A/N: I do apologize - I hate to do that mid-story. But it seemed every time I even got near the computer, something happened to drag me away. Sorry, anon, you've been very patient. There should be no further interruptions to our regularly scheduled story. Thanks so much - C.

Chapter 14

Doctor, Doctor - Give Me the News

"You don't have to do this." He watched the door snick shut behind his father, then turned his head enough to see Dr. Gibbs untangling the blood pressure cuff. Actually, if she had something for his headache, that wouldn't be all bad…

"Sure I do." She opened a small plastic sleeve and pulled out a digital thermometer. "I took an oath and everything. My job's a lot like yours - I'm legally bound to offer succor where needed, 24/7."

Sucker? True enough, but no need to rub it in.

Oh wait – maybe she meant succor? Well, either way, it wasn't far from the truth.

"You must have real patients. A practice and stuff."

"You look like a real patient." The wand slid under his tongue. He was getting kind of tired of that, but it was still a little better than that thing in his ear. "And I'm semi-retired."

Realization filtered through his slow-moving brain and he mumbled around the thermometer, "You know what I do?"

Cool fingers pressed against his wrist and Dr. Gibbs glanced at her watch. Something about the gesture reminded him of his job. "I've been hearing about you and your brother for years. Don't talk until that thing beeps."

"Years?"

Dr. Gibbs released his wrist and scratched something on a pad before giving him a disapproving glance. "And to think I heard you weren't the chatty son." The thermometer beeped and she drew it out, wrote something else on her pad.

"I just like – you know – information." He rubbed impatiently at a hitch in his chest. "Don't I get to see those?"

This time Dr. Gibbs smiled. "Will they mean anything to you?" She wrapped the blood pressure cuff around his bicep.

Okay, so I just feel silly lying here in bed while a strange woman writes down a lot of stuff about me. He winced a little at the squeeze of the blood pressure cuff and decided on a change of subject. "Look, I appreciate you helping my dad last night – he – y'know – he gets all worked up."

She chuckled. "About nothing, hm?" She watched the readings and added them to the others, then leaned forward to feel under his chin, on either side of his jaw.

He closed his eyes to hide a flinch. "No – I mean, I guess I was kinda out of it…"

"So I hear. Caribou, hm?"

"It was a dream." He considered going into details, decided that wouldn't help and diverted the subject. "It's better now, right?"

"Depends on what you mean by better." She let go of his throat and picked up a stethoscope. "Let's hear what your chest sounds like. You can leave your top on."

Well, at least that would bypass the whole cold stethoscope thing…

"Can you cough for me?"

She was kidding, right? Coughing was about all he did. Stopping was the hard part. He coughed obediently, made a face at the grotesque noise.

She offered no comment other than, "Lean forward."

Yeah, that sounded easier than it was. He pulled his knees up and braced his elbows against them to steady himself as the stethoscope started its methodical journey over his back, followed by a brisk tapping with her fingers.

"Okay, you can lean back." She wrote something else down and folded the stethoscope. "You know, you have crackles in both lungs."

He swallowed to rewet his throat. Funny how tiring this could be. "Dr. Rodriguez said something like that."

"You had x-rays taken?"

"Yeah."

"Sputum test?"

He stared.

"Then probably not. Who's your regular physician?"

He shrugged. "I use the FBI Medical Team, mostly. Emergency Room, sometimes."

Her eyebrows lifted slightly. "No regular physician," she said aloud as she wrote. "If you give me permission, I wouldn't mind taking a look at your x-rays. You'll need a follow up set in two weeks, by the way. Did he tell you?"

ANOTHER set? "No," he admitted reluctantly, feeling a little as though he had opened poor Dr. Rodriguez up to scorn.

"We need the follow up to be sure all the infection is gone before you return to work."

Wait a minute, wait a minute - back up. He coughed to find his voice. "What did you say?"

"You should have a follow up x-ray before you return to work - two weeks is customary."

"But - Dr. Rodriguez - " He broke off abruptly. Okay, maybe he didn't need one more person laughing at him about that. And despite the fact that she wasn't laughing openly, he got the distinct impression that Dr. Gibbs found him even funnier than his father did. He sucked in a careful breath and tried to look healthy and vigorous. "I mean, I'm in good shape. It's part of my job. Doesn't it make sense - " He was betrayed by a machine gun stutter of coughing, had to pause again to find his breath. Dr. Gibbs handed him a sports bottle, and he wiped at his tearing eyes to make sure it was water and not Pedialyte before taking a sip. Damn. Okay, okay - a setback, but not a total loss. He took another sip and cleared his throat, swore inwardly when that set off a new round of hacking. This time, that damn kiddie syrup dispenser danced before his eyes and he latched onto it like a drowning man and swallowed.

He closed his eyes this time to regroup, since the coughing tended to leave him a little - just a little - dizzy, and he was keen to demonstrate that he had this thing on the run. When he thought he could manage a sentence without doing a Camille imitation, he tried again. "I guess what I'm trying to say - " He paused to head any recalcitrant coughs lingering in his chest cavity off at the pass - " - is that, if two weeks is customary," Okay, another pause here might be wise… "Well, it should be shorter for somebody who's reasonably young and healthy, right? I mean, usually?" He took another gulp of water.

Dr. Gibbs nodded gravely. "You'd think so, wouldn't you?"

Okay, that was not an answer. "But…?"

She smiled. "There are a lot of other factors. Severity, for example."

"Can't be that bad. I'm not in the hospital or anything."

"No. Not yet."

His heart did a funny skip in his chest and lowered the sports bottle. "I'm gonna wanna hear a little more about that. You mean I could be?"

"Nearly were last night."

He scrubbed at his eyes again so he could see her more clearly, studied her face. "For real?"

"For real. But your temperature finally started dropping, and no one was eager to move you unless absolutely necessary. Especially in the rain."

Yeah, okay, he did remember something about the rain…he picked at the comforter, suddenly cold, trying to digest that. "So…you're saying…"

"I'm saying, why don't we wait and see?"

Don blew his breath out carefully, winced when it snagged on a small cough. Waiting. Not his best thing. And - two weeks? "What am I going to do for two weeks?" he asked the ceiling.

She gave his forearm a quick pat. "If you're like most people with pneumonia? Precious little." He made a face and she started tucking instruments back into her bag. "Come on - be honest - you're ready for a nap, right?" He gave her a sideways glance, then a reluctant smile. "That's what I thought." She stood up. "I'll leave instructions with your father. Do us all a favor and try to follow them, okay?"

"Yeah. Sure." Where did people get these ideas about him? "What do I owe you?"

"Nothing. Your father and I worked out a deal."

"Uh uh - no way. Anyway, I'm a government employee. If nothing else, we have kick-ass insurance."

She pursed her lips and shook her head. "Sorry - but your father offered me a very attractive handicap the next time we play golf. It may not be very sporting, but it's probably the only way I'll ever beat him. You're not going to mess that up for me, are you?"

"No." He laughed, stopped abruptly when the laughter bottle-necked the air in his chest and nearly choked him. "I know how you feel."

"I'm going to call your father back in so you both hear the same thing, okay? That is – I assume you'll be staying here?"

For TWO WEEKS? He scrubbed his hands over his face again. Man, this sucked. "For a couple of days anyway, I guess. I don't need somebody around the whole time, right?"

Dr. Gibbs gave him a look he had trouble reading and he reflected ruefully that she'd be killer in the interrogation room. "You at least need someone to look in on you regularly. The hospital is always an option too, if that's not possible, but somehow I can't picture Alan ordering you out into the rain."

Don started to point out that it wasn't his father's house, but that would seem to imply that Charlie would kick his ailing brother out into the rain, and as entertaining as Charlie's subsequent outrage at that insinuation would be, he really wasn't well enough to fully enjoy it. Besides, he wasn't entirely positive that Charlie couldn't take him right now. Better safe than sorry.

He found his energy – or what passed for it – was flagging and he edged back into the pillows. Give it up, Eppes. Even the refrigerator outmanned you on this one. "Guess it's really up to them. I can do the hospital thing if I have to." Hopefully, it wouldn't come to that.

Dr. Gibbs shook her head and went to the door, easing it just far enough open to stick her head out, then pulled her head back in with another shake. "Alan. What a coincidence that you should happen to be there at just this moment."

Don tried to decide if she was being sarcastic or not.

Alan gave a guilty smile as he stepped over the threshold. "We Eppes men are famous for our timing. So, Charlotte, what's the verdict?"

"I want him to have another x-ray in two weeks before we decide if he's ready to return to work. And I know he wants to go back to sleep, but I'd like him to eat something first. If anything comes back up, let me know and I'll give him a shot – he needs the antibiotic consistently in his system. I also would prefer he doesn't stay on his own for a week, at least. I can check on him here again, or he can stay in the hospital – unless you have something else in mind, Don?"

Oh, hey – almost like I'm in the room too, Don thought dryly. He glanced at his father. "I can always check into a hospital, Dad. I'm covered."

The look his father shot him he had no trouble reading at all. "You should be so lucky as to get off that easy. I'm sure we can all survive being under the same roof for a couple of weeks. What else?"

"Bed rest, mostly. Don't worry - he won't feel up to much else."

Don frowned. Everybody seemed to think they had a better take on him than he had on himself.

"Lots of fluids - again, if he has trouble keeping them down, I want to know immediately. I'll look in on him before our golf game next week."

Next week. He rubbed again at the growing throb behind his eyes. Okay, he could deal with a week - especially if he slept through most of it. But two weeks? No way. He'd be okay long before that. Okay enough, anyway.

"Thank you, Charlotte, for everything. For last night and today…coming back next week really is above and beyond the call of duty."

Don looked up to thank her as well and noticed she was watching him. Something about her expression gave him an uncomfortable feeling that she knew exactly what he was thinking.

If she did, her smile gave no clue. "Nonsense. I wouldn't miss it. I haven't even heard about the caribou yet."

As his father ushered her out the door with an offer of a cup of tea, Don tried to smile back, since giving into the urge to pull the pillow over his head and disappear would only interfere with his already compromised breathing. He lifted a hand in farewell, then dropped it abruptly in surprise, blinking and unsure of his vision.

Huh. If he didn't know better…he would almost swear that she had winked at him.

TBC

PS Yeah, I know - no hospital. I just do that so much (and probably will again), that I really needed not to this time. And most pneumonia patients do recover at home.