Questions And Answers...

No One Like You.

Inside these walls was undoubtedly the most painful Stellaride episode...S7 E10.

But behind that emotionally charged scene were two people who were hurting....

This chapter has a little insight into their headspace E10 to E22....

This is written for everyone who ever wondered what each of them was feeling, for everyone who wanted to throw something at the t.v and scream.....No! No! No!! And most of all it's for everyone who still cares...

♡♡♡♡♡♡♡

"I love you. But I can't be with you."

Kelly stood staring out at the Chicago river in the darkness of the Loft, his girlfriend's......rephrase that, his ex- girlfriend's words spinning around his head on a loop like a record. That's if there were things like records anymore. Well, there were in his head. Especially tonight. He closed his eyes, the trendy brick walls closing in on him, the Chicago city lights that were usually a balm to his frayed senses, tonight a taunting reminder of all the times she had stood in this very spot, with her arms around him, mesmerised by the view.

When he had first seen her waiting outside his apartment building, his initial reaction was one of worry. She had looked upset and his instinct was to pull her into his arms but before he could say or do anything, she had broken his world and his heart by telling him all the reasons why she couldn't be with him anymore. And he had just stood there and said nothing, while each of her words had cut him like a whip.

" I've been a lifeline for a drowning man, and I"ll never do that again."

That one had hurt. A lot. Is that what he was? A drowning man? Perhaps she was right because he certainly fucking felt like one right now.

Even when she had turned and walked away, he had just stood there silently. Maybe because he was used to this. Everyone that meant anything to him leaving him. Eventually.

Across town, above Hermann's garage, Stella was curled up in her bed like a wounded animal, wearing his T, the one pulled from her laundry basket, which smelled of him. Her eyes were sore and swollen from all her crying even though an accusatory voice reminded her that she was the one who had ended it. She didn't want to do this! But for her own salvation, she had to. Their relationship had become a form of torture, chipping away at her self-worth until she knew there would be nothing left of her.

She choked on another sob, her insides twisted into a thousand knots burying her face into her pillow, soon drenching it in damp, a mixture of the output from her eyes and her runny nose. But even with her eyes tightly closed, his face swam in front of her, his beautiful smile when he was happy, his post sex lazy grin, his broody face when he was tired, and then tonight his vacant stoicism when she had laid into him......even while she was hoping somewhere in the recesses of her broken heart that he would fight for her and argue that she was wrong. But he hadn't. Oh fucking fucking shit! He hadn't...... and her heart splintered into more shards of broken glass than she would ever be able to count.

And if either of them thought work would be bearable...... it wasn't.
Each of them tactfully stayed out of the others way while the rest of shift two very quickly worked out that Severide and Kidd had split up. The new unsmiling Stella called out the likes of Mouch, Hermann and Otis when they took pot shots about the reasons why firehouse relationships shouldn't be allowed, reducing them to quivering wrecks with her one solitary hard eyed glare.

But out on a call, it was impossible for the ex lovers to avoid each other, and both were far too professional to let their bruised hearts get in the way of doing their job.