The nightmare twists inside me like something alive. I wake with a gasping start, sitting up in bed, panting like I had run a really fast mile. The bleakness of my thoughts and the memories of Hoyt intermingle, turning the experience even more volatile, even more dark and dangerous. The room is dark and still, a stillness that holds something other than simple quiet. Loss. I feel alone in a way I have never felt alone before in my life, and my thoughts turn automatically to Maura. I hadn't been alone. I just isolated myself because that is what I have always done. I closed myself off from Maura, because I just didn't know any other way. Alone was what had felt right, normal. Now I just feel loss.

Heart bumping hard against my breastbone, I fight to untangle my legs from the sheet and then race down the stairs in nothing but my pajama bottoms and tank top. Down the stairs I run until I reach the door. Everything is all tangled up inside me.

I sprint towards Beacon Hill without thought or purpose. A small, rational corner of my brain tells me to let the numbness back in, let it make me safe, but I fight against it. Something inside me is pushing me toward recklessness. I don't understand it, I'm not sure I want to understand it, but I can't seem to stop. Where is my self control? That rigid bitch inside me that holds me to the most impossible standards? Where is she? I want to kill her.

When my feet hit the street with the house Maura and I picked out together, I keep pelting down it, my lungs screaming, my legs straining, my heart breaking. I reach the front lawn, where I trip and fall. I get up on my hands and knees. I don't know when I started sobbing. I pound on the grass below me.

"This is all your fault! This is all your fault!" Anger bleeds from me, the fury that has lurked in every pore of my body. I beat at the grass until my fists throb, until every single ounce of scalding rage is gone. Expunged. Released like a torrent of pain that flows out of me and into the face of the dawn.

But this isn't anyone fault but my own. I know that. I am railing at myself, the breakdown bringing a new chance to look at the possibilities. I gasp for air and the truth hits me, hammered home like a backpack full of bricks had just been placed on my shoulders. This is all my fault.

One year ago.

When I pull into my company's parking lot, the rain is coming down so hard I can't see anything but silver sheets streaming down my windshield. The downpour traps me inside my car and leaves me feeling isolated and cocooned at the same time. And I don't do well when I'm alone with my thoughts. When there's no problem to solve or work to accomplish.

My phone rings, and I answer expecting Maura to call, she was worried about me driving in this rain.

"Hello." My voice is still scratchy from sleep.

"Jane?" I recognize the voice.

"Detective Korsak?"

"Yes." His voice is brusque, but there is also regret threaded through it. "Jane, I don't want you to worry, because we have everything under control, but I need to inform you that Charles Hoyt escaped custody."

My heart jumps into my throat. The pelting cascade of water continues to come down in staccato rhythm which had, only moments ago, been soothing, but now did nothing for me. My keys slip from my slack grasp and fall into shadows, landing somewhere on the floorboards. My past and present merge and opens up memories of Hoyt that I've been able to keep closed since he was sent to prison a little over three years ago.

I flash back to all those sessions with Hoyt, his hot breath, his groping hands. I push the door open and stumble from my car. Immediately the rain soaks me to the bone. My heart beats frantically, as if it will pound right out of my chest.

I hear a shout, the sound of a male voice sets off a spurt of panic. What is happening? I realize it's just Korsak and my panic settles until the unsettling thought of Hoyt finding Maura and Theo, how do I keep them safe? The roar of the rain muffles Korsak and I hang up on him.

The present

When the sun hits the horizon of the new day, I get up and head back home, slipping up the stairs. After my shower, I go downstairs. My mother is in the kitchen. The terrible ache isn't going away any time soon, And when I meet my mothers eyes, I have to look away.

"Good morning." I say. "How was your date with detective Korsak?"

"Good morning, Jane." Korsak walks into the kitchen looking like he belongs here. My eyes snap to my mother and she blushes ever so lightly. Even with the pain that twists my heart, I am so happy that my mother has found love.

"Well, I guess it went pretty good."

My mothers laughter and Korsak's mingle. As I stand there, it hits me like a backlash. This is what love looks like. This is happiness. And, it looks so much like…what Maura and I had shared. The longing wells up in me to once again see that patented grin that is so uniquely Maura's.

"Maybe you should start calling me Vince."

"Oh, I don't know about that." I say, giving him a weak smile.

He chuckles again, and gives my mother a knowing look. "I've got to get going." He says.

After he leaves the house and I put my cereal bowl into the sink, and turn to my mother, who is at the French doors in the kitchen looking out on the beautiful garden, a cup of steaming coffee in her hands. She seems so pensive all of a sudden.

"Well, you waited a long time, but you're finally going for it?" I say, with newfound wisdom.

"I did. And I am." She says.

I walk over and slip my arm around her waist. Its easier to do this now. Another thing Maura had made easier for me.

I stand there looking out at the garden with my mother trying not to think about Maura until I need to start getting ready for the day.

Thoughts of Maura linger in my mind as I go upstairs and tiptoe over to Theo's toddler bed. It's only then, when he looks up at me, and smiles his sweet smile that my head snaps back on straight.

"Good morning, doodle." I gather him into my arms, kissing the warm curve of his neck beneath his dark curls, that place that is still so soft and smells like the baby he once was instead of the busy toddler he's becoming.

I lean down to fetch his Happy, his name for his blue and white striped blanket from his nest of blankets. He clutches it in his chubby hands and presses it to his face with a content sigh, making me smile.

"You ready for breakfast?" I ask, pressing a kiss to his forehead.

He nods, and we head down the stairs.

The rest of the morning passes in the usual state of barely controlled chaos. Theo spills his orange juice on my last clean shirt and I have to dash back upstairs to change while my mother changes him out of his orange juice soaked sleeper and then I give him a quick wipe down at the sink. No sooner do I have him cleaned and dressed for daycare than he burst into tears because the zipper on his backpack breaks. When I finally walk out the door at ten 'til eight, I'm already exhausted and not looking forward to work.

AN-I won't be able to update this one as much as I did beautiful stranger, but I'll do my best to update as fast as possible.