A/N: A short one before fictional Christmas. Oh and #sexytime!

As always, enjoy x

Chapter 55: Medicine

Two weeks later, Friday 23rd December 2016, 3.44pm, Paul's house, Elmhurst, Queens

Going back to Jasper, can't do it anymore.

Thanks for the ticket.

P.S. I ate your burrito. Brock.

The departure of Taylor's roommate was uneventful; Brock didn't stick around for the rest of finals to see the full extent of his failure or if his future at Emory was salvageable, and left by a note in the middle of the afternoon instead. And though some would say he shouldn't have, Taylor still felt guilty because he didn't help, which was why he was moping at his dad's house again. Paul was so surprised to see his son on his doorstep voluntarily that he wasn't concerned with why. Christmas had come early and no number of Gina's reminders that it was time to talk it out could dampen that belief. "So he left? Just like that?" Paul asked as he screwed a new adjustable TV bracket to the wall from the step-ladder.

"Yeah." Taylor said in a monotonous tone that gave his age away.

"Where's Jasper?"

"Arkansas."

"Can't save everybody." Paul said knowingly as he knew the guilt of leaving one or more behind from the field. "You gotta know when to save yourself." The silence that followed brought them back to that sore spot called Jeremy, and there was no more avoiding it. "I don't hate that house, Tay." Taylor would've been more convinced if his dad hadn't sped past it every time they went to Virginia. "It used to smell like pound cake… sometimes. My mama made the best pound cake, all that butter. She was good like that."

Paul never talked about his mother; not to Susan, never to his son, so that small disclosure made its mark on Taylor. "Dad?"

"What?"

"It's crooked. Maybe I should get up there..."

11.18pm, Galah Apartments, Washington Street, West Village, Manhattan

The day the custom-made 8-foot-wide bed arrived was unceremonious because neither John nor Joss were around for long enough to christen it. Between the promotion she was still on the fence about and the conundrum that was Dr Vanessa Lockett, they both had their hands full their respective day jobs. But as fate would have it, a successful stake -out with Fusco had produced the primary suspect in a semi-cold case from 5 months ago and Dr Lockett had left the research lab for a Seinfeld marathon leaving John with no-one to watch for the night. The Detective had never been so happy to spark the ignition when she got a Unknown phone call and it wasn't Finch or Shaw on the other end. If Christmas comes early; let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.

The Man in the Christmas socks was prepared as every good boy scout should be; the only way Finch could interrupt them was by hacking the Bluetooth on the microwave. With Taylor in Queens with his dad, Fusco and Shaw on call and Bear on guard for any intruders, John thought he had all the bases covered. He hadn't considered Joss being the biggest disruption to his plans; with nothing on her skin but sweat and jasmine lotion making the oysters and red wine forgettable.

"I've missed you, John…" She said, with her sultry tone sending his mind into a spin; she was winning and they hadn't even begun. His hair passed through her fingers like the bristles on a paintbrush. There was no kiss, just her nose brushing against his. Slight intimate touches that caught him off guard. Her gentleness still did that to him sometimes, disarmed him from taking her clothes off in a fury and making her submit until she tapped out like a WWE heel. That unnamed scent in her hair still got to him and there was no way he could go another year without finding out what it was. "Have you missed me too?"

John didn't answer rhetorical questions because he wasn't much of a talker, and if she wanted conversation she shouldn't have picked a time when he could barely breathe. He heard Shaw's voice in his head and agreed for once. " What a tease ." But she was wrong, Joss was taking her time, enjoying the slow burn all the way down to her knees. And suddenly, deliberately and intentionally, the long-awaited bed moved further and further away from John's sight as she rolled her tongue back and forth across the tip. She was winning without trying or so he thought, when it wasn't a competition to begin with. It was in her nature to take him into her mouth with the same eagerness she took him into her body, giving substance to the season of giving. And giving. And giving...

The edges of that bed could have been as far and wide as the four corners of the Earth. John set her body aflame then doused it sweat like a glass of crushed ice and rum. Her mind was free so her body followed to climax and quivered on the comedown. And that rush was enough to dull their sense of sound, of his medical pager.