So this was meant to be a short oneshot, and it's turned into a long twoshot. The next chapter will be up whenever I've written it, but I'd appreciate it if you let me know your thoughts!
Disclaimer: I own nothing.
It's a strange thing, being a fully trained cardiothoracic consultant with a heart tumour which has a very real potential to destroy your life. For the average human – even the average non-heart specialist doctor – a heart tumour diagnosis is shocking, but you don't ever really know what you're going to experience. You don't know what's a symptom and what's not. Everything just carries on as normal. Except for the tumour, of course.
But when you know the structure and impact of the human heart better than you know almost anything else (and certainly more than you know about expressing emotion), it's a second form of trauma. When an irregular rhythm is more than just feeling a bit faint because it proves that the heart – your heart – isn't working.
It's a situation where you become hyper-aware of your own morbidity, of knowing exactly how the final minutes will look and feel – and it consumes you.
A knock at the door of her office startles Connie out of the torturous cycle of the questions of what is a life worth living and when will she experience it, and she calls coolly, "come in."
Or as coolly as she can, when the undertone of her voice is a perpetual current of worry.
It's both a relief and a concern to see Charlie Fairhead enter her office; the man certainly knows her better than anybody else in the department, and he's onto her. He knows something's wrong, and she's not sure how much longer she can continue to disguise her illness. Or how much longer she wants to.
"Everything okay?" Charlie asks, his brow furrowing, closing the door behind him. "You look…tense."
Their eyes meet for a split second, and Connie's concerned that he can read her better than she can read herself.
"Er, yes, fine thank you," Connie replies dismissively, picking up the file on top of the unorganised heap on the side of her desk. It's a paperwork mountain, and she's never cared less. "What can I do for you, Charlie?"
"Are you sure?"
Something snaps inside of Connie, and it takes everything in her to pull back from the edge. She doesn't need to lose her temper with Charlie; in all honesty, it isn't worth the energy she would expend in doing so.
"I just told you that I am," she snaps, her tone weary with an undercurrent of irritation. "Why are you in my office?"
Charlie pulls his phone out of his pocket and presses a couple of buttons before approaching Connie's desk, the screen directed towards her. "In the last twelve hours, I've had ten calls from Grace, Connie," he explains, his tone infuriatingly patient. It's obvious why all patients share their secrets with him, Connie realises. "She says that you haven't been answering her calls, and you've turned your read receipts off so she can't tell if you've received her messages."
He pauses, expectant, and Connie purses her lips. Of course this would be about Grace. It always is, isn't it?
"Yes, well, I've been busy…"
"Too busy to speak to your own daughter?" Charlie retorts, shaking his head. "Connie, you can keep your secret, whatever it is, but you can't lie to me about Grace. I've been here through it all, remember?"
She counts to ten before she responds. "In case you haven't noticed, we've been a little busier than normal – with fewer staff," she reminds him, her tone curt. "Grace has Sam. She doesn't need me. And I certainly don't have time to listen to why she wishes that she could move back here, Charlie. Now if that's everything, I really need to get on with some paperwork…"
It's clear that Charlie bites his lip to stop his first attempt at a response, though she looks away, ostensibly towards the stack of paperwork.
"You cannot seriously sit there and expect me to accept an answer that says you don't care about Grace," Charlie snaps, his voice raised. "I have seen you through three years of ups and downs with her. I've seen her leave and what that did to you. I saw her come back, and I remember when you were almost buried alive. Not to mention the crash and the court case and everything which followed. So don't make me out to be a fool, Connie, or try and fob me off with some rubbish about the department being busy."
If this is the restrained version, Connie wonders idly what his initial response would have been.
Heaving a sigh, Connie reaches for her water – the only thing she's allowed to drink nowadays – and takes a long sip as she contemplates what to say. How to word it, whatever it is that she wants to say.
"It's complicated," she admits, finally looking at Charlie once again. "And, no, I don't want to tell you what's wrong. But it's far simpler to leave Grace out of it. So if I have to pretend to be an absentee mother – well, that's better than hurting her. Sam certainly thinks that I'm one anyway, so I'm sure he's delighted with how things are developing." She can't resist the small, sad smile which forms on her lips, but she can just about stop the tears from forming. Just.
Charlie's expression changes to become one of sympathy, of understanding. Sympathetic though, not empathetic. As, for no matter how well he thinks he knows Connie Beauchamp and her parenting struggles, he truly has no idea.
"No matter what happens, I can assure you that, in ten years' time, Grace won't remember why you left her alone," Charlie reminds her, his tone far more sympathetic than she deserves. "But she will remember that you left her, that you abandoned your plans. So just keep that in mind when you plan your next act of altruism, and give the little girl who is desperate to speak to her mother a chance."
Blinking once, then twice, Connie nods curtly. "I'll bear that in mind," she promises, surreptitiously crossing her fingers underneath the file. It's one of Grace's childish mannerisms that she's adopted, and the action hurts her heart more than cancer ever could. "Now, if that's everything, I really think you should get back out there…"
He doesn't reply as he walks out, but Charlie's eyes meet hers fleetingly on his way out, and she has a sneaking suspicion that he knows more about her than he's letting on…
~x~
The next morning before work, Connie makes a spur of the moment decision.
She stops at the local shops nearest to the hospital and, parking as close as she can, heads into the 3 shop.
"Good morning," she begins brusquely, avoiding eye contact with the member of staff nearest the door. "I'd like to change my mobile number, please…"
As the assistant explains the process to her, Connie's attention is on the call history on display on her phone screen. Forty missed calls, last night alone, all from Grace. Part of her is surprised that her daughter hasn't tried to use Sam's phone, in the hope that she would be tricked into answering. Or maybe Sam's already five steps ahead of her – for once, they're on the same page.
Not that he knows that of course.
"Is there any particular reason you need to change your number, Mrs Beauchamp?"
Connie's attention is dragged back to the present, and with it, her heart.
Subconsciously pressing a hand to her chest, she shrugs. "Nothing in particular," she replies, her voice barely louder than a whisper. "A need for a fresh start, I suppose."
A world where her daughter doesn't want her would be ideal right now.
~x~
"Hello, Mrs Beauchamp," Noel calls from the reception as she enters the department. "Did you have a nice evening?"
"Fine, thanks," Connie replies drily, tightening her coat around her. This department's far too cold; she needs to have another word with estates to see if she can get the heating turned up.
"There've been a couple of phone calls for you," Noel continues, almost as if he hasn't heard her response. "Couple from Mr Hanssen's office, and Grace rang, said she can't get through to you on your mobile. So I tried to ring you and it said that it had been disconnected…?"
"Yes, I changed numbers," Connie replies distractedly, her brain moving as swiftly as possible from Grace towards Henrik. What could he want to talk to her about?
"Oh, if you pass me it, I'll update it on the system," Noel says, his tone far cheerier than the situation calls for. "And if she rings back, should I pass it onto Grace?"
An almost debilitating rush of fear courses through Connie's veins, and she almost spits out, "no, don't. I'll give it to her myself." Picking up a piece of paper from the reception desk, she continues, "I'm on an admin day today. Do not disturb me under any circumstances."
~x~
"Dad, I don't understand…" There're tears in Grace's eyes as she makes eye contact with Sam, her phone gripped tightly in her hand. "Why won't she answer me?"
Sam has a theory, but it's certainly not one that he's going to share with his daughter. "I don't know, sweetheart," he replies gently, reaching out to remove the phone from Grace's hand. "I really don't. I think that it's really busy across there, and obviously the NHS isn't very well staffed. Maybe she's just been at work all day?"
"No!" Grace declares, her sadness visibly turning to anger. "No, she always answers me. I think something's wrong, Dad. Because…why doesn't she want to talk to me?"
"It's alright, darling," Sam murmurs, wrapping his arms around Grace's back. The anger's dissipated back to sadness, a pattern which reminds him of the first time that his daughter moved in with him – only that time, he hadn't stolen her away. "Just try and relax, okay? I promise I'll try and get to the bottom of it, but you really do need to go to bed."
"I don't want to until I've spoken to Mum," Grace insists, her voice barely audible through the tears.
"It's the middle of the night in England," he reminds her, gently but firmly. "She isn't going to ring you back until tomorrow at the earliest. So can we please go to bed?"
It takes another ten minutes, but somehow Sam manages to get Grace to go to bed, and he's left in the living room alone with his thoughts. Well, his thoughts, a large sheaf of paperwork and a slightly larger than large malt whisky, and the problem of what Connie Beauchamp is doing.
She has a game, he's sure of it. It's deliberate to go from constant contact with Grace – and fighting a court case to try and regain custody – to the occasional text, to then absolutely nothing. She cut the legal action, too, without even a word; that was the first trigger that something deeper was at play. He can't fathom what she would do, what she could be capable of, and that worries him slightly. Because, no matter how twisted her games have been, he's always been one step ahead of her – because for everything he tries to claim about having the moral high ground, he's far shadier and more underhand than even she could ever be.
On the spur of the moment, Sam sets the pile of paperwork to the side and grabs his laptop. For some unknown reason, his registration information at Holby City Hospital hasn't been deleted, meaning that he's still able to access the rota information for the Emergency Department. Actually, every department – as apparently he hasn't been replaced as Medical Director. Unsurprising, given the manner in which he quit, and incredibly useful for when he wants to stalk his ex-lover.
For all his rhetoric of togetherness and we could be a family together, his feelings for Connie Beauchamp are the most complicated part of his life. Hatred is followed by irritation, which is followed by lust, and then finally, the scariest part of the circle: the idea that, should they make one iota of effort, they could be a family. That they could be the strongest couple in the world – if they only gave the idea of being happy a shot for ten seconds.
And then she turns away, scarred by some emotional trauma that probably happened ten or twenty years ago and she hasn't sought help for, and he gets bored. Well, not bored per se – frustrated is probably more accurate. So he gives her space until she initiates some form of contact, and the whole cycle continues again.
Within seconds, he's logged onto the ED's rota, and sees that Connie's off. Though that's not a surprise, given it's two in the morning in England, he has noticed that she's working much fewer hours than normal – something which is feeding his suspicions that she's planning something to do with Grace.
Someone who could be of use is working, however. Charlie Fairhead – the closest thing to Elliott Hope that Connie has in the Emergency Department. Nowhere near as good, of course, but Connie's certainly unable to be a beggar in the team she's created herself.
Impulsively, Sam dials Charlie's once-familiar number and waits for the all-too familiar sound of an international call dial tone, before a wary, tired voice answers. "Hello?"
Sitting forwards, Sam clears his throat before he speaks. "Hi, Charlie? It's Sam Strachan here…yeah, sorry for the late call – you are at work, aren't you?"
"Yes," Charlie begins cautiously. "Look, if this is about Grace ringing, I passed onto Connie that she had rang."
Sam frowns, but decides to tactically ignore this. Clearly his daughter wants to speak to Connie more than he had previously thought.
"No it's not about that, Charlie…well, it sort of is, but not that exactly," Sam replies, rambling a little. "She isn't answering any of Grace's calls – or mine. Not that that's a surprise on my part, but it is a worry. I do care about her, Charlie, no matter what she thinks."
"I know," Charlie confirms, sounding marginally more awake. "There's something wrong, Sam, I've been meaning to ring you for a while, but you know how it is…She won't tell me, or anyone to be honest. The only person who knows is Ethan, and he's keeping her secret as tightly as she is, though it's clear that he isn't happy about it."
Something tugs inside Sam's chest, but he ignores it. "What do you think it is?"
"I don't know."
Slightly frustrated, Sam counts to five before replying. It wouldn't do to alienate Charlie now, after all. "An educated guess then?"
"Honestly, Sam, I haven't got a clue," Charlie replies, his tone suggesting that he's aware of Sam's frustrations. "Thirty years plus of medicine hasn't made me a doctor, after all. But she's definitely ill. I just don't know how – or if she's even getting treatment. If she is, it isn't on the NHS…"
Sam snorts. "No, Connie certainly wouldn't," he confirms, thinking back to the one time that he could remember Connie being ill in the time before. Before everything got even more complicated than it already was. "Wouldn't want any of you to be able to access her notes, anyway. Do you think it's likely that you could get her to answer the phone to me?"
"That's about as likely as she is to tell me what's wrong," Charlie replies, almost immediately. "She's still hurt about what you did, Sam. One minute you were on the verge of becoming a family again, and then you're gone – with Grace, too."
"You heard about that, then?" Shit, Sam thinks. Maybe Charlie's less likely to help him than he had banked on.
Charlie laughs. "Anyone who knows Connie in the slightest knew that she was hurt that you left," he explains, his tone gentle. "If you forgive an old man his analogy, it was as if she was a teenage girl who had just drawn both of your initials in a heart."
"Right…"
"And then when you left, she ripped it up, burned it, and then burned the ashes." Charlie's tone almost becomes a warning. "So tread carefully, Sam. I don't think that she's up for a fight, honestly."
"Okay," Sam says. "Thank you, Charlie. Honestly, I really appreciate it. If you could avoid letting her know that I've rang, that'd be great…but I think I'll be seeing you soon."
This time, Charlie's words are intended as a warning. "Don't try and make things any worse just to get one up with Grace, Sam. I can assure you, you would live to regret it." He doesn't say anything else, simply hangs up the call, leaving Sam pondering the information that he's just learned.
Connie's ill. It could be anything with her – even something as stupid as a secret pregnancy. His baby. How poetically unjust would that be, for him to have left with their first child, just for her to have their second?
But surely that's unlikely. She would have to be, what, five months pregnant now? That wouldn't be something that even Connie could hide, slight as she is.
No, it's more likely to be something serious. Something that's got Connie giving up.
Or maybe it's a ruse to trick the team into thinking that she's quitting when, actually, she's going to come and steal Grace.
He has no idea. Connie Beauchamp has always been an enigma, and that hasn't changed now. But he knows what he has to do now.
He has to go back.
~x~
It's been three days, and there's not been a single attempt from Grace to try and contact Connie.
Under any normal circumstances, this would be devastating for Connie. But for this strange, painful, confusing situation that she's in, it's a good thing. She doesn't have to try and lie to her daughter – and she doesn't have to pretend to have missed the calls.
She's finally achieved the distance that, perhaps, would have been better to have had from the beginning. If she hadn't fought for her in those early days, it would certainly have been easier to have severed the contact now, wouldn't it?
"Morning, Mrs Beauchamp," Ethan says cordially, as she approaches the workstation nearest to her office. "You really shouldn't be here," he reminds her gently.
"I'm fine," she replies distractedly, tucking her phone into her pocket. "I'm on cubicles, Ethan. It's hardly heart surgery."
"You know the risk of infection is too high," he urges her, his voice dropping in volume as some of the night staff approach. "At least stay in your office if you're too stubborn to go home."
Somewhere inside, Connie knows that she needs to quash Ethan's caring side, but she can't quite bring herself to get rid of the one person in her life who talks the sense she needs to hear.
"Yes, well, perhaps after lunch," she replies flatly, picking up a file from the desk. "But for now, I'll go and do my job. Unless you want to make it public why you're challenging me, that is…"
"I won't do that," he promises. "You know I won't. But when you've got chemo again next week, Connie, you can't pick up any illnesses…it could be catastrophic."
An unwelcome image flashes through her mind: Sam, all those years ago, in ITU.
"Catastrophic," she repeats, a small, wry smile on her lips. "Doctor Hardy, you do so have a way with words. Perhaps a literary career, if you ever lose your interest in medicine?"
~x~
It takes him a week to organise things enough for him to get back to the UK – work, it seems, aren't a fan of letting their Head of Department go on an extended leave of absence, especially when they've just returned. Grace's school aren't impressed either, though the mention of an ill parent has them ultimately supporting his decision.
He also can't rush them off back to England for the simple reason that he doesn't want to worry Grace. He's told her some rubbish about Connie being unable to answer the phone due to crazy shifts – crazier than normal, he's stressed, crazy enough that she doesn't even have time to sleep let alone do anything else. It's probably a bad idea, but at least it'll prepare Grace for seeing Connie looking ill. If she really is ill, that is.
"So does Mum know that we're coming?" Grace asks, her tone excited as they disembark from the plane at Holby Airport. "Or is it a surprise, like when we went back to America?"
Her comment startles Sam, and makes him question how totally his daughter believes that Connie wanted to surprise her with a secret move back to New York.
"She doesn't know," he admits, tightening his grip on his laptop case. "And we're not going to see her straight away. We can't startle her – not when she's been working this much, after all."
"Oh, okay," Grace says, her tone dropping. "So I guess we're not staying with her, either?"
"Nope," Sam confirms. "Or maybe we will. But not for the first few days. Then we can reassess the situation."
It takes almost two hours to get through customs and security, and then pick up a hire car from the airport, and then a further hour to drive back to the hospital. They have to take the longer route because, as Sam remembers almost too late, the shorter route involves going near the cliff which Connie's car flew over all those months ago. But, finally, after a brief pit stop at their hotel to drop off Grace's ridiculous number of bags, they make their way to the Emergency Department of Holby City Hospital.
"Now, do you remember what we've agreed, Gracie?" Sam asks sternly.
"Yes," she huffs.
"What is it?"
"That I won't run off and try and find Mum, that I'll stay with you, and if you tell me to go with Charlie, I will and I won't complain," Grace replies, rolling her eyes. "I still think it's totally ridiculous."
"Think that," Sam says, a touch of humour in his tone. "Just don't act on it."
With a deep breath, he gets out of the car and crosses the road with Grace, approaching the department with trepidation. He won't be greeted with kindness or even neutrality; there's a culture which is entirely against Sam Strachan in here, from the sound of what Charlie said.
He bypasses reception and heads straight for the nurse manager's office in the hope that Charlie will be there. He's lucky.
"Sam…" Charlie says slowly, making eye contact with the younger man as he enters the office. "What…what are you doing here?"
With an overstated glance at Grace, Sam smiles and replies, "just came back to visit Connie, didn't we, Grace?"
"Yeah, we wanted to see Mum!" Grace replies. "But Dad said I have to wait with you until he's spoken to her. Which is super annoying. How are you, Charlie?"
There's a semi-amused expression on Charlie's face as he makes eye contact with Grace. "I'm good thanks, Grace," he replies. "Can I get you to stay in here with Duffy while me and your Dad have a quick conversation outside?"
"You can tell me all about New York," Duffy interjects immediately, not allowing Grace to protest. "I've always wanted to go – is Central Park as nice as they say?"
Surreptitiously, Sam and Charlie slip out of the office and close the door behind them.
"You brought her with you?" Charlie hisses, his tone conveying his anger. "You need to have a frank conversation with Connie, Sam. Bringing Grace isn't going to let that happen."
"What could I have done?" Sam hisses back, running a hand through his hair. "If she really is ill – and I say if, as this could all be a game – then Grace needs to see her again. You know that better than anyone."
"So what's your plan?" Charlie asks coolly. "Burst into her office and demand that she tells you what's wrong?"
"Er, I hadn't got that far," Sam admits. "But that sounds like a start. Except for one small issue…" He grits his teeth, his eyes flitting across the department.
"And that is?"
"Her office is open," Sam explains, pointing to the open door. "And she isn't in there. Any idea where she could be?"
Charlie frowns. "She said she was on paperwork this afternoon," he replies, confusion evident in his tone. "Look, I'm not impressed with how you've just turned up. But if you give me two minutes, I'll get her new number and you can ring her and sort this out once and for all."
"Thanks, Charlie. I owe you."
"I'm doing it for her and Grace," Charlie replies darkly. "Not you."
Sam suddenly wonders if anyone would ever believe the fact that he cares about Connie Beauchamp more than them all put together.
~x~
It's like a nightmare. Maybe it is a nightmare – maybe she's passed out somewhere and this is the way that the cancer is trying to hurt her now.
But as she looks up from the stack of paperwork, she catches sight of a familiar face, one that she hadn't expected to see again – at least not in Holby City Hospital.
Sam Strachan.
And if Sam's here, then it's likely that Grace isn't far behind.
Grabbing her phone, Connie panics and stands up, rushing out of the office. This is the first place he'll look for her – if he wants to find her, that is. She needs to go somewhere and think, somewhere he won't come for her.
Irrationally, the first place she thinks of is the female toilets.
She bypasses the ones closest to her office, simply because they're the busier ones. Instead, she heads to the rarely used ones in the Major Incident Overflow area of the department, the one that is a warren of white sheets and empty spaces where beds used to be until they had to pull them into the corridors to deal with the patient overflow which comes with every NHS cut. These toilets aren't frequented, even by the cleaners, and there's a layer of dust over the mirrors, distorting her reflection.
Surely she's imagining this. She has to be. Sam Strachan can't be back here, not without any warning.
Then again, she thinks wryly, that's his forte. Whenever he appears (or disappears), he doesn't give warning. He just appears. Or goes.
Why now, though, she thinks. She's ill. He couldn't have chosen a worse time to appear – because, for all his flaws, he's a remarkably competent doctor. And more than that, he's a cardiothoracic surgeon; he'll be able to connect the dots between her symptoms with ease. Whilst he won't get cancer – even he isn't that good – he'll certainly be able to tell that there's something wrong with her circulatory system.
Dependent how good he's become, maybe he'll even be able to pinpoint it.
Of course he had to come now, she thinks bitterly. He had to come and try and save the day, or whatever it is that he's here for. Maybe he's here because he's stopped running from the prospect of them being a family. That's how he's always worked; he proposes the idea of a family, of being a unit, and then he realises that he isn't ready for it, that he isn't willing to make any form of change to make their relationship work. Then he bolts until he comes to terms with it.
Last time, it took him eight years. Five months is certainly an improvement.
It's only then that she lets herself think of Grace. Grace, sweet Grace, the daughter she wanted so badly and couldn't bear to give up. The daughter she's done her best to hurt over the past few weeks, so that it would be one less person who mourned her death.
Grace, who is most likely in this hospital, who is going to see how weak her mother really is.
Interrupting her reverie, Connie's phone starts to ring. It's an unfamiliar number, and she frowns, before deciding to pick it up. She has a sneaking suspicion that she knows who it is – and, for once, she's up for the challenge.
"Hello?" Connie whispers, wrapping her left arm around her body.
"Connie?" A familiar voice says in response, his tone firm, and his voice initiates a fight or flight instinct in Connie.
This time, she chooses to fight.
"What do you want, Sam?" Connie replies, deciding to act as if she hasn't a clue that he's in her hospital. "Isn't it the middle of the night over there?"
He laughs once, then twice, and she can tell that he's trying to make his voice less harsh when he replies, "you know perfectly well that I'm in your department, Connie. So let's cut the bull and tell me where you are."
Connie snorts. "And why exactly would I do that, Sam, when you're clearly here for a fight?" Taking a deep breath, she leans over the sink slightly, using its mass to keep her balance. Arguing's taking more of a toll than she thought it would. "Just leave, and we'll pretend that none of this ever happened. That we never happened."
There's shocked silence. "Why on earth would we want to do that?" Sam asks, astonished. "For better or worse, Connie, we're a family of some form, and I need to talk to you."
"A family where you up and run without even a word of warning? Some family," Connie spits back. "Look, I don't have time for this. Go back, take Grace, and be a family without me. You…you clearly don't need me." It takes everything she has to force herself to say this because, no matter how much she says otherwise, she wants Sam. She needs him.
She just needs him to look after Grace more.
"I know you're ill," Sam blurts out, and Connie almost drops her phone. "I…I spoke to Charlie. And I'm not leaving until we've at least had a conversation face-to-face." His tone is firm, and Connie decides it's not worth her effort trying to fight anymore. She should save her battles for another day.
"Fine," she concedes, unable to hide the exhaustion from her voice. "But…I'll talk to you. Not Grace. Keep her away. Please." Her voice becomes a beg, and she has to breathe deeply to stop herself crying.
"Just me," Sam promises, his tone gentle. Gentler than he's used with her for years, at any rate. It's a voice he'd use with Grace, or at least someone he cares about. "I promise. I don't want to hurt her, but I don't want to hurt you either."
"Should have thought about that before you ran off," Connie retorts, unable to stop herself. She hiccups, which turns into a half-sob. "I'll…I'll meet you in the gardens outside the Wyvern Wing. Ten minutes."
Before Sam can reply, she hangs up and sets her phone down on the sink. She has ten minutes to pull herself together, to be the strongest, baddest Connie Beauchamp the world has ever seen.
A Connie Beauchamp who doesn't need Sam Strachan, no matter how far that might be from the truth.
~x~
It's with trepidation that Connie approaches the gardens outside the main part of the hospital, her coat tucked tightly around her body. For all of the issues she has with Sam Strachan, he's managed to broach her hard exterior more successfully than anyone in the fifty years she's been alive – and she's scared that he'll do the same thing again. Unfortunately, this time, he's going to be faced with a prospect that he's never had before: a Connie Beauchamp who can't build herself back up.
He isn't here, thankfully, as she begins to slowly pace the strip of pavement in front of the flower patch closest to the hospital. Slowly enough that it couldn't cause her heartrate to increase, but fast enough that nobody would stop to ask if she's okay. It's a fine balance, an art that she's perfected – how to look okay when you're really, really not.
"Connie." His voice almost startles her, and it takes a split second to place who it is. Sam. He really is here. It wasn't a dream – or a nightmare. He's here, and he's real, far more real than a distant voice on the end of a phone could ever be.
"Sam," she retorts coolly, summoning up all of the strength she possibly can in preparation for this war of words. "Nice to see that you're capable of turning up as suddenly as you can disappear."
She turns to face him, noting how her words don't even trigger a reaction on his face. Clearly, she's become predictable.
"What's wrong?" He comes straight out and says it, his eyes roaming up and down her body, across her face. "Just tell me. I'll work it out, you know I will."
Connie rolls her eyes. "Because you're the world's best doctor? Why are you back?"
"What's wrong with you?"
They're at an impasse, as they always are, and Connie can feel herself breathing more heavily. She needs to rein the anger in, at least until she's sure the argument's almost over.
"Why. Are. You. Here?" She repeats through gritted teeth.
The mask on Sam's face breaks and, for a split second, he looks concerned in a way she doesn't think he's ever been for her. She blinks, and it's gone. Perhaps she did imagine that.
"You're not well," he replies matter-of-factly. "I thought you were playing a game with Grace, that you were going to do something mad, but I don't think you are. I think, in your twisted way, you're trying to protect her." He's trying to goad her into saying what's wrong with the insult, and she won't fall for it. Sam Strachan might be an enigma to most of the world but, to her, she knows every single one of his tricks.
"I will always protect Grace," Connie vows. "And since when do you do anything for me, Sam? As far as I was concerned, I came at the very bottom of your priority list."
This time, it's Sam's turn to roll his eyes. "We both know that that's utter bollocks, Connie," he replies curtly. "And it's also a conversation for another time. Now, are you going to make me guess, or are you just going to tell me what's wrong?"
"I can handle it on my own," Connie insists, clinging to the flame inside of her, the one burning the fuse of all of her frustrated rants and secret sobs about Sam Strachan and his sudden departure all those months ago. "Now, just take Grace and go. I don't need you."
He doesn't even need to refute that last statement. They both know that it isn't true, deep down at least.
"Significant weight loss, a distinct pallor to the skin," Sam begins. "You're clearly cold – and Noel told me that the heating's been on full since October, which is most unlike you. You're gripping your chest, and you're looking distinctly worried, which leads me to believe that…it's the circulatory system. Probably the heart, which is why you've been so keen to keep me away."
"Don't flatter yourself," Connie retorts. "You're hardly a cardiothoracic specialist."
"And why you've been so keen to spend time with a registrar in emergency medicine, who wouldn't know a cardiac contusion if it hit him in the face," Sam continues, a note of amusement registering in his voice. "Do I need to go on, Connie, or are you just going to tell me? I'm far better than you ever thought I could be."
"I'm sure that's as far from the truth as you could be."
"You're doing a disservice to yourself," Sam continues. "I'll figure it out, and I'll just annoy you all the way. At least if you tell me, you get rid of me faster."
It's a trick. It must be.
Shrugging indifferently, Connie shakes her head. "I don't believe you for a second, Sam."
She's right, because then his tact changes, and he's angry. Angrier than she's seen him in years – as angry as when Grace fell down the stairs, all those years ago.
"Why are you so bloody selfish, Connie?" He shouts. "There's not just you in the world. There's a little girl who has been worried sick because her ignorant, scheming mother has deliberately ignored her for weeks. Not as much as a word! I bet it's nothing, I bet this is all an act to try and get Grace here so that you can run away with her and try and hurt me as much as I've hurt you. Well, it isn't going to work, Connie."
Without thinking, Connie blurts out, "I wish that was true. Because it's cancer. And you of all people should know what that's like."
There's a beat of silence as she realises what she's said (and that this was his plan all along; he's always been far too scheming for her), and he processes what she's said.
And the anger drops out of the pair of them.
"Shit," Sam replies. "Cardiac?"
Connie nods.
"I'm really sorry," is his next words, and it rears her anger once again.
"Sorry?" She repeats, scoffing. "You're as far from sorry as you can be."
"What on earth are you talking about?"
A small, sad yet bitter smile slips onto Connie's lips. "This is what you wanted all along, isn't it? A world where you get to have the perfect daughter without me hanging around in the background, a perpetual threat to the little world that you've created. Obviously you didn't expect this – even you can't plot around the human body, Sam – but it's perfect for you. So let's stop pretending that you care, and just go back to how things were."
She tries to walk away, but Sam takes a hold of her left arm. She pretends to fight, but doesn't really mean it because, now that she's finished speaking, she's spent. She certainly wouldn't be able to walk back to the department now, not unaided.
"You're as far from the truth as you could possibly be, Connie," Sam retorts, his voice low. "I've been here before, remember? I know that you need people around you – like you were for me, even though I pushed you away."
"Well, this time you ran away," Connie reminds him, turning so he can't see her face. There are tears forming, and she isn't ready for Sam to see her cry. "Look, you know now. So you can go back to New York, with Grace, and we can pretend that this conversation happened over the phone…"
"Absolutely no chance," Sam says firmly. "Whether you like it or not, Connie, we're a family. And families stick together during things like this."
She doesn't have the heart to remind him that, in their family, he was the one who walked away.
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