"Fry, where are we?"

Leela was beginning to feel annoyed.

"We're nearly there! Don't open your eye yet!"

Fry gripped her elbow, steering her around some invisible obstacle as Leela tried to guess where they were. The sewers, maybe? The air had that dank, underground feel to it, but it couldn't be the sewers – she'd know that stench anywhere.

"We're not going to visit my parents, are we?" she asked cautiously.

"Nope. Hold up. Okay, steps. Just take it real slow . . ."

Leela edged her way, blind, up a flight of creaking steps, and then Fry cried "Stop!" and she opened her eye.

She was standing in a gloomy, moldy-looking old room. The absence of light proved her suspiscions right – they were underground – but other than that, Leela was at a loss. She had never been here before. Or had she? It did look a little familiar . . .

Leela stepped a little closer to the wall, blowing the dust off what she had thought at first glance was some ancient manuscript.

It was a Star Trek poster.

She spun round, taking in the room with a fresh eye. The shabby single bed, the ancient television set, the Beastie Boys cds . . .

"Fry . . . this looks like your old room."

"It is! Um. Kinda. I mean, it is . . . but not like that!" Fry protested, as he caught her disapproving glare. "We're not here like that! It's just - " he stuck his hands in his pockets - "it's a good place to think. And stuff."

"Stuff," Leela said archly.

"Not . . . Jeez! I meant . . ." Fry waved his hands vaguely, avoiding her eye. "Stuff. Stuff I can't do with Bender around."

Leela snorted. There couldn't be much on that list - Bender made enough jacking off jokes to convince her of that. She was about to say so when she noticed that Fry was avoiding her eye with more determination than ever, and she remembered where they were, and how he had cried over that dead dog.

Maybe there were things he kept hidden from Bender.

"It was stupid," Fry said awkwardly. "I just thought maybe you needed someplace to think, and this is where Ialways come when I need someplace to think, so . . ." He tailed off and sat down heavily on the bed. "It was stupid."

Leela looked around. "No," she said slowly. "It wasn't stupid, Fry. Actually," she confessed, "I kinda like it down here. It reminds me of my parents' place."

Fry brightened. "That was the first place I thought of," he said eagerly. "But your mom and dad are such a big deal to you, you're always trying to do the right thing and make them proud and stuff, so I figured being around them would just stress you out more."

Leela felt the corner of her mouth twitch.

"That's surprisingly insightful. And a little bit offensive." She leaned over and kissed him on the cheek as she whispered, "But thanks for trying."

Fry had opened his mouth to say something else, but her sudden proximity seemed to dry his throat, and no words emerged. He turned his head and his lips brushed hers. It was just a light touch at first, but when she didn't pull away, he shut his eyes and kissed her again. Leela kissed him back, feeling herself unspool. She had to admit, it was nice. It was cramped but unexpectedly comfortable, squashed together on Fry's single bed. She was leaning on his chest, feeling his heart thump beneath the heel of her hand. Their ankles were tangled together, and Fry had her cheek cupped in one hand ; he was kissing her in a lazy, contented sort of way, as if he could do it all day.

The kids in the orphanarium had used to do this, as teenagers. Leela never had, but she had watched them jealously, crammed into each other's beds, kissing and giggling, and whispering together like members of some secret club. At the sound of Warden Vogel's footsteps they would spring apart and leap back to their own beds with flushed cheeks and swollen mouths, and Leela had wondered, bitterly, if kissing could really be that much fun. By the time she'd got around to be being kissed, it had lost its magic. It was something men did as a clumsy overture to sex, standing on her doorstep and waiting for her to invite them up for the real action. She'd missed out on years of ticking off bases and hiding lovebites, but it wasn't until right now that she realized just how much she'd lost in her lonely teenage years.

Leela knew she ought to stop this, but her teenaged self seemed to have taken over her brain. Fry was sucking on her neck, and she was moaning happily, before she came to her senses again.

"Stop," she gasped. "Stop . . . Fry . . ."

She pulled away as reality returned like a bucket of cold water. Fry made a muffled, indifferent noise. When she pulled away he simply moved with her, as though her lips were some magnetic point of contact. Even turning her head had little effect. He only found somewhere else to kiss, and she could feel him grinning against her skin, laughing, wearing her down. His happiness was catching, as Fry's emotions tended to be. They always had been, now that she thought about it. Whatever Fry felt, he felt it so simply, so unconstrainedly, that it swept her along with him. She had always been miserable in Applied Cryogenics, but it was Fry's feelings – Fry's expression, holding out his hand in the ruins of Old New York – that prompted her to pull the career chip out of her own palm. And then there was the opera. The holophonor. The stupid Romanticorp candy and the parrot that had almost got him killed ; all the clumsy gestures meaning "I love you", which tugged at her like a tide, no matter how many barriers she threw up to force them back.

Her stomach clenched in sudden panic.

"We can't do this."

Leela felt Fry's heart skip, felt his skin grow hotter under her touch as her own panic bounced back at her.

"But you want to," he protested.

"Fry, I'm married."

"I don't care! I love you! And you . . ." Fry hesitated, looking suddenly uncertain. "I know you feel something for me," he said nervously.

Leela said nothing. She couldn't say anything. She couldn't seem to pull away either, when Fry reached for her hand.

"So just leave him," he said desperately. "Just . . . just give me a chance. I could make you happy, I know I could."

"Fry . . ."

"I could." He touched her cheek and kissed her again.

Leela couldn't stop herself relaxing into him.

"See?" he mumbled. "You're happy now."

"It's not that simple."

"Yes it is," Fry said stubbornly. "You're happy or you're not happy. It's not like you can be both."

Leela pushed him away, annoyed. Intentionally or not, Fry had hit a nerve.

"Maybe you can't," she snapped.

Fry blinked, obviously stung. And then, for the first time, he moved away from her.

"You don't have to be smart to feel stuff," he said angrily. "I love you. How come that never counts for anything?"

"Because it takes more than that to make something work. It wouldn't work, Fry. It just . . . wouldn't."

"The only one saying that is you," Fry retorted. "And you won't even try."

"Because I know what would happen!" Leela said, exasperated.

"What? No you don't! You couldn't know that! I mean, unless you're pyschic or something. And I'm pretty sure you're not. You would definitely have mentioned it."

There was silence for a beat, and Leela realized he was waiting for her to respond.

"I'm not pyschic."

"It'd be really neat if you were. You could-"

"Fry."

"Oh. Right. Sorry."

Leela sighed. "Fry, you couldn't hold down a relationship. You can't even hold down a conversation."

The hurt flashed across his face before she could even think about taking it back. She opened her mouth but it was too late – Fry's expression had hardened into something she'd never seen before.

"Yeah?" he said. "Well, you're controlling and interfering and a complete killjoy, but I still love you. I guess I am an idiot then, coz I thought that was kind of the point."

Leela was still reeling when he crossed the room and walked out, slamming the door behind him. The action set the whole dilapidated house rocking. Dust showered down from the ceiling and a chunk of plaster peeled away from the wall and drooped forlornly to the floor - but Fry didn't come back.