"Alex!"

Normally, she'd have been startled by the sudden appearance of her partner in front of her as she exited the conference room, but she was pretty sure her daily capacity for surprise had been entirely used up by the phone call she'd just received. So she just stopped walking, instead, and looked at Webster calmly. "What?"

"You need to ask?" he asked incredulously, grabbing her arm and pulling her back toward their desks. "What the hell was that, Eames? You just looked at your phone, got an expression on your face like you saw a ghost, then ran and locked yourself in the conference room, and you have to ask me 'what'? Sit!" he commanded when they got to her desk, giving her a gentle push into her chair. "I want to know what just happened to you."

"I . . ." She shook her head and tried to pull her arm out of his grasp. "Nothing."

"Alexandra," he intoned, doing his best imitation of her father. "Don't you dare lie to me after that stunt!"

"Leave me alone." She finally resorted to glaring at him and prying his fingers off her arm. "Now."

"Not a chance." In spite of his words, though, he released her arm and returned to his own chair. "You scared the hell out of me, Alex. At least tell me everything's ok - no one you know is hurt or dead or anything?"

"Dead?" she said with a snort. "Hah. More like 'raised from the dead.'"

"Ok, at least you're answering me. That's progress. Now tell me who it is that's been raised from the dead."

"No."

"Yes."

"No."

"Y-"

"I'm sorry," said a loud voice from behind Webster's shoulder. "Did someone replace two of my detectives with five-year-olds when I wasn't looking?"

Both detectives closed their mouths and looked up at Deakins, who was giving them a look that demanded an explanation for their behavior. "Uh, sir . . ." Alex managed weakly.

"Just a minor personal disagreement," Webster said quickly. "Didn't mean you to overhear."

Looking unconvinced, Deakins raised an eyebrow. "I would have thought you're both at least thirty years past the stage of life where 'minor personal disagreements' are resolved by 'did too'-'did not'. In fact, I don't know that I've ever seen you two disagree out loud at all in the - what, a year? - that I've had you together."

"Yes, a year," Alex snapped a little too quickly.

Both men looked at her curiously. "Been counting?" Webster teased. "I didn't think I was that bad."

"I . . ." Damn. She hadn't thought about how odd it would sound that she'd been keeping track of the time. Fighting the blush that wanted to rise on her cheeks, she shook her head. "Uh, I meant that it's been about that, yeah."

Neither man looked dissuaded. "Miss him, huh?" Deakins said with a sympathetic smile. "He'll be back, Eames, you know that. It's temporary."

Wanting to kick herself, Alex just pressed her lips together and shrugged.

"Is that what this is about?" Webster said with dawning understanding. When Deakins shot him an interested look, though, he decided that discretion was the better part of valor and cut himself off before he could go any farther in that vein. "Never mind, Cap. She's just a little . . . moody lately, you know?" he said in a smug tone designed to imply that he thought his partner was PMSing.

"Moody, eh?" Deakins replied, looking thoughtfully from Webster to Eames. After a second, apparently having decided to accept that explanation, he sighed. "Play nice, Eames. Don't make me go buy some Midol for you."

She glared at him but said nothing, preferring to have him think her moody instead of continue to wonder about her attitude.

"You can say 'thank you' now," Webster said mildly when Deakins was gone.

"Don't expect me to thank you for diffusing a problem you started," she growled, refusing to look at him.

"Hey," he shot back, "I'm not the one who just had an . . . an episode of some kind in the middle of the squad room when my phone rang."

"Shut up."

"Talk to me, Eames. I just saved your ass from Deakins's questions; I think you owe me an explanation. Especially now that you just let it slip that you've been keeping track of how long your old partner's been gone. Was that him on the phone?"

"I . . ." She shook her head. "Don't, please."

"Was that him on the phone?" Webster repeated insistently. "It was, wasn't it."

"Fine, ok. It was him," she sighed. "There. Are you happy?"

"No," he said flatly. "You need to tell me what the hell's going on."

"Nothing. Nothing's going on. I just hadn't talked to him for a while, that's all."

"Nope, I don't think so." Leaning forward and pinning her with his gaze, he shook his head pointedly. "You don't almost pass out just because someone you haven't talked to in a while calls you up. How . . ." He paused, glancing around to make sure no one was eavesdropping, then lowered his voice. "Exactly how close were you to this guy?"

"I'm not listening to this." Glaring at Webster, she pushed her chair back and got to her feet. "If all you're going to do is pry, then I'm going home."

"Alex . . ."

"I'll see you tomorrow," she said tightly, then turned and fled.

"He called," Alex said, not bothering with a greeting, when her sister answered the phone that night.

"He . . . what? Who?" Maggie said blankly. "Wait a minute - you mean he called? After all this time?"

"A year on the nose," Alex affirmed. "And right in the middle of the work day."

"Oh, no!" The sound of Maggie pulling out a chair at her kitchen table and dropping heavily into it came through the phone line. "What did he say? What did you do?"

Sighing, Alex switched the phone to her other ear. "I freaked out and scared the hell out of my partner - he thinks I had some sort of breakdown, I think - but when I actually answered the phone, I think I managed to come off as normal."

"How normal?"

"Well, I didn't cry, for one thing." And that was something to be proud of, she reminded herself as she opened her refrigerator and fished out a bottle of beer. "I asked him how he was . . . how his mother was . . . you know, the usual polite stuff."

"And that's it? What did he say? Does he miss you?" Maggie demanded. "Did he beg your forgiveness and swear that he'd never do anything stupid ever again if you agreed to take him back? And then did you flat-out laugh at him?"

Alex snorted. "Not quite. The closest he came to that was 'I miss you.'"

"And you said . . .?" her sister prompted.

"I said, uh . . ." She sighed, remembering. "I told him that he knows where he can find me. And then . . . I hung up."

"That's good," Maggie said with firm reassurance. "That's what we decided you should do, remember?"

"Yeah, I know. It just . . . didn't feel as good as I hoped it would. But at the same time, I'm glad you made me think about it, because if I hadn't known that he might call . . . I think I would have totally lost it."

"Well, good, then. You did good, Alex! Be happy."

Alex just sighed again. "My partner started asking questions afterward, though. And then my captain showed up and pointed out that it had been a year, which Webster didn't know, and now he does know, and he's entirely too not-dumb to not put the pieces together . . ."

"So what?" Maggie interrupted. "No one is going to take in the fact that you were unsettled by Bobby calling and come up with 'Eames was madly in love with her partner and then he deserted her after treating her like crap' as an explanation - I promise you, that's not going to be Webster's first inclination, or anyone else's."

"Yeah, I guess. I . . ." She took a gulp of her beer. "He sounded kind of like he wanted to say something more than what he actually said."

"Like what?"

"I don't know. Maybe to apologize or something."

"And what would you have said if he did apologize?"

"Oh, I don't know," Alex groaned. "Probably hung up on him because I didn't know what to say. Which I did anyway, really."

"Al?" Maggie said cautiously. "What is it that you want from him now? Would you want him to come back? Would you take him back, if he did move back out here? Or are you over him?"

"Christ," she muttered, "I don't know what I want! I'd say that I'd take him back - I mean, as pathetic as it is, I do still care about him - except that I know things would just get harder from there, if he did come back. There's not going to be a happily-ever-after, no matter what he does or I do."

"Hmm."

"Mags?"

"What?"

"Do you think he'll call me again?" Even she could hear the note of hopefulness in her voice, and she wanted to kick herself for it.

"Yeah," Maggie sighed. "Yeah, I think he will. If you thought it sounded like he had more to say . . . then he probably did. Will you talk to him if he calls back?"

She contemplated her half-empty bottle for a few seconds. "I don't think I'm capable of not talking to him if I get the chance. How's that for pathetic?"

"You need closure, hon. You were in love with him. It's only human to want some kind of resolution, no matter what that resolution ends up being."

"The problem," Alex said quietly, "is that even now, I don't think it's a matter of how I 'was' in love with him . . . it's a matter of how I think I still am."

"Maybe you are. But I'll tell you this - if he's not still in love with you . . . then he's too stupid to deserve you anyway."

Alex just closed her eyes and downed the rest of her beer.