Disclaimer: I don't own Bates Motel or the characters.

Summary: Takes place after 3x04. Emma and Dylan, both feeling rejected by the Bates family, find solace in each other. Or what if Norman had told Norma about Caleb after he found out?

OK so a bit of warning here, I wrote this while stuck in an airport and sleep-deprived. Unbeta-ed. But I felt like posting it, so here you have it.

The last thing he remembered was drinking himself into a stupor he was not sure he would ever wake from. Yet somehow he was conscious. All of his hopes to become Dylan Bates were dead, but Dylan Massett was still alive.

His head was pounding and his soul was crushed but his heart was beating.

That was the first thing he realized.

The second, was Emma. Somehow she was here, talking, her hand on his forehead. The next thing he knew he was drinking, downing a glass of water in one gulp and fighting a strong desire to puke his guts out. The hammering in his head was maddening. He could feel his heart drumming so hard in his ribcage it felt as if it was trying to pierce its way out.

The last thing he remembered was a soft hand on his forehead, brushing back his damp hair. It was the only thing he could feel that didn't hurt. Then came the small liberation of fretful sleep.

/

It was mid-afternoon, almost evening when before he was conscious again. He found another glass of water by his side, and sat up on the camp bed and drank it slowly. He followed the scent of fresh coffee into the makeshift kitchen (a kettle, a hot plate and a chainsaw sitting on the same freshly cut shelf) before venturing outside. Finding the kitchen empty had been absurdly disappointing and he wasn't sure if he was ready for what the outside world had to offer.

The already dimming sunlight was not as bad as he had anticipated. And has he took a look at the land around him—his land—he found Emma sitting by the lake, a mug of coffee in hand and looking intently at the water.

She didn't turn around when he sat down by her side, just took another sip of coffee before handing him the cup. He took a large gulp and barely refrained from spitting it out.

"Don't blame me," she said defensively. "Your coffee machine is evil. And," she added looking him pointedly in the eyes, "don't act like it's the worst thing you had to drink in the last 24 hours."

He sighed and took another sip, bravely swallowing it as smoothly as he could to avoid answering. He wasn't sure how to react, how this situation made sense or why he was being lectured when he had never asked her to be here in the first place. He had plenty of objections but wasn't ready to voice them, wasn't ready to be alone-even though it was probably what he deserved.

"I knew," she confessed, her eyes firmly on the lake. "I've known for a while about Caleb. I'm really sorry, Dylan."

That wasn't something he waw ready to process, so he pushed it away for the moment and asked the first thing he could think of.

"What are you doing here?"

It could have been an accusation, but his tone was strangely blank, dull.

She turned toward him to answer and he took advantage of it to hand her back the coffee, and tried to hide his shaking hands in his pockets.

"Gunner stopped by the motel. He was worried." Dylan vaguely remembered firing the young stoner the other night.

"He seemed to think we were friends. You don't seem to have any other. So I came," she explained simply.

For the first time since this conversation had started, he noticed the cannula in her nose, and followed the tubes to the oxygen tank sitting behind her. Maybe it was that simple. Maybe she came because she knew he needed help, a friend. But nothing was that simple. She was a dying girl and her time was limited. So no matter how little he wanted her help, he probably ought to feel grateful.

"Thanks," he said.

"You're welcome."

She sipped coffee in silence as he recovered slowly, flashes from the night before coming back to him.

As if sensing it, she turned to him again, observing him as if she was looking for the answer to something.

"Dylan, right now you might think you want to die," she said carefully. "But trust me, you don't. I know what I'm talking about."

She took a deep breath before continuing.

"Two years ago, I didn't have any friends. My mother abandoned me. I don't have any family except for my father. And my father—he loves me, but this thing, it's killing him as much as it's killing me. I won't ever live a long and happy life. I'll never be able to have children, and even if I physically could, I never would bring a child into this world while knowing that I wouldn't live to see it through puberty. There were days when I wanted to die. When I couldn't see the point of going on. Why not just die and be done with it?"

She smiled as if to undercut the gravity of her words, and handed him the coffee back with increasingly nervous hands.

"Then my lungs got infected. Really bad. I was hospitalized for six months. That was the worst pain I ever felt. And somehow every day I fought for my life. You don't want to die, Dylan. When you are dying, you don't think of all the things you'll be rid of. You think about all the things you could still do, and you fight back."

(This got strangely The Fault in our stars, right? Sucks a bit not deep at all)

He drank some of her disgusting coffee and contemplated her words in silence. He wasn't interested in how they applied to him although he was very curious of what they revealed about Emma.

She had always held some strange fascination over him. This pretty and optimistic girl with a terrible disease, so in love with his brother that she seemed half as desperate as him for his family's attention and love.

"What did Norma and Norman tell you?" he asked.

She took the almost empty coffee cup from him before replying.

"Norma said that you weren't welcome at the motel or the house anymore. Norman told me what I already knew."

"And do they know? About you and me? That you knew, I mean," he corrected himself quickly.

"No. I generally keep secrets. For what it's worth, I'm sorry, Dylan. Hiding him might have been a bad decision, but it's such a complicated situation—I understand why you did it."

"Fucked up. It's a fucked up situation, let's call it like it is."

She smirked, and he thought it was just as beautiful as the lake and the open sky. It had the same calming effect on him, this smile of hers, and he thought for a fleeting second that she fitted around here.

"The word does apply," she approved.

He didn't realize he was smiling until he caught her staring, he looked away and bit his lips to stop them from twitching under her stare.

"I'll make some more coffee," she announced happily.

"No!" he stopped her. "I'll make it."

He could swear he heard her giggle behind his back as he walked back to the cabin, the empty mug in his hand.

/

"You really don't smoke?" she asked him again, seeming just as surprised as the first time.

"No. Well—not weed," he answered.

"That's what I meant, yeah."

"Is that really that difficult to believe?"

"I guess not," she said slowly. "I just assumed. I don't really see why someone would go into the pot business if they don't."

"Have you never seen Scarface? The first rule of the drug business is don't use your own product."

"Hmm. That's a good point." She took a look around at the darkening landscape. "I should go now. I'll be back tomorrow."

He got up to walk her back to her car.

"You don't have to, you know. I'm fine."

The last part was a lie, they both knew it.

She smiled. "I know. I'll be back tomorrow."

/

When he heard the easily-recognizable noise of her quaint little orange car approaching, the coffee was already ready for her. It had been three day since that first afternoon they had spent together, and she had been here sitting with him every day since, only leaving with a promise to come back.

"Hi," he greeted her with warm coffee and a smile.

"Hi," she answered with a smile that was uniquely hers. She was wearing purple jeans and a deep green sweater. He wasn't sure why he was noticing that but he was, maybe it was the way the green made her brown eyes more vibrant, richer. She looked fairylike, like something magical that shouldn't exist, particularly not here with him.

"Thanks for the coffee," she said, looking pleasantly surprised that he had anticipated her desire in such a way.

"You're welcome. Do you want to sit inside today? It's a bit chilly."

She shook her head. "No, let's sit by the lake."

He smiled. It was her favourite spot. The pride and happiness he felt every time she showed her love for his land in this way always took him by surprise. Those were feelings he had given up on a few days ago.

She seemed in a particularly good mood this morning, so he used it as his chance to ask her a question that he had been turning over in his mind for a while now.

"Emma, not that I don't appreciate your company or anything—I do, I really do—but don't you have school or work or something? Can you really spend your days here?"

She bit her lips in a way that made him dread her answer.

"Well, I had been home schooling with Norman."

"And?" He knew that already.

"And we broke up. Or something like that. I'm not sure we were ever really dating. I've been doing it on my own since."

"What about the motel?" he asked, confused.

"I quitted."

"Why? Because you guys broke up?"

Maybe he shouldn't have been surprised that a teenage girl would quit her job to avoid her ex, but Emma had never seemed like that kind of girl.

"No, you idiot. Because of what happened with you."

His dumbfound silence gave her plenty of time to explain herself, and after taking a deep breath, she did.

"It's not like I ever needed the money. My father has a good health insurance and my doctor is giving me six months so it's not like I need a college fund. My mother left us when I was a baby. I might have started working there because of Norman, but it wasn't about him, not really. Just—Norma seemed like such a good mother. She cares about him so much, she loves him so much and—It felt like if I could work there, be a part of it somehow—It's stupid, I know."

She paused, looking at him with a half-apologetic smile and troubled eyes.

"And then, she just -she just gave up on you like that. She abandoned you," she cried, outrage and pain clear in her voice.

It wasn't about him and Norma, not really. He knew that. But it felt good that someone seemed to understand, and acknowledge the pain he was feeling.

"It's not the first time," he said in a reassuring voice.

She snorted. "As if that made it any better."

"Emma," he called in a soothing voice.

"I'm sorry. I'm fine."

"You're practically shaking."

"I'm fine. Just a bit cold, that's all." She was avoiding his eyes, but he could still catch the hint of tears. Her eyes had been completely dry when she had talked about her time in hospital, he noted.

"Do you want to go inside," he offered.

"I'm fine," she repeated stubbornly.

"Here, take that then," he said, taking off his leather jacket to drape it over her shoulders.

He was being stupid and obvious, he knew this. Yet, when he lingered a little longer than his excuse should have allowed him to with his arms around her, she took advantage of it to lean against his side and stayed there, in his embrace and her face against his neck.

In the end, no tears rolled out of her eyes to wet his skin. Instead they waited in silence as her breathing regulated. She seemed to have fallen asleep and he didn't want to wake her and risk her moving away, so they stayed like this until the rain began to fall.

She got up immediately and they rushed to the cabin together, trying to run as she covered the both of them with his jacket and he carried her oxygen tank.

Her laugh as he closed the door behind them was light and enchanting. She sat down on a crate catching her breath, and he moved around awkwardly, running his hand through his damp hair.

For all the time they had spent together over the last few days, it was the first time they were trapped in here. The land might have seemed impressive to her, but the cabin was bare and almost empty except for the camping material and construction tools. As his eyes kept going back to the camp beds, he knew he had to find something for them to pass the time.

"What?" she asked, catching him staring.

He smirked. "I think this is the perfect occasion for me to teach you how to use our coffee machine."

"Oh really?" she asked, arching one eyebrow.

"Yep. No more tricking me into making all the coffee run."

She pouted and he couldn't help but laugh. She stood up, looking ridiculously pleased with herself and walked over to him.

"Fine. But I'm still pretty sure this machine is evil and only answers to one master."

"Who? Satan?"

"No. You." He grinned again. "Come on," she said, dragging him toward the improvised kitchen. "Impress me with your manly fixing skills and your mastery over the dark arts."

/

"No, when it makes this noise you have to hit right here, otherwise it gets stuck."

"Here?" she said, hitting the machine just a couple inches too high.

"No, here. Let me show you," he said positioning himself behind her, one hand on her hip before he realized it. "Sorry," he said. "Could you just—yeah thanks," he said flustered as she moved away a slight glint in her eyes. "Here, see?"

"OK, I think I got that part. What now?"

Maybe she was right, maybe that coffee maker was evil, because just as he thought he was off the hook and everything was back to normal, she went on to look and fucking poke at the botched wiring.

"What about that? What's the deal with that?" she asked innocently.

"Emma, fuck! Don't fucking touch that," he snapped, dragging her away from the electrical hazard. "This shit is dangerous, please don't touch it." He was holding on to her wrist maybe a little too sharply, he realized, but she didn't say anything and just blinked and stared up at him with those large brown eyes of hers.

She was alright, he realized, and let out a breath.

"Shit, I'm sorry. You scared me there. And here I thought I had found a safe activity for us to pass the time, one not including power tools or—" He stopped abruptly. "Anyway, I'm glad you are alright."

"Or what?" she asked.

"Uh?"

"Power tools or what, Dylan?"

His throat was dry, and he was trying to come up with something to say, anything, when , without consulting him, his eyes darted somehow to her mouth and then to the bed and back again. She caught the trail of his eyes, and her mouth opened in a perfect O, horrified.

"Dylan!" she exclaimed, her tone chastising. "You've got to be kidding me. I know you might legitimately be pretty enough not to know that, but women are not going to just fall into bed with you out of boredom if you don't distract them!"

"What? No. No. That's no what—That's not at all what I—I mean, don't presume. That's not what I'm thinking at all. I was trying to keep myself distracted."

"Oh." She seemed surprised for a moment, before going back to something akin to incensed. "Anyway, that doesn't change anything. This conversation is ridiculous. I thought we were friends, Dylan."

"We are friends. I just happen to be attracted to you."

"As flattering as it is, this is not something that I want to hear right now. I should probably just go. Maybe you don't remember, but until less than a week ago, I was in love with your brother."

"I remember," he said, the bitterness in his voice surprising them both.

"OK. Good. I'm leaving", she said, not moving. "And I'll be back tomorrow. Don't get drunk."

"OK," he said. Maybe he should have felt a lot more defeated at having been rejected like that—not that he was trying to make anything happen—but her promise to come back tomorrow was more than enough.

"OK," she repeated.

And then she left, carrying her oxygen tank and running as well as she could to her car.

She was still wearing his leather jacket, he realized. Well, she did say she would be back tomorrow, didn't she?

/

"Hi," he greeted, looking down nervously as he offered her coffee.

She took it, giving him the jacket in exchange. "OK, so I've thought about it."

"Oh?" he said unsure what she was referring to and dreading the worse after last night.

"Yeah. It's fine, it doesn't have to change anything." She took a large sip of coffee and hummed in contentment. "Also, maybe I'm attracted to you too."

He made a strangled noise that she seemed to interpret as a question.

"Yeah. I mean, like I said, it doesn't have to change anything."

"Uh, OK," he said.

"Like you said, we are friends. We can just happen to be attracted to each other and be friends. It doesn't have to be weird. It doesn't have to change anything. I think, we both need a friend, and right now we're all we've got."

For some reason this made him think of Caleb. We were all we had, we only had each other. He had said that many times. Guilt and a burning sense of shame filled Dylan.

"Friends. Right. That's good," he said, unable to meet her eyes.

/

Somehow it worked. It wasn't not weird, but it wasn't weird either. They were friends. It felt right. And if sometimes he wanted to kiss her when she laughed, it was okay. If sometimes she got lost in his eyes, it was fine as well. He didn't mind. They had something rare and precious, and they were protecting it.

"What's wrong?" he asked one evening, as she was laying down in the grass, stargazing. He was sitting next to her, finishing his beer—only one, he always stopped after one now.

"I ran into Norman today."

"Oh."

"He was—He was like a completely different person. It was like I never even knew him."

Dylan had told Emma many things, but his brother's secret was always one he would keep. He took another sip of his beer and waited for her to continue.

"I think I never knew him," she said, determined. "I don't think I ever truly loved him. No. It was this idea. O someone like me, different. Someone nice. Of a family."

He was fidgeting with the beer bottle. He didn't like it when she talked about Norman. It didn't happen often lately.

She sat up suddenly, large eyes staring up at him with shattering clarity.

"I think I love you, Dylan," she blurted out.

He gaped at her, unable to respond.

"Wow. Sorry, that was super random," she said. "But it's true. I just realized it. I think I love you. Not like a friend, I mean in love with you I love you."

"Emma," he said, taking her hands to stop her from fidgeting with her tubes. "Please. Don't apologize. I'm not sorry."

He kissed her. His lips were soft and slow against hers but firm. There was no apology or question in his kiss.

"I love you too," he whispered against her lips.

"You know, I always thought this would be a nice place to die, but I'm starting to think it would be even more fitting for something else."

And they laid together in the grass, his body covering hers, sheltering the flesh he undressed from the gaze of the stars.

She died that night, but it's just a small death and she came back stronger and braver than before, heart filled with love and eyes filled with ecstasy as she screamed.

/

She wakes up to Dylan whispering sweet nothing against her skin, one hand playing with her hair, and she's not sure she wants to wake up because this—this has to be a dream. The way he feels against her, so warm and protective, arms around her pressing her to his chest, it's perfect. He tickles her with kisses trailing down her neck, whispering her name in between them and she has never felt so loved.

If it's a dream she doesn't want to wake up.

But then there is the pain, sharp in her lungs and she knows. She's awake. Alive. Happy.

She turns around and meets Dylan's smiling eyes and kisses him-if he can look at her like that when she has tube coming out of her nose, she doubts he will care about morning breath.

She doesn't want to waste any more time.

FIN