"Sorry, it took her a while to go to sleep," Miles said, rushing into the room.

            Jensen looked up from rocking Beckett in her arms. He'd started crying the moment Jensen and Miles were going to go through her lines for her Diana Thomas audition. Rocky in one arm, snoring away on his shoulder, and his other hand holding various pages of script Jensen had printed off a couple days before and never touched, Miles had too much and Jensen felt bad for asking him to run lines with her. She wasn't sure she even wanted to audition. Three months away from home didn't sound like something she'd enjoy. Staying home didn't sound like it either. She'd spent two months with Beckett and leaving him sounded terrifying, even when she felt like he deserved better.

            Jensen was tired of having her brain feed her paradoxes she couldn't hope to unravel.

            "It's fine," Jensen said. She sat down in the rocking chair they had in the corner of Beckett's room, adjusting how she was holding him as she unbuttoned her shirt with one hand. "He's still fussing anyway."

            "Do you want me to go grab something from the freezer so you can focus on your lines?"

            Jensen shook her head. "I'll never practice these if we wait for perfect conditions."

            "Are you looking forward to the audition?" Miles asked, pulling up a tiny chair to sit near her.

            "Honestly," Jensen said, desperately trying to get Beckett to latch so she could feed him. She pushed hair out of her face. "I don't even care."

            Jensen let out a small breath as Beckett latched onto her, both of relief and at the soreness. She looked back up at Miles, who's eyebrows knit together.

            "I thought you were excited about this," Miles said. "Diana Thomas... and all."

            Jensen gave a small shrug. "It's... it's whatever. I don't care."

            "Rhodes—"

            "Are you starting or am I starting?"

            "Um." Miles sighed softly and read over the side quickly. "Me."

            "Go ahead."

            "Are you sure?"

            Jensen nodded and closed her eyes, attempting to picture her lines in her head. They had to be somewhere between all the baby books and Quentin Tarantino monologues, right? Jensen would even take half-remembered lines over not-at-all-remembered lines.

            "Stop me anytime—"

            "Please read the lines."

            Miles sighed. Jensen wasn't sure she was meant to hear it. "Kansas? Of all places?"

            "I want to live," Jensen said, "See the world."

            "Diagnosed with stage four and Kansas is where you want to go? Wait—" Miles said, "You'd have cancer in this?"

            "Yeah."

            "If I have to see you die, I'm going to bawl my eyes out, Rhodes."

            "I've seen Daydream Believer," Jensen said. "Keep reading."

            "Diagnosed with stage four and you want to run away to Kansas?"

            Jensen found it charming how Miles read his lines. It wasn't like a casting reader, usually monotone and lifeless. Miles read them to her like he was auditioning for the role himself. Jensen played easily off his emotions and the dialogue flowed like it would in front of a camera. He made it simple to bounce off of.

            Jensen shrugged. "To start."

            "And where's the end?" Miles let out a small snort of laughter as Rocky snored loudly on his shoulder. Always the worst at pretending he wasn't laughing.

            Jensen drew a deep breath in. "Isn't that what we're all trying to figure out?"

            "Why Kansas?"

            "End of the rainbow," Jensen said. "Maybe it's all just a dream. I don't know. It's... it's  somewhere. It's not here."

            "And running away is better than facing this?"

            "Running away is better than saying goodbye," Jensen said. "I'm not going to die surrounded by people feeling bad for me."

            "Some people would consider that love."

            "Love's for people who aren't borrowing time."

            "Do you fall in love in Kansas?"

            "Miles."

            "Sorry." Miles read the slide quickly. "Shit ton of direction. Um." Miles dropped the page he was reading. "Shit."

            Jensen carefully shifted Beckett in her arms so he could feed from her other side. She closed the side of her bra Beckett was finished with. "Kids in the room."

            "Sorry." Miles' eyes moved quickly as he read. "So... we're smoking. On a rooftop. I'm sure that's good for the cancer. Staring at a sunset. Blah. Blah. Blah. Um. I believe in love at all chances."

            "You weren't the one told you might have four months."

            "Four months?"

            "To a couple years." Jensen scoffed. "You know if you keep looking at me like that I'm not going to ask you to come with me."

            "You were going to ask?"

            "Road trip at the end of my life?" Jensen asked. "Could use some company."

            "Jensen Rhodes." Miles looked up at her from the side.

            Jensen's heart skipped a beat. "Did I get the line wrong?"

            "You know when you get this role," Miles started, "You're an Oscar winner. No competition. I can feel it."

            "I don't even have the part."

            "Academy Award Winner Jensen Rhodes suits you."

            "Please be serious."

            "I can't wait to be a trophy husband."

            "That's not what that means." Jensen shook her head. "And you have to say nice things."

            "Did I say that during Sparks Fly?"

            "Had we been together for six years with two kids at that point?"

            "Do I have a habit of lying to you?"

            "Is that the end of the scene?"

            Miles read the side again. "Thought you wanted to disappear."

            "Need someone to hold my hair back when I vomit." A smile pulled at the corner of Jensen's lips. She wasn't sure how convincingly coy she could be with a baby suckling on her. "Are you in?"

            "The day things go south—"

            "I don't want to think about that day." Jensen wished she could do the same. Stop thinking about the future. Focus on the present. Somehow be less stressed ignoring every aspect of her life except herself in any given moment. Diana Thomas definitely hadn't typecast her.

            "Am I allowed to get help?"

            Jensen shook her head. Curls flying free and hitting her cheeks. "One last hurrah. For however long it lasts. No turning back."

            "That's a tall order."

            "To let me die?" Jensen raised an eyebrow.

            "To live after." Miles frowned. Either he was getting into character, or he didn't like what he was picturing for the rest of the movie. Miles tended to do so if he thought Jensen's character was going to be killed off. (Jensen wasn't sure she'd ever be forgiven for having him watch the Legendary finale with her.) (She'd been killed off with twenty minutes left in the episode.)

            "Gotta live while you can."

            "I must be crazy."

            Jensen smiled. "Does that mean you're in?"

            "This movie's going to be fucking good." Miles lowered the side. Getting into character, then. Jensen appreciated that.

            "Kids are still in the room, babe."

            "This movie's going to be fudging good."

            Jensen looked back down at Beckett. "I don't know. It's..."

            "What?"

            "It's what it is."

            "Can we talk about this?"

            "What's there to talk about?" Jensen shifted in her seat slightly. If they were going to go for three kids, they were going to have to invest in a better nursing chair. Jensen didn't appreciate the uncomfortable after twenty minutes one they owned.

            "You're not looking forward to this."

            "Should I be?"

            "Well..." Miles looked like he was trying to find the proper word. "Yeah. Kind of."

            "Time's changed."

            "Did they really change that much?"

            "Why's it so terrible that I might've changed my mind?"

            "You texted me to tell me about it," Miles said, "Usually you wait to say it if you're not looking forward to it."

            Jensen frowned. No words to tell him that it annoyed her that he was right. Not enough words to admit he was right in the first place.

            "I know you, Rhodes."

            Jensen sighed and looked down at Beckett, who had unlatched. She didn't feel achingly full anymore. Beckett had been feeding for long enough. At least. Well. Jensen hoped so. Beckett being able to tell her he'd had enough would've been perfect. Taking the guessing out of parenting was something that Jensen would have appreciated immensely.

            What Jensen knew was that Beckett looked tired. And she was sore and needed soothing cream. Jensen adjusted the buttons on her shirt and got up, Beckett in her arms. She laid him down gently in his crib, careful to do all the things she'd spent too much time reading about in books and practicing on him the last couple months.

            "Am I wrong?" Miles' voice was gentle. Non-accusatory.

            "I don't know."

            "Rhodes—"

            "Am I supposed to know?" Jensen grabbed the cream on the small shelf they had set up near the crib.

            They had many tiny shelves throughout the room. One with book ends and a few of Rocky's favourites from her first year. They didn't know if Beckett would be the same, but the shelf was low enough that Rocky could go and grab a book if she wanted it.  There was teddy bears that Dayna, Liberty, and Maddox had given them. Back to back to back on their shelf, waiting for Beckett to be old enough to give them all the love he could. (Rocky had those teddies too.) (She liked the unicorn she'd stolen from Miles the best, though.) One shelf had too many creams. Diaper cream and nipple cream and Vaseline and many more.

            Jensen had grabbed the nipple cream. Uncapped the lid. Winced as she applied it. Winced harder when she clipped her nursing bra back on and buttoned her shirt.

            She turned back to Miles and leaned against the crib. Eyebrows knit together. Miles gave her the same look. His looked like he wanted to hug her but didn't want to risk waking up Rocky by putting her down.

            "Are things bad again?" Miles asked.

            Jensen pressed her lips together. Shook her head slightly. Not dismissing him, more questioning her own mind. Which she had been doing since Beckett was born. "I don't know."

            "Would you tell me if you did know?"

            "I hope so." Jensen twisted the hoop in her nose.

            "If you decide..." Miles ran his free hand across his face. "If you don't want to tell me what's going on, that's okay. But can we get you someone to talk to so things don't get bad again?"

            Jensen wrapped her arms around her stomach and nodded.

            "Okay," Miles said. "Just... let me know."

            Jensen had spent the first ten months of Rocky's life shutting Miles out of everything she felt. Post-partum depression had made her her own worst nightmare. Being antagonistic to Miles while they were trying to figure out how to be parents was the worst thing Jensen had done in her entire life. Miles had forgiven her time and time again for the anger she threw his way and how irritable she'd been until she started telling people how she felt. Jensen wasn't sure she'd ever forgive herself. And it was happening again.

            "I'm sorry."

            "Please don't be."

            "I am." Jensen nodded. "I should be."

            "You can't control how you feel."

            "I can't control anything, really." Jensen hadn't meant to make eye contact with Miles, both pairs of eyes widening. "I mean—"

            "Jensen—"

            "Oh, God—"

            "Jesus Christ."

            Jensen swallowed hard. "I—um. You weren't supposed to hear that."

            "I figured," Miles said. Sounding half annoyed with her. Jensen couldn't blame him. Not in the slightest. "Do you want to talk—"

            "Daddy?"

            Miles let out a small sigh and pressed his lips together. "Yeah, Rock?"

            Rocky lifted her head. "Can't sleep."

            "You can't?" Miles asked. "You were snoring pretty good earlier, little queen."

            "No I'm not."

            "You—" Miles took in a deep breath. "Okay, let's get you back to bed."

            Miles cradled Rocky's head and stood up. He gave Jensen a frustrated glance as she tore her eyes away from him. Jensen didn't need to see that. She didn't want to see that. Miles' footsteps walked out of the room. Talking was too much but silence was worse. When Miles was silent he was either upset or angry. Sometimes both. There wasn't a good time to break silence.

            Jensen turned back to Beckett in his crib. She crouched slightly, forearms across the top bar and her chin rested on her hands. As close to Beckett as she could get without waking him up. Her hand traced the soft sheet Beckett's mattress was wrapped in.

            "Hey, little guy," Jensen said. "I'm sorry mom's being weird. She doesn't know what to do about it either." Jensen tiled her head, cheek against her hand. Narrowly avoiding an engagement ring in her eye. Curls slid onto her cheek. "I hope you like it here in spite of me. That's all I really want, you know. For you to be happy."

            Jensen stood up straight and walked to where there was too much laundry that needed put away. She'd walked it up to Beckett's room earlier but hadn't had the energy to fold. Or put into drawers. Jensen didn't have the energy to do a lot of things, frankly. She was exhausted.

            Picking up the laundry basket, Jensen walked over to the corner where the drawers sat. Jensen opened the top drawer, knowing there were too many onesies and socks and shoes missing. Her phone vibrated as she bent down to pick up the first item of laundry.

            She frowned, tossing the onesie over her shoulder and pulling her phone out of her pocket. An alert popped up on her home screen, Jensen's eyes read quickly. Jensen Rhodes seen for first time since having baby. Despite her better judgement Jensen clicked the alert. Popping up was a wonderful little article with pictures of her in Miles' sweatpants and a hoodie when she picked up groceries the day before. Lovely prose picking apart every pound she'd gained during her pregnancy.

            Jensen turned her phone off and held it in a fist. Considered opening Beckett's window and throwing her phone out of it as far as she could. Would Miles be mad he could never get a hold of her? Not if she told him why she decided to drop off the face of the earth and exist only in her house. God.

            Jensen tossed the phone haphazardly onto the rocking chair. Secretly hoping it smashed. Knowing it hadn't because Jensen wouldn't follow through with faking an accident.

            "Happiness for you, Beck," Jensen said, looking at him over her shoulder. "All for you."