Many thanks for your kind reviews, just a quick update, hope you're all enjoying your break (if you get one...)

.

.

.

Tori lay awake, staring at the ceiling. She glanced at the clock to see it was nearly one.

She's not coming.

The answer to the question she didn't want to ask was laid bare. Last night she'd given Jade a golden opportunity to jump-start their relationship, to take a short cut through the maze of apologies and recriminations that should have preceded their reconciliation and cut right to the chase - Tori could hardly object to her thinking there was a chance, when she'd made the first move herself. And now she felt aggrieved that she'd let down her defences for nothing. It was as though she'd deliberately taken in the Trojan Horse to find it empty, to find the besieging army had packed up and gone home.

She doesn't want you back. That's not why she's here.

She doesn't love you any more.

She didn't want to do it.

Five minutes. She'd give it five minutes. Maybe Jade was just deliberating, wondering whether she'd be welcome. That would make sense. Five minutes and if she didn't appear, that was the end if it. She'd just forget it and go to sleep. It was ridiculous to think like this. They were both grown women, for God's sake. If Jade really just need a shoulder to cry on - or more accurately, a shoulder to make breakfast for and bicker with - then so be it. Last night had just been a one-off, consenting adults, no big deal. Everybody slept with their ex. If Jade didn't want her back then Tori would just have to live with it, content herself with the thought that she was doing something good for a friend in need.

Four minutes.

And Jade had been a friend, despite the way they'd ended up. Tori had never been happier than when they'd met again after school and she'd discovered that Jade had mellowed into someone she could spend time with, someone who actually wanted to spend time with her. She could remember with startling clarity the point that she'd thought of her as something other than a friend, a secret that she'd never dared let Jade in on, in case she felt like the victim of a long con.

"Well, thanks, Vega. That was the most humiliating experience of my life. Remind me to kill your sister. Slowly and painfully."

"Don't be such a grouch. At least you'll get to be on T.V."

"Be still, my beating heart. I don't want my first role on T.V. to be dressed as a piece of cheese being chased around the studio by a bunch of kids in mouse suits."

"I thought we looked pretty hot, though."

"What?"

Tori colored. That wasn't quite how she'd meant it to come out. "I mean, you know, the costumes. We weren't dorky cheese, or..."

Jade shook her head. "That might be your idea of hot, Vega, but then your love life's a mystery to me. A fact for which I'll be forever grateful. Is there any pizza left?"

"I'll warm it up." Tori grabbed the leftover pizza and headed for the kitchen, thankful for the distraction. She wasn't entirely sure why Jade was still there. She'd only come over to get out of going to some stupid race with Beck, but that must have finished hours ago. And the fact that she'd forced her to share in the misery of Trina's television show should have sealed the deal as far as 'see you later, Vega' went. And yet here she was, making herself comfortable in Tori's house as if they were friends, as if it was the most normal thing in the world. Tori pinched herself briefly to see if this was some kind of weird fever dream.

She came back to the sofa with the box to find the other girl flicking through the channels looking for old horror movies. She placed the pizza on the table and sat down beside her, as, apparently satisfied with her choice, Jade kicked off her boots, stuffed a slice of pizza in her mouth, and lay out on the sofa, throwing her legs casually across Tori's lap.

Tori froze. She knew that this was probably habitual, that Jade had just forgotten for a moment that she wasn't with Beck, but the unexpected contact made the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. She waited, blood pounding in her head, for Jade to realize her mistake and move, for her to laugh it off and somehow make Tori feel embarrassed, as though it was her fault, but she didn't. She just lay there calmly, legs up, turning Tori's world on its head.

Three minutes.

Tori lost track of how long she sat there, unable to move, but the longer she didn't say anything, the harder it got to protest. And all the time she could think of nothing else but Jade's legs, the curve of her calves, the feel of the delicate muscles underneath the skin, the weight of them against her own thighs - the slow heat rising through her body.

After what she guessed was about a thousand years, she manages to fire up enough control of her body to reach, tentatively, for a piece of pizza. She fully expected the movement to alert Jade to their predicament, but Jade simply shifted slightly to let her lean forward, then resettled as she moved back.

She stole a sidelong glance at her tormentor, but Jade was apparently engrossed in whatever they were watching, slowly macerating her way through a mouthful of pepperoni. Tori stared at her own food, feeling no inclination to eat it, just thankful for something to do with her hands.

"You wanna watch something else?"

The sound made her jump. "Nothisisfine," she mumbled quickly, and rammed the pizza in her mouth to avoid having to say anything else. She felt Jade shrug, the slight movement transmitted and amplified by their contact. She tried to focus on the bloodbath on screen, but it didn't help. In addition to the mental anguish of the situation, she was now fighting a burning urge to pee, and that raised its own problems. Aside from the fact that to get to the bathroom she'd have to awkwardly draw attention to the legs, the though that when she sat down again those legs might not return filled her with an unexpected despair, as though her lap would be destined to go through life feeling cold and empty if she were to break the spell, if she were to shirk the responsibility of supporting these limbs which had so lately become the focus of her universe.

An eon later she began to relax slightly, and considered her position. Maybe this was normal. Maybe Jade sat like this with all kinds of people. Maybe this was her default T.V. position, regardless of who she was with. She felt a little twinge of jealousy, and hoped not. She didn't like to think of anyone else feeling this heat, this closeness, taking advantage of Jade's unwitting intimacy for their own pleasure. Without thinking, she lowered her hand, protectively, onto Jade's leg.

And it was then. Then that she knew. Every sensory detail of that moment was branded onto her brain, every sweltering degree of the warmth spreading from skin to skin, every contour of Jade's calf under her palm, the texture of the stockings against her fingers, everything. She felt dizzy. She couldn't even breath. She could stay here like this for...

"Having fun there, Vega?"

She almost choked.

Two minutes.

It had led nowhere. Not then. Jade had left. No fuss, no intimation that anything was wrong, no hint that anything unusual had occurred. It wasn't until later, one lazy afternoon in another place and time, that they'd sat in Tori's tiny apartment and she'd made her move - older now, and bolder, more experienced than at school. Jade had been shocked at first, and Tori had been a little disappointed to realize that the pizza moment had meant nothing to her, that she hadn't even noticed.

But Jade had finally succumbed to the idea, declared herself interested, and Tori had felt like everything had fallen into place for the first time. It hadn't been easy - their love life had been a complicated one, and for long enough it had been as if every time was the first time, Jade shy and uncomfortable, Tori coaxing and reassuring, and while things had got better, the memory of it sat heavy in her mind. Tori had instigated a new intimacy, on the crest of a wave of friendship, and sometimes she was haunted by the suspicion that Jade had simply gone along with it, that she hadn't wanted to let her down, that her determination to keep Tori happy had led her into the bedroom with the same weary resignation that she'd shown over everything else.

One minute.

No. That couldn't be true. Jade must have loved her, surely? Otherwise she would never have given up the things she had, not for a friend. So if Jade had loved her, what now? She looked at the clock again. Now she should just go to sleep, she decided, and forget about it. You're a big girl, Tori, you of all people should know how these things work. People change, relationships end, and you can't make someone love you, no matter how hard you try. Maybe this is all for the best.

Time's up. She's not coming. Go to sleep.

She slipped out of bed, and padded softly out of the bedroom.

"Jade?" Her voice sounded loud, unwelcome in the silence. "Are you awake?"

There was no answer.

"I just wondered if..." She hadn't really thought any further than this. In fact, as far as her brain was concerned, she was now asleep. "I just wondered if you were comfortable."

Still no response.

"It's just that if you wanted to, you know, come to bed..."

And then she heard it. It was a sound she was familiar with, a sound she'd heard many times before, usually when she'd been unable to sleep, mind whirling on some trivial idea or imagined calamity that she'd wanted to share with her girlfriend in the middle of the night. Jade's breathing changed, almost imperceptably, from being asleep, to pretending to be asleep.

She had never felt so lonely, so desolate, as she did hearing it now, as she stood half-naked, shivering in the half light of her own apartment. She doesn't want to talk to me.

She could have left it then. Gone back to bed, cried herself to sleep, and let the weeks and months wash over her until Jade left. She was sure that the other girl would never mention it, be happy to pretend that it never happened.

But she didn't.

She walked around the sofa and knelt down in front it. Jade was just a bundle of blankets, drawn up tight against the cold, just a tousle of brown hair poking out of the top.

"Jade?"

She though she could detect movement, a slight tensing of the grip on the blankets.

"I'm sorry."

There was nothing more from the bundle, and it looked as though it was going to be a one-sided conversation. She cleared her throat. "I'm sorry about last night," she said, hoarsely. "I know I kind of took advantage of you, and you probably didn't really want to do it, but I honestly thought you did. It wasn't fair of me, and I get that you're mad with me, so I'm sorry, okay? And if you want to just share the bed, I promise I'll... leave you alone."

She couldn't tell if any of this was penetrating the woollen wall between them. "I mean," she babbled on, hopefully, "I don't want you to think that I think that you ought to think that you have to... to... you know, put out or something, because I really don't want you to think that I think that." She paused, as she ran through the last sentence again in her head. "You don't think that, do you?"

Very slowly, a pair of blue-green eyes appeared above the edge of the blanket, staring at her with an unnerving intensity.

"Do you?" The question hung tearfully in the silence. "Please, Jade, you have to..."

An arm emerged from the bundle, a single pale finger raised. It weaved its way hypnotically towards Tori, whose gaze followed it entranced, until it came to rest hard up against her lips.

"Shh."

And with that Jade unfurled from her cocoon, and rose to her feet. She took Tori gently by the hand, and led her into the bedroom.