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The boy had come in unconscious.
EMTs were screaming about dropping vitals and needing more blood.
On break and cradling a bitter cup of cafeteria coffee (too cheap to invest in the good coffee they dish out in the gift shop) heading for the upstairs staff room, nurse Derek Hale watched them wheel the gurney back behind the doors that sometimes sucked people in, but didn't spit them back out.
The surprising moment for Derek was when nurse McCall was suddenly running away from the doors to skid to a halt in front of their small town sheriff.
"Where is he? What happened?" the stern man whom Derek had always looked up to as a teenager, was hysterical.
"John calm down. He's already been rushed to surgery. I'll let you know more the very second I do." She said firmly, leading him to the brittle plastic chairs outside of the trauma ward.
Derek spared one last sympathetic glance towards the sheriff and then carried on to his break.
Unfortunately the scene was familiar.
_-_
"Hale, you're taking over rooms 202 through 230 for Lindy. Her kids got a bug."
Derek shrugged and added the charts to his stack and moved towards the supply cart to stock what he needed.
Moving through the rooms he paused when he came to Stilinski. That was the sheriff's kid who'd almost died when a drunk driver slammed into his jeep.
He'd heard the kid was mouthy and pouty about being stuck in the hospital. Derek silently prayed he was asleep.
Pushing into the low lit room, he wheeled his cart up to the heart monitor and started recording the statistics.
Strong pulse, slightly elevated blood pressure - normal with the pain the kids body was fighting, and even temperature. Huge improvements from the unsteady week he'd spent in the STICU.
Buried under pillows and thick fleecy blankets his friends had brought to make his stay more comfortable, "Stiles" was almost invisible. Derek snorted at the ridiculous nickname and checked the chart for the kids first name.
"You'll never pronounce it right." a thin voice mumbled from beneath the pillow mound.
"I've been a nurse for a few years now, I'm sure I've seen every name in the book." Derek replied, searching the fluff mountain for the kids face. The brat had to have seen him searching the chart for his name.
Scanning the chart he realized Stiles wasn't a kid after all. Twenty-four, just five years younger than him. Finally reaching the name portion of the chart he squinted. A mad key smash of letters were neatly typed beside the space for First Name.
"This isn't a name. This is a key smash."
Pillows avalanched towards the edge of the bed, but Stiles was still securely hidden beneath them.
"It's Polish you jerk. Fight me!"
Derek reach out and moved a few pillows, unearthing a messy mop of brown hair and drowsy amber eyes.
"Maybe later."
He administered the round of meds Stiles was due for and he tried to hold back a laugh when they almost immediately made the boy start blinking slowly, his eyelids moving up less and less each sweep.
Sleep heavy and soft Stiles mumbled, "Yeah, later is good."
Watching him snuggle back into his plushy cave, Derek's heart lurched when Stiles' mouth suddenly went slack and a thin trail of drool slid down his chin.
"That should be disgusting and absolutely not adorable."
_-_
Nurse eyebrows was back.
Stiles can't really remember much from their previous encounter, but he remembers telling the guy to fight him when he called his name a key smash.
The ache in his ribcage and lungs feels a little less today, but he's looking forward to his next dose of meds. If only they didn't knock him out for hours at a time.
"Hey, what happened to nurse flowers? She smelled nice and didn't glare at me like I'm a delinquent." He asked as the dark haired male made notes on a chart.
"Nurse flowers? Lindy? She's got a small child at home and she's sick, so I've got this portion of her rotations." The broody nurse replied without looking up. Stiles didn't realize it was possible for the man's eyebrows to furrow more, but they did. "Also, I'd like to remind you that it was you who cried 'Fight me!' the last time I was in here and so my glare might be deserved. I've encountered nothing that assures me you aren't a delinquent."
The man was tapping on a glass bottle, inserting a syringe, and quickly pulling the plunger back.
"What is that stuff? Is that the stuff you gave me last time?" Stiles questioned.
"Fentanyl, it's a very strong pain reliever. After what you went through you don't want to know what you'd feel like without this until you've had more time to heal."
"Why do you put it in my IV? Why don't you just give it to me?" Stiles asks, watching the nurse move towards his bedside.
"The way your pain management team has scheduled your dosage, this is the best way to keep you from feeling the pain for the longest amount of time. Keeping stress off your system so it can heal." The man pauses, "It has the added bonus of knocking you out fairly quickly once it mixes with your system and I can do the rest of my job without being challenged by a bedridden brat."
"Rude. So rude."
"You drool in your sleep, I clean it up. I feel entitled to a few shots at your combative nature."
"Combative nature? I will show you combative nature!" He rallies his strength and lifts an arm from the bed, long thin fingers ball into a fist and he shakes it weakly, "Fight me!"
Almost immediately a coughing fit sizes his system and the pain flares bright. The nurse rushes to his aid, the scowl and faint smirk gone with a look of intense worry.
"Remember that little pillow is your friend. Hold it tightly to your chest with each cough to support your body and not strain the stitching." the nurse mutters while pressing the maroon Beacon Memorial Hospital pillow to his chest for him.
Pulling in a hard breath and wheezing, he smiles slightly at the mixture of green he can catch in the nurse's eyes. The general hazel color he glimpsed from a distance melts into grassy greens and molten golds up close.
"I can't fight you. You'd win." The nurse smiles, "What's my nickname?"
After a few calming breaths Stiles looks puzzled and asks, "Huh?"
"You called Lindy- nurse flowers. What's my nickname?"
"Oh, nurse eyebrows." the reply is weak. The coughing fit has taken a toll on Stiles' energy and he's pretty sure he's ready for that Fentanyl now.
Giving a deep laugh and backing away from the bed, he pushes the medication into the IV drip. Checking to make sure everything is still secure with Stiles', the nurse deposits the syringe in the sharp hazardous bin and turns towards Stiles as his world is getting hazy and shapes are losing their edges.
"It's Derek. Rest well Stiles."
_-_
"Scooooooott. I'm ready to go." He's itching to leave the tiny little room that's been his home for the past weeks. Nurse Derek has been the only bright spot in the long hospital stay, and even the dark and broody nurse wasn't enough to make Stiles want to stay any longer than was necessary.
"They're bringing your release papers. Mom would kill me AND you if I leave with you without those papers." His best friend Scott McCall replies.
"Just because she's a nurse here doesn't mean she has any pull over me." Stiles grumps.
"She has enough pull to make sure 'nurse eyebrows' got you in rotation as much as possible after you mumbled poetic phrases about his brood and bod in your sleep." Scott laughs.
"I did not! Scotty you take that back! I challenged the man to a fight and he conceded I would win. There was no poetry about his brood or bod!" He tried to sound as outraged as possible but his lungs were still weak after being punctured during the wreak.
Scott's face is paused in a laugh when Stiles looks up, his gaze firmly glued to the door. Whipping around to face the door in his hospital issued wheelchair, Stiles is mortified to find Derek standing in the open doorway.
The older man clears his throat and steps inside the room, trying to be nonchalant about his burning pink cheeks under his stubble. "I heard you were being released today and that your dietary restrictions had been lifted. I remembered you bemoaning the loss of coffee, so uh, here."
After securing the gift shop coffee in Stiles hands, Derek fled the room.
"Scott. I'm going to kill you." Stiles is staring at the vacant door. "I'm going to bury you so far out in the preserve that my dad will never find the body."
Scott is too busy snickering to pay much mind to Stiles' threat.
"Stiles, your drooling and bad lungs must have seduced the dude. Look at your cup!" Scott near giggles.
Stiles finally glances down at the warm cup between his hands. Turning it slowly he sees in a big broad scrawl, "fight me? 916-555-9158"