Title:One Good Friend
Author: AthenaIceGoddess
Spoilers: not very many big ones, just a few from this season, a few from seasons past barely mentioned
Angst/Romance/Drama
Summary: Woody gets out of the hospital after being shot, and he goes into a dangerous downspiral. Can he get help before it's too late? WJ of course.
Disclaimer: Nope, still don't own 'em. I just like to play with them every once in a while. I also don't own the title of the fic or the chapters. They're all from songs.
Chapter 1
Nothin' to lose
Woody Hoyt was an alcoholic. After getting out of the hospital, booze seemed to be the only way to get rid of the pain. He remembered the exact day, the exact hour, when the line between drinking socially and drinking to lose himself began to blur.
He was sitting at the bar in a place he would always think of as the Pogue, nursing his fourth shot of whiskey. The ghosts of his past danced all around him, all of his mistakes and good times he would never have again there to slap him ni the face.
The time Cal almost got Jordan killed, saying he was all Woody had, Jordan telling him he had her, thinking that they might have a chance. Kissing Jordan in the desert, her kissing him in the car before they left.
Returning to the present, Woody tossed back the rest of his drink and threw enough money to cover his tab at the bartender.
The detective staggered to the door, stopping to look back for a second.
In his mind's eye, a grinning Woody spun a laughing, radiant looking Jordan into his arms, and smiling down at her like she was the only woman in the universe. To him, at that moment, she had been.
Shaking his head to dispel the unwelcome memory, Woody walked out of the bar.
He'd thought Jordan was the only woman for him, and he had been willing to wait as long as it took to make her his. For a while, he'd even foolishly believed that she loved him back, until he got shot, that is.
That's when he realized he was alone in the world. The whispered confession of love from Jordan was nothing more than pity, so he threw her out of his hospital room. After that, all the friends he thought he had at the morgue stopped visiting him.
He realized that they had never really liked him, they just put up with him while Jordan strung him along. They probably laughed at him behind his back, the lovestruck farmboy from Wisconsin chaing the smart, pretty ME. Like he ever really had a chance.
Woody fumbled with his apartment keys, drunken fingers feeling like lead as he dropped them in the gutter.
Cursing bitterly, the detective splashed around, trying to find them. Finally he found them, and stood up.
"Sir, do you need any help?" A concerned sounding female voice asked, tapping him on the shoulder tentatively.
"Do I look like I need your help? Get out of here." He snarled at the woman, who scurried away muttering 'miserable drunk!'.
Laughing, Woody realized it was true. Woodrow Hoyt, a detective with the Boston PD, public defender, was a drunk. And he didn't care.
A/N: SO, what do you think? Worth continuing? I'll only know if you press that pretty little purple button with your clicker and tell me! Things will pick up in chapter two, with Woody drunk on the job.