Cherish had begun counting differences every time she traveled, whether it was the trip itself or the destination, something always changed. 

This time she traveled with Ari at her side, the both of them excited for a Christmas spent with their mother. They'd reminisced the whole way there about the meals they'd get to eat; proper Indian dishes they got once a year.  It was a nice change from traveling alone, like she usually did, like she'd done the last time.

The last time she'd returned to Montreal it had been with her head hung and tail tucked after running away. This time it was very different.

This time she took with her no apologies, no tears and no guilt. The greeting she got was no different than it would have been had she only been gone one week under very different circumstances; warm, loving, carefree. But that was the only thing that had stayed the same; Cherish's Montreal had drastically changed.

Saturdays were no longer morning workouts followed by breakfast with neighbor Etienne and his two girls. Saturdays were now morning workouts and breakfast with fiancée Etienne. Cherish knew that her mother and Etienne flirted and she'd always suspected it of being more than that.

Her suspicions had been confirmed not long after she'd arrived; Renata had not wanted to announce even that they'd been more than friends without Cherish and Ari being there. Though in her absence, it seemed that Renata had become more a part of Etienne's family and neither of his daughters were surprised by the news.

Cherish had visited Len's grave site to tell her of this news; the two of them had been rooting for the union since Etienne had moved into the house next door. It was a little strange to see Renata playing mother to Etienne's girls, but it was a welcome change to things.      

What wasn't such a nice change was Cash's avoidance. The boy had decided to stay away from her while she was visiting to appease the ever jealous Jacqueline. It worried her. She knew how it would work out. She'd seen it happen before to others.

First Cash would avoid her only when Jacqueline was around, and then he'd start avoiding her altogether and their friendship would dissolve into nothingness. Even Jeb was flustered by the new behaviour; Jacqueline was nothing if not bossy, clingy, and just plain stupid most of the time. In other words- not Cash's type of girl.

Why he was letting her keep him away from the best of his friends was beyond most of them. But Cash, very apologetic, had driven her to the station early morning with a promise that he'd come visit her soon. She supposed it would have to do.

After all the Christmas dinners, holiday dances and loud celebrations she found herself homesick for a place she never thought she'd call home. She was sad to kiss Cash goodbye at the station, but she gave him a quick squeeze and eagerly boarded the train.

The long ride home was equally as uncomfortable as the last time, and without Ari, who'd stayed back for some one on one time with their mother, by her side. There was an unspoken rule when traveling by train, Cherish had discovered. Sit beside the one person you will annoy the most, as evident by the smelly man, the snoring old lady and the hoodlum with the excessively loud music blaring from his headphones. How he managed to sleep like that Cherish would never understand. Needless to say, for the second time, Cherish was relieved to see that the train had pulled into the station at Toronto.

But again there was a difference. After struggling her bags up the stairs and out to the bus terminal, there was someone waiting for her. "Hey!" Cherish snapped her head around when someone grabbed the larger of her two bags.

"I can leave them here if you want and you can lug them home on that bus," said the grinning face behind her.

"Sev!" she jumped to hug him. "Tu me manques!" she froze, realising what she'd done and giggled nervously. "Oh sorry, Montreal brain."

Seven cleared his throat as he shouldered her two bags, "Uh, yeah, how was Montreal?"

"Good, what are you doing here?"

"If that's the kind of thanks I get, I think I might let you take the bus," Seven joked turning back to the terminal.

"No, no! Thank you, thank you, oh most awesome Bunny!"

"That's better," he cracked another grin. "You've got to be tired after that trip."

Cherish nodded, "Hmm, sleep sounds good about now."

"You didn't sleep on the way?"

"My seat mates were Mr. Smelly, Mrs. Snores- Alot and Obnoxiously Loud music kid, so no. No I didn't."

Seven chuckled lightly as he tossed her bags into the back of his truck, "Only you, Rish."

"Yeah, yeah."

"Your dad is away for some emergency meeting." he explained his presence, and Cherish knew her father has most likely called Pam.  "Ian said Ari stayed back, so do you wanna crash at ours?"

Cherish nodded casually, he was probably only asking because Ian had told him to.

"You hungry? We can grab something on the way home."

-.-

"Shlpng."

"What?"

"Shleeping!" Cherish growled louder, hoping that whoever was insisting on wiggling their fingers into her side would stop. A soft chuckle followed her growl, and the barely there sound of receding footsteps after that.

She had almost drifted away again when she felt the fingers niggling their way around her flesh again. When she heard the muttered curse and was lifted clean into the air, she let out a surprised yelp and kicked herself to her feet. Leaning against the truck, Seven was laughing so hard he had tears in his eyes.

"What the hell was that?" Cherish screeched.

Seven laughed harder still; he'd forgotten how irrational Cherish was when tired, "I was going to carry you upstairs. Oh My God, that was funny!"

Cherish glowered at him, though she felt her face warming up. "You scared me," she said in a tiny petulant voice.

"Aww, Rish, I'm sorry," Seven chuckled as he took the porch steps two at a time and held the door for her.

Cherish stepped past him timidly; he'd bought all her bags in and they sat in the alcove under the stairs. She frowned at herself as she examined the takeout bag that held their lunch on top of her wheelie bag. Since when was she shy around Seven; she was bitchy, teasing, mightier than thou, but never awkward or shy. She chalked it up to lack of sleep.

"Your stuff's upstairs. Ian made a shelf for you."

Somehow the mention of having a shelf at his place made her feel even more awkward. It was akin to having a drawer or closet space at your boyfriend's house. Then again, this was Ian's place, not Seven's, and besides that, neither of them was her boyfriend. Cherish gave Seven a withering glare as she went upstairs, meant to reprimand him for laughing at her, and slammed the door shut behind her.

She was surprised that he gave her a full five minutes of changing time before he knocked on the door and poked his head in, "You decent?"

"Yeah."

"What?" she barked when he smirked at her sitting on the bed in the pyjamas and the pair of bunny slippers Ian had bought her.

"Nothing. You look so cute, Pumpkin."

"Don't call me cute," she sniped and then smiled despite herself.

"Okay, fine, Ugly. Here's your food."

Cherish grabbed the bag from him and settled back onto his bed to examine what he'd bought her. "Thanks," she muffled through a bite of the A&W burger.

Seven nudged her over a bit and stretched out beside her, "I know you probably want to sleep, but Jo's gonna be home soon, so do you mind if I hang in here? I'll be quiet."

Cherish nodded and squeezed herself closer to the wall to make more space for him. She passed him the second burger as she slurped at her root beer. Eating quickly, she stuffed the wrappers into the empty bag and tossed it halfheartedly across the room.

She settled herself into the pillow and closed her eyes. After some time she was aware of Seven getting off the bed, but he returned shortly muttering an apology when he jostled her. The soft random clicking from his video game controller is what eventually lulled her to sleep.

-.-

In retrospect, falling asleep on the same bed as Seven was not a good idea. At least not in the same house that he shared with Ian and that was most often frequented by Juss. The loud wolf howl was obviously Juss' obnoxious reaction to the sight he was greeted by in the bedroom.

Ian's reaction, however predictable, was confused, excited, and reprimanding at once, "What? Woah! Shuttup Juss, she's sleeping!"

"Guys!" Seven hissed rather menacingly. It was enough to shut them both up, but not enough to save Cherish the embarrassment. Somehow on the small bed, she'd curled herself into Seven's side and thrown an arm up over his stomach. She supposed it might have been hard for Seven to comfortably play his video game while she was cuddling his side and squishing his arm, so it would explain why his arm was around her shoulder. It was the most rational explanation.

Cherish fought hard to keep her face from burning red and giving away the fact that she was awake. Her embarrassment would only make it look like something was going on. At any rate if she kept pretending to be asleep, then she would eventually be asleep again. In theory.

"So, uh, what's going on, Man?" She cursed Juss for his whispered inquiry, he was making it that much harder for her not to have any reaction.

Seven shifted, stopped playing his game and set the controller down softly behind her. "Not much."

Juss' impatient whisper was almost too much to ignore, "I mean, what's with the cuddling?"

Seven sighed, "Seriously, guys, you're worse than girls. We were eating, I was hiding out in here, she fell asleep... Cuddling? Really."

"God, you're so boring, Sev!" Ian let out an exasperated sigh. There was a pause in which Cherish was sure they were checking that she was in fact asleep. If they were checking, she wasn't sure she wanted to hear whatever they were going to talk about. Then again, it might be interesting to know what they talked about when she wasn't around.

"Ian," Seven's voice was a warning, meant to shut him up. It appeared, however, that their assessment of her sleep had been a good one because Ian ignored the warning altogether.

"What? It's not like it's not freaking obvious, Sev. You guys were alone, a-lone. As in, if there was really that big a problem she wouldn't be here. And you two have been just dancing around this freaking obvious elephant for-ever! You could have at least talked to her."

"She was tired," Seven said in a small defeated tone. "It wasn't really something I wanted to bring up."

Cherish fought the tiny smile that was trying to etch itself onto her face, and fought even harder the urge to blush. She wasn't so sure now she wanted to know where the rest of this conversation would be going.

"Seriously? What the hell you waiting for?"

Seven sighed, she could feel him move his arms up, his muscles stretching under her cheek, and she could imagine him brushing back his hair like he did when frustrated. "I don't know... for her..."

And suddenly the conversation was getting way too awkward for her, all fly on the wall as she was. She wouldn't be able to look any of them in the face if she kept listening, least of all Seven. Things were already weird between them, she didn't need to add her eavesdropping into the mix.

Before she could think of a way to fake waking up, Joana sorted out that problem for her. The girl had apparently come marching upstairs to ask her brother something and been faced with seeing Seven and Cherish all cuddled up together. "Ian, Pam wants to kn... What the Hell!?"

The sheer volume of Joana's voice caused Cherish to flinch violently and smack into the wall. She let herself look bewildered for a few seconds before Juss' fit of choking laughter caused her to throw her head back and guffaw somewhat hysterically.

The absurdity of the situation and Joana's awesome timing amused her so entirely that she was crying while she laughed. She was vaguely aware of Joana continuing to yell, ranting about Seven torturing her with his relationship with Cherish, and about how much of a bitch Cherish was. She caught Juss' eye at some point, and despite the fact that she was trying to stop laughing, it only made her laugh harder. Soon she was suffering through big raucous gulps for air and everyone was glancing at her in concern.

"Cherish?"

"Why... does... everyone... always... as... ass... assume... that... we... Ow!"

"You okay?" Seven voiced, a hand on her shoulder, half concerned and half smirking.

"Can't...breathe," she doubled over, stuffing her face into his blanket hoping it would stop her from laughing.

"Would it help if I punched you in the face?" Joana demanded in a spiteful menacing tone.

Cherish peered up at Joana with one eye. Her laughter was suddenly reduced to a tiny giggle and a ridiculous grin, as she felt Seven tense up beside her. "You could try." There was no challenge in the way she said it, only matter of fact smugness at the close proximity of all three boys, and the fact that Joana wouldn't even get as far as pulling her fist back before she'd be stopped.

Cherish twisted in the bed so she was lying on her back and squealed as she stretched, "Good morning guys, we having a party?"

"It's 7:30 at night," Ian laughed.

"Right. Well if you didn't notice, I just woke up, I'm entitled to being disoriented."

"Yeah, you must've been tired, huh? You slept right through our conversation and all," Juss said before Ian smacked him and conspicuously cleared his throat.

Cherish ignored them and stretched again as she tried to stand up on the bed, but lack of balance on sleep heavy legs sent her careening down onto Seven who caught her easily around her waist. She caught the glance that Juss and Ian shared and the less than flattering word just audibly muttered from Joana's mouth.

"What?" Cherish asked the girl. Joana didn't answer but glared in disgust at Seven's hand resting on the sliver of bare skin where Cherish' pajama top had ridden up. "Oh right," Cherish straightened herself and rolled her eyes, "I did that on purpose, Joana."

* Title song by The Stray Cats