I know very little about OCD and about the same amount about recovery from being stabbed in the back. Sorry if I screw up too bad, and please let me know if there's something glaringly wrong.
Dying, Coulson thinks, really fucks with your routine.
It is 09:00, and he's only just woken up. That's wrong. Supposed to wake up at 05:30 precisely, 06:00 gym or jog, depending on what day of the week it is, shower and breakfast by 07:30. 08:00 report to work. He has a set route for his jog and a set series of exercises, precisely timed, for his gym routine. And now he had to fit in to a new routine. A routine that belonged to someone else.
09:00 wake up, check vitals. Breakfast, but he doesn't eat it because he hasn't seen it get prepared and he's having difficulties at the moment. Normally his issues with food aren't noticeable. But, dying will do that for you. 09:30 he's due at physiotherapy. There's some restriction of movement in his left arm, and Loki's staff had clipped his spine causing a limp. He wants to hack off his malfunctioning limbs, but he'd have to take off the working ones as well so that it would be equal.
11:00 and he has a meeting with a psychiatrist. She throws around words like post traumatic and stress reaction and he counts the tiles on the ceiling. There are 24. That bothers him. He counts again. Still 24.
She leaves at 12:00 but returns 27 minutes later with the orderly who brings his lunch. She saw it prepared, she says. She promises it's safe to eat. He's counted the tiles 3 more times since she left.
He knows it's safe to eat. That isn't the point.
He doesn't eat it.
He's been off medication for 4 years, 5 months and 23 days. He doesn't need to go back on it just because of this. He had it under control, before. He did.
Nick comes to see him. Tells him he'd better goddamn get better soon because he needs him to play super-nanny to The Avengers. They still don't know he's alive. Nick notices him counting the ceiling tiles.
"Ah shit."
"I said something similar myself, sir."
"I thought you had it under control."
"I did. And then I died. That's the sort of thing that really fucks with my routine, sir."
"And no routine means no control." It's something that Phil had told Nick when it had first started getting bad. When he was counting every mouthful and had to chew fifteen times before he swallowed. When he was counting every grain of rice he cooked. When he chewed a hole in his lower lip when something unexpected happened.
"Yes, sir." Phil needs structure. He needs plans. That's what makes him such a good asset handler. His missions always run to schedule. And he had it under control. First with medication, then with routine and talk therapy. He had been doing so well, really he had. But now that festering sore at the back of his mind has broken open again, and he doesn't know what to do.
Nick brings him dinner. They count the peas together and Nick gets rid of the extras. He tells Phil that he saw them cook the meat, and that he mashed the potatoes (2 of them, cut into 5 equal pieces each) himself. Phil isn't sure he believes that. Fury lies. But he's hungry enough to ignore it. Besides, everything is the right number, the right shape. They aren't touching each other.
He eats.
Nick leaves as soon as he's finished. Phil doesn't blame him, running a super secret government agency takes a lot of work, and Nick hates hospitals.
Phil taps out Morse code on the bars of his hospital bed. He taps out the entire Morse alphabet, then starts again from the top. He does this 3 more times. Then he gives in and taps out Clint's name. He taps it out 15 times.
Then, he finally sleeps.