Disclaimer: (I'm actually having a lot of fun with these disclaimers!) I do not own Red Dwarf. (Hm. Maybe not.)

Author's note: I hate making Lister seem like a horrible drunk bastard - I love him really! Cat and Kryten will make appearances later on, I swear to God! In fact, in the next fanfic I'm planning, they both have fairly major parts. When I say 'fairly major' I mean they have two of the main stories....

Nicole needn't have bothered rushing to get back to her room; Lister had left a long time ago to go back to the bar and drink the place dry. She considered going back to Rimmer, but decided against it - she could easily run into Lister on the way. Sure enough, five minutes later, when Nicole had just gotten into bed, Lister stumbled into the room. He mumbled something incomprehensible. Nicole pretended to be asleep.
"Well!?" came a loud, insolent, Liverpudlian shout.
"Well what?" she answered groggily.
"What do you say?"
"Say to what?"
"The answer to the question of the enquiry of my asking..." Nicole didn't hear any more; she covered her ears up with her pillows. Half an hour later he was still trying to get an answer to the mystery question he had supposedly asked her. She closed her eyes as tight as she could. It was going to be a long night.

For about two weeks Nicole and Rimmer spent nearly every night together.
"How'd you get rid of him this time?" Rimmer asked her stroking her hair. He felt terrible asking her that question; as much as he adored being her lover, he couldn't get over the fact that she was technically 'taken'. She was Lister's girlfriend, and she would remain Lister's girlfriend until they both felt the time was right to tell everyone what had been happening. And for now, neither of them were ready. So Rimmer just had to be 'OK' with the situation.
"I didn't," Nicole replied, "He went to the bar again."
"Again!?"
Nicole nodded and shifted her position in the bed, "I'm actually getting quite worried about his drinking. Was he like this before?"
"Well, he was tipsy most nights. He used to get drunk, not too often, but quite a lot. Nothing like recently, though. He's spent every single night down at that drinking hole for the last month. Even before the accident he didn't do that."
"God..."
Rimmer could see this was going to turn pretty sombre unless he did something about it.
"But let's not worry about that right now, eh?" he said wrapping his arms around her. Nicole sighed, closed her eyes, and felt his hand run up her body. He kissed her head and she began to drift off.
A high-pitched whistling stopped her.
"What the smeg!?" she cried.
"It's Holly," Rimmer said with more than a hint of annoyance in his tone, "she must want something."
"Well, what are we going to do? She can't see me here like this!"
"Er..."
They both looked around in a state of alarm.
"Arnold?"
Holly's face appeared on the screen. Nicole ducked down under the sheets just in time. Rimmer cleared his throat heavily in an attempt to appear innocent.
"Y-yes, Holly?"
"Could you go down to the drive room and fix one of my circuits for me?"
"No, go away, I'm busy."
Holly saw the nakedness of Rimmer, and how he had reacted so agitatedly when she had disturbed him; she put two and two together and got three hundred.
"Oh, sorry Arn. I didn't realise I was interrupting...that."
Nicole identified Holly's misunderstanding immediately. Rimmer, however...
"What?" Rimmer was startled--had she seen Nicole?
"It's OK, I understand it's a bit lonely out here in deep space."
Nicole bit her lip.
"Seriously - what?"
"I understand, Arnold," Holly said in calming tones, "a man's pleasures should always--"
Nicole didn't get to find out what a man's pleasures should always be, as Rimmer finally comprehended Holly's meaning.
"What!? No, Holly, no! You weren't interrupting...that!"
Nicole had to stuff her fist in her mouth to stop herself from bursting out with laughter.
"Well, if you're not...doing that...then you can fix my circuit for me, can't you?"
"Get someone else to do it."
"I did try. Lister's pissed, Cat's no use, Kryten's still halfway through the laundry, and I can't find Nikki anywhere."
"Oh..." Rimmer was torn. On the one hand if he didn't agree to help Holly, she would constantly be on his case. On the other, if he did help Holly, it would mean a trip to the drive room which meant being away from Nikki for at least forty-five minutes. Again, 'Ippy-Dippy' came to the rescue.
"OK, Hol, I'll be there in a minute. Dress me." He said in despondent tones. She did so. Rimmer was then faced with the tricky take of getting out of the bed without crushing Nicole. It involved a lot of awkward maneuvers and whispered apologies but he eventally managed it.
"See you there." Holly said. And she was gone. Nicole emerged from the covers.
"I'll see you later?" she said. Rimmer nodded and kissed her.
"I'll be back as soon as I possibly can. Believe me, if I could have my way I'd never leave you. Ever."
Nicole smiled and kissed him. The kiss lasted a little longer than either of them had intended, and it meant Rimmer had to practically run to the drive room.

As she waited for him to come back, Nicole was given time to think. She was having an affair. She could sugar the facts all she wanted; she could say that Arn was giving her everything Dave couldn't; she could say she was lonely; she could put it down to the pressure. What it boiled down to was: she was having an affair. And what was more, what made her feel really terrible, was that when she was in bed with Arnold, it felt good. It felt right. The affair was making her happy.
But then she thought about it some more. If she truly felt bad about going behind Dave's back, which she knew she did, then surely it wasn't what she was doing that was pleasuring her, but who she was doing it with...
She quickly got dressed and went into a corridor so as not to arouse suspicion.
"Holly?"
The same impatient face evaporated onto the screen.
"Holly, have you ever been in love?"
"'Fraid so. A Sinclair ZX-81. Everyone told me not to do anything about it. Biggest regret of my life. Then, of course, there was Hilly, my alternate personality. She was who I based my head on when I had my op."
Now that's what you call obsessive, Nicole thought to herself.
"Aw, how sweet," she said aloud.
"Why do you ask?"
"How do you know when you're in love?"
"You just do. You get periods where nothing makes any sense, and then all of a sudden everything does. Then, just as quickly, it doesn't again. You can't stop thinking about them. You start picturing your future with them. Your whole life pretty much revolves around them."
Nicole nodded pensively.
"Who is it?" Holly interrupted her train of thought.
"Hm? Who's what?" Nicole asked innocently. Holly lifted a pixilated eybrow.
"OK," Nicole began with a resigned sigh, "If I tell you, do you promise not to tell anyone?"
Holly nodded eagerly.
"Over the last couple of weeks, I've been seeing...someone else."
"Lister?"
Nicole stared at the senile computer incredulously.
"Hol, Lister is who I am seeing."
"Is it? Then how come you've been spending most nights at Rimmer's place over the last couple of....oh."
The penny dropped.

A/n: Funnily enough I don't have very much to say about this chapter. Possibly because it's getting late and I had my braces tightened today so my teeth are in agony. But anyway... I had a lot of fun writing this chapter and I've already started on the next. it should be up tomorrow.

P.S. Can someone please tell me to stop using elipses (...) cos they're pissing me off!