A/N: Hey all! This is a surprise isn't it? This just randomly barged into my head this morning on the bus to school. It amused me greatly and I hope that it will appear so to you as well! Apparently, the plot-bunny thinks that it's Virgil's turn for a one-shot! This technically is a part of the Bound universe, but can also be read as a stand-alone. Oh, and if you were ever to come across this, and perhaps want to read it, Six, I promise that it is perfectly free of what we talked about!
Disclaimer: If not for Sylvia and Gerry Anderson, I would not be able to play in this wonderful playground, so no; I do not own the Thunderbirds.
Onwards! Xx
You know that moment when someone tells you specifically not to do something, and you immediately feel an undeniable urge to do exactly that, and thereby drive yourself nuts in the process because not only can you not resist, but something is physically barring you from doing it? That is exactly the kind of thing that is happening to me right now.
Oh, I wouldn't mind half as much if it were just the one thing that is contributing to my overall state of discomfort; but it is two, and one of them is significantly more frustrating than the other, as it is inextricably linked to the former.
Just three days ago, I had been participating in my Tuesday afternoon soccer practice. Being early spring, it was kind of inevitable that the winter rains would continue well into early March, and as a result; the surface of the pitch where we trained had been drenched and re-drenched by the falling water and chilly mornings for weeks now, and although it had been a handful of days since the last down-pour, the appearance of the soil was entirely misleading about the actual firmness of the ground.
It was through no fault of the school that the state of the field had been overlooked, but it just had to be me, with my inherent need to go slip-sliding at least once a day didn't it? It just had to be exactly where I was trying to dodge a team-mate -who in this instance was playing opposition in our drill- and was trying to aim the ball towards fellow red team member Tom Lancenet up closer to the goal. Uh-huh.
One second I was zipping up the pitch; chilly momentum whipping my wind-chilled curls back from my face, checkered black and white ball held firmly within my instep, and then the next thing I knew, I was out flat on my back on the patch of soggy ground that had been right in my trajectory; gritting my teeth so much that they creaked, as I tried not to scream nor faint at the wave of white-hot agony as it blasted its fiery way along thigh, ankle and shin.
I had spent an agonising, mud and nausea-filled five hours in the emergency department of Lawrence's tiny town hospital, and then had re-emerged slowly out to Scott's rusty old pick-up with newly-minted crutches, a thick plaster cast and strict orders not to place any weight on the hairline fracture to my femur, nor the compound breaks to the tibia and fibula of my left leg, for at least the next ten weeks.
And that is why, right at this moment, I am reclined on the living-room couch; heavy, pain-filled left leg propped up on numerous pillows, and am subsequently bored out of my mind; because certain elder brothers; the only ones that I could possibly hold interesting conversation with, are out for at least another couple of hours getting flying lessons from Dad. Even if I ignored the jealousy that fills me with, I am annoyed at the fact that I can't even practice the new piece I have been given to work on from my music teacher; my leg is still too far too swollen beneath its rigid covering for me to even think about being able to rest it in a vertical position without bolts of agony shooting through it that makes my eyes tear up and a scream almost tear through my lips. The piano is sat in its customary spot in the corner of the room, taunting me with my inability to play, and over the past few days I have trained myself not to look at it; as I am only really brutally torturing myself with the waiting that I have to do until the swelling has gone down. I have contented myself with spreading my manuscript on the half-lap my good leg presents, but as I have no concrete keys to play on, I can't accurately visualise where my fingers are supposed to go. It is extremely unsatisfactory, and does absolutely nothing to distract me from the intense itching on the skin of my leg, nor does the throbbing headache that I have been nursing for most of the day make it at all easy to concentrate on the chord progressions and the melody of Moonlight Sonata anyway.
Grandma is somewhere in the upper levels of the homestead; presumably rounding up Gordon and Alan, who are coincidentally home at the same time as me; for the selfsame reason that my suffering has been infinitely compounded into total and utter misery; for the itchiness that is emanating from beneath the heavy fibreglass cast is not only due to the broken bones.
Oh no. A week ago, my two younger brothers had both managed to come down with chicken-pox. Yes, I, Virgil Tracy, at almost fourteen years old, have been infected with the varicella virus by a seven-year-old and an eleven-year-old, who honestly delight in causing trouble. I would be fine if I hadn't broken my leg, and had both kids throw their contagious selves at me as soon as I had swung my slow, agonising way into the house once home from the hospital; no-one had been fast enough to stop them from pulling me into their germ-and-spot-filled embraces.
Scott and John had both had the illness as young children, well before I had been born; so as luck would have it, in all of my early years, I had never once come into contact with the virus. The kids are supposed to be going back to school tomorrow, as they are no longer contagious; damn them, and I find myself very much wishing for more of the peace and quiet I am currently experiencing. I am still the owner of a raging fever that accompanies the first two or three days of chicken-pox, and only this morning have I reached that terribly itchy stage. Both of those factors, along with the discomfort in my barely-healing leg, the fact that the blasted red blisters have seen fit spread their way beneath the cast, and the fact that some of the more painful ones are situated on my fingers, inhibiting my drawing as well, they have also added to my general level of unhappiness and are for lack of a better phrase, 'driving me bananas' to quote Dad on one of his favourite sayings.
Grandma has come up at somewhat of a roadblock where alleviating the discomfort of the rash is concerned, as with the awkwardness of a cast that begins at the end of my foot, and stretches all the way up over my knee and part-way to my hip, there is no feasible way that I would be able to sit comfortably in the bathtub for an oatmeal dip; and yes, don't think that I wouldn't have actually swallowed my pride and jumped at the chance, even if it meant cutting the damned cast off and putting up with the agony it would bring. Calamine lotion was kind of helping with the parts of me not covered in plaster; I had looked like something greatly resembling a pink iced cake once Grandma and Dad had finished coating me in it this morning, but right now, I am seriously contemplating incurring both adults' wrath and dragging myself into the kitchen -broken limb or no- and cutting the thing off myself so that I can scratch my skin into oblivion; despite knowing that it probably will only get me an infection instead of the relief I so greatly desire.
I must have dozed off at some point, though how I possibly could have done so in my current condition, I have no idea, but as I open my eyes, it is to see Scott quietly paging through one of his hugely thick course books, as he has his Yale entrance exams coming up in the next month and a half. The papers spread over the side of the armchair where he has perched, and the pile of spiral-bound notebooks and the scattered pack of pens suggest that he has been here with the sleeping me for a more than a while now.
I realise then that I am quite uncomfortably hot, and lift my hands blearily; puzzled to discover that the blanket that I had tossed off of my lap earlier in the day has somehow, miraculously managed to find its way back over my tired, terribly itchy and achy body. And now that I think of that, of course the itchiness recommences.
I look up to meet Scott's curious blue gaze, the specks of purple grey that have become noticeable in the last couple of months are growing rapidly. I remember that Mom's eyes had been that same amethyst colour, and that John sometimes -in the right light- has the same phenomena occur, though most of the time they are as azure-blue as Alan's.
He smiles at me then, and does his big-brother-mind-reading thing. "I put it back on." He tells me, meaning the red-and-blue afghan that was currently making me swelter. "You must have kicked it off when you were sleeping." He closes the textbook in his hands; Advanced Applications of Algebra and Calculus, and leans over to place his palm over my forehead.
I go to protest; I'm fine Scott! but the words die on my lips as I sigh at the cool skin that my brother's palm brings to my achy and overly hot forehead. Almost absently, I pull my hand from within the blanket to scratch roughly at a cluster of raised bumps on the side of my neck, the other attempting to dig questing fingers beneath the tight edge of the cast. The leg must be swelling up again, for there is much less room than there was last time I had attempted it.
"Stop that." Scott orders, lightly slapping the hand at my jaw away from the increasing burn it has instigated. I realise hopefully, that he hasn't yet noticed my left hand as it gives up on the cast and contents itself with relieving the tingling near my hip instead; at least until he whips the blanket off of my lap and grabs my hand at the wrist, gasping at the sight of my skin and nails.
I am wearing an old pair of shorts in place of sweatpants; they are much more comfortable, and a lot easier to pull on with the cast, and I wince just much as Scott as I see the evidence of what a little harmless itching, even with blunt nails can do to skin that is already tender, raised and puffy.
The tops of a dozen blisters have been scrubbed raw, and there is a bit of blood and pus appearing from the heads of a few of them where the bacterium beneath my nails has clearly decided that my skin is a nice place to set up shop. I sigh glumly as I think of exactly how much that is going to sting when the inevitable cleaning with the cotton and Betadine takes place later tonight. But back to the whole reason why my left leg is like that in the first place…
"Virgil." Scott sighs, once again waving my hand away from where my fingers are making half-hearted swipes at the stupid cast and looks me squarely in the eyes. "Do I really have to fetch the oven mitts? For God's sake, Kiddo; you're gonna have no skin left the way you're scraping it off!"
"But it's itchy, Scott! Beneath the cast… they're everywhere and it's driving me nuts! Grandma's been trying to think of something to help all day, but she hasn't thought of anything yet!" My voice is an abominable mixture of whining, irascibility, and a big dollop of self-pity on top, and yet Scott is still staring at me in that maddening way of his; inscrutable and completely unfazed by my attempt. John was ever the same, but I have achieved both partial and total success on Dad from time to time.
"Has she tried an antihistamine?" My brother asks suddenly; his dark brows shooting up like they do every time he asks a question. I remember when he used to make me laugh hysterically just by wriggling his eyebrows, and I smile to myself, because once again, Scott has succeeded in distracting me from scratching like a flea-ridden dog, and the guy knows it perfectly well thank-you!
"No!" My eyes widen in astonishment; amazed that neither Grandma nor myself had thought of it before. All day I have been shifting uncomfortably, trying to not go insane with my leg and plaster and poor ol' Virgil in his music-less boredom, and here my brother walks in and amazingly and magically has a solution; as always. Damn. I think. Why didn't I think of that? But then I brighten instantly; because truly; who cared? I was going to be drugged and happy and blessedly not-itchy!
Suddenly forgetting entirely about the burning irritation of the blisters on my feet, face, and everything in between; I lunge abruptly for the crutches set down on the floor next to the couch, and then promptly gasp sharply in pain as my leg erupts in a noisy blast of Oh-my-freaking-God-ouch-my-God-that-goddamn-hurts!
Chuckling slightly, but his brows furrowed in concern, Scott carefully assists me to my one-foot-and-crutches, and I grunt with pain as all the blood from elevating the limb goes rushing into swollen and abused muscle and bone. Definitely need to top-up on the pain meds then.
"So," I ask, as we slowly begin to make our cautious way to the kitchen, where our med-kit and my salvation from itching resides. "How did the lesson go?"
A/N: I am very fortunate not to remember being a four-year-old with chickenpox; my poor mother had her hands full with me and both of my sisters sick with it! And the eyebrow thing is also something from my childhood; I used to do it to my little sister all the time, sometimes even though she's now eighteen it still works!
I'll see you all tomorrow with chapter twenty for those who are reading Bound. If not, I wish you all a lovely Friday, and a great weekend!
Please review!
-Pyre. Xx