"Michael? How you doing, bro?" Michael turned eagerly towards the known quantity of his brother's voice.
"Linc?"
"Right here." His brother was draped across a chair next to the bed. Lincoln sat up and rubbed his eyes groggily, then leaned in towards Michael.
"How you feeling?"
"Hurts," Michael answered, flexing the uninjured shoulder and arm towards the throbbing one but meeting resistance. Frustrated, he flung his hand against the restraint.
"Woah, bro, don't pull out your IV." Lincoln laid a calming hand on Michael's good shoulder, stopping his movement.
"IV? Am I in a hospital?" Michael couldn't reconcile the obvious smells that said 'hideout' with the presence of the IV. He peered around the room, trying once again to piece together the puzzle of his surroundings.
"We're at the cabin. The Doc fixed you up."
"Doctor?" Michael repeated hopefully. "Sara?" Michael's eyes had suddenly come to life.
"Yeah, actually. I went and got her last night. You were in bad shape, Michael. But she says that you're going to be okay." Lincoln watched his little brother, grateful to see him doing better and slightly amused at his reaction to Lincoln's mention of the lady doctor. He had thought Sara's reaction to his middle-of-the-night plea had been something more than that of a doctor concerned for a patient. Now, watching Michael's face suddenly bloom with color and spirit, he suspected there was something going on between the two of them.
"Where is she now?" Michael wanted to know.
"She's here. I'll go get her. She'll probably want to check you out anyhow. Just a sec." Lincoln stood up, stretched, and walked out the door. He was only gone a few minutes, but in Michael's foggy mental state, it seemed like forever.
Sara, here? After their difficult conversation in the infirmary just before the breakout, he had assumed she never wanted anything to do with him ever again. He was sure he'd blown it with her back at Fox River when she'd caught him in a lie. She'd asked him if he'd lied about everything. He had tried lamely to win back her trust, but he'd seen the truth in her eyes: it was gone. Maybe gone forever. And his heart had broken, for although he was guilty of lying to her, and he deserved her anger, he had grown to depend on the unintended connection that had somehow developed between them. He both dreaded and desperately desired to see her again.
"Michael?"
Her voice had long ago become one of his favorite sounds and he turned towards it with a mixture of hope and fear. Her slender fingers found his wrist and he recognized that she was taking his pulse.
"Sara?" He mumbled.
"Yeah. I'm here."
"Are you still mad at me?" He asked. Sara looked down curiously to meet his half-open eyes. She had never heard this self-contained, enigmatic man sound so tentative. She considered her words before answering.
"Let's just say, when you're feeling better, I think we have some talking to do."
Michael's heart lifted a tiny bit. "Does that mean you're going to stick around for a little while?"
"You need me," she replied with simple conviction.
"You have no idea," Michael murmured, completely serious, his eyes closing again. He missed the blush that flew over the doctor's features.
"Your pulse is strong and steady, quite a change from last night," Sara reported. She unrolled the blood pressure cuff. With steady fingers- steadier than she felt inside- Sara grasped his upper arm and began checking his blood pressure. He watched her intensely. She determined that she would not be distracted from her task no matter what his electrifying, disconcertingly close, blue eyes were doing to her composure.
"Sara, can you…"
"Shhh…I'm trying to…" he allowed her to finish reading his blood pressure, although he continued to stare at her. Within a minute, she pulled back and hung her stethoscope around her neck.
"I think you'll live," she pronounced. "What were you saying?"
"I was just wondering where the ice water is. I wouldn't mind some jello or ice cream either." The Michael she knew was back, poking gentle fun at her, his gaze drilling right through her defenses.
"I'll get you some water. But I'm afraid there's no ice. Or jello, or ice cream, for that matter. Are you hungry? I'll go see what Lincoln's got stashed around here," she offered.
"I'm a little hungry." Michael started to sit up.
"Let me help you." Sara stepped to his side and placed her arms around his back and waist, assisting him as he slowly slid into a sitting position without disturbing the IV or reopening his wound. He tried to prolong the process as long as possible, enjoying being securely braced in her arms.
"You okay? Does your shoulder hurt?"
"Nothing hurts."
"That would be the pain meds I gave you earlier," Sara pointed out. "You look a bit buzzed. I'll be right back with some water and food, so stay right there."
"Funny," Michael said wryly. "I don't think I'll be jumping up any time soon."
While he waited for Sara's return, he looked around the room again. The early morning light was shining in freely now, illuminating the previously dark interior. The walls were built of logs and some kind of filler material that looked like stucco. The ceiling was low, typical of an authentic log cabin, and the floors were made of extra wide, polished planks of oak. This was not the cabin Michael had visited as a boy, and he briefly wondered whose it was and who knew about its existence. For how long would they safe here?
Michael's restless eyes next explored the pattern of threads that made up the quilt covering the lower half of his body. He was forcing himself to resist his familiar compulsion to count each thread when Sara came back with food and water.
"Peanut butter?" He asked when he smelled the sandwich she offered him.
"Is it okay? Actually, it's all there is that's edible in this place."
"So I guess it's okay," Michael joked, nibbling the edge. "Sara," he continued after swallowing his first bite. "I'm sorry. About everything."
"Michael, I understand why you lied to me. I would have probably done the same thing, in your case." She stared sadly at the floor.
"But?"
"But it still hurts that you used me, always calculating your conversations with me. I can't believe how easily I fell for everything you told me!" She looked angry again, much to Michael's disappointment.
"It wasn't like that. At least not the whole time."
Sara's eyes filled with tears. "I want to believe you. But I don't know how to trust you again."
Michael began to reach for her but the IV limited his range. His hand flopped back onto the sheet beside him.
"Everything I was about in Fox River had to do with one thing only: freeing my brother. That's done now. Please, Sara, can we start over? Can't we just take the good and leave the bad things behind? You have to admit there's a lot of good in our relationship."
"I don't know," she whispered in a tortured voice.
Author's notes: Sorry so short. The next Chapter will soon be posted!
