Red had been gone for three months and Liz felt herself going more and more insane as the days passed. He had told her he would only be gone for a short while. Who considers three months a "short while"? A month, maybe, but not three.

She hated that she missed him so much. She didn't want to miss him, but with her marriage starting to implode after his words of warning, she missed going to where ever he had been staying at that particular time, and just sitting in his company. Even if they didn't talk, she felt calmed by his presence. She hated that she was so emotionally dependent on him as well. Everything was just so messed up, and she didn't know how to fix any of it.

It was only seven more days until Christmas, but she didn't even feel like celebrating this year. What was there to celebrate? She had no one to buy presents for, not even her Dad, and she probably wouldn't get Tom anything since they hadn't talked beyond the basic niceties for weeks. She found herself hoping he would just give up on her and move to Nebraska, and she didn't even feel guilty for thinking that. She wasn't in love with him anymore, but didn't have the courage to do anything about it. She convinced herself that when Red eventually came back she would finally "buck-up" and file for divorce, but that was mostly wishful thinking.

OOOOOOOOOOOOOO

Liz stepped outside and took a deep breath. She felt like it was going to be a better day today, she didn't know why, but she just did. It was the morning of the eighteenth and the temperature was hovering around zero. Snow had fallen the night before and she could see the snowplows had just been down her road. She walked down the steps of her brownstone and saw that her car was buried with snow and groaned. Not again. "Shit." There went the optimism she had felt only moments ago. She was already running late and now was going to be even later. Cooper had warned her that if she didn't get herself together soon and stop showing up late he was going to put her on leave and send her to an FBI psychiatrist. That was the last thing she needed, but she very well couldn't tell him that Red returning would be the answer to her problems.

Liz hurried down the steps and attempted to move the snow from around her car as much as possible. She was soaking wet and freezing by the time she finished and was cursing whatever higher power she could think of while stepping into her still semi-buried car. She turned on the heaters full blast and decided to wait for it to warm up before attempting to drive. Glancing to her right, she noticed something sitting on the passenger seat that she swore hadn't been there the night before.

She reached over and picked up the rectangular box wrapped in red wrapping paper. Liz turned it over in her hands, but there was no tag to indicate who it was from. Shrugging, she slowly unwrapped the box, having a hard time doing so because her fingers were still frozen. She finally got the paper off and saw that the box said Neiman Marcus on the top.

Bewildered, she lifted the lid, and inside were a pair of black leather gloves. They looked really expensive and she wondered who the hell would care enough to spend that kind of money on her.

She took the gloves out and saw a note taped to the bottom of the box. She set the gloves down, picked up the note and unfolded it.

She immediately recognized the handwriting and felt like she had been punched in the gut. Sucking in a deep breath, she attempted to see what was written through the tears in her eyes. The words were written in red ink, and the familiar scrawl was like a boon to her entire emotional state. She read the note out-loud, so she could physically hear the words that were written to her from him. "To replace the gloves you lost so many months ago when you were chasing me down. I know you'll need them this morning."

There was nothing else written on the paper and she let the tears roll down her face unchecked. She missed him, and as sweet as it was that he gave her the gloves, it would have been better if it had been him that had come back.

He obviously wasn't ready to though, and Liz realistically couldn't hate him for that. He was protecting himself and her by proxy.

She picked the gloves up and ran her fingers over the smooth leather. They were really well made, and it caused Liz to smile at the thought of Red picking out womens gloves at a department store. She actually had a hard time picturing it, but she still felt a lot better than she had ten minutes ago. All because of him.

She slipped the gloves on. They fit her hands perfectly, not that she was surprised. She lifted her gloved hands up and put them on her face, breathing in the scent of the new leather. She liked to think that she could smell Red's familiar aftershave on them too, but was probably imagining it.

Finally getting her emotions under control, she pulled her car out into traffic, not even cursing the person in front of her who cut her off.

It was beginning to be a good day and she wasn't going to let anyone ruin it for her.

Author's note: This is part 1 of 7 for The Blacklist Secret Santa for adaughterofzion. Hopefully you guys liked it. Let me know what you think! Thanks for reading. :)