Hello – good evening/morning/night (time zone dependant)

We have chapter 4, it's a bit of a sweet one, based on episode 6 in essence, I hope you enjoy it! Thanks you so so much for all your lovely reviews, they mean so much to me and it's lovely reading each one.

Please continue to review - and thanks for reading!

Further A/N –

1. My spell check recognised Ribena, but not Quinoa which I'm oddly pleased about,

2. If anyone particularly cares – the ELC that I keep on mentioning is a made up health board, it stands for East London and the City, which is the health board that Poplar would fall under … if it existed.

3. Mr Jensen of the ELC is named after the number 1 most popular surname in Denmark, to mark their success in the Eurovision song contest last week!

Last night I was dreaming I was locked in a prison cell, when I woke up I was screaming calling out your name. Whoa and the judge and the jury, they all put the blame on me, they wouldn't go for my story, they wouldn't hear my plea. Only you can set me free –

"'Cause I'm guilty, guilty as a girl can be, come on baby can't you see. I stand accused of love in the first degree …" Shelagh sighed, and turned down the radio as she surveyed her appearance in the mirror on the inside of her locker for the umpteenth time.

"Morning – you're sounding very tuneful this morning!"

"Hi John, sorry, did I disturb you?"

"No no, It's ok – you're good, what's with the uniform?" He asked nodding towards Shelagh's choice to wear her outdated former midwives uniform. Normally she was in scrubs, after an NHS directive 3 years previously, but stashed away in a drawer was her old hospital blue dress, complete with black belt.

"I'm attending this bloody ELC meeting in place of Julie, she's at Sarah's wedding – and I thought the ELC usually like us to look like proper nurses, as opposed to functional ones. Do I look OK? I'm wearing a bit of mascara."

"Shock horror! Stop the front pages – Shelagh McDonald wears mascara!"

"I didn't want to look too … tarty?"

"Not much danger of that! Is it just you going then?"

"No, Patrick Turner's coming with me, well apparently, I haven't seen him this morning."

"Oh – I just saw him, he's in the car park."

"I'll go and catch him then – wish me luck!"

"You don't need luck – you'll be fabulous!"

Shelagh caught sight of him, before the doctor had seen her, he was leant back against his car smoking as he scrolled down his phone with a small smile on his face, instinctively he turned and looked over towards the staff entrance, catching sight of Shelagh.

"Shelagh, I was expecting Julie …"

"It's Sarah's wedding today – she asked me to cover for her."

"Of course, yes, well that's smashing of course it is … I was just looking at a couple of pictures from Tim's birthday … he loved the cake but we were sorry you couldn't come."

"It's a pity yes … shall we go?"

"Of course of course, sorry – here let me get the door for you."

"Thanks ... so how was the birthday tea?"

"Oh excellent – yes, we had a nice day, watched Doctor Who, ate your cake and had a Chinese delivered. He's going to one of those laser-quest places next Friday with some of his school friends – I'm dreading it, I'll be left sat in that depressing burger bar place in the foyer with a group of middle aged people, all of us wishing we were at home watching the cricket."

"It can't be that bad!"

"Oh believe me – it is! Making small talk with people who you see for about 4 minutes a day at the school gates is nigh of impossible, you have nothing in common bar your children are the same age, and we all live in the same borough. You know most of them drive Chelsea tractors and give their children quinoa for lunch."

"I take it you don't make Tim quinoa and pepper salads for his lunch then?"

"Bloody hell no, we're more of a Monster much and Penguin type of family, and if I'm feeling particularly middle class, he might get some sugar-free Ribena too! Now, have you given any thought to what we're going to say in there?"

"Not really, Julie just kind of landed it on me – not that I mind, but it's not really my area of expertise you know."

"I think it might be you know, you're my secret weapon I think Shelagh. You're on the front line, these cuts are affecting you and I harder than it's affecting them – behind their desks their not feeling the pinch. You're my little … Emmeline Pankhurst! Out, on the front line – seeing the day to day workings of the NHS."

"I'm not sure … oh is this it? I always assumed the ELC'd be a bit grander."

"They might be our Lords and Masters but it's still the NHS, loving the uniform by the way."

"Mmm? Oh right yeah, it's a bit old."

"Suits you."

"Dr Turner, I am trying to be civil but you are making very difficult. Funds are stretched to bursting point, now the health secretary is in the middle of trying to get emergency loans out to struggling health boards, funds are on their way. However, unless your hospital stops haemorrhaging money then there is little we can do, you have some of the highest A&E waiting times in the south of England, and more of your annual budget goes on emergency care than almost any other health board in England."

"You can't really be serious?"

"Nurse McDonald?"

"We serve the East end of London, we have some of the highest rates of gang related crimes in the UK – of course our waiting times are long and our expenditure high! We work with the most densely populated boroughs in London, the fact that we have an A&E full of drunks and stabbing victims does not mean that our maternity department should suffer!"

"Exactly! You say that these emergency funds are coming, coming to where? To the privileged Chelsea and Westminster? To the sexy, crowd pleasing Great Ormond street? Not to us though, because our patients aren't middle class, because almost 60% of children born in our hospital have one or both parents born overseas – and that's not popular!"

Silence filled the small office, Mr Jensen smoothed a damp hand over his badly concealed bald patch and licked his lips before lifting the phone on his desk and pressing a button he waited a moment before speaking, twisting his wedding ring up and down his finger as he did so.

"Sarah – can you bring my milk in please, thank you … it's my ulcer," He said, turning back to the pair sat in front of him, "I give up smoking to stop myself getting lung cancer, and I end up getting an ulcer because of the stress of giving up! Why do I bother … ah, Sarah, thank you." he continued, as a young woman stepped into the office and presented him with a glass of milk before turning to leave. "Now; Dr Turner, Nurse McDonald – I appreciate what you're saying, but my hands really are tied. However what I can do is put your hospital at the top of the emergency staff fund list, the emergency fund isn't a great deal I'm afraid – but what it will do is enable you to take on another member of staff, with a little left over to allow you to continue to take on bank staff without draining your existing budget. Have we a deal?"

Shelagh and Patrick exchanged a glance, he raised an eyebrow at her, questioning. Why was he asking her she asked herself, this was not her area of expertise, she didn't know about this sort of thing. And then she thought about what he had said in the car, about how she was his secret weapon, about how as she worked on the front line she was in fact best to tell poor balding Mr Jensen exactly what was what. She swallowed hard and turned to Patrick, giving her a small supportive smile she took a deep breath,

"I think that that's just what we need. Doctor?"

"I agree."

There was a click of the doctors lighter, and a pause as he inhaled the smoke,

"You were magnificent Shelagh, you really were. Had you prepared all that?"

"No, I was just getting so annoyed that he wasn't seeing behind the statistics! I did almost feel sorry for him and his ulcer though." she said with a laugh, taking the proffered half smoked cigarette of Patrick.

"Well I suppose giving up smoking, and his job would be quite stressful!"

"I don't think it was that, did you not see? His secretary, her blouse was miss-buttoned up, and when he was playing with his wedding ring – there was no tan line, so he takes it off regularly. He's been boffing his secretary!"

"Blimey – have you thought about doing an ITV crime drama?!"

"Women's intuition! You learn to be observant, shall we go?"

"Good idea … Shealgh, you know I really did want to apologise for the other night, I mean coming round at God-only-knows what time, and then when I … I'm just sorry that's all. It was just the emotion of the night and … I'm sorry."

"Stop apologising Patrick. It's fine, I didn't mind, and I'm not offended – I wasn't offended … look if this party of Tim's really going to be so dire then why don't I come along too – just to keep you company?"

"I'd like that – if you're sure?"

"I am … I'm sure."

"So Clair, what do you think? Am I being a fool? She's not a bit like you, you were much nicer than her – she's got fire in her belly, she won't be knocked back, and I like that. But I think you'd have liked her … she's funny and so kind, she really cares about things. I see that – I see her put her heart and soul into life, that's what I need I think – without you it's so hard to care sometimes but she makes me care, she gives me such passion. And she really is beautiful, blue eyes just like yours – I still remember your eyes, I loved your eyes, and her smile – you hated your smile didn't you, I never knew why. When she smiles you can see that it's full of joy. Oh God – is this really awful? She's much younger than me, but when I'm with her I don't care, all I care about is her, making her happy because she makes me feel so happy, and lord knows it's been a long time since I felt happy. But I'm scared Clair, what if admitting my feelings for her destroys everything, my friendship with her for a start, but what if it destroys everything I ever had with you? I remember the first time I saw you on the train, that book you were reading and your dark hair, even that jumper you were wearing … I remember it all. And I'm scared of losing it … oh God Clair, what am I going to do?" With a sigh, Patrick Turner closed his eyes against the photograph of Clair that he kept beside his bed and turned over, looking at the side of the bed that his wife used to occupy he took a moment to watch her pillow, covered in the pillowcase that he had never had the heart to change, it didn't smell of her shampoo any more but he still hadn't changed it. Perhaps, he thought, it was time to.