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He doesn’t hear the snap, but the guy he’s patrolling with reports it was clear as day. The falling beam comes down hard on his shoulder, pushing him to his knees before his partner is scrambling to lift it just enough to get him from where he’s pinned.
“Jesus,” he groans, shuffling quickly out of the way.
His arm hanging limply at his side is damning evidence that he hadn’t managed to keep the promise he made to Ellie earlier that morning. “I’ll be fine,” he said. Stupid, he thinks, to push his luck like that. He does think, letting his partner tie off the flannel he’d worn over his T-shirt into a sling, that he’ll be able to make good on the other half – they’ll definitely be back before lunch, heading straight back not two hours into his first patrol shift.
It's not the worst he’s had by far, the pain of it only spiking beyond tolerable if he moves it too much. Still, he stands next to the horse bracing his bad arm with his good hand and looks over at his partner with a heavy sigh.
The guy grimaces, “I’ll give you a lift.” He helps Joel get a grip on the saddle and gives him a step up and a steady hand to keep him from toppling over.
They take it slow, with his arm securely braced, he’s more embarrassed than hurt. His partner raises a blue flag as they approach, injured party, he knows now, after a whole damn class he had to take with Tommy explaining to him and a few teenagers starting their junior rotations the routes and protocols required of patrollers.
They’d only been in town a couple of weeks.
Ellie had already been torn up about being left for the day while he was on shift. He sighs heavily, trying to script out exactly what he’d need to do when he got back. They’re through the gates before he has much more laid out than to be really sure that she understands he’s fine. Apparently they were going slow enough or maybe he was just that unlucky today because Tommy’s standing right by the gate as they come through.
“Christ, Joel, what the hell happened? Day fuckin one?”
“I didn’t do it on purpose,” Joel argues. “Beam fell out of the roof in that damn cabin.”
Tommy has a hand on his leg and is reaching up to brace his waist as he swings around, sucking in a breath to slide down and catching it in his throat when the jolt of hitting the ground sends a sharp bloom of pain through his shoulder.
“You alright?” Tommy asks, one hand grasping his shoulder.
“Wonderful,” Joel says. “Not sure if it’s my shoulder or my collarbone – ain’t too bad unless I move it.”
Tommy’s already directing him toward the clinic down the road from the school, “Well quit movin’ it then.”
Joel rolls his eyes, “shoulda sent you to medical school when I had the chance,” he quips, “don’t know what I was doing lettin’ you waste instinct like that.”
Tommy gives him a light shove, still enough to jostle his shoulder and have him hissing in pain.
“Jesus, Tom – “
“Quit bein’ shitty then, I’m tryin’ to help.”
“I don’t know how pushin’ me around counts as help.”
Tommy’s retort is cut off by a sharp, “Joel?”
He’s still got his good arm holding his bad one to his chest and drops it immediately. They both turn to see Ellie running up behind them, breathless.
“I was at the stables and they said you got hurt,” she’s panting and her face is red, pinched with worry.
“I’m fine, Ellie,” Joel says, “hurt my shoulder. I’m goin’ to get it checked. That’s all.”
“Are you sure? What happened?” Her eyes are wide and he can see panic rising beneath them.
“Easy girl,” Joel says. “Support beam fell out of an old cabin we clearing out - doesn’t even hurt unless I move it and Tommy here advised me not to. Doc’ll probably just put ice on it, ain’t that right Tommy.”
Ellie looks to Tommy for confirmation and to his relief Tommy is happy to play his part, giving her an easy smile.
“Yes ma’am. He’s feelin’ fine enough to be an ass so I reckon he’ll live.”
“Alright,” Joel rolls his eyes, looking down to Ellie who’s gone quiet, walking several paces away from them both, staring at the ground a head of her when she wasn’t trying to sneak glances over at him. “Hey, you okay?” he asks.
She looks up and gives him that awful forced twitch of a smile and nods, humming false confirmation that he has no idea what to do with. He knows she freezes up when he tries to touch her at all unless she reaches for him first, so he keeps his good hand tucked around his elbow, but her fake little grin had dropped. He takes in a breath and looks away – completely unable to watch her pull up her mask again after he’d seen through the cracks, looking like a kid who just needs a hug, like a stray cat tense and ready to bolt at the slightest provocation.
Tommy looks over at her too, then up at him. He gives a shake of his head, hoping that hearing the Doc tell her it’s fine too might help get her head around the scale of this thing, which he’d wager was, at worst, a couple months of one-handed light duty.
“Broken bones used to mean ice cream,” Joel says, “ER, Ice cream parlor, in that order. Right Tommy?”
He looks to Ellie to react to Tommy’s reply but her voice is sharp cutting him off, “you think it’s broken?”
Of course that’s her take-away. Why did he say that?
“I’d say it’s hurt enough for ice cream,” Tommy cuts in, “if that’s what you were gettin’ at, Joel. You’re a grown man, no need to play games for dessert.”
“But they can fix it right?” Ellie asks.
“It’ll heal on its own, Ellie.” Joel reassures her, “We’re basically just grabbing a real sling and an ice pack.”
Tommy snorts and looks to Ellie, “I think he did it on purpose. Lazy old man didn’t want to be back at work.”
Ellie humms again, looking at his arm worriedly and then back at her feet.
Sarah had never really been a tough nut to crack. She’d been his in a way that meant he knew how and when to push or pry.
He’s still working it out with Ellie.
The Doctor, a young woman who’d been a FEDRA medic for a decade before leaving her QZ, predictably hands him a small bottle with a few Tylenol, a reusable ice pack, and a hand sewn sling with a strip of fabric to tie around his chest to immobilize his shoulder.
Ellie, all the while, stands in the corner, alternating nibbling on her nails and watching the medic work with rapt attention.
“I’d give it 3 months,” she says, “could be less, could be a little more.”
“3 months,” Joel asks, not quite catching his surprise in time to monitor his tone.
“12 weeks is about normal for someone young and healthy – even general wear and tear can draw that out and it would be a pretty big task to find an adult alive with ‘general’ wear and tear, all things considered.”
Tommy whistles low, “3 months total or 3 months in the sling?”
The medic grimaces and Joel rolls his eyes, pinches the bridge of his nose. This was going to be more of a headache than he expected. “Alright, that’s. It is what it is, ain’t it.”
Tommy rests a hand on his shoulder, “usually.”
Ellie was still silent in the corner, eyes wide.
“Ice and rest, come back for more pain killers if you run out,” the medic says, “swing back if you need anything else,” she directs.
“Yes ma’am,” Joel replies, sucking in a breath.
Tommy gives his shoulder a squeeze, “I think we all earned some damn ice cream,” he says.
“And a drink.”
“Could make a float,” Tommy suggests, “vanilla whiskey?”
Ellie does look up at that crinkling her nose.
Joel catches her eye, “Would you try that?”
She looks up in thought, “I would try it.”
They get ice cream and he does his best not to watch Ellie nervously shift every time he fumbles with his left hand, how she winces when Tommy starts to crack jokes about it.
By the time they get home he realizes that he’s spent the better part of the last few hours thinking about what he should say or do to get her comfortable but hasn’t actually said or done anything. He’d just let her hang there, worried about him while he bickered with Tommy at the clinic and all throughout dinner. Adult of the year material, he was not, he thinks bitterly.
She’s laying stiffly on the couch, comic book over her face when he comes down from the shower, thankful that he’s still able to maneuver his arm enough to get it in and out of the tied off sling.
“Hey, El,” he calls, “help me with this, real quick.”
She’s up at once and pauses when he hands over the strap to tie around his sling.
“Does it hurt?” She asks, while she circles it around his chest, pulling at the edges to lay it flat with an uncharacteristic care.
“Not nearly as bad as that joke you told me the other day,” he says.
She hums and finishes her knot.
“Are you okay?” He asks again.
She looks up with a sigh and her shoulders fall, eyes going just a little glassy before she turns back to the couch.
“Ellie? Talk to me kid.”
“I know you’re fine,” she says, wetly, face hidden by her comic book.
“I’m sensin’ a ‘but’.”
“That sounds like a you problem,” she says roughly. Christ, this kid.
“Finish your thought, Ellie,” he says.
She huffs and lets the comic drop to her chest. “But, last time you were hurt, you were very not fine, so when that fucking guy came to the stables and was like ‘that new guy got hurt on patrol’ and I knew you were the only new guy on patrol, it sucked really bad.” Her breath is shaky and she doesn’t pick her book back up and Joel takes a full 3 seconds to feel like an idiot before he goes to the couch to sit at her feet.
“Come here,” he says.
She pushes herself upright, arms crossed and pressed back into the couch. He props his good arm up across the back and she takes the invitation as it is and leans her had back to rest on it. “I’m being dumb. It’s fine.”
“You’re not being dumb.” He says quickly. He pauses and thinks, wonders if this is as close as she’ll let him get without the world actively crashing down around them. “That was a bad situation. It makes sense that it would stick with you.”
She huffs, and swipes a tear off of her cheek as it falls before crossing her arms again, “how the fuck does it make sense.”
“Because if you’re thinkin’ about it, it can’t catch you by surprise anymore, so your brain doesn’t want you to forget. Keeps bringin’ it up whenever it can to try and keep you safe. But it’s usually more of a bother than anything.”
Ellie clears her throat, “brains are dumb.”
Joel chuckles and risks a hand brushing over her hair which he’s happy to find she doesn’t immediately pull away from. “You just gotta remind it what’s what. This ain’t like that. I’m ok.”
She nods and stays put, her head resting on his forearm.
“How about that float?”
She looks over with a wry smile, “I kinda liked it. The sweet make the burning less awful. I could definitely drink a whole bottle of that.”
“For your own good, I’m askin’ you not to.”
“We’ll see.”