As lawslave as my witness, this chapter and the slap to be heard 'round the werks Jamko world was written and shared with her weeks before the preview to S6-E15 ever aired. Maybe the BB writers are channeling this piece because that's not the only coincidence lately with that hoarder's apartment in S6-E18. She's got my back on this! lol.
Chapter 9
Taking a prompt from what he had observed earlier, Danny purposefully steered his brother away from the crowded front entrance of the hospital and in through a back door. Jamie had settled into a sort of self-imposed quiet isolation just as his older brother had feared and allowed himself to be guided with little independent thought and absolutely no protest. He had slipped his badge over his belt before changing obediently into the clean crew-neck t-shirt provided and moved where he was told until they arrived in the back hall which had been turned into a kind of temporary command center where quite a few of Carson and Rodgers' close friends from the 3-5 had been allowed back and were now present. There he stopped short as he spotted his father across the way where Frank was in conference with Renzulli and Wilson. The pair locked eyes for a second as Frank pursed his lips and nodded slightly while Jamie gave a tight grimace and a small, almost imperceptible shake of his head before Danny pushed him firmly from behind to keep him walking towards Eddie's room while he shot a look and a frown at his father that told him in no uncertain terms that things were not good.
"In here first, Harvard," he insisted as he prayed that they would find Eddie in a better state although he was prepared with a hand on his brother's arm just in case. Instead there was only an empty bed with Eva sitting in the accompanying chair with Kaylin on her lap. "Daddy!" she yelled and started to wiggle.
"Where… where is she?" Jamie rasped in a bit of panic as his future mother-in-law jumped to her feet and set the little girl down so she should run to her father. He immediately scooped her up in his arms but his eyes never left Eva.
"They just took her down the hall for some kind of scan before the doctor came in to do her stitches," she revealed. "Linda said they would be back any minute now," she assured. "Jamison… it's so good… I mean, thank goodness… we thought..."
"I know, I'm sorry..." he muttered softly as Kaylin squeezed her little arms tightly around his neck. She was a perceptive child, and while she couldn't comprehend what was truly going on, she could sense the tension and she knew that no matter what she was safe in her father's arms so had no intention of leaving them.
"Eddie has a bad boo-boo," she cried softly into his shoulder. "She fell down!"
"I know, baby," he whispered hoarsely as he patted her back and kissed her cheek while the thought that his child had witnessed what happened knifed through his heart and added to the cumulative guilt he was already feeling. "Don't worry though, we're gonna make it all better. I promise, okay?" Jamie would have stood there all day comforting the little girl, but a sudden disruption in the hallway caught his attention and he managed to brush past his brother's warning nudge to step out in the doorway, thinking that perhaps it was Eddie being returned to the room. Jamie instantly went three shades paler as he recognized Eloise Carson being helped down the hall by a man with similar features and build to the Lieutenant, having obviously just come from viewing the body. He had met her several times over the course of the past year as she would often stop in during the middle of a shift to drop off lunch for her husband. Every officer and NYPD official in the area instantly came to attention as she tearfully walked past them clinging to the other man's arm, stopping as his father put a hand out and leaned in to speak some soft words. A moment later, Frank stood up and three pairs of eyes shifted over directly at Jamie and he stiffened as Eloise began to make her way slowly towards him.
"Kaylin, sweetheart, Daddy needs to talk to this lady," Jamie whispered as he tried to pull the little girl away from his shoulder. "Can you please go with Grandma Eva for a minute?"
"No! No not Nagyanya!" Kaylin cried as she clung even tighter. Jamie had no idea what she was talking about at that point and there wasn't any time to ask, he only knew that he was going to have the face the shocked new widow of the man that had taken his place in that cruiser today with his daughter in his hands as she buried her face even further into his neck. Danny had come up alongside of him and taken a protective step forward while keeping a hand on Jamie's side as he had the same sense that this was not going to go well.
"Sergeant Jamison Reagan," Eloise Carson said softly as she approached and stood in front of him with the other man still supporting her. "I need to speak to you," she whispered.
"Yes, ma'am," he replied in his all-but absent voice as he hitched Kaylin up a little more on his hip as she remained flattened on his shoulder. "I'm so sorry for your loss…" he started.
What happened next was not anticipated by anyone… not Jamie or Danny; their father with his ever-present detail complete now with Renzulli and Wilson; the surrounding officers from the 3-5 who stood at attention; Eva who was plastered in the doorway behind her future son-in-law, or Eddie who for now was unnoticed and only had eyes for the love of her life… the one that she had convinced herself she would never see alive again... as she was being quietly wheeled back to the room from down the hall by Linda.
No one expected the defeated-looking Eloise Carson to reach out and viciously slap Jamie across the left side of his face as hard and as fast as a rattlesnake bite as she screamed at him with all of the anger now pent up in her soul. "I DON'T CARE WHOSE SON YOU ARE! It should have been YOU in that car today!" she cried. "Don't you DARE show your face at his funeral unless you take your place in that box instead of my Bobby! MY HUSBAND WAS A GOOD MAN!... HE WAS! He didn't deserve this! My daughters didn't deserve to lose their father today!"
The grieving Mrs. Carson was immediately pushed off to the side by her companion who looked equally stunned as everyone else in the vicinity as Jamie absorbed the surprisingly hard blow and staggered back just a step in shock as Kaylin started to wail in fear of the woman's sudden actions and volume. He honestly forgot to breathe for the next few seconds as he just stared on blankly while one side of his vision blurred before Danny managed to steady him and push him back in the room while the widow was instantly surrounded with concerned onlookers as her knees buckled and she threatened to collapse herself and Frank was forced to rush over to her first in a sense of duty.
"Jesus, I'm sorry, kid," Danny's words were broadcast but nowhere near ready to be received in Jamie's brain as his older brother cursed himself for allowing that to take place. He knew all too well the effects that deep sudden grief like this could have on family members, but what had just happened wasn't right on any level and would only add to the blame that he was sure Jamie would no doubt invoke upon himself.
In the meantime, Eddie had also plainly witnessed what had occurred and her hands had gone to cover her mouth in another level of disbelief as Linda quickly wheeled her down the remaining few feet and pushed her inside the room before briskly closing the door behind them to keep the sounds in the hallway at bay. It was the look on Eddie's face that finally broke Jamie's stupor, and a shock that would instantly turn into so many intense emotions reeled through the both of them as he stepped forward to catch her as she leaped out of the chair to collapse against him. There were no coherent words as she allowed herself to sob for a few seconds while everyone else attempted to guide the little family over to sit on the bed so that Jamie wouldn't go down himself under the weight of his two greatest loves who were now both clinging to him for all they were worth.
"Well, you two certainly look like quite a pair," Linda observed softly after giving them quite a few moments before the nurse in her came back to the forefront and she stepped in and gently tried to guide Eddie's bandaged area away from his shoulder and off to the side since the doctor was due to arrive any moment to start stitching her wound. "Honey, you need to get back in bed now so we can get you fixed up," she advised. "The CT results came back looking good," she assured everyone as she gently went about untangling the three of them from one another. Kaylin had already calmed down a great deal in the quieter presence of this room, however she was still not ready to budge from her spot on her father. "But we are going to keep her here just as a precaution to keep an eye on her since she certainly has a concussion. She'll need to be watched carefully and take it easy for a few days. The doctor will be in later to discuss things with you."
Without knowing exactly why, Eddie cried out, "please stay here tonight!" as she pulled back slightly and gently cupped Jamie's face just below the angry red mark left my Mrs. Carson's hand. "I need you," she continued with a broken voice while an intense anger started to well up in the place of her own grief as her momma bear claws were unleashed when she saw the damage that had been done... not so much the physical bruise, but the utter soulful dagger those ugly and heated remarks had left behind in him.
"I'm not going anywhere," he rasped with the tiniest twitch in the corner of his mouth in the familiar interplay between the two of them, but there was no light left in his eyes and despite everything that had already happened so far that day… Eddie found that to be the most frightening thing of all. "It's alright," he tried to assure as he shifted Kaylin to the side after reading her thoughts and knowing exactly where her mind was.
"She hit you with our child in your arms, Jamie! You didn't do anything wrong!"
"Please, Ed… not now," he pleaded softly as he glanced around the room at the concerned faces… all wondering of course just how he might react. Danny was staring at him and reading the situation like an open book, and he suddenly felt as if he was being uncomfortably shoved under a microscope while not having what was needed at the moment to relive this in front of everyone again. There was a solitary place within that Jamie was accustomed to going where he either dealt with things like this or decided to lock them away and having it out in the open was adding to his unease. "Baby, you have a concussion and the doctor told you to take it easy. Let it go. She just lost her husband. We have to be thankful for what we have," he added flatly as an almost afterthought.
"No it's not okay, Jamie! Would it have been okay if this had happened last week when you were pulling shifts for him and I did that to the Lieutenant in front of his wife and children with all the rest of the 3-5 standing there?"
"Eddie, you fainted when you thought it was me. No one knows how we'll react to the stress of something like that. Please, we can't judge her for her actions today, alright?" he asked as he kissed her forehead once more and turned around to help as Linda and Eva guided her back into bed and under the blanket.
A soft knock at the door ushered in a harried-looking Police Commissioner as well as Dr. Miller, the chief of plastic surgery at the hospital who had been called in to attend to Eddie's cut personally. Frank took one look at his youngest and his heart dropped at the mere ghostly presence that had been left behind after the events of the day, and as much as he wanted to cross the room in two steps and physically take his son in his arms to hold him and tell him that everything would be okay, he restrained himself. There would be time for that later in private, he promised... later since there were still so many necessary unpleasantries left unfinished.
"Jamie," Frank called quietly after the doctor had made his introductions and busied himself setting up for his task as Linda assisted in pulling the necessary trays over to the bedside. "Come here, son, I need to talk to you," he ordered. "Lieutenant Carson's older brother, David, wishes to speak with you," he revealed after giving in to his own need to ground himself by placing a hand on his youngest's shoulder when he was finally successful in passing Kaylin over to Eva; the two taking their leave with the promise of a trip to the cafeteria for some ice cream to clear the room as Eddie was being readied for her procedure.
"Seriously?" Danny hissed in a whisper as he had accompanied his little brother over to the doorway for the conference. He was still enraged himself with what had taken place in that hallway and had taken the whole situation personally. "What does he want? A crack at the kid himself?"
"He's an FDNY captain," Frank explained gently. "He's been through the drill himself. Son, he had no idea she was going to react like that and wants to apologize in person," he said as he sought Jamie's eyes despite the somewhat unsettling swelling and discoloration now taking place under the left one, but they were instead still listless and now glued to the floor as the young man could not bring himself to look at his father. "The doctors have taken her down the hall and prescribed a sedative. Maybe we should get someone in here to have a look at you as well," he worried as that strike had certainly left a mark and would no doubt be a constant reminder of the widow's feelings for the next week or so.
"I'm fine, Dad," Jamie rasped almost breathlessly as that remark had caused his hazel eyes to flash upwards in anger for the first time. He felt like he was caught in a virtual stew of emotions at that moment and really didn't have a handle on any of them at this point, but the last thing he wanted was to be poked or prodded or have any more attention directed at himself... he certainly hadn't been one of those unfortunates in the car or collapsing to the ground in a heap today because of it. He had instead selfishly gone to his girlfriend's apartment in the middle of the day to take a nap in unfettered peace and quiet after all.
"I insist," Frank replied firmly as that closer inspection had revealed a nasty broken blood vessel leaving an unsettling bright red blood streak in the lower part of the eye itself.
"Whatever," Jamie muttered as he knew it was a lost cause now. "How's Rodgers doing?" he deflected as he averted his gaze once more.
"Still in surgery," his father confirmed. "They've repaired the lung and are trying to extract the bullet now. So far he's holding his own. The doctors expect they'll need to keep him on a ventilator and sedated for at least the next several days though before he'll be strong enough to come out of it and breathe on his own."
"Did he give up anything on the shooter?" the youngest Reagan asked coldly.
"No, he was unconscious at the scene… we don't have much to go on yet," Frank admitted. "The task force is on it, though."
"Shouldn't you get out of here and go to work then?" Jamie directed at Danny. He was still irritated with the way his brother had played him earlier… like he was a little child that could be expected to fall apart over something like this all the time. "I've got nothing left to give you so don't feel the need to babysit me any more."
"Hey! You're a little bit more important to me than the case, kid," Danny admitted but did not fail to catch the glare Linda shot his way from over by Eddie's bedside. So many of their arguments lately revolved around the fact that she thought he always put the work before her… and yet here he was sticking around for his younger brother when there was a cop-killer out there on the streets. Looked like another chilly night ahead at the Reagan home in Staten Island.
"Captain Carson is down the hall waiting for us. We should go…" Frank began before being interrupted by a small cry from the bed.
"Jamie, wait!" Eddie called in a bit of a panic as she lay back flat with a sterile blue sheet draped over the wound and now concealing her face as it was prepped for the stitches and a numbing solution was being injected. He immediately hurried back to her side and his stomach churned at the sight of the rather jagged gash on the side of her head the doctor was getting set to trim up. Surely that was going to scar in some fashion unless this plastics guy was truly gifted and the wedding was only four months away.
"I'm here, Ed," he assured as he grabbed her hand and kissed it while the doctor paused with the needle in his hand and shot him a disparaging look. "Honey, you have to stay still for Dr. Miller so he can do a good job, okay? Listen, I've gotta go with my dad for just a minute, and then I'm coming right back. I promise," he vowed as he rubbed her arm and felt her tense up.
"Okay, okay," she sniffed, for some inexplicable reason she had an overwhelming sense that he would continue to be pulled away from her. "Sorry… just don't… Jamie, please don't listen to him if he says anything bad, alright? This wasn't your fault."
"Yeah," he conceded as his voice disappeared once more from the cumulative effect of emotions and illness. "I'll be right back," he scratched out as he gave her another small squeeze before gently laying her hand down on the bed. "Love ya, Janko," he said as he walked away.
Eddie closed her eyes under the blue draping and her worried heart listened to the footsteps as they disappeared through the door as she prayed for him to have strength.
"You better get used to that with this family," Linda's voice drifted over to her with a more than a hint of crossness. "When you're a Reagan the obligations to the job always come first."
So Jamie is going to struggle with this that much is for sure… and trouble in paradise keeps cropping up for Danny and Linda at a time he'll need his whole family behind him to deal with the guilt. Problem is everyone will assume this was some kind of random act of violence against the police, or perhaps a personal vendetta against Carson or Rodgers. The only one that knows the truth about who the shooter was really after will be lying in a medically induced coma for at least the next several days and Danny is going to run into all kinds of brick walls trying to figure out who the guy really is in the meantime.
