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“Stevie!”
Iain’s shout breaks free too late and he’s forced to watch the beam come crashing down on her shoulder as if in slow motion, glancing off and clattering to the floor at her feet.
He sees the way she buckles slightly under the force and it takes everything in him not to dump the patient he’s half carrying onto the floor and run to her side.
“Stevie?!” he calls again, urgently.
“I’m fine, I’m fine. We need to-“ she brushes him off, motioning for the door of the dimly lit building and he nods in agreement.
She winces as they help their patient back to his feet but he doesn’t comment, just takes a little more of the weight. They don’t have time for this right now – the building isn’t getting any more stable so if she can walk then they need to get out.
Only a few metres more and they manage to, only just in time as more of the building collapses behind them, crumbling practically to dust and making him wonder just how it ever actually supported them at all (and how exactly he let Stevie talk him into letting her go in with him).
Jacob comes over to help, taking Stevie’s place half-carrying their patient so she can follow at their side, coughing a little at the cloud of dust wafting over them from the remains of the building that he’s trying desperately not to breathe any in himself.
A part of him wonders if he should get her some oxygen when they get back to the van but he knows she won’t let him. She probably won’t even let him check her out until they get back to the ED, always wanting to minimise, keep her focus on the patient.
It’s a focus he admires and loves her for but hell if it doesn’t make him worry (and, yes, he can see the irony).
Except he’s proven wrong when – and only when – their patient is in the ambulance, stable, medicated and in no worse state for their rapid extrication, she begins to carefully peel off her HEMS jacket, revealing a large splinter of wood sticking out of her shoulder and he winces.
That’s got to hurt.
“Ouch,” he sympathises aloud, brushing some of the dust off his own coat.
Part of him wonders how she’d even managed to move with what must be quite a considerable amount of pain but he’s seen time and time again what adrenaline can do.
And, added consideration, this is Stevie. Her stubbornness cannot be ignored.
She spares a moment to glare at him, retorting, “You think?” and lifting her other hand to feel carefully around it, grimacing as she does- “I think it’s just superficial.”
Pulling on a fresh pair of gloves, he steps closer and gently nudges her hands out of the way to examine the shoulder himself (not because he doesn’t trust her ability but more because, again, minimisation).
It’s a bit scraped up and will definitely bruise but it doesn’t look too deep and isn’t bleeding particularly badly. She’s okay (she’s okay).
“Just try not to move it too much until we get it checked out, alright?”
She nods in agreement, wincing again as she flexes her fingers.
Even though he knows what the answer is going to be, he asks, “You want some pain relief?”
“Not until we get to the ED,” she refuses, then tilts her head, raising an eyebrow at the expression that must be saying more than he wants it to on his face, “you were really worried about me, huh?”
It’s not until she asks, only half joking, that he realises that his heartrate hasn’t fully slowed back to normal from seeing that beam come crashing down.
Yeah, he was ‘really worried’. He generally is about Stevie, she’s always getting into something.
And the moments where things seem to happen in slow motion… when something bad is happening to someone he cares about and he can only stand there and watch…
He hates that feeling, that helplessness.
“Pft, as if,” he scoffs, in direct contrast to his own thoughts in an effort to brush them away, reaching out to squeeze her good arm (just in case she can’t read the relief into his humour, just like he had to read the genuine question in hers).
A part of him idly wonders if maybe they need to stop doing HEMS shouts together if this sort of thing is going to keep happening.
It’s not until they’re in the back with their patient on the way to the ED that he asks lightly, “You are prepared for how Faith is about to react, aren’t you?”
Stevie raises her eyebrows. “Are you forgetting how many times I’ve seen her worrying about you?”
Sheepishly, he winces. He knows that he’s like – he just doesn’t know how to change (and he’s not sure they would love the person he would become if he did change, not in the same way). “Yeah, she’s used to it now. But you? I think we’re about to see a new level…”
When Faith catches sight of Stevie walking out of resus, the first thing she feels is a tiny flicker of joy that one of her favourite people is back in the building… the second is pure worry at the sticky red coating her shoulder and the bit of wood sticking out of it.
“What the hell happened to you?”
“It’s just a bit of wood,” she shrugs. Or, half shrugs, with the one shoulder that isn’t currently impaled.
Exasperated, she exclaims, “A bit of wood? Stevie, it’s sticking out of your shoulder!”
“Cadogan, I’m fine, okay? It’s only superficial.”
Her voice is a little too quiet, it doesn’t quite have its usual amount of fight in it, but the part of Faith that notices is too busy being drowned out by the voice shouting loved one in danger, loved one in danger.
Or, possibly more accurately, loved one was in danger and now she’s trying to pick up the pieces before they fall apart.
Gripping her gently but firmly by the arm (her uninjured arm, of course), she begins to steer Stevie through the ED, retorting, “I’ll be the judge of that.”
“Why are you being like this? Iain gets in messes all the time.”
Faith barely holds back a pained laugh. “Yes. And I don’t need another person to worry about.”
Immediately, Stevie tenses, jerking away. She doesn’t say anything, not even a retort about how she doesn’t need to be worried about, she just stops, eyes downcast and Faith internally winces.
She should have known that Stevie would take those words as Faith giving up on her.
(Sometimes it’s exhausting, the constant battle against Stevie’s expectations that they’re going to drop her at the first sign of trouble but the determination to prove those expectations wrong keeps her fighting.)
“Sweetheart,” she sighs, “that’s not what I meant and you know it.”
Her face doesn’t change, a lost sort of pain sitting there clear as anything to anyone who knows her as well as Faith does, but her eyes – wide and threatening to fill with tears – flick up to meet hers.
It’s obvious she doesn’t want to do this here, not in the middle of the ED and so, more softly, Faith insists, “Come on, let’s get you sorted out.”
She reaches out again but doesn’t quite touch her, hovering hand directing her towards the lift.
Thankfully there’s a lull in radiology and Faith smiles sweetly to get them in straight away, making polite conversation with the overly chatty tech to keep the attention away from the unusually quiet Stevie.
Back in cubicles, she inserts a canula with practised ease to administer some pain relief and she barely flinches. Even when the results confirm what Stevie had said, that the wound is superficial and not near anything important, she doesn’t give her usual ‘I told you so’ look or give any sort of sarcastic quip, she simply nods her understanding.
Faith makes short work of setting everything up, calling over Rida to assist (she does give brief thought to which nurse Stevie would prefer, Rida probably sees a little too much for her liking but at least she has the tact to not say anything).
As they set to work, Stevie stays silent, disconcertingly so, through the removal, the irrigation, the sutures and the tetanus booster. She doesn’t even lament the sacrifice of what Faith knows is one of her favourite bras when they have to cut through the strap.
She just sits perfectly still, gaze lost. Not offering any sarcastic comments, any ‘are you done yet’ whines, not even any backseat driving comments about her suturing technique.
Rida – who had clocked on almost immediately that something was off but had also made the merciful decision to simply do her job and get out, not attempting to dissolve the edge of tension in the cubical with her usual friendly chatter – makes a quick exit after they’re finished, pulling the curtains tight behind her.
When that still doesn’t get a reaction from Stevie, her gaze lost somewhere halfway up the wall, Faith sighs softly before sinking onto the bed next to her and very slowly reaching out to cup her cheek, turning her gently to face her.
Stevie doesn’t resist, doesn’t force her gaze down, just meets her eye and the weight of it hits Faith more than anything as she lets her hand fall down into her lap.
“Sweetheart, I’m sorry for snapping okay,” she apologises sincerely, “I just… I worry.”
Pausing for only a beat, Stevie answers quietly, “I know you do. But I’m fine.”
“Yeah, you say that a lot,” she points out wryly. They’re hardly ever reassuring words to hear.
“And I mean it.”
But Faith can see how she’s pressing her lips together, sees how she’s struggling to maintain eye contact. Gently, almost teasingly, she corrects, “Some of the time.”
That gets a ghost of a smile out of her. “Most of the time.”
More seriously, she asks, “Is this one of them?”
“Yes. Faith, I’m okay,” she reassures simply.
If it could come with a shrug, it would have done.
This is Stevie being as honest as she can be and Faith sees that, she sees that she is as okay as she can be. It’s just that Stevie’s bar for ‘okay’ is pretty low, barely getting by is sort of her baseline.
It terrifies her, seeing someone she loves being injured (because every time is a reminder that they’re all one misadventure, misstep or mistake away from never coming home to her) but it saddens her, seeing someone she loves hurting like this.
In a way that she can’t solve.
Slowly, she reaches up to brush a few strands of hair out of her face, tucking them lovingly behind her ear and letting her hand settle against her cheek. She twists round to check the curtains are still closed around before softly asking, “Can I…?”
Stevie hesitates for only the briefest of moments then gives a small nod and she leans in to steal a soft kiss, their foreheads coming to rest against each other as they breathe.
Sometimes it’s hard to know if Stevie is as reassured by touch like this as she is, if she feels the same relief from having someone she cares about so close she can feel their warmth under her fingertips, but her hand comes to rest on Faith’s shoulder, squeezing for a beat before she’s pulling away entirely and Faith lets her, knowing that this is a ‘we’re at work and I don’t want one of our colleagues to walk in on us right now’ not an emotional distance she’s putting between them.
And not a moment too soon because the curtain twitches… though she relaxes when it’s Iain’s head that appears, peering around as if to check the coast is clear.
Eyebrows raised in amusement, he asks, “Do I need to mediate whatever is happening in here?”
“What, like I mediated the argument between tea brands last night?” Stevie scoffs, though there’s no real heat behind it.
(That ‘mediation’ had involved Stevie rolling her eyes, picking her own preferred brand off the shelf and going to the till without them.)
“I was thinking more… coffee!” He steps fully into the cubical, revealing the tray with three cups from the cart nestled inside.
Stevie narrows her eyes playfully. “If that’s a latte, you’re allowed to stay.”
“It is. And…” he drags the hoodie from her locker off his shoulder where he’d draped it for ease of transport and holds it out, “here y’are.”
Before she can take it from him, Faith cuts in, answering her glare with her own stern look as she offers it to feed her arm into. For a moment, her glare sharpens but Faith simply raises her eyebrows further in challenge, fully prepared for the battle of the next few days where Stevie is going to repeatedly attempt things that she physically shouldn’t and get irritated when they stop her.
Still somewhat grumpily, Stevie relents, grimacing as she feeds her arm into the sleeve but managing an almost-sort-of smile of thanks as Faith adjusts it around her, laying the hood so it’s not bunched around her neck and pulling the zip most of the way up.
Iain, who’d been watching their silent battle of wills with some amusement, produces a packet of biscuits from his pocket and holds them aloft. “For the adrenaline crash,” he announces, cutting her off sagely when she goes to protest, “Don’t. If it hasn’t happened already then it will.”
A part of Faith expects this to be too much too soon for her (too much attention, too much she needs help with, too much looking after) but although she does roll her eyes, she doesn’t disagree, instead conceding, “Just give me the damn biscuits.”
“Aye-aye,” he hands them and the coffees over before nodding at the tiny bit of space at the head of the bed, “budge up.”
Faith takes that as her cue to be the logic in the situation. “You really think all three of us can… fit on this bed,” she finishes lamely when he doesn’t listen, plonking himself down before she’s even finished her sentence while holding his coffee carefully aloft.
Stevie, though she’s busy glaring at him for jostling her with his wiggled attempts to find a space on the bed, still answers, “I don’t think he’s being swayed by logic. I don’t think he’s ever been swayed by logic, in fact.”
“Logic smogic,” Iain retaliates eloquently, settling back and closing his eyes, “we’re all here aren’t we?”
That’s a logic that carries them through into a comfortable silence, all sipping on their coffees as they hide for a moment from the chaos of the ED that’s only just being kept away by the thin curtains.
After a few minutes, Faith sighs, her hand coming to rest on Stevie’s thigh as she reluctantly admits, “I should get back to work.”
Stevie knows they’re not going to let her work, not on the pain meds she’s on.
The pain isn’t entirely gone from her shoulder but the morphine and the local have certainly helped and even she would be hard-pressed to gallivant about at her usual speed when there’s a sort of drug-induced heaviness beginning to settle over her.
A very tiny part of her is whispering to ask Faith to stay, for the three of them to keep their little bubble, but the realist (and the adult and the consultant who actually wants enough staff on the floor with her out of action) silences the thought.
But she doesn’t want to just leave this how it is.
“I love you,” she says, quietly.
It’s sort of an apology for getting herself into this mess, or at least for making Faith worry, and a thank you (for always caring).
It probably wouldn’t have come out quite like that if morphine wasn’t involved – she’s been careful so far about spreading their personal business in the ED – but she knows Faith understands, squeezing her leg as she whispers back, “I love you too sweetheart.”
“What about me?” Iain laments dramatically behind them and she exchanges an amused look with Faith.
“I love you too, you idiot,” she tells him, setting her coffee carefully back in the tray and batting at his leg, “now budge up.”
He lifts an arm to let her lean against him, and she melts back onto the pillows that give support to her steadily aching limbs as he wraps his arm carefully around her uninjured shoulder.
Even though there’s this underlaying anxiety to the entire situation that they’re not at home and that anyone could walk in at any moment, Stevie still finds herself relaxing into the embrace, allowing herself to draw comfort from it.
Distantly, she’s aware of Faith’s fond gaze on them as she makes her affection known with a final pat to each of their legs before she slips out of the cubical, leaving the curtains carefully pulled behind her.
After only a few seconds of silence, Iain asks quietly into her hair, “Are you alright?”
For a moment, she considers the question. Is she alright?
Her shoulder will be okay with a bit of time and she already knows she’s going to have two shadows hovering around, stopping her from pushing it too far over the next few days.
The building had been… terrifying. She could have come out so much worse (she could have not come out at all). But she hadn’t really had time to think about it, just get out and, as always, focus on the patient. Having Iain there is always a comfort, she knows he has experience that even she doesn’t.
And so, maybe she’s feeling better about her close call than she should (maybe it will hit her later).
“Yeah. Yeah, I’m alright.”
There’s a shift as Iain nods above her. He takes her at her word better than Faith does. Maybe because she’s better at being honest with him than Faith sometimes (something to think about, she wonders). Perhaps Faith asks so often that it’s easier to brush off. Iain only asks when he’s pretty sure he knows the answer, he just wants to hear her say it.
And she knows he needs the reassurance of her honesty today. She remembers his panic, can still hear the way he’d shouted her name with so much raw emotion and see the concern etched into every line of his face.
Vaguely, she wonders if they’re destined to traumatise each other every time they go out together.
Slowly, she asks, “Are you alright?”
His grip tightens fractionally around her. “I am if you are.”
She nods against his neck. Words are becoming more difficult as the combination of the pain meds and adrenaline dump settle in a heavy curtain of sleepiness across her and instead she inches closer to him, curling as best as she can into his side.
Easily, he adjusts. She’s sure he’s half hanging off the bed but he doesn’t make even a hint of a complaint as the haziness drags her so she’s closer to sleep than she is being awake.
She knows there’ll be hell to pay if anyone walks into the cubical while they’re like this but, just this once, she thinks it might be worth the risk.