Surfboards and Smiles

Please be kind, this is my first Sam/Dylan fiction and I was a little bit nervous about posting it! I intend on this being a short series of 3 or 4 parts which will all be set over the course of one day, reminiscing of key events in Sam and Dylan's relationship.

Oh and please review, good or bad :)

Chapter One – The Walk That Night

The day had been a peculiar one for Dr Sam Nicholls, she was standing by her locker at the end of a particularly long shift contemplating the events of the day. As she stood there, she couldn't help but smile to herself at what she thought had been a predominantly successful day.

It had been a pretty bad morning for her, she been picking through her redirected mail, which had been forwarded to her from her previous address, when one of them caught her eye. It was addressed to Mrs Samantha Keogh, a name which she hadn't used for a long time.

When she first married the man, who had become known to her as Grumpy, they had both decided that in a personal capacity that she would be known as Samantha Keogh but in a profession capacity she would remain Dr Nicholls in order to create the much craved separation between work and home life for the couple. Working in the same hospital and in the same department had taken a toll on their relationship to begin with as he had been her superior and it was deemed to have been 'inappropriate' by some of the staff due to the age gap however this was never something which had crossed her mind, he was the man she loved and no number was every going to change that in her mind.

Samantha Nicholls had always been wise for her years, even when she was a small child her mother had always commented on the fact that she wanted to contribute to 'grown up conversation' rather than play with the other children, in her eyes it had been because she was more comfortable at her mother's side, away for the possibility of having to interact socially with other, something which had never been her forte – perhaps one of the reasons why she had been so attracted to Dylan which she first met him. She both respected him as a superior doctor but was also intrigued by him which fuelled her desire to get to know him more.

This desire lead to her opting as much as possible to work alongside the man, watching carefully how he worked, how he moved through each stage of diagnostic contemplation in his mind and above all she absorbed all the information which he handed her way. In a way she was almost scared of disappointing him which is why she always worked so hard whenever she was in his presence as a means of getting him to notice her.

They had never planned that their relationship would go anything beyond being colleagues who worked closely together, Sam had become part of a very selective network of staff who Dylan was willing to work alongside as an equal, the first time that their relationship moved from anything more than colleagues was at a staff leaving party, an event which neither of them had any desire to attend but had been practically forced there by their then Clinical Lead Miriam Turner. At said event they had both taking up refuge in the furthest corner away from the others in a bid to avoid the awkward social interaction which neither of them had been comfortable with. They had their own ways of communicating, in silence, in the eye contact which they made, they could say so much more than most others could with words.

At times when they were working together, especially on a critically ill patient, others observing them would think that they were one person as they worked so seamlessly together in the absence of words, each knowing what the other was going to do next. Their means of communication was almost telepathic.

On the particular night in question they had both managed to avoid interacting with the rest of the group for the most part until Sam announced that she was going to excuse herself for the evening as she had an early start in the morning, Dylan then saw this as his opportunity to also leave the gathering , offering to drive her home to save her the walk.

As they left the pub, both relieved to finally be out of the presence of others, they walked in silence to his Land Rover.

"If it wouldn't be too much of an inconvenience to you, I would like to drop my car off at my boat and walk you the rest of the way to your home with my dog as she will be desperate to get off the boat by now." It was more of a statement of his intentions rather than a question as to whether this would be acceptable to Sam

"You don't have to walk me, I will be fine on my own" As much as she wanted to spend the time with the man who she had grown to admire, she didn't want to put him out.

"Nonsense, I said I would escort you home and besides Dervla gets bored when I take her on the same routes when I walk her." He had always been one to personify the beloved creature.

For the rest of the journey they sat in silence as he drove them through the familiar streets until they reached the mooring where his beloved boat sat. As soon as Dylan had parked the jeep, Dervla was sitting at the small widow of the boat, lead in mouth, having obviously been able to hear her master return.

As they began the short walk to Sam's flat with the dog walking in-between them, in an almost childlike fashion, Sam couldn't help but feel simply content and wanted to savour this moment in her mind. The closer they got to her flat, the more she wanted to walk to go on for longer, when she spent time with Dylan she often felt like she belonged, although she never had any expectation for anything to happen between them.

She made her way up the few steps in the approach to her front door, she saw that he was following her up which made her stomach flutter somewhat, despite the fact that she never saw herself as a woman who would ever feel like that. In that moment she decided that she would, for once in her life, through caution to the wind and invite him into her flat.

"Would you like to come in for a coffee?" Instantly after the words left her mouth, she almost wished that she would inhale them again and that they hadn't came out as she saw him thinking the question over, she was almost terrified of his rejection "It's just that I have been working on some research and I would be really grateful if you would take a look at it for me" she added hastily as an excuse for her question.

"Oh, em, yes, sure, I guess I could take a look at it, if you don't mind Dervla's mucky paws in your flat" He almost looked embarrassed at her request and she couldn't help but think that she had crossed the line

"Only if it wouldn't put you out, I'm sure you have better things to be doing rather than look at my research, perhaps I should just bring it to your office tomorrow..." Before she had a chance to finish her sentence he had leaned in to kiss her softly on the lips, almost brushing by her delicately, a kiss so tender that made her feel so wanted in that moment, she moved closer towards his body, kissing him deeper.

"Samantha, I would very much like some coffee."

It was those simple words which marked the start of their relationship, so simple yet they meant so much to her. He became the only person to call her Samantha, it was almost as if that name was reserved for him to call her and to this day if anyone else referred to her in such a way she corrected them, that was always going to be his name for her no matter what happened between.

She sighed to herself as she stood against the locker, wondering how so much time had passed since that night and how so much had happened in their relationship to the point where their marriage was simply a technicality.