And nothing else (4/?)
Title: And nothing else.
Author: KittyBlackCat
Disclaimer: Luke and Reid aren't dating and going at it like bunnies so obviously, I don't own ATWT or its characters
Rating: PG-13(to be safe)
Summary: Post episode of June 17th. Reid said that he would do nothing else but his job. Just how far along that line will he go?
Words: 3808
Part 1, Part 2, Part 3 Part 5
AN: Hey everyone. I decided to cut what I was writing and seperate it in two, so this chap will be shorter than the last. Sorry about that, but I thought that it was a good place to cut and I'll be leaving with my sis soon because my birthday present for her is to go see the play "L'avare" de Molière and I haven't finish writing what needs to be written so this way you can get a next part instead of waiting longer and have a longer part. The next part has already been started so it should be posted tomorrow for sure!!! Enjoy!
Chapter 4
Luke Snyder felt more exhausted than ever and his thoughts were flying around in his head like crazy. He was thinking and feeling too many things at once. Bob Hughes had done nothing but unnerve Luke even more. He just couldn’t believe that a man with his experience could have failed to notice what was happening to Reid. How could it have gotten so far? That question had kept repeating itself in Luke’s head. But now, he found that he didn’t care. He didn’t care how Reid had gotten to this point; all he cared about was Reid waking up and getting better. The causes didn’t matter because this would never happen again. Luke would not let it happen. From now on, Reid Oliver will have trouble keeping him away; whether or not he wants Luke back, he would be there to look out for Reid. And he knew he wouldn’t be the only one. No doubt Katie would be in full mother hen mode from now on. She’ll probably sit with Reid at every meal time and make sure he eats everything she prepared for him. Luke couldn’t blame her; he wanted to do the same thing. However, he didn’t know if it was a good idea or not. Reid had been independent since forever it seemed. Luke didn’t want to hover too much. Lord knows that didn’t work with Noah. On the other hand, Reid is totally different from Noah and Luke didn’t want Reid to think he didn’t hover because he didn’t care. He was just unsure of what to do next and he couldn’t know as long as Reid didn’t wake up.
“How is he, Katie”
“No change. I supposed it’s not so bad; it could be worse. I overheard quite an interesting and loud argument out there” Katie remarked, looking at Luke who was now looking rather sheepish about the whole thing.
“Thank you Luke”
“For what?” asked a confused Luke
“For giving Bob a piece of your mind and allowing me to dissipate part of my anger vicariously . If I had been the one to see Bob…I don’t know what I would have done but I can’t guarantee it wouldn’t have been physical. I wanted to jump at his throat so badly last night! I swear I could have strangle him”
“I know how that feels. But we can’t. Bob is most important person in this hospital and he is still Reid’s boss. We shouldn’t compromise Reid’s position here even though right now, I’d really rather he go work outside of Oakdale.”
“ Well, we’re not there yet. First he has to wake up and get better. It’ll take a while before he’s ready to come back to work. There’s still plenty of time to decide what the next move would be.”
The two friends sat beside the fallen doctor in silence. Neither of them felt like talking at the moment. Hours later, once the sun had disappeared to leave the place to darkness once again, Chris Hughes came to talk to them.
“Katie, Luke. You two should go home tonight. You look dead tired. I’ll be going home too. I asked the night doctor to call me as soon as there are any changes. I promise I’ll call you both if something happens before tomorrow morning”
Katie nodded. As much as she wanted to be by Reid’s side, she couldn’t take it anymore. She hadn’t slept in over 36 hours and she had tried very hard not to cry as to not upset or worry Luke more than he already was, but she couldn’t be strong anymore. Right now all she wanted to do was to go hug her son real hard and crawl into her bed and cry her eyes out until she fell asleep. This way, when she came back tomorrow, she would be able to be a positive presence for both Luke and Reid. Luke, however, had a very different sentiment than Katie.
“I’m not leaving him, Chris. I refuse to leave his side”
“Luke, Reid wouldn’t want you…”
“I don’t care Chris! He needs me… or at least I need him. I won’t be able to go to sleep without evident proof that he’s still breathing. Beside, I don’t want him to wake up alone. Hasn’t he been alone enough in the last two months? Just bring me an extra pillow and I’ll sleep here ok? You’ve already bent the rules by letting Katie and I stay here all day, you can bend them to allow me to spend the night with him. Lord knows you wouldn’t be able to make Reid move from this chair if the situations were reversed”
“Argh…I swear you two are the two most stubborn people I have ever encountered!” said an exasperated Chris. “No other you were at each other’s throats before. Neither of you is ever ready to give.”
“ Yeah well…it keeps things entertaining doesn’t it?” joked Luke.
“Yeah I guess it does. Do try to sleep some would you Luke. If you look half-dead when Reid wakes up, it will only worry him and then he’ll scream at me, detailing how incompetent a doctor I am.” Luke gave small chuckle. Boy how he wished he could hear Reid insult Chris’ competence right now.
Luke stayed sitting, holding onto Reid’s hand, as the other two left the room to get some much needed sleep at home. Looking at Reid, so frail and pail and still, was heartbreaking. It was an absolute nightmare. “See Reid. That’s why I wanted the overnight rooms and some entertainment in the new wing. Because sitting around doing nothing and not knowing what will happen to your love one is hell. You know, I don’t understand why Bob was worried about the integrity of the project. You’ve been interested in me for quite a while apparently and yet, you’ve never lost a chance at insulting and double guessing every single suggestion I made for the new wing. You never once stopped being your hardass self or stopped being less than brutally honest with me. You don’t play games. I don’t know why Bob thought our relationship could have an influence on our professional decision. I mean, I’m not the best at separating my personal life from…well everything actually” Luke gave a small chuckle. Yeah his personal life and emotions normally affected every aspect of his life.”but you’re the exact opposite. If I had ever brought the personal into the professional, you would have stopped me immediately. You would have made it clear from day one that just because we were together, didn’t mean that you’d go for any airhead scheme I would come up with, wouldn’t you?” Luke looked at Reid’s unconscious form. He wasn’t moving at all.
“You know, I’d like you for a while too. From way before the kiss in Dallas actually. Oh I didn’t want to admit it to myself of course. You were just so frustrating I wanted to punch you most of the time and…back then I didn’t want to admit to myself that maybe Noah and I weren’t NoahandI any longer. It was…it was a really frustrating time. On one hand, you drove me nuts, on the other hand, you made me laugh, smile and flirt like no one else had before. I had so much fun with you. I loved annoying you. Do you know I purposefully sought you out about any reason just because I wanted to see you and I wanted to see that look on your face when you’re irritated with me? It was fun. How long until Dr.Oliver starts calling me names? You made the few months in my life that should have been unbearable, completely bearable. And when you kissed me…Do you remember when we got back from Dallas and you wanted to talk about the kiss but I didn’t? You said I didn’t want to talk about it because I liked it. Actually, you were wrong. Well not wrong as much as you were saying the understatement of the year. What you made me feel…It’s a good thing you pager went off. I couldn’t answer that question back then. I still can’t answer it now, because what you made me feel, I have never felt before. And that’s confusing, because before I met you, I was sure that I knew exactly what love, lust, desire felt like and then I meet you and you kiss me and….nothing makes any sense anymore. It was like an explosion.” Luke tried to stop a sob. Lord this was hard. This man made him feel so much and now he was in a hospital bed… Thinking about happier times hurt…He just…he wanted him to wake up so badly. He wanted to tell him these things while he was awake but he had never been able to. Reid and him really weren’t good at expressing themselves when the other was concerned.
“When you kissed me,,” Luke started again, determined to say everything he wanted to say for so long even though the other couldn’t hear him. After all, it couldn’t hurt to practice and Luke needed to get this off his chest before all his emotions made him explode. He needed to be closer to Reid for the next part. Slowly, careful not to touch any medical equipment or hurt Reid, Luke lied down sideway on the bed beside Reid and started playing with the other man’s hair, still holding one of his hands.
“When you kissed me, I had this surge of intense happiness inside of me, like you wouldn’t believe. If I hadn’t been so shocked, I would have been grinning like a maniac and jumping around giddily. And that never happened before. One of the reason I kept keeping you at arms lengths is because what I feel when I’m with you, is always more intense than what I’ve felt with anyone else. You make me feel much more than others and that’s scary because…you can make me happier than I’ve ever been. But the opposite is also true Reid. The things with Noah…they hurt me so much. They’re still hurting me. It was so hard. I loved Noah so much and he was my first love and for things to go down like they had, for things to end like that…it was hard and it’s still painful. But what I feel for you and with you…I never felt with Noah. As much as I talked about Noah being the love of my life, I actually never felt even close to how I feel for you. So I had to stop it. I had to protect myself Reid. Especially after the ultimatum. When I love, I give myself completely and that means that I’m generally the one who gets hurt the most. And when you were ready to take a break, it felt like you were giving up on me. It also made me feel like my opinion wasn’t important in your eyes because you hadn’t consulted me. Gosh, you and I really need help with the whole conversation thing. It’s like we try to talk but it never comes out quite the way we want and we never quite hear exactly what the other is really saying. But I think, the biggest problem is that we leave. Every time the situation gets serious or uncomfortable, one of us leave. And we hurt each other. But this time it’ll be different Reid. I’m done running. I’m not leaving your side and I’ll be damn if you try to leave mine before we ash things out. I suppose there’s one positive thing with you being in this bed, huh? This way I’m sure you won’t be running away. It’s your turn now after all” Carefully, Luke found a position more comfortable and fell asleep beside the man who had, unknowingly to them both, completely stolen his heart.
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When Katie Snyder woke up the morning after, she felt like she hadn’t slept in a week. Her arms and legs were so heavy she had difficulty moving them. ‘Coffee’ she thought as she slowly dragged herself to the kitchen. ‘I need coffee’ Going to the kitchen and preparing herself a cup of coffee seemed to take an hour. She was definitely in slow motion today. She had no idea how she was going to get to the hospital. She was in no state to drive a car right now. Maybe taking a shower would wake her up. At least, it’ll make her smell better. An hour later, Katie was ready to go and waiting on Henry to pick her up and bring her to the hospital. He friend had been extremely nice, taking time off to take care of Jacob while she was at the hospital. Once she arrived there, the sight she encountered warmed her heart. Luke was snuggled against Reid’s left side, his head on the older man’s shoulder and his left arm around his waist. If Reid hadn’t looked so horrible, she would have taken a picture of them like this with the camera she constantly have on her in case Jacob does something cute……Oh who was she kidding? Even with Reid sick, this scene was way too adorable not to be immortalized. Plus it would serve as a good reminder for Reid as to how bad Reid state had been and how much Luke clearly cared about him. She wondered silently if she should feel bad about intruding on the two men’s intimate moment, but dismissed the notion quickly. It was just a part of who she was. They’d get used to it eventually. But right now, leaving them alone seemed like the best solution. Luke really needed to sleep. Katie would go question the doctors and let him be for now.
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Reid Oliver felt like he was floating in a giant cloud. His senses were foggy and asleep. Slowly, one by one, his senses started working again. The first thing Reid Oliver came to know was the sound of a heart monitor being in the background. Yet, he couldn’t make the connection between the monitor and being in the hospital. For what seemed like an eternity, the only thing Reid was aware of was that annoying beeping sound. But eventually other information started to enter his brain. There was a source of warmth on one of his side (he couldn’t tell if it was the left or the right one right now). There was also small burst of air on his neck coming from that side. He had the impression that he should do something, but for the life of him, he couldn’t figure out what. So he just stayed there, in limbo.
“Do you think we should wake him up?” Reid heard a voice say. It was strange. There seemed to be some sort of echo in the voice. It sounded so far away. He could tell however that it was a feminine voice, a soothing voice. This voice was pleasant to hear.
“No. I think we should let him sleep until we need to run further test on Reid.” For some reason, the second voice left an unpleasant impression in Reid’s mind. He didn’t really like the second voice, but he had no idea why. He hoped the second voice wouldn’t talk anymore.
“Ok. Be truthful Chris. How does it look right now for Reid”
“It’s hard to tell when he’s still unconscious. Right now, we can just wait.” Reid didn’t like the sound of that. It didn’t seem to be what the first voice needed to hear.
“Ok” the first voice answered. It sounded so sad. Reid didn’t like it. He didn’t like it at all. He didn’t want the first voice to be sad. He didn’t want the first voice to cry. Suddenly, the source of warmth on his side seemed to shift.
“Waiting is what we’ve been doing for over a day Chris. What we want is answers. Anything” softly said a third voice, much closer than the other two. It sounded groggy and wasn’t as loud as the others. But most of all, it sounded familiar.That voice. Reid liked that voice. Something was special about it. Precious. Like…like home. This voice felt like home.
“Hey. How are you holding up Sweetie” said voice number one with a tender tone.
“I’m…holding up” answered voice number three. Something wasn’t right. The third voice sounded so depressed and worried. Reid didn’t like it. He liked voice number three being sad even less than he liked voice number one being sad. For some reason, Reid felt as if he should do something. He felt like he needed to do something to make that voice less sad. And with that thought, Reid Oliver drifted back into full consciousness.
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Luke Snyder woke up to the worried voice of Katie Snyder and the patient voice of Chris Hughes. Apparently, nothing had changed since he had fallen asleep and Chris couldn’t tell them much of anything. Luke didn’t like that and voiced his opinion about it. Katie looked much better this morning than she had the night before, but you could still see a haunted look in her eyes. Luke supposed he had the same look in his. Luke looked at the still form of Doctor Oliver and passed his hand through the man’s hair, as if to comfort him when actually, he was the one who needed comforting. He was getting lost in his thoughts when suddenly, he saw something from the corner of his eyes. ‘Wait a minute’ Luke thought. ‘Did Reid just twitch?’ Luke started moving his hand again, this time looking intensely at Reid’s face. There! He twitched. He reacted to Luke’s touch! And it looked like he was trying to open his eyes.
“Omg. Katie, get Chris back in here. He’s waking up!”
“What?” Katie startled out of her thoughts, surprised. She immediately got up and closer to Reid. “Are you sure?”
“Yes look see?” Luke petted Reid’s hair once more and again Reid reacted. His eyes were now moving more, as if trying to get his eyelid to open and Luke and Katie were able to hear a very soft groan.
“Omg!” Katie ran to the door and opened it. “Chris, get in here! He’s waking up!” Katie screamed at him, excitedly. Omg. Reid was waking up. She was so happy. She knew deep down that he wasn’t fine yet. He was still only skin and bones and it would take a while for him to get back to his former self, but right now none of this mattered. Reid was out of the coma. It was the first step they needed for things to finally turn right again.
Chris Hughes was surprised when Katie screamed for everyone to hear that Reid Oliver was awaking. Surprised and happily relieved. Quickly he went back to the room he had just left.
“He’s groaning and trying to open his eyes” said Luke with smile.
“Reid. Reid can you hear me?” asked Chris. “Dr.Oliver can you hear me?”
Reid groaned. “Stop” he said, too softly for anyone to understand what was said.
“What? Dr.Oliver can you repeat that please?”
“Stop”he said a little louder.
“Stop what?” the other doctor asked
“Stop talking” Reid answered opening his eyes slightly. “Your voice annoys me”
Luke and Katie couldn’t help but burst out laughing at that. Both of them had tears of relief and happiness falling from their eyes. Reid Oliver was back.
“Hey Reid” Luke said softly. “Can you see me? Do you know who I am?”
Reid turned his head towards voice number 3 and was greeted by the sight of an angelic face with tears falling from its eyes and a huge smile plastered on it.
“Luke” Reid answered in wonder. “You’re Luke”
“Yeah” Luke sobbed. “I’m Luke. I’m Luke.” Luke couldn’t contain his emotions anymore. He burst out crying, his body shaking as uncontrollable sobs overtook his body. He had been feeling so many emotions in the last 24 hours that the relief and happiness that he felt now had completely broken his defence and made him explode in tears.
“Hey. Hey” Reid said in a comforting, though weak, voice. “Why are you crying?”
“Why am I crying? Why am I crying? My god Reid why do you think? After what you did…”
“Luke, calm down” interrupted Chris in his serious voice. “Reid doesn’t need this right now. He probably doesn’t have a clue as to why he’s in a hospital bed in the first place. You’ll have to wait to discuss the two last months with him.”
“You’re right” Luke agreed, calming himself down. “I’m sorry Reid. I shouldn’t have taken that tone with you. I just…I was worried. And I’m happy you’re awake. And it doesn’t matter why I’m crying right now, ok? The only thing important is for you to get better. And for that, you need to let Chris treat you and answer all of his questions even if his voice annoys you. Can you do that?”
. “Do I have to?” Reid groaned
“Yes you do!” Answered Katie’s stern voice. “Right now you’re going to do exactly what Chris tells you to do, when he tells you to do it”
“But Katie. It’s Doogie” Reid whined, but the only reaction he got was a chuckle from everyone in the room.
“Ok Luke. Let’s leave Chris to do his doctor mojo ok?” Katie said, putting her hand on Luke’s shoulder.
“Ok” Luke told her. “Listen Reid, I’m going to leave the room so Chris can do his job properly ok? But I won’t be far. I’ll stay right here outside of this room and I’ll come back in as soon as I get the ok. I’m not leaving” Reid nodded his head, slightly confused at Luke’s speech.
“Reid, look at me” Luke reached out and gently took Reid’s chin, turning his head towards him. “I’m not leaving you. Do you understand me?” Luke asked. Reid still looked like a lost puppy though. Slowly, Luke lowered his forehead until it touched Reid’s. Luke looked at the man he loved right in the eyes, trying to convey his message more clearly. “I’m not leaving you ever again. Ever.” Slowly, recognition crept in Reid’s eyes. He understood what Luke was saying now. He wasn’t sure why the younger man was saying it, especially with so much conviction and affection, considering what had happened two months ago, but he had received the message loud and clear. Luke smiled at him gently and Reid couldn’t help but respond to him with his own small smile. Then Luke touched his cheek with his hand and kissed his forehead and then left the room with Katie.
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part 5 coming up tomorrow (or at like 1 am in the morning, depends how tired I am after the play)