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Charles is sitting at the piano in the middle of the OR, hands flying across the instrument as everyone else is bent over their patients. They all move in sync, taking the next steps for surgery as Charles’ fingers come into contact with the black and white keys.
Someone, Colonel Potter and his mother at the same time, tells him to do better, that lives are in the balance, that they're counting on him.
He puts more heart into it. He gives it everything he can.
Blood stains his fingers, drips down the keys of the piano, stands in stark contrast to the ivory of the keys.
“You're losing this patient, Winchester. You're losing all of them,” a voice chides him, as if everyone else is a marionette controlled by the piano strings and he's a conductor in hell.
He’s trying his best. But it isn't enough. It isn't enough. He's -
Charles gasps as he wakes up, clutching a corner of the silk sheet in his fist. He blinks, trying to shake the images from his head, but they remain like a petulant stain.
The aesthetics in Charles' brain are a far cry from the meticulously curated decor of his bedroom and the lovely woman breathing steadily beside him, sandy blonde curls mussed with sleep. The contrast frustrates him. He’s left meatball surgery behind, traded it in for a cushy hospital job and evenings with the woman who’s quickly becoming his best friend. Why does his subconscious insist on acting like an insolent child?
The images replay in his head. The patients, the bloody piano. He could have saved them all, at least some of them, if he'd had more time. If he could have just -
His shoulders tense as he remembers his mother standing above him and ready with critiques as he played piano as a boy. He did his best, but it was never enough.
Wallowing is not becoming of a Winchester. He knows that. He glances down at his hands and is filled with the desire to do something productive and good after the failure in his dream.
He sits up, careful not to wake Donna as he grabs a robe from the closet. The oversized cable-knit cardigan that she wears as a house jacket hangs next to his bathrobe. He offered to buy her a robe to keep here, but the faded green cardigan had been her grandfather’s. They had been close, before he passed. Charles runs a thumb along the sleeve, mindful of the fraying yarn.
He glances out of his bedroom window. The sun is up, but barely so. He sees it above the trees that are dressed in orange and yellow for the start of autumn.
He wonders how long he’ll have to trade a clumsily played reveille for a wakeup call of the ill-mannered ramblings of his subconscious, not fit for an ivy league educated mind. Perhaps his mind is more ivy than ivy league these days. An unkempt garden of weeds that Korea cultivated in the horrid horticulture of the war.
He makes his way downstairs, walking through the main room and shying his gaze away from the record player that has sat largely unused since his return.
He steps into the kitchen. He could have woken Donna up, but part of him still likes to work through these things on his own. He knows that eventually, if there's someone he'll open up to, it's her.
Without thinking about it, he grabs eggs and milk from the refrigerator. He steps into the pantry to procure sugar.
More often than not, meals were prepared by their chef growing up—usually with his father having endless critiques and telling his mother they should inquire at the agency for someone with more culinary expertise. But sometimes, when their parents went away for the weekend, Charles made pancakes for himself and Honoria.
He hasn’t made them since before he'd left for college. Before Harvard, before the war, before the chief of thoracic surgery position slipped out of his hands. But starting again is like greeting an acquaintance that has been away for some time.
He grabs a blue and white checkered bowl and cracks an egg, adding cinnamon and sugar to the mixture.
Usually he puts ingredients back as he’s finished using them, everything in its proper place and just so. But this morning, the opened carton of eggs sits near the stove. Dashes of flour and sugar decorate the countertop.
Perhaps he misses the clutter of the swamp more than he cared to admit, the chatter of Pierce and Hunnicutt a comforting soundtrack as the three of them decompressed after hours in the OR. He hasn't spoken to either of his old bunkmates since they'd returned home months ago, spread all across the country when they'd gotten used to practically living on top of one another.
He should call them. He'll probably call them.
He heats the griddle and then measures some of the mix before pouring it on. It forms a perfect circle, bubbling gently for a few minutes before he flips it over.
For the first time since waking up, his mind is at peace. He's meticulous about ensuring that each side is against the heat for the same amount of time; the task centers him.
He pictures Donna in his bed upstairs, sprawled out and still asleep. They always switch between being the big and little spoon. Last night, Donna wrapped her arms around him and tucked his head underneath her chin.
"Goodnight, Chuck," she murmured.
He squeezed her hand sleepily. His last thought before falling asleep was that he loved the way her voice curled around the nickname as it came out of her mouth. He hates when anyone else calls him that, but something about the way Donna says it makes him feel like a schoolboy in love.
He smiles at the memory as he flips the pancake. It smells like cinnamon, just like it should. He piles them up one after another on a white plate.
He turns the stove off and steps outside, humming to himself. He picks a handful of the daisies that grow outside of the kitchen window.
He sets the flowers on the counter and steps into the panty and finds the vase and serving tray he's looking for.
The plate with the tower of pancakes is the centerpiece on the tray, joined by the flowers on one side and a container of maple syrup on the other. He adds two glasses of orange juice.
In a past life, he'd worry about spilling on the sheets, but Donna has taught him it will be ok. They can always wash them.
He picks up the tray and walks upstairs, ready to say hello to the day with her.