Hey people. How is everybody? I'm not that great. It's flu season at the moment, and I caught it. Blahh! Anyway, thought I'd put this in. This is Stella's take on DnA.

Disclaimer: I sadly don't own anything you recongise.

--

They were the partnership nobody expected would last. He was the rough, cocky Staten Island boy and she was the tall, beautiful, Angelina Jolie, Red Hook, Brooklyn. They were two people who never would have met if they both hadn’t applied to the New York Crime Lab.

I remember the first time I met him. It wasn’t that long ago, five years, but he looked so young, with his mischievous face and bright blue eyes. Five years had aged him more than everybody expected. Lines had etched their way across his skin and his eyes, though still bright, held the horrors he had seen in the line of work. Danny Messer had his own worries before he joined the Lab, but what humanity had served him had pressed down on him, squashing the childhood innocence I saw in him, evenwhen he was 28. Everyone pressed him to grow up, but I realise nowthat a grown up Danny isn’t fun.

I was worried about talking to her. Not that I would ever admit it to her, or to anyone, but she had that Brooklyn air about her that screamed, “I bite if you get too close!”. Danny had that air about him too, but when they were together, it just evaporated. She looked like a model, with her long brown hair, creamy skin and full pouty lips. Aiden Burn became known as the Angelina Jolie of the Lab, and men stumbled over each other to talk to her, if they weren’t scared off by Danny.

He thought she was a guy when he first heard about her.

‘A guy.’ Danny snorted as he threw a piece of paper on the white lab bench. ‘All the hot cops in the world, and I get a guy. He’ll probably be butch. All the guys I work with are.’

I stayed silent, fully aware of the fact that Aiden Burn was a woman, and a “hot” one at that.

‘You’re not a guy.’ Danny said stupidly, seeing his new partner sitting in a chair in the lobby.

Aiden looked at him like he was stupid, but held out a slim hand anyway. Danny shook it as I smiled inwardly beside him. Aiden coughed a little when Danny didn’t let go of her hand, he dropped is quickly with a soft blush, and shook hands with me.

‘Stella Bonasera.’ I tell her, smiling at her.

‘I remember.’ She tells me, smiling back.

Since then he was fascinated with her. Funny, seeing as women were fascinated in Danny Messer, not the other way round. He’d show off, try to get her attention, or try turning her attention away from other guys. Aiden seemed to notice, and let him, loving the attention Danny placed on her.

He was gutted when she left. Gutted that he had to find out from Chad, not hear it from her own lips. It was too hard for her to tell him, she had said when I asked her.

Their friendship was rocky for a while then. He called her whenever he had the chance, and she wouldn’t pick up or call him back. I heard him smash his phone against the wall and sob and swear under his breath, swear at her, and cry because even though he hated her at the moment, he loved her too much.

‘You need to call him Aiden.’ I watched her squirm in her seat as I put down my cup of coffee.

‘I can’t.’ More squirming.

‘What happened to the old Aid…’

‘He’ll kill me.’ She blurted out, looking up at me with teary brown eyes. ‘He’ll kill me for leaving, for not telling him, for ignoring his calls. I’m doing this for a reason. I am.’

The next morning, Danny came to work happier, a ghost of his old cheeky smile stuck on his face. He spent all morning in the break room talking with Don, and the afternoons helping Lindsay politely in the Layout Room, a first for him as he usually had to be told.

They got better then. They’d go out for dinner every night, and a rumor started around the lab that infamous Mr. Danny Messer had finally been snagged by beautiful Miss. Aiden Burn. Danny looked happier with each passing day, and the few times I talked with Aiden on the phone, she sounded happier than she’d sounded in months.

And then it happened. She left. Left Danny, left her family, left her friends, left this life. D.J. Pratt killed her. Beat the shit out of her and then set her on fire. Danny almost died. He yelled his head off at us, cursed the world blue. He looked like he’d like nothing more than to take his gun and shove it in his mouth and blow the trigger…

He loved her, like she loved him. And everybody thought their partnership wouldn’t last, but if it had been given the chance, it would have lasted way longer than most.

I saw the ring in his locker the day before she died.

--

Did you like it? Please review and tell me. I'm sick, and reviews would make me happy.

Ciao...(I'm constantly blowing my nose and sneezing at the moment. :-).)