Hello everyone! I'm so excited that you're all still reading. Thank you! You should all go hug yourselves. You deserve it! Anyway, I told you I'd try to get a chapter out to you before the week is out and I actually did! It's pretty long and there's plenty of Kirk/McCoy interaction to make up for the lack of it in the previous chapter. I hope you all enjoy. :)

Notes: This AU takes place about 20 minutes in the future in San Francisco. I'm not sure what sort of "verse" it is yet, so if anyone has any ideas, please let me know! Also, I rated this T because there's nothing too bad except for McCoy and Kirk's language. I don't think it's strong enough to warrant an M rating, but if anyone has a problem with it, I will up the rating. Seriously, does anyone have an idea for what I should call this universe?

Disclaimer: I own "Acting Professionally" and I really need to start reading it this weekend so I can write that paper that's due on it in two weeks. ...But I don't own Star Trek.

To:

From: j-money

Subject: WONDERFUL NEWS!

I'll be in San Francisco! 3 days!

-James T. Kirk, badass extraordinaire

To: j-money

From:

Subject: You know, it actually pains me to type your e-mail address.

Dammit Jim,

I know. I've known for the past week because you keep e-mailing me. And texting me. And calling the hospital (By the way, the Dean of Medicine talked to me about the other day. You really need to stop fucking doing that.). And calling me at fucking 4 in the morning to inform me! I swear to God, Jim, you're like a damn puppy or something.

-McCoy

P.S. I don't know how it can't bother you that your signature is longer than your actual message.

To:

From: j-money

Subject: I'm sticking with j-money. Deal with it.

If I were a puppy, I'd be a golden retriever.

-James T. Kirk, badass extraordinaire

P.S. I can't understand how it bothers you, Crankypants.

(Two and a half days! You know you missed me.)

February rolled around without much change. Weekly and sometimes twice weekly calls with Joanna. Idiots at the hospital. Chapel still gushing over the ballet book McCoy had given her for Christmas. More idiots at the hospital.

The only difference was that McCoy took a new route when walking the dogs so that he didn't run across Nancy anymore.

She had been understanding and seemingly okay with his lame-ass excuse that he wasn't ready for a committed relationship. McCoy knew she was mature enough to get over any sorts of childish grudges she might be harboring (Unlike some other woman he knew…).

But still. There was still some guilt and too much confusion over the whole situation that he just wanted to avoid the whole thing. Just ignore it, pretend it never happened, and walk away from the whole memory. McCoy was getting pretty good at that whole damn process.

The new route took an extra fifteen minutes, which meant nine hundred seconds more of yipping and barking and peeing on every. Fucking. Hydrant. But, the pluses out-weighted the cons this time.

"I'm sick."

There was no hello, no preamble. Nothing. Yet, McCoy would have known who it was even without the caller id.

"Are you in San Francisco yet?"

"Yeah."

"Come on over."

He expected to hear someone racing up the stairs (The elevator hadn't been working for the past few weeks and the landlord had better things to do, apparently. Jackass.), but he heard no hurried steps or stomps. Instead, there was just a half hour of silence outside the door with the occasional sound of the vacuum in Mrs. Whatsername's apartment across the hall.

Then finally, a slow knock resounded through his tiny studio three times before it trailed off, the knuckles running down the length before, McCoy assumed, falling back to the owner's side. He opened the door to find Jim leaning his forehead against the wall beside his doorway.

When the door opened, Jim rotated his head against the wall so that he was still supported by it but could face McCoy more clearly. His face was clearly flushed with a fever and the light in his sunken eyes seemed a bit dimmer than usual as though the shine had lost its fervor. Even his hair seemed a bit droopier than normal.

McCoy wordlessly moved away from the entrance to let Jim pass by. The younger man walked slow as molasses, shuffling his feet against the floor as he walked in with a faint glare on his face. McCoy noticed that he wore loose pajama pants and a oversized tee shirt in an effort to stay comfortable.

"Why did I have to come here?" he asked with annoyance, his voice sounding congested.

"Here is where my medic bag is," McCoy answered, gesturing to the bag laying on the floor near his desk that he had gotten out of the closet when he first received Jim's phone call.

"Why couldn't you bring it to the hotel?" Jim exclaimed with indignation, staring at the bag with a bit of resentment. He glanced back at McCoy, waiting for the answer.

McCoy shrugged.

"It's heavy."

"You're lazy."

McCoy shrugged again, this time allowing his lips to turn upwards in amusement. He made no comment and instead slid an arm around Jim's lowered shoulders to steer him towards the old worn couch. Jim eased his way onto the couch, shucking off his sneakers and curling up onto the cushions like a child.

Though his eyes shut immediately upon resting against the arm of the couch, he readjusted his head to give McCoy a better angle to feel his forehead. McCoy brushed the hair away from his face to get a better view of Jim's flushed skin and when he pressed the back of his hand to the pale expanse now exposed to him, it nearly burned to the touch.

"Interesting," Jim commented with a smirk, his eyes shut tight.

"What do you mean?" McCoy questioned, the back of his hand still pressed to Jim's forehead.

"You take temperatures like a good ol' fashioned country doctor," he teased with an overly thick accent drawling out his words.

McCoy frowned and pulled a thermometer out of the front pocket of his bag and poked Jim in the arm with it until he opened his eyes.

"You know, this doesn't have to go in your mouth," McCoy threatened with a venom-sweet smile etched across his stubble-covered face.

Jim's eyes widened slightly before the blue rolled in its sockets and he gave a half-hearted smile. Opening his mouth wide, he waited for McCoy to place the thermometer under his tongue.

"Well, I guess we're all about to see if you can manage to keep your mouth shut for a total of thirty seconds," McCoy joked sardonically.

Jim made a mock laughing face before his features fell back into a silence that clearly read "you're the only one who thinks you're funny." Which was only made more amusing by the thermometer still hanging between his pink lips.

Finally the thermometer beeped and McCoy was surprised to see that it read 102.3. He glanced back at Jim who looked on with vague interest about his temperature.

"Looks like you weren't kidding," McCoy said, flashing him the numbers. Jim shrugged and settled himself more firmly into the couch cushions.

"Told you I was sick," he answered quietly, his voice muffled by the couch arm.

"What are your symptoms?" McCoy asked as he started to fish around in his bag to see what he had that might help Jim feel better.

"I'm about ninety percent sure that my head is about to split in, oh say, three or four pieces, my body hurts like a bitch and every joint just aches. My muscles hurt and I didn't even do anything all that strenuous lately. And my throat hurts. And just in general, everything feels sick," Jim listed, pointing to various afflicted areas of his body as he moaned on the couch.

McCoy said nothing and merely nodded, his eyes unfocused as he stared at Jim's bent knee and wondered what Jim might be suffering from.

"Well," he finally said, moving his eyes back up to Jim's tired countenance, "sorry that it's nothing more interesting, but it sounds like maybe the flu. I can't tell you much else without taking any tests."

Jim only groaned and waved away the suggestion as he pulled the pillow out from under his back and rested it under his head.

"I can give you some penicillin if you want. See if that elevates any of your symptoms," McCoy offered, pulling out a spare bottle from his bag.

"Can't," Jim refused, eyeing the bottle carefully from a safe distance. "I'm allergic."

McCoy looked at the younger man with a touch of surprise.

"You're allergic to penicillin?" he questioned, just to make sure. Anti-biotic allergies weren't unheard of, but they sure made things a hell of a lot more difficult. McCoy could only imagine how tough it must have been for Jim's mother to get him fixed up as a kid when he was sick. "How about cephalosporins?"

"Yep," Jim nodded with a wince as he pressed his fingers lightly against his one exposed temple.

"Monobactums? Carbapenems?" McCoy ticked off each one on his fingers.

"Yep and yep," Jim said, making a popping sound on the last p. "They make me itchy, my hands swell, and my tongue gets numb. Makes me feel like I'm leaking or something."

"Is there anything you're not allergic to?" McCoy pondered, half out of concern for his friend and half out of his natural medical curiosity.

"Pain relievers," Jim answered with a grin. Then he paused with a thoughtful expression on his face before the smile returned with a hint of playfulness. "And chicken soup."

"Yeah, don't strain yourself," McCoy answered with a fake put-on voice, rolling his eyes with amusement. "I get the hint."

"You'll really make it for me?" Jim's somewhat incredulous voice followed his as he walked into the small kitchen area and pulled a can of soup out of the narrow cabinet above the tiny table.

"May as well," he shrugged, looking through the doors near the sink for a can opener. "You allergic to any foods?"

"Watermelon. And pork," Jim answered with a bit of a laugh in his voice, clearly knowing how atypical his answer sounded.

"Pork?" McCoy repeated, actually looking up from the can opener in his hand to stare at Jim in incredulity. "Who the fuck is allergic to pork? You Jewish or something?"

"Nah," Jim said, shaking his head, his voice thick with sickness. "I'm just legitimately allergic to pork."

"You're a medical mess, aren't you, Jim?" McCoy asked, shaking his head slowly as a small smile broke across his face without his noticing.

"And proud of it," Jim beamed as brightly as he could with a high fever. Then his eyes fluttered a few more times before finally shutting.

McCoy continued to shake his head while he put a pot on the miniature stove and set it to boil. While waiting for the soup to get ready, he dug out a plastic container from under his bed. He pulled out some fresh sheets and began to strip his bed of the dirty cloth. Jim looked over as McCoy flung the pillowcase into the hamper next to the bed near the couch.

"New sheets? For moi?" he peaked, looking up from the edge of the couch with interest.

McCoy shrugged and started tucking the corners of the sheets around the mattress to make sure the elastic wouldn't snap up.

"Not really medically relevant to making you feel better, but it's more comfortable," he explained. "And apparently that's all I can do for you today since you're a fucking walking disaster waiting to die from an anti-biotic overdose."

"Thanks, Bones," Jim responded, completely ignoring the somewhat crabby tone laced throughout McCoy's words.

McCoy grunted, a little uncomfortable with Jim's genuine appreciation, and shoved a pillow into its new pillowcase with a bit more force than necessary. Throwing the pillows and blankets onto the bed without any careful finesse, he took a few steps back over to the kitchen area and found that the water was boiling enough to add the soup.

He poured the contents of the can into the hot water and signaled to Jim that it was nearly ready. Jim understood the strange one-armed gesture and gingerly lifted his aching body over to the small table and promptly plopped down, lacking any and all grace.

McCoy handed Jim the hot soup and a spoon and watched in silence as Jim began to eat the instant chicken noodle soup. He noticed with faint amusement that Jim was quick to eat the chicken bits first and he almost gave a little laugh when he saw the look of sheer and utter contentment on Jim's face as soon as the warm liquid soothed his aching throat.

"Weirdo," Jim commented with a ghost of a smile as he swallowed another spoonful of noodles.

"What?" McCoy asked, crossing the room to occupy the vacated couch.

"Staring at me like that," he continued, not looking away from his soup. "I guess you take such a personal interest in all of your patients."

"You can always leave," McCoy threatened without any real promise in his tone.

Jim didn't even respond, but McCoy watched his broad shoulders shake with silent laughter. The next few minutes passed in silence as McCoy continued to idly watch Jim (only because there was nothing else to do and it would have be rude to turn on the television if Jim had a headache) until a clatter of metal against the ceramic of the bowl indicated to McCoy that Jim had finished. He rose from his seat to take the bowl away from Jim, but Jim held up a hand in anticipation and stood up to wash the bowl in the sink.

While Jim rinsed off the bowl and the spoon, McCoy walked over to the window and lowered the shades. Even though the sun had set and the city was shadowed in night's darkness, the street lights and car lights would be glaring against the window and would probably irritate Jim's headache.

"Before I forget, I got you something."

McCoy turned around to see Jim pulling something out of his large pajama pants pocket. In his outstretched hand, he held out a balled up shapeless mass of fabric. Taking it from his hand, McCoy unraveled the mass and extended it to its full length recognizing it as a long scarf similar to the scarf Jim had worn in the picture he had sent from France.

"Uhura knitted one for me, too. It was my Christmas gift. And she knitted one for you, too, since apparently I mention you enough that she thought you deserved one," Jim was rambling a bit, his hands fluttering around his body as though he were unsure what to do. Then he smirked a little with a warm look in his tired eyes. "She said something about how people who spend time with me need a little extra sympathy in their lives."

McCoy gruffed a laugh, fingering the scarf's soft fabric between his fingers.

"I need to meet this girl," he half-joked, poking lightly at Jim's over-inflated ego. Then his voice took on a slightly more serious and heartfelt tone as he said, "Thanks for passing the gift along."

Jim looked a bit more relaxed and managed one of his easy smiles that met his eyes as he nodded.

The two men stood there while McCoy examined the handiwork of the knitting (it reminded him so much of the blankets Gram used to crochet for him) and Jim stood with his dancing hands flitting around again.

"I'll tell her you said thanks," he promised, pounding his fists together idly. "They're really nice scarves. Nice and warm. Mine's in orangey colors. Reds and yellows. Yours is in blues and greens."

McCoy looked up with an amused grin at the pale, sickly, and uncomfortable man before him.

"Good colors. I like it," he assured Jim, holding it up and gesturing it to him. His grin grew as he watched the relief wash over Jim.

Heading over to the closet to put the scarf away, he rubbed his fingers along the tied-off fringe before shutting the narrow door. He heard shuffling behind him and turned to see Jim collapsing into the bed. There was a moment of stillness as Jim seemed to hug the mattress before he shifted around and pulled the blankets haphazardly over his body. He squirmed around a bit more in an effort to get more comfortable before finally laying to rest.

Satisfied that Jim was finally going to get the sleep that he needed, McCoy walked over to his desk area and grabbed some of his books. He turned back around when he thought he felt Jim's eyes on his back. Sure enough when he turned around, Jim was watching him with tired eyes.

"You don't use any aftershave or cologne or anything?"

"What?" McCoy asked, blinking in surprise as Jim caught him off-guard. "No. Why the hell are you asking?"

"No real reason," Jim yawned, snuggling further into the bed. "Your sheets just smell exactly like you do. I always thought it was aftershave or something, not just laundry detergent."

McCoy just shook his head.

"Sorry to disappoint."

"Never," Jim assured him with a lazy smile before letting it slip off his face. His eyes slid shut once more, his long and dark eyelashes resting gently against the tops of his unusually color-less cheeks. His lips parted softly as his breath came out in slower and more even puffs of warm exhalations until his entire face seemed to smooth out in sleep.

McCoy walked over to the bed to lay his hand against Jim's forehead once more, just to double check the heat of his skin. He was careful not to let his hand rest there any longer than necessary, although he wasn't really sure why he had to monitor his own behavior. But he did pretend not to notice when his fingers trailed lightly down Jim's cheek before finally falling back to his side.

With a last glance at Jim's slowly rising and falling chest, he grabbed his books, glasses, and a few pens and highlighters before heading over to the couch. He turned out all the lights except for the small lamp beside the threadbare couch and, as he slid on his glasses, opened one of the books to an essay about different surgical techniques.

The tiny room seemed almost alive with the faint breathing and constant presence of the warm body just a few feet away from McCoy. He focused on the words on the page in front of him, but even his deepest state of concentration could ignore the soft sounds of Jim's breath. Surprisingly enough, he found that it did not bother him in the slightest.

Hours later and McCoy had found himself highlighting through essay after essay and was actually impressed with himself. He had not been able to get this much work accomplished by himself in more time than he could remember. For the first time in over a year, he was able to actually concentrate on text without suddenly remembering something he needed to do or starting to drift away into the deep recess of his mind that ever so often reared its head as though to remind McCoy that it still existed. Instead, the time passed by with unexplained speed until it was much later in the night and Jim began to stir in his sleep.

McCoy glanced at the slightly moving body as Jim slowly woke up from his nap.

His sleep schedule is going to get screwed up, McCoy noted as he began to fall back into doctor-mode as his patient woke up.

His form still mostly obscured by thick fabric, Jim hoisted himself up a bit on the bed and propped up his pillows to rest back against. He looked over to see McCoy keeping an eye on him and smiled sleepily.

"Nice nap?" McCoy asked, wondering how long he should wait before taking Jim's temperature again.

"Yeah. I'm actually starting to feel a little better," Jim commented, stretching out his arms a little and yawning.

"You've probably only got a day or two more of that sickness and then everything should start to feel back to normal," McCoy instructed. "You might have a bit of a cough for a while, but otherwise you'll be fine."

"Thanks, Doc," Jim nodded. He paused and pulled back the shades to look out the window for a moment, watching as a few cars drove by in quick procession. He allowed the silence to wash over them for a full minute before letting the shades fall back to their previous position and turning to face McCoy again.

"How are things with Nancy?" he asked as though the thought hadn't just popped into his head.

"Over," McCoy said shortly, leafing through another chapter and wondering just how well he'd be able to comprehend the material now that Jim was awake and talking to him.

"What happened?" he questioned with curiosity inflecting his every tone, just as McCoy knew it would.

"None of your business," he answered breezily without looking up. "Things with her are just done.

"Of course it's my business," Jim stated, somewhat affronted. McCoy could hear him cross his arms across the darkness of the room. "We're friends."

Something about the way he stressed it like a lifeline made McCoy sigh and look up from his work. He stared at Jim barely illuminated from the lamp and the subtle light still shining in from the city street below. His face was cast in a multitude of light and shadow, his features softer and his hair more silver than gold. With another sigh and another moment to collect his thoughts, McCoy finally spoke again.

"She just… wasn't right. There was something wrong," he answered vaguely. Although, honestly, it was the best answer he could come up with.

"What? Was she a monster in disguise or something?" Jim prodded, clearly unsatisfied with McCoy's answer.

"No, she was a perfectly lovely lady," McCoy snapped for reasons unknown to even him. He was sick of Jim pushing all the damn time. "I just didn't want to waste the poor girl's time on a relationship that I knew wouldn't last." He glared at Jim with a bit of a reproachful expression. "It's called being considerate. Something you wouldn't know about."

Not ever someone to miss the slightest nuance in McCoy's face or inflection, Jim understood not to press McCoy for more answers. When he spoke again, his voice was slightly higher and much happier than it had seemed before.

"Being considerate? Perfectly lovely lady?" he repeated, eyeing McCoy with glee and teasing alternating in those blue eyes that still managed to shine in the relative darkness. "Your Southern charm is charming."

McCoy snorted and looked away from those crystalline eyes.

"I see you're not too sick to be redundant and annoying."

"Never for you," Jim replied in that sickly sweet voice. Sure enough when McCoy glared at him, Jim did nothing except bat his eyes infuriatingly and smile as innocently as a child.

Innocent as a child, my ass, McCoy thought to himself as he looked back at his text.

"Hey, Bones?" Jim asked, his voice losing its saccharine tone. "Can I take a shower or something? I feel all clammy."

McCoy didn't answer, but instead stood up from his spot on the couch to walk into the tiny bathroom. The leaking sink had some drawer space underneath it where McCoy kept towels and washcloths. He handed them to Jim, who had followed him to the doorway.

"Thanks," Jim smiled, his face very pale with the exertion of standing up. He started to make his way into the bathroom as soon as McCoy walked out.

"Hold on a minute," McCoy warned, waiting until Jim turned around. "Don't you need clothes?"

Jim shrugged and tugged on the hem of his gray shirt, wordlessly indicating that he would just wear the same clothes.

McCoy shook his head and rooted through a drawer in his dresser before pulling out a pair of black sweatpants and an old blue tee shirt.

"Take these," he said as he handed them to Jim. "You're a little bigger than me, but I'm taller so it should work out alright."

"Says who that I'm bigger?" Jim asked affronted, his voice tainted with a bit of vanity. "I'm sick. You need to be nice to me."

McCoy gave him a stoic look and then headed back to the couch to keep working. Jim huffed a little childishly behind him before turning to shut the door. Before he went into the shower, he looked curiously over McCoy's shoulder at the books.

"What are you doing?" he asked, shifting the clothes under his arm between his elbow and his waist.

"What the hell does it look like I'm doing? I'm studying some medical texts," McCoy answered, knowing that Jim would have come up with some sort of inane and damn idiotic answer.

"Well, yeah, I can see that. But what's with the yellow highlighter?" He pointed to it as though it had deeply offended him.

"Maybe you've never had to study before in your life and whoop-de-freakin'-doo for you if that's the case," McCoy answered with dead-pan sarcasm and deliberate slowness. "But for the rest of us mere mortals, we have to use studying techniques to remember every damn thing."

"But a yellow highlighter?" Jim continued, completely disregarding everything that McCoy had said, unfazed by the older man's glare. "Bones, that's so overdone. Overused. Cliché. Unoriginal. Uninspired. Banal."

He annunciated each word with a higher degree of exasperation, his entire body seemed to slump over tired and dejected by McCoy's personal choice.

"It's what I've used for years and I don't see any point in changing now," McCoy grumped, refusing to give in to Jim's jackassery.

"I'll bet you've been called a stubborn mule your entire life," Jim mused once he realized that McCoy was going to ignore him.

"Yes."

"And it would be hypocritical for me to call you that after I made a comment about how you shouldn't do things that are overdone, overused, and uninspired?"

"Don't forgot banal," McCoy offered helpfully, looking up with his most sarcastic grin.

Jim just shook his head and laughed a little, shifting the clothes so that they rested on his stomach. With a single chuckle, he walked into the bathroom, shutting the door behind him. Moments later, the water sounded and the door opened again as Jim poked his head out.

"By the way, nice glasses."

McCoy growled a little and looked around the edge of the couch to see Jim staring at him with suggestively raised eyebrows. The steam of the shower wafted through the door and Jim's smooth, bare shoulders was a sign that he had already started getting ready to wash.

"You look a bit like a sexy librarian."

There was another waggle of his eyebrows and then the door quickly snapped shut. McCoy supposed he should probably glare at the door or roll his eyes or do something that would label him a grouch. But he was too busy laughing to really make any other sort of gesture.

Full-belly laughter faded away to a contented smile that lulled him into a sense of complacency as he turned back to his journals. The steady sound of water hitting against the sides of the shower were muffled through the door into a strange melody to which he could not predict the end. It became white noise and he imagined he could feel the heated steam float through the air particles and surround him.

His weight on the couch was heavy, pulling him further against the warm cushions beneath him. The words before him were losing meaning and their sharp edges were becoming fuzzy just before his eyes. Giving in to the tiredness he had been fighting for a few hours, he finally allowed his eyes to shut gratefully.

Through the thick haze that seemed to settle over him, he could barely hear the shower end and the door open nearly half an hour later as he fell further and further into deep unconsciousness. He heard a door shut that sounded very far away and moments later, the highlighter was slowly pulled from his limp grasp and the weight of the books and journals on his lap disappeared. A thickness settled over him and he grew dimly aware that it was one of the blankets he had tossed on the end of the bed in case Jim needed them.

The last thing he was aware of before finally slipping away completely was the feel of fingers through his hair. He didn't understand, but it felt nice and it was too difficult to open his mouth and ask questions anyway.

When McCoy awoke in the morning, he was laying on the couch in an awkward angle, still swaddled in an afghan. Jim's snores just a few feet away were strangely comforting in a way that he really could not define.

He walked over to the side of the bed and turned off the alarm clock that was still singing some Linda Ronstadt from the radio station. Jim was unresponsive to the alarm and merely rolled over in his sleep, cocooning himself deeper within the comforter.

McCoy got ready for work, careful not to wake Jim who, after McCoy gently pressed a hand to his forehead, still felt as though he had a fever. At the last moment, he grabbed a pen and a Post-it from his desk drawer.

Had to go to work. Feel free to any food in the apartment if you can find any. There's a spare key in the top drawer of the desk. It's yours if you want to go out.

Debating for a second about where to put it so that Jim would notice (the wall? the table? the headboard?) , he finally settled on smoothing it onto Jim's forehead.

With a final smirk to himself, he left the house for work, carefully shutting and locking the door behind him.

What McCoy did not know was that he started a new system of communication. For the remainder of Jim's stay at the tiny studio apartment, Post-its both serious and unnecessary were used to convey messages to each other.

Went to get food because you ain't got jack shit up in this crib, yo.

-J-Money

Hey, there was a call from the hospital. Work? Should I order food while you're gone?

-J

Where the hell did you go? I come home, see your post-it, but I don't see you. And yeah, get some food for yourself. I called the hospital back and it sounds like I'm going to be there for a while.

-M

(That one actually had to written on an index card because it was just a bit too long for a Post-it.)

I woke up before you. Your forehead looked lonely.

(That one was on the wall next to the couch.)

There once was an ugly barnacle and then everybody died. The end.

(That one was on his forehead.)

I have a young daughter. I know that you stole that from SpongeBob, you moron.

(Jim was actually in the apartment when McCoy wrote that one. He just really enjoyed slapping him hard in the back to make the Post-it stick to his shirt. "Ow, Bones! I swear, you're a sadist! Worst fucking bedside manner ever!")

Then one day nearly a week later, McCoy came home and there was an instant feeling of loss in the apartment. It didn't take him long for his hazel eyes to survey the room and find it completely devoid of Jim or any Post-its hanging in their usual places. Instead, there was a large piece of cardboard lying on his table from the pizza box they had ordered last night for dinner.

Tossing his work bag onto the couch, McCoy leaned over the table to read the sharpie-scrawled message barely legible across the brown surface.

You know me. I've got restless leg syndrome or something. So I'm off to Montpelier, Vermont. I've never been there and I want some winter in my life. San Francisco has a lot of things that nowhere else in the world has, but it doesn't have snow. I want to make a snowman. I'll make his coal mouth into a frown and name it Bones. lol It'll be great. Anyway, thanks for letting me stay until I felt better.

Give it a month. I'll be back. :)

-Jim

P.S. Left you a gift on your desk.

Honestly, McCoy wasn't surprised. Last night when he checked Jim's temperature and found it to be the average 98.6, he was hesitant to tell Jim because he knew Jim wouldn't want to stay in the same place for too much longer. The company around the apartment had been fun, albeit a little cramped.

Still, he couldn't avoid the disappointed notion in his stomach as he glanced at the bed Jim had made that morning for the first time since he had come to visit.

He headed over to the desk, curious about what Jim might have left. Instantly, he was met with a comical sight.

On the desk sat a value twelve-pack of highlighters from the nearby Stables. There were bright greens, blues, pinks, purples, and oranges and an empty space were McCoy assumed the yellow highlighters had sat before Jim took them away.

With a grin and a shake of his head, McCoy opened the desk drawer where he usually kept his highlighters and placed the pack inside. He looked within the contents of the desk and found that Jim had gotten rid of all his yellow highlighters save for one.

A lone highlighter rolled around between the packs of index cards, tape, scissors, and a box of paperclips with a Post-it note stuck to it, covered simply with familiar handwriting.

Eventually, you gotta make a change.

So what did you think? Please review! I'd love to know. I'll try to have the next chapter up soon. I'm so excited to write it. Planes, shopping trips, weddings, and possibly Joanna? Depending on how long the chapter is, Joanna might show up in the next chapter! Or maybe the chapter after that. We'll see... Please review!