Bad Desire: New Beginnings - Fast Forward

(bonus chapter)

Louise was still sleeping when Dan walked into her hospital room.

She was lying there so peacefully and completely immune from the pain as she was lost in her dreams, unaware of everything else around her.

Taking a seat on the chair beside her bed, Dan reached out for her hand and gently placed a kiss to her knuckles. He could feel the warmth from her skin, her touch being the same even though her body had been taken over by her illness.

As Dan looked across at this woman laid before him; her dark hair cascading across the pillow and her lips rested in a near smile, he couldn't help but let his mind drift back to the past.

He remembered that first time they met, to the first time they spoke and he remembered thinking he never had a chance with a girl like her.

She was fifteen, him seventeen and her quietness and need to shy away from the crowds was something that lured him in. While he was loud and cocky, Louise was calm and sweet with a heart of absolute gold.

Nevertheless, the differences had never been something to prevent them from connecting and instead it had been what brought them together. Their polar opposite personalities had been what carried them through life with a friendship, relationship and marriage as strong as theirs.

It was something that kept it exciting, something that gave them a reason to argue and a reason to make up. It was something that those around them didn't always get but it never mattered because they did. They knew the love they had for one another and they knew that it would be something to last. Opposites attract was the motto always spoken and they were clear proof that it was true.

The moment Louise had fallen pregnant with Connor; Dan had thought it was the end of his world. He had lost control of what his life would entail and he struggled to cope with that concept.

He hadn't been the man he wished he could have been back then. He was eighteen and stupid; a boy who didn't realise what he had and what he could have potentially lost.

However, once the pair had managed to fully rekindle and work past their struggles, Louise had welcomed him back in with open arms and guided him through the scariest experience of his life.

He didn't know anything about babies. He didn't know how to look after them or how to know what they wanted but it didn't matter because Louise was right by his side every step of the way.

She had been the most amazing mother but also the most amazing mentor to him, helping and guiding him into being the dad he turned out to be.

She had been patient and kind, never placing too much pressure or expectations onto him and to this day she still acted in that same manner.

When Jack had come along four years later, giving them a bit more time to grasp what they were dealing with, Dan's lack of confidence had not been given up on by Louise.

She had been patient because she believed in him.

She gave him the time to process and revaluate what it meant to be a father and a husband and yet again she had welcomed him back with that same loving heart.

Squeezing her hand, Dan couldn't stop thinking about how he was physically going to cope without her.

He didn't understand how he could go from spending 32 years of his life with this woman, living with her, having children with her... spending every single day with her to that suddenly being gone.

Their huge family home that was always so welcome to anyone who wanted to stop by wouldn't feel the same anymore. It would no longer feel loving or welcoming because it would no longer have that one incredible woman who made it feel that way.

It instead, would feel empty and lonely. It would be silent, with nothing but the sound of his own thoughts, instead of the singing and chatting of Louise, who always had something to say.

He would be losing his business partner, his mentor, his wife, his bestfriend. He would be losing the woman he loved unconditionally due to a cruel illness that was ripping the life from an innocent and Dan physically couldn't bear the thought of it.

"I love you." He mumbled as he leaned down to press his lips to her forehead. "I love you." He continued to repeat as the tears fell from his eyes.

"Don't leave me. Please don't leave me."

The pain erupting through his body was vicious and unbearable.

He couldn't explain the throbbing feeling of desperation in him that was mourning something that wasn't even gone yet.

"You have to stay, Louise." He ran a hand across her hair, brushing it from her face. "I love you. I love you even more now than I did when we were younger. You mean everything to me. I can't lose you."

His muffled sobs were heard from Louise who was in and out of consciousness as her sleepy body was trying to wake. Her hand squeezed his back as a sign that she was still here and as a promise that she was still by his side.

"I can't be without you. I can't live in that house alone without you. Please. You need to get better."

As Louise's eyes began to flicker open, she looked up at Dan with the most comforting smile that she could manage.

Her spare hand gently cupped his cheek, gliding over the rough stubble on his skin.

"I've had to put up with you for 32 years, Daniel Lawrence." She whispered, trying to preserve her energy. "But I am more than happy to put up with you for so many more."

*

just a short bonus chapter to go along with chapter 50 - this will be moved to the end of that chapter very soon :)