Title: Misdemeanors
Disclaimer: Language, violence, angst, and slash.
POV: Speed
Chapter Nine: Invisible
I call Ryan's cell-phone as Horatio drives toward the hospital. When I had gone back into my bedroom to change, he had given me a questioning look. I'd held a finger to lips to tell him to stay quiet. I didn't want Horatio to know that Ryan was there. Now we are nearly to the hospital. Horatio still doesn't have any information on the conditions of Calleigh and Delko. I drum my fingers impatiently on the dashboard, waiting for Ryan to answer his phone.
Horatio glances quickly in my direction, taking his eyes off the road for just a mere second. "Give him a break, Speed, he's probably sleeping. Something that normal people do at this time of the night."
"We're not normal people, H, we've never been normal. Not with the job we do," I reply.
Ryan finally picks up his ringing phone. He sounds distant and there's music playing in the background. He better not be playing with my stereo. I tell him about the car crash and he says he'll meet us at the hospital. He mumbles on for a few seconds more about what happened earlier in the night. I cut him off and hang-up the phone. If I wanted to talk about the mistake I made, I would have brought it up.
"What's on your mind?" Horatio asks as we pull into the parking lot at the hospital.
"Nothing," I mutter. "Just tired."
"I know things have been rocky, Speed, and I'm sorry about this afternoon. I can understand you getting mad in the heat of the moment. Please, reconsider the decision to quit your job. You are a great CSI, one of the best on my team, in fact," Horatio says.
"I don't want to talk about it," I snap.
He gives me a worrying look but keeps his mouth shut. I follow him into the brick building with its white walls and tile floors. I hate the smell of hospitals. They smell like disease and blood and sterile-ness. Horatio walks up to the nurses' station and starts talking to the young woman behind the counter. I see her giving me the eye over my boss's shoulder. I look away. My eyes drift over people with blood wounds and broke bones. One guy is even holding a hand over his bleeding eye. I look in the other direction just in time to see Ryan walk through the door and head in our direction. At this point I figure it's best to just look at that floor.
"Horatio, Speedle," Ryan greets. "Not the best time for the team to be together, huh? How are they doing? Will they be okay?"
I glare at the floor. How can he act so normal, so…friendly? After the things that transpired in my apartment he acts like nothing ever happened. He sounds happy to be standing in a hospital in the middle of the night. Shouldn't he sound more worried about Calleigh and Delko? Both of them have been so overly nice to him that it's made me sick.
Horatio lightly touches my shoulder to capture my attention. A doctor has shown up to take us to see Calleigh and Delko. I trail after Horatio who is talking quietly with the young Wolfe. I feel like I shouldn't be here. This is all wrong. Nothing good happens when you end-up in the hospital. I know, I've been here before, more times than I care to count.
We enter into a room and there they are, my friends of such a long time. Friends that I feel I hardly know anymore. Delko has his right arm in a sling, but there's no cast so it can't be broken. He has a few cuts and bruises, none of them will scar though. Calleigh has a cast on her left wrist and a bandage on her cheek. Was she driving? Or was Delko driving?
"Hey," Calleigh greets in her cheerful southern accent. "You guys didn't need to come down here."
Horatio smiles softly. "We had to make sure you guys were okay."
"We'll be fine," Delko pipes up. "The only broken bones is Calleigh's wrist. I dislocated my shoulder. Other than that, it's just some minor bumps and bruises. We'll live."
I listen to them talk. Ryan starts talking about past injuries and how bad some of them were. The others chime in with their past wounds. When did a trip to the hospital become a badge of honor? To me, a trip to the hospital meant that you failed in protecting yourself. I watch the four of them, talking, smiling, and even laughing. I feel so invisible, like no one wants me here, like they can't see me. If they can't see me, then I should be able to slip out and disappear. Maybe I'll go home and burn the sheets on my bed. That would be too dramatic but throwing them away wouldn't be.
I slip out of the room and walk down the hall, my arms crossed over my chest and my eyes on the floor. Outside, in the night air of Miami I finally relax, letting my shoulders drop. I walk through the poorly lit parking lot to find the grass along the outskirts of the concrete field. The breeze is enough to keep the night from being hot and uncomfortable. The sounds of the city buzz around me but I'm able to block most of them out. What would it be like to live in the country, out in the middle of nowhere? Would there be only the sounds of the night to enter my brain?
A hand on my shoulder makes me jump. "It's just me, man," Delko says as I turn to face him.
"Something I can do for you?" I realize that I sound nasty and I don't care. My anger has been coming out a lot more than usual lately.
"Touchy, touchy," he replies, removing his hand from my shoulder. "Why did you leave back there? Somebody say something to upset you?"
"Yes…" I lie, somewhat.
"What was it, if I may ask?"
"Everything," I whisper.
"Excuse me? I hardly heard that." He leans toward me to hear better.
"I said, it was everything," the anger in my voice a little more apparent. "Every damn time that Ryan guy is around it's like I don't exist. You and Calleigh fawn over him. You two took to him like ducks take to water. And even Horatio seems to be extremely proud of him. He's not that great. He's just some lousy cop that lucked into a job in the lab."
Delko stands up straight, his eyes wide with surprise as he listens to me. "Whoa, slow down, buddy. It can't be all that bad."
"Really? How many times have you talked to me since Ryan showed up?"
"Well." I can see him mulling it over in his mind. He sighs and his shoulders drop. "I hadn't realized, Speed. I'm sorry, man. I really am. Why don't we hang out this weekend? I won't be working much anyway," he jokes.
I shake my head. "No thank you."
I turn to walk away and I hear Delko yell my name. I don't care if I'm being rude or acting like a child. People that I would have trusted my very life with have hurt me so deeply in the last few days. I can't tell if I honestly even trust them anymore. The farther away from the building I walk the better I feel. The anger slowly exits my body, leaving me tired. A cough escapes me. The second cough is worse than the first and the third causes my ribs to ache. I drop to my knees as the coughing gets even worse. My head starts to heart and my lungs ache for much needed oxygen. I feel the cool grass touch my bare arms and my cheeks as I pass out.