This part is kind of filler-y because while I've written part 7 (had little bits written for a few days, but needed to fill in the bits around it), this didn't really seem to fit within it yet I'm not sure it fits with being it's own part. So hopefully it is ok, as I am not overly convinced by it and I'll probably put part 7 up later.
He closes his eyes for a second as he tries to contemplate what has happened. Everything seems so confused. For a week, she was been AWOL. He had worried that she'd done a complete disappearing act that he'd never again see her presence on Darwin ward and that had scared him. He had found himself trying to get information from anyone who could possibly help and all he had learned was she'd taken a small amount of leave for undisclosed reasons. This too had concerned him, worried for what she would do alone with her thoughts, but finally she had returned. She had walked on to the ward this day and acted like nothing was different. She was her normal self, perhaps more elusive with him, but for all intents and purposes she was the Jac Naylor that everybody knew and feared.
He had watched her closely, trying to note changes in her, anything that would confirm what he believed to be true – that she was indeed pregnant. He wasn't quite sure what he was looking for, knowing that logically she would not yet be showing but still he had hoped for a little sign. She knew he was looking, and he knew it made her uncomfortable. He had seen the looks flashed in his direction, as he took her in. The way her eyes told him to leave her be, to stop only he couldn't. He never had been able to ignore her, she drew his eye and he wasn't able – or indeed willing – to try to prevent it happening.
And then her body had given her away. They had been standing at the patients' bedside – a patient with whom she seemed to share a mutual disliking which had been almost instantaneous. She had been trying to pull the bed away from the wall, to take him down for surgery. He was certain she'd have attempted to do it alone, against all health and safety rules that hospital had because she was determined like that. She took no heed of the damage it could cause to herself. But her balance her wavered, he had watched the movement of her eyes and the paling of her face as the world had tried to slip away from her and she'd been forced to grip the bed for support, a bed which was unfortunately for her unlocked, but she had somehow stayed upright. She had tried to act like it was nothing, like it was something to be ignored. He had known it was something more, a sign and yet while he could see something in her eyes, a fear perhaps over what was happening otherwise she tried to carry on as before. Had tried until her body faltered again, and he had tried to intervene, to order her to stop before something happened and he had known instantly how wrong those words had been, the offense she had taken. But he had been unable to stop himself then, talking to her telling her she couldn't cope and watching as the confusion passed over her face as she contemplated the words and their meaning, he knew in that instant that she still believed the false negative, that as far as she was concerned she was not pregnant and that once again he was trying to force that she was on her. He watched as she walked away from him, tears gleaming in her eyes as she went, and the reality that once again he had made her cry.
And that had gotten him to this point; the point of knowing that she is somewhere within the hospital having once again disappeared. He knows she is still in the building because her bag is still in her office though her hoodie has disappeared from where it hangs, but he cannot seem to locate her despite trying so many different places; all of the ones he had tried to week previously and with no luck. But he knows she has to be somewhere; that he has to find her once more. He cannot even contemplate not continuing his search because he knows that wherever she is, she isn't in a good place. That though she would never admit it to him, she needs him. He sees it in her, and knows that he isn't just projecting his own wants, and desires on to her. In so many ways, he needs her too. Needs her in-spite of everything that she does to him, needs her because of so many of the things she does.
She worries him that she isn't taking care of herself because she doesn't know, or won't accept it. He could see it in her, the weariness and pallor of her skin. When he told her that she couldn't cope, he hadn't meant it cruelly, but as a stating of a simple fact that she was so very obviously struggling and he had hoped she'd be able to read in to this that he wanted to help her, to be there for her and to support her. Only she had taken it the other way, seen it as a critique of herself and realised that her normal mask wasn't holding so strongly.
He turns back to Darwin and sees the name on the board changing, the patient becoming Professor Hope's rather than hers, and he feels a flood of panic run through him at the change of name. It is so unlike her to hand over a patient, to relinquish control and in many ways to admit defeat. And that worries him all the more. It means something has to be wrong, seriously wrong. He stares at the newly written name as if it will give him answers, though he knows that is ridiculous.
He thinks of the patient, the man in the bed so near to him, the catalyst for this. The man had called her his missus. Her reaction confusing. Initially she almost turns on him in disbelief at the words but she does not deny it and that surprises him. Her immediate response was not to show that she'd lower her standards to be married to a lowly nurse such as himself. Yes she had denied it the second time he had made the accusation and yet she hadn't not completely at least, her breath stolen by another wave of dizziness. And that too gives him a little hope of a future with her, but right now he needs to find her and he tries to push these thoughts from his head.
He hears footsteps approaching, and he thinks for a moment he may be saved the search, but that makes little sense. He cannot see her searching him out after this, and sure enough seconds later his best friend whispers to him that a certain red head has been spotted. He flashes her a grateful smile before he dashes to grab his hoodie, ready to make the journey in search of her once more. This time he cannot let her escape, this time they have to confront things no matter how hard she tries to push him away. He slows his pace, trying to psych himself up for this, knows it won't be easier but he is doing it for her as much as he is doing it for himself, and their child. He walks through unfamiliar corridors and pathways in areas of the hospital he has never had any need to tread, preparing himself for what is to come.