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After she'd asked about his shop on the other side of the rift and turned to make her way toward the park, Lee thought that this other Tarin wasn't going to answer her, that he was going to just continue on his own way. Because he didn't seem to be following her. The energy she was feeling from him wasn't moving.

Well, whether the man followed her, whether he answered her question, it didn't really matter. Lee had a lot of stuff she was going to need to figure out and still needed that coffee.

Though she was consciously paying attention to his energy in particular, it had just about blended into the background and faded away from distance before Lee felt that Tarin moving. Catching up with her.

Lee nodded, not at all surprised when he came up beside her and spoke. "So much better than random jobs," Lee agreed, not looking over at the man walking beside her. And that's probably what he would be looking at for work if he didn't set up a shop on this side.

"Not having to break the lease would be one less headache to deal with in all of this," Lee continued. A lease she had arranged a decade earlier to last a good many more years.

Things were different here. Lee couldn't help but think that that was an understatement, at least with her limited knowledge and experience with people and the way things were on the other side.

It was also a very noncommittal answer.

He went on to make a comment about…some sports team being bad on this side as well. Lee knew that the Mets were a New York team, but they didn't play hockey and that's about as far as Lee's sports knowledge went.

Followed by a very familiar phrase. 'I'll figure things out', meaning he really had nothing figured out in terms of a job or place to live. At least that was always how she had used the phrase.

"So you haven't found anything yet," Lee said, but as she spoke, her eyes moved back to look at the shop. Which if Tarin really was gone would just sit empty.

Sorry that it was happening. That made a hell of a lot more sense. Because how, why would this Tarin have had any reason to do anything to him?

"Thanks," Lee said, giving the man a small smile.

And Tarin said that he would let her know if he heard - or saw - anything. Lee pressed her lips together and nodded a little grimly. Depending on what had happened, what Rupert had done with the body if he had ended up finally pulling the trigger, Lee knew that that might be the only way she ever found out. Because unlike when Tarin had been out of his body, Lee knew she wouldn't sense him now; she had only ever been able to feel energy from a spirit when it had been merged with him.

Death, whether her own or Tarin's, had always been a possibility. Lee knew that. She'd known it from the first day that Tarin had told her about merging and she had decided that she wasn't going to do to him what so many people had done to her because of her powers. It had come close. So many times. She had died in Romania.

Yet now, knowing that Tarin might be dead, and she may never know for sure…

"I will be," Lee told him when he asked if she was okay. "I'll manage." Like she always did. She'd push as much of everything she could down and lock it away, because unless Tarin miraculously showed up in the morning, she was going to have to explain this all to Kevin. And to Josh and Adele. Though she had no idea how she was going to do that.

She'd just stick with the rift story. Until and unless she had proof of anything else.

The rift, which had closed days ago. But this Tarin had only been near the shop tonight. "How did you know where his shop was?" she asked, a crease forming between her brows.

The man in front of her looked completely shocked at the idea that she had a child. Well, more than likely the fact that Tarin, the Tarin from this world, had a kid.

Which at this point seemed like an obvious to Lee. But things had changed A LOT since Lee had first met Tarin Brooks. For both of them. Twelve years earlier, neither herself or Tarin would have been able to see themselves in the kind of relationship that they had quickly found themselves in. Lee had thought that the possibility of marriage would never happen, and the simple idea of being pregnant had terrified her. And though they had never explicitly talked about it, at that point marriage and a child probably seemed like worst case scenarios to Tarin.

"That….That does sound less likely.”

"Hence why I was banging on the door to the shop," Lee replied. "And his apartment before that."

Sighing in frustration, Lee glanced back toward the shop before pulling out her phone. No calls that she had somehow missed. She then shot a quick text off to Matt. "Damn it," she muttered as she tucked her phone away again. "This is not good."

This other Tarin did not look all that happy about the idea of using his powers out in the open, or at all. But he didn't say anything else. Didn't refuse, didn't argue or question anything else. He didn't agree, either.

He simply closed his eyes and stood there silently. "I've seen the eye thing before," Lee muttered, crossing her arms impatiently. Not because he was taking too long to find out the information, but because of her frustration and growing worry about Tarin.

Finally, though in reality it was probably less than a minute, he opened his eyes and told her that the spirits hadn't seen Tarin in days.

He hadn't been to the shop, whether working or not, in days…

"Shit, shit, shit,” Lee muttered to herself, turning slightly as she ran her hand through her hair. "This is beyond bad. I swear…If that hypocrite has done something to him…”

Then Lee's eyes shot back to the man standing for a moment before she turned to look in the direction of Central Park. "He couldn't have," she said quietly. "Why would he? There's no reason…"

The man said that the first part, that he was in fact, Tarin Brooks was ready to prove. And he reached his hand into his pocket.

It was a testament to what Lee was worried about that she didn't even consider the man might be reaching for a weapon in his pocket. Any weapons that would work Lee in this situation would be too large to fit in a pocket like that.

It was, in fact, not a weapon but his wallet. Which he opened a moment later and held out toward her showing his ID.

It was not an ID that looked at all familiar. As she leaned in slightly to look at it, Lee saw that it did say New York, and also had a picture that looked like the man in front of her. It was difficult in the relative darkness of the street, but it looked like it said 'Tarin Brooks' on it as well.

Either this man was Tarin Brooks from the other side of the now vanished rift, or he had gotten a useless ID with her ex-husband's name on it for some reason.

He had also realized that she had been talking with Tarin's brother on the phone.

As for whether he was merged…that was a very good point that he couldn't actually prove it one way or another. Not when Lee didn't know the man standing in front of her.

She also wasn't feeling any extra energy that shouldn't be there coming from him.

At this point, Lee kind of had to believe what he had said, didn't she?

"Well, there should be another Tarin Brooks here," Lee replied, some of the anger and frustration at her ex-husband coming out again like it had when she'd been at the door of the shop.

Then Lee had an idea, something that would now be possible in her search for Tarin that she wasn't able to do on her own. "Since you're here, can you ask them,” she said, tipping her head in the direction of the closed shop. "Where my Tarin went?” And no, Lee did not just call him her Tarin, she had been talking about from her world.