Disclaimer: If I owned them, Stacy would still be on the show snogging House's face off. They belong to David Shore and his minions, the cruel geniuses.

Of course, the times weren't always so happy. If she's going to make a rational decision (practice making rational decisions and becoming better at arguing and manipulation than she ever intended to be were what came from years in law school) she can't forget the bad times. It's a different couch now, she notes as she moves to sit down with a glass of Greg's single malt scotch. ("Oh, there's my shirt," she thinks to herself as she spots it sticking out from between the couch cushions. She quickly switches from the Motley Crue tee.) She realizes with a pang of guilt that the couch they sat on together before was very deep. This one is shallower, it must be easier for him to get up from; he must have bought it shortly after she left. Of course he would never tell her that they needed a new couch. Of course he wouldn't have told her. Especially her.

There were fights before the infarction too of course. It wasn't the act of arguing that bothered them, everyone expected them too; it was the fact that they knew the arguments could have been so easily avoided. The arguments themselves, the bickering, each of them consciously aware that some of it was only a contest to see who was best at verbal manipulation that day, that wasn't the stuff that hurt. No, the bit that stung was the bite that came from inside both of them, the knowledge that they would never have to hurt each other if each only changed a little bit.

"Stacy, just what the hell – besides distracting me from my soap I mean – do you think all your pacing is going to accomplish?" he said from his sprawled position on the couch, his voice raising just a little in volume with each word.

"Why does it have to accomplish something, Greg? Does the fucking anomaly bug you? Then figure it out. Maybe talking to me in the two hours we see each other away from the hospital would help you more than watching another one of your god damned soaps." She was close to tears with the last words and stormed off into the bedroom before he could see. She was rarely this emotional but today had been a tough one and putting up with Greg's irritability was the last thing she wanted to do that night.

She was still in the bedroom an hour later and had sufficiently calmed down enough to only glare at him as he walked in rather than her previous plan of chucking the nearest object that struck her fancy straight at his head. He came in with his head slightly bowed and his immense, translucently blue eyes that ranged from indigo to the chemically perfect chlorine water you saw in swimming pools trying to sneak a glance without her noticing. No one could fail to notice his eyes. She didn't know why he even tried to hide them from her anymore. If anything, looking her straight in the face with the puppy dog look only served to help his case. Right then, he looked like he was still expecting a flying object. Truthfully, she was more upset with what he hadn't done than anything he had done.

"Are you going to tell me, or are you going to make me ask why you were upset enough to be pacing like some sort of jungle cat in the whole four feet our living room provides?"

He sighed as he realized she wasn't letting him off easy this time and moved across the room to sit with her on the bed. "I'm sorry, okay? Now if you don't tell me what happened I'm going to assume you're feeling better and refusing to tell me out of spite. In which case I'll bug it out of you until you tell me. So really, it's for a good cause if you just spill now," he said as he moved to put his arms around her.

"Well it just sounds stupid now. Would've packed much more of a punch if you had let me stay mad at you and let me scream it in your smug face."

"It's official. Women have no idea what they want. I give up," he said as he lay down on the bed, pulling her with him.

She let him pull her down onto the bed and snuggled into him, resting her head on top of his chest as his arms held her in close. This type of open affection was rare from Greg. Even after sex he kept a little space between them on the bed, even if he still touched her, rubbing her back or just lying on his back as she fell asleep next to him was more common. She was so happy to have him just lying close to her like this when she needed him to be gentle and caring, both things that he tried his hardest not to be most of his life. She loved that she brought this side out of him and had a sneaking suspicion even he didn't mind it all that much.

"Byrne came onto me today. You'd think he'd have some sense after getting sued for sexual harassment in the radiology department. But I can't dump the case. I already told Cuddy I'd take it, Shane and Diana already have a back-up of cases and there's no one else to defend him." She could feel the tension leave her body as she told him and at the same time felt his tense up.

"Page me the next time you have to have a consult. Have it somewhere open so I can hang around without him getting paranoid. He won't try anything while someone else is looking. I can even get Wilson to come. Everyone's afraid of a man that wears a pocket protector."

It was a simple solution what someone else might have made a very complicated problem. He didn't dramatize it any more than it needed to be. It was something she had to do and he did his part to make it as easy as that situation afforded. She loved this part of him too. His intelligence and ability to break down problems surpassed even her own.

"Thank you," she said as she kissed him long and deeply and let his hands tangle through her hair.

"Mmmph. Just promise me you'll talk with your mouth first instead of your feet next time."

"You mean like this?" she said as she leaned down and captured his mouth with hers for the thousandth time.

"Yeah, just like that."

It's 3:40 A.M. in his apartment and all she can think of are the good times.