Chapter Text
PART I
Despite not having fallen asleep 'til late, Bradley is woken up at an ungodly hour in the morning by a med student asking him questions about his night and how he's feeling. When he leaves, Bradley falls asleep again only to be woken up once more by Dr. Walker, flanked by the med student and Marcy, asking him the very same questions all over again.
Bradley's already had his surgery, he doesn't know why this is necessary other than some bizarre form of torture.
"His stats seem a bit high, don't they?" Marcy comments.
Dr. Walker doesn't give any indication of having heard her, just keeps staring down at his iPad.
"Dr. Walker —"
"When I want your opinion, Nurse, I will ask for it."
Bradley's eyes flick to Marcy but she seems unbothered by Dr. Walker's rudeness.
"What if—"
"What if you went back in time and attended medical school, instead of wasting my time?" He tucks the iPad away.
Marcy visibly holds back a huff. "His temperature is a little high, his BP is too high for his age and fitness and his—"
"—it could be an infection, sir," the med student says, jumping in eagerly.
"It could be an infection, sir," Dr. Walker says, "and yet, he was given five hundred milligrams of metronidazole three times a day for the first 48 hours after his surgery. Why was that?"
"To—"
"To prevent an infection. There is no risk of it here."
Behind him, Marcy subtly rolls her eyes, making Bradley suppress a laugh.
"I feel fine," Bradley volunteers.
Dr. Walker hums. "Order up some blood work but it'll be a waste of time." He hands the folder to Marcy without saying thank you or even looking at her and tucks the iPad at his side. "That'll be all for today."
"What about his recovery—"
"We've already discussed his recovery." He turns and walks out the door without a backwards glance to anyone in the room.
It's not that Bradley isn't capable of obeying orders. Obviously he is. Especially with his line of work.
But he is seemingly incapable of following doctors' orders. Especially when they're tantamount to: 'sit still and do not move for a week.' What kind of bullshit is that, anyway? If the Navy hadn't been worried about getting sued, he'd have been discharged already anyway.
He should be able to move and walk around and shit.
Of course, between the broken leg, the ribs, surgery site and everything else, the only thing that happens when he attempts to move is causing further injury to himself and having nurses rush in to save him. Unfortunately, it seems the nurses at North Island General are even less tolerant of disobedience than Navy admirals.
"Lieutenant Bradshaw," Nurse Patel says, waving a warning finger in his face, "if you attempt to move from this bed one more time, I will get out our restraints and strap you down for the duration of your stay here. Do you understand?"
Bradley makes a meek squeaking sound.
She steps closer, her finger an inch from his eyes. "Do you understand?"
"I'm sure he understands, Leila."
They both turn to the doorway, where Dr. Seresin is standing, an open folder balanced in one hand, and looking amused.
"And he won't do it again."
They both turn to Bradley, who says primly, "I won't, I promise."
She wagged her finger. "Make sure you don't."
"Yes, ma'am."
Nurse Patel makes a warning gesture at him then turns to leave, brushing past Dr. Seresin.
"She's terrifying."
"She is," Dr. Seresin says, "and I take it you are terrorizing the nurses by trying to escape every five minutes, despite having promised just last night that you would call a nurse if you needed to move. What gives?"
Bradley sighs. "I'm sorry, I am. It's just…." He looks over to Dr. Seresin who merely raises an eyebrow. "I'm so bored."
Dr. Seresin blinks. "Sorry?"
"I'm bored."
"You're bored."
"I am so bored. I'm not used to being useless and just sitting around, staring at a wall all day."
Dr. Seresin looks absolutely flabbergasted by this and looks pointedly at his watch. "I have surgery in fifteen minutes, Lieutenant, and this isn't really my area. Call a friend. Play something on your phone."
"My phone is still in my locker at work and all of my friends are deployed right now." He pauses. "And in different time zones."
"So what have you been doing this whole time?"
"Sleeping. Staring at the wall, mostly. I tried watching TV, but you guys only have, like, three channels."
"Oh." Dr. Seresin shrugs. "Read something then."
Bradley gestures around him at the complete lack of books.
Dr. Seresin looks around him again, then pats his coat, balancing his still open folder in one hand. He slips a hand into a pocket and it resurfaces holding what looks like a one-page pamphlet. "Here."
"Wow," Bradley says, reaching for it. "It'll take me a whole week to finish this."
He looks at it, then flips it around to show it to Dr. Seresin with a raised eyebrow. The words, '10 Signs You Might be Pregnant' are printed in bold, block letters.
Dr. Seresin gives him a look and huffs. "Okay. One minute." He leaves, but seems to only go a few rooms down, into an office, reemerging a minute later holding something that Bradley can't quite see from his vantage point.
"Here," he says and holds out a tome of a book to Bradley.
Bradley takes it. "Harrison's Principles of Internal Medicine?" He looks up at Dr. Seresin. "Why not just put me in a coma and get it over with?"
Dr. Seresin rolls his eyes. "It's this or counting sheep. Your choice. I have to go." He's out the door before he turns back. "And do not try to leave that bed again."
"Yes, sir."
"He doesn't even work at this hospital!" Someone hisses loudly just outside of Bradley's room. "Where does he get off embarrassing me in front of everyone?"
"Dr. Seresin wasn't trying to embarrass you," says a soft, placating voice, "he asked you a question relevant to the surgery."
Bradley cranes his neck and sees a young man and woman in lab coats, standing over a cart, sorting out something or the other.
The man huffs. "Which he knew I wouldn't know the answer to because we've spent the past four nights indexing his research instead of prepping for the surgery." He slams a bottle down of medicine. "And he has us writing reports for him, and patient notes, and we're already doing our own pre-rounds and the rounds — when are we supposed to write our own patient notes? Or study?"
"Yeah, but you got to assist!" She says with obvious excitement. "That's exciting. I would kill to be on a —"
"Yeah, but does he have to be such an ass about it? Dr. Walker hates him, you know."
"Dr. Walker hates everyone."
Bradley is just about to open his mouth to defend Dr. Seresin when a stern voice rings out.
"Dr. Lin, Dr. Mackenzie."
Dr. Seresin rounds the corner, wearing scrubs and his head buried in an iPad.
Bradley has to stifle a laugh at the way both people drop the medicine bottles in their hands and stand immediately at attention. All they're missing is a sharp salute and a "Sir!" and it would be like an admiral just walked up to them.
He has to admit, he himself is not unaffected by that voice either.
"Patient in 302. Which of you did the pre-round?"
"I did, sir," the woman says, looking terrified.
"Great. You're with me." He pauses in front of them and looks up from his iPad. "And Dr. Mackenzie, if you are finding balancing your duties to be too demanding, I would be happy to recommend a transfer to a less challenging research team for you."
"No, sir!" Dr. Mackenzie says, looking like he is about to pass out. "It's fine."
"It's fine?"
"It's great! It's really great. Really. It's an honour to be part of the team."
"Great. Now get back to work."
Bradley watches them go, smiling to himself. What a man.
Beggars can't be choosers and counting sheep loses its appeal once he hits 398, so Bradley eventually does open Harrison's after all. And regrets it.
"Disgusting." He flips another page.
"What's disgusting?"
He looks up and smiles. "Dr. Machado. Hi."
The other man grins and steps inside. "Heard you were bored."
He holds up the back of the book in his lap. "Dr. Seresin's prescription for it isn't very good."
Dr. Machado gives a shudder. "The stuff of many students' nightmares."
Bradley glances down at one of the open pages, flinches and promptly shuts it. "Stuff of my nightmares too."
"Well, luckily for you, two of my surgeries got canceled today and Jake won't grab lunch with me."
"Aw. He ditched you?"
"Yup." He takes a seat. "Said if I'm so bored I should come to the other person in the hospital with the same affliction." He puts 'affliction' in air quotes.
"Ouch. Well, you'd definitely be saving me."
They talk about nothing in particular, mostly trading Netflix recommendations. They agree on Star Wars, but agree to disagree on Star Trek, and when the topic turns to fantasy series, the whole conversation goes to hell:
"—I can't believe that you would even compare the two when it's not even a contest—"
"—the whole thing is about a piece of jewelry, just buy a damn ring—"
"—it's about an adult terrorizing a child—"
"—why the hell are there so many elves—"
"What the hell is going on here?"
They both stop and swivel their heads to see Dr. Seresin by the doorway, looking panicked.
Bradley feels a smile forming before he can stop himself. "Dr. Seresin. Hi."
The greeting gets ignored. "What's going on?"
Bradley switches looks with Dr. Machado.
In unison, they say: "Which one is better, Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings?"
Dr. Seresin looks between them.
They look back at him.
"Javy," Dr. Seresin says slowly, "you paged me…for this?"
"Yup."
For a minute, no one says anything.
Finally, Dr. Seresin breathes out a deep, heavy sigh and says, "I always preferred Percy Jackson myself."
The reaction is immediate and loud:
"—What?!—"
"—what are you talking about?!—"
"—you can't even compare—"
"—it's not even in the same —"
Dr. Seresin crosses his arms and leans against the door, giving them a steady look that has them falling slowly silent and mumbling apologies.
"Have either of you ever read Percy Jackson?"
They trade looks with each other and shake their heads.
Dr. Seresin frowns, as though something has just occurred to him. "Have either of you read Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings?"
Again, they shake their heads, scoffing.
"Of course not," Dr. Machado says at the same time that Bradley says, "What a nerd."
"Wow. Okay, offense taken," Dr. Seresin says, but he doesn't sound bothered. "If you're both quite done—"
Something occurs to Bradley, and he can't fight the small smirk that forms. "Were you a nerd in school, Dr. Seresin?"
"Pft." Dr. Machado sweeps a hand towards Dr. Seresin. "This guy was President of the Math Club and the Chess Club."
"Really?" He turns back to Dr. Seresin. "Man, if we had been in the same high school…"
Over the music of the Cranberries' Dreams, he sees a montage of their teenage alternate-selves: Baseball Star Bradley with Chess Club President Jake Seresin: a rom com duo for the ages. Jake — Dr. Seresin, jeez, Bradley — would have looked amazing in Bradley's letterman jacket and Bradley would have doted on him.
Dr. Seresin scoffs, cutting off Bradley's day dreaming. "We wouldn't have gone to the same high school."
"Why? 'Cause you'd have gone to, like, some special high school for super smart people?" Which, hot.
"No," the other man says easily. He pauses and thinks about it. "Actually, yes, but also, because when you were in high school, I'd have been in middle school."
Bradley looks at him. He doesn't look that much younger than Bradley. But then who can tell someone's real age anyway. "Oh my God. I'm robbing the cradle."
Another scoff and Dr. Seresin turns away, heading out of the room. "Have a good rest of your day, Lieutenant." He turns back. "Javy? If you page me again?" He points at Bradley. "He better be dead."
"Hey!"
Dr. Machado smiles. "Understood."
Dr. Seresin shoots Bradley a megawatt smile and walks away, leaving Bradley staring after him with a small smile of his own. What a smartass.
"You know you have no shot, right?"
Bradley's head snaps to Dr. Machado. "What?"
Dr. Machado shakes his head. "You're his patient. Doctors have selective blindness with their patients. He doesn't see you that way."
"But—"
"And even if he does, which I highly doubt, he's not going to jeopardize his career to mess with that."
Bradley gapes. "Wha—but he's not even my doctor! And he doesn't work at this hospital!"
"He did your surgery and he's working at a hospital in which you're a patient. It's the same thing to him."
"Just 'cause he just happened to do my surgery?"
"Yup."
"I don't get a say in this?"
"Nope."
"But that's not fair!" He sounds like a four year-old and what of it?
Dr. Machado shrugs. "Them's the breaks."
"Well then unbreak the breaks."
Dr. Machado shakes his head and gives him a light pat on his shoulder. "There are 7.5 billion people in this world, Bradshaw. Pick someone else."
He leaves. Bradley is left staring, indignant, after him.
Bradley's staring glumly at the flickering TV in his room, wondering how the Home Shopping Network is still around and if he needs a Yee-Haw Paint Sprayer with a "a platinum detail nozzle" for five low monthly payments of $29.99, when a pretty, bubbly woman Bradley hasn't seen before steps into the room.
"Hi!" She beams down at him. "I'm here for your blood."
"Well, gee, Vlad, buy me dinner first."
She blinks at him for a minute before the penny drops. "Oh!" She laughs, a little longer and a lot louder than the pun deserves, but that's fine. "That's very funny! No, I need to draw some of your blood for some tests Dr. Walker ordered?"
He holds out his arm. "Uh, tests for what?"
"They're mostly to make sure everything is in order, but Dr. Walker will be able to tell you more after."
"Alright, well, have at it, Dr. Vlad."
She laughs again and reaches for his arm. "I'm just a third-year med student. They said you've consented to students assisting?"
Bradley nods. "Ten-Percent-Dr. Vlad, then."
She laughs again as she grabs for her alcohol wipes. "You know, this is actually my first official day."
"Yeah?"
"Yes, you're my first blood draw."
Reassuring.
"Always happy to be someone's first," he mutters and twists his arm so that the crook of his elbow is more accessible. "Enjoy."
And 'enjoy', she does. She pokes and prods at his skin, sinks the needle in, pulls it out, tries again — no dice.
Bradley, remembering the first time he ever stepped into a cockpit, stays quiet, and lets her puzzle it out even though he thinks if she were to hand him the needle, he could probably draw the blood himself.
She huffs. "Just one more try there, Mr. Bradshaw."
"No problem."
She gives him a tight smile (the bubbly personality having left her completely around 10 pokes ago) and dives back in.
Bradley watches her, biting his cheek to remain quiet. It's right there, he thinks, watching her miss his vein again. Literally, right there. Couldn't be more prominent.
A particularly rough poke has him wincing and she releases him with a glare aimed at his arm. "Goddamn—"
"Maybe you should call a nurse or another doctor," Bradley suggests gently before things could escalate further.
For a minute, she looks like she's about to go but then she shakes her head, staring at his arm again. "I'd have to go to Dr. Walker first and, um, he's—"
"Unpleasant?"
She gives a small, sheepish shrug, like 'your words'.
"Right, right." Once, when he had just started his career, Bradley had been forced to wake an admiral in the middle of the night to tell him there had been a grease fire in the mess hall (when the mess hall was definitely supposed to be closed) and emergency services were on their way to the base, so he understands the sheer terror of this task. He does. Still…. "It's just, I'd like to keep this arm, if I can, Doc."
Her head snaps up. "Right." She looks at him. "Right. Yes. I will go…go and find someone who can assist."
"Please."
"I'm going," she says, still rooted to the spot. "Now. Right now I'm going."
"You're making good progress." A figure catches his eyes. "Wait, hold on. Dr. Seresin! Can you give us a hand?"
The man in question turns and Bradley sees he's holding a half-eaten sandwich in one hand and his phone in the other. He watches as Dr. Seresin looks to him, to the student, to the needle in her hand and finally, sadly to the remainder of his sandwich.
Realizing belatedly that he's interrupting what is likely Dr. Seresin's (very, very late) lunch, Bradley shakes his head. "Shit, sorry, nevermind. We'll—"
But Dr. Seresin's already shaking his head and walking towards them, pausing only to throw out the remainder of his sandwich. "What do you need?"
"Can you help us with a blood draw?"
Dr. Seresin looks to the student who gives him an apologetic look. "I'm sorry, I—"
"Just one second," Dr. Seresin says.
He disappears into the bathroom and there is the sound of running water before he reappears a minute later, wiping his hands on a towel and grabbing a pair of gloves.
"What's your name?"
"Helen. I'm a med student, I just started here."
"Helen, I'm Dr. Seresin. I'm a visiting doctor from Scripps. Have you done a phlebotomy before?"
"No, I haven't — this would have been my first time."
"Well," Dr. Seresin says easily as he snaps on gloves. "It's a teaching hospital. We're supposed to teach you, so don't be sorry about asking. Hand me a needle, please."
He takes the offered needle with a muttered thanks then holds out a hand to Bradley. "Arm, please."
Bradley holds out his arm silently and Dr. Seresin pulls it closer to himself before hesitating. His thumb brushes gently over the bruises already forming under Bradley's skin from Helen's prior attempts. Softly, he says, "Other arm."
He holds out his other arm and Dr. Seresin walks around Bradley's bed to reach it better.
"Now," Dr. Seresin says to Helen as he wipes the crook of Bradley's elbow with an alcohol wipe, "your best bet for blood work is to just ask a nurse. Doctors tend to do this once or twice in med school then never again but—"
Bradley pulls back his arm. "Whoa, hey, how about you call a nurse, then?"
Dr. Seresin takes hold of his arm and pulls it back to him with an eye roll. Bradley lets him, smiles to let them both know he's teasing. "Fine, fine, do your worst."
He watches as Dr. Seresin patiently explains the process to Helen and fills two vials of blood, then steps away and — once he's made sure Bradley's okay with it — asks her to fill out the remaining two, watching and instructing her as she does so.
"There you go," Dr. Seresin says to her as she finishes up and slaps a bandaid on Bradley. "All done."
She beams up at Dr. Seresin adoringly, a light flush on her face and a sparkle in her eyes.
Bradley barely manages to hold back a glare. Hands off, he's mine.
Dr. Seresin doesn't seem to notice that he has a new fan, however. He turns, instead, to Bradley and smirks. "And because Lieutenant Bradshaw was such a good boy, we'll give him a treat."
He reaches into his breast pocket and pulls out a lollipop, which he holds out to Bradley.
"Oh, awesome." Bradley takes it and promptly rips off the wrapper, stuffing it in his mouth.
Dr. Seresin raises an eyebrow. Bradley shoots him a grin that is all teeth, the end of the candy sticking out.
The other man shakes his head at him and turns to Helen, who is still looking at him like some kind of hero. "If you have any questions, I'm here for another week and my visitor office is just three doors down. Feel free to drop by.
"Yes!" She says, looking like the cat that caught the canary. "That—that would be great. Thank you."
"Three doors down, you say?" Bradley says with a suggestive tone.
Dr. Seresin just shakes his head again at him but before he can say anything, they're interrupted by a beeping.
Helen jumps, scrambling for her device. "Oh. I have to—"
"Go on," Dr. Seresin says, nodding towards the door.
She smiles and nods at them both, before practically running out the door.
When Bradley turns back to look at Dr. Seresin, the other man is already looking at him with a soft smile.
"What?"
"Thanks for being patient with her." He nods at Bradley's bruised arm. "I'm sorry for the—"
Bradley shrugs off the apology. "I remember what it was like getting started in the Navy. Better she practices on me than a sweet old lady or something."
"Fair enough. Still very nice of you though." He pauses. "Oh, and I almost forgot. Got this for you on my lunch."
He fishes in his coat pocket and pulls out a paperback book.
"What is it?" Bradley asks as he takes it from him.
"It's a hamburger."
Bradley looks up from examining the book and Dr. Seresin rolls his eyes.
"Obviously, it's a book."
"You know, you keep rolling your eyes like that, they're going to get stuck that way." He turns the book to the front cover. "What's it about?"
"No clue. But it was the only book in the gift shop, so, it's what you got. Figured it's better than Harrison's."
"Anything's better than that," Bradley says, looking up from examining the book and smiling. "Thank you."
"It's no problem. You—" Dr. Seresin's beeper goes off and he glances down casually then a look of alarm covers his face. "Shit. I have to run."
And he does exactly that, leaving Bradley staring blankly into space.
"Bye?"
The only response is the sound of beeping from the machines.
Well, at least he has something to read now.
Bradley sees neither hide nor hair of Dr. Seresin for over a full day after that. He doesn't see Dr. Machado either, really, except walking quickly in a group of doctors and nurses, speaking over each other as they discuss some surgery or another. Nurses come by occasionally to check on him (and once to confiscate the butterknife he had been using to scratch under cast) but they're mostly perfunctory visits and they disappear as soon as Bradley tells them he's fine. Dr. Seresin seems to have disappeared off the face of the planet entirely.
Bradley has always been self-sufficient, even as a child. It's a natural consequence of having his only 2 parental figures being a single, working mom and a Godfather who, due to the nature of his work, could only be there when deployments and assignments allowed. Bradley just doesn't need people. He's not wired that way. But he could have used something to distract him from his thoughts and he's grateful for the book Dr. Seresin bought him because — as outlandish as the spy thriller turned out to be — it's a welcome distraction whenever he feels the silence growing and the hollow feeling building in his chest.
And then the book is done, and he's back on the Home Shopping Network, wondering if that's how his mother had spent her nights whenever visiting hours were over and Bradley and Mav ushered out. Had she spent her nights staring at random objects with dubious promises and ridiculous prices? Had she been tempted by any of them before remembering that she wouldn't be alive long enough to use them? Towards the end, they'd let Bradley stay with his mom — no one could have gotten him to move — but she must have been lonely and scared on the nights before and Bradley hadn't been there for her. He should have snuck in. He should have tried harder. He should have held her hand and —
— The sounds of the machines swell and fill the room, the endless chatter on the TV become nails on a chalkboard, the room is hot and pressing on him from all sides and Bradley wants to rip his ears off and punch a hole through the TV —
God. He should have never let go.
Fuck fuck fuck fuck.
"Dr. Seresin?"
Bradley's heart gives a kick of relief.
Finally.
Even a few minutes talking with the other man would be enough, he thinks, to chase away all his darker thoughts.
Dr. Seresin stops and turns and Bradley has to blink against how haggard the other man looks. His hair is rumpled and sticking up in each and every way; his eyes are bloodshot with bags under them so prominent that they look like bruises against his pale skin. He looks ready to crawl into bed and sleep for the next week.
"You look like shit."
Dr. Seresin shakes his head, smiling ruefully as he steps into the room. "Oh, how quickly the romance disappears these days."
Bradley smiles and sits up. "Sorry, you look great, I swear, it's just…you look…tired."
"Yeah, uh." He rubs a hand over his face and barely suppresses a yawn. "We had a Code Orange the other day when I was in here. A bus t-boned another bus in the middle of rush hour. The ER's been a mess and it was all hands on deck. I've been in and out of surgery for thirty-six hours."
"Oh, shit."
Dr. Seresin stifles another yawn and shakes his head. "Anyway. You needed something?"
Suddenly, Bradley feels guilty, and embarrassed, to have called the man for such a trivial thing when he was clearly tired and just wanted to go home. "No. Uh. It wasn't important, I'm sorry. You should go home."
Dr. Seresin frowns and looks at him. "You look a little flushed. How are you feeling?"
"It's just hot in here," Bradley says, nodding at the covers he'd unceremoniously kicked off. "I'm fine, Doc. I promise. I was just bored and wanted company, which is stupid. Go home. Get some sleep."
Dr. Seresin gives him another long look, taking him in before seeming to come to a decision. He grabs hold of a chair and pulls it closer before dropping down on it like he's weighed down by lead. "Tell me more about life in the Navy."
"No, really, you need rest and—"
The other man shrugs. "I'm too keyed up to sleep right now. So come on. Dazzle me with tales of your life, Lieutenant."
"Don't you know everything already?"
"I know your medical history, your call sign and the fact that your parents liked Johnny Cash. Everything else is a complete mystery."
"Uh, okay. If you're sure." He is all too selfish and too lonely to pass up company — and especially Dr. Seresin's company — a third time. "So — wait." He frowns. "Johnny Cash? How do you —?"
Dr. Seresin smirks. "With a name like Bradley Bradshaw, I could only assume they were inspired by A Boy Named Sue."
"How dare you."
Dr. Seresin gives a soft laugh then nods at him. "Go on. Tell me about the Navy."
"You know the Navy!" It sounds accusatory because it is. Bradley's been talking for what feels like hours and Dr. Seresin has spent the whole time interjecting his own thoughts, inputs and corrections in Bradley's stories and not letting him get away with a single embellishment. It's messing up his game, honestly. "How do you know so much about the Navy?"
"You mean you need some kind of expertise to know that taking down enemy pilots your first time in a jet is a load of bull?" He raises an eyebrow. "Does the line ever work? What enemy is attacking near flight school, exactly?"
Bradley flushes. "It works better than you think." He shakes his head. "But how do you know all the other stuff? No one knows that much detail about Navy hierarchy or the mach speed in an F-18."
Dr. Seresin looks at him, his lips pulled into a polite smile, clearly debating whether he wants to answer the question or not.
Bradley waits.
Finally, Dr. Seresin releases a breath and says with a sheepish smile. "My dad. He's in the Navy. In aviation."
Bradley stares at him. "Seriously?"
"Yup. It makes up like eighty-eight percent of his personality so it's most of what we talk about."
"Sooooo…you're a Navy brat?"
"I didn't move from base to base or anything, but yeah. I thought about joining for a while too, which is how I know that there is no way they let you get on an F-18 in your first week at flight school." He says this last part with a glare.
Bradley grins sheepishly. "How come you ended up becoming a doctor, then? If you wanted to follow in your dad's footsteps?"
Dr. Seresin leans back in his chair. "Ended up following in my mom's instead."
"Your mom's a doctor?"
"She was a nurse." He bites his lip as though mulling over his next words. "She was planning on going to med school but then she had me and couldn't afford it anymore." He pauses. "She liked being a nurse, don't get me wrong, but the idea that I derailed her childhood dream…"
He trails off and Bradley feels a pang of sympathy.
"I'm sure she didn't see it that way."
"No, she didn't. It just…" He shrugs, eyes downcast. "Felt like becoming a doctor was the least I could do."
"Is your mom..." Bradley's not sure how to finish that sentence. 'She was a nurse' could mean she was retired or…something more permanent and infinitely worse.
"Gone. Passed away when I was twelve."
"Oh. I'm so sorry."
"Thank you." Dr. Seresin looks away. "It was a long time ago."
"My mom…she passed away when I was young, too." He's not sure why he's telling Dr. Seresin that. He always found it strange when people decided to meet his losses by enumerating their own. But maybe he just wants him to know he really, truly understands. That he loses time in 'what if's and 'could be's too; the other man's grief is safe with him.
"I'm sorry."
"It was a long time ago," Bradley echos. It doesn't make it hurt any less, but time, at least, helps you accept.
There's a long pause as they sit in silence and then Dr. Seresin takes a deep breath. "So. What made you join the Navy?"
Bad topic for a subject change.
Bradley winces and gives him an apologetic smile. "Uh. My dad. He was in the Navy when he passed away."
"Oh, shit," Dr. Seresin says, with a horrified half-laugh. "I'm sorry, I didn't—"
Bradley laughs and shrugs off the apology. "I was a baby when it happened. I barely remember him, really. But he was an RIO and he loved flying, so all my life, that's all I wanted to be."
It's not entirely true. There was Mav and his love for flying and the first time he took Bradley up in the sky with him. The long stretch of blue surrounding him; the world at his feet; the big swooping feeling in his stomach he never wanted to let go of.
But that's all irrelevant now.
"And you did it."
"Yeah." Despite Pete Mitchell pulling his papers; despite having no one to turn to; despite having his career pushed back by 4 years. He did it. He fucking did it. "Yeah I did."
There is another silence, and then Dr. Seresin clears his throat. "I should head home. I have to be back here in 5 hours."
"Oh, shit, yeah, of course. Thanks for keeping me company. Oh, hang on." He grabs the book from the table and holds it out to Dr. Seresin. "You can have this back."
"You finished it?" Dr. Seresin asks with a raised brow as he takes it from Bradley.
"Yeah, I had nothing else to do. I'd have probably tried to escape through the window if I hadn't had it, so thanks."
"No problem. How was it?"
Bradley shrugs. "Definitely entertaining, though the main guy jumps in a jet and immediately knows how to fly it on instinct, which is—" He mimes his head exploding and Dr. Seresin smiles.
"What, you need training to do that or something?"
Bradley rolls his eyes.
"Your eyes will get stuck that way." But Dr. Seresin isn't even looking at him, he's paging through the book until something makes him freeze. "You dog-eared it?"
He sounds so scandalized, Bradley leans away. "Is that bad?"
"Horrible. Just horrible." He shakes his head in disgust, then holds the book back out. "This is yours. I don't really read Brett Jervis."
"Why not? Are you a snob?" Bradley asks, delighted, as he takes back the book. Of course he's a snob.
Dr. Seresin flushes. "Shut up. I read David Baldacci and Lee Child just fine, but Jervis does this thing where he thinks he's so clever and witty and he's really not and it's irritating."
Bradley lets his smile say everything for him.
Dr. Seresin gives him the stink-eye. "What do you know, anyway, you dog-ear books." He stands. "Alright, I'm out of here. You're sure you're feeling okay? You're still looking flushed."
"Yeah, for sure. I just run hot."
Dr. Seresin looks doubtful but nods. "Okay. I assume your bloodwork's been delayed because of the Code Orange but I'll flag it for Walker tomorrow. Sleep well, Lieutenant."
"It’s Bradley. Goodnight. Get home safe."
The other man is almost out the door when Bradley calls to him and he stops, one foot on the other side of the doorway.
"If you're not busy tomorrow, drop by again, will you?"
Dr. Seresin looks at him a moment, then nods. "I'll come by in the morning."
When Bradley falls asleep that night, his head is blessedly silent.
PART II
A long sigh reverberates throughout the room. It's the fifth one in as many minutes.
"Hang on."
Another sigh, this one deeper and louder.
"Hang on. I'm getting there."
"Tell me something," Dr. Seresin says, "when you're up in the sky, in your fancy jets, do you ever run out of fuel?"
Bradley looks up from his board and glares. "Just let me think."
Dr. Seresin waves a hand with a flourish. "Oh, please, your highness, take all the time you need. I'm at your disposal. Not like I have a job to get to or patients to see."
"Goddamn it," Bradley huffs and sits back with a glare. "G4."
Dr. Seresin grins. "Miss. J3."
Bradley gapes at him. "I can't believe it. You sunk my damn ship."
Dr. Seresin laughs and Bradley feels some (if not all) of his irritation disappear. It's a pretty nice sound.
True to his word, Dr. Seresin had dropped by in the morning, and after Bradley had assured him again that he's fine, just bored, had disappeared and come back again holding a game of Battleship and a deck of cards he'd unearthed from the Lost & Found.
He'd managed to beat Bradley at Battleship four times now.
Still laughing, he stands and throws his coffee cup out. "Guess we can all count our blessings that you just land on ships and don't actually sail one."
"You're hilarious," Bradley says, "did they teach you the sense of humor in med school?"
"Nah, this was God-given," Dr. Seresin says as he moves towards the door. "Well, it's been a pleasure kicking your ass — again — Lieutenant, but duty calls. Get some rest. I've asked Dr. Walker to take another look at you when he gets a chance."
"Oh, God," Bradley says, "don't do me any favours, please."
"It's his job, Lieutenant."
Bradley huffs. "If you won't call me Bradley, at least call me Rooster."
"I will absolutely not be calling you by that ridiculous name."
"It's my callsign. Everyone calls me that, except for superior officers when they're yelling at me and threatening me with a court martial."
Dr. Seresin looks at him with interest. "That happen often?"
Bradley grins and wiggles his eyebrows. "Wouldn't you like to know?"
"No," Dr. Seresin says, "I wouldn't like to know. Have a good day, Lieutenant." He nods at Bradley's bedside table. "Hope those will keep you entertained."
"Ugh." Bradley groans, both from the use of 'Lieutenant' but also because of the brochures Dr. Seresin had kindly provided him as reading material: 'How to Ease Menstrual Cramps', 'Over 60? Get the Shingles Vaccine Now' and 'Why Smoking is Worse For You Than You Think.'
Bradley's playing solitaire (interestingly, the deck Dr. Seresin had pilfered was missing the two of spades, the eight of diamonds and, ironically, the queen of hearts) when he hears a loud clatter from the halls followed by booming voices. It's the sound of a group of people used to being noticed wherever they go. Not just used to it, but flaunting it.
Pilots.
"Roost!" Lieutenant Oscar Howe's big frame fills the doorway, his face lit up with a big smile. "Hey, guys, I found him!"
Bradley grins. "Bogie. What the hell are you doing here?" Last he'd heard, the other man was stationed in Japan.
"Apparently your squad was one man down," Bogie says as he saunters in with his usual charm. "Called me in for a transfer."
Behind Bogie, the faces of the rest of his squad appear before they quickly file into the room. One of them, Chaos, he thinks, is holding an obscene balloon together with a giant card: "Glad You're Alive, Dickhead!"
Bradley laughs and gathers the cards off his lap and puts them aside. "You guys came all the way here to see me?"
"You didn't think we'd let you get away with not getting one of these," Viking says as she gestures to the phallic-shaped balloon. Whenever a member of their squad spends the night in medbay, they end up with an obscene balloon to keep them company. Bradley hadn't thought he'd be getting one this time. He hadn't missed it.
"Thought crossed my mind," Bradley says, "not like I got injured in the line of duty."
"You're right," says Webster, "you officially got the award for the dumbest injury on the squad."
"Oh, is that why I get a card, too?"
"Yup," Bogie says, as he opens the giant card that is roughly the size of his torso. "Look, everyone signed it."
Bradley smiles. "Thanks guys, didn't know you cared."
As expected, they all say some variation of "we don't" and "shut up" but they clap him on the shoulder and take up posts around him, some of them finding creative perches — the windowsill, Bradley's night table, the floor — and most of them just standing around. The room isn't made for almost 20 people and Bradley wonders if security is going to have a problem with them. At least he’s the only patient in the room.
"I can't believe," Chaos says, "that the man who overthinks every turn in his jet suddenly gives zero thoughts to jumping under a falling crane."
"Yeah, yeah," Bradley says, because Chaos has been giving him grief since flight school about his flying habits. "But what can I say, heroes are never off duty."
That sends up a chorus of incredulous hooting from everyone.
"Oh, don't be jealous, don't be jealous," Bradley goads, "we can't all be heroes."
Shaking his head, Webster reaches inside his breast pocket and pulls out a card. "The guy you saved has a 5 year-old, apparently. She pretty much ordered Admiral Taggert to deliver this to you."
Bradley snorts as he imagines the look on the dour Admiral's face as he was ordered about by a five-year-old. He'd have loved to be a fly on that wall.
He takes the card from Webster and smiles. The artist certainly had used a lot of colour, and not necessarily in expected ways: the sun is purple, the rainbow is blue, and there are green stars all around the improbable sky. There is a house in the corner, roughly the same size as the sun, with flowers growing on its roof and three stick-figure people, presumably (based on their tufts of "hair" and size differences) representing a mom and a dad with a little girl in the middle. They are holding hands and smiling at him and there is a speech bubble from the little girl's mouth, the text of which says, in big letters and a childish scrawl:
"ThaNk U 4 sAvng my dady!
Frum: Amanda"
The 'k', 'g' and 'y' are backwards.
"It's cute, isn't it?"
Bradley looks up and smiles. He thinks he'd like to live in a world where the sun is purple and flowers grow on thatched rooftops. "It's fucking adorable."
Viking nudges his uninjured foot. "Open it."
He does. There's a polaroid of a man with a broken arm (adorned with flowers and stick figures — likely the work of the same artist as Bradley's card) next to a little girl with a wide-toothed smile. They're both holding up a thumbs up and grinning bright and wide at the camera. There's also ten dollars taped to the other side of the card.
"It was all her savings."
"Oh, noooooo," Bradley says, laughing despite himself. "Why did you take her money?"
Chaos snorts. "She almost punched Taggert in the nuts when he suggested she keep it."
"Girl after my heart," Bradley says, then sombers enough to say, "thanks for bringing this, guys. And for coming by."
Viking rolls her eyes. "No problem, you fucker. You know we'd have been here sooner if it wasn't for Taggert."
"Yeah," Webster says, "he was being such a hard-ass about training more because our team leader is down."
Bradley winces. "Surprised he let you out at all."
"Orders from the top," T-Ball says. He's been quiet so far, him and Bradley having never been on friendly terms, but now he's eyeing Bradley suspiciously. "to give us the day off to visit our injured member."
"From the top?" Bradley asks, blinking. "Who?" It sounds suspiciously like 'you have friends in high places'. Who the fu—
"You tell us," T-Ball says with an appraising look.
Viking rolls her eyes. "Give it up, Tee. Rooster is team leader because he's better than you, not because he has connections."
T-Ball only hums but Bradley shoots Viking a bewildered look. "But I don't." The only real connection he has — if one can even consider Maverick a good reference when it comes to the brass— had only ever held him back in his career.
But T-Ball — and some of the other members — keeps looking at him like he's holding something back and he doesn't know what to tell them.
Bradley gives another shrug.
A long, uncomfortable silence falls.
Finally, Viking leans over and says, "Hey, Roost, you want me to sign your cast?"
He doesn't really get much of a choice in it, in the end. He ends up with a cast adorned with vulgar sayings and even more vulgar drawings. It's lucky he's fond of these assholes. (And if he's secretly relieved to not have a bare cast…well, no one needs to know.)
"Come on, guys, stop! Stop!" He leans over and examines Webster's drawing of a couple in compromising position, as the man in question is cheered on by the others. He groans and laughs at the same time. "Oh, come on!"
His injuries vehemently protest the movement — and the laughter — and he falls back against the pillows with a pained groan.
Viking takes over the sharpie. "Oh, how about—"
"Nononono," Bradley says, "whatever it is, no!" But it's drowned out by the chorus of: "Do it! Do it! Do it!"
"Guys, I have to walk outside with this thing," Bradley whines.
Viking snickers. "That's your personal prob—"
"Gentlemen." A stern voice cuts through the chaos.
They all stop and turn their heads. In the doorway stands Dr. Seresin, glaring at them, with crossed arms.
His eyes land on Viking and Badger and he amends: "And ladies." He steps further into the room. "May I remind you that this is a hospital, and not a bar? Please keep it down."
Bradley winces. "Sorry, Doc. We'll keep it down, I promise."
"Excuse me?" Viking says. She sounds indignant, but something tells Bradley it's not because she's offended by being told to keep it down.
"Who is this?" Someone else says.
And then there is T-Ball, who is standing up and taking a step towards Dr. Seresin, staring at the man like he's a meal.
Bradley sighs. "Guys, this is Dr. Seresin. Dr. Seresin, these are my squad members."
But T-Ball is ahead of the game, already taking up more of Dr. Seresin's personal space than would be considered polite, and holding out his hand. "Lieutenant Jason Green, at your service."
Bradley rolls his eyes.
Dr. Seresin eyes the hand a moment before reaching out and giving it a quick shake. "Lieutenant."
"Please," T-Ball says, practically leering. "Call me Jason."
Dr. Seresin's eyes narrow.
"It's no use," Bradley cuts in, keeping his tone loose and friendly. "I've been trying to get him to stop calling me Lieutenant for days."
"Hold the fuck up," Viking says.
"This is your doctor?" Chaos continues.
"Sure is," Bradley says at the same time as Dr. Seresin says, "No."
"Don't listen to him. He saved my life," Bradley tells them, smug as shit.
Dr. Seresin huffs and shifts, putting some distance between himself and T-Ball Lecter. "I did your surgery. You weren't in critical condition."
"Saved my life," Bradley says again, grinning from ear to ear.
"What the fuck," Badger says.
"When I was in the hospital," Webster says, "I got an old dude with a sweating condition as my doctor. Rooster gets that?"
Bogie, the asshole, shakes his head somberly. "Some guys get all the luck."
Dr. Seresin looks at them and says blandly, "I'm still here."
"Excuse my colleagues," T-Ball drawls, stepping closer to Dr. Seresin again. Bradley almost rolls his eyes again at the way he's thickened his southern accent. "They're not used to being let out in polite company."
Dr. Seresin, merely raises an eyebrow and says slowly, "Seems like a problem you share."
Beautiful.
As one, Bradley and the rest of the squad make a face and says, "Ooooh," like they’re all still in high school.
T-Ball's smile only widens. "Now, is that a southern accent I hear?"
Dr. Seresin's jaw ticks. "It is."
"Alabama?"
"Texas." Dr. Seresin pointedly turns away from T-Ball to address Bradley. "You—"
"Now, what's a guy gotta do to get his hands on a doctor like you?" T-Ball asks and Bradley wonders if it's too late to change the man's call-sign to Sleaze-Ball. T-Ball the Sleaze-Ball. Seems suiting.
"Yeah, I'd like to know that, too," someone says.
"Me too."
"Come on, guys," Bradley says, mortified. He shouldn't have goaded them. "Behave."
"This is us behaving," Viking points out.
Bradley rolls his eyes. "Show some respect, please." Then, hoping it might help, he adds: "His father's Navy."
This, of course, renews everyone's interest in Dr. Seresin, making them do a double-take.
"Really?"
"Where?"
"Aviation?"
"Infantry?"
Dr. Seresin hesitates a moment before he relents and says, "He's in aviation."
Chaos tilts his head. "I don't think I've heard of a Seresin. Where is he stationed?"
"Is he a pilot?"
"What does he do?"
Come to think of it, Bradley doesn't know the answer to that, either.
There's another brief hesitation from Dr. Seresin, before he answers slowly, "I think it's mostly desk work."
"Oh, that explains it," T-Ball says dismissively. "We don't really know warrant officers."
Dr. Seresin’s eyebrows shoot up.
Bradley very nearly facepalms.
"T-Ball," Webster hisses.
"What?" T-Ball says dumbly, then turns to Dr. Seresin. "I mean, no offense, of course."
"Of course," Dr. Seresin says stiffly. This time when he turns away from T-Ball, it's with his whole body. When he addresses Bradley, his voice is cold. "Lieutenant Bradshaw, we made an exception for the number of visitors, but I'm afraid you'll have to wind it down."
"Of course," Bradley hurries to say. "These clowns are just leaving."
Like children, the room full of grown men and women, start protesting at once at being called 'clowns'.
"Oh come on!"
"We brought you a card!"
"Two cards!"
"And a balloon!"
"We brought you two cards and everything!"
"Ten dollars!"
"Hey!" Dr. Seresin claps his hands. The room falls into a sudden hush. "What did I just say about the noise?"
No one dares answer.
Bradley gulps.
Dr. Seresin shakes his head in disgust, but it seems to clear some of his anger too, because when he speaks again, he says in a measured voice: "Look. I'm glad that you're visiting your squad member, but please keep it down and respect the staff and the other patients here." He sighs. "Two people can stay, but I'm afraid I'm going to have to ask the rest of you to leave."
He steps to the side of the door, and holds out one arm out in the universal gesture of 'the exit is this way'.
Slowly, the group starts to file out, mumbling goodbyes to Bradley and apologies to Dr. Seresin. Only when the two visitors left in the room are Bogie and Chaos does Dr. Seresin turn away and leave. Bradley watches him go and hopes his visitors hadn't just destroyed all the goodwill he had with Dr. Seresin.
Bradley's eyes roll to the back of his head as relief and ecstasy barrel through him. He knows it's wrong. He knows he shouldn't do this. Especially not now, especially not here. But he's just — so — fucking — desperate.
He needs relief.
"Oh, God," he moans, throwing his head back as his hands work quickly to bring him relief. “Oh my God.”
That's it. Almost there. Right there. Yes! Yes! Yes! Ye—
"What are you doing?"
Bradley freezes and snaps his hands down. "Nothing."
Dr. Seresin raises an eyebrow.
"Heeey," Bradley says and laughs nervously and not suspiciously at all. "Dr. Seresin. Glad I caught you. I wanted to apologize for—"
"What are you doing?" Dr. Seresin asks again, this time pronouncing each word.
"Nothing." Shit. That's cagey. "Masturbating."
What the fuck.
With that damn eyebrow still raised, Dr. Seresin stalks towards him.
"Drugs!" Bradley says, pulling the covers over him. "I'm doing drugs, okay? I'm doing drugs."
"Let me see." Dr. Seresin takes hold of the covers, and tugs.
"No, it's nothing. leave me alone." Bradley holds on tight to the covers. "I was masturbating, stop it. It's private!"
A tug-of-war ensues as Dr. Seresin tugs and Bradley tugs back, holding on for dear life.
"Were you doing drugs or masturbating?"
"Both! I was doing both! Leave me—"
With a final, hard pull, Dr. Seresin yanks the covers away.
Silence.
They both stare down at Bradley's lap.
"I told you," Bradley says petulantly, "it's nothing."
The other man ignores him, still blinking down at what he'd just uncovered.
"Are you—"
Slowly, Dr. Seresin reaches out and wraps a hand around the cord that Bradley had fed into his cast. Still slower, he pulls at the cord and pulls and pulls until finally the electric plug snaps out with a small pop.
He holds it up to Bradley. "Are you ten?"
Bradley looks at him a moment and thinks about staying quiet; preserving his dignity. Then the discomfort shoots through him again and he thinks: fuck dignity.
He whines. "It itches."
"Are you five? You could have broken the skin and caused an infection, Lieutenant."
"Please, please," Bradley pleads, "just let me do it one more time, okay? One more time and I won't do it again. I promise."
Dr. Seresin shakes his head and rolls up the power cord. "Absolutely not. Talk to Dr. Walker and he can prescribe you an antihistamine, or you can ask one of the nurses for help." He looks around the room, suddenly alarmed. "Where did you pull this out of anyway?"
"Um."
"You can't just unplug things at a hospital!"
"I didn't! It wasn't attached to anything, I swear!" He points to the machine with its dead screen. "It was wrapped around the handle."
With a sigh, Dr. Seresin walks over to the machine and wraps the cord around it before moving it away and out of Bradley's reach.
"I have to congratulate you on your ingenuity. Most people use a coat hanger or a butter knife or something."
Bradley crosses his arms. "There are no coat hangers and the nurses took the butterknife away when I tried it."
Dr. Seresin snorts. "Of course." He shakes his head, still smiling. "Marcy said you were looking for me?"
"Yeah—yes." Bradley sobers and sits up straight. "I wanted to apologize for the way my squadron acted. It was completely unacceptable and I'm really sorry you had to deal with them."
Dr. Seresin looks at him a minute, then says softly, "You don't have to apologize for them. It wasn't your fault."
Oh, thank fuck. Still… "They were here for me, kind of feels like my fault." A pause, and he says cautiously. "I'm sorry about what T-Ball said about your dad."
Dr. Seresin blinks at him then flushes. "He didn't actually say anything about my dad."
"Still. The thing about warrant officers…it's a dumb thing that some pilots do. Assume they're better than everyone else."
"Some," Dr. Seresin says, looking at him carefully. "But not you."
Bradley shakes his head. "No. Not me." Though, to his shame, he can't for the life of him remember anyone named Seresin. Not that he's going to tell the other man that. Bradley's planning on looking up every officer on the North Island base as soon as he has his phone again and only then is he going to say anything about it.
"Well, T-Ball, was it?" Dr. Seresin asks and nods to himself when Bradley nods. "T-Ball wasn’t ever going to be the metric I use to judge pilots by in any case. Didn't seem to have the best judgment."
"You didn't seem too impressed by him."
Dr. Seresin makes a face. "Who likes getting hit on in their place of work?"
Bradley freezes. Dr. Machado's words echo through his head suddenly: "He doesn't see you that way. And even if he does, which I highly doubt, he's not going to jeopardize his career to mess with that."
Fuck.
Dr. Seresin has just been trying to do his job and Bradley's been no better than T-Ball. Rooster the Sleaze-Ball, more like.
Fuck. He even knows better. Never flirted with an on-the-clock waitress or bartender in his life (well, nothing serious). Damn.
"Still," Dr. Seresin says, when Bradley's self-flagellation stretches the silence between them. "Seemed to cheer you up, their visit."
It seems to be phrased like a question so Bradley nods slowly then shakes his head to clear it. He can act normal and friendly. He can do that. He grins and reaches for the card he'd propped on the table next to him. "Look what I got."
Dr. Seresin smiles as he takes it. "What's this?"
"The guy I heroically saved had a daughter, she made me a card." He pauses. "And gave me all of her savings."
"Not sure you should be bragging about taking money from a literal baby," Dr. Seresin says as he opens the card. The smile he gives at the polaroid is so soft and so sweet, Bradley has to clutch his hands to stop himself from reaching out and touching it. "Getting these was my favourite part from my pediatrics rotation."
"You didn't want to stick with pediatrics?"
Dr. Seresin shakes his head. "Wanted to be a surgeon. Thought about pediatrics surgery, but…" He looks down and swallows. "It's harder. When you lose a kid."
"Shit." Bradley says. He can’t even imagine what that must feel like. "I'm sorry."
Dr. Seresin shrugs. "You do your best. That's all you can do." He looks away and busies himself with putting the card back on the table, dedicating more time to it than was strictly necessary. Then he clears his throat and turns back to Bradley. "Was there anything else you needed?"
Bradley shakes his head. "Any way you can make the room a little cooler? I'm boiling in here."
The other man frowns and walks towards the thermostat located by the door. "The temperature is fine. Are you sure you're feeling okay? Your stats are a little high but they haven't changed significantly."
"I'm fine, just hot."
Dr. Seresin nods, chewing on his bottom lips. "Your blood test results are still backed up from the accident but let a nurse know if your condition worsens."
"There is no condition. The worst thing I'm in danger of is dying from boredom. Can I get any more brochures from you? I can't keep playing solitaire and I keep losing against myself at Battleship."
He feels gratified when Dr. Seresin smiles at his dumb joke. "That does remind me. I got you another book on my lunch."
He reaches in his lab coat pocket and pulls out a paperback book and holds it out to Bradley.
Bradley takes the book and examines it with a small frown. "The Lightning Thief?"
Dr. Seresin nods. "It's the first Percy Jackson book." He gives Bradley a look as he tugs at the piece sticking out of the book. "With a bookmark, this time."
"It's a kid's book."
It's the wrong thing to say.
Dr. Seresin frowns and reaches for the book. "Well, if you don't want it—"
Bradley tightens his grip on the book and tugs it back. "No, no, I'm sorry, I want it—I want it!" Dr. Seresin lets go and Bradley holds the book protectively to his chest. "I want it," he repeats, softer this time. "I'm sorry."
Dr. Seresin seems to thaw at this and he shrugs, flushing slightly. "I—I figured it's an easy read, which is better if you're drugged up or in pain. But if you prefer, the gift shop in the other ward has the new Jeffrey Deaver and I can only guess a million James Pattersons."
"I don't know who those people are."
"I'm shocked." He nods at the book. "But the options exist. You don't have to read this."
Bradley clutches harder at the book. "I want to read it."
Dr. Seresin nods, looking pleased, if still a little flushed and then clears his throat. "Well, uh, I should go. Do some actual doctoring."
"Go doctor the shit out of your patients."
It gets him a chuckle as Dr. Seresin walks out of the room.
Bradley stays watching the spot Dr. Seresin had just vacated for a minute more before he shakes his head and reaches for the book. He quickly scans the back cover. He hasn't read a book since…well, since the last time he had to read books for school. And now: two books in one week. One of them, bizarrely, a children's book. Given to him by a fully-grown man.
"Zeus's lightning bolt has been stolen, and Percy is the prime suspect?" He flips the book to the front cover, then back again. Then front. Then back again. "What is this shit?"
And yet Dr. Seresin had remembered a silly conversation about Percy Jackson a whole Code Orange and annoying squad visit ago. He’d remembered it and spent time on his lunch getting this for Bradley when he didn’t have to.
Bradley's going to read it and he's going to like it. Even if it kills him.
The bookmark has drawings of golden retriever puppies on it, each in 1950s style flight suits, complete with helmets and aviators. Some of them are piloting old-school type planes.
Bradley smiles when he sees it and feels his heart grow three sizes.
PART III
Bradley gets a roommate.
Her name is Winifred and she's seventy-six years old with a big family who all pile into the room at once and fuss over her.
Bradley is just finishing up his lunch when a nurse rolls her in, and then watches with wide eyes as a hoard of people follow after them, all speaking loudly and at the same time.
Dr. Seresin trails after them, looking rundown. "Please, only two visitors are allowed," he says, with the tone of someone who has probably said the same thing many times and been ignored. "Winifred needs to rest. Please. There is another patient in the room."
"I don't mind," Bradley says helpfully, as he watches Dr. Seresin — who had ordered about a room full of Navy pilots — succumb to a group of teenagers and middle-aged women.
Dr. Seresin glares.
Bradley grins back, and peels off the lid of his jello.
"Remember," one middle-aged woman says, "she likes to watch her television every night at 6:30. We like to record her soap operas for her, so —" she reaches into a large bag and pulls out a pile of VCR tapes and pushes them against Dr. Seresin's chest then goes back to rummaging in her bag, not even checking to see if he's able to hold on to them with his iPad and his own pile of files already in his hands. "Here you go." She pulls out another set of VCRs and heaps them on top. "And here are her magazines—and here are her photo albums—and here are her picture frames, she has to have the one with my father next to her bed—and here is the book she was reading—and here are reading glasses—her vitamins—and her snacks—"
One-by-one, she piles on the items as she calls them out, until you could no longer see half of Dr. Seresin's face; the poor man looking like he might fall over soon.
"Mom!" A young woman rushes to their side, and takes half items from Dr. Seresin and puts them on Winifred's bedside table. "Leave the good doctor alone. He's here to make Grandma better. Not babysit. Let's not make his job harder."
"Thank you," Dr. Seresin says, moving to place the rest of the items on Winifred's bedside table. "I appreciate that." He straightens. "Winifred's surgery went fine. She—"
"If it went fine, why are you still keeping her here?"
"She is at an increased risk of surgical site infection. I just want a few days more of observation before we release her. And I'm sorry to do this, but your mother really does need to rest. Sarah and I" — he nods to the nurse — "will make sure she has everything she needs, I promise."
No one looks convinced.
"What's a girl have to do for some privacy around here?" Winifred says, the first word she's spoken since she was brought in. She's an adorable, tiny thing, with big glasses and snow-white hair, but her voice is tough and her tone sarcastic. It's completely different from the sweet, demure person he expected to hear. "They bring food to my bed. I have someone to escort me to the bathroom and wait at the door if I want. I have a very handsome doctor and a very handsome roommate. I could live here, if they'd let me."
As one, everyone turns to look at Bradley.
Bradley, who had just taken a big bite of his jello, goes wide-eyed and very slowly pulls the spoon from out of his mouth. "Hi?"
"Look," Winifred says, waving at him. "He's adorable."
Dr. Seresin shakes his head and turns to address the group. "Your mother will be fine until tomorrow. We will take good care of her. It's the rest of the hospital you have to worry about."
It takes a bit more coaxing, but eventually, the people file out with the nurse following after them — possibly to make sure that they actually leave.
Dr. Seresin turns to Winifred. "Alright, Wini, I'm just going to take a look at a few things here and then leave you to rest." He hands her a remote. "You can watch TV as I do them, if you want."
Winifred nods but ignores the TV and turns to Bradley instead. "So. Magnum PI. What's your name?"
It takes a minute for Bradley to realize he's being addressed. "Bradley, ma'am."
"You're a good lookin' fella, aren't you?"
He hasn't been all too good. He's been feeling overheated and his muscles hurt and his head is absolutely pounding, but meeting Winifred has managed to distract him from it. Bradley grins. "Thank you, ma'am. You're—"
She waves a dismissive hand. "Don't bother blowing smoke. I'm seventy-six years old and I own a mirror."
"I'm sure you're turning quite a few heads wherever you go."
She looks at him a beat then nudges Dr. Seresin. "Now, do you see that, Dr. Seresin? That is how you're supposed to charm a lady."
Dr. Seresin shakes his head, still jotting notes. "Wini, I wouldn't know how to keep up with you." He pauses. "Or the good Lieutenant."
At 'Lieutenant', Winifred turns to Bradley with raised brows. "Are you a military man?"
"Navy, ma'am. A fighter pilot."
Dr. Seresin scoffs before quickly schooling his face and busying himself with his task. Bradley narrows his eyes but Winifred doesn't seem to have noticed.
"A Navy pilot," Winifred says, making a face. "Well, where were they making people like you 50 years ago? Hey, you married?"
"No, ma'am."
"Engaged?"
"No, ma'am."
"Girlfriend? Boyfriend?"
"Neither, ma'am."
"Do you want one?"
Bradley laughs.
"I mean it. My husband's still alive, but that's nothing my sister-in-law's tuna casserole can't fix overnight."
Bradley laughs again. "Only if you promise the cops won't be able to link it to us."
She waves him off. "Oh, forget it. I'm too used to that old geezer. I do have two single daughters and 4 single grandchildren." She reaches for her purse, which Dr. Seresin hands to her without even looking up. She pulls out a notebook and a pen. She touches the tip of the pen to her tongue. "Now, what are you into? Tall? Short? Big? Small? Blonde? Brunette? Red-head? Man? Woman? Non-binary? We got 'em all."
"Which one of them looks most like you?"
She pauses and looks to Dr. Seresin. "This one's a flirt."
"Oh, I know," Dr. Seresin says.
"I'm taking him home." She turns back to Bradley. "Now watch yourself, I'm a married woman." She pauses. "That's unless you want me to call my sister-in-law and let her know I'm craving a tuna casserole." She waits a beat and when Bradley just smiles, she shakes her head. "You marry the only man in the neighborhood with all his teeth when you're twenty and boy do you pay for it later. Now to answer your question, the one who looks most like me is Judith, but she's too young for you so I'd stay away from her unless you want to be swimming with the fishes."
Bradley holds up his hands in mock surrender.
"I—"
"—If I could interrupt this match-making session," Dr. Seresin says.
Winifred puts down her notepad and gives Dr. Seresin her full attention.
"Everything is healing like it's supposed to, and I expect that you should be able to make a full recovery. But, Wini, you need to take it easy. You need to not try to keep up with your 50 pound dog. You need to not pull so many pranks in your neighborhood, even though I'm sure Gladys Moritz Campano deserved it. And you need to stick to a healthier diet and listen to our instructions."
"Hey, when I have not listened to instructions?"
"Wini."
"Name one time."
Dr. Seresin gives her a look. "I have seen the McDonalds wrappers, Wini."
A pause. "Name one other time."
Dr. Seresin huffs out a sound that's somewhere between a groan and a laugh. "Wini, we give you that food because it's—"
"Wait a second," Bradley interrupts. "You have contraband? Where? Who's your dealer?"
Winifred opens her mouth, but Dr. Seresin cuts her off and shoots a dirty look at Bradley. "Do not start, Lieutenant. We give you that food specifically because it's better for you."
"Really?" Both patients say at the same time. Bradley tries and fails to look back at Dr. Seresin as innocently as he can.
"Yes, really."
"Because it kind of feels like we're being punished for being sick—" Winifred starts.
"—which is really unfair because we're already sick, you know?" Bradley finishes.
"It's supposed to help you heal!" Dr. Seresin points to the half-full jello cup that's still in Bradley's hand. "And we give you jello!"
"Yeah," Bradley says, taking a big spoonful of it. "Not even the good jello."
"What's the good jello?"
"The blue jello."
Dr. Seresin looks at him like he's crazy. "No one likes the blue jello."
"I do!"
Dr. Seresin huffs. "Okay, you know what, I don't get paid enough for this and you're not my patient. You eat as much McDonalds and blue jello as you like. Wini, you are on a light diet for the foreseeable future."
"Boy, throw an apron on you, and a wig, and it's like I'm back in Aunt Gertrude's kitchen in the Depression."
"Your Aunt Gertrude sounds charming," Dr. Seresin says, "now if that's all, I have to check on my other patients with less vocal roommates. Have a goodnight, both of you." He points to Winifred then to Bradley. "Do not get up to any shenanigans while I'm gone. I still work here for another few days, I'd like it to not burn down."
As he turns to leave, Bradley calls out to him. "Hey, Doc?"
He turns back. "What is it?"
"What was so funny earlier? When I was talking about being a pilot?"
Dr. Seresin's look of impatience melts away and is replaced with a smirk. "How do you know when someone's a fighter pilot?"
Bradley tilts his head.
"Just wait. He'll tell you."
Bradley stares at him. "Ha." Dr. Seresin breaks out into a big grin and Bradley rolls his eyes. "Ha ha ha."
"Goodnight, Lieutenant Bradshaw."
He leaves and Bradley and Winifred are left staring at each other.
"So," Winifred says into the silence. "Bradley Bradshaw, then?"
"Yup."
A beat. "Have you ever heard the song, 'A Boy Named Sue'?"
The flowers show up sometime around noon.
Bradley, who had spent all of the last night tossing and turning, overheated and spacy and bone-tired, is trying to sleep as Dr. Seresin and Wini speak in hushed voices on the other side of the room.
Maya walks in, holding the basket of yellow and white daisies in her arms. "Look, what we have here, Bradley!"
Bradley's gaze is hazy and his brain is muddled, but at the sight of the flowers he smiles and sits up. "Someone sent me flowers?"
"They sure did!" She says as she clears the table. "And they're beautiful, aren't they?"
"They are," Bradley says and ducks his head. "Daisies are my favourite flowers."
Not too many people know that about him. But it's a family thing. It was his mom's favourite flowers and his dad always made sure she had a fresh bouquet at home. When he'd gotten older, Bradley had continued the tradition. To this day, the only thing he can think of when he sees the flowers is his mom's bright smile and cheerful, "you don't have to do that," even as she pulls down a vase for them.
He doesn't know too many people who know that fact about him.
"Who're they from?"
Maya places the flowers down on his bedside table and frowns. "I'm sure I saw a card here somewhere. Oh, here it is!" She hands him the card.
Bradley takes the card but the words are blobs and has to blink a few times to clear his vision. When he's finally able to read the words, he wishes he hadn't.
Hope you get better soon. - Mav
His heart clenches and he no longer feels like throwing up from the (suspected) fever.
How dare he? How the fuck dare he.
"Everything okay?" Maya asks.
"Yeah," Bradley says, clenching his jaw so hard, it aches. His head throbs. "Everything's fine. Can you get rid of the flowers?"
Maya stops. "What?"
He looks up at her, but the pain and the anger cloud his vision and he's left with a distorted version of a figure. "I don't want them. Can you throw them out?"
"Throw them out?" She looks affronted. "These are perfectly good, beautiful flowers. How could anyone throw them out?"
God, everything hurts. He resents the flowers. He resents Mav. He resent Maya. He resents having to fom words. "Give them to someone else then. Take them yourself. I don't care. Just get rid of them."
She gives him a strained smile, like she's trying to handle him. "Now just look how lovely they look here on this table—"
“I said get rid of them!"
A hush falls over the room.
Bradley swallows the bile in his throat and squeezes his eyes shut.Fuck his head. He pinches the bridge of his nose. "How many times do I have to say I don't fucking want them?"
There's a long pause and then Maya says very slowly, "My apologies, Lieutenant Bradshaw. I'll just take these—"
"Leave them."
Dr. Seresin's cold voice cuts through Bradley's headache, and pulls him down straight to reality. Where he'd just yelled at a nurse.
Shame and dread flooding him, Bradley drops his hand from his head. He watches helplessly as Dr. Seresin marches over and takes the flowers from Maya, putting them back on the table next to Bradley. "If Lieutenant Bradshaw wants, he can throw them out himself."
Bradley wants to open his mouth. He wants to apologize, wants to beg for forgiveness, but the words die in his throat.
Dr. Seresin pointedly turns away from Bradley and fixes Maya with a smile. "Thank you, Maya. I'm sure Lieutenant Bradshaw is very grateful for all your help."
Bradley winces and nods.
"Why don't you head over to lunch, I can handle things from here."
Maya gives Bradley a look, to which he can only stare on helplessly, and turns away.
Dr. Seresin waits until she's gone before he rounds on Bradley. “The nurses are here to help you heal faster. They are not here for parcel deliveries or to be your personal assistants, and they're definitely not here to be yelled at by you."
Bradley finds his voice again. "No, I know. I'm sorry. I didn't—"
"If you want the flowers gone so badly," Dr. Seresin says, and pulls a wastebasket close to Bradley's bed. "Be my guest."
With that, Dr. Seresin leaves the room. Bradley stares after him.
“Shit.”
“That could have gone better,” Wini says.
He knows.
He throws the note in the wastebasket.
The problem with Mav is, Bradley had always had him. So the dead dad, the kids in the schoolyard, the absence of anyone to give father's day cards to, the working single mom, then the sick mom and then the dead mom, and then the absence of anyone to give mother's day cards to — it was all tempered by having Mav. Mav taught him how to throw a ball. Mav showed up to his games whenever he was stateside. Mav didn't teach him how to ride a bike, but many years later had taught him how to ride a motorcycle. Mav taught him how to drive a car and how to fix up anything with wheels. Taught him, even, the silliest pick-up lines.
Whatever the world dealt, Bradley knew he could handle it, because Mav would be there by his side.
And then that very same man had pulled the rug out from under Bradley.
You're not ready.
What Bradley had heard was: you're not good enough. You will never be good enough. I won't support you. You have no one in your corner.
Bradley hated him. Wishes he'd never met him. And then he hates himself because he knows that deep down, he doesn't mean it.
At every triumph, his first thought is: if I call Mav, and tell him, will he be proud of me? Will he admit he was wrong?
Two years ago, in a motel room in Tijuana, drunk off his mind, and missing his mom so much on her birthday, all he'd wanted was to call Mav and say, "Can we just forget we're fighting for today? Can we just pretend everything is okay with us? Can you just be here? Can you just hug me? Can you just sit here and tell me your favourite story about my mom?"
He hadn't called Mav that night, but the weight of missing him had followed Bradley around for days after.
He wishes he'd never met Mav. But what he really wants is to have him back. Because Bradley is thirty-four years old and he's been carrying all his hurt and his loss and his love by himself for so, so long with nowhere to put it that he's aching. He wants a safe place to put it all. And Mav had always been his safe space.
He wishes Mav were here right now. It's so hot where he is.
He needs to go somewhere cooler. Somewhere with water. A beach would be good. If only he could be a kid again at the beach, throwing the ball around with his mom and dad and Mav.
That would be nice.
"Jesus, he's burning up."
"What's wrong with him?"
"Get Dr. Walker now!"
"I need 40 mg of meropenem right now!"
"I need a line for ibuprofen!"
"Where the hell is Walker?!"
"Get him stable! Get him stable!"
Bradley hears the beeps first, telling him he's alive. And then, slowly, he opens his eyes.
He sees the daisies first. Then Maya's smiling face.
"There you are."
"I'm sorry."
She frowns. "For what?"
"I'm sorry for yelling at you," he says again, voice croaking from disuse. "I shouldn't have yelled."
"Oh, now," Maya says, holding out a small glass of water with a straw. "Forget about that. Drink that water nice and slow, now. How are you feeling? You gave us quite a scare."
He takes a long sip of the water. "What happened?"
"You had a fever," Maya says, taking back the glass from him and putting it on his table. "It started off mild and then it spiked."
"It spiked?" He feels totally fine now. Like he'd just been run over by a train — or had another crane fall on him — but fine.
She nods. "It was horrible. I thought Dr. Seresin was finally going to snap and punch Dr. Walker."
Bradley smiles. It's good to know Dr. Seresin hadn't written him off completely after yesterday's debacle. "Sorry I missed it."
"Me too," Maya says, "it was certainly memorable."
His gaze goes to the empty bed in the room and he frowns. "Where is Wini?"
"She's fine. She has some tests today and then she wanted to walk around and sit in the courtyard a little."
"Oh." It's a relief to hear it's not because she'd taken a turn for the worst. "Good to know."
She smiles. "I'll let your doctor know you're awake."
"Thank you!" Bradley calls out.
He's less thankful when he remembers his doctor is Dr. Walker, and left staring up at the dour man who berates him for hiding his condition then adds an extra three days to Bradley's sentence, complete with antibiotic, cold saline infusion and ibuprofen. Bradley is relieved when Dr. Walker, with his typical curtness, turns and stalks out of the room as soon as he's done imparting that information.
After that, with his roommate gone for the day, Bradley has not much to do. He reaches for the book Dr. Seresin had given him however many days ago (who can tell anymore) and flips it to the first page. The past few days he'd been too out of it to be able to concentrate on words, but now, he's feeling remarkably refreshed.
"I accidentally vaporize my pre-algebra teacher," Bradley reads aloud from the chapter title. "Yikes."
Then the book begins: Look, I didn't want to be a half-blood.
"You're up."
Bradley looks up from the book. He's more than half-way through it, having liked it far more than he'd anticipated. He smiles. "Dr. Seresin. Hey."
Dr. Seresin shoots him a look and steps inside the room. "Don't hey me. Not after what you just pulled."
"I didn't do anything!"
The other man glares. " Multiple times I asked you if you were feeling unwell. Multiple times I checked-in on you. And each time you said you were fine."
"But I was fine. I mean, I started feeling a little feverish towards the end but —"
"—and you didn't think to mention it?"
He shrugs. "I thought it was normal?"
"The normal amount of fever is zero, Lieutenant Bradshaw."
Bradley stops trying to defend himself, and instead resorts to his last line of defense: he slumps back, and fixes Dr. Seresin with the biggest, most pathetic puppy-dog he can muster. "I'm sorry."
Dr. Seresin stares at him, mouth agape. Then, he shuts his mouth with an audible click and glares. "That's low."
Bradley grins. "But it worked. And I am sorry. I just didn't realize what was happening."
The other man sighs and his shoulders droop. "Just don't do it again, please."
"Promise." He raises an eyebrow. "You getting attached to me, Doc?"
The glare comes back. "I promised my dad I'd get you out of here in one piece."
"Whatever you say."
The other man rolls his eyes, but the action causes his gaze to fall on the flowers next to Bradley and he pauses.
Bradley immediately sobers. "I apologized to Maya."
It draws the other man's attention back to him, but Bradley can't read the expression on his face and he hurries to add: "I really am sorry. It was completely out of line."
"You don't have to apologize to me," Dr. Seresin says, "but thank you for apologizing to Maya."
"Of course."
Dr. Seresin nods at the flowers. "Do you still want to get rid of them?"
Bradley thinks about it. Thinks about his mom's happy smile whenever she saw daisies. He shakes his head. "No, it's okay."
"Okay," Dr. Seresin says, and nudges the wastebasket until it's in its original spot by the doorway. Bradley wonders for a minute if the other man is going to ask him what it was about the flowers that had set him off, but instead Dr. Seresin says, "Do you need anything?"
Bradley shakes his head. "I wouldn't mind some company until Wini gets back."
The other man smiles as he walks back to stand next to Bradley. "I'm just a cheap replacement, aren't I?"
"You bet."
"You break my heart, Lieutenant Bradshaw."
Bradley huffs. "What do I have to do to get you to call me Bradley?"
"Stop being a patient at this hospital."
"You call her Wini!" He points to Winifred's empty bed.
"That's because I like Wini."
Bradley gasps. "What are you implying?"
Dr. Seresin smirks. "I wasn't implying anything, I was saying that—"
Bradley cuts him off by reaching for Dr. Serein's latest donation to his brochure collection ('7 Signs of High Cholesterol!'), balling it up and throwing it at the man's head. Dr. Seresin sidesteps easily. They both watch as it lands, pathetically, next to the wastepaper basket.
A minute passes as they both consider the paper/basket interface, and then—
Bradley: "Bet you I can get more in that basket than you."
Dr. Seresin: "You're on."
Bradley nods off again sometime in the late afternoon. When he next wakes up, there's a blue jello sitting on his bedside table.