A/N: Yeah so I'm honestly really sorry for falling off the face of the earth there for a while… I was and am still dealing with some major personal issues but I'm baaaackkkk I promise!

I wanted to say thank you though to the readers of this story who made sure I took the time to come back to this, your support for this story is amazing so thank you!

Here's the beginning of the 'Taymily' healing process as promised last time! This one's from Taylor's perspective for once.

PS- just to help you picture it; the apartment of Emily and Taylor is not like anything shown in the show, but its closer to Emily's first one with the stairs rather than the series six corridor one.

Taylor rolled over in the huge comfortable bed she'd missed so much during her short-but-horrible stay in the hospital bed she now pitied her patients for having to sleep in. She let out a sigh of disappointment before she could stop herself at the emptiness of the other side, yet again. She took a minute to just lie there and take in the fact that she was home. But that only led her to think about what was possibly going on in Emily's mind that meant she was pushing Taylor away rather than pulling her as close as she wished she would. After psyching herself up to drag herself out of bed, Taylor got up with a wince. She shuffled into their en-suite bathroom and proceeded to begin her usual struggle to undress for a shower. This is one of the reasons why she needed Em to snap out of whatever had a hold over her: she needed her help.

Taylor pulled Emily's FBI hoodie – which she'd stolen back now it smelled of her girlfriend again – from her bare skin and after dropping Emily's boy shorts to the floor she paused in front of the mirror. She ran her fingers over the still fairly fresh wound on her stomach; unwillingly flashing back to that cold floor, a blurred Emily hovering over her, hands pressed to her stomach, begging her to stay… thinking about it; Emily's attempts at saving her life was the most her girlfriends hands had been on her in weeks – taking away the few kisses to the cheek she'd received in the hospital as well as that breath-taking kiss planted on her when she first woke up.

All Taylor wanted to do was feel that Emily was really there. They were in the same apartment but they were a million miles apart. Apart from exchanging a few pleasantries every now and then; Emily had barely spoken to her since they were both discharged. Taylor knew she was fighting some sort of internal battle; she could see it in her eyes, it was like she'd come back from a hard case and was second-guessing every decision she had made. Was she regretting saving me? Taylor knew it was stupid, but it was the one question that kept coming to mind, and no matter how hard she pushed for her girlfriend to just talk to her, to just answer her questions, Emily just pulled herself further and further away.

After she'd showered and pulled on one of Emily's old college shirts and her own black jeans, Taylor made her way downstairs preparing herself to be brushed off by her girlfriend. From the last step she surveyed the living room and sighed inwardly at the sight of a pale hand draped over one side of the couch. She walked across the hardwood floor and psyched herself up yet again.

She stopped for a second, and took in the sight before her. Emily was lying on the couch, the covers kicked back to an extent away from her body. Her face was relaxed into sleep; her body loose, her hair was splayed out across her pillow, and her arm was curled around the back of the couch.

'You gonna stand there and stare at me all day?' Emily muttered with a hint of the sarcasm Taylor had been missing so much.

Grinning at the progress, Taylor turned up the sass in her own voice. 'Well maybe if you got off your ass earlier in the morning I wouldn't have time to check you out'

'It's still morning' Emily quickly shot back, a ghost of a smile on her lips whilst she pulled herself up into a sitting position with a wince.

'Barely, but whatever you say baby' Taylor moved to help her up, bringing her hand gently around her upper arm and winced as Emily visibly tensed.

'I can do it myself its fine' Emily muttered and walked towards the stairs 'I'm going for a shower'

Taylor stood with tears in her eyes and her hand still outstretched as Emily walked away. Again.

'Mom!?' Taylor shouted into her childhood home as she shut the door behind her.

'In the kitchen!' she heard from the kitchen and she followed the sound.

Taylor took a second to just watch her Mom cook, something she never thought she'd be stood appreciating as much as she was right in that moment.

'You just gonna stand there staring at me all day?' She could hear the smile in her mother's voice before she looked up.

'You're the second person to say that to me today' Taylor smiled sadly

'Why does that not sound like a good thing?' Andrea motioned for her daughter to sit at the table as she got drinks from the fridge. 'Is everything okay?'

'I don't know to be honest mom'

'What happened?'

'Nothing. Absolutely nothing. …and that's the issue.'

'Okay'

'Em is barely talking to me. She's distancing herself. She's not touched me at all since we got home. If I have a nightmare and my screams wake her up all the way downstairs – because that's where she's been sleeping, on the couch – she'll come up and sit awkwardly with me until I fall asleep again but when I wake up she's gone. She won't let me start a conversation about what happened and I get that she's battling something internally mom because I can see it on her face but I need her to just talk to me and-'

'Whoa. Honey, breathe! Okay, that's it. Now, have you said any of this to her?'

'Every time I try to Mom she says she doesn't want to talk about it, or that she has to go do something which I know is a lie because we're both still technically on bed rest and she hasn't been cleared at work yet.'

'But you know that she's struggling'

'I can see it on her face Mom. In her eyes. She can't hide stuff from me in them and she knows it, that's why she keeps avoiding looking at me.'

'Do you know anything of what happened to her honey?'

'No Mom and that's what I want to talk to her about. Whatever it is she's struggling with I want to help her, but she won't co-operate.' Taylor paused and looked her Mom in the eyes '…wait. Do you know what happened?'

Andrea sighed. 'It's not my place to say'

'Mom if you know what happened to her you better tell me right now'

'Taylor honey-'

'No. Mom no!' Taylor stood up as her voice rose 'I don't care if you were told in confidence. I don't care if she's told you not to tell me. I don't care if-'

'Taylor it's not that.' Andrea stated calmly, forcing Taylor's attention onto her again. She waited until her daughter sat once again before continuing. 'Emily hasn't talked to me about what happened to her. She turned to me one day when you were still asleep and said "why don't you hate me?" She thought I should hate her because it was her fault you were laying there. So whatever she's struggling with right now Tay, a lot of it is guilt. I'm not saying that guilt is justified; in fact I said to her then that I didn't hate her. That I thanked God every minute that one of my daughters was sitting there with me and that I was just waiting for you to join us.'

Taylor sat in silence for a minute, letting what had just been said sink in before she turned to her mother with tears in her eyes for more answers.

'But you must have been told what her injuries were when she came in to the hospital Mom. I know procedure. You must have…'

Looking into her daughter's eyes, Andrea knew that in order to get through to Emily, Taylor needed to know what had happened. So after gathering herself, she began to speak.

'You obviously know she was shot, you were there. And you saw how she'd been beaten and generally extremely mistreated to the extent of her having broken ribs as well as other things…' Taylor nodded. 'Well, there's one thing that she needs you to help her accept and move past…' Andrea grabbed Taylor's hands and held on tightly. 'Taylor honey, Emily was raped. …More than once.'

A/N: So like I said up top, I'm really sorry for the major gap between updates, I know how annoying that probably was.

I want you guys to know that I have no intention of leaving this story unfinished – in fact I have a sequel or two in mind.

Also, I know this is one of my smallest updates I've ever done but I wanted to get the feel for this story again to begin writing it more – therefore I apologise if it's not up to standard!

Reviews would be helpful now more than ever! (Let's make a deal – The more reviews the faster my next update of a wayyyy longer chapter?)