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Jackie realised that getting a parking space on Robbie’s street that was also close to his flat was an upside to leaving early to avoid another argument with Brian. Somehow all of his various grievances about her choices paled into insignificance while she was checking in on the well-being of her best friend and at one time lover.Quickly walking to the door, she rang the bell and knocked, giving him a few minutes to let her in. Stepping back she looked up to see if he was looking out of the window to find out who’d dare to turn up so early. Rather than waiting any longer she used her key to let herself in.“Robbie, you still here?” she called out waiting a couple of seconds for a reply before checking the rooms for him, eventually finding him in the bathroom.Robbie was sitting on the edge of the bath holding his injured arm, grimacing as the pain started becoming unbearable.“You okay?” she asked, worried he’d need to go back to hospital for another check up.He looked up at her, his face greying from the pain, tears threatening to fall in an instant without any warning. Sitting beside him, Jackie said, “Let me look.” Shaking his head, Robbie stubbornly replied, “I just need my medication.”Jackie tried not to roll her eyes at his bloody-minded attitude to his injured limb. Taking his silence for consent to start gently prising the now bloodstained fingers of his good hand away from the bullet wound which was bleeding through the bandages.“What have you been doing? It’s bleeding.”“Trying to clean my teeth,” Robbie sighed, “I must have strained it.”Jackie got up, heading towards the kitchen for the first aid kit and two week supply of dressings the hospital had prescribed with an information leaflet on dressing gunshot wounds before discharging him in the early hours of the morning.Hearing Jackie returning, Robbie shouted, “In the bedroom. Don’t be getting any ideas.”Jackie couldn’t help but laugh at his thinly veiled attempt at humour. “I forget that you don’t do gently,” she responded as she entered the room she hadn’t been in for quite a while.Sitting beside him, she carefully removed the blood soaked bandages from his arm, taking a moment to inspect the wound and stitches before applying melanin and iodine patches over the wound to help prevent infection then placing a large piece of gauze held in place with surgical tape to keep it as clean until the next time it needed to be changed.Although Robbie had grumbled his way through the first dressing change, he was glad that to have Jackie come over so early to look after him.Suddenly feeling shy, Robbie asks, “Could you help me to finish getting dressed? It’s just that black t-shirt from the back of the chair.”Taking a few minutes to help him into his chosen attire, bad arm first, Jackie asked, “Do you want it pulling down? You look a bit scruffy, even if you are going nowhere.”Robbie softly chuckled. “I’m going to the office, you’re driving me.”“I thought the boss told you not to come in.”“He did but I've got the incident report and some other forms to fill in.”“You should stay here and rest. Forget Burke's forms, they can wait for a few days.”Robbie frowned at the way she was stating the obvious to him. “I know that they can wait but I'd rather get them done now. I'll be on desk duty anyway and I can start catching up on my paperwork.”