Amy was fast asleep on her couch when a piercing ring startled her awake, almost causing her to fall onto the floor. Letting out a scream as she bolted upright, she accidentally smacked her bandaged leg against the living room table, causing her to yell again. She wasn't used to having the phone right beside her head when she slept, so its ringing had scared her half to death when she woke up.
With her teeth gritted together to keep from crying out due to the now throbbing bruise on her leg, she unwillingly picked up the accursed phone. "Hello?" she asked through her teeth, trying not to sound angry.
"AMY! Guess WHAT?" Knuckles's voice practically screamed so that she had to hold the phone an arm's length away from her head.
"Is it worth guessing?" she said, now full-on grouchy from the morning's events so far.
"I HAVE A DATE WITH ROUGE! Can you believe it? Your crazy advice worked!"
Resisting the urge to slam the phone down, she forced herself to smile in an attempt at convincing not only the echidna - who couldn't see her anyway - but herself as well that she was happy for him. She really was, but couldn't he wait until a decent time to call? After all, it was only...9:30! How could it be any later than 8 already?
"That's great, Knuckles! I told you it would work," she cleared her throat and shook off the morning grumpiness, trying not to focus on the throbbing spot on her right leg.
"I know, right? I'm meeting her tomorrow night at that pizza place; pretty cool huh?"
"Yep. Hey, can I call you later, though?"
"Yeah, sure. Anything wrong?"
"No, I just woke up is all. I'll talk to ya soon though," Amy said cheerfully while gritting her teeth.
"Oh, well okay. Talk to you later," the echidna exclaimed, apparently excited, but Amy stopped him just before he hung up.
"Hey wait! When is the next baseball game on?"
"Well, there's one pretty much every day, and the one tonight starts at 6:30," he said, having apparently memorized the schedule.
"Well come over then and we can talk, okay?"
"Alright! See ya then!" the echidna said enthusiastically just before he hung up.
Amy calmly hung up her own phone and slowly let her eyes trail down to the now darkening splotch on her shin, just a few inches below the bottom of her cast.
"Oh maan," she groaned, putting her leg up on the couch to inspect it more closely. "At least it didn't hit my cast," she sighed.
Her knee was fine, just a little jostled, which was the main importance of the situation. If she had hit it, it could easily displace the repairing ligaments and mess up the entire healing process. Plus, it was Monday, which meant that she would be going over to see Tails later for her weekly inspection. It had been exactly a week ago now that she had broken it, so Tails would have to take another x-ray to check the progress and adjust anything later today.
Amy sighed again and dragged her crutches over so that she could stand up. Flinching slightly as she stood, she tried her best to push away the soreness by smiling. It was a twisted fake-looking smile, but it worked well enough for her. The house was chilly, so she pulled on a pair of gray pants that stretched over her cast and a red jacket over her tank top on her way to the kitchen. Just as she reached the table after pouring a cup of coffee, however, Sonic burst through the front doors without warning.
"Man in the house; make yourself decent!" he hollered so loudly in made Amy jump and hit her other knee against the top of the table. Some of the coffee sloshed out of the cup, but thankfully, none landed on her.
"Ouch!" Amy yelled as Sonic appeared in the doorway to the kitchen.
"What?" he asked, concern clouding over the enthusiasm in his eyes.
Amy bit her lip in an attempt to keep from yelping again, trying to force herself to keep smiling.
"Aammyyy?" Sonic asked warily, taking a step into the kitchen.
Just as he did, Amy opened her mouth with the original intention of breathing, but ended up nearly yelling out in pain and frustration. However, just as noise escaped her lips, she changed the sound so that it came out as a loud, utterly unconvincing, somewhat psychotic laugh. Sonic took as step back, staring incredulously at her while she got over the momentary insanity.
"Should I be concerned?" he asked as her almost maniacal laugh slowly died and she let her head fall on the table.
"Today's a great day, isn't it?" she said in an absolutely phony-happy soprano squeak.
"Uh, suure. I'm just gonna go call the mental doctors now, okay?" he said slowly, pretending to back away.
"Ugh, sorry; I'm probably freaking you out right now huh?"
"No, no, this is totally normal," Sonic said sarcastically, zipping over to sit beside her and noticing the small puddle of coffee on the table. "Did you spill hot coffee on yourself?" he guessed.
"There's still a whole cup, though, so I'm not gonna say anything yet and jinx it," she sulked.
"Oh, so it's one of those days," Sonic said in an exaggerated way.
"Should I just hit you now, or wait until the next stupid comment and then hit you twice as hard?"
"Now's fine," Sonic said indifferently as Amy swung at his shoulder more playfully than angry. "Seriously? Do I have to say it?"
"Don't say it," Amy pleaded.
"You hit," he began.
"You're only getting yourself in more trouble," Amy warned.
"Like..."
"Really. You can stop there unless you're just that stupid."
"You hit like a girl. Hah!" Sonic laughed and Amy reared back and punched him again, only much harder. "Eheh, see now that's better," Sonic said, grinning while he rubbed his arm.
"You shouldn't tease someone with a hammer bigger than even your mouth," Amy said.
"Yeah, but you can't use it, remember?"
"Says you! I'm gonna ask Tails about that today."
"But you still couldn't; remember the bet?"
"How could I forget? Oh and by the way, don't you at least knock to give me half a warning anymore?"
"Naw, it's not like that would help; you're still a cripple who couldn't answer the door."
"I am not a cripple, and what if...what if I had been getting dressed or something?"
"Amy, please, I know you. You live alone and still go in the bathroom with the door locked when you change clothes."
"There's nothing wrong with that; it's just an old habit. And, you know, old habits die hard, right?"
"No, you're just paranoid."
"Okay, did you just come over here to tease me or was there an actual reason?" Amy asked, sipping the steaming cup of coffee cautiously as to not risk the inevitable spill.
"Oh yeah! Tails has got to leave again later and he wanted me to go ahead and bring you over for your leg checkup thing!" Sonic said, pulling her into his arms the second she set down her cup.
"Sonic! I didn't even get breakfast yet!" she argued as he took off towards his and Tails's place.
"It's okay, I didn't yet either but we have doughnuts over there," Sonic said.
"But...I'm not dressed yet!"
"So? We're just going to see Tails for a quick check up thing and then I can bring you back," Sonic said.
Amy sighed and decided to give up; there was no sense in arguing with the stubborn hedgehog, plus they were practically there anyway due to his incredible speed. Within only a short moment, Sonic was skidding to a stop in the kitchen of the large metal building in which he and his brother-like two tailed fox companion were accommodated.
"TAILS! I BROUGHT AMY!" Sonic yelled as he set her down on one of the chairs.
"Wow, the kitchen is...clean," Amy said, somewhat surprised. Tails was often too busy to keep things tidy and Sonic was...well Sonic. Cleaning wasn't exactly one of his priorities.
"Tails gave me chores," Sonic grumbled and Amy couldn't help but giggling.
"Well good for both of you," Amy laughed. "It does look good in here."
"Thanks! I'm glad you could tell; it took me, like, almost an hour yesterday!"
"Ya know, normal speed people would've probably taken two or three hours," Amy commented.
"Well sucks for them," Sonic said as he pulled a large white box down from the refrigerator and set it on the table, getting two plates for them to get some doughnuts.
"Us, Sonic. I'm normal speed, remember? You and Shadow are the only ones who wouldn't! That is, if Shadow ever does clean and stuff..."
"You're weird," Sonic said as if it was as natural as saying 'hey, what's up?' or something. Amy punched him again just as Tails found his way into the kitchen.
"Oh, hey Amy! How are you?"
Amy quickly turned her glare at Sonic into a polite smile directed towards the fox. "I'm fine, thank you. I've heard you've been busy lately."
"Yeah, there's a lot of stuff going on in Mazuri and I keep getting sucked into it all. It's all good though, other than going back and forth every other day."
"Why can't you just stay for a few days at a time, if you've gotta keep going back anyway?" Amy wondered.
"Well, mostly because I'm afraid of what Sonic here would do to the place," Tails admitted.
"Hey, I take offense to that!" Sonic interjected.
"If he tried to fend for himself for a while, chances are that something would explode by dinner time," Tails continued, ignoring Sonic's comment.
"You know I'm right here, right? And can hear everything you're saying?" he added.
"Well maybe you should have a babysitter for him," Amy suggested jokingly, shooting Sonic a quick teasing smirk.
"Yeah, like anyone would be willing to put up with him," Tails joked.
"Still in the room, guys. And by the way, Amy's been putting up with me just fine the past few days...or week actually."
"He's not that bad," Amy shrugged with a slight giggle.
"Hey, I have an idea!" Sonic said, and finally the two turned to him. "Tails, you could go out of town for a while and Amy will keep an eye on me while I take care of her! Because apparently neither of us can be left alone, so why not just let us deal with each other!"
"That's...actually not a bad idea. Only if you'd be up to it though, Amy," Tails said, turning to Amy.
"Sure, that sounds fine."
"Really? Are you sure? Because, you don't have to or anything; just if you think..." Tails trailed off as Amy rolled her eyes.
"Tails, I've dealt with hyper five-year-olds at the park with no parents before; I can handle Sonic."
"Hey, I'm not five, and I'm three years older than you Ms. Super-sitter," Sonic said, only pretending to be annoyed really.
"Okay, if you're sure. Really the only thing I'm concerned with is making sure he has something other than chilly dogs every night and not too much sugar or anything."
"You say that while I sit here eating a chocolate glazed doughnut with sprinkles," Sonic said, gesturing to his breakfast.
"I mean don't get into the sugar container and dump it all in your mouth like that one time," Tails said, looking annoyed.
"That was just once, and...I didn't know we still had a sugar container after that," Sonic smirked, causing both of the other two to shudder at the memory. There had been a few tornadoes plaguing the surrounding areas that day, mostly because of Sonic's even more extreme rapid whirlwind of running.
"Anyway, we can talk about it some other time if we have to," Tails said, apparently trying to distract Sonic from the mention of the sugar container. "For now, I have to get you all checked up on, Amy."
Sonic automatically picked the girl up and followed as Tails led them back to the hospital wing of his shop.
"Can you roll you pants leg up; I'm gonna need to take off the cast for a few minutes to do another x-ray," Tails said.
Amy obediently did and Sonic noticed the purplish bruise that had built on her shin.
"What did you do?" Sonic asked, gesturing to the blotch of dark skin.
"I hit it on the table this morning," she admitted, but quickly added onto it. "But my knee was fine!"
"Was that what happened when I got there?" Sonic asked, looking somewhat guilty.
"No, that's from when Knuckles called and woke me up. Don't worry, though, you gave me one on my other knee," Amy said, rolling her eyes.
"Yay, I gave you your own bruise!"
"And you called me weird," Amy muttered and Tails just laughed at the two as he carefully unlatched her cast. "Wow, air!"
"Yes, it's everywhere. Is this new, Amy?" Sonic teased.
"Not like breathing, you dunderhead! I meant my leg," she said.
"Tails, Amy called me a dunderhead!" Sonic yelled in a purposefully immature voice.
"Let's not bicker, shall we?" Tails said, rolling his eyes. "Amy, be absolutely still; I'm gonna do the x-ray and be right back, okay?"
"Sure; I'll be a statue."
"We'll see about that," Sonic smirked taking half a step towards her.
"Sonic, you stay right where you are or farther! If you make me move and screw up my leg even worse I swear I gonna-"
"Freeze!" Tails instructed and they both stopped mid-movement as the x-ray did its scan.
They both sighed in slight relief as it finished and Tails back over a second later, holding out the new x-ray picture and comparing it next to last week's.
"Okay, so a few of the fibers between the bone have started to reconstruct, which is good, and so far its healing at a pretty normal rate. The thing is, though..." the fox began.
"Oh, I hate that phrase," Amy muttered and Sonic just shrugged.
"See, if it heals completely but your knee has been in just that one position the whole time, then it won't be as flexible or controllable anymore. In fact, it may never get back full mobility," Tails explained and Amy gulped, trying to swallow her nervousness.
"It's nothing to worry about, except that I'm going to have to move you cast a little bit every week. The goal is for you to be able to hold it straight by the time this is over so the ligaments can be completely stretched out and you'll still have full control. Since you're knee is at a right angle exactly right now, I say we make it even and unbend your leg about 15 degrees every week so that by the end of the six weeks it's straight again."
"Okay," Amy agreed.
"The thing is, it might hurt when I unbend your leg a little," Tails explained, looking down at the floor a little nervously. Amy knew the fox would do anything to get out of hurting one of his friends, but if it was for their own good, it had to be done. No matter how much the fox despised it.
"Oh..." Amy took a deep breath. "It's okay, Tails. It'll be over in just a second, right?"
"Yeah, I guess so. Let me get the cast set first," he said, taking the bulky cast and inserting a screw driver that he used to turn the gears to that it was now at a 105 degree angle.
"Anything I should do?" Sonic offered.
"Hold my hand?" Amy asked, her eyes looking nervous as she stole glances at Tails, who was putting the cast on top of her knee so he could just bend it into that.
Sonic gladly took her hand and gave it a reassuring squeeze as Tails looked up at her.
"I'll go on three, okay?" the fox said and Amy nodded. "One...two...three," he said as calmly as he could to not scare her.
Amy bit her lip as her knee shifted. It felt like a spider web, very light and thin, inside her leg way being stretched apart until it fit into place back in the cast. No, it was worse than that. Maybe if a giant spider web was being dragged in two different directions and was just strong enough to not break...either way, stretching, not quite breaking, ouch.
"You okay?" Sonic asked. Amy stopped clenching her jaw shut over her bottom lip and nodded. "Then any chance you could allow blood to circulate through my hand again?"
Amy almost gasped, realizing how tightly she'd been holding his hand. She immediately unclenched her fist as Sonic bent his fingers a few time experimentally. "Sorry," she mumbled.
"That's fine."
"Are you okay now? I can give you a pain pill or something if it still hurts," Tails offered.
"No, that's fine. Thanks though, Tails." Amy smiled, pretending that there wasn't really a throbbing pulse in her leg.
"Alright. Well I've got to get going soon," Tails said, looking quickly at his watch and almost gasping. "Really soon," he corrected.
"So are you gonna stay gone for a few days?" Sonic asked.
"If you guys are up to that," the fox said and both hedgehogs nodded. "Well okay. Make sure to call me if you need anything, right?"
"No worries, lil buddy! I'll keep Amy off her feet and she'll keep me under control."
"Okay. I'll probably see you around Thursday if that's not too long," Tails said, beginning to look jumpy and ready to get going.
"Take your time; we'll be fine," Amy said.
"Okay. Bye then," Tails smiled and practically sprinted towards the X-Tornado.
"Well, you up for baseball tonight?" Amy asked with a smile.
Wow, what a horrible ending to the chapter. I was gonna keep on for a minute to get to a better stopping point, but it's getting really late and I'm MONDO tired! I've been hiking for the past two days and I have school tomorrow again, so I REALLY need sleep! Sorry this took so long and I SWEAR I'm gonna try to update more often! I think I'll try my hardest to get out one every week, so if I haven't updated all week by midnight every Saturday, I not only give you all permission but ENCOURAGE you to PM or flame or SOMETHING to get my attention and go off on me all you want!
Thanks for all of my spectacular reviews and here's a few replies (since I'm too lazy to PM you guys :3) to:
HBee16- Yes, I do still plan on your idea, and I'm not sure, but I think Apotos is across the planet or something. That doesn't matter all too much with Sonic around though :) I wanted to have done it already, but new plots just keep wriggling into the story and it's like, "oh dang! Now the chapters full!" and that's just in my head! Plus, I don't want to use up all the "perfect" things at once because we're just now starting week two of six :)
DanceDream-Thanks so much! Hah, yeah, I forget food names all the time. Once my dad tricked
me into eating calamari (squid XP) because I had forgotten the name! He told me it was like fries or something and then he started cracking up when I ate it (never a good sign) and didn't tell me until I swallowed. I don't dare to taste things that aren't fish or fries in a seafood place anymore...and I barely even like fish! Oh, and peanut butter and cinnamon, I personally think, is awesome! I have it on toast and stuff all the time, but I can understand if some people didn't like it. I'll eat half of anything with peanut butter anyway xD
Kataanger476- Yeah, sorry about all my stupid steak tempting. It made me hungry when I wrote that chapter and we haven't had steak in AGES! (Okay, not really, but not for a long time!) And just so you know (since I wrote that chapter just before bed) I actually dreamed about steak and then in the dream my brother took and was all like "Hah! None for you!" O.o Yeah, maybe I shouldn't have mentioned that, just NO ONE REPORT ME TO THE MENTAL WARD!
Kaz McDonell Miller- Oh, I'm sorry you were sick :( but thanks so much for your review! We had a bug going around my house a few weeks ago and everyone had caught it so far but me and my brother and just when I thought I was home free and everyone had gotten over it I got all stuffy the day before a sleep over and I had to cancel :( But on the (almost) bright side, I learned what it sounds like if you sneeze while playing trumpet at my orchestra rehearsal. Kinda like a 6th grader just learning the instrument actually. (NO OFFENSE TO ANY SIXTH GRADERS!) But yeah, I'm glad you reviewed :) And they say laughter is the best medicine, so I'm sure your review did turn out fine (really nice too :D)!
Okay, that's it for replies. Sorry, I wasn't doing everyone, but tell me if yall like the reply thing and I'll make sure to do it more often, maybe even start doing replies to everyone if you want :) Let me know! Well, I'm zonked out, so no more hiking for awhile :/ I swear I twisted the same ankle five times today and I can't stay on a path to save my life! For real, there's a point in which I find snakes less a threat than throns...because I saw no snakes and I'm still finding thorns in my clothes. So why do I like hiking so much? WHO KNOWS!
Anywayzies, please review and tell me about the chapter, plus let me know where yall stand on the review replies matter. I don't mind, but lemme hear what you think first, if it might just be a waste of time. Wow, long A/N, huh? Okay, goodnight people! :D