Thoughtlessly, Ethan lets go of the car door handle behind him and hears the slam come a fraction of a second later than his poor judgement. He eyes the door in front of him and decides a call would be better than a knock. Treading carefully never hurt anyone, and the last thing he wants to do right now is scare her.

He clears his throat, feeling awkward as the phone begins to ring. Three rings and the dialling tone changes, connecting them.

'Uh, I hope I haven't woken you, just realised how early it still is...'

'What is it? Are you okay?'

'All fine,' he answers quickly. 'It was more I wanted to see how you were.'

The call cuts out and dread swiftly overcomes him. Maybe she doesn't want to see him. No heroics, like the advice he was given. Was he trying to play the hero by driving to see her at such unsociable hours? He gulps. Initially when she was discharged, he'd had an uneasy feeling about her going home alone to a messy house with thin cardboard and duct tape for a back door. He just wanted to check.

Perhaps the signal was poor, or she couldn't hear him at all. That would be plausible. Even the—

The door flies open before he can process what's happening, and he is greeted with the sight of a miraculously healthier-looking Alicia. Round blue eyes stare back in shock, an ashy blonde curl falls over her forehead and her shoulders are no longer tense and hunched. Two symmetrical dimples appear as her lips curve into a smile that spreads over her entire face like black coffee on a cream carpet. He wants to laugh and smile and cry all at once.

'Hey.'

Though she only spoke a syllable, the fatigued catch has gone from the Geordie lilt of her voice he would have sold his soul to hear yesterday. He knows he is smiling like an idiot now, but so is she.

Forgetting to be cautious, he drops his bag on the step and opens his arms. She takes a few staggering steps over the doormat, socked feet on the first concrete step and they meet somewhere in the middle as a tangle of limbs.

'Your arm,' he whispers, realising with guilt the painful position she's adopted. 'It must be so sore.'

'Nothing co-codamol doesn't numb,' she replies brightly, removing them from behind his neck and giving them a little shake. 'The dressing is fine for now.'

'You seem much better than you were yesterday.'

'Lying in a hospital gown strapped up to wires and tubes and plasters is enough to make anyone seem at death's door. All of this is but a drop in the ocean, Ethan. Come in, anyway. Nippy out. Autumn is well and truly on its way.'

He steps in and wipes his feet thoroughly on the doormat, bending down to unpick the laces in his brogues whilst she locks, bolts and puts the door on latch, checking the handle twice. She rises and he follows her through into the kitchen.

'Dyed your hair?'

'Well, it's seen a brush last night, if that's what you're noticing—'

It looks a lot blonder than he remembers, but then again, he hasn't taken enough notice of her lately to be certain either way.

'Curled it, then?'

'Makes me feel a little more human to sit in front of a mirror and turn myself from dishevelled into almost human again, rather than just shoving it back in a ponytail to sleep in, yeah.'

'You don't have to justify yourself,' he says quietly. 'Looks lovely either way.'

Honesty is the only way forward, as is his resolve. It is about finding a comfortable middle ground where he lets her know she doesn't have to make the effort for anyone else but herself, because quite frankly, he couldn't give the shiniest shit about the heat appliance she'd used to style her hair with. Alicia with tousled bed hair and Alicia with hair sprayed within an inch of its life would still be the same Alicia. The former probably suits her more.

'No blood to accessorise it today though,' she replies curtly after a pause.

The conversation dries up in an instant.

'I brought cake,' he offers weakly, feeling glad that he did. Tension is otherwise palpable and revisiting the minutiae of what happened, analysing how she felt would not improve matters.

She swivels round. 'Cake?'

'It could well be a bit squished from where I dropped it,' he chuckles, pulling the white box out the carrier bag.

'Where on earth did you get cake from at this hour?'

'I know a place,' shrugs Ethan with a little smile. 'Nothing is impossible, is it? I know what you said on the ward before you slept the other night about wanting to eat clean from now on, but just eat soup for dinner and it balances out.'

Alicia shakes her head, baffled. 'I just—'

'You sound shocked?'

'This isn't traditionalist Ethan Hardy I know, or knew.'

'Reinvention can be a tonic,' he replies, popping old glasses out from his pocket and sliding them on his face. 'It could be something disgusting yet. Besides, you do enjoy carrot cake, don't you?'

Their eyes lock and there is a comical silence for a moment and a half. Alicia's pet hate has always been foods where they shouldn't be. She used to moan at him for grating cheese into bolognese sauces, shoot daggers whenever he agreed pineapple sometimes belongs on pizzas, and almost burst into tears of rage when a colleague sinfully brought back pasta doused in ketchup from the hospital canteen. Vegetables in cake would forever be a bridge too far, and, judging by her hesitant expression, he is pleased this has not changed.

He passes the bag over and smiles as she peeks inside. Though it involved a 20 mile round trip, he knows the early start was worth it to see her so stupidly contented over such a trivial thing. For all it gives him joy to see his friend her bubbly self again, it winds him up too. A human being easily pleased, someone who never did ask for much. Bloody sponge cake to reverse all the wrong in her life.

'You are officially the cutest,' she says decidedly.

'Presumably laced with additives but the fact it has seven different colours really knocked me for six!'

'I thought rainbow cake only existed in cartoons. Once saw some on Tom and Jerry and remember nagging my mam for ages. I was always one of those kids, you know, that sees something on TV and pesters indefinitely afterwards?'

'Old habits die hard?' Ethan offers.

'What? No way, I do not pester.'

'I know, but the show still has a special place in your heart.'

'That is a secret,' replies Alicia, scooping up a handful of cake and ramming it into her mouth. 'But if we're going to bring up our private little indulgences, I suppose nobody yet knows about your Postman Pat teddy...'

'Tell everyone you like about Pat,' says Ethan confidently. 'He's an antique, satchel and all.'

'And what about Jess?'

'Oh it was very sad. Thirty years became too much for the cat, and—'

'You bumped her off?'

'She ran away to Catland,' he nods slowly. 'For a girl who swore she hated the programme as a child, your memory is rather clear.'

She rolls her eyes and shakes her head vigorously, cheeks bulging due to being stuffed with cake and gestures wildly until she has swallowed.

'Since we're being truthful?'

'Yeah?'

'I just felt uncomfortable. Those glassy eyes had an uncanny way of boring straight into me, like an interrogation of sorts. And he was always there when—'

'When...?'

'You know, like the third wheel watching from your pillow.'

'Oh God, that is dark, Alicia!'

She clutches her side now. 'Guess what's worse?'

He shakes his head pathetically, not suppressing a chuckle of his own. Seeing all the laughter bubble out of her has taken him aback. If he is the object of ridicule, so be it. He'll be it with bells on.

'I didn't have the heart to tell you and had you believe I preferred staying at mine because of pyjamas,' she smiles.

'I thought that was odd at the time! You'd say your favourites were at yours and end up in my shirt anyway!'

'Because I didn't give two about the clothes, you idiot, it was—'

They chuckle until she begins to splutter on the cake crumbs and desperately grabs the thrust glass of water off him, slugging it before collapsing against the kitchen cupboard still in stitches. She tries to mumble something but it comes out as nonsense, which makes them laugh harder in turn.

'Never a moment alone!'

Laughing has turned into wheezing now and he passes comment about how maybe Pat had his day and putting him in the loft wouldn't be so bad.

He thinks some more whilst she calms herself on another pint of tap water: maybe that was the definition of happiness and he took it all for granted. Albeit unknowingly, she has left her mark everywhere in his life. His childhood teddy being the subject of amusement for her — stirring a feeling of sorts — now a sentiment he will forever struggle to ignore.

'Cake?' Alicia nudges a plate with the remaining slice on it towards him.

Momentarily he is distracted by the door he notices in the corner and is stricken by how much it looks like a crime scene. Technically it is. The police visited her as soon as she returned home the night before. Aside from that, the worktops are positively gleaming. Not so much as a crumb on them. A clean state. She's washed all evidence of the trauma away.

'Cake,' he smiles.