Dancingwithmyshadow6: Thank you :-)

Ltfl: I'm glad you think so, and I'm sure they will.

Guest: You'll enjoy the next couple of chapters then :-)

Chapter Nineteen

"Noel!"

Noel looked up to see Archie storming towards the desk, dressed from head to toe in a suit. He didn't know the full details but what he did know was that Lily was in meetings with Connie all day, so wasn't available to see anybody. Of course he told Archie this straight away, but it was clear that he wasn't going to accept that answer.

"Well, where is she?" Archie hissed. "I just want to see my girlfriend."

"She's with Mrs Beauchamp," Noel repeated himself, for what felt like the tenth time. "I can pass on a message but that is all I can do. I'm not sure when Doctor Chao is most likely to be available."

"You have a phone, don't you?" Archie mentioned. "Can you not ring her? First, she gets asked to work last night and then she gets asked to work today as well."

"What?" Noel frowned at him. "Lily wasn't due to work a night shift last night, she wouldn't be working today otherwise."

"She wasn't?" Archie's eyes widened, rage building up inside of him at the thought of his own girlfriend lying to his face.

"No." Noel shook his head, confused. "She went home last night."

"Did she?" Archie cleared his throat and sighed, trying to hold his anger in. "Well, I um...I guess I'll just hang about and wait until she is free then. If you could pass on that message please, Niel."

"Um...It's Noel," the receptionist corrected him.

Archie didn't say anything, and walked away from the desk. Sick and injured patients surrounded the waiting area, and Connie's office could be seen with the door closed. Outside was a chair, along with Lily's bag, so he guessed that she was hiding away with Connie. He was so hurt, so angry at her lies, and he knew that he needed to show her how upset he was.

He went to sit down and noticed a mobile phone was on one of the plastic chairs. Smirking to himself, he glanced around the busy room and saw that no one was actually watching him. Picking it up, he made his way over to Lily's bag and dropped the mobile phone into the top of it.

"I'm not going to lie Lily, this is rather quite concerning," Connie said, as she read over the self evaluation that Lily had completed.

Lily just sat on the sofa, her head hung, her hands hidden in the sleeves of her jackets. Her stomach growled and she knew that she'd failed; she'd failed to throw up last night. She needed to do something but Connie was keeping her nearby and refusing to let her go until they'd finished their conversation. Her arm stung with the new cut that she had made last night, but she tried not to show it.

"You're saying that you don't get any sleep at all?" Connie raised an eyebrow at her. "You must get some."

"Not much," Lily whispered, shrugging her shoulders. "Maybe a couple of hours but no more than that. Can I get back to work now?"

"No," Connie replied sharply. "Now, and you often feel quite depressed?" She then asked, turning over the sheet of paper. "Why do you think that is?" Lily just gave another small shrug. "Okay," she sighed, beginning to chew on the end of her pen. "I just don't want you continiously hurting yourself Lily, and I think we need to put something in place to make sure that it doesn't happen."

"Just leave me alone," Lily whined, standing up from the sofa and holding her hands to her head. "I didn't want to talk about this with Ben, so why would I want to talk about it with you?"

"I just need to understand why you are doing this," Connie said. "So I can work out how to help you."

"I don't need any help," Lily whispered. "I'm doing just fine on my own."

Connie pursed her lips together and shook her head. Lily had always been awkward, and there was no denying that.

"Just talk me through it for me," Connie said, leaning against her desk with her arms crossed. "What makes you throw up like that? Why...Why do you feel the need to lose weight?"

"I just do," Lily said, giving a small shrug of the shoulders. "I...I look at myself in the mirror and I...I know that I'm not pretty. I exercise and I eat healthy, but nothing ever helps. Sometimes I feel like I don't have any control and that eating is the only control I have. When I...When I do eat though, I just feel horrible and guilty afterwards, and...I need to get rid of that guilt."

"Okay, and why the cutting?" Connie asked her.

"I can't help it," Lily said, her bottom lip wobbling slightly. "I...I just feel disgusting and ugly, and it makes me feel better."

"Well," Connie sighed, a small smile on her face. "You should be pretty proud of yourself, because you've just had a counselling session without even realising it. See? This is the sort of stuff that Ben was trying to talk to you about, but you weren't even five minutes in and you fled the room. Why?"

"I just couldn't do it," Lily told her. "I'm mental."

"No you're not," Connie sighed and wrapped an arm around her. "You're going through a rough time. That's completely different to mental, okay? Come on, we're going to get you help." Lily faintly nodded into Connie's blouse, just as the door opened and Cal and Ethan walked in. "Doctor Knight, we are in the middle of a private meeting," Connie said, just as Lily pulled away.

"Have you been crying?" Ethan asked Lily, concerned for his friend.

"I don't know why she's been crying," Cal said, holding up Lily's bag. "Care to explain?"

"What are you doing with that?" Lily spat, grabbing it from him.

"I think the better question is what the hell was my mobile doing in it?" He shouted.

"Cal, calm down," Ethan whispered. "I've already told you that Lily wouldn't do a thing like that, there must be some misunderstanding."

"Doctor Knight, what do you mean?" Connie asked him. "Lily's been with me all morning."

"Has she though?" Cal scoffed. "Because I couldn't find my phone. Ethan suggested ringing it and when he did, we found it coming from Lily's bag. I had a look and sure enough, it was in there."

"Lily," Connie breathed, shutting her eyes for a brief second. "Do you care to explain this?"

"I'm not a thief!" Lily defended. "And like you said, I've been with you all morning."

"I did leave you sitting outside by yourself for a little while," Connie mentioned. "If you didn't take it, who did and why would they put it in your bag? Maybe you just don't remember putting it in there, you haven't been getting much sleep lately have you?"

"I'm not crazy," Lily said, her chest tightening and her tears beginning to fall at their accusations. "Just leave me alone." She shook her head at them all and tossed her bag to the floor, before storming out of the office.

She quickly wiped her tears away and pushed through the crowd of patients and staff, until she reached the staffroom. She wasn't crazy, she knew that she wasn't. First the flood in her flat though, and then the mobile phone in her bag. She kicked a wall and stormed over to the counter, pulling open a drawer and reaching for the first knife that she saw. As she rolled up her sleeve, she heard the door open and turned her head to see Archie standing there.

"What do you think you're doing?" He hissed, walking over and slowly taking the knife from her grasp. "You silly, silly girl."

"Sorry," Lily whispered, her entire body filling up with fear. She'd been trying to avoid Archie all morning, and now here he was.

"Sorry?" He repeated her word as a question. "You lied to me, and all you can say is sorry?"

"I...I didn't lie to you," she said, frowning at him with a look of pure confusion.

"You told me that you were working last night," he said, tightening his grip round her wrist. "But you weren't, were you? I've just spoken to that receptionist guy and he told me that you weren't!"

"I...I was," Lily gulped, her tears escaping at such a fast pace that she didn't have time to stop them. "But he wasn't, so...He...He didn't know."

"Stop lying!" He shouted, pushing her into the cupboards at such a force that she actually yelled out in pain. "Why did I end up with such a useless, fat, idiot of a girlfriend like you?"

He raised a hand and slapped her hard around the face, causing her to fall weakly to the floor. She clutched at her sore cheek and cowered against the cabinets, praying that someone, anyone would walk in at that moment. No one did though. She was alone, with the man who she feared most.

"There's no one here to help you, Lily," he hissed. "You're on your own." He spat in her face and pushed her harder against the cupboards, before hitting her twice more around the face. She screamed and began to shake, as he kicked her and stormed out of the staffroom alone.

Lily pulled her knees up to her chest and tried to ignore the pain that shot through her. Tears rolled down her cheeks and her eyes caught sight of the knife that Archie had grabbed from her. It lay in the middle of the floor, staring her right in the face. She needed it, more than anything, but she couldn't even find the strength to stand up and go and collect it. She heard Connie's voice outside and guessed that she was probably looking for her.

Lily just buried her face in her knees, unable to take anymore.

A bit of a long chapter but I hope you enjoyed it. It was quite packed so I hope it was okay. There'll be a nice Iain and Lily scene in the next chapter, and Lily may tell people what's going on :-) x