A/N: Sorry this took so long to update - I've had issues with where to take it, but I think I've got it on the right track now :) Thanks to everyone who has read and reviewed!

Sarah x

Serena sat bolt upright in bed, the surroundings unfamiliar to her until she remembered what had happened today. How what little she had rebuilt had fallen apart on top of her, the debris of what was and what will be crushing her.

She tried to remember what had woke her up, but only found quick flashes of her dreams. Some fantasy and some true memory, none of it pleasant, it was a mix of pain and regret, but knowing she was doing the right thing. She was staying away from them for their own good. She didn't know when, or even if, she would return to them. It all depended on what happened next. On whether she had it in her to talk to the woman she once called her best friend. And, of course, if she could convince the woman she wasn't lying.

She got out of bed carefully, padding through to the living room, where she stood at the window, looking out at nothing in particular, not that there was much to see. Instead she resorted to staring at the glass, studying her own reflection. Minus the make up, and minus the front she put on daily, she was broken. She had built her walls up again, built her confidence up again, and now she didn't know what to think.

She looked at her watch. Two in the morning. "Can't sleep, Ms. Campbell?" a deep Scottish voice behind her asked, taking her by surprise and making her jump nearly out of her skin.

"Serena," she corrected him. "I'm in your home, Jonny. I don't think calling me "Ms. Campbell" will make you feel any more comfortable with my intrusion."

"You're not intruding!" he insisted. "If we didn't want to take you in, we wouldn't have done it. You're welcome here as long as you need," he added, and she noted he referred to himself and Jac as a single unit. "You know, I'm a light sleeper and a good listener," he told her, sitting on the sofa behind her. She didn't turn; she could see his reflection in the dark window.

"Pity I'm not a good talker," she sighed.

"Rubbish. You're a brilliant talker, until it gets personal," he reminded her. He stood up again and put his hands on her shoulders lightly. "Why don't we get some hot chocolate?" he suggested. "Hmm?"

She reluctantly nodded, letting him take her to the kitchen. Unusually, there was nothing about Jonny that unnerved her in the sense that he might hurt her; he was kind and he was trying to help, more than anyone was asking of him.

She sat down on the bar stool, watching as he made hot chocolate. "Right," he said, drawing up a stool. "What's going on?" he demanded, handing her her mug.

"There's a patient on Keller just now," she sighed. "His wife is the woman who used to be my best friend."

"So, what, you fell out?" he asked her, obviously confused by the reaction she was taking to what she claimed was nothing more or less than a misunderstanding becoming public knowledge.

"Not really," she admitted. "I moved out without a word when she was on a double shift," she confessed. "I decided I couldn't live with them," she continued, not saying it wasn't Mariah who had been the problem, but her step-brother. "I couldn't face them."

"OK," he replied slowly. "So she didn't know you were leaving?"
"I didn't even resign from my job," she confessed. "I just got in my car and left. I'm quite good at doing that."

"Why would you do that?" he asked her disbelievingly. "You had a job, right? You had a home. You had your friends."

"I was also pregnant," she whispered, looking down into her mug, taking a drink as an excuse not to say any more than she already had done. She knew she was going to have to explain it to him. She just had to find the words without being too blunt.

"Pregnant?" he replied. "With your daughter, I take it?" he asked, and she nodded her head lightly. "You've lost me. Was it because you weren't supposed to be in a relationship that you left?" he asked, very puzzled as to why she ran.

"There was no relationship," she said.

"One night stand?" Jonny guessed. God, was she going to have to spell it out to him?! He wasn't an unintelligent man, but he could be so dense at times.

"No," she moaned, not wanting to have to be so direct. Maybe it was best, though, to just come out and explain, for the first time, exactly what happened that night. "What happened was that I was up studying for some stupid assessment, and Mariah went out to get us something to eat because we hadn't eaten all day," she explained the basis of what went on.

"Fraser – her step-brother – came down the stairs, asking where she went. I told him she went out for a takeaway, and he sat on the sofa. I was on the floor, kneeling over the coffee table," she recalled. "He started telling me I was pretty, all the rest of it. I didn't think anything of it until he touched my face. I told him to stop it. I told him he was like my brother but he dragged me up by the wrists," she said. She looked up from her cup to see Jonny's face. He was horrified, with silent tears running down his face. She wanted to stop, but he had to know why she was losing the plot.

"He dragged me up the stairs, into my bedroom. He wasn't gentle about it at all. I tried to fight against him, but he slammed me against the wall," she remembered, feeling the sickening crunch of her back against the wall all over again. "I started shouting, hoping a neighbour would hear me, but he hit me across the face.

"Every single time I almost got free of him, he threw me to the floor, knowing I would be in too much pain to escape," she recounted. She looked at Jonny again and decided to stop telling the story; she was upsetting him, and she didn't want that. The mother in her felt terrible for upsetting him, and she reached out and wiped his tears away. "That's enough. I think you get the idea now."

He wiped his eyes and said, "Is this the same Fraser who attacked you and Chantelle last summer?"

"Yeah," she replied. "Hanssen, Michael, Ric, Chantelle, Malick, Sacha, Chrissie, Jac...we all kept who he was on the down low. To the rest of the world, he was just some nutter," she explained. "And don't give Jac a hard time. She was told not to tell anyone."

"I wasn't going to," he answered. "I know she must have felt obligated not to tell me."

"Good."

They sat and drank their hot chocolate silently for a few minutes, until Jonny shattered it with another question. "Are you going back to Ric and Eleanor?" he enquired.

"I don't know," she replied honestly. She was too scared to go back and face them. Too scare, as well, to put them through her own mental torture. She knew she was taking it out on them, but didn't see it until later on. In the heat of the moment, she didn't think. Desperation and fear and anger took over and her words and actions were not her own. It was a lousy excuse for her behaviour, but it was true.

"They'll be wanting you back. They'll be missing you," he urged.

"They want to make sure I'm not doing anything stupid," she said the same as she had to Ric just hours ago. "There's a difference."

"Either way, they love you," he reasoned.

"Do they?" she retorted. "I take it Jac told you why I left." He nodded his reply, but he didn't look like he was judging her. He looked like he could understand why she had flipped the switch on them, going crazy at Eleanor, and why she was leaving them alone. "See? They shouldn't have to put up with that."

"It's understandable though."

"Not to Eleanor. I haven't told her Mariah turned up. She doesn't even know who Mariah is," she snorted at her own cowardice. "I told Ric, but then Mariah pulled her stunt and it all came out, and then she phoned the police to say I've been found, and now they've done a press release, and now it's on the news and everyone wants to know why it happened and..." she trailed off, realising she was rambling something terrible. "And now the whole hospital knows I'm Serena McKinnie who went walkabout nineteen years ago," she finished, her voice calmer.

"So it's a matter of time until Eleanor hears anyway," Jonny reminded her. "That's if Ric hasn't done it himself. You can imagine she would've wanted answers when you left," he added reasonably. "It's not like she's a wee kid anymore, is it?"

"More's the pity," Serena sighed. "When she was younger, I could tell myself she was too young to understand it. Now she's a young woman with a mind of her own and a decent understanding of the world. I have no get out clause."

"You know, kids are made of hardy stuff. Hardier than us so-called adults, at least," he grinned. "She's still young. Better to sort it out now rather than leave her wondering why you deserted her, or she'll end up like Jac."

Being like Jac, in some ways, was not a bad thing. It meant strength and courage and survival. But in other ways, Serena knew as well as Jonny did that Jac's flaws were huge. She was cold and guarded and manipulative. And as much as she loved Jac, she didn't want her daughter to turn into the redheaded Ice Queen.

She sighed; Jonny was, of course, right. But he wasn't standing where she was, and he couldn't know what she was feeling like, though he was clearly making his best effort to try. He couldn't know that she was so terrified of hurting her own daughter that she felt the need to keep away from her. And that Ric, though patient, was under strain too. He would never have said as much, but Serena knew her antics and mindset were already driving him round the bend.

"Right, back to bed," he announced, getting to his feet and putting the dirty mugs in the sink. "Jac will murder me for that, but I really can't be bothered," he winked.

Serena just stared at him, not knowing how to proceed. He was unknown to her; before now, he had never been the one she opened up to. He had been Jac's boyfriend with a bright personality and the world's most childish sense of humour. She'd never really viewed him as a friend.

She eventually stood up. "I'm sorry if I upset you, Jonny," she said. "I just thought, well, you know. That I should explain myself. I've been a bit of a horror today."

"A bit?!" he exclaimed, feigning outrage. She smiled for the first time in twenty-four hours, although it felt like an eternity to her. "Listen, if you ever need to talk and you can't face Ric or Jac, you know where I am. Michael Spence is alright and everything, but I can imagine he'd get on your nerves," he grinned, knowing both her and Michael well enough to know they bickered like toddlers at times.

"Thanks, Jonny," she replied, the lump in her throat building again. He put his arms around her in what could only be described as a bear hug, hugging her tightly. He was right – Ric loved her, Eleanor loved her and she loved them both to bits, but she couldn't bring herself to go back. Not yet. Not while she was still torn and raw.

He let her go and led her back up stairs. "Goodnight," she whispered to him when they got to the landing, not wanting to wake Jac.

"'Night," he replied, going into his bedroom, leaving her in the darkness of the landing, wondering what she was meant to do.

Hope this is OK!
Please feel free to review and tell me your thoughts!
Sarah x