A/N: Thanks for your reviews and comments. As always, they are much appreciated.

I think this will probably start winding down pretty quickly. I've never gotten how some fanfic authors can churn out these epics with 20 chapters. I start to run out of steam around chapter eight. Anyway, I hope it will still be wrapped up in a satisfactory way for everyone!

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He is in darkness. He is only aware that his legs are healed, and he can walk unaided.

His eyes grow accustomed to the dim, and he sees that he is in an empty room. There is only a door on one of the bare, black walls. He opens it, and it leads to another room, exactly the same as the one before.

There is a voice coming from the distance. A woman's laughter: its throaty alto is all too familiar. She calls his name, and he follows through the door, on an on through a dizzying maze.

He searches in a rising panic as her voice seems at once to be coming from all directions. Finally, he pushes on into yet another room, and its white light is blinding.

There is someone there. Her voice is strong and clear. She is calling him on. He staggers forward, shielding his eyes from the glare. A shape begins to emerge. A bed? It is enveloped in a white curtain. She is inside, waiting for him.

"Jordan. I'm here," he calls, and parts the curtain.

She is there, kneeling on the bed. Her hair falls loosely across her bare shoulders. She turns to him and smiles.

"Jordan..." He reaches out for her, and then realizes with horror that she is not alone.

Nigel is beneath her. His hands run up the small of her back and around to her breasts. She moans with pleasure. He knows then it is not a beckoning smile she is giving him, she is taunting him. Her lips part, and she laughs. Nigel joins her, and he clamps his hands over his ears as their mocking laughter fills the room.

XXXXXXX

He awoke, breathless, heart racing.

The dream was familiar by now. He'd had it or one like it every night since he had found out about Jordan and Nigel.

Sleep was over for the night, he knew. The TV channel he had been watching had switched over to a test pattern. He leaned forward for the coffee table and rummaged amid the empty Chinese take-out containers for the remote.

The TV snapped off, and he stared at the little green dot in the middle of the screen as it faded to black.

Nigel was right. He didn't know where to direct his anger. He had known, in theory, that Jordan had a past. She was no blushing virgin, but he preferred being blissfully ignorant of the details. Had his own fragile male ego shattered when faced with reality?

Or was he angry that she had turned to Nigel of all people? He was surprised to hear that Nigel had gotten involved with Sarah. He had always assumed that Nigel didn't tend that way. Here he was, the All-American Boy Scout, with his big blue eyes, Pepsodent smile, and sturdy, Mid-Western confidence, and he had lost out to this pale, androgynous Goth biker with the sissy accent. Is that what Jordan wanted all along?

It was all of those things. But there was something else, too. He always came to this same conclusion in these waking hours. It wasn't just that Jordan had slept with someone else. He had hinted as much to Nigel that night.

She didn't fight.

He had been racked with fear and pain, afraid he would never walk again, afraid that he would become a burden to the woman he loved, so he pushed her away. And she went without a fight. She turned and left without another word, looking back at him once with hurtful eyes before sweeping out of the room.

She didn't fight.

Instead of fighting, she had run to Nigel. Is that how little he had mattered to her?

But then he heard Nigel's words still ringing in his ears: People do strange things when they're in pain. They don't always act the way their loved ones might hope they would. Do they, Woody?

"You bastard..." Woody muttered aloud. How had he known?

I'm everyone's crying shoulder down at the morgue...

The red lights on his VCR read 4:47. It would be morning soon. Perhaps it was time to shower and shave and find something to wear other than a pair of boxers and a pizza-stained t-shirt. He threw off his blue terry bathrobe and headed for the bathroom.

XXXXXXX

The flowers he brought her were dead. She had wanted to throw them away that night when he walked out, but the delicate little pink blossoms somehow gave her hope.

Now, they were faded and wilted. She picked up the vase and started for the trashcan, when it slipped from her hands and landed with a crash on the floor. She cursed under her breath and leaned down to pick up the shards.

Her hand suddenly flew up, and she hissed in pain. Tiny droplets of blood fell from her finger and dripped down into the puddled water. It all seemed a poetic commentary on the state of her life, and she sat crying in the mess of shattered glass and dead flowers.

The phone rang, and she quickly dried her eyes as she picked it up. There was a long pause after she said hello.

"Jordan?" Her heart skipped a beat.

"Woody..." She bit her lip as he paused again.

"I was wondering. If you don't have any plans...can we get together tonight?" He spoke cautiously. "I know it's late notice, but I was hoping we could talk."

She supposed she should jump at the chance, but she hesitated. What could he possibly have to say to her? Had he not made things clear enough? His words had hurt her enough already.

"Sure..." She glanced up at the clock. "Can we meet at the Pogue in a half hour? It's not called the Pogue anymore, but you know where it is." At least in public, they would have to be civil to one another.

"Thanks, Jordan." There was a sudden, unmistakable eagerness in his voice. "I'll see you at seven."

XXXXX

She got to the Pogue first. The new owner had renamed it Maggie O'Neill's after his Irish grandmother, but not much else had changed. She waited nervously with a drink in one of the private booths in the back, not knowing how she would feel when she saw him.

Then, he was there in the doorway, scanning the room, and her heart fluttered in anticipation. His eyes connected with hers, and he nodded in her direction as he crossed and stood awkwardly next to the table for a moment.

Woody. He stood there, seeming smaller and weaker than before the shooting. But then she saw his cowlick, unsmoothed as usual, and his small, lopsided smile. He was still Woody, and all the feelings came flooding back.

She swallowed hard and fought the tears. "Hi..."

"Hi." He slid into the booth opposite her. "Thank you for meeting me here. I wasn't sure..." he started with uneasiness. "There are some things I wanted to say to you."

"Oh?" Her throat was dry with anxiety.

"Nigel came to see me last night."

She groaned and bent her head. "Oh, God, I'm sorry, Woody. I swear I didn't put him up to it..."

"I know, I know you didn't. It's okay. It's been tearing me apart, thinking about you and...him." He found it difficult to look at her. "I've been so angry, and it's a lot of reasons, really. The way I found out, the fact that it was someone I know. And I guess I have to take my share of the blame for throwing you out of my hospital room that night. I just wish you had trusted me enough to know that I didn't really mean it."

"I know. I've gone over and over it in my mind. I should have stayed. If I had just stayed..."

"It's okay, Jordan."

She blinked hard and looked up from her drink. It's okay? That sounded mighty close to forgiveness, or at least understanding. "It is?" she asked in a small voice.

He licked his lips with nervousness and forged ahead. "Things happen sometimes, because you're hurt and angry and confused. Nigel reminded me of that." He took a deep breath, not sure how things would change once he told her his story. "I think there's something you need to know. About me."