Ch 29 is here, I missed a couple of days after my promise of faster updates but real life took over once again, anyway it's here now so let me know….
"Abby, Abby." Abby heard the familiar voice calling her name and turned to see Maggie and Birdie making their way towards her. She looked at them questioningly for a second before Maggie launched into a delighted explanation of why they were there. "Lauren's woken up, Jasper called your apartment, he said that she'd woken up and was talking and everything." Maggie smiled.
"Hey, that's great." Abby smiled genuinely.
"We're going up there now, are you going to come?" Maggie questioned. Abby looked around the teeming ER, assessing whether she would be able to slip away unnoticed for a while, as if on cue she heard Carter calling for her.
"Abby, multi victim MVA pulling up, we need all hands on deck." He said bustling past pulling a gurney with him. "Hi Maggie." He added as he passed, Maggie replied with a hurried hello, before turning back to Abby, who was making her way towards the ambulance bay.
"I can't but, tell her I said hello and I'll go up as soon as I get a break." She said waving Maggie away and heading towards whatever catastrophe awaited her.
"Looks like it's just us then." Birdie smiled at Maggie as they headed through the chaos towards the elevator.
Finally Abby pulled her bag out of her locker, it had been the kind of day where the harder you looked for the time to take a break the more the gods of the ER denied you the opportunity, Lilly had tried her hardest to persuade her to tag a nursing shift onto the end of her med student shift, she'd flatly refused though and was now, finally, going to make the trip upstairs to see Lauren.
"Hi." She said as she poked her head around the door, getting Amelia's attention.
"Hey." Amelia smiled quietly pushing herself up from her slouching position in the chair by the sleeping Lauren's bed, putting aside the papers in her hand.
"What are you doing?" Abby frowned noticing the huge pile of charts sitting beside Amelia, making her way further into the room, taking the seat next to her.
"I left with about four hundred thousand charts to do, so I figured that now was as good a time as any to get them done." She smiled.
"Need a hand?" Abby asked holding out her hand for some of the pile.
"Absolutely, it's highly illegal but be my guest." She grinned at Abby handing her a stack and a pen.
"I heard she'd woken up." Abby smiled,
"Yeah." Amelia nodded, her relief clearly on show. "She came too at about three o'clock this morning." She smiled.
"So how's she doing?" Abby asked looking over at Amelia, talking about Lauren.
"I'm not sure, she's still pretty groggy." She breathed out hard, her face forming a perplexed, concerned frown, "They've done a bunch of tests, she seems ok, and they want to do an fMRI in a couple of days just to check." She paused, shrugging, "The only thing they've confirmed is that she's got a partial loss of hearing in her left ear, the only other thing is her liver which their keeping a pretty close eye on, she's a bit jaundiced but we'll see, she knows who everyone is and wants to see Imogen so I think probably she's fine." Amelia laughed slightly, adding, "I think that if all we're looking at is a partial loss of hearing and a screwed up liver we probably got incredibly lucky." She admitted smiling over at Abby.
"They always said she was tough." Abby smiled back.
"Yeah, I think they were probably right." Amelia said allowing herself a tentative fully relaxed smile.
"How long has she been asleep?" Abby queried, scanning the chart in front of her.
"Since Maggie and Birdie left a couple of hours ago, I think they pretty much exhausted her." Amelia smiled, adding, "When did they get so friendly?" Abby shrugged her response.
"All I noticed was they were pretty tough to take together." She smiled, laughing slightly.
"It's been like a competition as to who could get more words out all day." Amelia said laughing.
"It's been a bit like that for a couple of days." Abby said looking over at her raising her eyebrows, smiling before looking back down at the char in front of her. "Where's Jasper?" She asked.
"He's gone home to pick up some stuff for her, and I think probably to sort out our house before I see it, I heard that he trashed it." She laughed slightly.
"Yeah, I heard that too." Abby smiled.
"And hit your boyfriend I hear." She added raising her eyebrows.
"Yep, that too." Abby nodded smiling along.
"Ah, well, his reactions always were crap." Amelia shrugged.
"How are you and Jasper?" Abby asked cautiously, eyeing Amelia.
"Actually surprisingly ok I think." Amelia raised her eyebrows, still looking down at the chart in front of her. "I guess that it's been a weird time and we both lost it a little bit." She said with a self-depreciating eye roll.
"I think you were probably both entitled to loose it a little bit." She shrugged her eyes still on the chart in front of her as well.
"Yeah." Amelia paused breathing deeply before looking over at Abby, "Listen about that I actually wanted to apologise." Abby looked up, a questioning frown on her face, "About out in the ambulance bay the other day." She explained a slightly embarrassed wary expression on her face. "I didn't mean to fall apart." She added as she bit her lip.
"You don't have to apologise for that." Abby frowned, shaking her head at the absurdity of Amelia's words.
"Yeah, no, I know, but…" She trailed off shrugging, "I just, I didn't mean to, and it was kind of stupid, and I just didn't want you to think that, I don't know, you know…" She said still looking embarrassed.
"It's fine Amelia really." Abby nodded at her reassuringly. Amelia looked back uncomfortably still before she bit her lip and nodded once, looking back at the chart on her lap.
"So how are you and Nick doing?" Amelia asked with a clear and unsubtle change of tack in mind.
"Ok, I guess." Abby shrugged.
"Ok, you guess?" Amelia smiled, her tongue running over her bottom lip, scepticism in her voice, as Abby shrugged again and nodded. Amelia figured that she needed to change angles and tried again, "How's Imogen doing?"
"She's ok I think." Abby nodded, adding, "She doesn't really get all this I don't think." Smiling slightly at Amelia, waving her pen in Lauren's direction.
"She likes you, you know." Amelia said looking at her.
"I don't know about that." Abby shook her head, laughing the comment off.
"No, she does, she's a pretty stubborn kid, she knows who she likes and who she doesn't." Amelia nodded at her honestly.
"She's great." Abby nodded noncommittally. Amelia stole a glance at her as she looked towards Lauren.
"Not sure about being the girlfriend of a guy with a kid?" Amelia asked narrowing her eyes slightly.
"I don't know, I've never done it before." Abby shrugged her response.
"Scared?" Amelia asked looking over at her.
"Unsure." Abby admitted looking back, Amelia continued to look at her, urging her to go on, slowly she did. " I guess it's, it's just that he has a lot more to loose than I do, and I don't want to get too involved in case it does all fall apart and then it's not just me or him that get screwed over." Abby rolled her eyes in a resigned fashion.
"You're not willing to gamble on it?" Amelia questioned.
"Maybe, I'm not sure." Abby shook her head.
"Too much responsibility?" Amelia asked.
"I don't know." She shrugged. "Maybe, I wasn't looking for anything and it's kind of just snuck up on me." She shrugged, mulling things over. Amelia frowned slightly, looking back over at Lauren, considering what Abby had said. She studied Lauren for a few minutes, as she and Abby remained silent, both settled in their chairs.
"I don't think that you should write Nick off because he's got a kid, he's a nice guy." She shrugged looking back at Abby.
"I'm not writing him off because he's got a kid, I'm not writing him off at all." Abby defended herself.
"Okay." Amelia nodded unassumingly.
"No, okay, well." Abby started in defence to Amelia's unassuming backing down. "I don't know if I want that kind of responsibility, god I don't know if I'd get it anyway." She shrugged pausing. "It's early days yet, it's only been three, maybe four weeks." She smiled.
"Fair enough." Amelia nodded looking back at her chart. They sat in silence for a while longer before turning to inconsequential things to pass the time.
"Birdie said that she might have put her foot in as far as what I used to do goes." Amelia said, her face sceptical, as she half glanced over at Abby.
"Yeah, you've had a pretty interesting working career so far I understand." Abby smiled subtly not looking up from her chart.
"Yeah, what did she say?" Amelia queried, praying that Birdie had kept at least some of the more unorthodox events quiet, she wanted to keep her upstanding citizen image up.
"Well you've got a pretty good right hook I hear." Abby smiled, still not looking back, toying with Amelia.
"Ok, now I know you've heard more than that so come on." Amelia said; now desperate to hear what Abby knew, laying her pen on the stack in her lap and turning fully to look at her.
"And lap dancing, now that I never expected, you look like a tough chick but a lap dancer, that I never thought." Abby continued, laughing into the chart she was concentrating on, shrugging dismissively.
"I…I was never a lap dancer." Amelia said forcefully dismissive. "No, ok, right." Amelia said as Abby shrugged again still smiling, writing notes on the chart as she did. "Ok, give me that." Amelia said grabbing the chart and pen from her, as she feigned innocence, as Amelia smiled knowingly back.
"That's it, now I don't get to help with your charts because you used to be a lap dancer." Abby laughed, pretending to be disappointed as she turned to face Amelia who was smiling at her still.
"Ok, one, the right hook thing was a one off, two…" She started her eyebrows raised, as she shook her head. "I was never a lap dancer, bar dancer yes, lap dancer no." She said, smiling earnestly at Abby, who had a 'who are you trying to kid' expression on her face. "I wasn't." Amelia implored light-heartedly.
"Whatever." Abby shrugged, grabbing the chart back of Amelia, shooting her a grin as she did.
"Ok, Jasper was I ever a lap dancer?" Amelia asked instantly, as a rustle came from the door announcing his arrival as he entered followed by Nick who was holding a small stack of files.
"No babe, you were just a really hot bar dancer." He replied a provocative smile playing on his lips as he made his way towards her and bent to kiss her hello, dumping a heavy looking bag on the floor beside her.
"See." She said raising her eyes at Abby, who remained with a smirk on her face, as Amelia waved one hand at Nick.
"Hi Abby." Jasper smiled at her, Abby shot a smile in his direction, before glancing back at Amelia. "I found him lurking." Jasper added indicating Nick.
"How's she doing?" Nick asked quietly, moving further into the room.
"She's good, she's good." Amelia nodded earnestly as Nick looked briefly at Lauren before turning to Abby.
"I came to see if you wanted a lift home." Nick offered smiling at her.
"Sure." Abby nodded warmly, smiling at him, laying the chart back on Amelia's 'done' pile and standing up.
"Hey, d'you want to see if Imogen wants to come and see her tomorrow?" Amelia said as Jasper instantly took Abby's vacated chair.
"Yeah, I don't think I'm going to have to ask her twice." Nick smiled, chuckling slightly.
"Ok, we'll see you at some point tomorrow then." Amelia smiled leaning down to pick up a new stack of charts as Abby made her way towards Nick.
"Sounds like a plan." He smiled, from Amelia to Abby, and they departed.
Abby and Nick had returned to his apartment to find Maggie, Birdie and Ed in a semi heated but amicable debate about the trials and tribulations of the British royal family, Eddie, Birdie and Maggie, actually being really just Maggie and Birdie with the occasional throw away comment from Eddie. Eventually Nick had managed to send Eddie and Birdie back to Jasper and Amelia's house and Abby had managed to deposit Maggie across the hall and return for some dinner with Nick.
"So Lauren's really ok?" Nick asked as they lay in bed.
"Yeah." Abby laughed slightly. "She's okay." She nodded, smiling along with him.
"You working tomorrow?" He asked
"In…" She started, shaking her watch round her wrist to see the face, "Three hours." She said still smiling.
"Three hours, d'you need to get some sleep?" He asked smiling knowingly, his intentions clear.
"Not right now." She bent to meet his lips a smile playing on hers as she said it.
Ok, there we go, I've lost momentum a bit and I have more essays and dissertations and stuff to do that time to do it in so this is taking (or at least should be taking) a back seat for a while but I'll try to keep it all coming if you are interested, bits that I want to write have been skipped a little in favor of getting my degree and trying to keep you all interested so sorry about that. It's also getting far, far longer than I anticipated so thank you for bearing with me!! Thanks for all the reviews, they are very much appreciated! I had one thing to ask you all, which was if anyone cared about any of the characters apart from Abby? I was just something I was wondering about, anywho, if you do or not give me a shout cheers K.
Teertornado ~ mate, he's not about to break her heart, she just might break his though; self-protection and stubbornness are funny, irrational things!! I want to keep you hanging (and reading!), is it working??!!
Blah ~ I'm liking Nick and Abby too, I'm glad you do as well! (It'd be bad if I didn't since I'm writing it,) thanks so much for all your reviews.
Tracey ~ I'm glad you found this story again as well, cheers for the reviews, keep 'um coming!
Lopylu1~ thanks buddy, I'm glad you think so, I just hope you continue to feel that way...
Foxywombat ~ I think it's going to get 'happy' (ish) again, you need a bit of trauma though to make you appreciate the 'happy' times!
Caitlin ~ I'm a big Abby fan too; Carby was never going to work though I don't think…. A lot of people are going to hate me for saying that!!! – sorry!
CourtiePie ~ here you go, the next chapter is here, they'll keep coming as long as you guys keep reading.