Welcome back. We're in the section that took me the longest now, and that I'm still working on. This is the part that I'm less good at, as I'm not naturally a very emotional person. So good luck with all that lol. Here we go.

Bo's eyes remained closed. "Have you ever seen a house burn down?"

Lauren gave no reply, waiting.

Bo opened her eyes now, but they were on the countertop, her fingers absently running on the stem of the wineglass. "The fire just…consumes it. From this tiny little point, it just takes over. It happens so fast – minutes, maybe not even that long. And it spreads, and it can't be sated until it's gotten everything. If you get to it in time, you can put it out. But even if you do, even if a team of firefighters are there and ready, everything will still be destroyed. The smoke will get in everything, the water will saturate anything that's left. You can rebuild but it's never the same."

Lauren hazarded a move, stroking her index finger lightly on the side of Bo's hand, silently.

"Addicts are like fires. They consume. The eclipse. If you're near them, they'll devour you, too. If you try to stop them, that doesn't stop the ruin. When they're done, when it's burned out, everything left behind is just…black. Unstable. Broken."

Bo paused now, and took a deep breath, withdrawing her hands from Lauren's touch. Lauren stayed quiet and didn't move to touch her again. Something odd niggled in her mind, a memory…it came back to her a moment later, laying in bed with Bo, the first time they ever woke up together, Bo saying that if she could commit any crime, it would be arson. What had Bo said then? Power. Complete power.

Tears slid from the corners of Bo's eyes. "She's destroyed so many things," Bo murmured. "I can't let her do it to you, too. I can't let her consume you like she consumed me. You're kind, and you're perfect, and you're good, and you're light, and she is just darkness and hate and…and she's put that in me, already. If you opened me up, it would just be the twisted charred beams that she left there. She already ruined me, and if I let you into that, I'll ruin you." The tears were falling harder now, though Bo didn't seem to notice them.

Lauren felt stunned. "Baby…"

"Please don't say 'that's not true', or 'you won't'," Bo said, looking up suddenly, her tear streaked gaze sharp on Lauren.

Lauren fell quiet again. "I want to be selfless," Bo forged on, returning her eyes down and letting the tears drip. "I wish I was. But I'm too much like her."

"Like…your mother?"

Bo gave and almost imperceptible nod, another tear dropping and soaking into her shirt. She took a shaky breath. "My mother…wants things. I mean, I know everyone wants things, but she…when she wants something, that's it. That's all that matters. People aren't people, they're ways to get the things she wants. I was never a person. I was…most of the time a hinderance. A thing in the way. Then, sometimes, I was a thing to pull focus – if my father was focusing his anger on me, she could happily shoot up in the bathroom. Sometimes I was practical things – I could go to the laundromat, I could wipe off the table, I could make dinner."

You made dinner? The thought hit Lauren hard.

Bo paused and inhaled. "I know what you're thinking."

Lauren said nothing.

"You're wondering what the hell I could make for dinner." Her voice was without humor, and Lauren felt a prickling on her neck.

Bo glanced up, but her eyes flicked off Lauren's quickly, not holding the contact, as she gave a one-armed shrug. "Kenzi and I did it because we had to. We weren't good at it. We made a lot of ramen and off-brand spaghetti-os. It could be why we hate it so much now, I guess."

A sting that Lauren hadn't expected went through her, and she felt herself wince.

"I never wanted to need anyone. I didn't want to be like her. So, I was independent, and that was good. I liked that." Bo dropped back to quiet.

When the silence stretched, Lauren hazarded another touch, her fingers lightly brushing Bo's arm. "I remember you mentioning that before," she noted, quietly.

Bo glanced up, and nodded. She didn't pull her arm away. "I made myself believe it was true. I don't think it was, really." She let her eyes drop, even as she let the contact continue. "I should have known it wasn't. I started dating people, and at first I'd really like it – having someone care about you, focus on you. But then the feelings would start, you know? The first time a guy said he loved me I just…ghosted him. I don't think I ever spoke to him again.

"I was in college the first time I dated a woman. I knew I was interested in women before that, but there was this girl in an English class I had…anyway, it was…I don't know. It was this intense, visceral thing. It was…consuming, you know? It's like she was my oxygen. An obsession. An addiction.

"She had this evening class on Thursdays, and I remember this night when I just wanted to see her, I needed to see her. And when I realized that, when I realized I was registering it as a need…there was an on-campus gym, so I went there instead. And I started going all the time. That was the first time I'd turned to exercise as a coping mechanism. I focused really hard on my classes. I flew into this workaholic mode and avoided her. We broke up, of course. I decided I shouldn't date, that was just asking for trouble.

"But that didn't last, because…well, anyway. You of all people can guess why that didn't work for me. So, I came up with the new plan, which was sex, no feelings. I didn't want a relationship, I didn't want emotions. When I got stressed out, or when my mother was calling, or when my father got parole, I wanted to do something. And sex was that perfect endorphin rush to work into my workaholic routines.

"So, that's what I did. Friends with benefits, hookups, call it what you want – I'd meet someone and strike up this deal, this 'hey, FYI, we can have fun, and have sex, but just know this isn't a relationship, and when it burns out we both walk away, no hard feelings."

Bo stopped here again. Lauren was riveted, her mind running through the warnings Vex had given her before she started dating Bo, trying to consolidate all this information in her mind.

"I didn't see it as using people at the time, but now that I look back on it, I do. I wanted stress relief, so it didn't matter what they wanted. They were a means to an end, a convenient body to use. I justified that I was letting them do the same to me, so, okay.

"Kenzi and Dyson called me out on it. The had a kind of intervention for me." She paused and smiled faintly, a real smile. "They did it after the first time I kissed you, too." Lauren filed this information away to ask about later, but let Bo continue. "Anyway, after that, it made me take a step back and really survey things. I tried to have relationships once or twice. There was a woman, Lydia. She and I made it about four months. Another woman, Steph – about three.

"I started to give up again. I just wasn't…I don't know. It didn't work. I thought maybe the issue was women. I met a guy, tried dating him, and made it maybe six weeks." Bo sighed and scrubbed her hands down her face. "I'm sorry, I know this isn't what you asked about, really."

Lauren shook her head. "No, go on. Really."

Bo gave a short nod. "I met Rainer at a bar. He was cute, I was attracted to him, at least attracted enough. I told my friends I would look for a relationship, but with him…I just flat out gave him the speech. 'No feelings, no emotions, just sex.' I figured no one needed to know, whose business was it, really? And Rainer signed on.

"Over time he started having feelings for me. I convinced myself for a while that I could, too. I mean, he was fun to sleep with, he was nice enough. I could work with that. So, I tried." She looked at Lauren now, gauging her. She hesitated. "Actually, that's a lie. I didn't try. I told myself I was trying. But I didn't." She sighed and looked down again. "I mean…I don't know what I mean."

"You didn't love him," Lauren said, simply.

Bo looked up, and nodded. "You're right. I didn't love him. And, if it were just that…well, there's nothing really wrong with that. But what is wrong is that – I knew all that, you know? I knew he loved me, and I knew I didn't love him. But I needed him. I needed someone to run to after a shitty day, or someone to take my mind off a bad case. He was…an activity." She said the last word with distaste. "See, that's how I'm like her. I just…used him. It didn't matter that he was a person, with feelings. It mattered that I needed someone to take my mind of whatever I had going it. That's how my mother is – what matters is her subjective point of view."

Lauren hazarded to speak again. "Bo, that's not –"

"It is," Bo cut Lauren off. "It is the same. It's exactly the same."

The silence rushed back in, thick and warm. Lauren took a breath, trying again. "Maybe your relationships before weren't healthy," she granted. "But now…that's not who you are now."

Bo sighed and leaned forward slightly, initiating contact with Lauren for the first time. "I wish that was true. Honestly, I really wish I was the person you think that I am. But I am that person now. I'm still selfish. I still push you out. I still have sex with you to make myself feel better. I still –"

Now Lauren cut Bo off. "Don't." The word came out quickly, and Bo froze. Lauren rubbed her hand against the back of Bo's, the touch reassuring. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to…I just…" Now it was Lauren's turn to sigh. Bo did not interject. Lauren re-centered herself. "I love you. You're my best friend. And, I just…I can't let you talk about yourself like that. Because it isn't true."

Lauren brushed a piece of hair off Bo's cheek while Bo looked at her skeptically. "Let me ask you this," Lauren continued on. "Do you think I'm selfish?"

Bo looked surprised. "What? No, of course not."

"Do you think I'm using you?"

Bo looked thrown. "What are you talking about?"

"Bo," Lauren said, giving a weak smile. "You aren't using me. You have sex with me to make yourself feel better…guess what? I do the same thing with you. Because having sex with you makes me feel better. Because I'm in love with you, and being close to you makes me feel amazing. That isn't a bad thing. That's just…what we do for each other."

"But that's not –"

"Have you ever slept with me when I wasn't 100% on board with it?"

"God, I hope not…"

Lauren smiled. "You haven't. Because you aren't using me for sex. You aren't using me at all."

Bo continued to look skeptical.

Lauren lifted a hand and moved it to indicate around the house. "I mean, look at where we are. Look at what you've done here. This is the textbook opposite of selfish."

"It isn't enough," Bo said, her eyes casting around them. "I should have –"

Here, Lauren stopped Bo with a kiss. She stroked her tongue over Bo's once, briefly, and pulled back. "Would your mother have done this? Would she have built something like this for someone she loves?"

Bo didn't speak, the answer obvious and not needing to be said.

"You were abused," Lauren said, quietly.

Bo flinched. "Other people have it worse."

Lauren ignored the response. "And it made you think you don't deserve things. But you do. And I don't know what good karma I built up to be the one to get to be with you, but all I can think is that I must have pulled 10,000 tiny orphans from a sinking ship in my past life, because there is no other explanation for how I got so mind-bendingly lucky to be the one who gets to be with you. And I know me telling you that doesn't just undo what you've gone through. But…I just…I want to say it anyway."

Bo was quiet. "I appreciate you saying that. But…I mean…" She ran a hand through her hair. "I am possibly the most selfish with you that I've ever been. The night we met, when I just walked into your house without an invitation…just seeing you, not even knowing who you were…it's like I was already in love with you before I met you. I was just…waiting to locate you.

"Halloween, after that case, when you came to my office…I wasn't even broken up with Rainer. But you were in front of me, and all I could think was…I just, I wanted you. And we tried to be friends, and I kept telling myself that I had to be okay with that because, I mean, I know me. I know I've fucked up every relationship. But Vex set you up on that blind date, and…all I remember thinking was how wrong it was, because you were mine. That was the word I kept thinking. Mine. I came to your house that night, and you told me you weren't interested in her, and…something just snapped. You were mine."

The night Bo and Lauren had slept together for the first time. The memories came back to Lauren, the way Bo had walked in, seeming agitated, the relief when they finally touched…

"I am selfish, even if you don't want to admit it," Bo said. "I know I am. Because I know what I would do to keep you. My mother is addict, a housefire, and I'm the same because…because I'd burn the world down just to keep you." When she finished speaking, Lauren noted that she almost looked out of breath. There's anger in the way she loves me Lauren realized. Not anger in a negative sense…but anger in the sense that Bo had never been allowed to love healthily, and there was a primal fear that Lauren would be taken from her.

Lauren stroked a hand down the side of Bo's face. When Bo looked into her eyes, Lauren gave a small, warm smile. "Need a break?" she offered.

Bo blew out a sigh, looking exhausted. "Maybe," she conceded.

Lauren wrapped her arms around Bo, gathering her in a hug as she felt Bo sag against her, her body feeling heavy even as her arms held Lauren fiercely. Lauren pressed her face into Bo's hair, catching the warm scents of coffee, of leather, the solid, safe smells she associated with Bo. She felt the smooth strands of Bo's hair under her cheek, and she slid a hand up Bo's back to nestle it in her hair, scratching gently at Bo's scalp. Something about that moment, about feeling Bo solid, and warm, tugged at the center of her chest.

It's her presence, Lauren thought. She was here – fully here, opening up, letting Lauren in. Letting her in in ways Lauren was fairly certain no one had ever been allowed in. Kenzi and Dyson, sure, but only because they were there to see it firsthand. She was the first person to whom it had been offered; the first to be invited.

As the moment slipped by, she felt Bo's arms loosening by degrees. As the hug eased off, Lauren hazarded a small step back, hooking a finger under Bo's chin to raise her eyes. "Hey," Lauren murmured, softly. "Can we look around again?"

A smile broke on Bo's face, and Lauren felt the heat of it like the sun on her skin in the summer. She nodded faintly and stood up, locking her hand into Lauren's. "Where do you want to start?"

Lauren looked around, once again overwhelmed by the scope of the work. "Can you…I mean, can you explain to it all to me? Why you picked things out, your thought process on all of it?"

Bo nodded. "Sure. But, I mean, if you don't like something, or if you want me to change something, I definitely can switch things out, or –"

Lauren tugged on Bo's hand, stopping her. "Baby."

Bo paused.

"This is the most unbelievably romantic thing anyone has ever done for me, and it's so perfect it almost hurts. And I know you – I know how your mind works. Most of the time," she added, with a small smile. "So, I know there are really specific ideas behind everything. And I want to know it all."

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