Chapter 1 – Everyone Goes Your Way

Connie had always been in control of her life and was used to getting her own way. It wasn't intentional to create problems between her and her staff, but she wasn't there to make friends. Everyone always saw her as a strong and independent leader with no emotion, but even the best of us struggle from time to time.

The past few months had been no end of trouble for the clinical lead. First losing Grace to her father, then being accused of assisted euthanasia to Alfred Maxwell. The final icing on the cake was the firey end to her predecessors wedding. She found herself treating not only Zoe, but the one person who had really shown her he cared. Charlie was ill, and there didn't seem to be much she could do about it.

"I know what that means Nurse Freeman, but I am not giving up on him." She stepped forward and continued compressions on her friend. "Come on Charlie, you're not leaving, not like this." Rita checked for a pulse and closed her eyes sighing when there was a slight beat. It was weak, but it was there. "We've a pulse, let's move him to ICU now." Connie moved back and allowed the porter to move Charlie upstairs.

After nursing Charlie back to health, he slowly returned to work however Connie seemed to just get worse. Sitting at home on her own every evening was beginning to take its toll on her and she couldn't see past it.

"Morning Mrs Beauchamp, Guy dropped some files off this morning which are all ready in your office." She didn't even acknowledge them as she wandered past reception. Lofty, Ethan and Cal were gathered by the nurses' station watching as Connie strutted in. "Something's weird with her at the moment, sure she's normally straight-laced but this is, well just weird." Lofty spoke to the brothers who both knew what he said was true but neither had any clue of what they could do to help.

Cal had been treating patients most the morning but realised he hadn't once seen Mrs Beauchamp since she arrived. Normally she'd have enjoyed walking round and moaning at people about something they were doing, especially him. He wandered towards her office and noticed that the blinds were open slightly showing a smashed picture on her desk but nobody at the table. He knocked softly before opening the door to see Connie with her back against the wall crying.

Cal closed the door behind him and half expected to have his head bitten off by the clinical lead. "Connie, is everything okay?" Nothing. It was like she wasn't even there, and it scared him. Cal looked at the table and noticed that there was also a glass smashed on the floor which must have contained something beforehand, it wasn't hard to guess what. The picture had been one of her and Grace, but now it lay amongst the glass completely destroyed. "What's wrong with me?" He heard a faint voice ask as he turned back to Connie.

It had been a shock to see her so broken, but there was no way he was turning his back on her now. No matter how much she had pushed him down previously, she needed someone right now and he's be there. Cal carefully moved towards Connie and sat on the floor next to her. "There's nothing wrong with you…" He leant against the wall and shuffled closer to her. She began to sob again and Cal moved his arm around her shoulders. "Hey shh, everything's going to be okay. You're an amazing woman, you'll get through this."

He felt his shirt dampen with her tears as he hugged her tighter. It felt wrong to be witnessing something so personal from Connie but she was on a downwards spiral which was doomed from the start. "Connie, you've cut your hand…" He took it in his and had a look before going to stand up. "I'm going to get something to clear that up and then I'm taking you home."

Cal disappeared to find some bandages to wrap up his bosses hand. "Dr Knight I need you to look at a patient-" "I can't right now, sorry Rita." She stood there stunned, not sure what the young doctor was playing at. Cal grabbed what he needed before heading back towards the office. "Cal, why has Rita just told me you were ignoring her instructions?" Zoe stood between him and where he needed to be. "Dr Hanna, please trust me when I say that it's important." She looked at him and saw what he was holding. She stepped aside and let him carry on.

A few minutes of complete silence and Cal had finished cleaning Connie's hand and she was beginning to sober up. "I've called a taxi, there's no way I'm letting you drive home in this state." She looked towards him as if to argue back that she was fine but instead left it and looked away. He managed to get her outside unnoticed "Go home, and sleep this off. You might think you're useless, but this place needs you, I need you. So sober up and sort yourself out Mrs Beauchamp." Connie blankly stared at him taking everything in before sitting down and driving off into the distance.

Cal cleaned the office, getting rid of the smashed glass and placing the photo into one of her drawers. He felt as though he was intruding but didn't want to leave the place a mess for anyone else to see. For all her flaws, Cal cared about Connie and wanted to be there to help her. Although he knew that at some point this would probably backfire, he wanted to at east try.