Alright, next chapter. I didn't get much sleep last night so that I could get this one wrote and posted today...you guys better appreciate me, lol :) But I do hope you like this, another long chapter, yay. Enjoy!

(Joanne's POV)

Maureen lay in my arms just crying. I knew it couldn't be easy for her to be back in that apartment. I kept thanking Mark and everyone for coming and cleaning that place up before I bought her home. Actually though, if they hadn't I probably wouldn't have even brought her back there just yet. I just sat there with her, trying to be as supportive as possible, allowing her to share all of her fears and pain with me. I knew she needed me and I was going to be there for her as long as she needed me to be; I was always going to be there for her.

"Hey baby, how about we go back to our bed," I softly whispered to her, wiping some tears from her cheeks.

She sniffled a little bit, "ok". She gazed up at me, "Joanne, I'm going to be ok, right?" She looked so lost and vulnerable. To see this woman who was typically so strong and vibrant to be hurting so bad, it just tore me up inside.

I leaned over and kissed her forehead, "if I have anything to say about it yes. We are going to make it through this Maureen, together. I'm here for you."

She smiled at me and stood up off the couch. She reached down her hand to me, lifting me up. She quickly had my body close up against hers. "Thank you Pookie." She kissed me, it felt so perfect. "I love you, how'd I get so lucky," she let out a little giggle with that last statement.

"Hey," I pulled slightly away from her, grinning, "watch it".

She started laughing; it was so nice to hear her laugh. She then grabbed my hand and began leading me down the hallway. I got up close behind her and wrapped my arms around her waist, resting my head on her shoulder. I was kissing her neck causing a big smile to come over her face. When we got into our bedroom, Maureen attempted to progress our evening activity along.

After giving into her efforts for awhile, I finally had to unfortunately stop. "Maureen come on, stop it," I was pushing her roaming hands off of me. She got this cute little disappointed look on her face and started pouting; she was so cute when she pouted. I somehow just ignored it and walked over to the dresser to pull out some pajamas, "you know what the doctor said."

"Oh come on, since when we do we care," she had walked over to me running her hands up my back. "Pookie, please," she now started kissing the back of my neck; I turned around to face her.

"Baby, I would love more than anything to take you to bed, but we can't." She looked slightly disappointed, but she knew I was right.

"I know Joanne, I know," she hated the fact that some doctor had control over what she did in her own bedroom with her own girlfriend. I hated it too, but I knew that she didn't need to be participating in that type of activity, well at least not tonight…tomorrow was a different story.

I walked over to the mirror we had in the bedroom, brushing my hair out before going to bed. I happened to glance at Maureen's reflection in the mirror, she was still pouting on the other side of the room. She finally grabbed her clothes to change, her back towards me and I knew she didn't notice me watching, so I just stood there and watched her. I loved those moments that I could steal watching her, when she didn't notice it. When she took off her shirt though, I saw something that for some reason I had not thought about then. Her entire body was covered in bruises; in that moment all the hurt I had felt from not being able to stop this from happening rushed back to me. This was the first time I was seeing her bruised body; I hadn't seen her body at the hospital, when she changed she went into the bathroom, said she could do it by herself; I hadn't pushed the issue of helping her then. I gasped and dropped the brush, causing a loud crash as it hit the dresser. Maureen jumped and quickly went to put her shirt back on realizing that I had seen her changing.

I walked over to her and grabbed the shirt before she could put it back on. I just stood there and looked at her body. My eyes started to well up with tears. I reached out to her and gently touched one of the bruises on her shoulder. Her body started to quiver. She reached up and placed her hand on top of my mine. I looked up into her eyes, she almost seemed ashamed. I moved closer to her and bent over a kissed one of her bruises. I kissed a few more bruises, before she finally spoke.

"I love you so much, do you know that?" she had started crying half way through this statement.

"I know. I love you too." I took her hand and led her over to the bed and sat her down beside me. "Maureen, it's going to be ok, we are going to be ok."

"As long as I have you, I'll be ok," I saw a little smile come over her face. "So you like in the mood now?" she started running her hand up my thigh. She leaned towards me and started kissing me.

I pulled away though, as much as I hated it, I did. "Baby, let's just get some sleep ok."

"It was worth a shot," she flashed me a little smirk and got off the bed.

We each started finishing getting ready for bed; exchanging small kisses or slaps on the ass as we'd pass each other. I had gotten in bed first, laying there watching this beautiful woman prance around the apartment, getting ready to get into my bed. I just laid there and smiled while I was watching her; she'd catch me watching and just smile back and go along with whatever she was doing before she caught me. She was being so brave about all of this happening; I admired her so much. She eventually climbed in bed. She was quickly sharing my side of the bed with me. She intertwined her leg in between mine and laid her head on my chest. I wrapped my arm around her, lightly rubbing my hand over her body.

"Goodnight Pookie, I love you."

"I love you too, goodnight."

It wasn't too much longer till we were both asleep.

(Maureen's POV)

I woke up the next morning, stretching my body figuring I'd soon hit some part of Joanne's body, but I never did. Surely, she wouldn't have gone into work today; she wouldn't have left me alone today. I opened my eyes and looked around; there was no trace of Joanne. I couldn't even hear any noise in the apartment. As I was getting ready to jump out of the bed and go look for her I noticed a note lying on Joanne's pillow.

Good morning baby. No I didn't go to work, I'm here. Whenever you get up and feel like it come out here. I love you Maureen.

Love Joanne.

I was quickly on my feet heading down the hall. I noticed Joanne sitting at the kitchen table, her back towards me. I just stood there for awhile, starring at her. She was just sitting there, her arms folded on the table; I could tell deep in thought. She was still wearing her sweatpants and the Sex Pistols t-shirt I had bought her; I don't know if she could have been more beautiful in that moment. I eventually walked up behind her, wrapping my arms around her chest. Apparently, I startled her cause she nearly jumped out of her chair.

"You know last night I fell asleep in the arms of this really hot woman and when I woke up she was gone. Can you believe that she'd let me wake up in the bed alone," I reached other and started nibbling on her ear. She started giggling, she always giggled when I did that.

"Well good morning to you too," she turned her head so that our lips were now connected into a long passionate kiss. She had pulled me down onto her lap, our lips never loosing connection from one another's. "Hey I cooked you breakfast," she finally told me when she pulled away. I turned to look at the kitchen table to see a plate of pop tarts sitting there; it made me laugh. She reached over and pulled the plate closer to us. She started breaking pieces off and feeding them to me. Who knew that being fed pop tarts was such a turn on.

"So, what do you want to do now? Anything you want to do today we'll do," oh the possibilities she was leaving me here. My mind began racing with ideas; mainly ideas that had us alone together in the apartment, undressed of course.

"Well you know," I was being very flirty by now, "actually I just want to spend the day with you, preferably here in the apartment alone."

"That sounds like a wonderful idea to me, but we can't."

"What!" I was slightly perturbed, she said anything.

"It's just that Mimi called earlier and they all want us to go out to dinner tonight at the Life and then over to Mark and Eden's; they want to spend some time with you."

"But I want to spend time alone with you," I was pouting now.

"Well we have all day and then later tonight." Then this huge smile came over her face, "and actually I called the office before you woke up and took the next three days off."

"What are you serious?" I was so excited. I wrapped my arms around her. She was going to be all mine for the next four days, oh the possibilities. "Thank you Pookie. This is so great. But are you sure you can afford that kind of time off?" Joanne had always been so involved and dedicated to her work and now she was taking four days off of work just so she could be with me, damn I love this woman.

"Don't worry about it," she reached up pushing some hair out of my face and lightly kissing my lips. "But baby can we talk a little before this big four day party of ours starts?"

"Of course," her face looked so serious.

She took a deep breath, "who did this?"

I jumped off of her lap and headed into the living room; of course she was right on my heels. It's not that I didn't want to tell her or talk to her about it, but I was just nervous to. Talking about it meant I had to relive it; I wasn't completely ready for that yet. I knew though that Joanne would be there supporting me and helping me get through it, I wasn't worried about that. Some part of me felt as though when she heard it was Steve that she'd completely blame herself and I didn't want her blaming herself for this; it wasn't her fault.

"Baby," she grabbed my shoulders and turned me around to face her. She looked so concerned, "talk to me".

I grabbed her hand and sat down with her on the couch. "Ok listen," I took a deep breath, "I want to talk to you about this, I do, but it's just hard."

"I can imagine, but I'm here for you. I want you to tell me; I want to help you. But baby I can't help you until you let me in on what happened. Please baby let me help you."

"It was Steve," I just kind of blurted it out. Figured I do it like a band-aid, quick.

"What?" she was furious. She was quickly on her feet pacing the floor. She was mumbling something, her arms flaring through the air. I let her go on like that for a little while, hoping it would help calm her down some. I eventually walked up to her, grabbed her arms, restricting them from flaring about. She was still firing off at the mouth. I just pulled her into a kiss; I knew that would shut her up.

"We have to call someone. I'm going to kill him," she was nearly screaming as she headed for the front door. I could tell she was pissed; but I couldn't really blame her because I would have been too. And part of me wanted to let her go after him, but I knew that wouldn't be the best of situations.

"Wait Joanne, I don't want to," she froze in her footsteps. She turned around to face me and flashed me this what in the hell look. "Well, I want to, just not today. I don't want to ruin our day. Don't let him ruin this, he's already ruined enough. Please." I was begging her, I was about to get on my knees if it came to that.

She slowly walked back over to me, "really, you don't want to?" she almost looked pissed, yet understanding.

"Really, well not today anyway; tomorrow first thing."

"You promise?"

"I promise," and I really wanted to, Steve would pay, but I wanted today to be about Joanne and me. I could tell she didn't agree with my decision, but she'd go along with it. She was having a hard time processing all of this, I could tell.

"How about we watch a movie?" I was attempting to get her mind off of this topic. I figured she wasn't in the mood for some sexual fun, plus she'd see all the bruises again that way and that wouldn't help either.

She agreed to a movie and went to grab a blanket out of the closet. I went over and stuck in a movie and sat on the couch waiting on her. When she returned to the living room we snuggled up on the couch together and covered up. It was weird to me sometimes at just how well our bodies fit together.

We laid there watching the movie sometimes; making out during other parts. During one of our make out periods, of course the phone rings. I reluctantly got up and went over to answer it.

"Hello"

"Hey Maureen, what's going on? How are you feeling?"

I was doing really well right before you called, "oh I'm doing ok, what's up Meems?"

"Well I was just checking that you and Joanne are still meeting us for dinner and then going to Mark and Eden's?"

"Yeah, we'll be there," I mean seriously this was why she felt it necessary to call and interrupt us. I looked over at Joanne who was laughing at me. I could tell she realized how pissed I was that someone had called.

"Ok, I'll see you soon, bye."

"Bye Meems." I hung up the phone and was quickly back on the couch, picking up where I had left off.

As we were lying there Joanne all of sudden got up off the couch for no apparent reason. She didn't say anything to me, she just got up.

"Where do you think you're going?" I was confused, yet upset that she was leaving me there on the couch to snuggle by myself.

"If we are going to make it to the Life on time, I need to get a shower," then she just took off down the hall.

"Well, let's go take a shower," I was quickly on my feet chasing her down the hallway.

An hour later we immerged from the bathroom, rather satisfied I might add. We got ready to go to the Life; every once in a while sneaking in a little playtime here and there. After every time Joanne would kiss me, I would become a little more upset, that we were going to the Life with everyone tonight. I really wanted to just be with her, but I guess it'll be good to see everyone else and to get out of this apartment for a little while.

As we were walking out of the apartment I asked Joanne not to mention to anyone that it was Steve that had beat me up. She was actually very understanding why I didn't want everyone knowing, just not yet. I kissed her and we headed to the Life.

Tonight was about Joanne, me, and our friends. Tomorrow we'd deal with Steve; I hope he dies.

Please review this one, I know you will though, thanks for all the reviews I really do appreciate all of them. Ok so now you guys are pretty much going to decide where I go from here. I could either write a chapter about them at the Life with everyone and end my fic OR I do have another idea in my head to cause a little more drama and I could write that, which will probably give you another oh I'd say approx. five more chapters. So what do you want, let me know! The sooner you let me know, the sooner the next chapter will be up obviously. Thanks for reading.