Earlier while Alan had been sleeping on the sofa, Ken had nipped out to get some groceries, the fridge had been completely empty. With Alan in the shower Ken started to make them some lunch, bacon and eggs sandwiches.

The confrontation had gone better that he thought, but then again Alan was still hung over. Ken hoped he could get through to his boss, this needed to stop.

The shower being turned off brought him out of his thoughts and he just about managed to rescue the bacon before it got burned.

"You're still here."

"Yes" Ken just said and placed the plates on the table and he filled a glass of water for each of them.

Alan still glared at Ken, but took a seat anyway and started eating. Ken noticed that Alan's hands had started to shake, he was already going through withdrawel. It doesn't seem to bother him though, so he must've experienced the tremors before.

Alan finished his lunch quickly and downed the glass of water in two big gulps.

"Since I can't go to work and you have taken everything else fun, what do you expect me to do all day?" He asked angrily.

"We could watch a film, read a book or we could talk."

"Film it is then." Alan decided. He knew Ken really wanted to talk, but there was no way Alan was going to do that.

Ken quickly cleaned up the plates and made them another cup of coffee. Alan meanwhile sat stubbornly on the sofa making no attempt what so ever at helping Ken.

He knew where Alan's DVD collection was. It wasn't really a collection, just 5 DVDs that had probably been a gift from someone who didn't know his boss that well. So Ken just took a random one.

About half way through he noticed Alan's hands were shaking again, worse then before. And as he looked at Alan's face he could see that his boss was sweating too.

"Here take these." Ken offered two high strength paracetamol. There was one problem though, Alan's hands were shaking so badly that he couldn't hold the glass properly without spilling everything. Ken had to hold the glass for him and bring it to his lips.

"Please, I don't want you here Ken." Alan pleaded.

"I can't leave you alone, you could get seriously hurt." With a sigh Alan gave up and let his head fall back against the sofa.

After that not much was said between them. Ken focused on the film, while Alan just sat there staring into space shaking and sweating. He looked so tired.

"Why did she have to marry David?" Alan suddenly said.

"I don't know boss." Alan looked startled when Ken answered, he hadn't meant to say it out loud. "I don't really like the guy. There's something dodgy about him, I can't quite put my finger on." With a nod Alan looked back at the TV, clearly not wanting to talk about it.

Ken realised though that this could be his chance to get Alan to open up at bit. So he asked "What happened between the two of you? You looked really happy when you were together." It wasn't just him who had wondered, everybody in the office had questioned what went wrong, but of course no one had the guts to actually ask Annie or even worse Alan.

He thought the subject was closed for good as the slighly uncomfortable silence stretched between them but then suddenly Alan said "I made the stupid mistake of telling her I needed more time to think. I told her I love her and then I said I needed more time, how pathetic is that?!" By now Alan was standing and shaking so badly that Ken feared he might need to steady him. "I let her walk right into David-bloody-Hornby's arms!" Tears had started to run down his cheeks now and he made no attempt to stop them, not that he could anyway with all the shaking.

Slowly Ken got to his feet and cautiously placed a hand on Alan's forearm. Alan crumpled at the touch, he collapsed back onto the sofa and started to sob. All the pent up anger, frustration and sadness that he could keep restrained with a bottle of whiskey finally slipped free.

"I'm gonna be sick." Alan suddenly said. And Ken was prepared for this, nausea and vomitting were signs of withdrawel too, he had a bucket at hand.

The rest of the day they didn't talk much, but the air had been cleared between them. Ken made them spag-bol for dinner, thankfully Alan was no longer shaking all over so it made eating a lot easier. He had started to get very fidgity though, no matter how hard he tried he couldn't sit still. Alan tidied the kitchen after dinner, it gave the opportunity to move around. He had just turned the dishwasher on, when the sounds of Miles Davis suddenly filled the room. The music seemed to have a calming effect on Alan he felt like he could breathe a little easier. He took a seat on the sofa and wrapped the blanket around himself.

Of all the Miles Davis records he owned Ken had to pick that one. The Man with the Horn had been a birthday present from Sandra. They had been very happy then. Living in a tiny flat in Brixton, the good bit not the dodgy end. Alan had been working for the Met for about a year and Sandra had been studying for her journalism degree 24/7. They got married as soon as Sandra finished Uni, Tracy was born a year later and they had to move into a proper house, a lovely semi detached house in Lewisham.

Then two years later Alan got the chance of promotion to detective sergeant, but only if they moved to Yorkshire. Sandra had been furious when he had accepted without talking to her first, she didn't want to move, she was happy living in London. Something changed her mind though, that same month she found out she was pregnant again and reluctantly she agreed to the move. Seven months later Brian was born.

Ten years later they were still living in Yorkshire, but Alan got transferred to East Vale to work for the Major Crimes Unit. It was after that, that small cracks appeared in their marriage. Sandra had never been happy living in Yorkshire, she missed the buzz of London and all her friends were there. Because Alan's working hours, had at the time been very irregular, she was always stuck at home with the kids, getting more and more miserable each day. They were fighting a lot, sometimes even in front of the kids.

From that time on the marriage had been pretty much over, they were basically just living in the same house, actually Alan was more like a lodger in his own home. Every night he would come home only to work from his home office, he would often even spend the night in there. Deep down he knew he was working too much, but it felt like the right thing to do at the time.

Then when Tracy was 17 and Brian 14, he came home one night to find a letter from Sandra on the kitchen table saying that she was leaving him. They got divorced two years later and three months later Sandra got married again to photographer called Sean and as far he knows she is very happy.

The end of the record brought him back from his trip down memory lane. Ken was still there, was he ever going to leave?

"Why are you really here, Ken?" He wanted to know.

"Because you need my help. If there's one thing you've taught me, it's that you leave no man behind, we stick together as a team. And right now you are struggling, I wont leave you fending for yourself."

With a nod as a thank you he stood up to pick another record, hopefully something that wouldn't make him remember what a sad life he is living. He picked a different Miles Davis record, this time a live recoring of one of his last concerts ever. Alan would be fine with this one, he had bought himself.

This is how they spend the rest of the night, playing one record after the other. Ken would usually just pick a random one, clearly he had no idea what he was doing. Whereas Alan always made sure the music wouldn't make him feel too sentimental.

Alan finally fell asleep at 4 am, his body had at last calmed down enough to let him get some rest. Ken watched him the whole time, he was grateful to finally get some rest himself.