Once upon a time there was a human woman. She was like you and me, she had her life ahead with dreams of her own. She was a bright Detective, but there was one truth she couldn't accept.

"Did it hurt?"

Chloe blinks and looks up when she realizes that someone is talking to her. It was a man, thirty something, dyed-blond and with a smile that had little to do with happiness and more with the high amounts of alcohol he probably had already consumed.

"When you fell from heaven." He finishes once he gets her attention.

The woman smiles for a very different reason than what the man is probably thinking. She thinks that the way he is smiling and waiting for her response is almost cute. If she wasn't a woman on a mission tonight she would have granted him a few minutes of her time and see where this conversation would go.

Instead, she gulps down the rest of her drink. "Not interested, thanks."

The man frowns. "Why?"

Across the room, Chloe notices certain someone walking down the steps towards the grand piano in the center of the club. She smiles fondly and wonders what is he exactly going to play tonight. She blinks back to the man in front of her and remembers he exists.

"Because, tonight, I'm quite busy. You see, I have to finish checking the books of this place and catch up with my human friends before going back to Hell with my husband."

The man blinks slowly, wondering if such a beautiful woman was tripping with something strong . Opting for not getting involved with someone so crazy, he shrugs and walks away towards the next woman in the bar, trying again with another lame pick-up line.

Chloe looks down at her empty glass before looking up at the cute bartender serving drinks to tonight's Lux's patrons. For a moment she imagine Maze there in one of her skin-tight leather outfits pouring rich whiskey into someone's empty glass. She knows that Maze won't be there, but she misses her nonetheless. For her it has been a while since they saw each other.

"My gift is my song, and this one's for you…"

She turns when the lights diminish to focus on the solitary silhouette seating at the grand piano, eyes closed, humming along the notes dancing in the air.

"And you can tell everybody, this is your song."

His eyes are still closed, but she feels like he is singing in her ear those beautiful words. Of course she knows them. They've had what feels already like a lifetime together even if by what she gathered yesterday it has been only a few months. So many songs he had played for her, so many quiet moments enjoying the other's presence, basking in the simplicity of it all.

"It may be quite simple but, now that it's done. I hope you don't mind…"

She sang with him in her mind, smiling once he opened his eyes and looks straight at her. Of course he knows where she is. Always.

"... I hope you don't mind that I put down in words how wonderful life is now you're in the world."

She remembers words like those, a long time ago. A conversation in hushed whispers as if the world was going to end, his tear-stained cheeks as he confessed how he didn't want to live in a world without her, how he didn't want eternity if it meant losing her. A confession about wanting to be human by her side.

It all started when, paradoxically, her world ended. At least how she knew it. You see, she had always been an atheist because it was absurd to believe in a God that punished their children and expected to be worshipped. It just didn't make sense -

Until she found out that her own partner and best friend, and maybe-not-quite-something-else was the actual real Devil. Yep, the one from the Bible. The Adversary, the Beast, yadda yadda. Looking back to the Chloe of the past, she was an idiot for letting it get so much into her head. But she had to give her some slack. Up until then she was a mere mortal, an ignorant human living her everyday life thinking that there wasn't much else out there.

How wrong she was!

And how much wrong she did, indeed.

It was a dark chapter in her memory. She wasn't exactly in a very good place and made decisions she regretted deeply. She refused to acknowledge Lucifer for a long while, expecting that everything would disappear if she closed her eyes hard enough. She went back to work acting as if nothing out of the ordinary happened - as if her former partner and resident Devil hadn't killed Cain before her eyes. Cain. The man she almost married.

She guesses that it was her brain shutting down after so many fucked up stuff filling it. It simply couldn't be happening. It didn't matter that Dan and Ella were obsessed with asking her if she was okay, or that the new lieutenant gave her one week free while they investigated Marcus Pierce's death (in the end everything went a bit under the rug, not that she was surprised). She came back to work and did what she did best: detect. Solve murders. Put the bad guys where they belonged. Defend the innocent.

Punish evil.

No. That wasn't her job. She had to remind herself every time the urge to do more assaulted her, when the absent murderous actions of her ex-partner hit her with its emptiness. The first week she worked alone, she almost missed Lucifer. Things were much easier and fun with him. A tiny voice in her head filled interviews and silences with witty banter and inappropriate commentary in his voice. But he wasn't there and she didn't want him back. Did she?

It wasn't until Maze - Mazikeen of the Lilim, her former roommate and actual demon from Hell - stumbled through her door, breathing hard and gripping the door frame with white knuckles.

"He's gone." Was what she said.

Her first urge was to demand her to leave her home and leave her daughter and her alone, but something in her crazed expression stopped her. And the red-rimmed eyes glaring at her.

"... " the demon frowned, but didn't make a move towards her. Maze looked down at the knife in Chloe's hand and then at the half-finished dinner on the counter. Her eyes narrowed. "I thought you should know," something instinctual told Chloe that it wasn't what the other wanted to say. "Lucifer won't bother you lot again. I hope you are happy."

And with that, she left to maybe never come back.

Gone.

Lucifer had left Earth and gone back to where he belonged. Chloe took a deep breath and let the air out in something that sounded like a sob. She should be happy. She didn't have to wonder when he was going to cross paths with her again and didn't have to look over her shoulder expecting his dark form to be following her wherever she goes. She had the chance to move on and leave all this celestial bullshit behind.

Her legs gave out on her and the woman crumbled to her kitchen floor, the knife making a clattering sound when it clashed on the tiles. She was safe, she was free, she was -

"Mommy?"

Chloe looked up at her daughter, who was looking down at her with worry.

"Why are you crying? Are you sad? What happened? Was that Maze?"

She blinked at the flurry of questions, not knowing what to say. She looked down at her hands to find them wet with salty tears and when she tried to speak her throat seemed to be against it.

"I'm fine," neither believed the lie. "And yes, that was Maze. Lucifer... He - he's gone away."

Trixie blinked a few times, digesting the news. "Away? Will he come back?" she frowned when her mother shook her head. "That's why you are sad?"

"No, I…" she hesitated before speaking next. What was she going to say? That she was happy he was gone would be a lie.

And Lucifer hates liars. Lucifer never lies.

The thought made her go down another rabbit hole - her mind swirling with all the times he told her exactly the truth and nothing but the truth. That he was the Devil and that he liked working with her. She, a nobody. How could she digest being partners with the actual Devil?

"You miss him?" Trixie sat down besides her, mindful of the abandoned knife.

"I do." It wasn't a lie.

Her daughter patted her leg, making her look up. "Then why have you been avoiding him?"

Chloe blinked. "I did not -," she started, but the girl's glare made her shut up. "Okay, maybe I was avoiding him."

"Did you have an argument? Like Daddy and you?"

She scoffed. "No."

The girl leaned in like she was going to tell her a secret. "You remember that time when I fought with Mandy? You had to come to school and everything," they laughed together at the memory of sweet Beatrice all battered and screaming at the other girl. "She had been avoiding me for months! Like, really?" she rolled her eyes at the memory, "In the end I had to confront her to see what was the problem and, well, that happened."

"But you guys made up," Chloe tilts her head trying to see the connection.

"Yes. She's my best friend," Trixie nods eagerly. "That's my point! Lucifer is your best friend, Mommy. I have eyes and I know how he makes you feel. Avoiding me almost cost Mandy our friendship," she looked down at her socked feet. "After what happened with Marcus," she gulped, "I think you need a friend. Like him."

Marcus. Cain.

Chloe jumped in her place, taking a big breath. She almost married that man, but she broke it up! Lucifer, he… He was always there. He was part of her life and she pushed him away to the point of making him go back to Hell.

That wretched place! She could almost hear his voice. How many times had he talked about Hell and she had brushed it like another silly comment from his delusion? Everything he talked about was true and she had chosen to ignore it.

She has been a coward.

Regret consumed her next, and Chloe felt the tears start to gather in her eyes. Why was she so scared of anyways? That he would eat her soul? That he would try to hurt Trixie? If he wanted to do that he had two years with plenty of opportunities to try.

Was she afraid of dying? Of going to Hell? Now that it was proven to her that there was something after death, did she think that she was damned? Chloe had killed people, lied to people and had plenty of jealousy and envy moments through her life. This was why she was an atheist - she believed that we only had one life and had to make the best out of it with our own decisions.

It seemed that it wasn't the case anymore. And she had started her life as a believer with the wrong foot.

"You know what, monkey? You are right." She managed to get out of her chest. Trixie smiled up at her before pulling her mother for a tight hug. She had to get her friend back.