A/N: sorry for radio silence. The past two weeks have been crazily busy. I am still writing this, I promise, but updates might be a bit more sporadic than they have been. Sorry!
Recap: Lyn's just walked into Robbie's hospital room.
Laura put her arms around Lyn in greeting, their initially hesitant embrace soon yielding into something more powerful. She stepped back to take in the sight of Robbie's tall, slightly gangly daughter, her hair scraped back into a pony tail, her slender frame swamped in an oversized charcoal jumper and skinny jeans. Make-up free, her face looked pale and pinched with tiredness, but a familiar pair of watery grey eyes shone out from underneath her dark eyelashes.
"I'm sorry, I wasn't… we weren't expecting you until tomorrow… I would have picked you up from the station." Laura withdrew.
"Don't be silly. I got on an earlier flight and my phone ran out of battery so I couldn't text you." Lyn was addressing Laura, but her eyes were fixed firmly on Robbie. She looked worn out. Having been on a specialist nursing course in the US, she had travelled home as soon as she had heard the news.
Laura stepped instinctively back from the bed, allowing Lyn full access to her father. She watched Robbie's daughter with discomfort, recalling only too vividly how she herself had felt upon first sight of him in this state. Lyn's eyes filled and she sat down by his bedside, reaching for his hand.
'Dad." Her voice wobbled. "Dad, it's me, Lyn."
Laura hovered uncertainly at the foot of the bed. Lyn looked back at her.
"I'll go," Laura whispered, gently, "and give you some privacy."
"No." Lyn's eyes were tired and frightened. She corrected herself, "I mean – don't go. Stay. I know he'd want us both here."
Laura nodded and drew closer.
Lyn looked round at all the medical paraphernalia. Just like Laura, whilst she was used to all of this, having spent most of her working life in a hospital, it seemed so bizarre when it was attached to her dad.
"How's he getting on?"
For the umpteenth time that day, Laura parroted the ins and outs of the situation. Lyn listened carefully, asking the odd question, but mostly just staring helplessly at Robbie.
"He looks so weird." She murmured.
"I know."
"I keep expecting him to laugh and say this is all a big practical joke."
Laura smiled, wearily.
"Do you think he can hear us?"
"I don't think so. But you never know. I've been talking to him anyway."
"That's good. He'd like that."
"He'll be so glad you're here, Lyn." This time it was Laura's voice that wobbled.
"Pat's coming too."
"He is?"
"Yes, did you hear that, Dad?" Lyn leaned over to Robbie, before turning back to Laura. "He managed to get a flight out of Sydney at lunch time today so he should be here sometime tomorrow afternoon."
Laura nodded as a wave of emotion hit. Robbie would be so delighted to see his son. Although they talked occasionally on Skype, they'd not seen each other since Robbie had ventured out to Australia two winters ago. Of course Pat would feel the need to travel to his father. Of course he would. But the fact he was going to scared the hell out of Laura. The last time Pat had returned to England was for his uncle's funeral. No, no… she had to stop thinking like that.
"Well, that's good." She managed.
They both stared at Robbie.
"Do you…" Lyn's voice fell to a hoarse whisper. "Do you think he's going to be OK?"
Laura swallowed, gritting her teeth against the emotion that seemed almost insuperable after the past 48 hours.
"I hope so." She murmured.
Lyn's head dropped and her shoulders began to shake. Furiously, Laura tried to bite back her own tears as she went over to Lyn, sitting on the armrest of the chair and wrapping her arms around her.
"Hey, shhh."
Lyn sobbed into Laura's jumper, as Laura gently rocked her, letting her cry.
"First mum, and now…"
Laura grimaced. "Oh, Lyn."
"You look so worried, Laura. And you're a doctor."
Laura sighed. Giving others false hope wasn't in her nature, but nor was trampling the faith of someone she cared about. Someone she wanted to protect. "We've just got to take it a day at a time, Lyn." She withdrew in order to make eye contact, passing Lyn a tissue.
Lyn looked up at Laura, whose tired blue eyes were making their best attempt at reassurance and whose lips were being forced into a half-smile.
"And, if we're looking on the bright side," Laura continued, "that fall could have killed him. But it didn't. He could have died on the operating table. But he didn't." She squeezed Lyn's shoulders. "He's still here."
"Yeah." Lyn sniffed. "You're right."
"Just a day at a time. That's all we can do."
Both women watched the artificially steady rise and fall of Robbie's chest. In some ways Laura felt glad to have Lyn's company. It felt comforting to have someone else to think about, someone else to share it with. In other ways, it presented a challenge. She was doing it already – putting on a brave face for Lyn's benefit, yearning to protect her from the worst. She managed a shaky smile as she imagined Robbie telling her that was exactly what families were for.
"Come on." She said to Lyn at length. "I think you could do with some sleep."
Lyn took a deep breath and nodded. She watched Laura place a kiss on Robbie's cheek and whisper goodbye, before following suit.
"Bye, Dad. I love you."
Laura drove them home through the drizzly city, the rain spattering on the windscreen and the streetlights subdued as though to match their mood.
Her stomach growled through the silence and she laughed apologetically.
"I bet you haven't eaten." Lyn chided.
"No…" For the first time in two days, Laura felt hungry.
"Me neither. How about stopping for chips?"
Laura smiled. Like father, like daughter. "OK. I know a place."
Five minutes later, Laura pulled over and dashed through the rain into a seedy-looking kebab shop, emerging with two polystyrene boxes overflowing with chips.
"Mmm. They smell amazing." Lyn took the chips greedily as Laura started the car.
Laura laughed. "They're one of your dad's guilty pleasures. Best chips in Oxford… or so he claims."
"Really?"
"Uh huh." Laura nodded with mock sobriety. "To be enjoyed with a cheap bottle of Merlot and a Mars Bar for pudding." She patted her jacket pocket, in which two chocolate bars were safely stowed.
Lyn's face lit up for the first time since her arrival as she laughed. "Now that sounds like dad!"
After they'd eaten, Laura lit the fire. It wasn't cold, but she'd felt a chill all day. She and Lyn sat nursing the dregs of the bottle of red, watching the flames.
"It's such a lovely house, this." Lyn relaxed back into the comfortable warmth of the sofa.
"Yeah, it's not bad. We like it."
"Oh, I can tell it's all your doing – it's so much nicer than that pokey little flat of his."
"Actually, your dad chose it." Laura smiled. "I wanted him to move in with me, but he found this house… on the Internet of all places." She remembered Robbie cajoling her into booking a viewing and her resisting every last inch of the way: right up until the moment she'd stepped through the front door and got a funny feeling in her chest. She recalled how he'd looked at her, smiling widely: I told you so.
"Dad on the Internet. God help us."
Laura laughed. "You'd be surprised. He's got an iPad now and everything."
"Clearly you're a good influence."
"Bringing him kicking and screaming into the 21st century." With a fond smile, Laura took a sip of wine.
"No, seriously, Laura. I mean it. I just look around at this, your home, and how lovely it is. How warm it is. How happy I know he is. How happy you've made him…"
Laura shrugged, ducking the compliment, so Lyn continued:
"…I love it when I speak to him on the phone nowadays and he has so much to talk about. About you… about life. And, best of all, when he puts the phone down, I know he's got someone to go to. To keep him company, you know?"
Laura looked down at her lap.
"And…" Lyn swallowed, "if the worst happens, well, at least he's had this last 18 months with you. With you making him happy. Happier than he's been in a long, long time."
With a pang in her gut, Laura's mind clouded and her face twisted. I wouldn't be so sure.
Noticing the change in Laura's expression, Lyn became flustered. "Sorry, have I upset you? I didn't mean… I just wanted to…"
Tears filled Laura's eyes and she turned away, swiping them off her cheeks with her fingertips.
"Oh God, I'm sorry." Lyn moved nearer to Laura on the sofa, hovering hesitantly.
"No, no. Just ignore me." Laura coughed, trying to stop the tears.
Lyn waited and eventually Laura turned back towards her, her eyes awash with anguish. Lyn looked at her, questioningly.
"It's silly, but…" Laura's eyes filled again as soon as she tried to speak. "…the night before he fell, we argued."
Lyn reached out to rub Laura's arm. "Oh, Laura - everyone argues."
Laura attempted a smile, but this only served to spill tears down her cheeks. She looked beseechingly at Lyn, so desperate to share her distress with someone, but knowing that she should not burden Lyn with information that would most probably be difficult for her to hear at the best of times, let alone now.
"Do you want to talk about it?" Lyn ventured, unnerved by the desperation upon Laura's face.
Laura frowned and shook her head. "I don't think it's something you'll want to hear."
"Honestly Laura? My dad's in a coma. I'm not sure there's much to hear that's worse than that."
Laura's body flooded suddenly with exhaustion: she was at the end of the line. "You sure?"
Lyn rested her hand gently on Laura's arm. "Try me."
"OK," Laura relented, her entire being heaving with a sigh. She looked Lyn straight in the eye:
"Pretty much the last thing I said to your dad was that I didn't want to marry him."
"Ah."