I'm Still Here: Heart of the Matter

"I'm taking it things went well this time around?" Larry inquired as he sat on a bench outside the hotel doors, a newspaper in his hands. She turned around as he strolled over to her and let her lips collide with his, the discarded newspaper sitting on the bench.

She smiled against his lips, "It's getting there, if that's what you're asking." Both of their smiles grew wider as her hands wrapped around his neck. "You're getting really close."

"I believe we do have a room which to talk in." He points out, letting his lips collide with hers again. She tilts her chin up to meet his lips once more as the warmth of his body meshes with hers. Deepening, her eyes scan his.

With her hands still wrapped around him she pulls back, green eyes shining. "I am hearing you right." She arches her eyebrows sweetly, hardly unable to keep from the smirk on her face logically knowing exactly what he was thinking. She just didn't think that it would be now.

The wind blows and she tightens her hold around him, green eyes parting for his attention as they finally met hers again. "I've actually been thinking about it for awhile now." He confirmed, nodding timidly. "I'm not saying we have to right now, but some time, if ever." He offered, listening to a few birds chirping in the trees. "You know I really meant it when I said that some day you would make a great mother."

Her eyes scanned his, her brow arching then falling. "I know" She whispered, "But I've always had my doubts about being a mother." Confessing, her hands quickly interlaced with his as they walked back into the hotel, until they had reached the room they were staying in.

"You know, nobody can ever make you do what you don't what to do." He puts in understandingly, her expression falling gravely. "I guess what I'm trying to say is that you have the choice to change the future. Just because you have a past, doesn't mean that you don't deserve to have a future."

His last words caught her attention as she squeezed his hand, "Yeah about that." Pausing, she explained, exhaling. "It's just that I've had my share of thoughts about white weddings, somebody to spend my life with, and then I realize that my past extends beyond my future, to the degree. When I came back, I came back as a completely different person." He nodded with compassion, recognizing she was talking about after assignment.

Momentarily she looks away as if she would beg to differ, the wind blowing around them. She smiles in thought as she lets it fade. "Don, Charlie, David, Colby, you, you're all like the family I've never had. I blended in really well and I actually felt like everything would finally be alright. And I did everything just to redirect the director's calls just so that I wouldn't have to go. When I had to leave unexpectedly I had this big knot in my stomach. Not just because I was leaving and immediately. It was hard to pack and just leave, but I didn't know how hard it would be until I got there. In the DOJ I felt mainly from the moment I stepped in there that I was employed in a circus ring. It was in total opposition of what I stood for when I got up in the morning each day and put on my badge and gun." Sprawling out on her bed, he came and sat at the edge.

There was silence between them as she looked up towards the ceiling then looked at the empty space beside and invited him to lie beside her. "The truth is that I'm not sure how to react. I came back and I was just getting back into being home and going back to work and I couldn't tolerate the mindset that I had divulged into." She sat straight up, "That night we all went home from watching Colby being arrested, I couldn't keep myself from seeing those images with a lot of undefined rage because I had missed all the signs."

"I'm afraid we all did." He chimed in with regret as he pondered on everything she was telling him.

Letting her head rest against the palm of her hand, she admitted. "I wore myself out to the point of exhaustion, when we had a few days off." His forehead creased in concern, "I spent hours outside just walking around or running. It was better that I wasn't sitting at home waiting for a phone that wasn't going to ring. "

He sat up abruptly beside her. "But you did talk about it, tell me Don or David at least discussed what happened."

"Other way around actually. I tried to get to them and they practically put up in defense, a brick wall." Exhaling, she adds. "Don basically asked me if I was ready to do this again."

"I do not doubt your judgment with if you are or your not, but I see his point. Maybe he thinks that you were getting back into your work too soon and taking on something just as equally stressful as what you were doing."

Cocking her eyebrow, she exhales. "I can see why, but ever since I've stepped foot back onto land it's like he's uncertain of my capabilities. And I've found myself sinking further in cases, pulling all-nighters and studying new information whenever I can because maybe just one day I'll find what I've been looking for." It felt almost strange that he was going home tomorrow. In the aspects of their relationship, they had grown even closer. And in introspection he had gained a greater knowledge as he acquired a better familiarity for her state, hometown, and her, the woman he grew to love more and more every day.