A/N Hello all! My first venture into Holby fiction, for a few years at least! And certainly on these boards. This should be about a 3-4 parter, do let me know how it shapes up! Sarah.

Triplicate.

Part 1. Awake.

For the past few days he's been kidding himself that this is an entirely professional excursion. A patient is in need and he had to contact one of the only two pioneering transplant centres outside of London, for the sake of Mr Ellison. Even as a GP in Cumbria he couldn't see a patient die without hope when he only had to flex his status to get a slot with the best team in the country. The opportunity had presented itself when he'd stumbled across a journal article singing the praises of a groundbreaking domino procedure at none other than Holby City.

He made the arrangement before he had time to consider his true motivation, let alone that Edinburgh had a similar centre far closer. In fact he can almost convince himself Jac didn't cross mind at all until he received a call from Holby's transplant coordinator and the wheels rolled into motion with alarming speed. Then, travelling at 120mph on a late night cross country service to the south west, he finally has time to think.

For most of the time that Joseph had known Jac Naylor she had remained a complete and unarguable enigma to himself and everybody else around him. There were of course moments of clarity, when every now and then he'd imagine he could see exactly why she'd done or said what she had. These cropped up all too often in their blissful early relationship, and eventually he came to see that every moment he spent with her then was overridden by her inability to trust him. Only in his last few weeks in Holby had he really began to understand her, and as he did it was as if she unravelled before his eyes. When she first confessed her feelings he had been taken aback, but at last filled with a sense of pride that this woman, so emotionally unfathomable, had finally laid herself bare before him.

It was as if she finally made sense in every single way, and to this day he has complete confidence that he must understand her and be capable of caring for her better than anybody else. It's not a modest claim, sure, and he checks himself as he ponders the possibilities this visit could behold. He has to actively remind himself that it is of course only a visit, and in 48 hours he is returning to his home, and his son.

The 0039 arrives into Holby Parkway with pleasing punctuality, rumbling into the station with an automated accompaniment, waking his fellow passengers and only serving to widen his own red rimmed eyes. He steps out into the station on autopilot, next stop taxi rank, then hotel, and an inevitably sleepless night of anticipation.

oooo

As it transpires Jac is not the sort of woman you can fall asleep with, tired and satisfied with limbs entangled, perhaps an arm draped protectively over her milky stomach. Perhaps he shouldn't be so surprised. She only let him fall asleep in her on call room at all because this particular dalliance came off the back of a tough eighteen hour day for them both, and their eyes had begun to close before their chests stopped heaving.

For Jonny, that blissful harmony didn't even last an hour. His cruel awakening was in the form of a particularly sharp wrist to the face, jolting him dizzily back into reality. His first conscious thought was that of the completeness with which her incredible hair had obscured his vision.

He's overwhelmed by the smell of sweet coconut shampoo as he wipes a mouthful of her soft tresses from his face and sits up, alert. He has never before had the privilege of seeing somebody so unbelievably asleep. It could keep a person awake just to watch, even if that person didn't have an ulterior motive. (That being her pleasingly approachable unconscious body.)

Her hair truly is splayed across the bed in every direction, and as he's shifted himself upright against the headboard much of it lies across his left thigh. She doesn't seem to go more than five minutes without rolling over, wriggling, or uttering the occasional murmur. It's nigh on adorable. Another fifteen and she slides across the pillow, her head coming to rest against his hip. Her right hand falls backwards to lean tantalizingly close to his groin. He smirks, can't help but feel a bit dirty as he responds to her innocent move by gently stroking her hair. Damn, that hair, he could fall for that hair.

Jonny has never danced with insomnia before, and as he turns the possibility of his feelings for Jac over in his mind he starts to regret his initial pleasure at the current situation. He's half stunned if truth be told, that after all their macho game play and mutual assurance that this 'relationship' is only physical, he finds that he'd be happy to watch her sleep until dawn with a cramp in his neck.

Fallen; Well and truly felled. Knocked sideways and trodden on.

oooo

A student nurse called Emma rolls over in bed and, for the umpteenth time that night, succumbs to the display on her alarm clock; 04:53am. She sighs in exasperation, as in not less than three hours she'll be walking into the front entrance of Holby City Hospital to start a placement on their acute admissions unit. She's been determined to excel ever since she first saw the allocation list. This is what she's been working towards for months and she's certain all that studying will pay off.

Of course, she's also chewed up with fear. The reasons for that, however, stretch far deeper than those of any other nervy new girl.