Author's Note: Well, since I got mixed reviews for what people wanted to see, I decided to write alternative endings to this story. This is the ending that I'll tag on the end, just to give the quick happy ending, but expect to see two more that I'm really excited about.

Also, this is unbeta'd because Brynn is out of town. I already miss her, I'm sure you guys will too.

He fumbled for his keys, trying to force away the sudden pang of nervousness that had begun to take hold of him since he got out of the car.

A dozen roses didn't seem like much, JJ wasn't even a girl who really liked flowers, but it was a start.

He was determined not to give this up without a fight.

JJ was supposed to have been home hours ago, and hopefully, if he played his cards right, they could take the first steps toward mending their fractured relationship.

He felt bad for the way he had treated her.

Someday, all of these discussions they wanted to save until later would come to the surface.

And after hours of mulling over the look of emptiness in JJ's eyes, he knew that 'someday' had to be tonight.

They had to fix this.

And they had to start now, before it was too late.

He slowly pushed the door to their home open, hoping to catch her by surprise—even if it was just for a moment—to assure her that they really could get back to the way things used to be.

He was willing to try.

The dark expanse that greeted him surprised him. He put his keys in the dish on the table by the door, keeping his hand on his side piece, just in case, as he surveyed the darkness.

Everything looked the same, except…

Something was missing.

It took him a while, standing in the darkness. to put his finger on it. Realistically, it should have been obvious. Their home was cleaned perfectly, everything put neatly in its place as if it had always been that way.

The one thing that was missing was the clutter that seemed to accompany JJ wherever she went.

The clutter was gone.

A sickening feeling of dread—not fear or terror so much as knowledge of the world imploding around him—was pushed aside as he continued to look for his girlfriend.

They had to make this right.

"JJ?" He called, cautiously stepping out of their front room into the open dining room and kitchen. "JJ, where are you?"

Flipping on the lights, he dropped the flowers onto the table as a single solitary piece of paper, folded once, glared back at him menacingly from the black tabletop.

Fingers trembling, he flipped the folded piece of paper open with his thumb, not wanting to look at the answer he knew was coming.

Will—

I've been putting this off for far too long. Henry and I will be at Penelope's. We can figure everything else out later.

I am sorry.

—JJ

He stared at the note for a long time before finally dropping the paper onto the table.

After months of looking at her as if through tempered glass, believing they had all the time in the world, now he was faced with the harsh reality that he couldn't ignore any longer.

He had run out of time.

Just then, just as he felt his entire world crumbling beneath him, the door creaked open softly behind him.

Not daring to turn around, he heard whomever had come in pad softly up the stairs to Henry's room and turn on the light.

Could it be?

Could he really get a second chance?

He didn't dare to hope as soft familiar footsteps descended the stairs.

"I sat in the car for two hours." JJ admitted, her voice scratchy despite the fact that he was sure if he turned around there would be no hint that she had been crying. "I—"

He turned now, choking down a pained sob as she stood there, a defiant force to be reckoned with as she stood at the bottom of their stairs.

His vision blurred and she dissolved behind the blurry water of his tears. "Jayje."

She flinched. "I can't do this anymore Will." She shook her head, ignoring the overwhelming urge to just look into his charming eyes and pretend that everything was okay.

She couldn't live like this anymore.

It wasn't okay.

"I can't wait at home knowing you are trying to find a way to stay out. I can't have you slipping out of bed when you think I'm asleep, only to pretend you're asleep when I come home late." She shook her head. "I can't pretend it doesn't kill me every time you walk away from me."

She laid it out there for him to see, the uncomfortable truth she had spent months hiding.

"I can't lose you." He admitted, his voice breaking and for the first time, he made no attempt to shelter JJ from the raw pain he felt. "I thought—" He hesitated, knowing that so much needed to be said, but not knowing how to say it. "I thought I could protect you, but—" his voice hitched at the earlier feelings that came flooding back, "but I can't lose you."

It was ugly and twisted and dark, and for the last few months he had done his best to protect the woman he loved from the cancerous emotions inside him.

But now, it was too late for that.

"Will—" JJ's own voice broke, taking a step back. Yet neither of them made any movement toward the other.

Looking at her, though distorted by the water pooled in his eyes, it was as if he was seeing her for the first time clearly. She too had let down her walls to reveal the empty loneliness that encapsulated her soul.

Maybe that was what drew them together in the first place: they were both just a little bit crazy, a little bit broken, with a lot of issues.

She ran away from her problems.

He pretended they didn't exist.

But if they were going to fix this, it was going to take a lot more than pretending the world was not imploding around them, and running away from any sort of confrontation.

In short, a lot more than what they had been doing.

Suddenly, the distance between them seemed almost endless, the daunting journey ahead was almost too much.

And then he looked up and saw her eyes and nothing else mattered.

He closed the feet between them and pulled her close to him. She clung to him, as if certain that at any moment they could be ripped apart once more.

"Jay, I'm so sorry." He cried, burying his face in her hair. "I'm so sorry."

She sobbed against him, almost unwilling to let everything go for the fear that this could all crumble beneath her feet again. But the warmth of his presence, the smell of his aftershave, the comfort he could pass in one touch, it was something she had missed for a long time.

And she couldn't help but hope she'd never lose that again.

"I couldn't leave." She admitted softly, afraid to snap in two the overwhelming force that was guiding them back together. "I wanted to. I tried. But I couldn't. I—I love you."

"I love you too JJ." He closed his eyes, gratefully thanking whatever being upstairs that had given him this miracle.

He wasn't about to screw it up again.

In the days to come they would talk, he knew that much.

But tonight, in the soft moonlight of their pristine (and temporarily clutter-less) home, there wasn't time for discussions.

Because it was a time for healing.

THE END