SC6 Entry 5: Addicted To You
Title: Addicted To You
Themes and/or Prompt/s Theme: Addiction
Rating: PG
Word count: 3, 364
Characters/Pairings: Arthur, Gwen, Merlin, Arthur/Gwen
Spoilers/Warnings: None
Disclaimer: Merlin is property of BBC and Shine
Summary: Arthur has a nasty habit of checking into Camelot Addition Clinic just to flirt with Doctor Gwen Thomas. Gwen is not interested in him. At all.
“Mr. Pendragon,” she sighed. “What is it this time?”
He flashed her one of his trademark cheeky grins, the one that said “Has this worked? Will you go out with me yet?”
“Alcohol,” he replied cheerfully.
“Alcohol,” she repeated.
“That’s what I said.”
“I thought you harboured a deep aversion to alcohol because your father was an alcoholic? And,” she said, checking his file, “that’s why you became hooked on Serapax instead?”
He faltered a little.
“Oh well, you know how it is. Runs in the family and all that,” he said. “Least you know this clinic works. I haven’t had a Serapax since my last visit. That’s why I had to turn to alcohol.”
“Right,” she said. “And how long are you in for this time?”
“Full six weeks,” he replied.
“Of course,” she sighed. “Well, as you know from your previous visits, you have to make a booking several weeks in advance before we can let you in, and then you have to undergo an examination by one of our psychiatrists -“
“I’ll make another donation,” he said impatiently cutting her off.
“Of course,” she said, knowing it was coming. Whatever else he was, Uther Pendragon, and by extension Arthur Pendragon, was not a poor man.
She waited as he filled out a cheque to the clinic - they weren’t booked up, or she would have refused him - and tried to decide whether it would take him twenty or thirty seconds to do the inevitable.
“So,” he drawled, handing the cheque over. “How much do I have to donate to you? Bottle of red and dinner at Avalon?”
Twenty seconds this time.
“Mr. Pendragon,” she reminded him. “I am a psychologist at this clinic and as of right now, though you are not my patient, you are still a patient. Again. There can be no dinner.”
“Of course,” he said. “When I’m finished then?”
“No,” she replied.
***
As she had known he wouldn’t, Arthur Pendragon didn’t let up.
He flirted with her shamelessly at every opportunity.
He would leave roses by her desk every morning, until the groundskeeper filed a complaint with security about “hooligans” breaking in and destroying the rose bushes.
He would wear V-neck shirts every day that he thought showed off his chest and re-arrange the furniture in the living trying to “improve the aesthetics” so that he had an excuse to flex his biceps as often as possible.
Above all, he would ask her constantly for a date.
“What are you doing tonight Doctor Thomas?”
“Going home.”
“Anyone else there?”
“No.”
“Would you like there to be?”
“No.”
Or;
“What’s that in your bag Gwen?”
“A book.”
“Ah, of course. Lover of literature myself. What is it?”
“It’s a period drama.”
“Romance?”
“No.”
“You really should be reading romance,” he looked into her eyes. “You need more romance in your life.”
“And you need better pick up lines.”
But he wasn’t to be deterred.
He would write her reams of poetry that was so bad Gwen couldn’t help but laugh; she suspected he was doing it on purpose when she noticed him smiling at her giggles one day (she quickly stopped).
He would open doors for her and sometimes get stuck as another person walked through after her, and then another and another; Gwen had to remind herself it wasn’t cute as she saw him still standing beside the open door with a serious look on his face when she walked back again ten minutes later.
The other patients of the clinic however could rarely count on Arthur’s determine to woo her affecting them in such a benign way.
Arthur would often interrupt Gwen as she was on her way to a private session with another patient, or casually stroll over during a discussion with another of the Clinic’s doctors about patient progress to tell her she looked nice today. Twice he stopped her while she was filing important paperwork to ask her if she’d reconsidered his offer of dinner and a bottle of red.
Things came to a head on the second week of Arthur’s stay.
Gwen got into the clinic early to find Merlin sitting in the corner chair looking upset whilst another patient named Julius Borden whispered furiously into his ear.
“Is everything alright?” she asked, striding over and noting Merlin’s chewed nails and glassy eyes.
“Everything’s fine,” Borden said smoothly, stepping away from him. “We were just having a chat before I went to get my breakfast. See you later Merlin.”
He got up and left, leaving Gwen alone with Merlin.
Doctors weren’t supposed to have favourite patients, but Gwen had always had a soft spot for Merlin, because he was young, sweet and above all alone.
Camelot Clinic was one of the best in the country, and therefore very expensive, and so most of the patients were rich housewives being treated for addiction to alcohol or prescription drugs.
Merlin on the other hand was being treated for heroin. His stay was being paid for by a recently discovered but concerned uncle named Gaius, but this tenuous connection to the upperclass didn’t stop most of the rest of the group shunning him as housing commission scum.
Which made Borden’s sudden interest in him all the more worrying.
“Merlin?” she asked. “Are you alright?”
“Hmm?” he asked, looking up and quickly pasting a smile onto his face. “Yeah, everything’s fine.”
“Are you sure? Because if he’s harassing you, you can always say.”
He looked conflicted. Gwen sat down across from him, and didn’t say anything further but merely tried to look at comforting as possible.
Merlin wrung his hands for a minute, looked around to make to make no one was watching and took a deep breath.
“It’s -“
“Doctor Thomas!” a familiar voice boomed.
Oh god no.
Arthur Pendragon was striding up the corridor.
Merlin took one look at him walking purposefully over to Gwen and closed up like a clam.
“Merlin,” Arthur said with a dismissive nod toward him.
“I know you weren’t free yesterday when I asked,” he said, ignoring Merlin getting up quietly to leave. “But I was wondering if you could meet me here in the living room, say 9 o’clock? Not much of a date I know, but when you’re stuck in here - “
“What,” Gwen interrupted, rounding on him as soon as the door closed behind Merlin, “do you think you are doing?”
“Asking you out of course,” he said confused.
“You just interrupted an important conversation I was having with Merlin!”
“Merlin,” he said with a slight sneer. “He’s a junkie.”
Gwen saw red.
“Some might say,” she said, struggling to keep her voice under control, “that you are even more of a ‘junkie’ than he is. After all, this is his first time, and you’ve been in, what? Six?”
“Yeah, but none of mine were -,“ he stopped before he could say “real” but Gwen heard it anyway.
“You think cause you grew up rich you’re so great!” she exploded at him. “But this isn’t just some place you can come to whenever you feel like it to try and pick up girls! This is a real clinic, dealing with real patients who have real problems! And until you realise that Arthur Pendragon, I will never date you, not if you were the last man on earth!”
Out of breath and surprised by her outburst, Gwen turned and walked away, leaving a very shocked looking Arthur Pendragon in her wake.
***
After that, everything changed.
Arthur no longer hassled her.
Where before he could never pass up an opportunity to ask her out if he saw coming, now he kept his down and avoided her gaze.
He never surprised her anymore by hiding behind a pillar and jumping out in front of her at the last minute with a box of chocolates he’d somehow smuggled in.
Instead, he spent more and more time helping the other patients; collecting people’s plates at mealtimes, offering to do the dishes when it wasn’t his rostered night on and collecting flowers to leave anonymously by the bedside of some of the lonelier patients like Freya and Sefa.
Gwen felt strangely wrong-footed without Arthur’s constant attention. Now that he wasn’t speaking to her all the time, Gwen had to admit that there weren’t too many other people in the clinic she could talk to; most of the other doctors harboured the same kinds of secret prejudices as many of patients, especially Sofia and Vivian.
Even if she hadn’t exactly been talking meta on the latest Salman Rushdie with Arthur, at least he’d given her a challenge and a bit of excitement.
Gwen refused to allow herself to grow melancholy in his absence however, by reminding herself it was better for the patients.
Arthur was quieter in group session now that he wasn’t speaking out to get her attention, and since she was never stopped by him on her way to sessions anymore she was never late for other patients either.
This was what she reminded herself when she told the groundskeeper she was happy that the town’s recently imposed curfew had finally deterred the hooligans once and for all rather than admit that she missed Arthur’s roses.
There was however one unexpected benefit to Arthur finally dropping his pursuit of her.
Gwen was walking through the dinner hall to leave when she saw Arthur drop into a chair opposite Merlin with a casual, “Mind if I sit here?”
Merlin gaped at him like he had grown an extra head.
“What?”
“I said,” Arthur repeated patiently, “mind if I sit here?”
“Why?” Merlin asked shrewdly, “you hate me.”
“No I don’t,” Arthur said dismissively.
“Yeah you do,” Merlin said firmly. “I heard you bitching about me in the bathroom the other day.”
Gwen stopped and put down her bag, pretending to tie her shoelaces.
If Arthur thought he could use Merlin as a new way to try and get into Gwen’s good books then he had another thing coming, both from Gwen and Merlin himself. She couldn’t resist staying to see how this turned out.
Arthur took a deep breath and held it a minute for replying.
“Look,” he said. “I was an idiot alright? I was wrong. I’ve been....completely snobby about my stay here and I’m sorry.”
Merlin looked him shrewdly up and down.
“Well alright,” he said finally, “but I’m not your charity case or whatever so you can feel good about yourself.”
“Fair enough,” Arthur replied.
But from then on, Arthur always sat with Merlin at mealtimes. At first Merlin was reticent and suspicious, only speaking if spoken to, but Arthur’s persistence and apparent sincerity soon had him relaxing and they became something of a pair. Arthur stopped spending his free time with Bedivere and Pellinore and started spending it with Merlin, and soon added Freya to their group as well.
If he noticed that some of the others were now whispering about him as they did Merlin then he didn’t seem to care, and Gwen couldn’t be more proud of him, despite herself.
Gwen was pleased that Merlin finally had a friend in the clinic, but she couldn’t help but be a tiny bit jealous; Arthur still refused to meet her eyes and walked the opposite way with his head bowed whenever he saw her coming.
“Oh for goodness’ sake Arthur!” she cried, when she saw him get up from a chair in the living room as she entered. “I’m not angry anymore.”
He fidgeted.
“It’s not....well, that’s good of course,” he sat back down, but then didn’t seem to know what to do with himself.
“Arthur,” she said quietly, a little hurt, “what is it then?”
His eyes softened.
“It’s not that I don’t - “ he stopped. “I’m sorry, I was about to say something inappropriate to you.”
“Arthur,” she said, suddenly realising what might be happening, “you don’t have to prove yourself to me.”
He looked up - for the first time in the conversation he seemed completely sure of himself.
“I have everything to prove. But not to you.”
He got up and walked away.
Gwen watched him go with a mixture of sadness and growing respect.
I don’t miss him, she reminded herself, watching him walk away. I don’t miss him at all.
***
It was Friday evening and Merlin was once again in the corner of the living room, chewing his nails with an anxious look on his face, while Borden sat as close to him as possible, whispering fast.
Gwen was immediately worried, but before she could do anything, a voice shouted from just behind her, “Hey Merlin! Get over here, I want to play cards in my room.”
It was Arthur. Gwen breathed a sigh of relief as Merlin gratefully flicked his eyes at Arthur and got up.
“Thank you,” she whispered to Arthur.
“No problem,” he replied. “Borden’s a prick”
She turned around to admonish him and realised just how close together they were standing. Her breath hitched. She was standing close enough to reach out and touch him if she wanted. She slowly dragged her eyes up his chest, over his collarbone and up to his face; she nearly stopped altogether when she looked into it and saw the same look of shock in Arthur’s eyes.
She rocked foward -
“Arthur?” It was Merlin.
“Right,” Arthur said, shaking himself. “Cards. Yes. Now.”
They walked away.
What the hell was that?! She admonished herself.
She did not have feelings for Arthur Pendragon. He wasn’t chasing her anymore and the whole clinic was better off for it.
She shook herself and went home.
***
Ring ring!
She got up groggily. What time was it?
Ring ring!
2am?
Ring ring!
“Hello?”
“Gwen!” It was Arthur, and he sounded frantic. “I’m sorry, I stole your number from the files ages ago, I’m sorry. I didn’t know who else to call. I’ve already rung the ambulance but I don’t know his next of kin.”
“Arthur you’re babbling. Calm down. What are you talking about?”
“It’s Merlin. He’s OD’d.”
She was in the car immediately.
***
She arrived as they were putting him in the ambulance.
“What happened?” she asked, going straight to Arthur.
“I dunno, I thought he was fine. He was a bit fidgety in my room, then he said he needed to go to bed. I got up to the loo and his door was ajar. And I opened it and...”
He blew out heavily.
“Must’ve been Borden,” he said, voice hoarse. “He’s been harassing him for weeks. Must’ve been trying to get him to buy from him.”
Gwen nodded. “I’ll go phone his mother,” she said quietly.
Hunith Emrys was distraught. Gwen hung up feeling worse than she had since she’d begun this job, and when Arthur asked her how it had gone, she couldn’t say anything, only shake her head and turn her face so he wouldn’t see her cry.
But he wasn’t fooled; he caught her arm as she did, and the next thing she knew she was sobbing into Arthur’s chest and he held her and patted her hair, whispering over and over, “it’s alright. I’m going to make it alright, I promise.”
***
When Gwen arrived in the morning, it was to find Camelot Clinic in chaos.
People were milling everywhere as family came to collect patients and avoid the police that lurked in every corner; for the clinic had been temporarily closed, pending an investigation into how Borden had smuggled in the heroin he’d sold to Merlin.
She looked all morning for a blonde head standing over the crowd, but she knew she wouldn’t find one.
When she got to her desk, she found an A4 sheet of paper with the printed words;
Arthur Pendragon.
Xanax
Zoloft
Prosac
Lithium
Serapax
Alcohol
Underneath was the handwritten message;
“We might never speak again, so I thought I owed you an answer for the question you asked on Wednesday.
I’m sorry I avoided you, but it was because you were right. I was just a spoiled rich boy who thought I could use people’s problems to pick up girls. I’m sorry I wasted your time by harassing you everday, but please know, I did love you.
Arthur”
Gwen didn’t care what was best for the clinic anymore.
She hugged the paper to her chest and tried not to cry.
***
Two months later, Gwen was shopping at the farmer’s markets when she spotted a familiar black head poring over the cabbages.
“Merlin?!”
“Gwen??”
They laughed, and she threw herself into his fierce hug.
“How are you??”
“I’m fine,” he smiled. “Loads better since the hospital. Haven’t had one slip up, so that’s two months clean now.”
“I’m really pleased to hear that Merlin,” she said, sincerely. “Are you being treated somewhere else or...”
“Nah, my uncle used to be a doctor, so I moved in with him, and he decided he’d just oversee my recovery himself. That’s why I’m -“ he swept a hand around, “living around here now. It’s a bit posh for me, but I met a few alright people through Arthur.”
“Arthur?” she asked, “Arthur Pendragon? You’re still in contact with him?”
“Yeah,” he smiled slyly, noticing her sudden blush, “why, you wanna be as well or something?”
“What?” she said quickly, blush deepening, “no of course not.”
“Mmm,” Merlin smirked, clearly unconvinced. “Well, cabbages aren’t gonna cook themselves, so I gotta go. But it’d be nice to hang out with you again.”
He scribbled a number on a piece of paper and handed it to her.
“Call me when you wanna hang out!” he called as he walked away.
Smiling, Gwen pulled out her phone to call him right now to hassle him as a joke, but instead of seeing Merlin rummaging through his pockets to pull out his own phone, he just kept on walking as another voice answered the call.
“Arthur Pendragon speaking.”
Gwen’s breath stopped. That sneaky dog!
“Hello?”
“A-Arthur. Um. It’s Gwen.”
“.....Gwen?”
“Yes, from -“
“I know,” he said, cutting her off. “How did you get my number?”
“Merlin gave it to me”
Arthur breathed out heavily over the phone.
“That sneaky dog!” he cried, and Gwen laughed.
“Why?” she teased, “have you been talking about me?”
“Well I - wait, why did he give it to you? Were you talking about me?”
Gwen winced. “No, you just came up in conversation.”
She could hear him smirking.
“Right. Well, this was a pleasant surprise, but I’ll just give you Merlin’s number now, since that’s probably what you were really after.”
Gwen screwed up her face and her courage - it was now or never. Time to admit the truth.
“No, wait. I - I was talking about you.”
“Mmmmmmm?”
Well, maybe not the literal truth.
“I was saying.....saying I missed you. And that I’d like to see you again. And that maybe....maybe I’d like get you a bottle of red and a dinner at Avalon.”
She waited with baited breath.
“I’d love that,” he said.
***
Two weeks later, and Gwen was lying in the last place that, a few months ago, she ever thought she’d be - in bed with Arthur Pendragon.
Who was currently trailing little kisses up her neck.
She smiled.
“That tickles. Stop it.”
He grinned evilly - and when did she start cataloguing his grins, so that she knew this was his most attractive?
“What are you thinking about?” he asked, noticing her serious face.
“Oh, just that I never thought end up here. Happy. With you.”
“Well it’s good to know you’re happy at least,” he said, and she hit him gently with a smile.
“You know what I mean. Never thought I’d end up dating the most persistent addict in the clinic”
“I never really had any addictions you know.”
She grinned. “I know. I wasn’t completely stupid.”
He laughed, and then sobered up. “Well, that isn’t actually completely true. I did have one addiction.”
“Really?” she asked, sitting up to look at him.
“Yes,” he said sadly. “It was a serious one too.”
“What was it?” she whispered.
He turned to her and grinned.
“I’m completely addicted to you.”
___
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