I own nothing. If I did, then Shelby would have NEVER happened!

///

She began to smile again. Really smile.

It started when he bought her a new vacuum cleaner. It was pink, custom made, and ultra powerful. She lit up like a little girl with a new doll. She vacuumed every room in the house as well as all of the furniture. She was on cloud nine.

Then, it was just the little things. Making her dinner, steaming her clothes, singing her to sleep. He was always thinking of her. He made sure nothing upset her.

"Only a month and a half." He said as they ate his homemade Caesar salad in front of the TV. "Figgins will make sure your office is cleaned properly before you get there."

Emma shook her head as she chewed on the wad of lettuce she had just shoved in her mouth. "Oh, can I clean it?" She requested, eyes wide. "No one ever cleans the windows right."

Will smiled and nodded. "Of course! We can go over there with some of the new organic stuff we bought."

She agreed and continued to nibble on the large croutons in her bowl.

///

He hated the therapy more than she did. She was asked questions that she should never have had to answer. Why had he wanted her to get help so badly? She was fine three months ago. She was happy and content. Now she had more stress than ever, and with each session it grew.

"Emma, you drove quite a distance." Everest pointed out, studying his notes. "Did you have a destination in mind when you left?"

This being the fourth session, Will had learned to keep his mouth shut, and let Emma answer. This was one of the few questions though, that he had asked himself when he found her in the mountains. Emma shook her head and shrugged. "I just drove." She whispered. "I don't remember what I was thinking."

"You drove your car into a river."

"I did."

"Why did you do that Emma?"

"I was lost."

///

"A hammock Will?" She crossed her arms skeptically as she watched him from the back porch. "This is supposed to help me relax?"

He smiled and fell back onto the white netted hammock strung between two trees in their quaint back yard. "I'm about to fall asleep already." He held out an arm to her. "Join me milady!"

She sighed and walked over to lie next to him. He pulled her into his arms and nuzzled his face into her hair. "Say goodbye to high blood pressure." He murmured.

Emma giggled and shook her head.

///

"Are you angry at Will?"

"No I'm not." She sat up and glared at the doctor. Will seemed to tense up beside her. She grasped his hand tightly and clenched her jaw.

"You don't run away from someone for no reason Emma." Everest wrote on his notepad absentmindedly. "You must have been afraid."

"Fear and anger are different things." Emma pointed out. She bit her lip and stared at her unpainted nails, dry and chipped. Maybe Will would take her to the salon when they were done.

"So you were afraid of him?"

If there was one thing that she hated about psychology, it was that the doctors always made a habit of talking in circles.

"I was not afraid of Will." She said slowly, between her teeth. "I was afraid of…what I had done…"

"You mean the baby?" Both pairs of eyes shot up at the doctor. He knew immediately that he had struck a nerve.

"I…the baby was just the tip of the iceberg." She whispered. "I was making Will...he used to be so carefree…happy…then he met me. The woman who made him wash between his toes every time he took his shoes off."

"Emma! I told you that helped relieve a lot of itch!" Will reassured her. "If I was unhappy, I would have told you."

"Yes, and you did." She looked slowly into his eyes.

Silence and truth hung concurrently in the air.

Dr. Everest cleared his throat. "What he said is still fresh in your mind." He observed, much to both of their annoyance. "It made you run away. It made you scared."

"I thought he wanted…needed…someone better…someone sane."

"And now?"

"Now she knows what I need. And I believe that it's quite obvious that it's her." Will said matter-of-factly. He pulled her closer to him.

"You have accepted this Emma? That Will needs you?"

She nodded and continued to contemplate whether or not she should go with a nice coral nail polish, or more of a rosy shade.

"I need him." She whispered. "I love him…very much." She gave the doctor a tight-lipped smile. Her large eyes glowered as though she had just shared something personal. And she did.

"You're a strong woman Emma. That will prove quite useful in your recovery." Everest said gently. "Okay! I'll see you next week."

Emma choked up on the way out to the car. It was the first time she had ever been told that she was strong.

///

It was raining. He was in a hurry to get them to the school before the poorly constructed parking lot took on the swimming pools that were puddles. He had run to the store while she showered to get some last minute cleaning supplies. When he arrived back at the condo to pick her up, she was already waiting for him—with a large daisy umbrella as her shelter in the torrential downpour.

"I stood next to a puddle for twenty seconds!" She boasted, greeting him with a kiss. "I even touched the edge with my boot."

"I'm impressed!" Will beamed. She was slowly becoming his old Emma. She was joking, she was laughing, she was even singing.

He drove cautiously on the bumpy Lima roads. With the wipers going at full force, he still couldn't see a foot ahead of them. He kept glancing over to make sure Emma had buckled her seatbelt.

It was when a large semi-truck sped by them, splashing the windshield with a tidal wave of water, that it happened.

She screamed a scream so loud, so piercing, that Will swerved off of the road into a small ditch. This caused her screams to intensify. They hadn't crashed, per say. The airbags didn't even deploy. But the way she shot her hands out in front of her, you would think that they did.

"Emma!" He called to her. Unbuckling her and pulling her into his embrace, he grabbed her chin in his hand. "Emma! What's going on?"

"No! The water! No! No! No!" She shrieked. She grabbed his collar and cried out as the memories flooded her fragile mind.

Swerving. Skidding. Then letting go of the breaks and letting fate have its way.

She cried out as soon as her small car hit the river, head on. Icy water immediately began to seep in through the cracks in the doors and front windshield.

She didn't unbuckle her seatbelt. She wanted to suffer.

She began to sink. She cried harder.

If it weren't for the people who saw her go in, she would have just let the rapids take her into its white, foamy embrace.

She opened her tear-filled eyes and stared at Will. "I'm sorry." She whimpered. "I just…I needed to vent."

Will laughed and tried to hide the terror in his eyes. "Honey, that was not venting, that was hysteria!" He teased hugging her closer, before sitting her up. "Drink your water. There's some of your anti-anxiety medication in the glove box." He rubbed the back of her neck as she buckled up.

He wasn't going to ask what had been growing through her mind. She would tell him when she was ready. He just wanted her to be happy and secure again. Then would he get all of the answers he needed—and give her some in return.