A/N: What happened right after the episode "Dead Ringers"?

Chris turned around and walked away from him. Walked away from her marriage. Her tight skirt shortened her stride, she felt like running but kept walking. She would not cry, it was too late for tears. She clung to the belief that she had made the right decision. She had made the right decision.

Cory opened her door to a lonely figure. There she stood, with perfect posture and an impassive face.

"Come in," Cory said, the worry that had been niggling in her heart for a while now was kicking it up a notch.

Chris sat down on the sofa and stared at her hands. "I'm leaving."

Cory sat down beside Chris. "Did you tell TC?" She asked.

The only indication that Chris was feeling anything about leaving her husband was a sharp intake of breath. "Yes. He wanted to come with me. I told him no," Chris admitted, wringing her hands together.

"Where are you going to go?" Cory asked, trying to keep it together as best she could.

"Quantico, they want me for a profiler," Chris said.

"Can't you stay? I mean not with TC… You can stay here, stay close, so you can at least work on things…" Cory tried.

Chris closed her eyes, she seemed to bend, her head now resting on her still tightly clasped hands, her shoulders and every muscle in her body too tense.

Cory saw the pain etched on her friend's body and enveloped her in a hug as best she could from their awkward position.

"I'm not a bad person, Cory." Chris said, even her voice sounded tense as she sought some kind of approval. "I just can't stand it anymore, I don't want to be half a person anymore, I want to be me again…"

And Cory didn't understand it, but she didn't have to understand to see that her friend was in more pain then she had expected. She had always been so strong, it was hard to think of her as suffering.

"It's OK," Cory said, and to her own chagrin started crying as she pulled Chris tighter against her. "You can be you again."

Chris's voice trembled, as her tense control of her body was beginning to crack. "I want to be able to dream again, I want to be good at things without feeling guilty." Chris's whole body began to tremble as she finally started crying too. "I'm sorry, I'm so sorry," she whispered between hard intakes of breath as she still tried to keep her voice under control.

Cory started rocking, trying to soothe the crying creature in her arms, and maybe herself as well. "It's OK, it's all going to be OK," she said, because she could not think of anything else to say.