A/N: While I listen to "Stars" by The XX and procrastinate working on Echoes & Dust, this happens. Blame Tressie.

XxXxXxX

She's home only a week before it happens. And it was inevitable, she supposed. She'd been slowly, tentatively finding her way by watching everyone as they moved throughout the kitchen. Cataloging every cupboard opened and every drawer rummaged through. There's not much order in the Toretto household, but it is a well-organized chaos machine. She feels a deep affection for it, even though all she feels is a slight sense of déjà vu when she wanders around. But she does understand, on some level, why this place was home for her so long ago. Love permeates the air. From the dusty photos of Dom and Mia's mother and father, pictures from their old team, their shared adolescence and new ones taken shortly after Jack was born.

Jesse, she said suddenly one day. Mia dropped a frame in shock and Dom looked incredulously over at her from the couch. When asked how she remembered, she simply shrugged, tracing the young boy's face slowly. "We were friends, right?"

Dom shook with laughter, a warm smile crossing his face. "No one rolled a joint better," He smirked. "Your words, not mine. Though, I'd beg to differ…yours weren't half bad."

She'd rolled her eyes and set the photo back down, letting her fingers trail across faces slowly becoming familiar to her once again. Jesse was dead, and Leon had hightailed it out of Mexico as soon as Dom had joined them. Vince, well, she'd asked about the bearded man, once. Mia'd gone quiet and Dom averted his gaze and she knew whatever had become of him wasn't a safe topic to discuss, not with her fragile hold on this new reality and the process of reintigrating themselves into a normal sort of life.

"We'll have to get new ones," Mia informs them all over dinner, glancing at Dom before looking at Letty with a soft smile. "I want shots of you both, and with Jack."

She doesn't remember if she liked babies before, but little Jack O'Conner quickly won over her heart. Endearingly identical to Mia, with just enough mischief in his big eyes to incite arguments over whether he inherited it from his father or uncle. She's found an unexpected closeness to Brian, who she'd found possessed a steady voice of reason. She could tell he'd still felt guilty over his involvement in the course her life had taken, even though she'd reminded him countless times of her stubborn nature and headstrong attitude, both of which seemed unaffected by whatever havoc the explosion had wreaked on her brain. Left in the limbo of feeling just on the verge of remembering yet, no power of will being able to force the memories back, she felt startlingly off-balance in her new old life.

Which is why she's crumpled over in the dark kitchen, the moonlight casting long shadows and the shattered remains of a ceramic cup scattered to her left, heel of her hand pressed to her eyes in an attempt to stave off any more tears that threaten to fall.

Her time in London had cultivated a love for a good cuppa in her, and she'd thrown a box of her favorite into their cart that morning, but found herself unable to locate it in the dark, unfamiliar kitchen and in her frustration, had knocked the cup clear off the counter behind her.

The sound had shattered the relative silence of the house, and she'd waited with her heart in her throat for the telltale whine of Jack if he'd been disturbed from sleep. When she was sure she hadn't woken the baby, the first tears began to fall. She felt like such a failure. Couldn't remember which cupboard the teabags were stashed in, couldn't remember any of the people in this house, couldn't remember loving them or fighting with them or anything beyond what she'd gathered from pictures and stories and home videos they'd eagerly produced for her.

She's so lost in frustration at herself she doesn't even hear him come in, doesn't even notice him until he drops to his knees next to her.

"It's gonna be alright," He soothes, pulling her into his arms. He doesn't even have to ask, knew it was coming as much as she did. One hand anchors her firmly to him, the other slowly rubs on her back. "It'll be alright. We'll figure it out, we always do."

She hiccups on a sob then, buries her face in his shoulder. She should probably feel a bit silly, but the man holding her has been nothing but supportive, encouraging her to take all the time she needed and to give herself a break. Unlikely, but comforting to hear nonetheless. "I wish-I wish I could remember."

"It's no big deal," He teases gently. "Sometimes it takes me hours to figure out where Mia's stashed everything. Should get her to make diagrams or somethin'."

"No, not that." Her voice is soft, muffled into the warm skin of his shoulder. He still hasn't quite gotten over the feeling, and he wonders if it's just instinct or if she realizes that it was her favorite spot to lay after, well…

He doesn't let himself hope too much, is content with whatever she can give right now. He knows the years without her were hell, can't imagine what they must have been like for her. At least he had the memories, people who understood his pain. All Letty was left with was a hole, a gaping, empty spot that ached without her knowing why. Dropped in a strange world, with people who only wanted her around for what she could do for them and couldn't give two shits if she lived or died at the end of the day so long as the job was done well.

"Not that." She repeats, her voice a low rasp as she shudders a breath. "I just…" She swallows thickly and he kisses her hair, moves his arm from her back to behind her neck as she tilts her head back to look at him. "I wish I could remember why you love me so fucking much."

He smiles at her then, brings both hands up to cradle her head, ensuring that she can't dodge his gaze, a tactic she'd been employing a lot lately. Especially when it came to his feelings for her, and the ones he stirred in her from the first glance back in London, even though he was a stranger to her then.

"Now that," He flicks her ear gently, pressing a light kiss to the corner of her mouth. "Is something I won't have a problem with refreshing your memory on."

She still looks unsure, her eyes brewing a storm in warm brown.

"Don't worry about it, baby." He slowly moves this thumb down the bridge of her nose, soothes her even if she can't remember all the times he'd done it before.

"It's just, you know so many things about me, about us, and I can't-"

"You're here, now, with me." Dom shrugs. "Even if you never remember, it's enough."

He holds her for a few long moments, the crickets chirp outside and a dog howls and an engine backfires and it all feels like home, tucked safe in his arms and she thinks that maybe, just maybe, he's right.

When her breathing steadies, he moves to stand, locking one hand with hers and pulling her to her feet next to him. He doesn't let go as he carefully kicks the broken pieces aside towards the trash can, making a note to sweep them up before Mia or Brian woke to get a bottle for Jack.

"Come on," He says softly. "Let's go for a drive."

It's kind of crazy, she thinks a few minutes later, sliding into the passenger seat of the Charger in her pajamas, bare legs getting goosebumps against the cool leather and bare feet wiggling against the floormats.

He gets behind the wheel, and she laughs slightly at the tag sticking out under his chin and he frowns almost comically, before glancing over at her with a grin and starting the engine. She doesn't know that they've done this before, these late night rides, and that the last time ended with a very uncomfortable encounter with a shirtless Dom explaining turn signals to a gaggle of elderly women when he really just wanted to get the giggling Latina in the passenger seat into his bed.

He won't tell her where he's taking her, just drives past places that

"If you're driving me to Timbuktu to murder me, I'm gonna be so pissed." She's reclined in her seat, toes on the dashboard now. She's the only person he'd ever let get away with that, and it's just another thing to file away to be sorted as coincidence or memory later.

His throaty laugh brings a grin to her face as well, and she bites her lip trying to contain the laughter threatening to spill out. She couldn't explain it, but this, just the two of them, cruising around in the dark like they owned the streets just felt right, and her chest felt tight with something.

He slides his hand on her leg, rubs gently at the skin just above her knee. There's another scar there, one she got skittering across roofs with her cousins in the DR as a young girl, and one just below it, from skinning her knee trying to jump Vince's old skateboard ramp with her bicycle. He knows her body, as well as he knows his own, has spent the majority of his life learning it and loving it and he had no problem with going above and beyond to show her that this, them, was the way it was supposed to be. Even if she never remembered, even if all they could do was clear the wreckage and build new memories in their place. It would never be exactly the same, perhaps, but it could be just as good.

She drops her hand to cover his, lets it rest there as he flips his hand around, threads his fingers through hers. She's staring out the window, up at the stars or the streetlights he's not sure.

He pulls right onto the sand, kills the engine and is out of his seat and around to her door before she even unbuckles. He pulls her to her feet, her toes burrowing into the still-warm sand. He's produced a hooded sweatshirt from somewhere, and he's gotten it over her head, her arms sliding automatically through the holes, sinking into its warmth against the ocean breeze. It's his, she can tell. It smells like him and the arms hang too long and the bottom covers the hem of her shorts and she can feel a small tear in the cuff at the wrist, the perfect size for her thumbs to wriggle through.

They walk down it a ways, find a rock and settle on it, her between his legs as he rubs her arms slowly. The beach is abandoned but for them, although the remnants of a bonfire still flicker in the distance, the smell of smoke and salt and sea filling her with yet another sense of right.

"On a beach, in Mexico." She murmurs softly, and she leans back into him. "You said that to me, didn't you."

It's not so much a question, but he nods anyways. "I made a lot of promises, I just wish I did a better job at keeping them."

He'd promised to keep her safe, once. Swore on his life he'd take care of her, even if he'd made a show of rolling his eyes and shrugging it off then. She'd been just a kid, a tomboy with a big mouth and a killer right hook and a penchant for using both to get herself into trouble and Dom hadn't thought she was worth the hassle. But his father had just smirked and shook his head, went back under the hood muttering about her making him changing his mind someday. And she had, and it had hit him with the force of an earthquake, throwing everything off balance in its unpredictability and strength. If there was one injustice in the world that he'd give anything to remedy, it was that she may never remember how strong they'd always been together, even when it felt like everything was falling apart.

She shifts then, tips her head back, stares up into the vast blackness above.

If he was the sun, with everything pulled into his orbit, then she was the stars. The lights in the dark, burning brightly even when no one could see them.

They stay there until the sky starts to lighten, each star slowly flickering out of view and tendrils of sun reaching out to take their place, to hold its court until the cycle repeated itself like it always had.

And as the water crashes against the shore, she thinks that maybe, just maybe, everything will turn out exactly the way it should.

XxXxXxX