His Insomnia's Aftermath
Mostly because I've been too busy to write much else...thought I'd go ahead and post this; see what happens, bler.
Title of Series: Their Untold Story
Author: Elise Davidson
Rating: MA eventually, PG-12 for this installment
Pairings: JD/Cox, Jordan/Elliot
Warnings: Slash, Het, Femmeslash, Angst
Chapter: 1 of 20
Author’s Notes: Something to distract until I have more time…I’m a Senator that represents the Science Club to the Student Government Association, participating in the Film and Fine Arts Club, my usual 5 classes plus work…I’m working as quickly as I can without letting my grades suffer.
Right now, this about the only thing I can offer up until I have more time to work on other things. I’m sorry, folks…but school, clubs, associations and work are taking up far more of time than I’d originally thought.
Another note is that this is a series. 20 chapters; a mini-table of sorts. I’m going to try and do every other chapter by pairing; this one is JD/Cox. The next should be Jordan/Elliot. Thanks in advance!
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01. His Insomnia’s Aftermath
The humid night had brought with it a steamy fog that stuck to everything, making cool temperatures just as miserable as warmer ones would’ve been. It could have been a pleasant night, if the sky hadn’t been begging to rain.
As it was, the stars were hidden by purple haze in the sky.
It only served to keep Perry awake further. Very rarely, the thickness of the one-season year in California nearly made him miss Pennsylvania.
Nearly.
The sheets were tangled and not on his body, though Jordan slept soundly beside of him, curled under the blankets as if the weather were normal. Perry didn’t understand at all how she could sleep, but then again, he wondered too if the truly evil ever really slept.
The clock warned him cheerily with red numbers that he only had a couple of more hours before he had to start moving around.
Perry frowned. There was the reason sleep was eluding him in the first place. Hell, he hadn’t even really slept in weeks, not since the first dream.
It had startled him more than anything at first, and had even made him angry later. Anger and shock were easier to register and comprehend than fear and confusion.
Yeah. He definitely preferred the former of the four.
Perry had chucked it up to stress, both from work and home. It was plausible to think dreams were often just manifestations of the day’s unfinished business after all, and no shrink would ever convince him otherwise.
Prophetic dreams were right on up there with God in his book.
But then a second dream had come, followed by a third.
After the fourth, Perry had taken a shot of cough syrup bigger than Jack’s sippy cup, and he’d even considered using one of them to sip it through. All it had done, however, was give him a dull, constant headache (which hadn’t left in days) and a filmy, bad taste in his mouth.
After the fifth dream, Perry had decided to forgo sleep as much as possible. Lack of it now made him extremely irritable (at least, more so than usual), very edgy and feeling as if he had the flu.
It wasn’t uncommon for Perry to dream about someone, especially if that someone were both very hot and very annoying.
Dr. Miller, for example, still smoldered in the back of his mind like sexy little embers of pleasure, no matter how long she’d been gone.
Which didn’t explain why in forty hells he’d ever have any kind of dream (let alone that kind) about a stupid, girly, whiny, fresh-faced attending whom Perry barely deemed necessary to ever call by a real name.
And if it hadn’t been for a series of unforeseen events, Perry wouldn’t have thought of him at all. Ever.
It had all really started with those godforsaken man-cards.
And between those, Mrs. Wilk, Crazy-Tracy, a time-period that Perry tended to just block from memory and that stupid, no-name urologist, it was enough to make Perry actually consider the kid as a friend.
Perry nearly choked on the word even as he thought about it, earning him a swat from Jordan, followed by an angry, sleepy mutter. A small whoosh of air escaped his mouth and he gently rubbed her shoulder to soothe her back to sleep.
His mind drifted back as to why he couldn’t just drug him himself with cough syrup or alcohol to get rid of the dreams. Sure, he considered the kid a…tolerable acquaintance, but not a friend.
Hell, Perry didn’t have any friends. And even if it he did (which he wasn’t admitting to having or not having), he’d never dream about them.
Let alone dream about them like that.
Perry rubbed his hands over his face before he dropped an easy, careless kiss to Jordan’s head. She mumbled, swatting at him once more.
Perry had already moved to the kitchen to start the coffee, giving up on sleeping. He hadn’t been able to get a true second of peace since he’d stopped sleeping as much, and it was even more annoying that he didn’t even know what it meant or why.
Perry sighed as he inhaled the coffee, and then reluctantly acknowledged the dull ache in his head as well as the sleepless taste in his mouth. It gave him an overall feeling of being under the weather.
The coffeemaker burbled at him merrily, reminding Perry that caffeine-filled, coffee-goodness was on the way.
Maybe it was all nothing; he must’ve just picked up a virus at work. He’d only gotten sick, after all, because he hadn’t been sleeping properly in weeks, and he hadn’t been sleeping because of the stress from the past year.
Perry poured the first cup of coffee, just as soon as it had finished brewing. The thought occurred to him (not for the first time) that maybe he should bring it up the next time he saw one of his shrinks.
No sooner had he thought it, however, did the coffee catch in his throat and nasal passage as he snorted derisively.
He might as well see a witch doctor or shaman; either would be just as effective.
Perry sighed, bending his head over his clasped hands. Something had obviously changed between he and JD, and as soon as he’d thought the name, one of the more vivid dreams came back.
Perry’s face immediately pulled into an angry sneer, and he shifted in his seat.
Where in god’s name had any of this come from?
Pouring a second cup of coffee when he was done with the first, Perry still hadn’t figured out an answer to the question. He headed for the shower instead, struggling steadfastly to force the images from his sleep-deprived mind.
He insisted later that he’d taken a cold shower because he needed to wake up, not because his entire body felt like it was on fire. He would swear later that it was Coffee-Nurse he’d been thinking of when the cold shower did nothing to abate the course of arousal running a muck through his nerves.
Perry scrubbed a hand over his face, feeling strangely disoriented and even a little angry when he opened the door to leave for his shift at the hospital.
Whatever it was, it just wouldn’t quit.
When he saw JD wave at him in the coffee shop, he fought the color from his face through sheer force of will and sped directly past him.
Perry wondered if he’d ever sleep for more than a few minutes at a time again.
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JD never pouted. Ever. And if he did, it wasn’t a pout; it was a very manly sulk.
Very manly. And he wasn’t even sulking (or pouting) in the first place. Even if he was (and he wasn’t admitting he was, thanks muchsies), he had every right to.
Well, JD supposed the entire party of people wearing the "Welcome Back, Coxer" tee-shirts was still too fresh in Dr. Cox’s memory.
JD frowned as he sipped his caramel-chocolate macchiato (which he had written macho on the side just to make sure people knew it wasn’t a girl’s drink) and waited for Kim to show up.
His plan had been brilliant; there was no way she’d ever leave him now.
Still, another part of him felt terrified at that prospect; even a little agitated at times. Everything had happened so quickly, everything all at once…yet still seemed to last forever at times.
JD scowled at his coffee. Lasting forever had sounded so positive a moment ago, and now he found himself thinking negatively of it. He didn’t know when things had so suddenly and so frighteningly stopped being so easy here and there. He hadn’t been sure at all about how to feel about the baby at first, but after he’d gotten used to the idea, it had seemed awesome, even…
Hopeful.
He was somewhat understanding of Perry blowing him off then; Perry was only skeptical, and JD needed all of the positive feelings he could get right now just to keep him excited.
JD sighed, fingers tapping now on the side of his cup in a nervous gesture he hadn’t done in years. He was going to need some advice eventually, and Turk was still too busy with brand-new Izzy to really be able to offer it.
Not to mention Carla had just begun her anti-postpartum-depressant regime.
JD barely saw Turk sit down in front of him, but it interrupted his train of thought enough for him to look up and distract.
Dr. Cox eventually came back in for his own coffee as they talked, and JD was certain the man desperately needed that shot of caffeine.
Especially if the older man’s appearance was any indication.
"Hey, Dr. Cox!" JD finally called out hopefully.
"No, oh no, no, no," Perry snapped out before JD could continue, his voice edgily angry. "I don’t want to be a bridesmaid at your big, fat, gay civil union." He turned away with his lab coat swishing peevishly.
Turk rolled his eyes. "So anyway…have you talked to Kim yet? How’s the plan working out?"
JD wagged an admonishing finger. "She has to make that decision on her own. If I push her, she’s only going to resent me for staying here. I can’t make her hate me like some people do to their wives."
Perry did turn at that, the tell-tale vein bulging in his reddening neck. "Well, of course not, Newbie; that’s your style!"
JD could see the harsh insult coming even as Dr. Cox’s mouth moved, feeling a sudden rush of annoyance at the old nickname.
"You’re just so damn clingy and desperate that you just went ahead and knocked her up, didn’t ya?" Perry finished angrily, and ignored the regret that nearly made him apologize a moment later.
"Woah, uncool!" Turk immediately argued as he stood.
"Wanna take it outside so you can defend your baby sister’s honor, Gandhi? Or should I just knock you both flat now?" Perry sneered, insomnia and frayed nerves finally grating over him like a rake over dirt. Small pops sounded as he cracked his knuckles with lips drawn.
JD stood to try and stop the ensuing fight, but finally saw Kim’s blonde head entering the coffee shop.
"Kim, hey!" JD finally said, brushing between the two of them to greet her.
Perry growled, glaring at all three as he grabbed his coffee to leave.
"So…you’ve been so great about not pressuring me about everything that…"
JD sat down and braced himself to hear her stay, not giving much notice to Perry standing almost awkwardly in the doorway of the shop.
"Well…I took the job!" Kim rushed out excitedly. She kept speaking before she turned to gave JD a quick kiss on the cheek and left, but JD heard very little of it.
JD sat stock-still, unable to move for the oddly numb feelings that battered his system. He knew he looked shocked, but didn’t care.
Pain suddenly registered in his chest, and he didn’t bother to even look.
"Got it!" Janitor yelped happily, and blew over the barrel of his paint gun. He wondered if the zoo was still open.
Bright, nearly clownish-red paint stained JD’s scrubs directly over his heart.
Perry watched from the doorway. He hated it for him, in a way. When he realized that all he wanted to do was make sure JD was okay (via a gruff question of if he was ready to save lives or just drown his sorrows in a watered-down-appletini), he slammed the doors open and chucked his coffee into a trashcan without finishing it.
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It was how Dr. Cox found JD later, immersed in paperwork in the employee lounge. The stained scrubs top was hanging over the back of JD’s chair, the younger doctor opting out for a labcoat instead.
Perry wasn’t used to seeing him in it, and discomfort rose in his chest immediately before he finally settled on saying nothing and exiting once more.
"Come to tell me how knocking her up doesn’t mean she’ll stay or was the coffee shop your general piece of advice for the week?" JD asked dully.
Perry hated that flat tone. "Well, that depends there, Selena," Perry replied, reluctantly turning from the door and folding his arms across his chest as if to protect himself. "Are you still going to be shopping pink or blue for the baby shower?"
JD suddenly threw his pen down, paperwork forgotten. "What in God’s name is wrong with you?" he snapped. "Don’t you get that I don’t need this right now?"
"None of your business. Forget I tried to help there, Newbie," Perry muttered angrily, not recognizing the hurt at being rejected somehow. He saw it as anger instead and settled for glaring at him, eyes burning with something indefinable.
JD gritted his teeth as the old nickname sent something through him furiously once more. "My internship and residency ended long ago; you think you could drop the Newbie crap?"
"Who said you being a newbie had anything to do with your level of medical expertise anymore?" Perry shot back, hating himself more and more as the words came from him. Frustration surged through his chest, spreading as surely to his fingers, toes and brain as his blood did.
"Christ, I don’t need this from you right now." JD mustered up as much courage as he could gather and stood, glaring at Dr. Cox as he grabbed his stained scrubs top from the chair. "Blow it out your damn-"
JD never finished, as Perry had shoved him hard, knocking JD back into the small counter-sink in the lounge.
"So what, I start to move on and you’ve suddenly got some goddamn itch to growl and snarl at me again? I’ve been trying to get your advice on this for weeks!" On his last word, JD shoved Perry back with one hand.
"Didn’t we learn from the last time you shoved me, Newbilia?" Perry scoffed carelessly. "Every single time I actually-god forbid-try to help you, you never want it!"
Rage boiled in Perry’s sleep-deprived nerves as he glared back at JD’s face. The dark hurt lacing the younger’s features slapped him in the face, and the desperate frustration was back.
Perry struggled to ignore it and classify it only as anger and disgust once more.
Still, JD was hurting, and Perry struggled (most unsuccessfully) to let his anger melt away, but the process was interrupted by a surprisingly hard, two-handed push to his chest.
"That’s because you never actually want to help me; all you want to do is save the day so you can feel like you’ve got a friend other than yourself!" JD spat out, realizing just no sooner than he’d said it just how much that would hurt.
Perry struggled the anger away, but it wasn’t going down without a fight. "You know what, Newbie? You’re right. Kindly blow it out your goddamn ass." Perry turned sharply again to leave, but felt a strong tug on his lab coat when JD snatched it in his fist and jerked on it.
It brought them nose-to-nose, both men furiously breathing now.
"Let go," Perry snarled lowly, hoping desperately that JD would just so that Perry wouldn’t feel the labored puffs of hot air hitting his lips over and over again. He bared his teeth his slightly to help it along, but it only served to make his eyes lower to JD’s mouth as it began to move once more.
"You’ve been treating me like utter crap for months, and I really don’t-"
The unbidden dreams suddenly became brutal reality, if a bit surreal, as Perry saw more than felt his mouth crash into JD’s. The dreams had been like this too, hard and furiously desperate.
Perry winced; their teeth clacked and crushed upon lips. Oh god, it hurt, and in more ways than he cared to analyze.
JD froze and stood completely still, paralyzed by fear and shock. He jerked back suddenly, eyes wide and flushed from anger and something a little more.
Perry stared at him, hands clenched and his knees not all together steady. He wondered for a minute if he’d goaded JD on purpose just to make this moment happen or if it would’ve happened eventually anyway, and why in god’s name wasn’t JD saying anything at all?
Blood pounded a stormy rhythm in Perry’s ears, and the trained-doctor in him counted his pulse meticulously as it rushed from heart to head to groin all at the same time.
Light-headedness and disgust were both there too.
Perry didn’t know if he could really accept it or not that the disgust was only because he’d done something so incredibly stupid in the first place, and not because he’d hated feeling JD’s surprised mouth upon his own.
A coppery taste suddenly registered on Perry’s tongue, and he wondered if it was his blood or JD’s.
Breath came rapidly from JD’s mouth as he stared at him in a dumbstruck fashion, unsure of what, exactly, had just happened. Even more so, he was confused at how much he wanted more.
The terror and arousal gave birth to the certainty that JD would do anything just to get it.
JD slowly approached Perry, breath being expelled vigorously from both men. The older flinched visibly when they were within touch of each other.
Just as suddenly as the first one, Perry realized what JD was going to do only seconds before it happened. He raised rough, callused fingers to JD’s neck and head even as JD’s blunt, short nails wrapped around his face.
Unexpected need surged through Perry as JD kissed him again.
Still, the disgust fought through him as well, but more at himself than the pulse of arousal that flowed through him. He tilted JD’s head back to try and take control of the kiss and situation both.
Surprise rocked through him like a seismic shock when JD’s fingers slid up and into Perry’s hair to grab hard in response, trying to keep control as well.
Perry hadn’t pegged him for that.
It was when their bodies aligned from hip to shoulder that Perry let his hands drop, fingers curling against JD’s narrow hips to bruise against the pelvic bone. The fingers in his coarse hair tightened more, and pain shot through Perry’s head, making the ache in his temple worse.
He didn’t care, and only pressed his fingers harder, struggling now to dominate JD’s mouth with his tongue. The younger man’s mouth was bigger than Jordan’s; it was an unexpected sensation to feel another tongue shove back so vivaciously.
Perry groaned hard in the back of his throat when one of JD’s hands dropped to wrap around his neck across the back, fingers playing with the bones and sensitive strands of hair at the nape.
Jordan. Oh god, Jordan.
Perry yanked back, as if burned, when Jordan came screaming back into his mind. What the hell was he doing?
JD stared back at him, his eyes wide and more teal than blue with a great deal of confusion as opposed to the terror that he might have felt at one time. His lips were bruised and swollen, his mouth slightly parted as he struggled to breathe.
Perry struggled with himself to re-adopt the scowl on his face, but it didn’t work. His features contorted into a look of shocked embarrassment, though the fear pumped as readily in his blood as his heart shoved oxygen to his brain. Arousal ran across his features, feelings splayed across his face in a darkly consuming show of frustration and fear.
He hated that.
Opening his mouth to try and say something ultimately hurtful to distance himself, Perry found that nothing would come out.
A sound that came off vaguely like a stuttering, one-syllable "uh" shaped yelp escaped his mouth before he took off for the door of the lounge, slamming it behind him.
JD stared at it with saucer-sized eyes. That hadn’t…just…happened, had it? He fell back into his chair, fingers grazing across his mouth.
It couldn’t have.
It was too bizarre; it just…hadn’t happened.
JD looked back down at the paperwork in front of him. His mouth felt bruised and his system still reeled. He sat back, trying to organize his thoughts enough to form one cohesive thought.
It didn’t work.
JD let a sharp expulsion of air escape his mouth, and he pushed the waist of his scrubs-pants down to view a set of small, oval red marks that splashed vividly against his hips, threatening to become bruises. He yanked his pants back up, tying them more snugly than he normally would have so there wouldn’t be any danger at all of seeing them again.
Down the hallway in the near-privacy of the bathroom, Perry worked desperately to calm himself down even as he took a glance in the mirror. He swore sharply; his curly hair was an absolute mess and his cheeks were flushed with color.
The color wasn’t arousal. It couldn’t be.
Forgetting it as quickly as it had come, Perry realized it had been his own blood he’d tasted, and he licked the cut on his top lip, trying to ground himself as saliva made it sting. He let his head fall against the mirror, feeling now like he really was coming down with the flu.
And now, the first thing he had to - no, needed to do - was forget that this…thing had ever happened in the first place.
That could have been relatively easy, if it hadn’t been for the fact that all Perry could feel pressing through his mind was the deeply seated need to go back, find JD, shove him against the wall and kiss him all over again.
Perry tried his best to simply shove the desperate need away. He wasn’t…like that.
It was nearly an hour later before his mouth stopped buzzing with feeling, and it was another hour after that when Perry gave up on telling himself that he could forget that taste.
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It was nearly ten minutes later that JD heard his pager going off in a muffled beeping. The sound of it was quiet and groggy enough that it made him feel like he’d heard it under water. He snapped back to alertness from habit of the years, rubbing his mouth for a moment of sheer confusion as he headed back to work.
It was easy for JD to immerse himself in the mechanical actions of medicine. It distracted him, kept him busy, kept him from thinking, and stopped him from finding Dr. Cox and demanding to know exactly what had happened.
It was while he wrote the orders on a chart that he remembered Kim.
JD started for a minute, jumped when he realized that he still hadn’t really talked to Kim.
Too many thoughts suddenly thrived through his mind in a vivid, chaotic dance of heathen quality, twisting and turning so much that he could barely divide through them.
It was the fact that Kim was having his child that finally broke through, and JD finished the last order so he could leave for a few minutes.
JD tried not to think that Kim suddenly wasn’t on his radar any longer, only his child and Dr. Cox. Guilt pressed him that Dr. Cox was in his mind as much as his future-child was. He tried then to shove both away so he could think about it later.
It didn’t work, and set JD on anxious, frayed nerves. He regretted it later when he told Kim to simply go, to do what was best for her. They’d work out custody somehow; he wanted to be with his child.
What JD regretted and hated more was that he only felt as if Kim would now be gone, he could figure this thing out with…well…
Perry.
The name was strange in his mouth, and he immediately held his ear in reflex as if Dr. Cox had struck him for using his real name.
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Perry sipped at his scotch slowly, his thoughts scattered and his eyes unfocused. The TV went on, though he barely took in the plays or scores of whatever game was on.
He must seriously be losing it if he wasn’t paying enough attention to the game on the TV to even know what sport it was.
With a sigh, Perry reached forward and poured more scotch into his glass. He was going to need more ice soon, he thought, but drank it warm anyway.
Just what the hell had happened today? What the fuck had he been thinking? Or had he even thought at all?
Yet, it still wouldn’t go away.
Even after Perry had left the lounge and even later, he still couldn’t stop thinking about what had happened, how his mouth had felt bruised for hours later or even how his skin tingled with nerves.
Perry leaned back irritably. This wasn’t fucking fair. It should be Newbie that had the stupid, little man-crush.
Perry wasn’t supposed to be the one who had all but molested him in an obscure-but-still-public-place. He wasn’t supposed to be the one who couldn’t stop thinking about it. It wasn’t supposed to be him who wondered if enough alcohol could numb the stomachache in his belly that made his heart hurt in a place he hadn’t thought of in a very long time.
In a blurry, unfocused way, Perry glanced lazily at the small digital clock on the TIVO device he used to record football games.
It was barely past 2 AM.
Perry set his scotch down; this wasn’t going away. Alcohol had always numbed him in the past, had always made him more quiet than angry, had always served to silent ache that was seated deep within his chest.
Perry started to stand, finding himself wobbly and unstable. He rubbed a hand through his hair, tangling the curls and pulling just so as if to pull himself into sobriety.
Things just couldn’t get worse right now.
Of course, as predictable as ever, he was wrong.
There was a knock on the door, he drunkenly realized. Something was pounding on the stupid door in a stupid, girly way that could only be one stupid person in all…well…stupid general.
Perry hesitated before the door. If he opened it right now, everything was likely to come falling out. There was no protection here, no safeguards, nothing. If he opened that stupid door, then the whole stupid scenario was likely to be pouring…well…stupidly out of him.
Perry missed the word stupid sometimes.
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JD stood outside of the door, fist knocking gently. His face was dark and almost angry, though on him, it looked like a childish pout. There was still, however, no mistaking the fury that laced his tightly displeased features.
With a frown, JD listened quietly against the door as he heard muffled sounds within the apartment. He could hear stumbling footsteps, could hear swearing even. As the sounds approached, he could hear one word, and one word only.
"Stupid…stupid, stupid newbie…stupid door, stupid, girly…"
JD stiffened outside the door. He glared at it again then, a mixed look of both furious hurt and confused rage crossing over his features. He turned and headed for the elevator then.
If Dr. Cox (JD had stopped calling him Perry when his ear had started aching) was going to be like that, JD wasn’t going to stick around just to hear the berating that he knew was coming.
JD, as for himself, just wouldn’t take it. Not when something had finally stirred deeply in a place long forgotten since that first desperate hook-up with Elliot, not when things had finally made sense, not when things had finally, blessedly, fallen into a cursed, devil-ridden place.
Punching the elevator doors viciously, JD knew he just couldn’t stand to hear that everything was a mistake, a slip-up. Not this time.
Not when everything he wanted was on a desperate tight-rope, waiting to fall back to reality.
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Perry finally managed to figure out the doorknob in his drunken state and yanked the door open. He frowned immediately.
No one was there.
Poking his head owlishly out the door, Perry looked up and down the hallways, but only heard the elevator doors sliding closed again.
With a sigh, Perry slammed the door shut, mindless of both Jordan and Jack in a stupor that he didn’t bother to even try and control. Of course it hadn’t been stupid Newbie; if it’d been Newbie, there would’ve been someone at the door to demand what had gone on, what it meant, what it changed.
Perry wasn’t thick enough to think it changed nothing. He knew it changed everything.
But JD wasn’t at the door. Maybe it hadn’t meant a goddamn thing. Maybe nothing really ever mattered in the first place, and Perry was just as much of a bastard as he’d ever tried to make himself out to be.
Perry frowned, the words tripping like falling stars in his head. He leaned back on the couch, stomach burning in hunger and demanding food.
He gave it none. Nothing ever really mattered, in the long run, as long as he hydrated tomorrow and ate at some given point.
His stomach pointed out that its hunger wasn’t related to the ache that demanded closure, demanded more, demanded everything.
Perry felt his eyes slipping shut, even as his head nodded to-and-fro. Everything was too much to feel; it made him hurt. It made him think, it made him want to cuddle with Jordan.
And that was just not allowed.
Instead, Perry pulled a pillow normally used for Jack to sleep on the floor, and held it to himself as he finally, and blissfully, slept in silence on the couch with no dreams to plague him for the first time in months.
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Author’s Notes: Weird. I know.
Title of Series: Their Untold Story
Author: Elise Davidson
Rating: MA eventually, PG-12 for this installment
Pairings: JD/Cox, Jordan/Elliot
Warnings: Slash, Het, Femmeslash, Angst
Chapter: 1 of 20
Author’s Notes: Something to distract until I have more time…I’m a Senator that represents the Science Club to the Student Government Association, participating in the Film and Fine Arts Club, my usual 5 classes plus work…I’m working as quickly as I can without letting my grades suffer.
Right now, this about the only thing I can offer up until I have more time to work on other things. I’m sorry, folks…but school, clubs, associations and work are taking up far more of time than I’d originally thought.
Another note is that this is a series. 20 chapters; a mini-table of sorts. I’m going to try and do every other chapter by pairing; this one is JD/Cox. The next should be Jordan/Elliot. Thanks in advance!
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01. His Insomnia’s Aftermath
The humid night had brought with it a steamy fog that stuck to everything, making cool temperatures just as miserable as warmer ones would’ve been. It could have been a pleasant night, if the sky hadn’t been begging to rain.
As it was, the stars were hidden by purple haze in the sky.
It only served to keep Perry awake further. Very rarely, the thickness of the one-season year in California nearly made him miss Pennsylvania.
Nearly.
The sheets were tangled and not on his body, though Jordan slept soundly beside of him, curled under the blankets as if the weather were normal. Perry didn’t understand at all how she could sleep, but then again, he wondered too if the truly evil ever really slept.
The clock warned him cheerily with red numbers that he only had a couple of more hours before he had to start moving around.
Perry frowned. There was the reason sleep was eluding him in the first place. Hell, he hadn’t even really slept in weeks, not since the first dream.
It had startled him more than anything at first, and had even made him angry later. Anger and shock were easier to register and comprehend than fear and confusion.
Yeah. He definitely preferred the former of the four.
Perry had chucked it up to stress, both from work and home. It was plausible to think dreams were often just manifestations of the day’s unfinished business after all, and no shrink would ever convince him otherwise.
Prophetic dreams were right on up there with God in his book.
But then a second dream had come, followed by a third.
After the fourth, Perry had taken a shot of cough syrup bigger than Jack’s sippy cup, and he’d even considered using one of them to sip it through. All it had done, however, was give him a dull, constant headache (which hadn’t left in days) and a filmy, bad taste in his mouth.
After the fifth dream, Perry had decided to forgo sleep as much as possible. Lack of it now made him extremely irritable (at least, more so than usual), very edgy and feeling as if he had the flu.
It wasn’t uncommon for Perry to dream about someone, especially if that someone were both very hot and very annoying.
Dr. Miller, for example, still smoldered in the back of his mind like sexy little embers of pleasure, no matter how long she’d been gone.
Which didn’t explain why in forty hells he’d ever have any kind of dream (let alone that kind) about a stupid, girly, whiny, fresh-faced attending whom Perry barely deemed necessary to ever call by a real name.
And if it hadn’t been for a series of unforeseen events, Perry wouldn’t have thought of him at all. Ever.
It had all really started with those godforsaken man-cards.
And between those, Mrs. Wilk, Crazy-Tracy, a time-period that Perry tended to just block from memory and that stupid, no-name urologist, it was enough to make Perry actually consider the kid as a friend.
Perry nearly choked on the word even as he thought about it, earning him a swat from Jordan, followed by an angry, sleepy mutter. A small whoosh of air escaped his mouth and he gently rubbed her shoulder to soothe her back to sleep.
His mind drifted back as to why he couldn’t just drug him himself with cough syrup or alcohol to get rid of the dreams. Sure, he considered the kid a…tolerable acquaintance, but not a friend.
Hell, Perry didn’t have any friends. And even if it he did (which he wasn’t admitting to having or not having), he’d never dream about them.
Let alone dream about them like that.
Perry rubbed his hands over his face before he dropped an easy, careless kiss to Jordan’s head. She mumbled, swatting at him once more.
Perry had already moved to the kitchen to start the coffee, giving up on sleeping. He hadn’t been able to get a true second of peace since he’d stopped sleeping as much, and it was even more annoying that he didn’t even know what it meant or why.
Perry sighed as he inhaled the coffee, and then reluctantly acknowledged the dull ache in his head as well as the sleepless taste in his mouth. It gave him an overall feeling of being under the weather.
The coffeemaker burbled at him merrily, reminding Perry that caffeine-filled, coffee-goodness was on the way.
Maybe it was all nothing; he must’ve just picked up a virus at work. He’d only gotten sick, after all, because he hadn’t been sleeping properly in weeks, and he hadn’t been sleeping because of the stress from the past year.
Perry poured the first cup of coffee, just as soon as it had finished brewing. The thought occurred to him (not for the first time) that maybe he should bring it up the next time he saw one of his shrinks.
No sooner had he thought it, however, did the coffee catch in his throat and nasal passage as he snorted derisively.
He might as well see a witch doctor or shaman; either would be just as effective.
Perry sighed, bending his head over his clasped hands. Something had obviously changed between he and JD, and as soon as he’d thought the name, one of the more vivid dreams came back.
Perry’s face immediately pulled into an angry sneer, and he shifted in his seat.
Where in god’s name had any of this come from?
Pouring a second cup of coffee when he was done with the first, Perry still hadn’t figured out an answer to the question. He headed for the shower instead, struggling steadfastly to force the images from his sleep-deprived mind.
He insisted later that he’d taken a cold shower because he needed to wake up, not because his entire body felt like it was on fire. He would swear later that it was Coffee-Nurse he’d been thinking of when the cold shower did nothing to abate the course of arousal running a muck through his nerves.
Perry scrubbed a hand over his face, feeling strangely disoriented and even a little angry when he opened the door to leave for his shift at the hospital.
Whatever it was, it just wouldn’t quit.
When he saw JD wave at him in the coffee shop, he fought the color from his face through sheer force of will and sped directly past him.
Perry wondered if he’d ever sleep for more than a few minutes at a time again.
XXXXXXXXXXXX
JD never pouted. Ever. And if he did, it wasn’t a pout; it was a very manly sulk.
Very manly. And he wasn’t even sulking (or pouting) in the first place. Even if he was (and he wasn’t admitting he was, thanks muchsies), he had every right to.
Well, JD supposed the entire party of people wearing the "Welcome Back, Coxer" tee-shirts was still too fresh in Dr. Cox’s memory.
JD frowned as he sipped his caramel-chocolate macchiato (which he had written macho on the side just to make sure people knew it wasn’t a girl’s drink) and waited for Kim to show up.
His plan had been brilliant; there was no way she’d ever leave him now.
Still, another part of him felt terrified at that prospect; even a little agitated at times. Everything had happened so quickly, everything all at once…yet still seemed to last forever at times.
JD scowled at his coffee. Lasting forever had sounded so positive a moment ago, and now he found himself thinking negatively of it. He didn’t know when things had so suddenly and so frighteningly stopped being so easy here and there. He hadn’t been sure at all about how to feel about the baby at first, but after he’d gotten used to the idea, it had seemed awesome, even…
Hopeful.
He was somewhat understanding of Perry blowing him off then; Perry was only skeptical, and JD needed all of the positive feelings he could get right now just to keep him excited.
JD sighed, fingers tapping now on the side of his cup in a nervous gesture he hadn’t done in years. He was going to need some advice eventually, and Turk was still too busy with brand-new Izzy to really be able to offer it.
Not to mention Carla had just begun her anti-postpartum-depressant regime.
JD barely saw Turk sit down in front of him, but it interrupted his train of thought enough for him to look up and distract.
Dr. Cox eventually came back in for his own coffee as they talked, and JD was certain the man desperately needed that shot of caffeine.
Especially if the older man’s appearance was any indication.
"Hey, Dr. Cox!" JD finally called out hopefully.
"No, oh no, no, no," Perry snapped out before JD could continue, his voice edgily angry. "I don’t want to be a bridesmaid at your big, fat, gay civil union." He turned away with his lab coat swishing peevishly.
Turk rolled his eyes. "So anyway…have you talked to Kim yet? How’s the plan working out?"
JD wagged an admonishing finger. "She has to make that decision on her own. If I push her, she’s only going to resent me for staying here. I can’t make her hate me like some people do to their wives."
Perry did turn at that, the tell-tale vein bulging in his reddening neck. "Well, of course not, Newbie; that’s your style!"
JD could see the harsh insult coming even as Dr. Cox’s mouth moved, feeling a sudden rush of annoyance at the old nickname.
"You’re just so damn clingy and desperate that you just went ahead and knocked her up, didn’t ya?" Perry finished angrily, and ignored the regret that nearly made him apologize a moment later.
"Woah, uncool!" Turk immediately argued as he stood.
"Wanna take it outside so you can defend your baby sister’s honor, Gandhi? Or should I just knock you both flat now?" Perry sneered, insomnia and frayed nerves finally grating over him like a rake over dirt. Small pops sounded as he cracked his knuckles with lips drawn.
JD stood to try and stop the ensuing fight, but finally saw Kim’s blonde head entering the coffee shop.
"Kim, hey!" JD finally said, brushing between the two of them to greet her.
Perry growled, glaring at all three as he grabbed his coffee to leave.
"So…you’ve been so great about not pressuring me about everything that…"
JD sat down and braced himself to hear her stay, not giving much notice to Perry standing almost awkwardly in the doorway of the shop.
"Well…I took the job!" Kim rushed out excitedly. She kept speaking before she turned to gave JD a quick kiss on the cheek and left, but JD heard very little of it.
JD sat stock-still, unable to move for the oddly numb feelings that battered his system. He knew he looked shocked, but didn’t care.
Pain suddenly registered in his chest, and he didn’t bother to even look.
"Got it!" Janitor yelped happily, and blew over the barrel of his paint gun. He wondered if the zoo was still open.
Bright, nearly clownish-red paint stained JD’s scrubs directly over his heart.
Perry watched from the doorway. He hated it for him, in a way. When he realized that all he wanted to do was make sure JD was okay (via a gruff question of if he was ready to save lives or just drown his sorrows in a watered-down-appletini), he slammed the doors open and chucked his coffee into a trashcan without finishing it.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
It was how Dr. Cox found JD later, immersed in paperwork in the employee lounge. The stained scrubs top was hanging over the back of JD’s chair, the younger doctor opting out for a labcoat instead.
Perry wasn’t used to seeing him in it, and discomfort rose in his chest immediately before he finally settled on saying nothing and exiting once more.
"Come to tell me how knocking her up doesn’t mean she’ll stay or was the coffee shop your general piece of advice for the week?" JD asked dully.
Perry hated that flat tone. "Well, that depends there, Selena," Perry replied, reluctantly turning from the door and folding his arms across his chest as if to protect himself. "Are you still going to be shopping pink or blue for the baby shower?"
JD suddenly threw his pen down, paperwork forgotten. "What in God’s name is wrong with you?" he snapped. "Don’t you get that I don’t need this right now?"
"None of your business. Forget I tried to help there, Newbie," Perry muttered angrily, not recognizing the hurt at being rejected somehow. He saw it as anger instead and settled for glaring at him, eyes burning with something indefinable.
JD gritted his teeth as the old nickname sent something through him furiously once more. "My internship and residency ended long ago; you think you could drop the Newbie crap?"
"Who said you being a newbie had anything to do with your level of medical expertise anymore?" Perry shot back, hating himself more and more as the words came from him. Frustration surged through his chest, spreading as surely to his fingers, toes and brain as his blood did.
"Christ, I don’t need this from you right now." JD mustered up as much courage as he could gather and stood, glaring at Dr. Cox as he grabbed his stained scrubs top from the chair. "Blow it out your damn-"
JD never finished, as Perry had shoved him hard, knocking JD back into the small counter-sink in the lounge.
"So what, I start to move on and you’ve suddenly got some goddamn itch to growl and snarl at me again? I’ve been trying to get your advice on this for weeks!" On his last word, JD shoved Perry back with one hand.
"Didn’t we learn from the last time you shoved me, Newbilia?" Perry scoffed carelessly. "Every single time I actually-god forbid-try to help you, you never want it!"
Rage boiled in Perry’s sleep-deprived nerves as he glared back at JD’s face. The dark hurt lacing the younger’s features slapped him in the face, and the desperate frustration was back.
Perry struggled to ignore it and classify it only as anger and disgust once more.
Still, JD was hurting, and Perry struggled (most unsuccessfully) to let his anger melt away, but the process was interrupted by a surprisingly hard, two-handed push to his chest.
"That’s because you never actually want to help me; all you want to do is save the day so you can feel like you’ve got a friend other than yourself!" JD spat out, realizing just no sooner than he’d said it just how much that would hurt.
Perry struggled the anger away, but it wasn’t going down without a fight. "You know what, Newbie? You’re right. Kindly blow it out your goddamn ass." Perry turned sharply again to leave, but felt a strong tug on his lab coat when JD snatched it in his fist and jerked on it.
It brought them nose-to-nose, both men furiously breathing now.
"Let go," Perry snarled lowly, hoping desperately that JD would just so that Perry wouldn’t feel the labored puffs of hot air hitting his lips over and over again. He bared his teeth his slightly to help it along, but it only served to make his eyes lower to JD’s mouth as it began to move once more.
"You’ve been treating me like utter crap for months, and I really don’t-"
The unbidden dreams suddenly became brutal reality, if a bit surreal, as Perry saw more than felt his mouth crash into JD’s. The dreams had been like this too, hard and furiously desperate.
Perry winced; their teeth clacked and crushed upon lips. Oh god, it hurt, and in more ways than he cared to analyze.
JD froze and stood completely still, paralyzed by fear and shock. He jerked back suddenly, eyes wide and flushed from anger and something a little more.
Perry stared at him, hands clenched and his knees not all together steady. He wondered for a minute if he’d goaded JD on purpose just to make this moment happen or if it would’ve happened eventually anyway, and why in god’s name wasn’t JD saying anything at all?
Blood pounded a stormy rhythm in Perry’s ears, and the trained-doctor in him counted his pulse meticulously as it rushed from heart to head to groin all at the same time.
Light-headedness and disgust were both there too.
Perry didn’t know if he could really accept it or not that the disgust was only because he’d done something so incredibly stupid in the first place, and not because he’d hated feeling JD’s surprised mouth upon his own.
A coppery taste suddenly registered on Perry’s tongue, and he wondered if it was his blood or JD’s.
Breath came rapidly from JD’s mouth as he stared at him in a dumbstruck fashion, unsure of what, exactly, had just happened. Even more so, he was confused at how much he wanted more.
The terror and arousal gave birth to the certainty that JD would do anything just to get it.
JD slowly approached Perry, breath being expelled vigorously from both men. The older flinched visibly when they were within touch of each other.
Just as suddenly as the first one, Perry realized what JD was going to do only seconds before it happened. He raised rough, callused fingers to JD’s neck and head even as JD’s blunt, short nails wrapped around his face.
Unexpected need surged through Perry as JD kissed him again.
Still, the disgust fought through him as well, but more at himself than the pulse of arousal that flowed through him. He tilted JD’s head back to try and take control of the kiss and situation both.
Surprise rocked through him like a seismic shock when JD’s fingers slid up and into Perry’s hair to grab hard in response, trying to keep control as well.
Perry hadn’t pegged him for that.
It was when their bodies aligned from hip to shoulder that Perry let his hands drop, fingers curling against JD’s narrow hips to bruise against the pelvic bone. The fingers in his coarse hair tightened more, and pain shot through Perry’s head, making the ache in his temple worse.
He didn’t care, and only pressed his fingers harder, struggling now to dominate JD’s mouth with his tongue. The younger man’s mouth was bigger than Jordan’s; it was an unexpected sensation to feel another tongue shove back so vivaciously.
Perry groaned hard in the back of his throat when one of JD’s hands dropped to wrap around his neck across the back, fingers playing with the bones and sensitive strands of hair at the nape.
Jordan. Oh god, Jordan.
Perry yanked back, as if burned, when Jordan came screaming back into his mind. What the hell was he doing?
JD stared back at him, his eyes wide and more teal than blue with a great deal of confusion as opposed to the terror that he might have felt at one time. His lips were bruised and swollen, his mouth slightly parted as he struggled to breathe.
Perry struggled with himself to re-adopt the scowl on his face, but it didn’t work. His features contorted into a look of shocked embarrassment, though the fear pumped as readily in his blood as his heart shoved oxygen to his brain. Arousal ran across his features, feelings splayed across his face in a darkly consuming show of frustration and fear.
He hated that.
Opening his mouth to try and say something ultimately hurtful to distance himself, Perry found that nothing would come out.
A sound that came off vaguely like a stuttering, one-syllable "uh" shaped yelp escaped his mouth before he took off for the door of the lounge, slamming it behind him.
JD stared at it with saucer-sized eyes. That hadn’t…just…happened, had it? He fell back into his chair, fingers grazing across his mouth.
It couldn’t have.
It was too bizarre; it just…hadn’t happened.
JD looked back down at the paperwork in front of him. His mouth felt bruised and his system still reeled. He sat back, trying to organize his thoughts enough to form one cohesive thought.
It didn’t work.
JD let a sharp expulsion of air escape his mouth, and he pushed the waist of his scrubs-pants down to view a set of small, oval red marks that splashed vividly against his hips, threatening to become bruises. He yanked his pants back up, tying them more snugly than he normally would have so there wouldn’t be any danger at all of seeing them again.
Down the hallway in the near-privacy of the bathroom, Perry worked desperately to calm himself down even as he took a glance in the mirror. He swore sharply; his curly hair was an absolute mess and his cheeks were flushed with color.
The color wasn’t arousal. It couldn’t be.
Forgetting it as quickly as it had come, Perry realized it had been his own blood he’d tasted, and he licked the cut on his top lip, trying to ground himself as saliva made it sting. He let his head fall against the mirror, feeling now like he really was coming down with the flu.
And now, the first thing he had to - no, needed to do - was forget that this…thing had ever happened in the first place.
That could have been relatively easy, if it hadn’t been for the fact that all Perry could feel pressing through his mind was the deeply seated need to go back, find JD, shove him against the wall and kiss him all over again.
Perry tried his best to simply shove the desperate need away. He wasn’t…like that.
It was nearly an hour later before his mouth stopped buzzing with feeling, and it was another hour after that when Perry gave up on telling himself that he could forget that taste.
XXXXXXXXXXXX
It was nearly ten minutes later that JD heard his pager going off in a muffled beeping. The sound of it was quiet and groggy enough that it made him feel like he’d heard it under water. He snapped back to alertness from habit of the years, rubbing his mouth for a moment of sheer confusion as he headed back to work.
It was easy for JD to immerse himself in the mechanical actions of medicine. It distracted him, kept him busy, kept him from thinking, and stopped him from finding Dr. Cox and demanding to know exactly what had happened.
It was while he wrote the orders on a chart that he remembered Kim.
JD started for a minute, jumped when he realized that he still hadn’t really talked to Kim.
Too many thoughts suddenly thrived through his mind in a vivid, chaotic dance of heathen quality, twisting and turning so much that he could barely divide through them.
It was the fact that Kim was having his child that finally broke through, and JD finished the last order so he could leave for a few minutes.
JD tried not to think that Kim suddenly wasn’t on his radar any longer, only his child and Dr. Cox. Guilt pressed him that Dr. Cox was in his mind as much as his future-child was. He tried then to shove both away so he could think about it later.
It didn’t work, and set JD on anxious, frayed nerves. He regretted it later when he told Kim to simply go, to do what was best for her. They’d work out custody somehow; he wanted to be with his child.
What JD regretted and hated more was that he only felt as if Kim would now be gone, he could figure this thing out with…well…
Perry.
The name was strange in his mouth, and he immediately held his ear in reflex as if Dr. Cox had struck him for using his real name.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Perry sipped at his scotch slowly, his thoughts scattered and his eyes unfocused. The TV went on, though he barely took in the plays or scores of whatever game was on.
He must seriously be losing it if he wasn’t paying enough attention to the game on the TV to even know what sport it was.
With a sigh, Perry reached forward and poured more scotch into his glass. He was going to need more ice soon, he thought, but drank it warm anyway.
Just what the hell had happened today? What the fuck had he been thinking? Or had he even thought at all?
Yet, it still wouldn’t go away.
Even after Perry had left the lounge and even later, he still couldn’t stop thinking about what had happened, how his mouth had felt bruised for hours later or even how his skin tingled with nerves.
Perry leaned back irritably. This wasn’t fucking fair. It should be Newbie that had the stupid, little man-crush.
Perry wasn’t supposed to be the one who had all but molested him in an obscure-but-still-public-place. He wasn’t supposed to be the one who couldn’t stop thinking about it. It wasn’t supposed to be him who wondered if enough alcohol could numb the stomachache in his belly that made his heart hurt in a place he hadn’t thought of in a very long time.
In a blurry, unfocused way, Perry glanced lazily at the small digital clock on the TIVO device he used to record football games.
It was barely past 2 AM.
Perry set his scotch down; this wasn’t going away. Alcohol had always numbed him in the past, had always made him more quiet than angry, had always served to silent ache that was seated deep within his chest.
Perry started to stand, finding himself wobbly and unstable. He rubbed a hand through his hair, tangling the curls and pulling just so as if to pull himself into sobriety.
Things just couldn’t get worse right now.
Of course, as predictable as ever, he was wrong.
There was a knock on the door, he drunkenly realized. Something was pounding on the stupid door in a stupid, girly way that could only be one stupid person in all…well…stupid general.
Perry hesitated before the door. If he opened it right now, everything was likely to come falling out. There was no protection here, no safeguards, nothing. If he opened that stupid door, then the whole stupid scenario was likely to be pouring…well…stupidly out of him.
Perry missed the word stupid sometimes.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
JD stood outside of the door, fist knocking gently. His face was dark and almost angry, though on him, it looked like a childish pout. There was still, however, no mistaking the fury that laced his tightly displeased features.
With a frown, JD listened quietly against the door as he heard muffled sounds within the apartment. He could hear stumbling footsteps, could hear swearing even. As the sounds approached, he could hear one word, and one word only.
"Stupid…stupid, stupid newbie…stupid door, stupid, girly…"
JD stiffened outside the door. He glared at it again then, a mixed look of both furious hurt and confused rage crossing over his features. He turned and headed for the elevator then.
If Dr. Cox (JD had stopped calling him Perry when his ear had started aching) was going to be like that, JD wasn’t going to stick around just to hear the berating that he knew was coming.
JD, as for himself, just wouldn’t take it. Not when something had finally stirred deeply in a place long forgotten since that first desperate hook-up with Elliot, not when things had finally made sense, not when things had finally, blessedly, fallen into a cursed, devil-ridden place.
Punching the elevator doors viciously, JD knew he just couldn’t stand to hear that everything was a mistake, a slip-up. Not this time.
Not when everything he wanted was on a desperate tight-rope, waiting to fall back to reality.
XXXXXXXXXXXXX
Perry finally managed to figure out the doorknob in his drunken state and yanked the door open. He frowned immediately.
No one was there.
Poking his head owlishly out the door, Perry looked up and down the hallways, but only heard the elevator doors sliding closed again.
With a sigh, Perry slammed the door shut, mindless of both Jordan and Jack in a stupor that he didn’t bother to even try and control. Of course it hadn’t been stupid Newbie; if it’d been Newbie, there would’ve been someone at the door to demand what had gone on, what it meant, what it changed.
Perry wasn’t thick enough to think it changed nothing. He knew it changed everything.
But JD wasn’t at the door. Maybe it hadn’t meant a goddamn thing. Maybe nothing really ever mattered in the first place, and Perry was just as much of a bastard as he’d ever tried to make himself out to be.
Perry frowned, the words tripping like falling stars in his head. He leaned back on the couch, stomach burning in hunger and demanding food.
He gave it none. Nothing ever really mattered, in the long run, as long as he hydrated tomorrow and ate at some given point.
His stomach pointed out that its hunger wasn’t related to the ache that demanded closure, demanded more, demanded everything.
Perry felt his eyes slipping shut, even as his head nodded to-and-fro. Everything was too much to feel; it made him hurt. It made him think, it made him want to cuddle with Jordan.
And that was just not allowed.
Instead, Perry pulled a pillow normally used for Jack to sleep on the floor, and held it to himself as he finally, and blissfully, slept in silence on the couch with no dreams to plague him for the first time in months.
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
Author’s Notes: Weird. I know.