Joey Potter stirred her coffee idly, the spoon making light-colored swirls in the dark liquid.  She had always gotten up this early, even when her job didn't require it.  Now she used these dawn hours for drawing and meditating.  It was the only time during her hectic life that she felt truly calm.

"Still an unnaturally early riser, huh, Potter?"

She turned around to see Pacey Witter, standing in loose-fitting boxers and an undershirt, his dark brown hair adorably rumpled.

"I like mornings," she told him cheerfully.

"Well, that makes one of us."  He opened the refrigerator door, took out a carton of orange juice, and drank, in typical guy fashion, directly from it.  Joey made a face at him.  He put the carton back in the refrigerator, unfazed.

He scratched his neck and blinked, attempting to rid himself of the sleepy haze that surrounded him.  "So what's on tap today for Miss Potter?"

She shrugged.  "I have a hearing at ten, a lunch with the DA and three meetings with clients in the afternoon.  You know, the usual."  She smiled.

"If I did even half as much as you do in a day, Jo, I wouldn't even think of getting up at 5 am.  Damn."  He sat down at the tiny kitchen table.

"Hey, you're going to school and working...that's twice as much as I do.  You're no slacker, Pace."  She rubbed his back lightly, enjoying the feeling of his warm skin.

Pacey was in his third year of college at age 32, having worked right out of high school for nearly fourteen years.  Now he was a co-manager of a popular Italian restaurant and was taking six classes a semester in order to finish his degree early.  He never seemed stressed, though.  Joey admired that.

"You know I only work so much so I don't have to see your ugly mug, right, Potter?" he joked, looking up at her endearingly.

"Yeah, that's why you rouse yourself at 6 so you can see me off.  Jackass."  She ruffled his hair affectionately.

Pacey made a face at her.  "Out!" he yawned.  "Out of my house!"

"Mmm-hmm.  You know I pay more rent than you now," she told him.

"That's because you're high-maintenance," he sniffed.

It was one the mysteries of the Witter-Potter liaison-they still lived in the same tiny studio apartment Pacey had rented since he'd moved to Boston two years before, and even though Joey made quite enough money to live on her own, she didn't move out.

They remained completely platonic, carrying on with the antagonistic banter they had perfected in high school.  The only difference, of course, was that in high school they had been in love.

Or was that really different?

Joey put her coffee cup in the dishwasher and brushed invisible lint off her carefully tailored linen suit.  "Well, off to the office," Joey said, and gave Pacey a pat on the head.  "See you later."  She leaned down and gave him a swift kiss on the lips.

She was out the apartment door before she realized what had happened.

Why had it seemed so natural?

Joey sighed and flipped through the pile of papers for the third time.  The briefing had to be in there somewhere.  It had been a long day, and all she wanted was to find the briefing for tomorrow's trial so she could head home.  What time was it, anyway?

She heard her office door click open but didn't look up, still too involved in her search for the brief that got away.  "I can't find it," she said, annoyed.  "Do you know where it is, Andrea?"

"Um, I'm not Andrea.  I think she left," a deep voice came from her office door.  "What did you lose?"

Joey looked up and made a face.  "Pacey, what are you doing here?"

"Well..." he set down a paper bag that smelled suspiciously like delicious Italian food.  "I'll try not to take that nasty look you just gave me personally...I guessed right, I see."  He gave her a sneaky smile.  "I happened to look at my watch half an hour ago and realized that I closed up the restaurant at 12 and you still weren't answering the phone at home, so either you were here, stressing about something, or so fast asleep you didn't hear the phone.  Thing is-" A he took a styrofoam container out of the bag and opened it to reveal a steaming portion of spaghetti and meatballs, "you're a light sleeper, and you always answer the phone.  I also figured, since you're a private masochist-"

"I am not!" Joey said indignantly.

"You probably haven't eaten yet," he finished, handing her a fork.

She sighed, took the fork from him, and gave in.

"Have you ever seen Jungle Fever?" Joey asked Pacey, her mouth full of pasta.

Pacey looked at her, amused.  "Yes, in fact, I have had the opportunity to view that early Spike Lee gem."

"This reminds me of that scene with the-"

"Chinese food," Pacey said slowly.  "When they talk about how hard it is to eat that without making a mess, and then they have sex on the desk-"

"Okay, maybe that doesn't remind me of this," Joey said quickly.

Pacey leaned forward and looked at Joey carefully.  "Something you want to talk about, Jo?"

She shrugged.  "I don't know, I was just wondering if you have any particular insights on why-"

"You kissed me this morning," Pacey finished for her.  "In fact, I do."

"Is that so?" she asked, somewhat amused.

"I think we've spent the greater part of the last two years playing house, Jo," he said slowly.  "We act like a married couple-with the exception of certain things we obviously do not do-and married couples kiss each other before they leave for work.  Maybe you just forgot that we-"

"Aren't actually married."  Joey sighed.  "Yeah, maybe."

"Or maybe I'm just irresistible," Pacey said, smirking.

"I strongly doubt that, Pace," Joey said, shooting him a look.

"Hey, it's not my fault I'm beautiful," he continued.

Joey's look would have killed a snake.  Pacey struggled to keep a straight face.  "Look, Jo, I just think that people with our complicated...um...history together may never be able to leave that behind, you know?"

Joey sighed, playing with her fork.  "Do you...do you want to leave that behind, Pace?"

Pacey seemed stumped.  He opened his mouth and then closed it, running his hand through his hair nervously.  "What...what exactly are you asking me, Jo?"

Joey's eyes met his, and she said slowly, "Would you like this dinner to more closely resemble the scene in Jungle Fever?"

Pacey tried to say something, but then seemed to think better of it.  Instead, he pulled his chair closer to hers, moved his hand up to her cheek and brought her lips to his.

Joey shivered and blinked the sleep from her eyes, trying to place this sensation, to understand why she was suddenly so cold.  She rolled over halfway, and her leg came into contact with a leg that was definitely not hers-a muscular leg, a leg with hair....Pacey's leg.

She sat up suddenly, and the sheet fell away from her body.  Pacey made some quiet, sleepy sound, and she turned to look at him, his face illuminated by light from the street lamps outside.  The events of the evening came back in a rush...he had brought her dinner, there had been a frenzied passionate encounter at the office that led to a frenzied encounter in her room, then to another, and another, until they had finally fallen asleep from sheer exhaustion.  She glanced down and confirmed her worst suspicions.  This was not, in fact, a dream.  She was still completely naked.

"Joey, get some sleep..." Pacey mumbled, reaching out to pull her back down to the bed.

But Joey was frozen, unable to process what was happening, what had happened.  She had just slept with Pacey Witter.  Yes, she had slept with Pacey before.  Many, many times.  They had dated for years.  But then they had fought, and she'd run away.  Run to the man who had always been a reliable substitute, the man who always loved her (except when he didn't), the man who was always willing to take advantage of her when she was her most vulnerable.

Dawson Leery.

Surprisingly, for all the time she had spent with Dawson as friends and as supposedly more, she had never slept with him.  Ever.  She had married Dawson without sleeping with him, and he believed she just needed time, perhaps to get over some traumatic event of her past.

Joey didn't need time, she needed to let go.  But she never could.  Now, nearly three years after her husband's death and six years since the rainy night when she thought she had left Pacey behind forever, she was here again.  It wasn't just deja vu.  It was creepy.  It was amazing.  It was everything and nothing at once.

Joey was so absorbed in her thoughts that she didn't even notice that Pacey had sat up in bed.  He reached out to rub her back and she jumped.  He pulled his hand away like he had been slapped.  "I'm...sorry, Jo."

She blinked, and was surprised to find that tears had begun to slide down her cheeks.  She didn't know what to say.  When had she not known what to say to Pacey Witter?  He was her doing and her undoing, true, but she was hardly ever at a loss for words in front of him.

Pacey cleared his throat.  "I'm really sorry, Jo...if I had know that...well, I wouldn't have...never mind."  He gave up trying to form a coherent thought, and sighed audibly.

She turned to him and examined his features.  His blue eyes had turned cold, hardened by hurt and anger, but mostly sadness.  He looked older, she realized.  Thirty-two years looked good on Pacey, but he looked like someone who had truly lived those thirty-two years, every minuscule emotional detail.  His face had a certain air of experience, the same air that had attracted her more than ten years ago, when Pacey was barely 18.  Like Joey, Pacey had been forced to grow up fast.  Nobody had ever catered to what he wanted.

"You have nothing to be sorry for, Pace," she said slowly.

He bit his lip, and finally looked at her.  "Then why are you...what's wrong?"

In that second of vulnerability, she saw the boy who'd pulled her hair when she was 12, the boy who'd delighted in snapping her bra and calling her names and teasing her for her crush on Dawson at the age of 14.  She saw the boy who had always taken what she said, even when it was cruel, with a shrug and a smile, the boy who had loved her for years and hadn't told her because he didn't want to ruin their friendship, the boy who had, at the age of 17, kissed her so fiercely that she could only kiss back, could only reciprocate, could only acknowledge the passion and desire he built up inside of her.

"I feel...deja vu, or something."  She ran her hand through her tangled hair, and sighed.  "This feels like it was before I...before I married Dawson, before everything, and I'm...I keep thinking I'm going to turn around and he'll be there, you know, Pace?"

Pacey's face had turned sullen, now, and the vulnerability and openness was gone.  "I'm sorry if I hurt you, Joey."

You wanted me to take off the happy mask, and the happy mask is off.  So answer me this one question because this is what I've been wanting to ask you, Jo.  Why are you with me?  Why are you with me?  Because I don't know why I'm still with you.

Joey blinked.  "Pacey, I..."

But she couldn't finish her sentence.  There were too many memories.  Too much pain.  Too few answers.

Joey got out of bed, wrapped her bathrobe around her, and stumbled out of the room.  Outside, light was beginning to break over the horizon, but Joey couldn't help feeling like the night had left her with little illumination.