A/N: Not too much longer to go, and hopefully this helps tide everyone over. Given a certain promo photo and a description of this season as 'complicated,' I'm not sure what to expect – but as you all probably know by now, it's nearly impossible for me to keep these two apart when I have the choice.

The title (really, the inspiration for the entire story) comes from the exquisite "Space They Cannot Touch" by Kate Miller-Heidke. I was thinking about how they (particularly Andy) would handle starting over without any of the resentments or issues that plagued them before – which is really what they'll have to do if they're going to do anything, isn't it? – and this line kept jumping out at me.

This story contains several time jumps. I did my best to provide clear distinctions, but please let me know if it's difficult to follow.

Finally, I welcome any thoughts regarding plot, language, or characterization as depicted within this particular story. Character bashing, which includes but is certainly not limited to selecting a character's comment/action from within the story and using it as an example of why you dislike the character in general, will not be tolerated. As a matter of fact, if you possess an overall dislike for Andy McNally and/or Sam Swarek, your time would be best served reading a different story altogether. Thank you.

Disclaimer: I own neither Rookie Blue nor "Space They Cannot Touch."

She wonders if she can just remain on her best behavior permanently.

It's not impossible, right? If that's what it takes, that's what it takes. And anyway, this part usually comes at the beginning – all of the restraint, the judicious word selection, the consistent leg-shaving. It's pretty typical of the two of them to have screwed up the order and laid it all out there in the beginning, hurtling into the monotony and squabbles of an old married couple without the experience and understanding of one another to back it up.

Maybe that was the problem the first time around, she muses.

(Among others.)

She's quick to dismiss thoughts that it doesn't matter now; that he's been out of the hospital for over a month and his wound is all but healed, the scar rapidly fading into selective amnesia.

("It's really not that bad," Sam was saying just a few hours ago, his fingers tracing a path over the pale creases that now traverse his abdomen.

"Other than the fact that it nearly killed you." Andy fought to keep her tone casual.

Sam shrugged. "Except it didn't. So like I said: not that bad.")

He's been to a counselor – two, actually, since all the first one did was insist that he try hypnosis. She believes wholeheartedly that he's made his peace with the shooting and all that's followed.

But she hasn't. And until she figures out how to do so, she can't relax completely around him. Not even when he's sleeping peacefully beside her, a sliver of moonlight falling across his shoulder from beyond the edge of the curtain.

She feels herself tense involuntarily and forces a slow, quiet breath.

The second time his heart stops, they pull the curtain and kick her out of the room.

"We need you to step outside and let us work," a petite nurse tells her as she guides Andy outside the swinging doors of the trauma bay, her grip on Andy's bicep unexpectedly strong. It happens so fast that by the time Andy thinks to protest, she's in the hallway, the nurse preparing to head back inside.

"Wait!" she sputters, taking a halfhearted step forward. "I can stay in the corner, I promise I won't say anything…"

The nurse shakes her head. Mary F. is printed in big letters on her badge beside a smiling photo. "I'll come get you as soon as there's news." She turns to leave again.

"But…" The modicum of logic that's still somehow operational within Andy's mind at this point is telling her (rather smugly, it seems) that it's best to listen; that regardless of whether or not she sees what's happening, Sam's fate is entirely out of her hands and in theirs.

Of course, when it comes to Sam, logic has always been easily overridden.

"Can you at least come tell me how he's doing every few minutes?"

Mary turns on her heel, looks at Andy with a raised brow.

"Fifteen?" Andy amends, realizing even in her desperation that she's asked for too much. "Maybe twenty?"

"Look." Mary takes a couple of steps back toward her, zero nonsense in her gaze. "I understand you're worried, so I'm gonna give you the same speech I always give. Every time someone has to come out here and tell you that we're still working on it and nothing has changed, you're taking that person away from him for your own peace of mind. I could be in there right now, but you and I are having this conversation instead, and it's not helping anybody. I'll let you know when there's something to tell."

And then Andy's alone again in the hallway. She steps toward the waiting room, but before she enters, she sees Nick still sitting beside the doors, turning his vest over and over in his hands. She lets her head fall back against the wall; slides down until she reaches the floor.

Not every story has a happy ending.

He sleeps like a rock, she marvels as she watches him, not entirely without envy. She imagines physio is exhausting enough to begin with. Three hours a day, six days a week – the mere thought of it would knock her out, if her mind would stop racing long enough to allow it. But when she picked him up two days ago at his request, the head physiotherapist greeted her cheerfully. "You're here to get the overachiever, huh?"

Apparently, he's been setting personal goals to do twice as many reps as recommended. They're careful not to let him overdo it to the point of a setback, but they're impressed with his motivation. "He's recovering a lot faster than we'd expect," Jessica told her, motioning with her chin across the room. Sam was reclining on an exercise ball, breathing heavily as he slowly twisted his torso from side to side, arms extended forward and an alarmingly sizeable dumbbell in his hands. "The balance that that takes alone…"

Eventually, he put the weight on the floor beside him and wiped the perspiration from his brow with a nearby towel. When he looked toward the reception area, he caught her eye and grinned, tapping the assistant who'd been working with him. She's never been particularly good at reading lips and so missed the majority of what Sam said, but there was no mistaking the word mine.

She smiled back and waited for him to motion her over; she still hasn't stopped feeling the thrilled trepidation that comes when you finally have exactly what you want, only to realize just how great a responsibility it imposes.

She's vaguely aware of time passing, her eyes affixed to the wall (there's a chip in the pastel-blue paint that looks like a howling dog from one angle and Australia from another), until eventually she feels a relentless hand shaking her shoulder. She looks up to see Traci – the rippled pattern imprinted along the side of her face is suspiciously similar to that of Steve's leather jacket – and recognizes that her best friend's lips are moving, but her words are drowned out by the incessant ocean-roar in Andy's ears. She numbly finds her feet and follows Traci to an elevator and another waiting room; later, long after she's become aware that mid-morning sun is warming her feet, she trails down the hall after a nurse to yet another. Made it through surgery, she hears. Still touch and go resonates a little louder.

As the sun is fading, Frank, now in street clothes, taps her shoulder and urges her to go home and rest. "Just for a little while, McNally," he implores. "I'll call you if anything changes."

It's a twenty-minute walk back to the condo, during which she's on something akin to autopilot. She intends to simply shower and change before heading back, but winds up passing out fully clothed on the chaise for close to two hours. The horn of a passing car wakes her with a start, disoriented by nightfall and residual sleepiness, and she blindly moves toward the bathroom, nearly forgetting to strip off her uniform before climbing beneath the steaming spray.

Ten minutes later, she's in yoga pants and an Academy sweatshirt, debating whether to call her dad to borrow his car when someone knocks on the door. She opens it without checking the peephole first – at least some facet of her weary mind remembered to slide the chain into place – and nearly steps back with surprise when she finds Nick standing there.

"Hi," she says, hand nervously adjusting her damp bun. "Um, I was about to head back to the hospital, actually, so…"

"I was hoping we could talk," Nick proffers.

"Nick, look…"

"I can give you a ride there if you want. Just let me come in for a minute?"

She doesn't especially love this scenario – is it a poorly thought out bribe, or does he think he's somehow going to woo her to the point that she'll forget about Sam entirely? Hasn't happened yet – but she's too tired to come up with a succinct argument against it, so she rolls her eyes, shuts the door enough to remove the chain, and opens it fully.

Nick stands in the foyer, his expression uncomfortable yet resolute. "I know what happened yesterday shook you up."

"It's not that – " Andy attempts to cut him off, nip this entire thing in the bud before it expands beyond what she can handle.

"Andy, please." He holds a hand up. "I know he's an important person in your life, and I'm sure it must be really hard to have all of this going on right now, but I think I have a right to know what's going on with us."

"What's going on with…" She rubs the back of her neck. "Nick, I'm really sorry, but this meant more to you than it did to me. I do care about you and I thought maybe my feelings could catch up, but my heart's just not in it."

He looks incredulous. "He moved on, Andy. You're holding out for someone who doesn't really care. It means more to you than it does to him."

"That's not true," she says calmly. "The only people who really understand what happened or what we feel for each other are Sam and I. Yeah, we've both made mistakes. Big, big mistakes, and I know it looks like a lost cause to you, but…"

"I haven't made mistakes. I actually think we've been doing pretty well," Nick counters. "If we're comparing track records here…"

She squeezes her eyes shut for a moment. "Okay. Instead of comparing, let's talk about how I'm telling you that I was never really yours and you're not listening. I'm telling you I want to go back to the hospital to see Sam and you're standing in my way. Even if he weren't in the picture at all, I'm telling you exactly what I want and what I need and you're ignoring it. There's your mistake. We're done." She pushes past him to the front door and into the hallway, waiting impatiently for him to exit after her. She locks the door and starts toward the stairs.

"Andy, you have to know I won't hurt you, all right?" he calls after her in a last-ditch effort. "I'm not Swarek."

She pauses briefly without turning around.

"No. No, you're not."

"At least let me give you a ride," he calls after her.

This time, she doesn't stop. "I'll walk."

It's an interesting sensation, that of constantly pulling at her own reins. She supposes it's understandable to have a touch of insomnia – it's her first night back over here in over a year, everything familiar yet foreign – but her uneasiness has little if anything to do with that. Making it clear that she's here for whatever he needs, but letting him make the first moves so she doesn't drive him crazy or pressure him – it's a surprisingly tough balance to strike. She's done her best to project nonchalance and caring simultaneously, and damned if it's not harder than it looks.

(Maybe other people can do it effortlessly, but she and Sam have never been other people.)

Their previous crashes and burns are leaving her acutely aware of the stakes here. There's no more fake-it-till-you-make-it; no more fresh starts waiting in the wings. She stares at the ceiling and finds herself reminiscing about middle school, when she and her friends used to spend winter weekday afternoons (and whatever disposable income she could scrape together) playing Ms. Pac-Man at Funland Arcade. Regardless of how well she played in general – and she was notoriously competitive – she always became even more fastidious once she had slipped her final quarter into the machine. It was her last chance; she had to make it count.

It's not enough to vow, to herself or to Sam, that things will be different this time. Promises fall flat in spite of best efforts; she's learned that much. So she's taking action instead.

She's playing like she means it.

Frank is exiting the double doors leading to the ICU as she arrives in the waiting room. "He's doing okay," her staff sergeant tells her. "Sedated for now."

She swallows hard. "I can see him?"

He nods. "Room 350."

She passes through the doors and walks gingerly down the hall until she locates the correct room. Despite steeling herself before entering, the sight of him is still a sucker punch, nearly strong enough to knock her to the ground.

She's done this before, but with Luke, there was a lot less stuff going on. Sam's got the breathing tube (which she expected from earlier, but it's still horrible-looking), IVs up and down both arms and a giant one beneath his collarbone, endless colored wires snaking from underneath his gown, and several other devices she couldn't in her wildest dreams begin to distinguish.

"Ah, you're back."

Startled, Andy looks up to see Mary F., looking somewhat less terrifying than she had the night before.

"Don't you work in emergency?" she blurts out.

Mary shrugs. "I picked up some overtime down there. This is where I usually live." She studies the myriad IV pumps before pressing a few buttons. "He's doing better than anyone would expect after losing that much blood, you know. Kidneys are working well, vitals are solid. And he's already breathing on his own."

Andy's dumbfounded. "But he's got the tube in, and…"

She points to some fluctuating numbers on a behemoth machine. "See that? It means the ventilator is giving him a little support, but he's doing all the work himself. It'll kick in with backup if he needs it, but he's been going strong for…" She checks the clock. "Four hours now. That's a pretty good sign."

Andy nods, resisting the urge to request a detailed explanation of every single item in the room. Her gaze drifts back to Sam, and she stiffens as she notices something she initially missed.

"Why are his hands tied down?" she inquires, touching the soft fabric cuff wrapped around his right wrist and secured with a long strap to the base of the bed.

Mary smiles a bit. "You'll see in a few minutes. I just turned off his sedation." She exits the room.

Andy sighs, settling into an adjacent plastic chair. "I'm not sure if you can hear me yet, or... anyway, hi. I guess this is probably your worst nightmare, huh? I can talk as much as I want and you have no means of getting me to shut up." She forces a chuckle. "Um… I'll get to the point. I love you." She'll tell him over and over until she's blue in the face – or not at all, if that's what he wants. "And I'm sorry for, well, a lot of things, but I have a feeling you don't want to listen to me rehash all the gory details, so suffice to say I'm sorry for all the wasted time, and… and I don't want to waste any more time. So."

She notices some numbers beginning to flash on the monitor. The big green one at the top, the one that's been in the 70s since she walked in – his heart rate? – is climbing. The monitor starts to chime; as Sam's heart rate accelerates, the chimes turn to ear-piercing clangs. Suddenly, he's tossing his head restlessly from side to side, his hands straining with white knuckles against his restraints and both feet forcefully kicking outward.

She's on her feet. "Sam, hey. Come on, relax, okay?" She looks around for a button to call Mary, but just then the nurse comes back into the room.

"Saw him getting ticked off on the monitor outside," Mary says to Andy before turning her attention back to the patient. "Sam! Open your eyes! Look over here!"

Andy almost has to sit back down when he complies. Mary asks him where he is, what year it is; despite the hindrance of the breathing tube, he very clearly mouths 'hospital' and '2014.'

Mary then points to Andy and asks, "And who's this?"

Sam actually smiles. 'McNally.'

Her breath audibly catches in her throat.

'Stop crying,' he mouths at her, his eyes warm and teasing.

(Only he could manage to flirt while intubated.)

"I'm not crying," she says, much more shakily than she'd prefer. "I just have something in both my eyes."

"Okay, Sam," Mary tells him. "You're doing great, and we can probably get that tube out in the morning."

'No.' He shakes his head. 'Now. Right now.'

"Look, we need to give you more time to make sure you'll breathe well without it. We don't want to have to put it back in."

'Right. Now.' He's clearly not backing down, and after glancing between him and the pumps holding his sedatives, Mary exhales. "I'll grab the resident and see what she thinks."

A younger woman in a labcoat follows Mary back in a few minutes later, does a similar exam, and presses some buttons on the ventilator. "I say we do it. He looks good, let's see if he can fly."

Andy can't see too much from her vantage point in the room as it's happening, but after a plethora of revolting noises, Sam is wearing a simple oxygen mask and a tired but triumphant grin.

"How you doing, McNally?" His voice is hoarse, and somewhat faint beneath the mask, but she couldn't care less.

"I'm… I'm great. How are you?"

He shrugs. "Can't complain." He pats the bed beside him with a newly freed hand.

"No," she protests. "I don't want to end up pulling out something important."

"Come on," he implores. When she continues to refuse, his face softens. "I heard everything you said. And I agree."

"With what?"

"With all of it. So quit wasting time and get over here."

She laughs despite herself and perches delicately on the edge of the mattress after double-checking to ensure nothing essential to his medical care is present.

"So." He looks pensive. "You, uh, take care of whatever you needed to?"

"Take care of…" She realizes to what – or to whom – he's referring. "Yeah. I did."

"Good. Then everything's taken care of." He nods as decisively as the mask will allow him. "So we're clear, uh… would you have taken care of things if this hadn't happened?"

She takes a slow breath. "Maybe not the way I did. But eventually, yes. I would have. It was always going to be you, Sam."

He raises his eyebrows. "Okay. Good." After a moment, he adds, "Back at you."

She smiles, her heart surging as his fingers tentatively wrap around hers. Neither of them notices Mary walk into the room.

"So keep it up, and you should be out of the ICU in a few days at most," she says conversationally, causing them both to jump. She finishes emptying one of Sam's unidentifiable drains and straightens back up. "Just so you know, most of the regular rooms are shared. So don't get too used to canoodling."

Andy, unable to hold back, asks, "You don't pick up overtime there too, do you?"

"You never can be sure," Mary smirks.

Andy tightens her grip on Sam's hand. "I think there are some things you can be sure about."

She's almost afraid to look at the clock at this point, afraid it'll just confirm that any attempts to sleep now will be futile. The sky isn't quite beginning to brighten just yet, but the moon seems to be slipping out of sight, which means the morning can't be far behind.

Beside her, Sam stirs; Andy freezes, as if remaining perfectly motionless will ensure him an optimal night's rest. But he sits up in bed with a yawn, glancing over at her. "Hey," he says, a note of surprise in his voice. "What are you doing awake?"

"I didn't wake you, did I?" she responds, hoping to redirect the question. "Go back to sleep, there's still time."

He shakes his head. "It's probably right about time for early-morning vital signs. Been a month, and I still can't sleep past it." He does recline back against his pillow.

Andy closes her eyes to feign sleep, hoping he'll follow suit. Instead, he asks, "Where are you?"

She chuckles. "It's not that dark in here, is it?"

"No, McNally," he says, turning to face her, eyes bright in the shadows. "Where are you? Where have you been the last seven weeks?"

Oh. She sighs. "I'm just… trying to let you set the pace here."

"Why?"

"Because I don't want to screw things up," she admits after a long pause. "Is it that noticeable?"

"Well, I mean, I know it's coming from a good place," he muses. "But it's not you."

She looks at him blankly.

"Did it ever occur to you that your ability to drive me up the wall is one of the things I love most about you?"

She wrinkles her brow, giggles. "Can't say I ever would've guessed that."

"No time to waste on things like model behavior, McNally." He pulls her closer, and an ephemeral grin flashes across his face, gone as quickly as it comes. "I mean it. All I want is you, all right? So just… be you."

Like that, the perpetual knot of fear that's been living just below her sternum dissipates. She lets Sam pull her body on top of his and carefully leans forward until their lips meet.

For him, she's willing to become a better version of herself. But as far as he's concerned, the best version of her is who she's always been.