"You have one hundred and fifty seven books on that shelf."

"Do I?" Holly responded to Gail's musings with a distracted acknowledgement. She switched out one stack of papers for another, straightened the stack by tapping them against her desk, and picked up her highlighter.

"Yes," Gail said. "And they're probably the one hundred and fifty seven most boring books on the planet."

Holly finished making a large, yellow mark on the paper before agreeing, "Probably."

"I tried to read that green one in the middle one day," Gail pointed to it, but Holly was too focused on work to know it. "But I didn't even understand the title. So I just drew a picture of a giant turtle eating a library in the margins."

"Oh yeah?"

"The turtle's name was Larry."

"Good guess," Holly smiled to herself. "That's exactly what it's about. That and diagnostic pathology."

"I'm a genius, too," Gail pumped her fist in the air. When she got no immediate response, she sighed. Took another cursory glance around Holly's really super boring home office and added, "A hungry one."

"I told you to go get something an hour ago," Holly said, not looking up from her article.

Gail stretched out a bit further on the small sofa that provided the only other seating in the room. "You have nothing to eat, Hol."

"You mean, I have nothing you want to eat, Gail," Holly corrected. "There might be a hidden bag of Cheetos in there."

"There's not," Gail said. "I checked."

"Behind my rice cakes."

Gail narrowed her eyes. "Ass move, Stewart."

"Emergency stash, Peck."

Gail waited for about ten seconds before she jumped up. Holly was a bit surprised when she felt Gail's hands on her shoulders instead of hearing her footsteps leave the room.

"You want anything while I'm down there?" Gail asked as she leaned over Holly's shoulder to take a look at what she was highlighting.

"Hm," Holly thought it over. "Some water, maybe."

"Can do," Gail said, but still didn't remove her hands. She read the last word of the last yellow sentence. "Exsanguination. Sounds fun."

"Not as much as you'd think."

Gail's palms rested there for a moment longer, her thumbs making circles on the back of Holly's neck. Soon she felt Gail's arms slide over her shoulders and she was being hugged from behind. Gail's soft voice tickled her ear, "Anything else?"

Holly kissed the forearm closest to her lips and said, "The aforementioned rice cakes."

"Gross," Gail said. She added a mock puking sound to really drive home the grossness, "But okay."

"You're a child."

"A grown-up child that loves you," Gail said as she dropped a quick kiss on the top of her head and padded out of the room. "And is bringing you nasty rice cakes."

Holly heard her climb down the stairs, knock on the countertops with her knuckles and open the squeakiest cabinet in her home. The fridge opened and closed and Gail's stomping indicated her imminent return.

"I'm back," Gail announced less than two minutes later. She placed Holly's water and snack on the corner of her desk, out of the way of her work.

"It's always hell when you're away," Holly said playfully.

"Isn't it, though?"

Holly caught an underlining seriousness in Gail's tone and threw her a questioning look.

Gail smiled at her, "You miss me, it's okay to admit it."

"I did," Holly said. "I'm okay with that."

"Missing me?"

"Admitting it," Holly said. "I'm not ashamed of that."

"Hm," Gail said noncommittally and plopped back down on her sofa. She opened her Cheetos and crunched on them for a few minutes while she watched Holly go back to work. "So, Hol?"

"Yeah?"

"Is this going to be an all-day thing?"

"Probably going to be most of the day," Holly answered. "I've got a deadline, honey."

"Yeah," Gail said. "Okay."

"I really should have been working on it for a while, but I've been putting it off to hang out with my girlfriend."

"Selfish bitch," Gail said with a faux sneer.

"Nah," Holly said, still highlighting. "She's kinda cool. I kinda love her."

Gail threw a Cheeto into the air and caught it in her mouth, "Probably talented as fuck."

"That, too," Holly said.

"Hot?"

Holly tapped the framed photo of the two of them that was placed on her desk with her highlighter. It got special treatment because Gail was actually smiling instead of making a face at the camera. "Hottest chick in Toronto."

"Not bad," Gail played along. "The other one, though….damn! Those glasses really do it for me."

"You don't say?"

Holly waited for the reply, but Gail's next words caught her off guard. "I know that it's my fault for monopolizing all your time, but I was hoping we could hang out today."

"We are hanging out today," Holly pointed out.

"No," Gail said. "I was hoping I would…wake up here. And we'd have breakfast and talk about some stupid thing that's going on somewhere. Then, we'd lounge around all day. We'd watch a movie or you'd tell me a crap load of random, useless facts that I'll never use in any situation. We'd order some food. Make out. Spy on your neighbors…then, I'd sleep here…after some crazy lesbian sexcapade."

"You just described our last two days off together," Holly said. "Except you left out the part where I fall asleep and you write 'Return to Gail Peck' on the bottom of my foot with a Sharpie."

"That was for your own good."

"How?"

"Vanishing sleepwalkers, Holly," Gail said. "It's a real thing."

"You watch too much tv," Holly scolded her. "But the rest of that plan was great."

"Exactly!" Gail bit her lip and added very softly, "More of that, please?"

The 'please' caused Holly to stop what she was doing. She used to her feet to maneuver her chair around and face Gail. "What?"

"What?" Gail asked innocently. "What's up? What's going on? What the what?"

"You're…" Holly couldn't quite pinpoint exactly what Gail was today. "Unusual."

"People have been saying that for years, Hol," Gail shrugged. "You're just now noticing?"

"Something you want to say? Talk about? Something going on I should know about?"

"No," Gail's lips stretched with the denial. One side of her mouth curled, her face scrunched. She shook her head vigorously and then added an extra shake. "Nope."

Holly gave her the look. It was a look she had perfected over the past few months. It's just a slight tilt of her head, her eyes narrowing ever so much. But, for some reason, it's the equivalent to Holly reaching down Gail's throat and pulling the truth out of her. It worked every time.

"Damn!" Gail rolled her eyes, knowing she'd been Holly'd.

"Spill it."

"It's not a big deal," Gail prefaced. "Really…I just…"

"You…just?"

"Well, I slept at my place last night, you know?"

"Yeah."

Holly nodded, she did know. She had seen Gail for all of half an hour yesterday when they met for a quick bite at a little shithole place next to the station for lunch. Well, it was lunch for Gail, dinner for Holly, because Gail was working later shifts this particular week. It wasn't the first time that they're schedules made it difficult to see each other. It wasn't exactly fun. Holly didn't enjoy it, but she dealt with it.

"Because I texted you and you were asleep," Gail explained. "So I had to go home to my own stupid apartment. Which was entirely too loud, by the way. And, Dov and Chloe were having some strange, nerdy sexual relations. Not to mention that there was a bra hanging from my doorknob that wasn't even mine. It probably belongs to one of Chris' skanks. So, I burned it."

"You burned it?"

"Yes," Gail said. "It might have had herpes."

"You could have come over," Holly offered. She always did. Gail had an open invitation. She always had. "We could have had our own nerdy sex."

"Yeah, but…" Gail's shoulder lifted slightly. "I don't know…nevermind…"

"Gail," Holly pushed herself forward in the chair, "Did something happen?"

"No," Gail said. "I just…didn't sleep very well."

"Okay," Holly's eyebrows rose. "Something bothering you?"

"Yeah, I guess," Gail was having a harder and harder time looking Holly in the eye. She quickly popped a handful of Cheetos in her mouth. "I gus I jus slee etter when I wid you."

"That would have been sweet if you hadn't had your mouth stuffed with so many cheese puffs."

"Not sweet," Gail said after she swallowed. "Just a fact. I was sharing a fact."

Holly laughed at her reluctance to just admit she was being adorable and told her, "I sleep better with you, too."

"Really?"

"Yep," Holly said. She grinned, "I don't know if it's the snoring that lulls me to sleep or the security of knowing I'll never oversleep again with you kicking me awake every two hours."

"Ha." Gail threw a cheese puff at Holly, which she dodged gracefully.

"I'm kidding," Holly said, her eyes lingered over Gail's body for just a moment. "You're comfy."

"You're bony."

"Your feet are cold."

"You talk in your sleep."

"You drool on your pillow."

Gail reached out and grabbed the arms of Holly's chair and pulled her closer. "Do not."

"It's like a river of saliva over there, Gail," Holly continued. "Some mornings I need to boat just to get to the bathroom."

"You're not funny."

"Funnier than you," Holly said, still letting Gail slowly drag her across the floor. She kicked her feet up to rest on either side of Gail when she got close enough. "Any particular reason you brought me over here?"

"Just saying hi," Gail said.

"Ah."

"And the glasses," Gail nudged them up Holly's nose. "They're doing it for me."

"Don't try to distract me," Holly called her bullshit. "What's going on?"

Gail looked down. "I was thinking this morning..."

"What were you thinking?"

Gail picked some imaginary lint of Holly's old sweat pants. She'd had those for years. Gail knew that. They were Holly's favorite pair and she had acquired them her freshman year of college. 'Acquired' because she stole them on her way out of some girl's dorm room that she had accidentally slept with. 'Accidentally' because she got really drunk and didn't mean to sleep with a girl. But 'sleeping with a girl' was fucking awesome and she got a bonus pair of amazingly comfortable sweats. So win-win.

"I love that I know the story of your pants," Gail blurted out.

"You love that you know the story of my pants?" Holly was confused. "That's what you were thinking about this morning? These actual pants or is that a euphemism?"

"No and yes." Gail needlessly folded up her bag of Cheetos and pushed them further away. "Yes, these pants. And no, not what I was thinking about."

"Hey," Holly got her attention. "Tell me."

Gail took a steadying breath, "I was thinking about us this morning…when I woke up. I missed you. I missed your sleepy face and your yawny morning stretch that sometimes ends with me being punched in the face. You know? And…well, your ratty Raptors t-shirt and these pants."

Holly's face broke into a grin, "I missed you, too, baby."

"No," Gail said. "I mean, yeah. You missed me and I missed you, yeah. But, no, because this was different…or not really different. Just more intense. And, it's been like this all week because I've been there and you've been here…"

"It sucked," Holly agreed. "I know. But, it'll get better. You have an earlier shift for the next couple weeks and I'll have a lot of my research out of the way so-"

"Yeah," Gail nodded. "But, that's short term."

Holly stopped talking and her mind went into hyper focus. "Uh huh."

"I woke up in my room at my apartment this morning," Gail said. "And I realized that I never want to wake up there again…like ever. Because it blows. Seriously, it sucks. You're not there. It's colder. The bed's not as big. I don't have your fancy fucking sheets with the high ass thread count. It doesn't smell like you there…"

There might have been more, but Holly was pretty much doing the Macarena in her head because she'd been waiting for this for over a year. The very first night Gail had stayed over because she was high on painkillers, she'd wanted to ask her to stay…forever. The morning after the Great Hair Massacre, she'd awoken with Gail Peck snuggled up next to her and she never wanted her to leave. The first time Gail had come back to her house after their non-break up-break up, Holly wanted to chain Gail to her bed. And, now, Gail was finally-finally-saying what she'd been waiting to hear for so long. She was ready to give up her escape route.

"So…we've said all the things that need to be said when you're serious about being with someone. And I'm serious. I've never been more serious about anybody…ever…" Gail looked so nervous. It may have been as nervous as Holly had ever seen her. "I'm kind of putting myself out there, Hol."

"I'm trying to not scare you with how excited I am," Holly said truthfully.

"I'd rather you scare me with excitement than the alternative."

"Do you want me to ask?"

"Uh, yeah, Holly," Gail said with her trademark impatience. "Ask me. Otherwise, it's just a home invasion."

Holly reached up to cradle Gail's head in her hands, her fingers running through the short hair just behind her ears. "Gail Peck, will you invade my home?"

"Holly!"

Holly couldn't help but smile at the Gail's earnestness.

"Move in with me."

The corners of Gail's mouth turned up just slightly, "I'm so glad you asked. And, I will, but I have a couple of demands."

Holly rolled her eyes.

Gail folded her legs under herself so she could tug her girlfriend closer. "I love you and I can't wait to live with you."

Holly's lips had barely brushed Gail's when she pulled back, "You're already packed, aren't you?"

Gail did have a the good sense to look sheepish when she said, "Yes. I've already asked the boys to help me move and requested the change of address form from Oliver."