Popcorn Vigil [Early Edition]
Title: Popcorn Vigil
Fandom: Early Edition (Season 2 or so)
Characters: Gary, Marissa, Chuck
Prompt: "This was turning out to be more unpleasant than most."
Disclaimer: Early Edition is the property of Sony Tristar. (I think. It's hard to tell these days.) No infringement is intended; no profit is being made.
Undying thanks: To the hoopy froods who threw random prompts my way when inspiration was running low.
~*~*~*~*~
The smells got to him first--too clean, too strong, too metallic. Next came movement, up and down or sideways, he wasn't sure. Even a tilt of his head was dizzying, so he kept his eyes closed and tried to ignore it. And there were sounds, clanks and whirrs and all kinds of voices, none of them familiar. Shouting, far away and getting farther, and someone asking him questions.
"Sir, can you hear me? Sir?"
"What happened?"
"Can you move your legs for me, buddy? How about your fingers? Come on, give me something."
He couldn't answer. He did try to move, but it hurt too much. Even when he lay still, pain shot down his right leg, across his shoulders, and, most excruciatingly, around his chest, so that breathing hurt, even thinking hurt. A jab in his arm spiked it all, but sometime after that--seconds or days, he wasn't sure--everything, inside and out, got softer and quieter, and pretty soon it went away altogether. Or maybe he did.
~*~*~*~
The next time Gary knew anything, the pain had receded. It wasn't gone, but it was muffled, and far enough away that he didn't have to think too much about it. He still couldn't move, though; he was just too exhausted. Even his eyelids were too heavy to lift. Why was he so tired?
He seemed to be floating just under the surface of a very dark lake on an even darker night. Soft, distorted questions drifted down to him. Fear tickled his back, a cold spot in the water around him. He should be able to hear more clearly, shouldn't he? He should be able to surface. If he didn't, he'd drown.
Something brushed his hand, someone spoke his name, but the weight of the water pushed him back under.
~*~*~*~
Gary floated for a long time. Very little got through to him. One moment, he'd know what was going on around him--hands turning him over, more needle jabs--but the next moment, or what he thought was the next moment, everything would be silent. He was pretty sure that wasn't right. If he had to drown in darkness, he didn't want to do it alone.
Finally, he managed to get close to the surface and stay there. Moving was still unthinkable, but he could listen. More important, he recognized a voice, low and urgent and controlled--barely controlled, but controlled all the same. The weird thing was, he knew her well enough to recognize the tone and figure out what she was saying, even when her words overlapped with other voices, like waves rushing in one after the other.
"...before he can talk to us?"
"There's bruising down his right side."
"What happened to him?"
"...given him enough to keep the worst of it away."
"Is he in pain?"
"...could be hours. Tomorrow morning we'll run tests..."
He hadn't studied, Gary thought, and fought off a wave of panic. Marissa was there, and she'd make sure the doctor gave him a note.
"Who brought him in?"
"The EMTs said he was responsive at the scene, but..."
"...he broke a couple of ribs. We're not sure..."
"Will he be all right?"
Gary really wanted to hear the answer to that one, but it was lost in the drifting muddle of time.
"Someone should be here when he wakes up. I'll stay."
~*~*~*~
"Up and at 'em." Chuck's voice cut through the darkness. "Let's go, Gar, c'mon."
Gary felt movement, a small wave passing through the water that surrounded him. It wasn't enough to free him, but it didn't hurt.
"What are you doing? Leave him alone."
"Oh, sure, whatever you say, Doctor Clark." Another quick wave rolled around him, and he caught a whiff of cigar smoke and whiskey. "Gar, c'mon."
"The doctor did say." Marissa's voice was as sharp as Chuck's, and that worried Gary. He wanted to open his eyes and see her, to open his mouth and ask what had happened, but every time he tried, the water rushed in, and he didn't want to sink again. He had to hear them, even if he couldn't surface. "Dr. McBride gave him painkillers so he could rest."
Chuck muttered something Gary couldn't make out, then snapped, "So we wait--again. Fine."
At least this time what they were saying made sense--as much sense as Chuck and Marissa ever made. The sound of rustling plastic bags drifted toward Gary, and then there were a couple of thumps, and something tore.
"What are you doing? Did you bring--" Marissa must have been close; he could hear her sniff. "Is that popcorn?"
"White cheddar, light salt. You want some?"
"Gary's in the hospital and you brought popcorn?"
Food, he thought. That was good. It meant...what did it mean?
"Yup. I got Twizzlers and Dr Pepper, too. What do you want?"
Not the ICU. It meant he wasn't in the ICU. That had to be a good thing.
"It's two in the morning!"
"Lucky the White Hen's open all night."
"You stopped at the White Hen? On the way to the hospital?" Marissa's tone was shrill enough to break glass; luckily, whatever was insulating Gary from the worst of the pain kept her voice from tearing right through his eardrum.
"Would you chill the hell out? I've sat vigil like this more times than I can count, and I'm not even Catholic. So if I give up my Saturday night--"
"Sunday morning."
"Whatever. If I give up my date to hang out in another stinking hospital room, I'm bringing the comforts of home." A click, and the television hummed on. "Cable here sucks. Why can't he get himself dumped in a good hospital once in a while?" Brief bits of canned conversations wafted down to Gary. "So what'll it be: Bewitched, Sports Center, or a mockable infomercial?"
"Do you honestly think I care?"
Don't let him get to you, Gary wanted to tell her--but wait. If Chuck was giving Marissa a hard time, maybe things weren't too bad.
"Fine. Sports Center it is."
On the other hand, maybe Chuck was trying to hide from how bad they were.
The volume rose; Dan Patrick was going on a tear about the NBA finals. Again. "Would it kill them to give me the actual scores? I had a c-note on the Cubs game."
"You're such an ass sometimes."
"Only sometimes? I must be losing my touch."
There was more from the television--something about the Bulls and the Sonics--and the continuous crunch of the plastic bag.
"Chuck?" Marissa finally asked. "What if Gary--"
"Don't mind me," said a warm, woman's voice, close to Gary's ear, and he sensed movement again, more waves in the water. "I'm just checking his vitals." There was a tweak in his arm.
What if he--what? Gary wanted to ask. He opened his mouth, or tried to, but the water rushed in and he sank.
~*~*~*~
Later, or earlier, he heard them again.
"I don't get it," said Chuck. "Why isn't he awake yet?"
"Because he would hurt too much if he were awake."
Both voices were slurred, but close. Gary wasn't sure if it was because he was underwater, or if they were just that tired. He wanted to tell them he was awake, but he couldn't get the words through the water.
"How come he looks so beat up?"
"He was trying to help--"
"I mean, who gets hit by a Vespa? A Vespa!" Gary could just imagine the sneer on Chuck's face. "It must have been going a whopping seventeen miles an hour."
"He didn't get hit by the Vespa. It was some boards tied to the back of the Vespa. It came around a corner, or--I don't really understand what happened, but they said he was in the street at just the wrong time."
"Brilliant."
"He saved a little boy's life."
The boy--Gary remembered, then. He could see him. Black hair, Bears jersey, three or four years old. The kid chased a wiffle ball out into the middle of a Lake Forest street, and he would have been hit by a car swerving to avoid an overwide load on an Italian scooter if Gary hadn't been there. The paper had said--
--the paper. Shit, the paper. Where was it? How long had he been stuck here? He tried harder than ever to force himself up out of the water, but all he could do was wiggle a toe. Chuck and Marissa didn't seem to notice.
"Good thing it wasn't a Harley," Chuck said. "Or a dump truck."
"How can you be so callous about this?"
"I'm not callous. I'm practical. It could have been a lot worse. Look, this kind of thing happens to Gary a lot these days. We might as well get used to it."
"Get used to it." Marissa gave a half-laugh, half-something else. "I was brushing my teeth when the phone rang. It was the hospital this time, but sometimes it's the police. Once it was Crumb."
"See what I mean? This is his life now. Apparently it's ours, too."
"There's a phone call, and it's not Gary, it's about him, and my ears start ringing and I want to throw up, but I can't, because I have to go to the hospital and fight with the nurses and the doctors to get them to tell me something, anything, about what's going on and how he is and I have to call you away from your date or your bookie or your whatever and I know you must feel something because you show up too, because it is serious, and he's hurt badly again and--" Finally, she took a breath. "I can't get used to that." Her words broke into shards and fell through the water.
"He's never going to stop, and you know it," Chuck said, quieter and closer. With a supreme effort, Gary forced his eyelids up, not quite open, but enough to see a shadow-Chuck through his lashes. "All this--this helping. It's like an addiction with him."
"I don't want him to stop helping people. I just--I want this to stop."
Gary wanted to reach for Marissa, to tell her it wasn't his fault, that he couldn't stop because the paper wouldn't let him. But he couldn't even turn his head.
"If it helps, I won my bet. We could have steak. Does Gene and Georgetti's deliver?"
"Chuck--"
"Yeah, I know. Stop being a jerk."
"You're not a jerk." She let out a resigned sigh. "Sometimes I wish you were, so I'd have a something to get angry about."
"Is that supposed to make sense?"
"Probably not." A long pause, then she asked, "Did you say you brought licorice?"
"Twizzlers. There's a difference."
"Do tell."
But Chuck didn't tell. There were no footsteps, no crackling plastic bags. Instead, Gary felt a soft touch; Marissa tentatively brushed his hair off his forehead.
"He'll be okay," Chuck said.
After a bit of fumbling, Marissa's fingers locked around Gary's. "How do you know?" she whispered.
Finally, finally, Gary got his eyes fully open, blinking hard against the too-bright fluorescents above him. As Chuck swam into view, he gave Gary a wry, manic grin.
"Because he's got us."
Gary tried to respond, to nod or smile or something, but his energy was completely gone. This time, though, when the water overtook him, he knew he'd surface again.
"And we're not going anywhere."
Fandom: Early Edition (Season 2 or so)
Characters: Gary, Marissa, Chuck
Prompt: "This was turning out to be more unpleasant than most."
Disclaimer: Early Edition is the property of Sony Tristar. (I think. It's hard to tell these days.) No infringement is intended; no profit is being made.
Undying thanks: To the hoopy froods who threw random prompts my way when inspiration was running low.
~*~*~*~*~
The smells got to him first--too clean, too strong, too metallic. Next came movement, up and down or sideways, he wasn't sure. Even a tilt of his head was dizzying, so he kept his eyes closed and tried to ignore it. And there were sounds, clanks and whirrs and all kinds of voices, none of them familiar. Shouting, far away and getting farther, and someone asking him questions.
"Sir, can you hear me? Sir?"
"What happened?"
"Can you move your legs for me, buddy? How about your fingers? Come on, give me something."
He couldn't answer. He did try to move, but it hurt too much. Even when he lay still, pain shot down his right leg, across his shoulders, and, most excruciatingly, around his chest, so that breathing hurt, even thinking hurt. A jab in his arm spiked it all, but sometime after that--seconds or days, he wasn't sure--everything, inside and out, got softer and quieter, and pretty soon it went away altogether. Or maybe he did.
~*~*~*~
The next time Gary knew anything, the pain had receded. It wasn't gone, but it was muffled, and far enough away that he didn't have to think too much about it. He still couldn't move, though; he was just too exhausted. Even his eyelids were too heavy to lift. Why was he so tired?
He seemed to be floating just under the surface of a very dark lake on an even darker night. Soft, distorted questions drifted down to him. Fear tickled his back, a cold spot in the water around him. He should be able to hear more clearly, shouldn't he? He should be able to surface. If he didn't, he'd drown.
Something brushed his hand, someone spoke his name, but the weight of the water pushed him back under.
~*~*~*~
Gary floated for a long time. Very little got through to him. One moment, he'd know what was going on around him--hands turning him over, more needle jabs--but the next moment, or what he thought was the next moment, everything would be silent. He was pretty sure that wasn't right. If he had to drown in darkness, he didn't want to do it alone.
Finally, he managed to get close to the surface and stay there. Moving was still unthinkable, but he could listen. More important, he recognized a voice, low and urgent and controlled--barely controlled, but controlled all the same. The weird thing was, he knew her well enough to recognize the tone and figure out what she was saying, even when her words overlapped with other voices, like waves rushing in one after the other.
"...before he can talk to us?"
"There's bruising down his right side."
"What happened to him?"
"...given him enough to keep the worst of it away."
"Is he in pain?"
"...could be hours. Tomorrow morning we'll run tests..."
He hadn't studied, Gary thought, and fought off a wave of panic. Marissa was there, and she'd make sure the doctor gave him a note.
"Who brought him in?"
"The EMTs said he was responsive at the scene, but..."
"...he broke a couple of ribs. We're not sure..."
"Will he be all right?"
Gary really wanted to hear the answer to that one, but it was lost in the drifting muddle of time.
"Someone should be here when he wakes up. I'll stay."
~*~*~*~
"Up and at 'em." Chuck's voice cut through the darkness. "Let's go, Gar, c'mon."
Gary felt movement, a small wave passing through the water that surrounded him. It wasn't enough to free him, but it didn't hurt.
"What are you doing? Leave him alone."
"Oh, sure, whatever you say, Doctor Clark." Another quick wave rolled around him, and he caught a whiff of cigar smoke and whiskey. "Gar, c'mon."
"The doctor did say." Marissa's voice was as sharp as Chuck's, and that worried Gary. He wanted to open his eyes and see her, to open his mouth and ask what had happened, but every time he tried, the water rushed in, and he didn't want to sink again. He had to hear them, even if he couldn't surface. "Dr. McBride gave him painkillers so he could rest."
Chuck muttered something Gary couldn't make out, then snapped, "So we wait--again. Fine."
At least this time what they were saying made sense--as much sense as Chuck and Marissa ever made. The sound of rustling plastic bags drifted toward Gary, and then there were a couple of thumps, and something tore.
"What are you doing? Did you bring--" Marissa must have been close; he could hear her sniff. "Is that popcorn?"
"White cheddar, light salt. You want some?"
"Gary's in the hospital and you brought popcorn?"
Food, he thought. That was good. It meant...what did it mean?
"Yup. I got Twizzlers and Dr Pepper, too. What do you want?"
Not the ICU. It meant he wasn't in the ICU. That had to be a good thing.
"It's two in the morning!"
"Lucky the White Hen's open all night."
"You stopped at the White Hen? On the way to the hospital?" Marissa's tone was shrill enough to break glass; luckily, whatever was insulating Gary from the worst of the pain kept her voice from tearing right through his eardrum.
"Would you chill the hell out? I've sat vigil like this more times than I can count, and I'm not even Catholic. So if I give up my Saturday night--"
"Sunday morning."
"Whatever. If I give up my date to hang out in another stinking hospital room, I'm bringing the comforts of home." A click, and the television hummed on. "Cable here sucks. Why can't he get himself dumped in a good hospital once in a while?" Brief bits of canned conversations wafted down to Gary. "So what'll it be: Bewitched, Sports Center, or a mockable infomercial?"
"Do you honestly think I care?"
Don't let him get to you, Gary wanted to tell her--but wait. If Chuck was giving Marissa a hard time, maybe things weren't too bad.
"Fine. Sports Center it is."
On the other hand, maybe Chuck was trying to hide from how bad they were.
The volume rose; Dan Patrick was going on a tear about the NBA finals. Again. "Would it kill them to give me the actual scores? I had a c-note on the Cubs game."
"You're such an ass sometimes."
"Only sometimes? I must be losing my touch."
There was more from the television--something about the Bulls and the Sonics--and the continuous crunch of the plastic bag.
"Chuck?" Marissa finally asked. "What if Gary--"
"Don't mind me," said a warm, woman's voice, close to Gary's ear, and he sensed movement again, more waves in the water. "I'm just checking his vitals." There was a tweak in his arm.
What if he--what? Gary wanted to ask. He opened his mouth, or tried to, but the water rushed in and he sank.
~*~*~*~
Later, or earlier, he heard them again.
"I don't get it," said Chuck. "Why isn't he awake yet?"
"Because he would hurt too much if he were awake."
Both voices were slurred, but close. Gary wasn't sure if it was because he was underwater, or if they were just that tired. He wanted to tell them he was awake, but he couldn't get the words through the water.
"How come he looks so beat up?"
"He was trying to help--"
"I mean, who gets hit by a Vespa? A Vespa!" Gary could just imagine the sneer on Chuck's face. "It must have been going a whopping seventeen miles an hour."
"He didn't get hit by the Vespa. It was some boards tied to the back of the Vespa. It came around a corner, or--I don't really understand what happened, but they said he was in the street at just the wrong time."
"Brilliant."
"He saved a little boy's life."
The boy--Gary remembered, then. He could see him. Black hair, Bears jersey, three or four years old. The kid chased a wiffle ball out into the middle of a Lake Forest street, and he would have been hit by a car swerving to avoid an overwide load on an Italian scooter if Gary hadn't been there. The paper had said--
--the paper. Shit, the paper. Where was it? How long had he been stuck here? He tried harder than ever to force himself up out of the water, but all he could do was wiggle a toe. Chuck and Marissa didn't seem to notice.
"Good thing it wasn't a Harley," Chuck said. "Or a dump truck."
"How can you be so callous about this?"
"I'm not callous. I'm practical. It could have been a lot worse. Look, this kind of thing happens to Gary a lot these days. We might as well get used to it."
"Get used to it." Marissa gave a half-laugh, half-something else. "I was brushing my teeth when the phone rang. It was the hospital this time, but sometimes it's the police. Once it was Crumb."
"See what I mean? This is his life now. Apparently it's ours, too."
"There's a phone call, and it's not Gary, it's about him, and my ears start ringing and I want to throw up, but I can't, because I have to go to the hospital and fight with the nurses and the doctors to get them to tell me something, anything, about what's going on and how he is and I have to call you away from your date or your bookie or your whatever and I know you must feel something because you show up too, because it is serious, and he's hurt badly again and--" Finally, she took a breath. "I can't get used to that." Her words broke into shards and fell through the water.
"He's never going to stop, and you know it," Chuck said, quieter and closer. With a supreme effort, Gary forced his eyelids up, not quite open, but enough to see a shadow-Chuck through his lashes. "All this--this helping. It's like an addiction with him."
"I don't want him to stop helping people. I just--I want this to stop."
Gary wanted to reach for Marissa, to tell her it wasn't his fault, that he couldn't stop because the paper wouldn't let him. But he couldn't even turn his head.
"If it helps, I won my bet. We could have steak. Does Gene and Georgetti's deliver?"
"Chuck--"
"Yeah, I know. Stop being a jerk."
"You're not a jerk." She let out a resigned sigh. "Sometimes I wish you were, so I'd have a something to get angry about."
"Is that supposed to make sense?"
"Probably not." A long pause, then she asked, "Did you say you brought licorice?"
"Twizzlers. There's a difference."
"Do tell."
But Chuck didn't tell. There were no footsteps, no crackling plastic bags. Instead, Gary felt a soft touch; Marissa tentatively brushed his hair off his forehead.
"He'll be okay," Chuck said.
After a bit of fumbling, Marissa's fingers locked around Gary's. "How do you know?" she whispered.
Finally, finally, Gary got his eyes fully open, blinking hard against the too-bright fluorescents above him. As Chuck swam into view, he gave Gary a wry, manic grin.
"Because he's got us."
Gary tried to respond, to nod or smile or something, but his energy was completely gone. This time, though, when the water overtook him, he knew he'd surface again.
"And we're not going anywhere."