A/N: So, this is Chapter 4...gets a bit violent. Just thought maybe we ought to warn you.
Sarah and Caja xxxx
Just as Henrik looked like he was about to reply to her concern, there was an almighty thud as the door was thrown open. "Sorry," Greg Douglas' nervous and frankly worried voice came with his appearance at the Director of Surgery's door. "He said that he had to see you; he wouldn't stop. I couldn't stop-"
"What are you doing here Sahira?" shouted her drunken husband. He staggered a bit, but he was just sober enough to be angry. Furious. He had worked himself up to an almighty state, and there was no talking him out of it now.
"I work here. More to the point, exactly what do you think you're doing, coming to my work and attempting to terrorise me?" relayed Sahira. A moment later, her husband mad a sharp lunge at her and she felt a jeering pain in her stomach that knocked the breath out of her. She doubled over with the pain and shortly after felt Hanssen's unsteady but still reassuringly strong hands holding her up.
It wasn't long afterwards that she heard a sharp voice tinged with malice, that she knew all too well belonged to Jac Naylor, begin to round off what sounded like the beginnings of a lecture, before stopping in her tracks. She had came into and looked around the room before settling with, "I found these in the car park. I think they belong to you, but by the looks of it you're otherwise preoccupied. I think it would be best if I looked after them, don't you?"
Excellent, thought Sahira and Henrik simultaneously. Not only did they have Sahira's husband and two children in the office, but they now had Jac and her snide remarks to deal with on top of this. But to the surprise of both of them, Jac grasped both of the children by the hands, turned on her heel and stalked off towards the direction of Darwin ward with both of the children in tow.
In the momentary shock that Jac had caused, Sahira's husband once again swung round to take a swing at Sahira but was thrown back by an absolutely fuming Henrik.
"Don't you dare come anywhere near her ever again," he said in a low, threatening voice. Sahira's husband then took yet another move to try and get past Henrik to Sahira, but he was thrown back against that wall in an instant with an outraged Henrik body-blocking and pinning him against the wall, preventing him from moving. For the second time in the month, Henrik had not only surprised Sahira, but also himself. His shaking hands held his arms firmly to the wall with such force that Sahira's husband began to still slightly and started to stop resenting Henrik's firm grasp. He continued, "Because if you do come near her or the children ever again, believe me, you will regret it. Do you understand me?"
"Yes," came the slurred response if Sahira's husband. Sahira saw that Hanssen was resisting the urge to punch her husband and, to be honest, she was at that point where she wouldn't have minded all that much if the man she married walked out of this office with a broken nose. Or a broken jaw.
"Then," said Henrik, "you will get out of my office and my hospital and not come back, alright?" this was followed with the release of the man in Henrik's grasp as he was shoved out of the office door.
After what seemed like hours Henrik turned to face Greg Douglas, fixing him with his icy stare. "I would appreciate it if this," he gestured around the office, "was kept here and didn't spread out onto the ward. I'm sure I speak for both myself and Sahira when I say that the amount of gossip that the people working in this place come up with is not only frustrating, but ineffectual and petty too."
"Yes- OK- fine- I will" stuttered Greg as he hastily made his way towards the glossy door of the office.
The silence that followed was deafening. Neither spoke yet both was thinking exactly the same thing, each turning over the events of the last ten minutes slowly in their heads, each analysing every word said, trying to make sense of it all. Sahira was still stunned at exactly how much Henrik seemingly cared for her. He had put himself between her and her drunk, aggressive, violent husband and could have easily been hurt. Deep down she already knew that Henrik would do just about anything for her, and would never even dream of letting anyone hurt her. Henrik was stunned himself. Not only had he just invited Sahira and both of her children to move in with him, but he had openly expressed just how much he was prepared to do for Sahira in front of none other than Jac Naylor and Greg Douglas. These were two things he thought that he would never do.
He looked up to find Sahira's beautiful dark eyes studying him, looking at every single inch of his body before she eventually found his eyes. " Are you hurt?" he asked her whilst standing exactly where he was but with a level of concern rising in his voice.
"I'm fine. He just knocked the wind out of me, that's all." She replied still staring directly at him and not for one second dropping her gaze. "Are you OK?" she relayed back with genuine concern thick in her voice.
"I'm fine, too," he said, still slightly bemused as to what had just happened. Had he really just thrown a man against a wall, in front of his CT consultant and one of her registrars?
"Henrik…do you honestly believe that you're fine? After all, we both know from looking at those test results that you're far from it," she quizzed his once again, looking him up and down before she did so. After waiting for a reply with no avail Sahira asked, "Was this what your mother died of when you were a child?" Again no reply came and so Sahira gave up and began to walk towards the office door.
"Don't go," came Henrik's shaky voice. "Yes, this is what my mother di- what my mother had. And no, I know that I'm obviously not fine, but there we go life goes on."
"Henrik Hanssen. Don't you dare try that matter of fact sort of sarcasm with me. I've known you far too long to be drawn in by any of it. Understand?" she asked him. He looked down, away from her eyes, so she could not see the fear in them. When he looked up again, he, for all he tried, could not take his eyes away from hers.
"Yes, yes, I do. And it wasn't just my mother that had the disease. My grandmother, my mother and two of my cousins all got it and it killed them all." He trailed off and for one he was the one to break the eye contact between the two.
"Are you scared?" she queried. What a stupid question, she silently berated herself. Of course he was scared. Well, any normal person would be, at least. But then, most people didn't classify Henrik Hanssen under the category of "normal."
"Well I'm barley going to be ecstatic, but at least it's manageable…isn't it?" he half asked half stated at her.
"Yes, Henrik you know that Huntington's disease is perfectly manageable. You'll be fine, believe me." She assured both him and herself. It was not entirely true, of course. There would be a point, sometime in the coming years, when drugs would not have the power to control the symptoms anymore. At some point, she would look at him and see that he couldn't run. Couldn't walk. Couldn't speak. Couldn't think.
"I'll be fine until I'm not fine anymore," he replied with a sad, regretful smile. He had seen this disease at work. He had watched it kill. He had watched it drive people to suicide, just so they wouldn't have to go through the pain they had witnessed in someone else.
"And about earlier. I would like, I would love, to move in with you. If it's OK with you, of course," she added on the end, remembering that her husband's display of idiocy may well have put him off the idea. He knew as well as she did that this
"Sahira, you know that's fine. I would actually like that. You're welcome to move in any time. Tonight, even, if you wanted?" he rushed out. "Sorry," he said hastily, "I'm babbling again, aren't I?" He took a breathe and resumed more calmly. "It's just that, especially after what just happened, I don't like the thought of you and the children spending another minute in the same house as him."
"Henrik. You know I don't mind what you say or how you say it. I hang on to your every word."
Hope it was alright!
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Sarah and Caja xxxx