UPDATED


Chapter 2- One Step Behind

After the Doctor's bombshell announcement the hospital room went completely silent for at least two minutes.

"What do you mean nothing is wrong?" Henry said tentatively. "You mean the stitches look good, right?"

"No Mr. Spencer..." Dr. Grey said disbelievingly, "There is nothing wrong. There is no cut, but the stitches still seem to be here. They just are not stitching anything."

Shawn looked and sure enough, it looked like his arm had been given fifteen stitches for no reason. Without turning his head and giving himself away he checked the parts of him that were road-rashed from his skid. There were no cuts there either, not even scars or bruises. Basically no evidence he had been in a crash at all besides a freaked out doctor and a destroyed motorcycle.

Dr. Grey turned and addressed Shawn. "I can't explain it, I stitched up your arm myself. Y-you were bleeding..." He grabbed the chart and started reading frantically.

Henry looked at his son's arm for himself. "Kid, do they hurt?"

"Not really." Shawn sat up a bit and briefly locked eyes with Gus. His best friend had not moved from where he stood by the window and was flicking his eyes back and forth between Shawn's arm and the doctor with a worried expression.

Putting the chart back down Dr. Grey excused himself and rushed out of the room without another word to the shocked men.

Another uncomfortable silence descended on the room. Usually Shawn would break them with a snarky retort or a funny observation but Gus could see that his friend was freaking out. When Shawn was not talking, that was not a good thing no matter what Carlton Lassiter says. Shawn was completely lost in his thoughts, reliving every single moment he was conscious in the past twenty four hours that would explain anything about what was going on.

Gus was also freaking out, but in his own way, the stating the obvious and repeating himself way. "Shawn, you just healed from a life threatening wound over night! How is that even medically and physically possible?" Gus looked at Henry for help.

"I think I know how." Henry interjected. "The doctor made a mistake. Lots of patients and an overworked doctor, it could and does happen."

"But that doesn't make any sense! He lost a lot of blood! We both saw what he looked like when we got in here after he had the seizure." Gus pointed out.

"Listen, all this could have been because he was given blood when he didn't need it and was probably given the wrong blood type." Henry looked at Shawn who was still silent. "SHAWN!" Shawn jumped and looked up at his father. "What did you remember about your accident?"

"Dad, can we not do this right now?" Shawn snapped, "If I am okay, I just want to get out of here and back to the SBPD ASAP." He began to un-wrap his arm from the now useless bandages. Shawn saw there was blood on them but he hid it from the other men in the room. "I don't want to have them charging you for services I'm not using and I want to see Jules."

"Shawn you're over reacting. We can see that something happened to you and you still need to sit tight until they can figure out what it was." Henry stood up from Shawn's side and paced the room. "Why is it that every time you end up in the hospital something weird happens?" Henry sighed. "Why don't we get some sleep and I'll call Juliet and Carlton tomorrow to tell them what is going on."

Shawn fell back into bed. "Okay fine dad, but when I get out of here, I want my smoothie. My mouth is craving a plethora of delicious flavor."

All three men settled down for the rest of the night but only two got any sleep. Shawn did try but he kept feeling too hot and uncomfortable in the hospital bed. Plus it was way too loud. Every footstep and machine beep seemed to resonate in his skull. By the time morning came he was incredibly grumpy and his head hurt.


Around 8am when breakfast arrived, Dr. Grey walked in. Shawn noticed the bags were almost gone from under his eyes and he was wearing cleaner clothes. He had to have gone home and gotten some rest after the shock of thinking he screwed up really bad on a patient. Gus and Henry were just rubbing the sleep from their eyes and sat up as the doctor came through the door. The nurse started handing out trays to each of them. Shawn's looked considerably less appetizing than his father's and Gus' but beggars couldn't be choosers.

Gus immediately put on his patented "Hey There" face and made eyes at the nurse. Henry rolled his eyes and dug into the food, completely used to this behavior from his son's friend.

Shawn sniffed his plate. Broth, lime Jell-O and milk. "Liquid diet, nice." Shawn pouted. He was suddenly not very hungry at all. He pushed the tray away from him and waited for the doctor to finish talking to the departing nurse.

After a minute Dr. Gray approached the group. "Gentlemen, I want to apologize for my behavior earlier. I've checked with the other hospital staff and the EMTs that picked Shawn up from his accident and they did say his arm was severely injured. I can't explain why the injury is no longer there but I can assure you that it did happen and I did not accidentally stitch up Shawn's arm for no reason. We would like to keep Shawn for a day or so to run some tests to see what happened to give him such a miraculous recovery."

"Yeah, sorry I am not up for tests." Shawn said as he started to get out of bed. "Gus here would like some tests though. Maybe you can figure out why his head is so magically delicious."

"Stop comparing my head to Lucky Charms Shawn." Gus glared at his friend.

"Shawn, don't be an idiot." Henry admonished his son, "There could be complications later on."

Shawn started to pull out the IVs carefully. He knew from experience yanking them out really hurts. He had his dad and a poisoning, murdering lesbian to thank for that one. The doctor raised a finger in Shawn's direction but decided not to argue. "The only complication is that somehow overnight I became Wolverine and I have no idea how it happened."

"We will need you to sign some forms but if you insist we can't keep you here against your will Shawn." Dr. Grey explained.

"Dad, could you give Jules a call. I don't know what happened to my phone and I will be damned if I have to spend two hours sitting in between you guys in the truck." Shawn rubbed his hand where he had pulled out the IVs, he expected a lingering stinging sensation, but there was nothing. Casually glancing at his hand he noticed the hole where the IV was inserted was also no longer noticeable. Shawn nervously looked around to see if anyone else had noticed. By the way the others were still talking he figured they hadn't. "Dad, on second thought I'll call Jules." Henry handed him his phone.

Shawn turned his back to Henry and Gus who immediately stopped eating. "SHAWN!" Both shouted at the same time. After getting his attention Gus pointed to his backside and Henry said, "Son, you're in a hospital gown."

Mortified, Shawn ran his bare backside into the bathroom. "Doctor... could you mind bringing me some clothes?" He yelled through the door.


"Miraculous recovery! Yes, that is what they said." Shawn strutted out of the hospital, pausing to rub his eyes as he stepped into the sunlight. Juliet, Gus and Henry were at his side and a phone to his ear. "Yes mom. I'll remember to take care of myself... Okay, love you too." With a smile Shawn hung up the phone. "Dad, Mom says Hi."

"That is nice of her." Henry said with a twinkle in his eye. He still had a thing for his ex-wife even though they had been divorced for many years.

Shawn continued, "She also said that Andy Worhol wants his curtains back."

"What?" Henry looked at Shawn confused, before realizing where he was looking. His shirt. It was mostly yellow with bright designs on it. "There's nothing wrong with my shirt Shawn! It is a styling and perfectly nice shirt." Henry tended to get defensive when Shawn made fun of his clothes.

Juliet stepped forward before Henry got any more indignant about the shirt and turned towards Shawn, "Good to see your humor is still intact Shawn." She took his hand. She had driven down from Santa Barbara to pick him up. He sounded great on the phone which was a surprise since the last time she had seen him he was covered in blood and on a gurney. She had cried for a day straight but was not family and was unable to see him. She had to return to work the second day. Chief Vick and Carlton had made sure she was okay, but only the Chief had asked about Shawn. Juliet knew her partner Carlton did not care for Shawn's methods but did not actually hate him. He just liked to put on a show.

As Shawn leaned in for a kiss, Juliet put a finger up to his lips. "I have something for you." She smiled and reached into her vehicle only to pull out a large pineapple smoothie.

Shawn eagerly held his hands out and took the Smoothie. "You complete me!" Shawn said happily, then turned to Juliet who finally let him kiss her. "I love you too Jules." She smiled in triumph, having actually been able to surprise her psychic boyfriend.

Shawn was incredibly hungry. He had only been able to drink a small amount of water and no food since before his accident over two days ago. It wasn't for lack of trying. After the doctor left he had turned to his food tray and attempted to eat some pudding. He doesn't know how they made pudding so disgusting but he figured it was just because it was hospital food. Salivating over the ambrosia in his hand he said goodbye to his Dad and Gus before getting in Juliet's car. He took a long sip on the straw sticking out of his smoothie. He managed to hide his gagging from Juliet who was really proud she had gotten him something he really liked... unfortunately it was also the worst pineapple smoothie he had ever tasted. He looked at the logo on the cup as they pulled out onto the highway to head home, and swore he would never eat at that place ever again.


Mick St. John pulled into the hospital parking lot around 11am. He was not a happy camper. He had tried last night to be able to get into the hospital and see Shawn Spencer but was turned away due to not being a family member. He eventually had to return home and get some sleep. He had gotten up as soon as he could and rushed over to see if he could get into see him today.

As he got out of his car he noticed a group of people leaving the hospital. A young man on a phone was being escorted out by a woman and two men, one white and older, one black. The woman handed the young man a large cup and Mick smiled at the gesture because he had never seen a full grown man's face light up so much over a beverage. The couple kissed and got into their vehicle. The other two were still talking as Mick passed by them. The old man was arguing with the black man, who smelled oddly of Lavender, about who would drive.

Shaking his head he headed into the hospital, only to be greatly disappointed to learn that Shawn Spencer was discharged no more than Ten minutes earlier on his own accord.

"Is there any way you could tell me which town he was going to?" Mick showed the nurse his Private Investigator badge.

"I cannot divulge that information sir." the nurse said stubbornly, "But I can tell you that the Santa Barbara police called here every day to see how he was doing."

"Thank you very much." Mick hurried out of the hospital and put his sunglasses on.

Once behind the wheel he banged his head on it. It was going to take him a couple hours to drive to Santa Barbara and on a sunny day like this it was going to be miserable and almost impossible. Too much sun could kill a vampire but it didn't immediately burst them into flames as the movies love to portray. He wondered how Shawn was going to fare, would he know enough to get into a trunk or cover up? Were the police the ones transporting him? Was he a criminal? Mick hated running into situations half cocked so he figured some research was in order. Josef would not be up yet so he could not really call and tell him what was going on. Plus he also had to figure out where this guy even lived. Speeding out of the parking lot, Mick headed home to get some clothes that covered him up better and to get his lap top for the research hoping he would not be too late again.