'We all need somebody, Jac.'
'Enough.'
Why couldn't he just have left her alone? He had been pushing her all day, cleverly interspersing it all with joking and jesting; although whether all of it had been joking was yet to be seen – he often played the fool.
Jac controlled herself as she saw him walk away for the final time that day; how could he have broken her so effortlessly in one day? It normally took... Well, very few people managed it, and she was making a concerted effort to keep the number as low as possible. Sacha Levy had instinctively known how to play her – offering her the titbit of being Acting Consultant for the day had hooked her at first, and she had slowly got pulled into his game, deeper and deeper as the day had grown old. She had become so intrinsically weaved into his web that she was not conscious of how he was making her rethink herself, question herself, doubt herself. Then he would do a u-turn, and turn it all into a joke, allowing Jac to clutch at her wall of defence before it dropped too far down.
He plied everything she did into something to talk about. Every word, every action, and he turned it against her. she couldn't joke back, for fear that he would delve further into her world, creep under her shield even more, and see through her. It was during the operation that he really got into his stride though, it seemed as though he just couldn't help himself twist the patient's situation into her own, use it to get feelings from her, and get into her mind.
He built on everything in the locker room, but saved his last and strongest hit for the desk. He couldn't just leave her to do the paperwork, no, he had to deliver the final blow to her, make sure she was well and truly down for the evening. Okay, so everybody needed somebody, but she wasn't everybody, was she? She had survived through her childhood with no one to speak of – her adoptive family were little more than a roof over her head for the way they behaved, as for her mother, well, Sacha had seen her first-hand. There had been somebody, once, but as Sacha had quite aptly put it earlier, she was 'enough to give anyone a Vietnam-style flashback', and if she could give a flashback then she sure as hell had destroyed Joseph's world.
She did feel remorse, and unlike the general population of Holby City Hospital thought, she was in fact human, and she did make mistakes. And that was the worst she ever made. When Sacha Levy had said 'We all need somebody, Jac', her heart had literally hurt; she had a chance at having somebody, and she had messed up. The final 'enough' had been as much at herself as at Sacha; she did not want to break down in front of anyone, yet alone her colleagues. Seeing Joseph hurt her like hell, but she needed that, she needed to see him, she still needed him.
Okay, it's short I know, but I was inspired, and this is the result after revising physics for a whoooole day...
Hopefully you will find it within you to a) not kill me and b) leave a review :)
Woody2792x