Disclaimer: Burn Notice and all of its characters belong to Matt Nix and the USA Network.
This fic involves issues with cancer and the resulting chemotherapy. That being said, this fic is not for the faint of heart. I say that because I cried myself when I was writing it...read on at your own risk, I am not responsible for any resulting therapy bills...
This is an AU take post-season 5, which means that none of season 6 happened. Because most of it made me sad. And even I am not that into self-torture. It's a Michael-centric story, with some Michael/Fi thrown in and it's got Sam, Jesse, Nate and Madeline in there as well.
The title of this fic comes from the song by Martina McBride. The lyrics are from "Skin (Sarabeth)" by Rascal Flatts, I know it's about a girl, but its been a very inspiring song while writing this fic today.
"Sarabeth is scared to death to hear what the doctor will say.
She hasn't been well since the day that she fell,
And the bruise it just won't go away.
So, she sits and she waits, with her mother and dad, flips through an old magazine
'Til the nurse with a smile stands at the door, and says
"Will you please come with me?"
Michael grunted softly as he lifted his arm over his head, scowling at the dark purple bruise over the ribs on his right side. He knew that he'd landed on top of the car solidly when he'd jumped out of the second story window, but it his side should not have still been bruised three weeks later. He prodded at the inky flesh, an involuntary hiss slipping from between his clenched teeth.
He shook off the pulsing pain that radiated from his ribs to his knee caps and slipped the olive drab t-shirt over his head, tugging it into place and letting out the stuttering breath that he hadn't realized he'd been holding. He walked stiffly across the loft towards the fridge, his legs protesting the movement. God, maybe he was getting old...
"Everything okay, Michael?" He startled, turning around quickly and catching sight of Fiona leaning her hip against the workbench and staring at him curiously. Her head was tilted to the side as she watched him through squinted eyes.
"Why wouldn't everything be okay, Fi? We've got no jobs, we can relax for the first time in...God knows how long. Everything is good." He threw on a smile that didn't quite reach his eyes and she stepped closer, her eyes remaining locked on his.
"Is that so? Then you won't mind if I do this?" She reached out and closed her hand over his ribs, squeezing tightly until Michael doubled over, his hand going to the bruise as he stifled a pained groan.
"What the hell was that for?" He snarled, looking up at her from where he was leaning his hands on his knees and focusing on taking ragged breaths through his nose.
"That was for lying to me. Now, tell me what's wrong. What's this from?" She questioned, lifting the shirt and running her fingers over the dark skin more gently. He straightened up painfully and pulled half a shurg.
"It's from that job we had with the cocaine pushers."
"When you jumped onto that car? Michael, that was three weeks ago. That shouldn't still be that bad. You need to go to the hospital." His eyes snapped to hers, anger evident in the way that his brow furrowed.
"I'm not going to a hospital, Fi. It's just a bruise. I'll live." He pushed past her, yogurt clutched in his hand as he moved to sit on the bed. He couldn't stifle the way his face contorted in pain as he settled tenderly onto the edge of the mattress.
"You can't just ignore this, Michael. What if it's something serious?"
"Then we'll deal with it then. It's just a couple broken ribs, probably." He watched as she heaved a sigh and sat next to him, her eyes laden with a lingering concern.
"Does it feel like broken ribs?" Michael hesitated, his spoon hovering midway between the yogurt container and his mouth. He didn't want to lie to Fiona. He'd spent far too much of their time together since the day he...no, since McBride had met her.
"No..." He mumbled, dropping the spoon back into the container.
"So, why not go get it checked out, just in case? For me?" He scowled at her, his lips pursed and his eyes irritated.
"That's not fair, even for you." She didn't respond. Instead, her eyes widened and she pointed at him, her finger shaking. He was confused for half a second and lifted his hand to his face, curious as to what she was pointing at. He was shocked when his hand came away coated in blood. "What the hell?" He murmured, lifting his hand once again to feel the steady flow of blood from his nostril.
Fiona jumped from the bed and got a clean rag from somewhere in the kitchen and held it to his nose. She slipped the yogurt from his hand and gestured for him to hold the rag while she pulled her phone from her pocket, dialing frantically. Michael didn't need to be a super spy to know that she was calling Sam and Jesse, but it still shocked him to hear her voice void of its usual bite and sarcasm.
His fingers had grown sticky with the drying blood by the time Sam and Jesse burst through the loft door, their faces settling on the once-white-now-red rag that was pressed to his face. He rolled his eyes as Fiona recounted the events of their afternoon, starting with the bruising on his side. Sam frowned and moved closer, lifting his shirt with no hesitation. Michael couldn't miss the hitch in his friend's breath if he'd wanted to.
"Mikey, you need to go see someone. This looks pretty nasty."
"Yeah, Mike. It shouldn't be that dark three weeks later. And the whole," Jesse gestured in a circular motion to Mike's face slowly. "Old Faithful thing you've got going on is probably a bad sign too."
"You guys are overreacting. It's probably just a climate change."
"You live in Miami, Mike. The climate never changes." Sam scoffed, hooking his hands under Michael's arms and hauling him to his feet. He would have tried to fight the older man off if he hadn't been fighting a bone deep ache in his...well...everywhere. He allowed his friends to shuffle him out the door, sans his shoes, and into the backseat of the Charger.
"M'gonna get blood on the damned seats." He mumbled, brushing his free hand on his pants and scowling at the other three. Sam glared at him through the rearview mirror and his protest to going to the hospital died on his tongue. Fiona was still staring at him with that shellshocked, frightful gaze from her postion next to him and it twisted his heart in his chest. "It's okay, Fi." He whispered, reaching out and threading his fingers through hers. She winced at the drag of his dried blood mixed with warm, wet fresh blood on his hand. He mental cursed himself for not even thinking about that.
They made the short trip to Mercy Hospital in relative silence, save the sound of Michael snuffling softly every so often. When they pulled up to the large building, he felt panic building in the pit of his stomach. He could fight unseen forces in the jungles of South America, battle cartels in the Columbian heat, and he could blend in with rebel forces in the Middle East, but Michael Westen dispised doctors.
With a gratuitous amount of coaxing, they finally convinced him to get through the large sliding doors up front and into the area marked 'Emergency'. Fiona explained his situation, save for some details about the 'how' of his injury (she went with calling it a 'car accident', which wasn't a complete lie), and he signed the necessary paperwork with mechanical efficiency. Within the hour, he was settled onto an uncomfortable emergency room "bed" with an intern in scrubs hovering over him.
He was about to snap at the young man as he jabbed his finger into the space between Michael's ribs for, what seemed like, the twentieth time since he had been admitted, when an older looking man stepped into the small room. He was tall and thin, with light blonde hair and porcealin looking skin. He had twinkly (because sometimes Michael can use that word. Try to tell him otherwise.) blue-grey eyes and a soft smile that reminded Michael of his great-grandfather he'd met once when he was a very young boy.
"Mister Westen, it's nice to meet you, I'm Doctor Monroe, I'll be the attending in charge of your case. I trust Doctor Grosseman has been taking good care of you?" He shot an accusatory look at the younger man who had taken to cowering in the corner like an abused puppy. Michael considered throwing Doctor Touchy-Feely under the bus, but decided better of it.
"Yes, sir. He's been fine." Michael responded with a short nod.
"Well, that is good to hear." Monroe smiled, nodding his head towards the door. The intern scurried out of the room like a cockroach that had just been hit with a million watt floodlight. He gave a half-sigh of relief (as much as his ribs allowed anyway) and let his eyes flick to where Monroe was skimming over his chart. Michael wiggled his nose, grimacing at the feeling of the dried blood that was still caked to his upper lip. The least that half-witted intern could have done was given him a cloth to clean his face.
"Can I get a, uh-." He gestured vaguely to the sink and then to his face twice before it seemed to click with the doctor. He moved to the sink quickly, grabbing a sterile blue cloth and wetting it with warm water before handing it to Michael. He nodded his thanks to the doctor and dabbed at his nose carefully, making sure not to jar anything and potentially restart the nose bleed.
"So, Mister Westen, you seem to be like a pretty healthy man, overall. Aside from the obvious issues, of course. But, just to be safe, I'd like to run a few tests if that's all right?"
"Do what you have to do, Doc." Michael responded, setting the cloth onto his knee and waiting expectantly. Monroe rooted around in a drawer a moment before producing a handful of viles, and a needle attatched to a thin rubber tube. He washed his hands vigorously before pulling on blue rubber gloves, tying a strand of rubber around Michael's bicep and scrubbing at the juncture of his arm with an alcohol pad.
It had been a long time since he'd had bloodwork done, but he was pretty sure that nurses usually handled that sort of thing. He brushed off the apprehension as he watched Monroe slipping the needle into the crook of his arm, making sure that he had a decent vein before connecting the rubber tubing to the viles.
Michael watched his blood snake through the tubing and drip into the first of five viles. When all five viles had been filled, Monroe pulled the needle and pressed a wad of gauze to the small hole, taping it in place with paper medical tape.
"Okay, Mister Westen, I'm going to run these tests quickly. I'm going to put a rush on them so you don't have to sit here too long. Sit tight and we'll get this going." Monroe said with a tight lipped smile that left Michael feeling a bit unsure of the situation as the doctor disappeared from the room.
Michael flexed his elbow twice, looking down at the little gauze and noticing a small trickle of blood creeping around the edges. He scowled at the gauze before pressing his thumb into the crook harshly. He sighed loudly, letting his head drop back to the glorified gurney and let his eyes close as he settled in for what was sure to be a long wait.
x
"Sarabeth is scared to death 'cause the doctor just told her the news.
"Between the red cells and white, something's not right,
But we're going to take care of you. Six chances in ten, it won't come back again,
With the therapy we're gonna try.
It's just been approved, it's the strongest there is, I think we caught it in time."
Michael felt like he was in a haze as he walked out of the emergency room nearly two hours later. His hand was clutched in a death grip on his discharge papers and a fistful of deceptively cheery looking pamphlets. His gaze was empty and he couldn't help the fact that his jaw hung slightly agape as he rounded the corner into the waiting area.
"Michael, what'd they say?" Fiona was immediately on her feet and standing in front of him, her hands framing his face as she attempted to force him to look her in the eye. He stared at a spot somewhere just over her head and shook his head.
"Let's get out of here." He mumbled, pulling away from her and striding across the parking lot as quickly as his stiff frame would allow him. He slipped into the backseat of the Charger without protest, tucking Fiona under his arm when she slid in beside him and wrapping his other arm around her to hold her close to him. He placed a soft kiss to the top of her head before resting his cheek against the soft tendrils of her hair.
Sam pulled away from the hospital and sped towards the loft, catching Michael's distant stare in the rearview mirror as he wove through the five o'clock traffic. The look on Michael's face had his gut tied in a knot, but he knew better than to try prying something out of the other man when he was in that state. All they could do was sit back and wait.
x
"Sarabeth closes her eyes, and she dreams she's dancing,
Around and around, without any cares,
And her very first love is holding her close,
And the soft wind is blowing her hair."
Long after the sun had ducked below the horizon, they all sat in the loft, eating the steaks that Michael had shelled out for on the way back from the hospital, which had frankly worried them all. Michael didn't really do 'big meals', let alone red meat and potatoes. Sam had spent the hour that it took to get dinner prepared pouring through his memory bank to try to figure out which medical issues could cause Michael's symptoms and be related to protein deficiency. That was the only logical explination that he could fathom, but he couldn't seem to get a grasp on anything of the sort.
Michael leaned back against the counter top and ran his hand over his head slowly. He sucked in a ragged breath through his nose and blew it out, his cheeks puffing as he did so.
"Guys, I..." He paused, swallowing around his too-dry tongue as he tried to find the nerve to speak again. He reached into his back pocket and tossed the stack of pamphlets onto the workbench in front of them. Fiona picked them up and shuffled through all of them, her face growing more pale with every shift of paper.
"Michael." She choked out, her body quaking as she waged a losing battle against the sob that escaped her throat. She dropped them back to the table and moved to him, tightening her arms around his waist and burrowing her head in his shoulder as hot tears slipped off the end of her nose. He held her to him, settling his chin on top of her head and watching as Sam and Jesse thumbed through the pamphlets, staring at each other and then settling their confused gazes on him.
"Mikey, you can't be serious." Sam started, his voice crackly and sounding completely out of character for him.
"Serious as the grav...okay, bad analogy, but you get the drift." He muttered, rolling his eyes at his own stupidity. Jesse opened his mouth a few times, looking as if he wanted to say something, but not quite knowing where to start. He stood there with his mouth agape for a few more seconds before he seemed to settle on something.
"So...what are they going to do?" He questioned quietly.
"I'm going to see an oncologist they recommended for me tomorrow morning." Fiona stepped away from him, pawing at her eyes to wipe away the tears. She stared at him, but remained silent.
"What else did they say?" Jesse continued, running his hand over the back of his head slowly.
"It's Leukemia. Doctor Monroe said that it was outside his realm of capability so he couldn't tell me much. But, I'm looking at chemotherapy and taking cancer pills like they're candy for a while." Michael's voice sounded raspy as he spoke around the bubble of emotion in the bottom of his throat.
"When are you going to tell your mother?" Fiona asked, her hands still resting on his chest.
"I'm going over in a little while. I figure it's best to get it out of the way."
"So, we should probably stop taking jobs until we get through this. Jesse, you put the word out with your buddies and let them know that we aren't taking any more." Sam ordered, pointing at Jesse with an authority that practically oozed "Navy SEAL testosterone". Jesse nodded and had his phone out before Michael had a chance to get a word in edge-wise.
"Sam," He snarled, glaring at the other man. "I can still work jobs. I'm not an invalid."
"Mikey, you don't know what these treatments are going to do to you. Trust me, you're not going to want to be running around, playing James Bond when you can barely battle your biggest enemy of the day." Michael quirked an eyebrow at him curiously before Sam elaborated. "The food pyramid. My aunt had cancer when I was a kid. She couldn't even look at chicken broth without tossing her cookies everywhere."
Michael sighed, knowing that the other man was right. He shook off the shiver that ran through his body and he pushed off the counter, moving towards the door. He waved off Fiona when she offered to accompany him to his mother's. It was something he needed to do himself.
x
"Sarabeth is scared to death
As she sits holding her mom,
'Cause it would be a mistake for someone to take
A girl with no hair to the prom."
"Mom, where are you? I have to talk to you about something." He called, stepping into the house. He moved through the living room slowly, his body throbbing with every step. The ache had shifted from his legs all the way up to his hips and he had to really concentrate on putting one foot in front of the other.
He heard the shuffle of fabric behind him seconds before the arm wrapped around his chest. He grasped the arm and threw the figure behind him into the pillar near the kitchen. Nate gasped and arched his back off of the pillar, his eyes scrunching shut. Michael tried to stifle his own gasp as pain shot through his shoulders.
"You know, eventually you're going to learn from your mistakes and stop trying to sneak up on me." He breathed out, scowling at Nate as he rotated his shoulder in its socket and brushed past him into the kitchen.
"What's the matter, Super Spy? Hurt yourself showing off to little ol' me?" Nate teased, leaning on the counter and crossing his arms over his chest. Michael ignored the obvious attempt to rile him up and chose to grab a water bottle out of the fridge instead.
"What are you doing home, Nate?" He questioned, taking a long pull off of the water bottle. The cool liquid soothed his scratchy throat and he had to hold back a groan of contentment.
"I needed to take some time off from work and I wanted to come see how you guys were doing." Nate pulled a shrug and took a sip of the beer hanging from his fingers. Michael qiurked an eye brow at the bottle. Where the hell had that come from?
"Where's mom?"
"She's out back, working on...well, I'll be honest, I'm not really sure what she's working on. She says it's an herbgarden, but it looks like a plant cemetary, Mike. Who do we call to report plant abuse?" Michael shook his head and moved to the back door, ducking out back and dodging the vines that had snaked their way down the back of the house. He didn't need to look behind him to know that Nate had fallen into step, following him out onto the back patio. His mother was hovering over a small garden that was illuminated by a flood light positioned above the back door.
Michael gave the herbs a quick once over and realized that Nate was right. His mother was a lot of things, but a green-thumbed gardener she was not. The plants were wilted and bending to touch the water-logged soil, but his mother was humming merrily, clad in flower printed gardening gloves and a large, white, floppy hat. He sighed as he realized he was about to rob her of all of that blissful happiness.
"Mom?" He called, his voice barely above a whisper. Madeline turned to face him, a cigarette dangling from her smiling lips.
"Hello, Michael. To what do I owe the pleasure of both of my boys showing up at the same time?" Madeline smiled at him, reaching out and touching the side of his face gently.
"I have to talk to you about something. It's actually good that Nate's here. Now I can tell you both. Why don't...why don't you guys come inside?" He moved back into the house and pulled out two chairs for them at the table before sitting in his own, waiting for them to follow suit. They did so, albeit reluctantly as they watched him through cautious eyes.
"Michael, what's this about?" Madeline whispered, crushing out her cigarette in the ash tray in the middle of the table and leaning on her elbows to look at him. Michael took a moment to compose his thoughts before he reached over and took his mother's hand in his own.
"I went to the hospital today." He decided to start with something small. Something that would shock them, but wouldn't completely overwhelm them to the point of shattering their entire world.
"Oh my God, what happened?" Madeline questioned.
"I, uh, well, three weeks ago I...got in a bad situation and got banged up pretty bad." He lifted his shirt to reveal the deep bruising, drawing a gasp from both of them. "And I was talking to Fi about it and my nose started bleeding. It bled for quite a while. So, they made me got to the emergency room, and the doctor ran some blood tests."
"What'd...what'd they say?" Nate's voice was more quiet then Michael had ever heard it.
"I..." He swallowed and gave a short, breathy, helpless chuckle. "I have Leukemia." Michael found the way that Nate's jaw dropped to be almost comical, despite the circumstances. Madeline just moved from her seat and wrapped her arms around Michael's shoulders and held him until both of their sobs subsided, hours later. Her words echoed in his skull as if they planned to take up permanent residence there.
"I'm so sorry, Michael."
x
"For, just this morning, right there on her pillow
Was the cruelest of any surprise,
And she cried when she gathered it all in her hands,
The proof that she couldn't deny."
Michael and Fiona were sitting in the chemotherapy room, nothing but the sound of the clock ticking to fill the space between them. Michael stared straight at the needle that stuck in his arm, pumping radiation into his bloodstream.
"Just because you stare at that isn't going to make it pump any faster. You know that." Fi mumbled over the top of her 'Guns and Ammo' magazine.
"I know that, Fi, I'm trying to get rid of it with my mind." He joked, though his voice was flater than a Christopher Columbus map. Her eyebrow quirked upward in a skeptical look as he gave her a small smirk. "So, I was thinking."
"That sounds dangerous." Fiona teased, waggling her eyebrows at him.
"Hardy-har-har. Anyway, oh sarcastic one, I was thinking that...after all of this, if I make it through it, we do all of those things that we always said we were going to do."
"Like what?" Fiona questioned, setting the magazine down and staring at him more intently.
"Like...I don't know, skydiving. Parasailing. Bungee jumping. Let's...let's go dancing underneath the Eiffle Tower. Shark diving in the Great Barrier Reef. Surfing in Santa Monica. Let's get married in Hawaii." The last one shocked Fiona, her jaw hanging open.
"M-married? You want to get married?" She stammered.
"Fiona, I'm going to be going through hell and if, not when, if I make it out of this thing alive, I wanted to have something to live for. I want to know that, if I make it to the other side of this, I get to make you my wife. So, Fiona, will you marry me?"
"I..." She thought for a moment, tears hovering on the corners of her eyes. "Yes."
"Yeah?" He questioned, giving a laugh that boardered on manic.
"Yes. A thousand times yes, Michael." He leaned over and kissed her before ripping her lips away abruptly and leaning over the edge of the chair to puke into the trash can next to him. He wiped his hand over the back of his mouth and looked at Fiona a bit sheepishly.
"And there's that nausea they were talking about." He muttered. Fiona smiled and pulled a piece of tissue from the box on the counter and wiped his mouth.
"Yeah, but now I have to deal with it. 'Cause I'm your fiance. I have to love you through all of this. Sickness and health, baby."
Michael smiled as she leaned her head on his shoulder and held his hand tightly. She was going to love him through this. He was so happy that he had her in his life, because, even if he didn't admit it, Michael Westen was scared shitless.
x
"Sarabeth closes her eyes,
And she dreams she's dancing around and round without any cares,
And her very first love was holding her close,
And the soft wind was blowing her hair."
Michael was clutching the cold toilet bowl and dry heaving with everything he was worth for, what seemed like, the thousandth time that day. The sickening urk, urk sound echoed through out the loft, but didn't deter Fiona from perching on the edge of the tub and rubbing her hand in soothing circles on his back.
It had started as a good enough morning; The two of them had laid in bed much longer than Michael usually induldged, and then Fiona had gotten up to make them some breakfast.
Michael was laying on the bed, reveling in the fact that he thought he may have escaped the nausea that usually to accompanied the chemotherapy that he'd had the day before. It had been that way ever since the first round of chemo when he'd accidently thrown up all over Sam's favorite Tommy Bahama shirt. Then the scent of the eggs that she was cooking hit him.
He had stumbled through the loft, barely making it to the bathroom in time to vomit, what he was pretty sure was, every piece of solid food that he'd ever eaten. His body quivered and shook under Fiona's fingers as he dropped his forehead to the toilet bowl and tried to regain some semblance of control over his own centeral nervous system, praying that his muscles would stop spastically twitching.
"I'm s-sorry, Fi." He rasped, his throat raw from the exertion when he got through the bout of dry heaving. He was pale and weak looking as he leaned back against the wall, his chest heaving from exertion. Fiona frowned at him and reached out to wipe a washcloth over his chest and face.
"Michael, you don't have to apologize. The doctor told us that this would happen, remember? Just because you're a spy doesn't mean that you're invincible." She whispered, leaning her forehead against his. He managed a halfassed smile and a breathy chuckle against her cheek.
"I'm just..." He sighed and shook his head slightly. "I'm just so tired. I'm tired of all of the drugs, and the chemo, and...I'm just tired, Fi."
"I know, Michael, I know." She whispered into the top of his head, her fingers carding through his hair gently. He felt her hand freeze on top of his head, and he pulled back slightly, trying to figure out what was the matter. His heart sunk into his feet when he caught sight of the large clump of dark hair in the palm of her hand. "Michael." She whispered, her eyes filling with tears. He scowled at the hair before raising his own hand to his head and scraping his fingers through his hair. His hand was as hairy as a bear when he pulled it away and he felt anger surging through him.
"Son of a bitch." He grumbled, staggering to his feet and leveling a punch at the wall beside the mirror. His knuckles were already starting to bruise when he pulled his hand away to look at it. He glanced over at Fiona and an emotion that felt a lot like embarassment masquerading as anger hit him in the stomach. "Get out. Please. I just...I need a minute." Fiona nodded, even though he saw the flash of hurt in her eyes. He was being an asshole. He knew that. But he couldn't, he couldn't, let her see him breaking down.
When she stepped out, shutting the door behind her, he began rooting around in the cabinet underneath the sink until his hands closed around what he was looking for. He straightened slowly, the nobby ridges of his spine that were far too close to the surface of his skin jutted out as he stood, and he stared at himself in the mirror, examining the bare patches of his skull.
He placed his free hand over his ribs, his fingers falling into place the spaces between them. His arms were too skinny, lacking the muscles tone that he'd once had, and his collar bones jutted out far too much, causing a shadow at the base of his neck. His eyes were sunken into his head, inky bruises spotting the spaces underneath them. He looked like death walking.
He flicked on the clippers and went to work shaving the rest of his hair before he had time to second guess himself.
Large chunks of hair fell into the sink until he stood there, his face too sunken into his cheek bones and making himself look half dead already, and then there was his head. It was bare and shining in the dim light over the sink. He ran his thin fingers over the smooth, shiny skin once before dropping the clippers to the sink and stepping out into the loft.
He was shocked to see Sam and Jesse standing there next to Fiona when he came out. He stared at all of them a moment before they seemed to sense his presence and turned to look at him. Fiona's breath caught and her hands went to cover her mouth as she stepped closer.
She ran her fingers over his scalp a few times, but Michael could do nothing but stare at her, his eyes lacking the light they once had, but he had a small ghost of a smile on his lips. Her hand strayed down his cheek until it rested on his cheek, her thumb brushing over his bottom lip.
"I look like a pool ball." He whispered, suddenly acutely aware that his breath probably stunk to high heavens, but if she noticed, she hadn't mentioned it.
"You look handsome. I like it. I can see more of you." She responded, smirking at him and pulling his head down so that she could place a kiss to the top of his head. He couldn't fight the flutter in his stomach, but he couldn't tell if it was from the feeling of her lips on his skin or the urge to vomit trying to creep back up on him again.
"Mikey, you don't look bad, brother. You're one of the few people in the world that can, apparently, pull off the bald look. Frankly, I'm a bit jealous." Sam added, swilling down some of his beer after pantemiming a toast to Michael. Jesse crossed to him and clapped him on the shoulder, smirking at him.
"Welcome to the club, man. Your initiation package should be coming in the mail any day now. It's like having a key to the world. People assume you have power when you have no hair."
"That's bullshit." Sam interjected, scowling at Jesse.
"Baldness is a sign of high testosterone, Mister Full Head of Hair." Jesse shot back.
"Please. Your baldness is just a sign of bad genetics that led to male-pattern baldness, which led to the exectutive decision to shave your head."
As Michael sat there, listening to them arguing back and forth, he let out the first honest to God laugh that he'd had since the doctor had hit him with the news about the cancer months before.
They all sat, and they laughed, and they reminisced about times when Michael could run, and jump, and shoot, and he didn't get winded because he had to walk across the kitchen to get a yogurt that he would throw up an hour later. They didn't talk about the fact that he had dropped so much weight and gotten so pale that he literally looked like a walking skeleton. They didn't talk about when Michael had snapped at Fiona the week before and made her cry because he was so damned frustrated that he didn't have the strength to pull the slide back on his own gun. They didn't talk about his chemo, or his pills. All they talked about was how much they loved each other. And for a second, he could pretend that he wasn't dying.
x
"It's quarter to seven, that boys at the door,
And her daddy ushers him in.
And when he takes off his cap, they all start to cry,
'Cause, this morning where his hair had been,
Softly she touches just skin."
He had fought getting hospitalized tooth and nail, because he was Michael Fuckin' Westen. He didn't need to sit in some hospital and waste away in a bed, while nurses came in and out and insisted on giving him a catheter so that he didn't have to get up to piss. That was why he was sitting in his hosptial bed, a scowl on his face as he looked at the lime Jell-o like it had personally offended him.
"Michael, must you look so angry? These nurses are just trying to help you." Fiona huffed, sitting back in her chair and crossing her legs at the ankle as she leveled a Fiona-Glenanne-glare.
"Yes. Yes I must. I don't want to be stuck in this damned bed, Fi."
"I know you don't like being stuck in the bed, Michael, but you've got a lung infection. With your immune system the way it is, going outside would kill you." She scooted her chair closer and tangled her fingers with his, grimacing at the feeling of his bony, frail fingers. He grasped her fingers in his hand, and it sent a surge of warmth through her. It represented the fact that Michael was regaining some of his strength back. A week before he couldn't have even opened his own yogurt container. "You're getting stronger." She whispered, smiling at him.
"If you say so." He grumbled, running his hand over his head. A small sprout of peach fuzz had begun to grow back, and his eyebrows had even returned to their rightful place. They were miniscule accomplishments, but to Fiona they may as well have been Earth shattering discoveries. It meant that the chemotherapy had been over for long enough that his hair had started to come back. It meant that his sickness was gone and he was on his way to recovery.
Michael had gained three pounds back since the doctor had declared him cancer free, the day before he'd been admitted with his lung infection. It wasn't anything huge, but it was something. They'd spent almost a year of chemo, and pills, and hours spent hunched over a toilet. He'd dropped to a hundred pounds (on a good day) and lost a lot of his muscle mass. But that was all over, because Michael had beaten the thing that had threatened to take him away from her.
"We beat it." He murmured and it vaguely registered that she'd spoken that last part out loud. He lifted her knuckles to his dried and chapped lips, kissing them softly. "Do you know why we beat it?"
"Because you're the strongest man that I have ever met?" She questioned, quirking her eyebrow upward.
"No, because I had you with me. You loved me through all of the hell that I've been through, and I've been an ass to you. I mean, I've been a complete dick, but you stuck by me and you made sure that I followed the doctor's orders and you shuffled me into all of those appointments. I couldn't have done this without you." He sucked in a rattling breath, though she had to admit that even his lungs were sounding better. "I love you, Fiona. And, mark my words, we're going to do everything that I said we were going to when we get out of here."
"I love you too, Michael, but I'm sure you already knew that, Super Spy." She chuckled. Michael just blushed in response.
"First stop: Paris." Fi quirked an eyebrow at him curiously.
"Why is Paris first?"
"Because we're going to get married at the top of the Eiffle Tower, and we're going to have our first dance underneath it."
"Why, Mister Westen, when did you become such a romantic?" She questioned, leaning in until her lips hovered over his.
"Must be the radiation frying my brain." He teased before leaning in to kiss his fiance. His hands moved to her back and he realized that he was going to be okay. They were okay.
Because, sometimes, the love of the person you want to spend the rest of your life with is more powerful then any experimental drug that they can give you. Sometimes, that was everything.
"And they go dancing, around and around without any cares,
And her very first true love is holding her close,
And for a moment, she isn't scared."