Chapter 8

He looked around the bullpen, Fred Fielder was sitting at his old desk. Amanda was still talking to Francine so he made his way over to them.

"Sweetheart," she said, "Maybe we should make our way upstairs to the office, we have some files we need to sign off on before the end of the day," She told him, "and by we, I mean you," she smirked.

"Yeah OK," he said, "Francine," he acknowledged the other woman with a nod, she looked the same.

"Scarecrow," he heard her acknowledge him as he followed Amanda out of the room back to the elevator. She waited until the door slid closed behind them before she spoke.

"Are you feeling any better?" she asked him, her voice soft and full of concern. She ran her hand down his arm until she reached his hand, she held it gently.

"Yeah, yeah," he said, 'relax into this' he thought, that might not be a bad idea, "I guess I'm just…like you said feeling out of sorts…I never thought I would be leaving here, I suppose it's just a little...over whelming to me," he tried to smile at her.

"I can understand that," she told him, "lot of memories here," she said sounding unconcerned but the soft caress of her hand told him she was paying attention to him.

When the elevator doors opened, Amanda led him upstairs where she stopped in front of the old Film Library office. Last he knew they used this office for the Q bureau. He looked at the door in confusion.

"Lee," Amanda said expectantly, "do you have your keys?"

"Huh?" He said, "Oh yeah I do," he pulled his keys out hoping it wasn't obvious he had no clue what key opened the door but, he didn't have to look as Amanda took them out of his hands and opened the door herself.

He entered the room and looked around, hesitating until he saw Amanda sit down at one desk he went and sat down at the other. He caught sight of a photograph on his desk of him and Amanda, her boys, mother and the two young children. He picked it up and studied it.

"Hard to believe isn't it?" he heard her ask him. He looked up at her questioningly, "all of that," she gestured at the photo in his hands, "from one chance meeting at the train station," she moved to his side and leaned her head on his shoulder, "I don't know what I did to deserve all of this but, I can't thank you enough," she smiled up at him, "I love you."

He shifted on his head, "huh, yeah," he cleared his throat softly, "I-I love you too," he stumbled uncomfortably over the words. He cleared his throat nervously.

She smiled, "I brought up a couple of boxes for anything we forgot the last few days," she told him moving across the room and picking up two boxes, "and those are the files you need to initial before I can file them in to the vault," she pointed to a stack on his desk.

"What are these?" he asked flipping through them.

"Oh some of our older cases," she told him absently as she sat back down at her own desk, "most of them are from before we were officially partners. You know, just the ones you failed to sign off when we closed them," she smirked.

"Right," he said sitting down at his desk and opening the top folder, "you've looked through these?" he asked looking at the forms inside. He looked back up at her.

"Yes," she said with a scoff, "if you recall I typed all of those from your chicken scratched notes. Which by the way I left in the file too...in the back," she laughed, "haven't I always typed up all your notes for you," she said turning and giving him another smile.

He sighed as he looked at her pained, "so…I took advantage of your good nature, huh?" he asked, laughing awkwardly. Wondering for the first time about his other self.

"Oh no sweetheart," she said good naturedly, "I'm sure you always appreciated it," he watched as she started writing, working on something.

"You're sure?….did I say 'thank you' right?" he asked, wanting to make sure he was kind to her.

"Oh well sure, sometimes," she said thoughtfully, "oh not so much in the beginning…you didn't like me very much at first did you?" she laughed at the look on his face, "Oh don't look so shocked, you didn't try to hide it much."

"I didn't?" he asked wondering how he could work her to find out more about their relationship.

"Lee," she scoffed, "you seriously didn't try to hide it. The eye rolls, the fights, the annoyance in your face…when you'd laugh at me..." she said, while she smiled at him he could tell she was a little bothered by the memories, "you used to get this twitch in your cheek," she pointed to the side of his face.

He took a deep breath, and shook his head. She was a sweet woman. He never even tried to get to know her before. He wished he'd been a little nicer back then. He picking up the first file, "Amanda," he started, "tell me about this one," he said baiting her to tell him more about their lives. He'd make a game of it he thought, "What do you remember about it?" he asked looking at her mischievously hoping he could make her think he was teasing her. She mock glared at him and stood up and slowly wandered over to his desk.

She hopped onto the edge and plucked the file out of his hand and made a show of looking at the folder name, 'Hollander-Delano Nov '83' written across the front. "What I remember about this case was how little faith you had in me," she told him.

"That can't be true," he said in astonishment, "I surely w-," he coughed, "You know, I wouldn't have let you help if I didn't have any faith in you," he told her confidently.

She narrowed her eyes at him and cocked her head to the side, "Lee," she said with a scoff, "you didn't let me help. You abandoned me at a party and I made contact with Delano on accident. You fought help from me for," she looked away with a shake of her head, "two years," she said incredulously, "you very rarely sought me out," she hesitated, "I mean sure, you did sometimes but usually it was Billy's idea for me to get involved," she told him softly, "you once called me window dressing," she pinched her brows thinking.

The last thing he wanted was to upset her, "hey," he stood up and hesitantly put his hand on her arm, "that was a long time ago….right?" he asked. Knowing he needed to quickly change the subject, he spied a football on a file cabinet behind her, "what's this?" he asked.

'To a heck of a good reporter-best wishes, Sandy Newcome'

"Oh my football," she said looking at it fondly, "you know the first time we kissed was during this case," she said, "well," she disclosed, "it wasn't a real kiss, I mean you kissed me but you weren't kissing me. It was- it was just part of our cover," she admitted with a soft smile at him.

"Oh," he said softly, he wasn't sure what to feel at the look on her face.

"But it was a great kiss," she whispered huskily. She looked up at him trustingly, he could see her admiration- her love for him in her eyes. He swallowed thickly, it made him little uncomfortable knowing she had these feelings for him and he didn't belong in this life. He wasn't the Lee she knew and loved and he didn't know how to get that other Lee back so he could return to his own life as well.

"Well, I hope I've made up for it since," he told her nervously, "and I'm….sorry if I was mean to you when we first met. I hate that I...that you were hurt you…I-"

"Oh yeah well it's all right," she said standing and running her hands up his arms, "we've both changed so much, we have so much to be thankful for," she leaned up and kissed him quickly, "if you want to start signing those, I'll start packing this stuff up," she went and grabbed a box and started putting a few things from her desk into it. He sat down to start initialing the files when her phone rang, "Stetsons," she said cheerily, "Oh all right Beaman…alright, I'll be right there," she hung up, "Efraim can't find the list of new recruits we have coming in on Monday," she told him, "I'll be back in a bit and then it will probably be time to go down for your party-"

"Party?" he grimaced, that was the last thing he needed.