Apologies to those of you who were hoping for an update to Hello Goodbye; a combination of the untimely demise of my Mac and chronic indecision mean that I've, er, not got any further with it. As this is a remedy that's worked in the past, I've dashed off something completely different in the hope that writing something, even on a lousy 7" netbook, will get the creative juices flowing again. Thank you for your patience, and I hope you enjoy this in the meantime. Usual disclaimers apply.

Oh, and a guid new year to you all!

It wasn't the pallid expression that she noticed first. It wasn't the nascent beard, the new hollows underneath his cheekbones, or even the fact that he was clad only in a pale blue tshirt and trunks. It was that his face fell when he saw who was standing on the doorstep.

Wordlessly, he moved to close the door, and she placed her palm against the panel.

'We need to talk.'

His eyes were cold. 'I think you've said everything that needs to be said, don't you?'

'No,' she responded, simply.

His head sagged onto his chest. 'Please, just go.' His reactions dulled by too little sleep and too much alcohol, he could only step back as, with a muttered 'oh for god's sake', she pushed the door out of his grasp and strode past him down the hall. Closing the door, Harry stood for a moment with his forehead resting against it, trying to slow his breathing and the hammering of his heart.

She half expected the living room to be full of discarded pizza cartons and crumpled beer cans, but an empty whisky bottle lying on the rug and a quarter-full crystal tumbler beside it were the only visible indicators of his apparent emotional state. Una voce poco fa was lilting from the CD player. She smiled softly, a smile that faded when he appeared in the doorway and she, in the better light, could see the toll that the preceding weeks had taken.

'You look awful.'

'Well, I wasn't expecting visitors. Look, why don't you just say what you came here to say then bugger off.' She saw a flicker of consternation cross his face at the profanity but he didn't apologise. Nor did he move from the doorway. His arms were crossed high on his chest, causing the tshirt to ride up. Once upon a time she would have been embarrassed and directed her remarks to the floor, but now she looked him in the eye.

'I came to see how you were. I came to say I'm sorry.'

'Oh? For what? Humiliating me in front of the Home Secretary and the JIC? For avoiding me ever since? Or for throwing how I feel about you back in my face and happily sending me off to what I think we all assumed would be my death?' He paused. 'I could go on.'

She stared at him in disbelief. He met her gaze, his eyes now blazing.

'Happily? Why don't you ask Tariq if that is an accurate summary of the situation? And as for humiliating you, I had to say what I did, don't you see that? I had to make them believe that I didn't love you and had made it clear to you that nothing would ever happen between us. If they thought for a moment that your prime motivation in giving Lucas Albany was to save me or impress me or that it was anything other than a rational operational decision they would have thrown you to the wolves, bye bye career, without a second thought.'

'They still might. It's not over yet.' Harry uncrossed his arms and padded over to the window, leaning heavily on the sill. 'Is that true? Why you said what you did?'

'Of course it's true. Do you think I would lie to you about something like that? About anything?'

He massaged his forehead. 'No.'

Ruth sank onto the sofa, twisting the strap of her handbag between her fingers. The eyes gazing at his rigid back were beseeching as she desperately sought for words that would convey how she'd felt without wounding him more than she already had. And it was obvious that Harry wasn't going to help make it any easier.

She took a deep breath. 'And as for what I said after... Albany, I was just shocked that you could condemn millions of people to death in order to save me. How could you expect me to be able to live with that kind of burden?'

'Albany was a fake, Ruth. It never worked. But it was useful to have the Chinese and others believe otherwise.'

She frowned. 'I know that. But you still gave away a state secret to save me. I'm not worth that, Harry.'

'You are to me.' He turned to face her, and her heart lurched at the pain in his eyes. 'All I ever seem to do is let you down; say the wrong thing, do the wrong thing; and when Lucas snatched you I thought that was my chance to atone. And while I'm not saying that I expected you to fall weeping and grateful into my arms, I didn't expect ...well...' He fell silent. The hand that he wearily dragged along the stubbled line of his jaw was shaking.

Slowly Ruth rose to her feet and crossed the room to him. As her outstretched fingers touched his arm, he flinched. 'Don't...please.' He took a step back.

The hurt she might have felt at the rebuff was now overshadowed by her concern at his obvious distress. 'Okay, look, why don't I run you a bath, and while you're having that I could cook you something. You look like you haven't eaten in days.'

He grimaced. 'You've said your piece. Can't you just go?'

'I'm not leaving you like this.'

'Why not? You made me like this.'

He heard her gasp. 'Ohh, that...that's not fair. That's really not fair.'

'Oh, Ruth, Ruth, I could explain exactly why it's totally fair, and off we'd go again, round in bloody circles, because that's all we ever bloody do!'

He stormed out of the room and a few seconds later she heard his footsteps on the stairs. Shaken, she waited a few moments and then followed him. It was the first time she'd been upstairs at his house; the stairwell, painted in an anonymous, inoffensive, pale green, was decorated with black and white prints of contemporary London. Ordinarily she would have paused to examine them more closely, but she carried on up. The landing was in darkness, but from the light of the window behind her she could see that the stairwell theme continued, and the bare, varnished floorboards were covered with what looked to her like a very expensive Persian rug.

'Harry?' she called. No response. Further down the landing she could see a door slightly ajar. Pushing it open, she found herself looking into his study. Opposite her was a large desk, with a Mac, printer and telephone in one corner. Edging into the room she could see that the walls were lined with bookshelves, and at the far end two large brown leather sofas faced each other across a low coffee table. Harry lay on one, his arm resting on his forehead, staring unseeing up at the ceiling. Only the rapid rise and fall of his chest implied that all was not well. Still wearing her raincoat, Ruth perched on the sofa opposite, her fingers toying with the belt, her head bowed.

'I've been seeing a psychologist,' she began. 'When he came back to the Grid, and...well, Alec insisted, and he's not really the kind of guy you argue with. Anyway, I went along, thinking it would be like Miranda Saunders all over again, and it wasn't. It was actually quite helpful.' She glanced up at Harry. He hadn't moved.

'I-I've been going to her twice a week, and we've worked through a lot. Everything from my dad's death, to what happened with Lucas, to George...and, well, us.'

Harry snorted. 'Us? That'll have been a short conversation.'

'She helped make a lot of things make sense. And she helped me accept how I feel about you.'

Harry turned his head towards her, his expression unreadable.

'..Accept? You make it sound like some kind of terminal diagnosis.'

When she raised her head he was shocked to see tears in her eyes. 'I had got used to how I felt about you. I was comfortable with it, and I thought that was all there would ever be. Then I found out that you felt the same, and it scared the living daylights out of me. I...' Ruth palmed her cheek and took a deep breath. 'And George...he was a good man, and he died, and Nico lost his father, because of me. And what's worse...' she let the tears flow unhindered now, 'he died knowing that I didn't really love him; not like I loved you. But just having me in his life was enough. He loved me that much.'

I loved you that much, Harry thought. And for long and weary just knowing that you were safe and happy was enough, but then when I had to see you on the Grid every day as the list of funerals we attended grew...

'I've lost every single man I've ever loved, and I thought that frankly you were better off without me, but Diane and Lucas persuaded me otherwise.'

'Lucas?'

'Before he drugged me we talked a bit; I was trying to stall him. For some reason I told him that you had asked me to marry you and I turned you down. He thought I should say yes.'

Harry was silent for a bit, then he swung his legs onto the floor and sat up. 'Is there a point to all this, or did you just want to twist the knife a bit more?'

'I wondered if a second date might be a possibility.' Her voice quavered a little. 'I don't mean a Grand Tour, just a drink, or dinner, or something, and we can take it from there.'

He looked down at his hands, dangling between his knees. 'Why? Why now?'

'Because...because I love you. And because I'm going to be selfish for once.'

'Selfish?'

'I'm asking for what I want rather than settling for what I think I deserve.'

Harry stood. 'I'm going to have a shower,' was all he said.

While she waited, Ruth inspected his bookshelves, though if she'd been asked later what they contained she couldn't have named a single title. It was nearly an hour before Harry reappeared, wearing black buttonfly jeans and a clean blue tshirt, but still barefoot. He'd shaved, and his hair, longer than usual and with a definite curl, was still damp from the shower. He stood watching her for a moment, his face in shadow, then she sensed him and turned. Not trusting herself to speak, she gave him a tentative smile.

Finally he moved towards her. 'You should take your coat off,' he said, 'if you're going to be cooking us dinner.'

Her eyes searched his face. She realised she'd stopped breathing. 'D'you mean...'

'Yes, Ruth, I do mean.'

In a split second it was as if the past five years had melted away, had never happened, and the old Ruth stood before him once more; animated, flustered, all dimples and sparkling eyes as she'd been on her first day.

'Oh!' she said. 'Gosh!'

He eased the raincoat off her shoulders and tossed it onto the sofa behind them, then with infinite gentleness he cupped her face in his hands and tilted it up to meet his.