A/N: Sorry, sorry - I know I'm late posting. I knew that new job would catch up with me eventually, and I'm STILL not sure about where I broke this chapter…I'll try to post the next one sooner to make up for it.

Chapter 18

"I'm sure it's nothing to worry about, Mr. Eppes. The doctor will be by in about twenty minutes on rounds. He'll check it out then."

"But twenty minutes is a long time." When you're in pain it is, anyway. "If you'll just take a look at it, I - it doesn't look right to me."

"Is your brother complaining of pain?"

Charlie grit his teeth. "No, but - " My brother doesn't say when he's in pain. I'm not sure he even recognizes when he's in pain - that doesn't mean anything.

The nurse gave him a tolerant smile. "I know it sounds like a long time, but the doctor will be here before you know it. As long as it's not a matter of life and death, you just need to be patient."

That reminded him of what Don was always saying to him…you just have to be patient, Charlie, and let us do our job… and somehow, hearing Don say it in his mind made him more impatient than ever. "How do you know it isn't a matter of life and death unless you look?" he pointed out. "If someone could just take a look - "

"The doctor will be by soon. He'll be here before you know it." The nurse smiled a smile that said clearly that this conversation was over.

Charlie frowned.

He should have stayed with Don and just rung the buzzer. They had to come when you rang that, didn't they? He'd thought it would be faster this way, but…his frown deepened. He had just assumed that they would listen.

He was, he realized with mild surprise, accustomed to being listened to - whether lecturing, or teaching, or consulting, he was used to being accepted as an authority - a man whose words counted for something. Even at an age when most people were brushed aside and not taken seriously, his words had carried weight - at least when he was talking about math, and, let's face it, that had been a good deal of the time. Now to be casually dismissed by a girl about the same age as one of his students…well, it was…disconcerting.

Still, talking to students was what he did. He took a deep breath and tried another tact. "I know I'm not an expert on this, but I think his temperature is up, and his leg looks - it looks really bad. Since they've been doing so much to keep his temperature down, surely a rise merits some attention?" There. Just like lecturing. Walk the student through, show them how easy it is, how clear, if you only follow step by step…

The nurse gave him another perfunctory smile. "A temperature will often spike in the late afternoon. I'm sure there's no reason for alarm."

Charlie felt an ungentlemanly urge to shake her. What could he do now? What would Dad do? Dad had a way of digging in and demanding action that seemed to produce results. He could go looking for him, but that would be more time wasted, and Charlie had an uncomfortable conviction that all was not well with his brother. He wanted help for him now. They were in a hospital - he should be able to get help for him now - not twenty minutes from now!

His frown must have morphed into a scowl, because the nurse added, "I'll send the doctor in as soon as he gets here, Mr. Eppes."

Okay, so playing nice wasn't getting him anywhere…he crossed his arms. "It's Dr. Eppes," he corrected flatly. "Actually."

Now she was the one to look disconcerted, and Charlie felt a guilty stab of satisfaction.

"Oh." She hesitated. "I didn't know - I suppose - I could page Dr. Gillworth…?"

Charlie gave her a smile as perfunctory as her own had been. "Why don't you."

000

"So, Don, how are you feeling?" Charlie watched from his chosen post near the head of the bed as the doctor glanced at the list of vitals the nurse handed him. "I hear you're having some discomfort?"

Discomfort. Charlie rolled his eyes. And he thought the FBI was good with euphemisms - they had nothing on the medical profession. He saw Don half-open his eyes and gesture vaguely.

"You seem a little more alert."

"We had - a conversation," Charlie interjected. "He seemed - pretty rational."

Don tried to pry his eyes apart again. "…right here, Charlie," he grumbled.

"Huh? Oh. Yeah. Sorry." Charlie reached down to touch his shoulder.

Rational. He made a face. He had once accused Don of being too rational - too detached. He could never forget how shocked and hurt Don had looked in that split second before he got angry. When he had walked away instead of staying to fight he'd realized how thoroughly he had wounded him. He still couldn't think about it without feeling bad. "It's his - uh - your leg. How's your leg feel, Don?"

Don's lashes fluttered without opening and he groaned. "Like…there was…car on it…"

The doctor smiled faintly. "Well, let's take a look…" He folded back the blanket.

Charlie winced, his eyes automatically sliding away. He made a face and forced his eyes back. Ugh. His nose wrinkled at the smell as the doctor peeled the bandage away and leaned over to murmur something to the nurse. That couldn't be good…

"Looks a little more swollen - " Dr. Gillworth touched a spot critically. "Does it hurt here?"

Don grimaced, made an indistinct sound that committed to nothing. Charlie poked him insistently in the shoulder and his eyes struggled open again, clouded with morphine and mild annoyance. After a pause he conceded faintly, "…yeah."

The doctor nodded, adjusting his grip. "How about here?"

Charlie jumped at Don's sudden shout of pain, followed by a muffled but heartfelt curse. He grabbed onto Don's bicep, not sure which one of them he was clinging for, as Don's back arched, then collapsedagainst the mattress, his breath ragged and spattered with a soft, muddled monologue of expletives.

Charlie blotted at his damp upper lip with the back of his free hand, was surprised to find it shaking. "Hey." He tightened his grip on Don's arm, drew in a breath to steady his voice. "What would Mom say about the language?"

"What on earth is going on?"

Charlie twisted his head toward the door, not sure whether he was distressed or relieved to see his father there. "Um - "

Dr. Gillworth answered for him. "We're going to prepare Don for a little procedure here," he said evenly.

Alan let the door swing closed behind him. "What, another one? What's wrong?"

The doctor didn't look up from scrawling something on one of those ubiquitous clipboards. "I want to drain his leg. Try not to be alarmed, Mr. Eppes - we knew we might have to do this. We just wanted to give it a chance to clear up on its own, or for him to gain a little more ground first. It's a simple enough procedure - we'll use a local since I don't want to sedate him any more than he is already with a head injury and, as you say, he's not good with anesthesia." He smiled at Don. "I think ultimately, it's going to make him feel a lot better."

Alan peered at the exposed leg, then rested a hand lightly on Don's head, his face scrunched in troubled lines. "I wasn't gone for ten minutes! I thought you weren't due to stop by for at least another ten!"

Dr. Gillworth handed his clipboard to the nurse. "Your other son had me paged."

Alan raised his brows in Charlie's direction and Charlie shifted. "I wasn't trying to be an alarmist, I - um - I just thought - "

"No, you were right," Dr. Gillworth looked at the nurse this time, who flushed and moved toward the door with her clipboard of instructions. "Sepsis is something we watch for carefully with peritonitis, and he's fighting it from two directions. You should always feel free to contact me right away." The nurse dodged hastily through the door and the doctor smiled apologetically at Charlie. "Wendy's a good girl, but she gets a little too attached to structure. Hospitals need structure, but they need to be reactive too."

Charlie nodded. He couldn't really find it in his heart to feel sorry for her - it was just what he tried to teach his students: if you got too attached to the outcome, you weren't open to the other possibilities. You missed things. And she was dealing with human lives. "I appreciate you coming right away."

Dr. Gillworth nodded, poking his pen back into his breast pocket, leaving Don's leg exposed to the air. Charlie secretly wished he'd cover it back up again and that made him feel bad, so he lightened his grip on Don's arm and patted by way of an apology.

"All right, Don, I'm going to send someone in to prep you." The doctor glanced from Alan to Charlie. "You can spend a few minutes with him if you like." He peeled off his gloves and stuffed them in another pocket. "By the way, Dr. Eppes, I didn't realize we were colleagues - what is your specialty?"

Alan glanced at Charlie in surprise and Charlie looked up from Don, arranging his face into neutral lines. He cleared his throat. "Uh - Applied Mathematics," he offered with complete sangfroid.

The doctor stared for a moment, then snorted a laugh. "I'll be back."

TBC