watch all day waiting for it to strike five.

Working days had definitely been better than working nights. Faith actually got to see her children when they were awake and not in a mad rush to make it out the door for school on time. Mealtime was something new too. Instead of eating in the front seat of an RMP she got to sit at the table with her daughter pretty much every night and yes most of the food was take out, but at least neither of them was alone.

Pushing open the apartment door carrying the Chinese food in her arms, Faith breathed a sigh of relief. She all but threw the food on the table before pulling her coat off and tossing it over the back of one of the chairs.

"Em, food's here," she yelled, unpacking the bags and setting the containers on the table. Emily padded in through the hall and went to the kitchen to get some plates before joining her mother at the table.

As Faith filled their plates, Emily watched her with her mouth turned into a half grin. Faith finally looked up and caught the look on her daughter's face.

"What?" she asked as she continued to scoop out noodles onto her daughter's plate.

"Bosco called. Twice," Emily smiled as she picked up her fork and started to poke at her rice. "He said he'd call again but I left the messages on the machine in case you wanted to listen to them over and over again like you did with the ones from the other day."

"I did not do that," Faith said feigning innocence. The truth was though that she had done it. She had mentioned how nice it was to come home from her trip and find a message already waiting from him simply reminding her to call him when she got in. He took the hint and called a few days later while she was at work so she would get the same surprise.

It hadn't been much; just enough to make her smile and wonder where he had kept this side of himself buried for so long that even she hadn't noticed it. Faith had analyzed and memorized every second of those messages until she erased them while trying to frantically pretend that she wasn't doing anything when Emily walked into the room.

She could hear the messages clearly in her head even as she sat refuting the claim that she listened to them repeatedly.

"Hey, it's me. Just calling to say hi. I miss you. It uh…it feels bigger here now that you're gone. That's it. Oh and uh, I hope you had a good day at work. Okay. Call me when you get in. I'll be here." With that he had hung up. Faith had laughed silently to herself about how nervous he sounded.

The other was shorter and sweeter and had elicited quite the laugh from both Faith and Emily.

"Just me again. I just realized that it's kind of our anniversary. A week since…I told you… That makes me sound like a chick or something. Okay, ignore this one. Carry on."

Emily just shook her head as she spoke around her food.

"Sure mom. It was me listening to it for hours."

Saying nothing, Faith just laughed to herself as she lifted the fork to her mouth.

"So what does Bosco do there?" Emily asked after a short stretch of comfortable silence.

Faith loved that Emily had been so accepting of her relationship with Bosco. Up until she had come home from seeing him, they hadn't really talked about him much. The last thing Emily wanted was to make her mother upset and she knew that's exactly what would happen if she brought up her far-away partner and best friend.

As soon as Faith walked through the door a week earlier though, Emily had been full of questions about her favourite ex-cop.

"He's not working but sometimes he volunteers at the school there and works with the kids and I know that some of his friends own a little café and he ran that for them while they went a cruise a few months back."

Emily raised an eyebrow at her mother.

"Seriously? Bosco's good with kids, but I can't see him working in a café," she giggled before taking a drink.

"Yeah, me neither. And apparently it didn't go over too well. He said it was a one time thing."

"Good, 'cause I really can't see Bosco in an apron, not to mention having to wait on people," Emily said with a laugh as she stared into her food.

"Yeah, I bet they all had real pleasant meals," Faith agreed. She let the silence wrap itself around them as they continued their meal in companionable stillness. Faith watched her daughter as they both ate the remaining food on their plates, with only brief instances of easy conversation.

Standing at the sink giving the dishes a final rinse, Faith handed the last plate to Emily to dry as she turned to her daughter.

"Your dad will be here soon. Do you have all your stuff together?" she asked quietly as she dried her hands in a clean dishtowel. Emily nodded as she reached up and put the dry plate in the cupboard.

"Do you want me to come home Sunday or wait until Monday after school?" Emily asked, folding the towel quickly and tossing in on the counter.

"Whichever you want," Faith shrugged before reaching up pushing Emily hair off her neck. "Just let me know and I can rent us a movie or something if you want to come home Sunday."

"Sounds good," as Emily spoke there was a quick knock at the door.

"Get your stuff, I'll get the door," Faith said as they both headed out of the kitchen. Faith threw back the lock and opened the door as Emily jogged down the short hall to her bedroom. Standing on the other side of the door, Faith was greeted with her ex-husband.

"Emily's just getting her things," Faith said, holding the door open allowing Fred to enter the foyer to wait for their daughter. Nodding, he walked through the door, his hands uncomfortably shoved in the pockets of his jacket.

"Charlie's not with you?" Faith asked as he closed the door behind him.

"Nah, he has a friend over so… He said he'd call you tonight," Fred answered simply. They had managed to be civil to each other but there was always a steady state of discomfort between them. It had been about seven months since he brought up the idea of them trying to work things out and seven months since Faith had said no. Since then things were worse than they had been since the divorce.

Faith felt like she couldn't be friendly without giving him the wrong impression, so instead she found herself being cold and distant and that just wasn't who she was. It wasn't who she wanted to be. And the fact that she only felt uncomfortable and somewhat annoyed when she saw the person she had known and loved since she was a teenager didn't do wonders for how much she liked herself.

She had always imagined that someday they would be able to have even simple conversations as co-parents and as people who used to know everything about one another. Instead though, words were a struggle. Finding something to say proved more difficult than either of them would have imagined.

Folding her arms over her chest, Faith looked to her feet as they waited for Emily to come bounding from her room.

"So, uh Emily might want to come home Sunday. If you can't take her, get her to call--"

"I can take her," he said defensively, cutting her off. "Why would she want to come back Sunday?"

Faith sighed heavily and shrugged.

"I don't know, Fred. She just said she might come home." Before either of them could say anything else, the ring of the phone cut through the air. "I have to get that," Faith said, turning away and reaching for the small white cordless phone that sat on the end table next to the couch.

"Hello?" she answered, bringing the phone to her ear. Forgetting that anyone else existed the moment she heard his voice, her face widened in a bright smile and she sighed her frustration at Fred away. "Hey."

"Did you listen to my messages?" Bosco asked on the other end of the line. She could hear the smirk on his face.

"No, but Emily did so you better not have said anything bad," she laughed, tucking her hair behind her ear.

"Hey, I'm sure that she's heard worse." Bosco's voice was sarcastic and playful. Faith felt her stomach flutter at his words, bringing about the hope that she would never stop feeling like a girl in love for the first time.

"Yeah, okay. She better not have to be in therapy for the rest of her life."

"That would be all you," he started but before she could come back with anything witty or snide, he kept talking. "How was your Friday?"

"Hmm, it's over. That's the best thing. I couldn't wait to get home," she said as she traced the fingers of her left hand over the smooth wooden surface of the small table in front of her.

"To talk to me?" he asked sweetly, making her chuckle.

"Yeah, to talk to you," she said through her smile. At the annoyed groan she turned around to see Fred rubbing his eyes with his hand. Sighing, she figured it would be best to continue her conversation later.

"Listen, Em's just leaving for the weekend so I'm going to call you back, okay?" she said, turning her back to Fred again as Emily pulled her bags into the doorway.

"Fine, but don't forget. I love you," Bosco sighed into the phone. Faith could tell that he still felt out of sorts saying that, so she was completely moved by his openness and willingness to say it to her.

"Hey dad," Emily said throwing her book bag down next to her small suitcase.

"How long do you think you are leaving for, Em?" Fred asked as he picked up her bags. Emily just rolled her eyes at him, slipping her jacket on.

"I won't forget…I love you too," Faith said quietly, taking the phone from her ear and setting it back in its base. She turned around to a grinning Emily and a very disgusted, angry Fred. Faith just smiled sweetly at her daughter and ex-husband, walking over and kissing Emily on the forehead and taking her daughter's face in her hands.

"Have fun sweetheart. Let me know when you want to come home."

"I will. Love you, mom," she answered turning to follow her already retreating father down the hall.

"I love you, baby. Be good!" Faith called. She closed and locked the door. She smiled to herself as she went to her room, quickly changing into her most comfortable pair of pyjamas before shuffling out to the living room and settling into the couch. Pulling a blanket over her legs that were curled next to her, she reached for the phone and dialled Bosco's number feeling the rush of excitement that was becoming more and more common to her.

Hearing his voice, quiet and relaxed make its way through the receiver and make it to her ear, Faith relaxed into the cushions, feeling a familiar warmth overtake her, inside and out.