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Friday May 21st Week Minus 4

Harry sat at the back of the pub waiting for Leo to return with the drinks. He couldn't remember the last time it had just been the two of them. Certainly not since things with Janet had got serious. It was the way Leo had asked him, no told him even, that Friday night, it would be the two of them, out together. There wasn't to be an argument about it and it was clear that Leo wanted some answers. There were a lot of things that might pass Leo by, or perhaps he chose to ignore. But this week it was clear that his close knit team was anything but 'close' or 'knit.'

Harry thought back to that application he'd been tempted with over a month ago. He could have been revelling in the prospect of a new job and a new start right now, instead of having the worst fortnight since Leo was on a ventilator. Even by his generous time doubling there was only 4 weeks to go until Nikki was lost to him forever. He shuddered, he'd had the misfortune to run into Henry a lot this week. So much for his mother thinking Henry was married and if anyone should know, she should, he thought bitterly.

Leo had silently placed Harry's pint in front of him, Harry picked it up and took a long drink. Leo's eyes didn't leave him for a second.

"Come on," he said "don't make this any harder than it is."

"You don't want to know." Harry countered.

"I can't not know Harry, if you two can't pull together, I'll have to make some serious changes to the lab and Nikki was only well enough to come back to work on Thursday." Leo was sounding flustered but serious so Harry had no choice but to fill in the details.

"You know Nikki called me last weekend."

"When she was ill, and she needed to get to the doctors." Leo interrupted.

The piercing stare Leo received soon silenced him and he decided he'd better let Harry tell this story his own way.

"I spent all Saturday looking after her, I took her spare key, so as not to wake her when I had to go out. I kept the key so I could check in on her on Sunday. Her waste of space boyfriend had some massive emergency on a Saturday morning." Harry's voice was cynical.

"Nikki?" prompted Leo.

"She looked dreadful Leo, you know how she never admits she's ill, but this time..." he shuddered.

"So I went round on Sunday morning, let myself in, I could hear her"...Harry couldn't bring himself to describe to Leo what he had heard and just continued, "so I realised she was not alone and let myself out again."

"Ah," said Leo sagely.

But, I still don't understand?" Leo said. "Surely this isn't all because you didn't get to play Florence Nightingale. Nikki's been with Henry for months now, I thought you were O.K. with it. How did she even know you'd been round?"

"I don't think she did. I'd bought her some flowers but I just left them on the table on the way out." Harry mumbled.

He'd tried unsuccessfully for a week to get the recollection of the noises from Nikki's bedroom out of his mind. He knew she was with Henry, but it was less than 12 hours previously that she had been kissing him, Harry in that room. He kept telling himself that she was ill, and confused and mistaken and she probably didn't even remember doing it, but she had deliberately said his name. He ran his fingers through his hair and sighed. How much was he going to have to tell Leo, to get him off his back?

But Leo was already beginning to fill in some of the blanks and asked,

"So my making you take those reports round for her to sign on Tuesday, didn't help much?"

"No" Harry replied. With no trace of his trademark wisecracks,

"Henry was there that day too, that's when he asked me if I knew Nikki's ring size."

"Oh." it was all Leo needed to say.

Saturday morning May 22nd Week Minus 4

Hangover? - apocalyptic

Bed? – empty

Work? – never again

Run? As far as the bathroom

Mood? Rock bottom