I'm here, I'm here.

Tori: LOL, I like all the X-Philes coming out of the woods! Nobody is having a good time right now, and I know seemingly they are all acting out of character a bit but there is a lot on the line.

Now, as promised we go back in time but with a little twist, as some parts of this flashback were actually deleted scenes that (sadly) never made it to the final episode.

"No yes, yes I understand. Thank you anyway."

She had grateful words on her lips, but a very different kind of feeling going through her. Foster hung up the phone with a hasty gesture that produced a hard sound, then sighed again fighting back tears. She looked around her office aimlessly, for some reason hoping to find comfort in the familiar room, catching something coming towards the door but unable to stop herself from bowing down her head in frustration before Cal could see her.

He immediately made one of his 'I saw something but I'm gonna pretend I didn't' face, storming in looking like a ball of energy…definitely way too much for her to deal with first thing in the morning, especially on the back of the conversation she'd just had.

"Hei," he mumbled.

"Hei."

WOW Gillian, way to make the conversation! She thought, not even trying to put up a good face when Cal approached her with a strange look and waving his hand in the air.

"You got that IRS thing," he stated, and Gillian felt strangely reassured that by the look of it that was really the reason why he was there.

"Yeah."

She knew she took too long to respond, but that one was really hard to shake off.

"It's death and taxes," Cal quipped then, and she nodded and tilted her head slightly, clearly not engaged in the conversation. Then Cal grimaced and looked down at her desk "Bad news about the adoption?"

"Ok," she responded immediately, everything about her saying that obviously she was not ok with that as she shook her head, holding a finger up. "Rule number one, no reading coworkers?"

"You got a pamphlet on your desk!" He protested, hands sunk in his pockets.

She looked down at her own desk seeing the flyer, face up, showing images of assorted babies topped with the more than obvious words 'adoption agency'. Gillian moaned, frustrated with herself, then slammed her hand on it and looked up at Cal who was making a funny face despite himself.

Busted! He seemed to say, but also Sorry love.

Only for a very brief moment she thought about asking him to drop it, but after all it wasn't his fault, not that time. Besides, she had a long day ahead and maybe shedding some of that emotional weight might help a little.

"It seems that being single makes the odds of adoption exponentially harder than before my divorce," she explained then as she stood up and walked around the desk.

"Being 42 doesn't help, does it?" Cal shot at her with a smirk, and she burst out into a honestly amused laugh.

"Wh- Go to hell I'm 39!"

"There's a laugh!" He pointed all over her face, happy he had managed to get rid of that frown. "You see, that's good. You work with that!"

Gillian found it hard to admit, but maybe that wasn't such a bad way to bounce back. Not even Loker, approaching them with some nonsense about a study on mating primates, managed to bring her down again and, even more surprisingly neither did the sudden appearance of Zoe calling out for Cal. He joked about the sudden apparition but motioned to join his ex-wife, then stopped and gave her a last look and pointed finger

"We'll talk. All right?"

Gillian nodded briefly but as she watched him go, part of her hoped that whatever Zoe was about to discuss with him would make him forget about it.

She'd never thought that a statuatory rape case could be a distraction, it shouldn't really, but she would have lied to herself if she didn't admit that she needed a change. She wasn't going to give Cowley's words any kind of attention, she was far more concerned with the threat he posed for the woman and her children than with whatever he had tried to imply about her. And there was also a young man who seriously risked having his life ruined for something that he hadn't done, so she had her hands - and mind - full anyway.

Zoe's phone rang and she pulled away from her and Cal to answer. The moment they were alone, Cal leaned into her a little bit and waved his hand at her.

"How's it going with the prophet, Cowley?"

"Well, spending all day with someone who thinks they're all knowing? It's like I never left the office," she teased.

"Thanks for that," Cal mumbled in response, then he became suddenly serious and goofily reached out as if he meant to take hold of her but without actually touching her. "Hei, do you wanna have that chat? Talk?"

"No, there's nothing to talk about." Gillian shrugged, trying to play it down more with herself than with him. "My situation is what it is."

Instead of ending the conversation, her statement kicked off an amusing rant from Cal about newborns and potassium shots, complete with a wide range of hand gestures and face muscles going crazy. It was hard to follow really, harder even to figure out where he was going with it or to keep a straight face, but she could also suddenly and easily picture him holding Emily for the first time as he spoke and be completely lost in the moment.

"Not all that it's cracked up to be really," Cal eventually concluded.

Gillian thought he looked so sweet, something rare really, trying to be comforting without being too nosy. Oh, he could do that when he wanted, and masterfully so. And all of that based on one little thing he had caught sight of.

"Actually it sounds wonderful," she replied then with a smile bordering on bittersweet.

Before either of them could say anything else, Zoe joined them again with some updates and Cal recognised that was his cue. Gillian left them to it and started to get back into her office, stopping when Cal briefly touched her to get her attention for a last word.

"Hei, keep your chin up love."

That she did, and then some.

She wasn't one for rushed decisions and inconsiderate actions but helping that woman and her kids had been a lot more important than anything else. Maybe someone could object that she had also wanted to get one over Cowley, and they wouldn't have been far off the mark: but at the end of day, hearing from her contacts that they were all ok, settling in their new lives and finally free, was worth all the pettiness someone might put on her. Especially that day, which had ended with the tragic demise of Pollack and the obliteration of what was left of the Reeds family.

It had been a gloomy affair, and they all felt responsible for it. They weren't, but some kind of feelings couldn't be avoided in the face of tragedy.

That was why she was still at work. They all had their way of dealing with things; Loker and Ria had opted for getting drunk, Cal had pulled another one of his vanishing acts and she had gone back to the office, needing to feel in control of something. Still, it was only a matter of time before she would run out of things to do, and the prospect of a relaxing evening inched closer and closer.

When she finally closed the last folder and moved it to the 'done' pile on her desk, the adoption agency leaflet stared back at her with a vengeance. Gillian picked it up, staring at the babies smiling at her with impossible promises, then sighed and crumbled it up in a ball she tossed in the trash can.

Wishing it was as easy to remove the thought from her mind, Gillian stood up and gathered her things, then switched off the lights and left the office. As per habit, she took a peak into Cal's office as she passed by and found it empty and dark, then nodded to herself and continued on the way out, switching lights out around the empty office as she went. She reached the elevator and pushed the button, realising she was famished and starting to mentally browse her dinner options. When the elevator arrived and the doors opened she stepped forward, nearly crashing into Cal exiting the cabin and avoiding a full-on collision only thanks to his feline reflexes.

"That was a close one!" He chuckled as he stepped out of the elevator. "You ok, love?"

"Yes, thank you." Gillian took a deep breath, just needing a minute to recover. "What are you doing here Cal? I thought you went home to Emily."

"I did, yeah. Spoke to her and all." He sighed, straddling the back of his head. "Wasn't easy. She asked if it was ok for her to go be with her mom tonight. And I realised I left the brief for tomorrow's meeting here, so I came to pick it up."

Gillian nodded, then walked with him as he started off towards his office.

"Is Emily ok?"

"Hard to tell, lots to process." He sighed, shaking his head. "I myself can barely remember why I was so mad at her."

"Because she had fake IDs to go to bars and college parties?"

Gillian offered, somehow returning the favour from when he had tried to inopportunely cheer her up. As unlikely as it was to succeed, the move did seem to work because Cal moaned loudly and smirked, then gave her a grin.

"Oh yeah! She's so grounded!"

Gillian chuckled as they entered his office, watching as he went over the desk and started moving stuff around looking for the brief.

"What about Zoe? Have you talked to her?"

"It's a tough one," he answered absently, checking folders as they came to his hands. "Quite the baptism for her first solo case."

She had to agree, very little of that case must have been easy for her from what she had gathered. Yes, they didn't always see eye to eye but there had been so much going on and Gillian could only imagine how Zoe might have felt when Pollack had been killed.

"I'm glad she had you to help her out."

She surprised herself with that, not because she thought it but because the words actually left her mouth. Cal must have been on the same page because he suddenly stopped the frantic digging and tossing of his desk to look up at her. Then he slowly sat on the edge of his desk, looking at her with a warm expression.

"You helped her out too, love." He smirked and squinted his eyes, his tell for when he was about to admit he had made a mistake. "The system…I missed that."

"Didn't help that much anyway," Gillian answered with a sad shrug.

"Come now Foster, don't do that." Cal immediately pointed out. "It wasn't even your case and you had enough on your plate already." It was her turn to look at him with surprise, and his smirk softened into some sort of silent apology. "We never had that chat…"

Gillian shook her head and sighed, folding her arms.

"Loker talks too much."

"That, I agree. Especially on this chimps thing? God almighty!" He blurted, easily eradicating a laugh from her before he got all concerned again. "Really love, I just want you to know you can talk to me if you want. Easier than me reading it out of you, or pretending I don't see it."

She had to admit that was probably true, although she thought there was always another option. For example, he could have just told Loker to mind his own business, or use the same courtesy she knew had been paid to her during the last months of her marriage when keeping to himself whatever he was seeing about Alec.

Yeah, 'cause that worked out really well! She told herself, then focused on Cal and his worried expression.

"Don't worry Cal," she smiled, sincerely. "It takes more than an abusive man with a god complex to get to me."

"Sorry, who are we talking about here again?" He quipped, and immediately decided he would never tell her how much he loved the way she laughed freely when they bantered in that friendly way.

Seemingly, he also didn't like the way her face could suddenly go dark and her whole solar and positive being deflate when something was going through her mind, but that she knew already.

"I'm ok, Cal," she said then, managing to sustain his gaze. "Some things are just not meant to be."

After she said that, Gillian motioned to turn around and leave saying a soft goodnight to him as she went, but she only made it to the door before he called her again.

"Foster?"

She turned around and found him back to his treasure hunt, looking for the brief and messing about in what he called the controlled chaos of his desk.

"Yeah?"

"Just so you know," he stopped and threw her a teasing glance, menacingly pointing at her with one of the folders he had been going through, "you're doing my taxes next year."

Gillian held his gaze with a smile, knowing that in Cal Lightman's book that was a sign of appreciation for her move. And thinking that, after all, she definitely owed that to him.