Thank you to anyone who has read part one of this and I hope part 2 is ok :)
"Are you ok?" Realising that calling after the consultant is a rather fruitless endeavour the Scottish nurse returned to the side of his girlfriend, who was pressed up against a wall; her eyes were stretched wide, and her body shook ever so slightly. Still she manages to nod and flashes him a small smile. He places an arm around her body, pulling her away from the wall and in to his embrace. Almost instantly, her body relaxes against his. It's strange how different it feels holding Bonnie to Jac. With the consultant, she would go through a cycle of being tense and relaxed as though fighting against whatever it was that she was feeling whereas Bonnie just gave herself to the embrace.
"I just thought I could help," she speaks softly against his chest, and he can feel the warmth of her breath through the material of his top. He has tried to tell her numerous times to leave Jac alone as much as possible, but he knows the caring nature of his partner and how in the right circumstance she wouldn't have been able to resist helping.
"I know," he tries to sound reassuring, and he finds himself rubbing his hands over her spine, "and maybe she'll take note of it" he adds, trying to force his voice to sound hopeful. He knows it's fake, that any advice offered by a nurse is unlikely to be taken seriously by the consultant. He is certain he could supply her with endless reams of evidence to back up the claims and she would still find an argument against it simply because, as the consultant, she has to be right. Her desire for control and power scares him at times, because she knows that in their current situation she truly has none.
"I suppose," her voice sounds brighter as she pulls away from her, the smile on her face much more genuine. It strikes him as the two of them start to walk back to the ward, his arm now draped more loosely around her, that he doesn't quite have the urge to keep her in his arms as he had done with Jac. He doesn't doubt that he has feelings for Bonnie but they lack the intensity of those he had experienced previously. His one time friend though is so much safer, and altogether more willing to reciprocate. He has wondered in the dark whether he is cheating her, that her feelings run deeper than his and that he cannot match that. She seems not to notice though, or choses not too, "You two are in theatre together later right?"
"You don't want to come in do you?" A current of panic runs through him. It doesn't end well having the two of them together, especially within the somewhat cramped confines of an operating theatre and a hoard of willing gossips waiting for some entertainment.
"No," she laughs, "I was just thinking maybe you could have a word with her," he considers laughing here as though she has told a great joke but he knows that she is serious. He hates that the relationship he has with the mother of his child has deteriorated to the point where having a conversation doesn't seem like a viable option but somehow that is the case.
"I don't think that'll work" he knows he is partly to blame for this state of affairs. He'd hurt her more than he wanted to admit when he had placed her key back in her office without a word of explanation. He'd known it was cowardly to do it in the way that he had but he'd seen no other option. He couldn't face her for fear of what he would do or say, and yet it had hurt to leave hurt to do it. And now he has gotten together with Bonnie, and she sees the two of them on the ward. He supposes she sees them as happy and loved up too. He's wondered if perhaps they are rubbing it in her face, whether it increases her feelings of being alone. Though she seems incapable of understanding how not to be that way. But still it has led to this. A situation where they barely talk despite the fact their baby is less than a month away from the date on which she will be forced in to the world. They should have been talking about a nursery and whether he would be staying with her during the induction and the labour – he wanted to be there but had no real idea if she'd actually let him. Instead any talking they do is pretty much limited to the professional. He finds himself being dragged in to the staff room.
"You can't just let her do this without you," she wriggles away from him and busies herself making a hot drink. He thinks that perhaps he has painted this a little bit wrong for her benefit. He doesn't really admit to anyone that he has partly given up making an effort. He makes sure she's ok from a distance, questioning Mo to the point where he is certain she wishes to kill him or slipping an extra drink to Elliot so that he knows she will at least drink something. He wants to help her, to be involved but he is never quite sure how. It's true that Jac is evasive and resistant to his efforts – and that is what he has made clear to Bonnie – but he knows too that she tends to have her reasons for doing so; not that he really understands them.
"I'm trying," the words come quietly, and he finds he almost chokes on them. It isn't a lie, but it isn't exactly the truth either.
"It's your baby as much as it is hers, Jonny," she turns back to look at him as the kettle boils, she offers him a smile, "you have rights" she adds with a nod of her head. He frowns a little as he thinks of it. If it came to it, would he evoke those rights? He doesn't doubt he'd fight tooth and nail for his daughter but would it ever go so far that he'd have to use the law to gain access to the little girl – if she even survived for that to happen. Could it be that he would be denied even meeting his daughter in life because she chooses to keep him away. He can't imagine she'd do that, and yet she has pushed him out in recent weeks. He has seen the smile that graces her lips when the baby moves, and longed to reach out to place a hand on hers to feel it but he daren't and even when he is close by she doesn't offer, nor does she offer him any updates on how they are doing. He is surprised that she'd even let him in on the meeting with Mr T when they were given the induction date; though he believes it was the obstetrician that had made it happen.
"Don't you think I know this?" he sounds more bitter than he'd intended. He wishes the situation was different. He shouldn't be stood here with the woman who doesn't have the swollen abdomen, it shouldn't be this woman he describes as his girlfriend or who he falls in to bed with each night. In the ideal world, he would be returning home to his pregnant partner, falling asleep with his hands rested on the swell in order to feel their daughter kick and roll. He would be able to whisper to them as he falls asleep that he loves them both, his girls. But this world is far from perfect. He feels the ache in his chest, the love for his daughter and the fear for the future. He feels to the love for the mother of his child, a love that leaves scars across the surface of his heart, wrapping themselves around the organ, constricting it until it each beat is enough to destroy him. But he has to learn to live with it.
"Your daughter is going to need you Jonny," she has a cup in hand now, though he cannot recall her actually making the drink. It's becoming so much more real, the baby is no longer an abstract concept. Even when the rounding of Jac's stomach had become obvious, it still hadn't quite felt real. He loved the idea of the baby, but it felt strange to think that he would be a father, that he would hold in his arms a tiny human whose creation he was at least partly responsible for. When they'd received that crushing diagnosis he hadn't known what to do, the baby he'd imagined flickered in his brain. The uncertainty of the future scared him, and he'd wanted nothing more than to escape, to go back to the days when he'd been carefree, when his worries had been small compared to this. Perhaps that was why he had sought sanctuary with Bonnie; a throwback to those days and someone altogether safe. She would be a constant in a world that seemed to spin too quickly for him to keep balance, though she was never quite what he needed, "she's going to need your love"
He doesn't know how to respond to her, but something in her words strikes him. The way she says them, and a look in her eyes. Does she doubt the love Jac has for her child? He has talked of their relationship, of how the consultant can seem so incapable of certain emotions that perhaps it has led her to come to such a conclusion. He cannot deny that Bonnie will have seen Jac at work, seen how she can be cold in practice. But he has seen her in other moments, the ones where the mask slips and she allows feelings to come in to play. She had once uttered those three little words to him, and he had failed to say them in return. But it had shown him something that he'd never thought he would see and that had given him hope of a future, of a life he had always dreamed of – one which he had never known, and which he doubted she had either.
"I can't do this," he shakes his head, as he glances down at the floor. He doesn't want to be having this conversation. He fears what he'll say to her. He's said things he's regretted before, not necessarily because they weren't the truth but because they removed his safety net. He doesn't know that she'd take him back again, and he doesn't think he can face that.
"You don't have any choice," she moves closer to him, hands still clasped around her cup, "You've got so much love for your daughter, and she deserves to know that" his daughter will never be anything but loved. It is one thing of which he is sure. So many people care already for the child who is not yet born, and while she is limited in blood relations, it is more than made up for in the family which they have created. No matter how long, or short, her life is destined to be, he is certain that she will never want for family.
"And she will," he answers gently, swallowing back the tears that threaten to come. If she is destined to grow up, he wonders how life will be. Would Bonnie become stepmother to his daughter, would they perhaps give her half-siblings in the years to come? Should his little girl not make it, he wonders would he feel guilty for having children in the future, fearing they would be seen as a replacement for his firstborn. And what would become of the consultant, this child, her miracle and seemingly only chance of motherhood. How would she cope if she was torn away from her, and yet seeing him be able to extend his family? Would she feel isolated within this strange little family that exists on their ward? Does she already feel that way? He has so many questions with no answers, and no way of getting them.
"You're sure of that?" she is in front of him now. He needs her to drop this because in truth while she is thinking of the baby girl, his mind had changed tracks. He is once more thinking of the flame haired consultant and how she is feeling. She is the only one who can understand the thoughts in his head, and yet they have not sought each other out – or they have ignored the need to do so. He has tried to ignore his worry for her, fearing becoming involved once more and the pain that it could lead too. And yet the pain is there regardless.
"Just let it go" he steps back away from her, her closeness is too much right now. It seems to be suffocating him. She narrows her eyes a little, and twists her lips together in thought.
"You can't just ignore this," she shakes her head a little, "I hate what this is doing to you, to us Jonny. I want us, you, to be happy" she's so innocent, childlike and yet he knows there is more beneath that. He remembers her from old, and how she could be when the mood took her. Like him, like Jac, she can pretend to be what she wants you to see though he knows deep down she is a good person but she can use that to her advantage.
"Happy? My daughter is likely to die, how on earth do you expect me to be happy?" the words come out before he can stop them, and he finds himself breathing heavily. He hates saying the words, the admission of his daughter's prognosis, and yet everything rests on that fact. If it wasn't for that, he wouldn't have wanted Bonnie and what she could offer him. If it wasn't for that diagnosis, he wouldn't have seen the haunted looked in the consultants eyes and known his showed the same, nor would he have seen the doubt in her face that he wanted this child. A doubt he knows she still holds, despite his assertion that he wants their little girl more than anything in this world – though in truth that desire may actually be second to wanting her mother.
"Jonny," she starts to talk but he cannot let her.
"I love my daughter, but I am terrified and I don't know what to do because I cannot fix this" he looks away from her for a second, "and I look at her mother, and I see the pain she is trying to hide – that other people seem not to see – and I can't take that away from her, no matter how much I want too"
"And what about me?" her voice shakes a little as she asks the question, and he turns back to her. For a moment not quite comprehending what she can even mean, "How do you think I feel not being able to help you, and knowing that the only thing that you actually want is your daughter and the only person who can give you that makes you more depressed than I've ever known you to be?"
"Jac doesn't …" he tails off, not quite knowing where to go with it. Bonnie has seen him in the nights when it gets too much, and has heard much of the story of 'janny' as Mo had once christened them.
"All I'm trying to do is making things better for you, and it's not enough is it?" she shakes her head sadly, "I love you Jonny, I want to be with you and have done since we met but I can't make you happy"
"Not now, maybe" he speaks in a rush, "but I can't be happy now but in the future, we could have it all" he sounds desperate, and he knows it.
"But it won't be, because I am never going to be Jac and I am never going to be the mother of this baby" she looks down, as she does so she thinks she sees his mouth move but no words reach her ears.
"love you" her eyes dart upwards to meet his face and then at his hip, his bleeper makes its noise and he pulls it free. Saved by the bell, "I'm needed in theatre" and with that he takes his leave.
As he steps in to the theatre, he is immediately struck by the fact Jac is nowhere to be seen but instead Professor Hope is stood over the patient, with Mo opposite him. A cold dart of panic slices his spine. She should have been here. He moves closer to the table, to Mo.
"Where's Jac?" he tries to sound indifferent, but he cannot quite disguise how he feels. He knows the consultant – it would take something important, something seriously wrong for her not to be operating.
"I'm covering for Jac," the professor speaks softly, looking upwards. There is no desperate panic or concern in his eyes, relieving the fear that there is something going on with the baby. If that were the case, the older man would not be so calm and nor he realises would his best friend. And yet that doesn't ease the feeling in his chest, because still something has to be wrong and if it isn't the baby then it has to be Jac herself.
"I …" he tries to speak but somehow the words don't come. He's frozen by a fear he doesn't want to acknowledge, or feelings he is unwilling to really accept. He looks in to the eyes of the kindly professor who gives him a small smile.
"I fear you are going to be no use to use Nurse Maconie," the voice is wise, "and I'm sure we can manage without you" and with that he is dismissed from the theatre and he does not argue. He knows he should, that he should stay but there is something altogether more important and so he goes.
On Darwin he finds Bonnie seated at the desk, a group of nurses and auxiliaries huddled around her. He recognises a few of them as people who are often found huddled together, the linchpins of the legendary gossip network that extends throughout Holby City Hospital.
"I hear she's planning to hand the baby over to you two anyway," he catches the words spoken by a youngish nurse whose name he doesn't know. He sees the way Bonnie's lips twist together.
"Probably best for the baby," another one adds with a smile.
"You can't deny how much Jonny loves his daughter" those are the words that come from Bonnie's mouth, "he all but proposed to me today, obviously we won't do anything for a while because of the baby and needing to concentrate our energies on her, but it's in the future and he told me he loved me" the words gush from her and he sees the obvious happiness in her face.
"You're going to have it all" someone tells her and her smile widens at the very idea of it.
"And just imagine your children" at this he almost expects her face to split open completely, for a second though he cannot be certain he isn't imagining it he thinks a hand slips for a second to her abdomen before they fold in to a cradle across her chest.
"I heard Professor Hope won't let her in to surgery" the speaker leans further over the desk, a move which is copied by the others. He watches Bonnie closely as she nods her head slightly, seemingly enjoying the attention. She always had enjoyed being centre stage, and here she is the keeper of gossip.
"Rumour has it. It's because he's worried she'll piss herself" this from another of the notorious gossips, but the expression that passes over Bonnie's face is enough to wordlessly validate what was suggested. Though it may have been unintentional – she had always been a nightmare for giving stuff away from her expression – still she had once again given ammunition against Jac.
Pulling his gaze away from the desk and the huddle of gossips, he thinks he sees a flash of red before he hears a door slam closed, and with a flash of horror he realises that she's probably heard every word.