The waiting room was eerily quiet when no one else was in it with me. The space did not have any windows, so the storm raging outside could easily be forgotten. I could also believe I was the only person in the whole hospital with the lack of noise. Not wanting to be alone in such a large complex, I quickly ran through an inventory of everyone I knew that was in the hospital. Nurse Becks was just with me. Jackie, who may or may not be Sean's biological mother, was tucked into her room until she fully recovered from the drowning and the effects of the sedative. Johnny Galloway was probably still in the cafeteria, waiting for the roads to clear up so he could go home. I didn't know where Sean was, but I was confident he was on the grounds and in the company of Dr. Pickett.

My heart ached upon thinking of Dr. Sean, hating the pain and loneliness he must have been suffering for being an unwanted baby. I couldn't afford to dwell on those thoughts; I had been given clear instructions on what I had to do next, and I didn't want my voice breaking with emotion on this phone call. I doubted Mr. Blackbourne would have approved.

My phone came out of my bra, and I remembered I still had Dr. Green's phone. He had left it on Jackie's room, and I picked it up for him before we parted ways. I set the purple cased phone on the coffee table on top of the magazines, promising myself I wouldn't forget it. I would have stuck it in the other cup of my bra, but I feared the electrical shock it could emit if anyone tried to gain his attention with a red or green line.

Mr. Blackbourne's text conversation was far down in my phone; I had to scroll almost to the bottom to find it. We didn't text nearly as much as I did with the other boys.

Sang: Are you busy?

It was just a normal text message, not one from the customized app with the violin as the icon. I didn't want to interrupt, for Mr. Blackbourne was a very busy man…

…which was why I jumped in surprise when my phone immediately started to buzz with an incoming call. The caller ID said Mr. Blackbourne and displayed a picture of him sitting at the piano in Music Room B, his fingers at the keys. I had snapped the picture as he played an impressionist piece about clouds. I tried to be sneaky about taking his picture to complete my contacts list of my guys; I was too nervous to outright ask him permission like I did the eight other boys. Mr. Blackbourne probably knew what I was doing nonetheless, for the picture had that millimeter lift of his lip at the corner of his mouth.

He must have not been too busy for him to answer my text message with a phone call. "Hello?"

"Miss Sorenson."

"Mr. Blackbourne," I automatically answered back.

"Are you alright?" he asked me.

"Yes. I'm fine," was my default reply.

"Did help arrive?" His tone was firm and slightly rushed. He had a thread of nervousness running just under his surface. This was the most rattled I had ever heard him to be, and I didn't like it. I wanted to reassure him, let him know he did not need to worry over me. I just wasn't sure on how to do that, and I wasn't quite sure if it was true or not, whether he really did need to fret over my wellbeing. How pathetic could I be for needing him to worry over me if Dr. Green was the one hurting?

I took in a deep breath and answered on the exhale. "Nurse Becks and Dr. Pickett came just in time. Dr. Green managed to draw Ms. Jackie's blood, but he didn't get to keep it."

"I take it Ms. Jackie is his patient and alleged mother?"

"That's right."

"Where is Dr. Green now?" he asked me. I could hear paper shuffling in the background, like he was at a desk in an office.

"He is with Dr. Pickett right now. Nurse Becks said something about a 'time out.'"

There was a silent pause before Mr. Blackbourne spoke again. "That is her own terminology, Miss Sorenson. Not Academy."

"Oh." I blushed in embarrassment, but glad he could not see my skin flush pink through the phone call. Knowing him, he probably already knew I was red anyways.

"It's a good thing Dr. Green isn't alone right now. He needs supervision until he can find a way to come to terms with his past again." He took in his own deep breath and let it out. Mr. Blackbourne was just as worried over Sean as I was. "A city crew is out and repairing the broken water pipe as we speak, though with the rain, it will still be several hours at minimum before the water levels lower enough for any of us to drive out to you."

My heart sank and lifted at the same time. On one hand, I was sad I was going to remain separated from the rest of the boys for a while longer, but the other hand held optimism that the situation with the flooding was on its way to improving. I just needed to exercise patience. Maybe this extra time secluded at the hospital was a good thing, not for me, but for Dr. Green. He would be forced to face his demons, and hopefully that would be the road to healing in the long run.

"While Mr. Lee made it seem like a joke at first," Mr. Blackbourne carried on, "Silas has indeed procured a rowboat in light of your situation with Dr. Green."

I giggled. I couldn't help it. As many times in such a short time as the guys had brought up Silas and his boat, I was sure Fate was trying to give me a cosmic hint. Hopefully Silas liked to fish and could take me out on the water to teach me. At a later date, of course. I doubted either one of us was in a fishing mood that day with the storm and what the water brought in to the hospital.

Mr. Blackbourne clearing his throat brought me back to the dire circumstances I was in. He had caught me lost in a daydream; Luke must have been rubbing off on me. "Sorry, Mr. Blackbourne."

He continued right on with the business at hand. "Do I need to dispatch him to the hospital?"

"There's no need," I answered. I wasn't in any danger. Neither was Sean, at least physically. We could wait out the flood just fine.

"I trust your judgement," he said. I warmed with his approval. "Is there anything else to report?"

My eyes homed in on the bright splash of purple on the low table in front of my knees. "Yes. I have Dr. Green's phone."

There was another silent moment before Mr. Blackbourne spoke again. I had a feeling I just got the doctor into even more trouble than he was already in.

"It didn't hurt you, did it?"

"No," I replied. "Not while I was holding it." He was concerned about the green button emergency phone calls and how they shocked to ensure the call received the proper attention.

"Good. Return that to him, if you please."

"Yes, Mr. Blackbourne." I fidgeted with the business card Nurse Becks gave me earlier and quickly realized Dr. Pickett's cell phone number was printed on the front. The area code certainly wasn't local to the Charleston area. "If you need to contact Dr. Green now," I said, "you can probably reach him through Dr. Pickett. I have his phone number if you don't."

"Excellent forethought," Mr. Blackbourne praised me, "but not necessary at the moment. Miss Sorenson?"

"Yes, Mr. Blackbourne?"

In the slight pause, I could imagine him adjusting the knot of his suit tie or touching the corner of his glasses to make sure they were perched on his nose perfectly. Those random attentions to details about himself betrayed his true feelings behind his intimidating, yet perfect mask. "Whatever he says to you, he doesn't mean it," he explained. "Dr. Green lashes out with things that do not reflect his true thoughts or feelings when he is overly stressed. Please do not take anything he says to you personally."

The way Mr. Blackbourne spoke made me believe he had experienced Dr. Green's scathing words for himself before, and coming from his best friend, it probably cut him to the bone. If Mr. Blackbourne could still stand by him, I had faith I could too. The verbal jabs Sean gave me hurt, but I still wanted to be there for him.

"Report back to me when you can," Mr. Blackbourne instructed. The clacks of a computer keyboard sounded over the line just before the call ended.

Both Nurse Becks and Dr. Pickett's phone numbers got saved to my contacts. I didn't think I was going to bother asking them for pictures to go with their names. That hardly seemed important in the light of everything else.

I immediately sent off a text to Nurse Becks, proud of myself for remembering to use the random protocol to make sure I entered her number correctly and I wasn't accidentally messaging the wrong person instead.

Sang: Reaganomics.

Nurse Becks: Ugly Christmas sweaters.

My butt wiggled in my seat with a happy dance. I was feeling more Academy with every passing hour today.

Sang: This is Sang. I need to find Dr. Green.

Nurse Becks: Ok sugar. He's in the staff lounge just down the hall from where we were. Call me if you get lost.

I picked up Dr. Green's phone and held it with only my fingertips, clutching just tightly enough to make sure it didn't fall and break on the hard tiled floor as I got up and headed out of the waiting room. I doubted someone would red or green line Dr. Green in the short span it took me to find the staff lounge, but the fear was still there, so I exercised caution to minimize the shock. Just in case.

The greater chance was that the lounge was in the same direction the two doctors headed when we initially parted ways outside of Jackie's room, so that was the way I went. There was the oddball risk of the men doubling back or circling around so they were behind me. I hoped luck was on my side.

A/N: This is about half as much as I wanted to put in. I'm sorry! My muses have been giving me problems lately, including Loki, who is currently pestering me to work on Paper Crane. Hopefully this chapter will be enough to tide you over until I can get the next chapter written out. See what I did there? "Tide?" Ah haha hahhaaa ha… eh… heh.. heh?

no?

Tough crowd.