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She finds out by accident. That shouldn’t be entirely surprising, Molly thinks, but she feels a little guilty for it even so, despite knowing full well that getting the news sooner wouldn’t have made a bit of difference. This isn’t the first time she’s lost someone in Darrow, after all. It just is, perhaps, the hardest for her to deal with. Even Stephen and Chase’s disappearances hadn’t hit her this hard. They’d been friends, the former maybe something a little more than that. Lisbeth is different. Molly had barely known her at all, had spoken to her infrequently at best, but she’d saved Molly’s life, and that’s not something she’ll ever be able to forget. Nor is it, now, something she can ever begin to try to make up to her.

If given the chance, she would have, too. Knowing that this is all she gets makes her that much more grateful for it, desperate, even, to hold on, to make it last as long as she can. That night, she’d been willing to accept that it was over, well aware that she’d already gotten more of a life than she otherwise would have, but she hadn’t thought there would be any other outcome. It’s only because of some impeccable fucking timing and instincts on Lisbeth’s part that she’s here at all, happier than she thinks she’s been in a long while, and that’s not something she could have disregarded.

Even with Lisbeth gone, it still isn’t. At work, after hearing a mention of the old abandoned fairground and how it really is abandoned now once again, she gets by alright, as good at compartmentalizing when she needs to as ever, but the more time passes, the harder it becomes. By the time she gets to Lee’s, where she goes after work as often as she does her own apartment these days, she’s distracted and she knows it, curled up on his couch with her computer and attempting uselessly to get a jump on what she has to do for tomorrow. It’s hard to focus on talking points for a press briefing when she just keeps thinking about Lisbeth swinging that fire poker and saving her life.

Before long, she stops trying, sighing as she snaps her laptop shut, pushing her hands back through her hair. "Fuck it," she says, as much to herself as to Lee. "I can’t focus."

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At the other end of the couch, Lee's nose is buried in a book as he studies for final exams. The year passed by a hell of a lot faster than he thought it would, and if he can pull this off, he'll be a third of the way done with law school in a few weeks. And after an entire year, Lee doesn't feel as rusty with academia as he did when he first started. College before the military seemed lifetimes away when he first started, but now it's almost becoming routine.

Just like nights like this with Molly are becoming routine. Though, Lee prefers somethings about their evenings together to others.

Molly shuts her laptop, and Lee sets his book down, closing it around a finger to save his spot.

"If what you're doing is as boring as what I'm reading, then I can't say I blame you," he says.

Any other night, and Molly would probably suggest they take a break and find a better way of entertaining themselves for a little while. Anyone else with her, and she would probably write her trouble focusing off as being exactly that, the product of working on something boring and nothing more. Even now, it would be easy enough, but she knows even before she starts to respond that she won't be able to lie. She owes Lisbeth more than that. Hell, she owes Lee more than that, too, and not just because, for all she knows, he'd be able to see through it if she tried to act like this was nothing.

"I can't say it's all that exciting," she says with a small, wry smile and a raised brow, just short of rolling her eyes. Just because she's going to be forthright doesn't mean she has to make too much of this. "But no, I've just got other stuff on my mind. I... found out today that someone I knew disappeared."

It's not what he was expecting to hear, but Lee's been in Darrow long enough that he's seen a lot of people come and go. He's had people close to him disappear, and he knows it's a lot harder to deal with than some people might expect.

Maybe it'd be something easier to handle if there were some answer about what happens after people leave Darrow, but as it is, that's as much of a mystery as every other frakking thing they're dealing with on a regular basis.

"Gods," Lee says, and he frowns, his expression concerned as he looks over at Molly, "Are you okay? Who was it?"

"Yeah," Molly says with a nod, careful to keep her voice light. She sets her computer on the coffee table, though, certain now that it's going to be a while before she can actually get back to work. The last thing she wants is to keep Lee from studying when he's got finals coming up just because she has this shit to deal with, but she's too unfocused to get anything done now anyway. At least it's nothing pressing. "I'm okay."

The rest is harder to say, though she tells herself that it shouldn't be. It's just not a subject that's come up between them much before, the one notable time when she was significantly more distressed than she is now, and in talking about it, it's harder for what she's just told him to remain true. She presses on anyway. "It was a friend of mine — not even, really. Acquaintance, maybe. I barely knew her." She'd never gotten enough of a chance to change that. She should have. Swallowing hard, she finishes, "Lisbeth. The woman who saved my life that night."

He tries, then, to put himself in Molly's shoes. He's had someone step in and save his life more than once; another viper jock taking out an enemy fighter, another soldier unloading into a toaster that might have hit him otherwise. There have been people who saved his life who died, but after a while, death became something they got too used to. There was never any time to dwell and reflect.

Either way, he gets how this might be hard on her. They haven't talked a lot about that night, but Lee knows Molly well enough by now to know how frakked up it was for her.

"I'm sorry," he says, not sure what else to say in the moment. His book closed around his finger to keep his place, he finally just closes it entirely, setting it on the coffee table. "It never really gets any easier, does it? Especially when it's something like this."

"No," Molly replies with a slight shake of her head. "It really doesn't." For a moment, she intends to leave it at that. It's not like there's a hell of a lot to be said on that front. Lisbeth is gone, and it sucks, and she's not sure she would be able to sort out the tangle of feelings she has about it to put it into words in the first place. She knows perfectly well that Lee's been through a lot of shit, anyway, that the kind of life he came from means he's lost a lot more people than she has. She doesn't want to act like losing one is the end of the fucking world now.

When it comes down to it, though, that's not really what this is about, and she knows she's not going to be able to shake it. Most of the time, she can, but it's too present now. This was always going to happen eventually, anyway. With as long as they've been together now, with the way things have been going lately, maybe it's time he found out what really happened to her, before they wind up taking this any further. Drawing in a deep breath, she twists her hands in her lap as she glances hesitantly over at him. "Lee, you told me once that... if I wanted to talk about what happened, you'd listen," she says slowly. "If that's still true, I think I want to tell you about it now."

He remembers that day, after Russell was shot. He'd turned up at her apartment to find her covered in someone else's blood, reliving something she'd been trying so frakking hard to forget. Then, Lee hadn't wanted to press. If she was ever going to tell him about any of that, she'd do it in her own time. And if she changes her mind now, after saying that she wants to, he'll understand.

"Okay," Lee says, glancing down at her hands, twisting in her lap before he meets her eyes, "But only if you're sure."

"I'm sure," Molly says, and though she doesn't manage to sound quite as sure as she actually is, she knows there's no turning back from here. Any other time, and she's not sure she'll want to at all. When not thinking about it is a possibility, it's one she'll always take, without fail, and usually, this is something she can put away, that she doesn't have to let affect her day to day life. That isn't an option now, though, and really, it's only right that she tell him. She always knew she would have to sooner or later. It wouldn't really be right just to keep going otherwise. If they're going to keep doing whatever the fuck the two of them are doing, she thinks he ought to know the kind of baggage she really comes with.

What she doesn't know, now that they're here, is where to start. She wants to tell him about it, but not just to go step by step, to recount the entire night in all its uncomfortable detail. He doesn't need that. Neither does she, for that matter. She settles, then, on what they both already know. "You saw me after, didn't you? The bruises, the stitches..." Then, she hadn't yet been able to hide her broken nose with makeup, or the gash along her lower lip where Patrick had bitten it open. "That was the least of it."

Lee nods, frowning. He definitely remembers. "Yeah, I uh... I think we spoke a couple of times not too long after."

They hadn't known each other well then, and after they had, Lee had been willing to respect the idea of Molly not wanting to talk about it. Gods, he can't imagine having to relive something like what she went through, even just what he knows up until now.

Though, thinking back on it now, thinking through what the two of them have been through now, he's almost irrationally angry at himself for letting something like that happen to her. Even though they weren't very close then, and there's no way he could have known.

But one thing Lee knows for sure is that he wants to make sure that nothing like that ever happens to her again.

Molly nods in turn, that having been what she'd thought. Most of that time in her life has blended together, so many days spent virtually hiding out in her apartment whenever possible, dodging calls and not wanting to be seen, but she doesn't think she would have imagined that. Forgotten having crossed paths with someone, maybe, but not that. Either way, that isn't really what matters here. It's a starting point, nothing more; if he hadn't known, it would have been the easiest thing to tell him. It helps, a bit, but it doesn't lessen the weight of the rest, things that she's already worrying about how he'll respond to.

Backtracking isn't an option, though. If not for him, so he really knows the truth of it, then she thinks maybe she needs to for herself, just to not have it hanging overhead anymore. Not telling him, she'd always wonder, always feel like she should. And if her talking about it now says a lot about where they are with each other, that's something it's convenient to ignore for the time being.

"A lot of it is kind of a blur now," she admits, trying to keep her voice as light as she can, mostly because she knows this only gets worse. If she starts off too bogged down, the rest will only be all the more unbearable. "I... He slammed my head into the wall. Gave me a concussion. Right after he almost strangled me." It takes effort not to lift a hand to her throat at the memory of that, but she manages, not wanting to dwell on that part of it now. "But the big things are there. The details."

She tugs the collar of her shirt down a little, gesturing to the scar just under her collarbone, small and round and matching an assortment of others. That Lee has never asked her about them is something she appreciates more than she can say. It also makes her all the more inclined to want to explain now. "He had a nail gun under his bed. I don't know how long it'd been there for. That's what these are from."

Lee listens, quiet as Molly goes through what happened to her. He's seen the scars, often enough that he could have asked just where they came from. He'd secretly wondered, but it had never seemed right to ask about them. Right now, he's mostly just glad that asshole got what was coming to him.

He's not sure if he's overstepping in the moment, but Lee reaches out, leaning in to touch the scar just under Molly's collarbone with a frown. A frakking nail gun. He'd known that Molly had been though something awful that night, but he'd never imagined this.

"Gods," Lee says, and his voice is quiet, as he looks up at her. He's been though a hell of a lot of things that he'd rather not relive, so he has an idea what it means that she's telling him all this.

"I'm... I'm sorry you had to go through that."

Molly nods again, then, but it's a distant sort of gesture. She's more focused on the way Lee touches her than what he says, keeping very, very still as he does. Any other time, and she'd take it as the only sign she needs to get closer. As it is, there's little she wants more than to curl up beside him, let him put his arms around her, take comfort from having him close, a reminder that she made it through and she's alright and he isn't going to hurt her. Knowing what else she has to say, though — that he hasn't yet heard the worst of it — she can't bring herself to. Ordinarily tactile, she stays, other than that one point of contact, closed in on herself now, hands still resting in her lap, gaze fixing on them. What preceded this was hardly easy to say, but it was still easier. She can't look at Lee while she talks about this, though, and not just because she's worried about what she'll see if she does. Save for that night, in the hospital, she's never actually spoken about it at all. Even now, so much time later, giving voice to it come naturally.

"There's more," she says, one corner of her mouth lifting, for just a second, in some approximation of an apologetic smile. With what she's just told him, it probably sounds ridiculous, or it would if it were any other subject at hand. Instead, it just seems as fucking awful as when she talked about it the first time. "I, um — I mean, it wasn't as bad as it could have been. He didn't... It wasn't like he had sex with me, or anything. He didn't even take my clothes off. But I was..."

Her chest tight when she draws in a breath, she finds that she can't finish the sentence, can't actually make herself say the words and tell him that she was sexually assaulted, just like, when she does continue, she can't say what it actually involved. They're words she hasn't yet been able to apply to herself at all. If she does, it will be too real, and she'll have to consider what it means to be that sort of survivor, something it's impossible to comprehend, when she really did mean what she said. It could have been so much worse. Better to focus on that than what did happen. "He went down on me. It was... violent."

Finally, she looks up at Lee, eyes wide and uncertain and brimming with tears that she doesn't realize have started to fall until she reaches up to brush them off her cheeks. "I wanted to tell you sooner. I thought about it. I just couldn't do it."

He isn't sure what the right thing to do in the moment is. He wants to pull her close, wrap his arms around her, but given what she's just told him, that might be the last thing in the world she wants. For all that he's been through, every time he was sure it was his last time in a viper, every Toaster he was sure was going to catch him on a bad day and blow him away... it doesn't compare to what Molly's been through.

"I'm glad you did," he replies, his voice quiet, restrained, even though there's a part of him that's frakking furious that someone could do that to her.

"I know it couldn't have been easy, that is hasn't been easy. But I'm glad you told me."

In that moment, though, he realizes he can't keep himself from reaching out to her, and he touches a wipes a tear from her face, from underneath one eye, with the pad of his thumb.

Though it's a hard thing to reconcile yet, to really feel when just talking about it has left her so emotional, deep down, Molly thinks she's glad she told him, too. It's a strange thing, to be sure, when she's never really done so, outside of the context when she absolutely had to, and there was no pretending at that time that she was anything resembling okay anyway. Had she kept it to herself, though, this always would have been hanging overhead, and there's something to be said for owning up to what she's been through instead of acting like it didn't happen. After almost two years, it really is about damn time. Maybe she doesn't know exactly what she and Lee are doing, but she cares about him a hell of a lot. If there's anyone she could say this to, regardless of what happens now, it's him.

"That's why I couldn't keep going, that day I first kissed you," she says, and though she hasn't yet managed to stop the tears from spilling down her cheeks, she at least sounds a little calmer. She's made it past the worst of this, now; the rest isn't half as hard to say. "I wasn't sure I could. I — I'd tried, once, a couple months after it happened, to sleep with someone, but I started freaking out and couldn't go through with it. I didn't want that to happen again. And I thought if you knew, you might not be interested in me anymore."

She still wants badly to move in close to him, but she hasn't quite worked up to that yet. Instead, in spite of what she goes on to say, she rests a hand against his, her touch hesitant, like she's not quite sure if she should. "So, you know, if this changes anything, I get it. I don't know if I'd want to sleep with me, either."

In the moment, Lee is bewildered that Molly would think that would be the case. "Molly, no. Why would I...?" he asks, and then trails off, finally pulling her close, wrapping his arms around her as he kisses her forehead. The whole thing is frakked up, there's no denying that, but nothing about what she's told him makes Lee think about her any differently. It hasn't even crossed his mind as a possibility.

"This doesn't change anything as far as I'm concerned," he goes on to say, pulling back for a second, only enough to make sure that he can look at her as he says the words, "Nothing."

She doesn't know why it's not what she's expecting to hear. Maybe because she's already been so hard on herself over it, or because she didn't want to get her hopes up only to be let down when the former is in itself already so uncommon for her, but either way, Lee's response comes as a surprise, and more importantly, a relief. Though it's not like this would have been an easy thing to talk about in the first place, that worry that it might change the way he sees her, make him less interested, has been a big part of what's held her back. Now that it's out in the open, now that she doesn't have to worry that it's going to fuck up what she has now, she really does feel a hell of a lot lighter, even if she doesn't quite look like it yet.

For a split second, when he reaches for her, it takes everything in her not to instinctively tense up. The moment passes so quickly that she's barely aware of it, though, and although she holds his gaze long enough to nod in response, she leans into him as soon as she's done so, shifting closer on the couch and wrapping her arms around his neck. Molly isn't sure she'll ever be entirely comfortable being seen like this, but Lee makes it considerably easier, and under everything else, she's grateful for that, too. Whatever he's said, however obvious he might think it is, there are probably plenty of people who wouldn't have felt the same way.

He's the only one she cares about, though — the only guy she's been interested in for a long time now, in fact — and, God, does she. Just what she's feeling, there's no name to put to it, none that she knows, but sitting here with his arms around her, it's almost overwhelming, and not in any kind of a bad way.

"Okay," she says, her voice faint, but steadier, surer, like she's starting to come back to herself. "Good. 'Cause I know I said I would've understood, but I would've been pretty disappointed, too."

"Yeah, well you don't have to worry about it," Lee replies, and he hears the change in her voice, and though Molly doesn't seem completely like herself just yet, he feels like maybe she's on the way there now. He knows how hard it must have been for her to tell him all that, even with as long as it feels like they've been... well, whatever the frak they are. So he's not about to make light of it.

He does wonder what made Molly finally tell him about all this now. One of the other women who were there may have disappeared and left Darrow, but that doesn't mean she was obligated in any way to come clean.

"So what made you change your mind?" he asks, "About telling me, I mean."

"I don't know," Molly says, shrugging, though that's not quite true. It's more that she doesn't know just how to articulate it, something that shouldn't be a big deal given all she's just told him, but that she finds herself tripped up on anyway. Really, when it came down to it, telling him just made sense, but she doesn't think it can be written off as easily as that, either. There's more to it. She's just never had to stop and put it into words before, not least because she was never sure she'd get this far, or that if she did, she would have a chance to talk about it beyond that. Maybe for him, it really is as simple as he's said, but she'd be surprised if there weren't plenty of people with whom this could have gone very differently.

That isn't a concern now, though, and knowing that leaves her surprisingly comfortable, even with as fucked up as talking about all of this makes her feel. Taking a deep breath, she sits back just a little, not enough to pull away, but so that she can look at him when she continues. "I kind of thought I would eventually, if this kept going. If I didn't, I... It always would have been there, you know? It was always going to be overhead, and I was always going to wonder how you'd take it, and... I didn't want to have that holding me back. Plus I figured if it was going to make a difference, it would be better to find out now than later."

She's still sniffling a little, her cheeks still flushed, but Molly summons up a small, self-conscious smile. "I really like you, Lee. In case you couldn't tell."

"I kind of had some idea, yeah," Lee replies, and he returns her small smile with one of his his own. But with as much as Molly says she worried about how he'd take what she's told him, he doesn't think this was ever going to go any other way. He's been in his share of frakked up situations, and saw a lot even before the attack on the Colonies, but comparing any of it doesn't seem right.

But when she mentions not wanting anything holding her back, it reminds him of something of his own. Lee is sure that Molly must have noticed his ring months ago, the one he finally worked up to not wearing, but she never mentioned it or asked about it. It's something that's been hanging over his head too. But he's not sure if now is the right time for it, or if there's ever going to be a right time for it.

This isn't a moment that he needs to make about him, he decides.

"And I feel the same way, if you were wondering."

"Good to know," Molly says, her voice as light as she can manage, almost teasing, a way of downplaying the whole thing. Really, by now, that sort of thing ought to have spoken for itself. She and Lee have been together, at least in some capacity, for months now, spending more and more time with each other, and it’s not like he hasn’t been there for her when shit’s gotten serious before. The one downside of something like this, though, especially when colored by her history, is that it’s hard to tell where the lines are, what’s determined by their dating or sleeping together or just being good friends. In this context, though, she doesn’t think there’s any mistaking what he means, and if she’s at all relieved by that, she has no intention of saying so.

Even most of the alternatives she considers, she quickly decides against. She wants to tell him that this doesn’t usually happen for her, both in terms of the way she feels and his reciprocating it; maybe more importantly, she wants to tell him that it was never anything like this with Patrick, that it never meant anything to her. Mostly, she just wants to kiss him, but with everything that’s still on her mind, she isn’t sure she’s ready for that. She does shift closer, though, swinging her legs over his so they’re resting in his lap, her body leaning sideways against his, head on his shoulder when she tips her chin up to smile at him, almost as if she’s already answered her own question. "In that case, would it be okay if I stay here tonight? I promise not to distract you from studying any more than I have already."

Molly swings her legs onto the couch and over his, and Lee instinctively sets one hand on her knee.

"I already thought you were," Lee replies, genuinely a little confused as to why she's asking in the first place. But it's been a weird night, between all that she's told him, and he figures that maybe she was unsure about where they might stand now.

Over the past few months, they've fallen into a comfortable routine, and a part of that has been Lee generally assuming that she'll be staying over at his apartment or he'll be at hers. It mostly depends on where they end up after work.

Maybe it's the sort of thing that should have spoken for itself. Most of the time, spending the time at one of their apartments or the other isn't something that requires any kind of discussion, it just happens, the same way it has been for months now. Gradually, Molly has been spending fewer and fewer nights on her own; when she does now, it's a rarity. This isn't how most of their time together goes, though. The nights she's spent with Lee before haven't involved her telling him about having been sexually assaulted and crying on his shoulder. They have, though, more often than not, involved sex, and in spite of her earlier worries about what this might change, she's not really sure she'll be in the mood, or if she's comfortable enough in her own skin for that.

But she doesn't want to be on her own, either. She'd rather just stay here, close to him, for as long as she can. "Good, so we're on the same page," she says lightly, not wanting to draw any unnecessary attention to how fucking vulnerable she still feels. "I just wanted to check. And to... thank you, for... letting me get all of that out."

"I'm glad you did," Lee repeats, because he thinks it's worth saying again. It seems like it might take a second to sink in that he's not frakking around when he says it. As horrible as it is, it's something important that's happened in Molly's life. And after so many months around each other, she's become a big part of his life, just like he's become a big part of hers. He cares about her past more than he's admitted.

"So, I guess we're both done for the night?"

"As long as I'm not keeping you from anything too important," Molly says with a small smile, a little sheepish. After all of this, she knows there's no way in hell she'll be able to get back to doing anything for work tonight, but none of what she had to do was anything that pressing in the first place. If she puts it off until the morning, it won't be a big deal. The last thing she wants is for her own emotional bullshit to get in the way of his studying when she really didn't intend for tonight to take the turn it has. "I don't want you to have to stop for the night on my account."

"I'll pick it up in the morning," Lee says, "Or I'll just wing it. I think I can manage."

If there's anything he picked up from his time as a pilot, it was quickly adapting to new situations at the drop of a hat. Not that this is anything like that, really, but he's heard enough excuses from enough pilots that he's pretty confident in his ability to make something up about why he hasn't gotten this done, if it comes to it.

"Okay," Molly says, not about to press the subject beyond that. If he's sure, then she isn't going to try to change his mind and convince him not to give up on studying for the night, though she has no idea what they're supposed to do now. This is a difficult turn of conversation to try to move forward from. With everything out in the open now, though, she doesn't especially want to dwell on it any longer than she has to. "So is it gonna sound really weird if I change the subject and ask what you want to do for dinner?"

"We could order in?" he says, and has no problem with the change in subject, especially if it's something Molly would rather talk about. They could probably both use something a little more light than the previous topic or work.

"What about pizza? I could cook something, but I don't think either of us really want to have to put out any fires tonight."

"Yeah, I'd really rather not," Molly says, pulling a face, though there's still something a little softer in her expression than there might otherwise be. It's from exhaustion, partly, but genuine affection, too, the kind that she doesn't usually let show very often. Right now, it's unavoidable, when she's just let her guard down more than she does around anyone else. "Pizza sounds great."

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