Okay, so I know I said I was open to criticism, but as it turns out I am rather terrified of that! So instead I want to ask you to be nice, haha. Thanks to those who have already written reviews, I really appreciate it, even though it also makes me highly anxious and scared of actually looking at them. Lol, I know, I am pathetic. Anyway, here is another chapter. Writing stories feels very personal to me, and sharing my writing with others is something I do not take lightly, but I figured I could at least give it a go.

Another thing that scares me is the fact that I didn't create these characters - they aren't mine, and therefore they already have established personalities which I have to channel, and I may or may not be successful in my attempt to do just that, lol.

This has been a rant.

Gill woke up abruptly, gasping for air, with sweat dripping from her forehead. She sat up, slightly disoriented, and looked around the room – although she didn't know what for, exactly. Blurry images from the nightmare she had just escaped from slowly resurfaced: a pool of blood on a car seat, which had expanded into a big red ocean that was about to swallow the car with her in it; Helen's face telling her to follow the blood path to the kingdom of death; stuff that made no actual sense but still seemed so very real.

Emotionally, she'd had a very intense couple of days. She was still trying to process it all; somehow the world seemed so incredibly different to what it had been just 48 hours ago. She had come face-to-face with death, and was grappling with some pretty major demons as a result of it. She'd had her whole world turned upside down when the woman who had been her best friend for more years than she could count had suddenly professed her love, and she had realised almost immediately that she actually felt the same way. Now she was here, with Julie lying next to her, fast asleep, and she could feel everything wash over her in waves. Helen was dead. She had been unable to save her. God, how she wished she could have saved her. She wished she could have had a chance to make things right again. Was it her fault? Had she actually ruined the poor woman's life?

Unable to go back to sleep, Gill got out of bed and made her way to the toilet. Once she had closed the door behind her, she sank down against it and finally allowed the tears to fall down her face. She was crying for Helen, for Louise, for Sheila and Michael, and for all the other victims buried in the Bevan cellar. Every time she closed her eyes, she could see the life slowly drain out of Helen's eyes. She couldn't escape the mental images.

A noise caused Julie to wake up; it had sounded like a muffled sob, slightly high-pitched. She opened her eyes, and could see a small ray of light coming from the bathroom. Then she noticed that Gill was no longer next to her. Slowly, she got up, feeling an increased sense of worry as she walked carefully towards the bathroom door.

"Gill?" She said, as gently as she could, not really knowing what to expect.

No answer.

"Gill, love, what's going on?"

Still no answer; instead she could hear another sob.

"Right, Gill, I'm coming in," she declared, too worried to wait any longer. She opened the door, and immediately knocked into something. She quickly realised that it was Gill.

"Gill, please let me in."

Gill slid away from the door, which allowed Julie the space to enter into the room. As soon as she saw Gill's face, her heart fell into the pit of her stomach. She was obviously in a lot of pain, and Julie wished she could make it go away, but she knew Gill would have to fight these demons herself. She was going to make damn sure she wasn't alone, though.

She sat down next to the other woman, and pulled her into a hug in an attempt to comfort her.

"Whenever you're ready, you can talk, and I will listen, and hold you when you need me to. You know that, right?"

Gill sniffled, and another sob escaped despite her best effort to keep it inside.

"I'm sorry," she managed, without looking up.

"What for?" Julie asked.

"For this; for being this way. This must be the worst way to start a relationship." Gill's voice was trembling.

"Gill, listen to me. I love you. You are the love of my life. We have gone through hard times together before, and we will do it again. Remember Dave? I wanted to be by your side, more than anything, even when you were hurting from being left by someone else and I was so in love with you I sometimes found it hard to breathe in your presence. Whatever you're going through, I want to go through it with you. Okay?"

She could feel Gill nod against her chest. Julie's heart was aching so badly, and she was feeling hopeless and helpless when she thought about how limited she was. Gill was wrong on so many levels when she said it was the worst start to a relationship, though; for Julie, it had been the absolute best. She couldn't come up with a word that would adequately describe how she felt about Gill, but it was a dream come true, and it had been perfect in its own way, despite everything. It had made them both forget about reality for a little while. But now it was back to haunt them both – Gill in particular.

After a couple of minutes, Gill looked up and straight at Julie with a tearstained face. "I love you," she whispered. "I can't imagine what I would do without you."

"And you won't ever have to," Julie said reassuringly. She lovingly stroked the other woman's cheek, before pulling her into an even tighter embrace.

"Everything hurts, Julie," Gill finally said, after sitting like that for several minutes.

"I know, love," Julie managed, barely in control of her own voice as she watched how broken her girlfriend was after everything that had happened. A tear made its way down her cheek, and she wiped it away quickly.

Life seemed so unfair sometimes.

Julie struggled to keep her eyes from falling shut as she sat in her office staring at the computer screen in front of her. She had eventually managed to get Gill back to bed around five-ish, and now the sleepless night was beginning to take its toll. She had left Gill alone in her bed to go to work; hopefully she was still there, getting some much-needed rest. She had been given fourteen days off work to begin with, as well as six mandatory therapy sessions to make sure she was okay to go back to work.

Julie yawned, and looked at the time. Still only 9:35, even though it felt like she had been sitting here for several hours. She couldn't focus on anything today. Even the thought of having to get up to make a cup of coffee made her feel completely drained. It seemed impossible. She shook her head, and tried to concentrate on the document she was reading, but the words just weren't registering. All she wanted to do was go back home and make sure Gill was okay. She wanted to keep her safe. She knew these thoughts were irrational, but she kept thinking about Gill being strapped to that car seat, and the knife against her face, and her heart started beating out of control and she wanted to run home and grab Gill before anything bad could happen to her. Her brain kept coming up with all these horrible alternative endings; she was getting mental images of Gill being stabbed in the back, or having her throat sliced, or actually driving the car off the cliff into the ocean. She didn't know how to block these images out. She couldn't stop thinking about the what-ifs: what if Gill had died before Julie had the chance to tell her how much she loves her?

She swallowed hard, and tried to focus on her computer screen for what seemed like the billionth time, but eventually she had to admit defeat. She got up and walked in what felt like slow motion over to the coffee machine.