Work Text:
When Beth’s phone vibrates on her desk, the last name she expects to see flashing across her screen is Rio’s. Mostly because he said he would be busy doing work stuff — “ ain’t your department, ma ” — and with it being the middle of the day, he should still be doing said work stuff. Still, she picks the call up, propping the phone between her ear and her shoulder as she continues to check through papers of the past months’ sales.
“Hello?”
“Where’s the first aid kit?”
Beth stops mid-way through turning over one of the pages. “What first aid kit?”
“Yours,” he says as if it’s obvious which it very well isn’t because he should be working and not in her house clearly in need of some kind of medical assistance.
“Are you bleeding on my kitchen floor again?”
“Nah, your bathroom,” he supplies. “Might’ve got some on your bedroom floor.”
“Rio,” she groans. “You know you’re paying for that, right?”
He makes a frustrated noise and she realises that yes, he’s probably considered that already. “Ma. The first aid kit?”
“It’s in the kitchen,” she tells him before quickly adding, “don’t go in there though!” He groans. “Well, there’s no point in you bleeding all over my house. Under the sink in the en-suite, right at the back, there should be some bandages from the last time.” She pauses as she hears him shuffling around, grunting at one point which she assumes is when he’s crouched down low enough to see beneath the sink. “Do you need stitches?”
“Don’t think so.”
And he doesn’t sound entirely sure about that so Beth settles back into her seat with a sigh. “In the other nightstand.” Dean’s nightstand, she thinks but doesn’t say. “There’s some fabric already cut into squares, you might be able to use it as a patch before you bandage up. There should be tape and some scissors in there too.”
“What were you gonna make?”
“Nothing,” she lies.
He scoffs. “Could just use the bandages.”
“Use the fabric too. Can’t have you bleeding out before I get home.”
There’s the rustling of something moving against the microphone on his phone. “You bossy, you know that?”
“Pot, kettle, black.”
He hums, something quiet but still filled with amusement. “I gotta go. Need both hands.”
“I’ll be leaving here in ten minutes,” she tells him. “Try not to die before I get there.”
“It ain’t that bad.”
“Yeah, it never is with you.”
When Beth gets home, the place is quiet. After leaving her coat and bag by the front door, she makes quick work of grabbing the first aid kit, a dish towel, and a bottle of water from the kitchen before she heads straight for her bedroom. The french doors are open a fraction as is the door to the en-suite but it’s the bed her eyes go to. Rio’s laying down on his side, his back to her. He hasn’t got his shirt on and she can see the bandage going around his middle, the bulge where he’s placed the make-shift patch on his side, right above his hip. She makes her way over to the bed and settles everything she’s carrying onto the ground beside it.
“Rio,” she says, gently shaking him. “Rio.”
It seems for a moment like he might not budge but then suddenly he starts to move. He blinks slowly before rolling over just enough to look at her. He smiles, eyes closing momentarily before he rolls over onto his back completely.
“Hey, ma.”
Beth settles on the side of the bed. Her eyes scan over the nightstand. The leftover bandages, tape, scissors, and patches of material are scattered over it. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah, told you it wasn’t bad.” As if to prove a point, he sits up, leaning back against the headboard and grins at her. “Just a little tired.”
“Can I take a closer look at your handiwork soon?” she asks, motioning vaguely to the bandages. “Make sure you don’t need stitches.”
He looks like he’s going to argue but then he sighs, sitting up a little straighter and leaning forward enough that she can carefully unravel the bandages. Once they’re off, she gently presses her hand over the patch. The tape isn’t the best so it’s already begun to peel away in places. With her other hand, she balls up the bandages as best as she can and unceremoniously drops them onto the bed to dispose of later.
“Hold that in place,” she tells him.
“It’s fine,” he says but does it anyway, settling back against the headboard again.
Beth gives him a disbelieving look before she leans down to pick up the first aid kit. She opens it up and pulls out some antiseptic wipes, gauze, and some medical tape. Putting them and the bandages from the nightstand within comfortable reaching distance on the bed before swapping the first aid kit for the bottle of water and dish towel.
“Okay,” she says as she pours some onto the towel. “You can peel it off.”
He does and well, he wasn’t entirely wrong. There’s an ugly-looking cut that could probably benefit from a couple of stitches but while it’s still slowly bleeding, it’s hardly life-threatening. She takes the wet portion of the towel and cleans him up as best as she can. Not spending too much time on it before she presses a dry part of the towel against the wound.
“Take a couple of wipes out,” she instructs.
Rio chuckles. “Yes, ma’am.”
She narrows her eyes at him. “Don’t forget I could hurt you right now.”
“You won’t.”
“Yeah, keep pushing it,” she mumbles, applying a little more pressure. “We’ll see.”
All he does is grin and hold a couple of wipes up to her. She takes one of them from him and as quickly as she can, she pulls the towel back and cleans around the wound before applying pressure again. She does the exact same with the second wipe.
“Open the gauze next.”
This time he doesn’t make any kind of comment simply opens it up. He grabs the scissors from the nightstand and cuts off a section of it before holding it out to her. Removing the towel once again, she lets it fall to one side before pressing the gauze over the cut. Without even asking, he picks up the medical tape and rips off pieces of it, handing her one at a time so she can slowly secure the patch.
“If that’s still bleeding by the time we go to bed tonight, I’m taking you to get stitches,” Beth tells him. He looks momentarily confused. It was only a couple of weeks ago that Dean had moved out and tonight was the first time she had let the kids stay with him since he’d left. In fact, they would be gone for the entire week. She was planning on telling Rio that after work, asking him to stay with her for the time they were gone. For a moment, she considers changing her words, taking it back, but then he just smiles slightly, eyes darting down before he looks back at her again.
“It’ll stop,” he tells her, passing over some fresh bandages.
Part of her believes him. He’s needed stitches before for wounds far worse than this one but still, Beth knows she won’t be happy until it actually stops bleeding entirely. And it’s not just that, her mind is also spiralling as she wonders about the possibility of infection. It hadn’t been a clean cut.
“What happened?” she asks softly, knowing he might not tell her.
“Someone pulled a knife on me,” he says, sitting forward again. She just hums, waiting for him to continue and eventually, he rolls his eyes. “He swiped, I moved, it came out a little jagged. Cut a bit deeper on one end.”
She begins to wrap the bandages around his middle. “And the guy?”
“Being dealt with,” he says as if it’s simple.
“Is this a small problem?” she asks. “Or a part of something bigger?”
Rio scoffs. “Small.”
And, yeah, she figures if it was something huge, he would be dealing with it himself, injury or not. There’s still a whole lot she doesn’t know about what goes on behind the scenes, no matter how much she’s asked him, but she knows enough.
She secures the bandage in place. “Will it become a bigger problem?”
“Nah,” he tells her and from the tone of his voice, he’s confident of that.
Beth utters a quiet, “good” under her breath before gathering up all the used materials and taking them into the bathroom to dispose of. When she comes back out, Rio is sitting at the edge of the bed. He puts the bottle of water on top of the nightstand and gathers everything together. Beth puts the unused patches of material, scissors, and normal tape into the draw of the nightstand then piles everything else into the first aid kit which she settles, along with the bottle of water, on top of the nightstand.
“You’re not always going to be so lucky,” she comments, standing between his legs.
“I know,” he agrees, hand on her thigh, squeezing gently.
She goes to step away from him but Rio grabs her hand suddenly, tugging her back to him. He lifts up just enough to wrap an arm around her. She doesn’t have time to react to any of it, so he’s able to pull her back onto the bed, right on top of him. Although she tries to open her mouth to protest, he drags her down and kisses her before she can speak.
“You’re going to hurt yourself,” Beth mumbles against his lips.
When she pulls back, Rio’s grinning at her. “You worried about me?”
She huffs, tries to pull up a look of indifference. “Would you be offended if I said no?”
“Nah.” He’s got that all too familiar smirk in place. The one that makes her want to slap him and kiss him all at once. “But only ‘cause I know you’re lying.”
Beth goes to protest but once again, he presses a kiss to her lips before she can utter a word.