"Do you have any idea what that was about back there?" Miles asked.

Rachel looked out the passenger side window as Miles drove her home. She let his question hang in the air while she thought about it. Her silence was half an answer already.

"Yeah, I think I do." she said eventually.

Miles' eyebrows went up, though he kept his eyes on the road. "Care to clue me in?" he asked snarkily. "I'm a detective, I can probably piece it together if you give me a hint or something."

Rachel's body moved subtly with a soft chuckle. "Juliet's thinking of moving to Miami." she confessed. "She got a really good job offer there, and I'm thinking of moving there too. I mean, I'm pretty sure I'm going. She was going to talk it over with James first, and I'm guessing she brought it up while they were on the Ferris wheel."

Miles kept his eyes on the road. It hit him a few seconds later. "Shit." he said, enunciating every sound. "Are you serious? You and Juliet are leaving LA?"

"Well, I'm not one hundred percent sure about Juliet. She hasn't technically taken the job yet, but she doesn't want me going out there alone, and as much as I think I'm the one in charge here, she's as stubborn as I am and won't take no for an answer."

"But it's sure enough for them to have a fight about it?"

"I don't know, Miles." Rachel sighed. "I don't know, I guess we'll both hear about it later."

"Shit." Miles said again. He couldn't believe it. Just thinking about what James would be like without Juliet in his life... "You know he wanted to find a new place and move in with her, right?"

Rachel turned to Miles with one raised eyebrow and a knowing smirk. She was well aware of their wishes, and the role she played in denying them that wish in particular. Miles seemed to realize it a second too late.

"Don't listen to me." he said. "I'm stupid."

"You're not stupid." said Rachel in a sad yet reassuring tone. "And yes, I know. I was actually looking forward to helping them look for a place."

The light ahead turned red, and the car slowed to a stop. Miles turned and glanced at his passenger. They'd just been talking about her cancer, and the possibility of letting go. He hoped she wasn't moving to Miami to give up and die.

"What about you?" he asked. "Why are you relocating, I thought you were sick?"

Rachel rested her elbow on the passenger side door, and the back of her head rested on her hand. She was still staring out the front of the car, uncomfortable from being put on the spot. "I found this new treatment option." she said. Squeezing her thinning hair gently in her fist, she risked a glance at Miles. He was watching the stop light again. "It's still in the testing stages." she went on, looking back to the light just as it turned green and the car accelerated. "It's not even marginally accepted by the medical world at large, but they said they've had the most success with my type of cancer. That, and it's painless. I won't feel anything, other than better, if it works."

They caught a streak of green lights, seven in a row. They were both quiet for all of them.

"Wow." was all Miles could say. He was usually unphased by anything, no matter how major. It all felt so sudden.

"Something with magnets." Rachel murmured, though they were both already thinking of her sister and Miles' best friend again.

Juliet went with James to his apartment. They were going to put their pride aside and tell each other the honest truth about what they wanted. Juliet wanted the job, and she wanted James too. She knew she couldn't have both, not if James stayed in Los Angeles. James wanted to keep his job. His career was as important to him as Juliet's was to her and he liked having it in Los Angeles. But he also wanted Juliet, and he knew he couldn't have her and keep her completely satisfied.

"Can we do a long distance relationship?" Juliet asked not for permission, but whether they could both handle it.

"I don't know." James answered honestly, as if the entire idea mystified him. "Hell, I've never had a long term relationship. Not one that mattered like this does to me."

Like so many of Juliet's visits to James' apartment, they'd ended up in bed, curled up as close to one another as possible. They were still dressed, lying on top of the covers, having fallen onto the bed during a fit of passionate hugging and desperate kissing. They were at rest now, looking into each other's eyes with an openness and understanding they hadn't been giving each other when Juliet first broke the news.

"I'm in love with you." said James, just to make it as clear as possible. He didn't see any way of falling out of love, in the present or anywhere in the future. James brushed Juliet's hair from her face, petting her head and searching her eyes for an answer to their dilemma.

"I'm in love with you too." Juliet replied. She smiled, even though she was touching the backs of her fingers to the corner of her eye. It wasn't exactly how he'd imagined it, but there it was. His daydream come true. Now all he wanted was to stop her tears from falling.

"I wanna be with you any way I can." he told her. "If that means long distance then I'll do it. I'll do it any way you want me to."

"Will that be enough for you?" Juliet asked. "I don't want to tie you down and leave you alone at the same time."

"It's not like that, baby." James sighed. "When I first asked you out I thought, great, a few weekends of fun, she'll get sick of me or I'll get sick of her and we'll never talk to each other again after that. You wanna know what I think now?"

"Tell me." said Juliet, with her soft, knowing smile.

"I think about a year from now, two years, five, ten - and you're still around. We're still together. I think about spending the rest of my life with you and it doesn't put me off in the least. And...I guess that's how serious I am about makin' this work. I don't wanna be with anybody else. I don't want you with anyone else either."

"Okay." Juliet said quietly, unable to keep a grin from forming on her face. "I think my heart just exploded."

Funny how those magical words weren't making it any easier.

"If someone had told me a few months ago I'd be falling this hard for you, I would have thought twice about asking you out. I woulda been too scared to go down this road."

"I'm glad we didn't know." said Juliet. "I would have been scared too. This thing with Edmund..."

A flash of familiar anger sparked in James' eyes. It burned through the desperation just long enough for Juliet to see it, to show her how deeply he cared about her.

"That man screwed you up real good, didn't he? See, that's why you gotta take this job. Stick it to 'im. Show him he's not the almighty lord of medical research."

Juliet smiled at the way he put it. She touched the front of his shirt and wondered how she was going to live without him, even for a week. "I don't want to be away from you." she said

"I don't want you to be away either." said James. "But you gotta try. I can't be the reason you don't try."

Rachel told Miles he was welcome to stay at her place for a while, or crash on the couch for the night if he wanted to avoid whatever was going on at his place, be it a fight, a breakup or however they chose to celebrate a reconciliation.

"I was going to watch a movie," she said as she unlocked the door. "Probably fall asleep in the middle like I always do."

"You don't have Mario Kart, do you?"

"Mario Kart?" Rachel gushed immediately. "I haven't played that in foreverrr."

"You gotta come over to my place, Carlson. I can't keep losing to Princess Peach, the shame is killing me."

Rachel laughed, and Miles decided he liked the sound of it. It was completely unselfconscious on her part. She was herself all the time, and he appreciated that about her. He felt himself around her too. They didn't have to fake anything for each other. They were both alternate third wheels on the intense relationship between her sister and his roommate, and had become friends due to mutual sympathy and snark.

Rachel curled up on her couch and Miles stood at the end, waiting for Rachel to make room for him on the far cushion.

"Please. Sit." she said, bending her knees.

"Thanks." he said, dry but easygoing, dropping down as Rachel started going through a queue of instantly watchable films. They argued for fifteen minutes about which movie to watch, browsing an endless list of nothing they could agree on.

"You won so many points with the Mario Kart thing." said Miles. "You are losing them all right now with these movie choices."

"Don't make me play the cancer card." Rachel warned him.

"Oh, you think that entitles you? To anything?"

"You are mean." Rachel's eyes were glued to the television, but she grinned and shook her head at Miles' stubborn attitude.

"I'm not mean." said Miles. "I'm just not an enabler."

"So if I asked you to pass me that blanket," Rachel pointed her chin at the blanket hanging on Miles' end of the couch. "You wouldn't do it?"

"Hell no."

"You little fucker." Rachel said with a smile, sitting up so she could get the blanket herself.

"Just kidding!" Miles said quickly, grabbing the blanket for her. "Jeez."

Rachel chuckled smugly. "Faker."

"You called my bluff."

"Such an enabler."

Rachel smirked, and Miles chuckled as he settled down on the couch. He made sure Rachel's feet were covered by the blanket as the movie - it didn't really matter which one they watched - started playing.

The next morning, Miles unlocked the door to his apartment very gingerly, trying not to make a sound. He wasn't sure what to expect, or what he even wanted to see on the other side of the door. Worst case scenario, they'd broken up and James would still be angry-drunk with that old, now rarely seen scowl on his face, telling Miles to quit lookin' at him like that.

The sight that greeted him was quite different than he'd imagined. If pressed, he would have described the scene as blissful.

James was sitting on the couch, but it was not a beer bottle in his hand. It was a steaming mug, and it was resting gently on Juliet's knee. She was sitting so that her legs draped over James', and she had a mug of her own, clasped in both hands, resting in her lap. It looked so domestic and cozy, a part of Miles that seemed alien to him felt bad for interrupting. The way they looked up at him was calmly expectant, as if nothing bad had happened the previous night.

"We were wondering where you were." said James, right before lifting the mug to his mouth for a long sip.

"We didn't mean to keep you away." Juliet added apologetically.

Not only had they not broken up, but they were speaking as a collective. Miles took a deep breath, and tried to think of an innocent way to describe what he'd been up to.

"Uhhh." he said, elongating the word with a sigh typical of his temperament. "I crashed at your sister's. On the couch."

Internally he regretted adding those last three words - where else would he have slept? - but the lovebirds didn't seem to notice. They were too wrapped up in their own drama, or lack thereof, to pick up on any subtle changes in his mood.

"Sorry." said Juliet. Her legs moving slightly on top of James. His hand caressed her thigh, comforting her in her sheepishness.

Miles frowned in that way that lets people know there's not a problem. "It's cool." he said, and that should have tipped them off big time.

No pain at all, in fact it was quite a pleasure.

"I'm gonna grab a shower." Miles said abruptly, before he could say any of the weird, unexpected things popping into his head.

"There's coffee left, when you get out." James offered, motioning casually toward the kitchen.

"Thanks." Miles said mindlessly, eyes shifting as he left the room. James' eyes narrowed as they followed his friend out of the room.

"Something about him seem off to you?" James asked Juliet.

"He seems tired." she said, wincing internally as she thought of him spending an uncomfortable night on their old couch. "At least there's one good thing about me leaving. Aside from having my dream job. He'll have his apartment back."

"Darlin, we gotta get our own places anyway. He's gonna find a girl eventually, isn't he?"

"Eventually." Juliet repeated scoldingly, smiling in spite of her disapproval of James' constant insults of his supposed best friend.

"So." James said, his gaze resting curiously on Juliet. She looked back at him expectantly. "When are you gonna call?" he asked.

Juliet looked into her coffee. "I guess I could try today." she said. "No sense in putting it off. It's down to the wire, isn't it?"

"I thought they promised you the whole month?"

"They did. But I keep getting this feeling that they've changed their minds and I've been worried this whole time about nothing..."

"They still want you." said James, as sure as he was about their relationship. He made a face like he wasn't so impressed by her future employers. "Not like I want you, but still..."

James looked at his girlfriend, the new smirk on his face a clear indicator that he was joking. Juliet felt a flutter of excitement in her belly. She had an awesome job lined up, and a significant other that was actually supportive of her decision to go chase her dreams. It was an odd sensation, and it made her feel like life, a real life, was finally beginning for her.

"You've got me." she reminded him. He knew it too; she felt it when he squeezed her thigh.

In the bathroom, Miles went through the motions of his normal morning routine. In the back of his mind, he was grateful it was a Saturday. He had no obligations, no plans aside from calling Shannon to make sure they were still on for their little appointment later in the week. Most of his conscious thought was consumed by trying to figure out how it had happened, last night. In the physical sense, he could remember every moment of how. But, philosophically, in terms of the why are we here and what are we doing with our lives? He had no idea how it had occured.

At a certain point, he noticed Rachel was shivering, even with the blanket pulled up to her chin.

This happens sometimes. she said. I just can't get warm. I'll be fine.

He just couldn't take the shivering. Not that it annoyed him. He just felt bad. It was distracting him from the movie, and no matter how many times Rachel said she was used to being completely, physically miserable, he knew of one easy solution and no good reason not to use it, as long as she was willing to try.

He kicked off his shoes, and told her to let him lay underneath the blanket with her. They were buddies, it was fine. He'd buddy-snuggle with her, heat her up with his manly warmth, they'd enjoy the rest of the movie and Rachel would feel better. That was all it was supposed to be. That was all he'd intended.

Of course, the movie they were watching just had to have a sex scene.

It was nothing remarkable. Just enough to get them both thinking about how close their bodies were.

Oops.

Miles wasn't sure if his hands were in the appropriate place, to keep this all platonic and friendly.

Sorry. he mumbled when his hand slid to the side of her waist.

No worries. she assured him. She tried adjusting her position to accomodate his on the couch that had never felt so small and cozy before.

Then, as if it had happened all of a sudden - he supposed it had - they were kissing, touching each other everywhere, and Rachel rediscovered an energy and an appetite she was sure she'd lost.

It wasn't even awkward afterward. That was perhaps what was giving Miles the most trouble. He had a difficult enough time getting girls into bed, it was near impossible to keep the conversation going afterward. Either Rachel was the perfect fuck buddy or she was really good at hiding her girly feelings. They'd spent the rest of the night in her bed, sleeping the sound sleep of the sexually satisfied.

In the present, Miles cleared his throat. He felt a twinge of guilt just thinking of the phrase - fuck buddy. It was a one time thing, it wasn't going to happen again, especially with her moving to Miami.

He froze in the middle of brushing his teeth and stared at himself in the mirror, toothbrush sticking out and a nice froth forming at the corners of his mouth.

"I am a very confused boy." he said aloud in a muffled voice, to himself, like there was a part of him that didn't know that already.