Laura Hobson studied the inert body in front of her. She gently cleaned the area of interest with a cotton ball moistened with rubbing alcohol. She then peeled back the paper on the adhesive strip she held between her fingers. She leaned in to carefully apply the adhesive to her subject's nose. She held it in place for ten seconds. The body began to stir as he pawed her hands away. "Go back to sleep, Robbie," she whispered in a soothing voice. Robbie Lewis rolled over and went back to sleep, anti-snore strip now secured to his nasal passages.

"What the hell?" he asked in the morning when he looked in the mirror.

"Well, you wouldn't put it on when I asked you to, so I had to take matters into my own hands. I need to get some sleep, Robbie. Don't forget that one of us hasn't retired yet. And I think it helped. Do you feel any more rested?"

"I feel like a guinea pig. I'm not your bloody science experiment!"

Robbie's snoring was such that Laura was considering having him submit to a sleep study, but she would sooner be tarred and feathered than send him into the care of Kate Jekyll, the sleep clinic's director. No, Laura reserved that pleasure for herself…

She crept up behind him and burrowed her head into his back. "Oh no? I'm not allowed to do things to you and see how your body responds when I… manipulate… a variable? I just want to collect the observable evidence with my senses- be it hearing, touching, tasting… is that so wrong?" She kissed at his back as she moved her hands towards the front of his pyjama trousers.

He groaned in surrender. "You win, Doctor Hobson." This round… he thought.

Robbie had planned to be back at Laura's house before she returned home from work that night so that he could fix their supper, but her car was already in the drive when he pulled in. "Laura, I'm home!" He called out as he was greeted by the scent of supper that she had started in his absence. "Sorry I'm late; I was running an errand and ran into James." Laura emerged from the kitchen intending to greet him with a kiss. He hopped down the single stair towards her and found a certain joy in knowing that her home had become as familiar as his own.

And then he tripped over an ottoman. Laura started to laugh as she could tell that the stumble wasn't serious. "Is that ottoman supposed to be in the middle of the floor?" He asked as he picked himself up.

"I thought I was dating Inspector Lewis, not Clouseau," she replied as she pushed the ottoman back against the couch.*

"I'm afraid I'm no match for your wit, Doctor. But I bought you a little something to make amends for the snoring. I hope you'll find it in your heart to keep me around." Robbie presented her with a little box, meticulously wrapped with a delicate bow. Laura made a little gasping noise. "James helped me pick it out, actually. He has good taste in these things," Robbie said modestly.

"Oh Rob!" Laura stopped short of the last syllable of his name out of surprise that her voice suddenly sounded so shrill- not like herself at all! She must have been caught off guard by the idea of everyman Robbie Lewis making a foray into a jewelry store. Surely that was the provenance of the little box… "You shouldn't have…" She kissed him warmly in anticipation before unwrapping her gift.

She slid the bow off and delicately removed the paper to find… not a ring, nor earrings nor a bracelet… but a box of noise-cancelling earplugs. "James says that this is the brand that he and his musician friends all use."

"You wicked man!" She pounded his chest until he took hold of her arms.

"Oy, lass! That's enough! Look, we'll eat and have a good snuggle in front of the telly. And then if my snoring offends you so much, I'll go back to me flat so that you can get some sleep." He started to nibble her ear and then whispered, "But I think you want me to stay."

"Yes, Robbie," she murmured, "please stay."

I win, he thought smugly, but he quickly reminded himself that relationships aren't about keeping score. That would be as ridiculous as trying to figure out who'd win a battle between an owl and a ferret. (Because, really, Robbie was not one for metaphors so he'd have to ask Laura to declare a posthumous victor. And she had better things to do with her time than a post-mortem on a couple of animals that had already passed through the tender hands of the taxidermist…)

Robbie, savouring his victory, began to coax Laura backwards towards the couch. "Who cares if our supper's burnt," he intoned suavely. Laura grinned.

And then Robbie tripped over the ottoman again.

This time, Laura joined him on the floor. At the end of the day, the plucky pathologist and the retired detective with the dull car and the cheap shoes both won- because they had each other to love.

*Author Note: Don't be silly, Dr Hobson! It's not a reference to the clumsy Inspector Clouseau, but an homage to the domestic bliss of Rob and Laura Petrie on the Dick Van Dyke show. Hobson just might find herself borrowing Mary Tyler Moore's voice for a moment as well.

If you have no idea what I'm referring to, I have posted two very brief youtube clips (20-30 seconds each) on Tumblr for the sake of understanding the story. They are tagged #muffinzelda or, search for the Tumblr blog Muffinzelda's Musings. PM me if that doesn't work and you're still curious. :)