Chapter 24 Desensitised
As they sat in the cab on the way back to the motel a sadness swept over Nick. He'd known tonight was going to be a long one, but he had still, obviously niavely, thought he'd be able to go home and sleep beside his wife at the end of it. He did not want to spend another night in the dingy motel room, with it's frayed and ugly bed spreads and dirty carpet. No wonder it was so cheap.
When they got back, they climbed the stairs wearily to their room. Upon entering, Nick moped straight to the window and pulled the curtains closed against the rising sun. He turned to Shay. "Let's just get a few hours in us then we'll go and get this sample."
Shay nodded, exhausted . She flopped onto the bed, her feet aching from being in high heels most of the night and the morning. She wrenched the black shoes off and threw them over by the dresser where her overnight bag sat. She didn't even change her clothes – simply too tired to even think of doing anything but sleep – and within moments she was sound asleep.
In the bed opposite, Nick lay staring at the ceiling, missing Jen and wondering how he could get yet another sample off his handlers at such short notice. They'd been obliging of all his requests at the Drug Squad and SIS, but Nick knew it was difficult to get supplies at the last minute. And this time they had less than half a day. He fiddled with the finger his wedding band was usually on and looked down sadly at the hand, wondering when he could next put the ring back on.

Jennifer kept her eyes closed. She didn't want to open them if he wasn't there. Blindly she reached out a hand across the bed, feeling for his familiar muscly frame, his warm skin, the soft material of his singlet.
But all she could feel was the bedsheet. Sadly she opened her eyes and sat up, brushing her hair out of her eyes. She frowned in the morning sunlight that streamed into the silent bedroom and looked at the digital clock by the bed. It was 7:30am. And Nick wasn't home. Again. She'd not really expected him to come home the night before, but she still hoped that he would. They'd already spent Friday night apart, and he had not come to the café with Shay like she had hoped he would. The stretches they spent apart were getting longer and longer.
She lay back down and pushed her face into her pillow, trying to grapple with her intense emotions. Hormones of all kinds ripping through her thanks to the treatment she was receiving, she often had a hard time keeping a lid on what she was feeling, and while Nick wasn't often around for her to offload it onto, she had had a few good cries over the last week or so. But everyday she could feel it building up more and more.
Fifteen minutes later she dragged herself from the bed, and knowing she had nothing better to do, and that it was best to distract herself anyway, she decided to head into work. It was a Sunday, but that didn't matter – the place would be quiet, she hoped, and she could get through her mountains of paperwork perhaps. And she wouldn't have to talk to anybody.
As she stepped into the bathroom to turn on the shower, she looked at herself in the mirror. She frowned at what she saw then quickly looked away. Thinking more of it, she slipped a foot under the bathroom cabinet and slid out the scales that sat hidden in dust under there. She stepped onto the small platform reluctantly and then looked down at the dial. She never normally weighed herself – the scales had in fact belonged to Nick, and when they'd bought this house together the scales had made the move too – so she didn't know if the weight she saw on the dial was normal or not.
She stepped off and nudged the scales back under the cabinet with her toe and stepped into the steamy shower.

"Jen!"
Jennifer looked up from her desk and saw Matt striding towards her. She sighed inwardly – not because she was unhappy to see him, but because she'd been getting so much work done in the office alone, and someone else arriving was sure to put a stop to that, she felt.
"Hey Matty," she greeted him softly, trying with all her might to muster up some strength for him. She didn't stand up from her desk.
Matt looked at her curiously as he made his way to his desk not far from hers and delved quickly into his paperwork the way she was. Jen tried to ignore the look and they both worked quietly for a while, lost in their thoughts, and trying to avoid any questions. Matt could only guess she was there to get some work done on a Sunday arvo the way he had intended, but something about her didn't seem right, and for more than a week now he'd been trying to put his finger on it, but had no luck.
When an hour passed and he'd got barely anything done because he'd been trying to figure out in his head what wasn't sitting right with him about Jen, he gave up momentarily and wandered into the kitchen for a drink. When he got to the door he turned back and called out to his colleague.
"Drink Jen?" he asked.
She lifted her head lazily to look at him. "Sure," she nodded.
Matt turned back towards the kitchen and began pulling mugs out of the cupboard. But then he stopped as it suddenly came to him.
Sheisn'tdrinkingcoffee,becauseshe'sdoingIVF,andohmygodIneverfoundoutwhathappenedwiththat.
Matt's mind reeled. She hadn't told him one way or the other what had happened. He immediately took this as a bad sign. It had been ages since he'd told her to call him day or night if she needed, and even longer since he'd wheeled himself over to her desk that afternoon and she'd admitted that she was glad she didn't have to knock down doors anymore now that she was a sergeant.
Jen plodded into the room and Matt turned, stricken, to face her. She looked at him, almost afraid.
But Matt didn't know what to say. Finally he spluttered out what he thought would be the least probing question.
"You don't want coffee do you?" he asked fearfully.
She immediately shook her head sadly. "Nah, just water."
He reached over to the fridge, grabbed her a bottle and handed it over to her, where she stood in a daze in front of him, lost in her exhaustion, her longing for Nick, her worry, everything.
"Jen are you ok?" Matt asked, beginning to worry.
She sat down on one of the metal chairs that bordered the small table by the fridge and propped her head up tiredly with her hand. "Yeah," she replied unconvincingly.
Matt sat down beside her and they drank in silence for several moments. "So…" Matt felt so intrusive asking her about her personal life, but felt such a concern for her at the same time. "Did you get any news from the doctor?" He asked it quietly, even though there was no one else but the two of them around. But it wasn't the type of thing you shouted from the rooftops, Matt thought to himself, so he kept it dignified and hushed.
Jen looked up and smiled sadly at him. She shook her head. "The first attempt didn't take," she admitted. "I'm in the middle of the second."
Matt bowed his head unhappily upon hearing the news, making a mental note of how she'd said 'I'm' rather than 'we're'. "I'm sorry Jen." He reached out a hand to stroke her arm kindly, but she barely noticed the touch.
"And how's Nick?"
She shrugged at the question. "As busy as ever with the Drug Squad," she generalised. Nobody was to know that Nick was undercover, and only if push came to shove, the way it had with his colleagues in the Drug Squad who had noticed his absence from their workplace, was it said that Nick was on temporary secondment outside of Melbourne at the appointment of Tony Eastough.
Matt nodded, accepting her answer. He looked closer at her. "Are you sure you're ok Jen? You don't look very good," he tilted his head, trying to catch her eye. She was noticeably thinner and her eyes looked tired and sad.
"I'm managing," was all she replied.