Visiting hours

[raw_youth]

The first days had been the worst. He'd shivered so hard he thought his teeth would come out. He couldn't keep his legs still and kept kicking the covers off, something he barely noticed because he just kept sweating. It wasn't as profuse as the day he'd come to the clinic. It was almost worse. He was sticky with it. It was good that he had the IV

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[chasinghumanity]

It was all too fucking familiar. Mitchell had glanced into the clinic every time he passed over the last few days, curious as to how Dodge was doing, but he had walked on every single time. Walked on because running would have been suspicious. Mitchell's own attempts to shepherd people through withdrawal had been light or failed. Lauren wouldn't have it; the coven had their neat little meetings and the rest of the group to help. Mitchell hadn't had to deal with anything as bad as this.

No. No, instead, Mitchell had been as bad as this. Carl had seen him through it, but Mitchell had done his even best to make it hell on the other vampire. He remembered the sweats, the moisture pouring from him because of the heat inside him, his dead body burning up with pure hunger. He remembered the awful things he shouted - at Dan especially - as the hunger consumed all his thoughts. He remembered, too, being tied down. No handcuffs for Mitchell, no, but he had been tied to chair and bed. For everyone's safety.

Mitchell hadn't been able to see himself in a mirror for ninety years, but he looked in on Dodge in his suffering and it was like he didn't have to. He saw himself there.

And it scared the living piss out of him. He had spent the last year on this island willfully ignoring every last detail of his life back home. Sure, there were AA meetings and some sharing with Sookie, but considering Mitchell's long, full history of terrible, horrific deeds, that only scratched the surface. Tip of the iceberg. Everything else was turned out, pushed away. The trip back home had done its damage, strewn bits of Mitchell's life like dirty laundry all over the floor, but he'd pushed it all away again. Things had finally settled. And then here came this kid pulling bits back out again. A piece here, a piece there and everything would come tumbling out again.

But somehow, there Mitchell was. Not running away today, or rather not walking very, very fast. But coming to stand, thoughtful, at the foot of Dodge's bed. Mitchell couldn't save himself, couldn't deal with himself, but he could do something, maybe, something small, for this kid. It wouldn't matter at all except maybe it would a little.

"How're you doing?" he asked. His mouth curved ever so slightly upward, more of a habit than a genuine smile. He wasn't Annie; he wasn't so brave as to smile through this.

[raw_youth]

Dodge was lucid now, more than he had been in days. His eyes were clear and bright and thanks to being released for a little while he was clean. He wasn't sticky and he didn't reek the way he had as he sweat out the poison. He had even eaten real food and had the where with all to keep it down. All in all, he couldn't complain.

Except he wanted a shot. He couldn't stop thinking about it. It squirmed beneath his skin like worms, raced up and down his back bone, consumed his thoughts. Alone in the bed with just his thoughts he could smell it. His arm ached to feel the prick of a needle. Yeah, the pain of the withdrawal was over but the worst part had only just begun.

"I'm better," he confessed honestly, flashing a hint to a smile back at the guy. That face, that hair...Dodge remembered. Sort of. A hazy, dim, confused memory, but he remembered warmth and...and strength...and floating.

"You got me here," he continued. "I remember you...you fuckin' got me in here. You saved my life, man."

He paused for just a second and pursed his lips together. Three days ago he was cursing the very fact that he was still alive, but now? Now he could say, "Thanks."

[chasinghumanity]

You saved my life, man. It was a ridiculous statement: John Mitchell saving a life. He had torn through hundreds of bodies, recruited a handful of people to keep them from death, but he wouldn't have truly said he saved anyone. Everything he touched became tainted, corrupted, one way or another. But maybe not now. Maybe now, now that he was human, now that the hunger didn't control him and he didn't have to live minute by minute, maybe now he could actually do something truly, wholly good. Maybe it could make up for a few things.

He smiled faintly at his own thoughts, at what Herrick would say, and lifted his shoulders in a barely there shrug. "You're welcome. I guess you're through the worst of it now if you can actually say that," he said. "You look better anyway."

[raw_youth]

"They let me take a shower," he replied. He knew that wasn't what the guy meant but he didn't really want to think about what he must have looked like when he'd come in, or how he'd looked through the worst of the withdrawal.

"I'm, uh, Dodge," he said sheepishly. "If you told me your name I forgot."

[chasinghumanity]

Mitchell nodded, accepting his answer as it was. Being addicted to something badly enough that you almost destroy your body didn't mean that someone was an across the board idiot. Dodge knew a shower wasn't all Mitchell was referring to. Mitchell knew he knew. But there was no reason to push for uncomfortable just then.

"To be honest, I'm not sure I did," Mitchell admitted. He walked around to the side of the bed, close enough to offer his hand on the side without the handcuffs. "Mitchell. Nice to meet you properly, Dodge."

[raw_youth]

"Mitchell. It's good to meet you, too," he replied. He felt good enough to smile and he closed his eyes when he caught a scent. Mitchell was close enough that it was unmistakable.

God, he wanted a fuckin' cigarette. He craved it almost more than he wanted a shot.

"Man, I wish they'd let me out of here. I wouldn't even care if I had a babysitter as long as I could have a cig, you know?"

[chasinghumanity]

He huffed a laugh out through his nose as he helped himself to a chair and sat down. No doubt the smell was more pronounced in the clinic atmosphere, as sterile as they could get it here, but the Council business had been doing a number on his nerves. If he came home smelling even faintly like an ashtray, George would give him dirty looks, so he took this as a sign that he needed a shower.

"It's for the best," he said simply. "For now. When they do let you out, I promise you one of mine. Unless you've got a better supply of your own. Cup of coffee, too. Coffee helps with everything."

[raw_youth]

"I don't know if I have any or not. One of the doctors went to my place and he told me he got rid of my stuff. I don't know if he means my smokes, too," he replied sadly.

All the heroin he had and House had just...Dodge didn't know. Maybe he'd dumped it the ocean or spread it in the jungle or flushed it down the toilet. Whatever he'd done, it was gone.

"Coffee would be good, too. It's sad that coffee and a cig sounds like heaven right now. Guess that proves how I've been feeling like shit."

[chasinghumanity]

"Coffee and a fag always sounds like heaven to me," Mitchell replied with a faint grin and a shake of his head. It didn't entirely, to be honest. Black, hot, fresh coffee was a poor substitute for black, hot, fresh blood, but it did a job. Other drugs to occupy the brain, the nerves. Not real heaven, but you could pretend. Not that Mitchell thought he'd ever know what real Heaven felt like.

"Maybe I've just got poor taste. I could live on coffee and cigarettes. Pretty much have, at times."

[raw_youth]

"Me too," Dodge grinned. "People wouldn't believe it if they knew how long you can keep going on just those two things."

Fagin didn't put up with that, though. He insisted the boys all eat. Hunger was almost constant but Dodge had always known he was guaranteed one meal a day.

"Where are you from, man?"

[chasinghumanity]

"Erm, well, I was born in Dublin," Mitchell answered, running his fingers through his hair. "But before I came here I was living in Bristol. 'Bout two hours outside of London." Those were the only two places he considered home, even though he had stayed all over, in some instances for longer than he had been in Bristol. But with George and Annie, Mitchell had been home. That was where the man he was now came from.

"What about you?" he asked.

[raw_youth]

"Toronto. Right in the city. It wasn't great but it could have been worse," he replied. And he knew that to be true. When he'd gotten to the city he slept in a grocery store loading dock and he stole food out of dumpsters. Getting in with Fagin's gang...there was worse shit that could have happened.

[chasinghumanity]

"You know, I never made it to Toronto," he said, pretending for the moment like this was a completely normal conversation, not one held between a former vampire and a known addict handcuffed to a bed. "I knew some people who ended up up there, but I never got around to visiting. They liked it." Probably for completely different reasons than a normal, living person might, but the point remained. "Why wasn't it great?"

[raw_youth]

That was a question that got him to withdraw a little. Dodge ducked his head and shrugged.

"You know," he said, then went quiet for a minute. What to say? He didn't just tell people about his life before. Not just like that.

"I ran away. I thought Toronto would be...better."

[chasinghumanity]

Mitchell didn't expect straight answers. He deflected every day of his life; he really did not expect a scared kid to bare his soul to him because he had carried him to the clinic. But Mitchell wanted to know sore spots. He wanted to have an idea that could be built upon later.

"I ran away, too," he said, gaze drifting down to his hands. "A lot. Thinking.. the next place would be better. Or somewhere I could get a fresh start. Some place safer or more exciting. Just a change. ..To get away from myself, I guess. Whatever life I'd built up in one place. Funny how that never works out the way you plan."

[raw_youth]

Dodge looked at Mitchell for a long moment. Just looking. Pretty much everyone he'd known in Toronto had been a runaway or had done their time on the street. Even Nancy and Becky. But here? Other than Neil who had hustled but hadn't been a junkie or anything Dodge didn't know anyone who had come from- well, he guessed a lot of people had shit in their pasts. Everyone did. But he hadn't met anyone who just flat out said they'd been there.

"I couldn't get out of Toronto once I got there. If I'd run again, Bill would have caught me and..."

His mouth had gotten away from him.

"...It wouldn't have been good," he finished lamely.