"Ahh!"
He yelled, roughly pushing up the blankets and waving about madly. Everywhere he moved the pressure about his eyes continued and he still was unable to see. Frantic, he moved to forcefully rip the bandages off of his face when a set of strong hands caught his own and stilled them. He was still yelling for a bit so he was having trouble hearing the person over his own elevated voice.
"Fred"
"FRED!"
Finally, he was able to hear the voice calling out to him, and he stopped fighting against the set of hands that was struggling to keep him from taking off the bandage. His heart was racing and the blood was pounding in his head making his hearing feel almost stuffy.
"Fred what's wrong?" He finally could hear clearer the voice that had been calling out, but as he stared across the darkness he was not able to find the disembodied voice that belonged to Velma.
"... I can't see anything..." As he spoke the memory of the accident in the darkroom came back to him. The explosion, the smoke and then his vision going out. He remembered it all and he sunk against her grip as he recalled his situation.
Not saying anything, Velma sat at the edge of the bed and pushed lightly against him to guide him back to lay down on the bed. Her slightly cold fingers drew a short line across his forehead to thankfully find he didn't have to worry about a fever on top of the fact tat he couldn't see. Even though he couldn't see, he could still hear the sound of Velma chewing upon her bottom lip. It was the faint sound of her lips parting and her sucking in on the lip so her teeth could chew on it. He might have been more intrigued about the way he knew what she was doing, if he wasn't still trying to calm down from his frightful awakening.
"Is he ok?" Came a quiet call from the door. Almost as if they didn't want him to hear the question. Velma shifted her position on the bed and spoke.
"He's fine, he just had a rough awakening." He could tell she was moving her hands to do some type of hand gesture, but without the gift of sight he could do little know know what she was saying in front of him. That angered him a bit, but he could understand that they were worried too, and they didn't want to say certain things out loud. But he wasn't stupid, just blind.
"Ok, well let me know if you need anything." Daphne mentioned before he could hear her feet shuffling away. She must have been in her slippers, since it made a flip flopping sound that they tended to make since they had an open back and her heel was not restricted by the show so that it flopped as she walked.
"I'm glad you are ok..." Velma had not shifted back to look at him, but spoke more at the door. Slowly, she seemed to move back to where she had been sitting, facing him and looking fully at the wrapping about his head. Unable to see his eyes beyond to get a better feel for what he was feeling. There is a lot of emotion that can be portrayed in the eyes, and a bandage made it hard to see most of besides an occasional eyebrow wiggle underneath.
He gave her a look, well the best he could in the situation and scowled a bit. "You call this ok?" He growled unhappily.
Holding her tongue from responding with more of a sting, she tried to keep in mind he was the one hurt. It wasn't the most polight kind of response, but given the situation he was allowed a bit to be snippy.
Crossing his arms, he turned away and let the air hang for a while. As much as she wanted to snap him out of his huff, she let him be angry for a bit so he would get it out. The seconds ticked away without either talking. The feeling about the room was pensive, and felt like you could cut it with a knife. Fred's mind went from defensive agreement about his right to be angry, to debating if it was a right things to yell at Velma since it wasn't her fault... To feeling bad at what he had done, even though Velma was just trying to help.
"Velma I'm..." He had turned back, softened his frown and let his arms uncross. Velma moved to press a finger to his mouth to quiet him.
"Shhh. I know. But as I was saying I'm glad you were ok." Her voice was soft and filled with tones of understanding. "The sound of the explosion and the smoke, I was worried that there was more of a problem. I am not saying that this is something easy to deal with, but at least both of you guys are alive and in one piece."
She was right. As much as he was angry that he was blind, he was not hurt. Flexing his fingers, he knew they were all there. Sighing, he knew that he could still breath ok. Any mental check he did he found everything was still there besides he fact he couldn't see.
With more of a joking response he sighed again and responded to her. "...I hate when you are right."
He heard a small chuckle from her as she was happy he was lightening up and made a bantering comment. Sarcasm was always a good sign of recovery, or at least acceptance. Sometimes it was easier when you would accept what was wrong and dealt with it rather then deny what was going on, or just stay angry. Nothing could get done if you struggle against people trying to help.
"... So this is how you feel when you loose your glasses." He muttered, getting a playful punch against his shoulder for it.
"Yeah mister. Now you know." She shook her head but most likely was smiling as usual from that kind of remark.
"... And knowing is half the battle..." Fred added, which gained a groan from Velma. She seemed to move and by the sounds of her sweater he figured she covered her face.
"What? Don't like G.I. Joe's?" Fred asked innocently. He would have batted his eyes lashes at her, but it kinda was useless as being blindfolded.
She laughed. "Now I know you're feeling better."
Her laughing quieted down and they sat there in a bit of silence for a while. The awkward kind that seemed to appear once a uncomfortable or difficult conversation had came to an end.
She seemed to be shifting her wait to get up. Fred shot out a hand and grabbed her arm before she got to far. She paused, half getting up to look back over at him. Settling down she sat back on the bed as he clung to her sweater. Squeezing it once, he loosened his grip but still held on.
"..." He wanted to say something, but he felt odd asking for it. Moving his head away for a bit, he fumbled about his mind to find the way to say it.
"Can you..." He started...
"Yes?" Velma's voice seemed confused, though she didn't move from his grip.
"... I mean. If it's not to much trouble... Well..." He stuttered, not being able to stick to one sentence.
"... Get on with it Jones." Velma sighed, but her voice gave away her amusement.
"... Yes. Well." He turned back and moved his free hand to pretend to cough. As if that was holding him back from getting the sentence out fully.
"... Can you visit me again?" He whispered, turning away a bit to itch at his nose. Velma laughed and patted his hand.
"Yes. I'll come back and visit you." She said reassuringly.
"Ah, good... Well, only if you have a spare minute to spend and such." He babbled to try to not force her to come, more like ask if she-would-be-nice-enough-when-ever-she-could-and-poke-her-head-in-to-say-hi rather then admit he just wanted someone by his side all the time while he couldn't see anything.
She patted his hand again and seemed to have nodded since the bed moved under where she was sitting.
"Though..." She started.
"Though?" He repeated confused, wondering what the problem could be.
"... I need my arm back so I can leave in order to come back." She responded with a amused tone to her voice.
"Oh..." He then released her arm and gave it a smoothing motion to get the wrinkles out of where he grabbed. Velma got up and ruffled his hair a bit before the sounds of her feet were about where he judged the door of his room to be.
"I'll be back." She tried to mimic the Austrian actor, but failed. Fred smiled and gave a wave though not knowing if she would even see.
Leaning back into his pillow he found himself staring at the darkness that made up his vision. It felt odd, since the bandages were around his head. It almost felt like where ever he turned, the blackness was moving with him even though he couldn't see anything. Moving his hands, they sought out his blanket on his bed. It wasn't terribly cold, but there was a sense of comfort with his own blankets. Pulling them up and over him, he felt the reassuring light weight the blanket had. The edges he moved between his fingers and he recalled from memory what the blanket itself looked like. His fingers wandered across the edge to the stitching that bordered the whole thing and he traced it as far as he could before bringing his hand back to rest upon his chest. He could move his head and feel all the lumps in his pillow and to his surprise could tell which area's were thinner and where he had to sew it back up after a slightly more energetic round of pillow fighting had resulted in it breaking open and showing the room with the stuffing contained inside. So many things that were always around, but he had not paid any attention to before since he had known they had been there but took no notice to the things around him.
Stifling a yawn, he started to feel tired again. Settling into his blankets, he gave up and drifted off to sleep.