A/N: I don't know why I always feel the need to give the characters a depressing backstory, but oh well. I like angst, I guess. Enjoy!

"Myyyyka," Pete whispered. "Myka!"

Myka turned around on the couch where she was reading a book. It had been a slow day, so she was trying to get some reading in. Seeing no one, she turned back to her book, deciding to ignore whatever she had heard.

"Myyyyyka," the voice whispered again.

"What, Pete?" she asked, once again turning around. "Don't you have some toys you can go play with?" She turned back to facee forward in her seat once she realized he would continue to hide from her, only to see him standing right in front of her, as close as possible. "Ahh! Pete, what the hell are you doing?"

"Did I scare you?" he grinned, backing up a bit.

"Just your face. It's quite unsightly." She turned back to her book.

"Haha. Whatcha doing?" he asked, poking at her book.

She swatted his hands away. "Reading. You should try it sometime."

"What book is it?" he continued.

"Pete, what do you want?" she sighed.

"I'm bored."

She ignored him, trying a different tactic. With any luck maybe he would go away. She went back to her reading, stretching out on the couch to ensure that he couldn't get next to her to read over her shoulder.

It took all of two minutes for him to resume his annoying tendencies. He reached over, making sure she was completely engrossed in her book before doing so, and lifted up her shirt a bit so he could see what he thought was a tattoo underneath.

"Eek! Pete, what are you doing?" she jumped.

"Pulling up your shirt," he answered. He smiled inwardly as he noticed she hadn't stopped him or pushed his hands away.

"Uh, why?"

"You have another tattoo. I could sorta see it when your shirt was riding up."

Myka dogeared the page she was on and put the book on the table next to the couch.

"How do you know I have more than one?"

"I saw it. The infinity symbol. When Alice had your body."

"Oh," she frowned. He'd never mentioned it before. It kind of made her wonder what else he had seen.

"Why do you have a triangle on your stomach?" he questioned.

"Seriously? It's not a triangle. It's delta." She moved her shirt a bit so she could see it properly. It was about an inch and a half tall, with the right side decorated with tiny interlocking lines, which looked like decorative vines.

"Delta?"

She looked at him doubtfully. "How did you not flunk out of high school?"

"Like I remember anything we did in high school. What's it mean?"

"In science it means 'change'. It's a capital Greek letter."

"It's still a triangle to me," he argued, just to see how riled she would get.

"It's a letter!" she argued back.

"Okay, one shaped like a triangle."

"Whatever," she gave up. "My god, your hands are freezing." He'd started to absently trace the symbol with his fingertips.

"Sorry. So how long have you had it and why did you get it? Most women just get butterflies and tramp stamps. Oh, you don't have one of those do you? 'Cause that would be se-"

"No, I don't," she interrupted. She had to stop herself from laughing at how disappointed he looked. "And I got it when I was 19."

"Why? Going through a rebel phase?"

"No, 19 was just a bad year. So I got a tattoo."

"What happened that year?" he asked her, growing more and more interested. He knew very little about her life before the Secret Service.

"I was pregnant, for one," she answered. Her voice sounded even, but Pete knew her well enough by now to know that she was nervous.

"You were…huh?" This was quite a surprise for him.

"Pregnant, Pete."

"Yeah, I know, but… you don't have any children. Right?"

"No, I don't," she sighed.

"What happened?" he asked gently. This story couldn't end well.

"I got into a car accident. Lost the baby." She wasn't sure how he could get all of this information out of her. Something about him made her want to trust him, and that scared her.

"I'm sorry," he told her, not knowing what else to say. He put a hand on her leg. "Do you not want to talk about it?"

"Well, there's not really much to say. It was around Thanksgiving, and I was only four months. The father had left and my parents weren't talking to me. They thought I was making a huge mistake. But I guess it wasn't meant to be."

"It was just an accident. It doesn't mean anything."

"I don't know, sometimes I wonder. I wouldn't have gotten to do a lot of things if I'd had her. I'd been thinking about having an abortion for a couple of weeks. I was just really thankful that the choice was taken from me, as horrible as that sounds."

"It doesn't sound horrible, just human. You were really young."

"Too young. But now I'm not and I don't have any children."

"You're still plenty young enough, Myka," he smiled, amused. She was nowhere near too old, no matter what she thought.

"I'm 29," she frowned.

"Exactly. You're not even thirty yet. I, on the other hand, am 34."

"Doesn't that worry you? You don't have any kids either," she commented.

"No, not really. I figure it'll happen when it's meant to happen. And now we have a new adventure here at the warehouse."

"Yeah, I guess," she agreed.

"So why delta?"

"It was rough at first, but after a couple of months I finally decided I needed to get my life back, and delta's the symbol for change," Myka explained. "I don't know, I thought it would help me." She embarrassedly realized that she was fighting back tears, and Pete noticed not long after.

He reached over, and pulled her into a hug, taking a seat next to her on the edge of the couch. "Did it help?"

"Yeah, it did," she whispered, burying her face into his neck. She didn't want to feel this dependent on him, but he was one of the few things that made living in South Dakota worth it.

They stayed like that for a few minutes, until they heard another voice. "Hey guys, we have another- am I interrupting something?" Artie came into the room, seeing them hugging.

"Yes," Myka whispered to herself, before she realized that Pete was close enough to hear her. Embarrassed, she pulled back from him and sniffled. "No," she told Artie, more loudly this time.

"Good, because we may have an artifact that needs finding." He eyed them for a moment, wondering what was going on, but kept his curiosity to himself. He had been curious for a while about just how close their relationship had become, and the scene before him had done nothing to alleviate his suspicions. But he told himself it was none of his business. "Come on, come on! We have a case."

With that he turned around and left the room, once again leaving Pete and Myka to themselves. Pete got off the couch first since he was blocking her way.

"Come on. He may get grouchy."

Myka laughed and followed. "Wouldn't want that." She was only mildly surprised when he snaked an arm around her and pulled her shirt down.

"Your delta was showing," he grinned.

"Only you could make that sound dirty."

"It's a gift."