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"Five minutes... please...."

Nick chuckled and shook Cori awake again for the third time. "Dr. Cori, come on, you've got to get up. You're being paged down to the ER."

Cori opened one eye and looked up at him in the feeble light coming in through the window. In the last month or so since she'd first met him, the two of them had become truly close friends. But, in the first few weeks after she let her guard down and let him near, they'd grown closer than friends. At work, it was professional. But after shifts, he spent a lot of time at her apartment. More than once they'd walked in together to more than one raised eyebrow from the staff. Both of them smiled, said their good morning greetings and parted ways to their own offices. If the rumors started it was not because they gave them reason to. She hated leaving him in the morning when the alarm clock went off. But, they both were doctors and more than once the emergency pages from the hospital had interrupted them. Those times they simply sighed, kissed one another and took care of business without an angry word.

And then there were times like now that she wished she could just roll over, snuggle up to him and pretend it was all a bad nightmare. It wasn't her choice to be so sleep deprived lately, but circumstances at home had led to her catching cat-naps in unoccupied rooms of the Pediatric floor. Nick had been on his normal rotations and some how, some way, she'd lucked into a three-week pediatric rotation in the ER. Because of the difference in schedules, the two of them had agreed to stay apart in their own places so as not to disturb each other. Most of the time when he would be trying to sleep, she'd be just getting in from work or just leaving for work. In the time that they'd started sleeping together, she'd grown used to having Nick there and now found she couldn't sleep well without him. Of course, other circumstances didn't lend themselves to allowing her to sleep peacefully, even if she could get to sleep.

"Nick," she groaned into the pillow. "I need just five more minutes of sleep... please.. I'm begging you..."

"Sorry Madame, you've got to come. You're being paged."

Cori threw the light blanket off and sat up. "Damn it! Just 5 minutes is all I'm asking! You think it's my choice to be this exhausted? No, it's not. I can't help it that the neighbors have decided to take up marathon sex as a past time! You do realize that in the last two weeks that I have heard her scream 'OH GOD, OH GOD, OH GOD' more times than in my entire freshman year of college? Five minutes is NOT too much to ask!!" She grabbed the blanket and flopped back down on the bed, yanking it over her head.

Nick blinked, trying his hardest to keep from laughing at her. She was entirely too adorable when she was this worked up. But, he looked at his watch as the minute hand ticked off and the second hand swept it's way around the face.

Cori wasn't asleep. She'd closed her eyes and waited for the shaking again. But it didn't come... 'what is he up to?' she thought... after another thirty seconds of complete silence, she sat up and groaned. "ALL RIGHT! Let's go. Give me a second to put my shoes on."

Nick had to laugh. "Your five minutes turned miraculously into 45 seconds. Is that a power nap?"

Cori gave him a look and came around the narrow hospital bed to just in front of him. Her hands on her hips, she looked up, then stretched up to press a firm kiss to his lips. She felt his arms come around her to hold her tight as he deepened and returned the kiss. After a few moments, she felt his arms release her and she opened her eyes. "Jesus Nick, you give me strength."

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