Christmas Treats

Halloween might be known as the biggest tooth decay day of the year, but Christmas was right up that alley, and given it tended to last all season, Casey thought it should've taken first place. It seemed as soon as Thanksgiving was over, people started baking Christmas cookies, and fudge, and cakes, and making chocolate covered everything. And people who didn't bake, bought.

It wasn't uncommon for grateful people to drop by the firehouse with something they cooked or made to show their gratitude for the first responders who saved them or their family. And if it wasn't them, it was family or friends or neighbors of the guys on shift who'd all been busy baking up a storm and brought some of their surplus down for them to try. People stopped in at all hours to drop off Christmas cookies, to drop off homemade fudge, to drop off Rice Krispies treats with green and red cherries in them, red and green dyed popcorn balls, peanut brittle, rum cake, divinity, homemade Turtles, everything imaginable. Sometimes though, especially around Christmas, anonymous Good Samaritans got really creative. The other day they'd returned from a call and several boxes had been delivered to the firehouse. Whoever the person responsible for the delivery was must've worked with Swiss Colony because they opened the boxes to find even more boxes inside full of all sorts of Christmas goodies: chocolate truffles, brownie bites, petit fours, chocolate covered cherries, marzipan, tins of assorted chocolates, very easily several hundred dollars' worth, nobody could guess who'd sent it, but everybody was grateful for it. At the end of shift everybody had divided up what they hadn't already eaten the day before and took it home with them.

Casey would never look a gift horse in the mouth, but between everything Cindy had been baking and bringing by the firehouse the last couple weeks, the stuff they'd gotten from their neighbors and the assortment they'd brought back from shift, he felt stuffed to the point he thought his eyes would pop out of his head if he ate one more piece of fudge or one more cookie. Severide on the other hand had been shoveling it in pretty much nonstop all day and into the evening, and showed no signs of slowing down any time soon.

And then the next thing Casey heard was a horrible scream of pain.

He'd run into the living room to see what was the matter, but Kelly was screaming in excruciating pain so loud and so much that he couldn't get a word out of him right away. Finally Matt was able to piece together that what had happened was Kelly had bitten down on a nut cluster that had a whole nut intact in it and it had broken one of his wisdom teeth. It took a lot of coaxing on Casey's part to actually get Kelly to open his mouth enough for him to look, and with the light in the room he was able to see that the whole center of Kelly's tooth had shattered and there was just a big black hole in the middle of it now. It must've hit a direct nerve because Kelly couldn't stop yelling in pain and tears started to run from his eyes. Casey alternated trying to get him to calm down and got on his phone and called his dentist, Kelly's dentist, and every other one in the city that he knew to see if any of them were taking emergencies and could get Kelly in right away. The earliest anybody could see him was first thing in the morning, Casey was already mentally calculating just how many hours that was going to be.

Casey had Kelly take two extra strength painkillers and they very slowly waited for the pills to kick in while they sat on the couch and watched movies to pass the time. Either the pain was excruciating to the point of delirium or the pills were having an effect on Kelly because in between his constant moans and groans, he leaned against Casey and pressed his good cheek against the Truck lieutenant's shoulder, and told Matt that breaking his neck had been the only thing more painful than what he was going through now, and given all the times they'd gotten beaten up, banged up and even blown up on the job, that was no small feat and Matt knew it.

A couple hours passed and Kelly didn't appear to be in any less pain, so Casey went to the kitchen and came back with three pills, Kelly took them without hardly even looking at them, anxious for anything to help. Around an hour later, Kelly's head started to drop down towards his chest, and finally he leaned all his weight against Casey as he fell asleep against the blonde man sitting on the couch. Casey heaved a small sigh of relief, and hoped the sleeping pill he'd slipped in with the two extra Tylenol, would help keep Kelly asleep until the morning. He slowly got up from the couch and eased Kelly to lay down on it, covered him with a flannel blanket, and headed to his own room to sleep.

Casey went into the living room and found Kelly still asleep on the couch in a slightly different position than last night. He reached over and tapped the Squad lieutenant on the shoulder to get his attention, Kelly's eyes opened slightly, then closed, then opened again, and he turned over on his back and looked up at him and asked, "What's going on?"

"It's morning, and there's just enough time for you to freshen up before we go to the dentist," Casey explained as he pulled Kelly to his feet.

"Huh?"

"Come on, we'll head in, and in a little while this will all be over," Matt told him.

Kelly felt his heart racing in his chest, he took that as meaning the Novocaine was starting to work. He could taste it in his mouth and he wanted to gag, he couldn't close his mouth as the dentist examined him so he felt it mix with his saliva that was pooling in his mouth until it started trailing down his chin. That was the least of his worries though as the doctor started applying pressure around the tooth in question and Kelly instinctively felt his feet kicking. It wasn't numb yet, so the doctor gave him a second dose of Novocaine. Kelly looked at the clock on the wall and he wondered how long this was going to take. He closed his eyes, wishing it was already all over, and he felt something clamped over his nose and smelt the rubber as he started inhaling the nitrous oxide. It didn't make him feel any different, but a few minutes later the dentist poked around his tooth again and this time he didn't feel anything, so he guessed it was working.

Casey looked at the clock again and anxiously tapped his foot as he waited for Kelly to come out. It had been almost an hour and a half, and while he didn't have any idea what a 'normal' amount of time would be for a procedure like this, he couldn't help thinking they should've been done by now.

Finally the door opened and Kelly walked out with his coat on and a plastic cup in one hand as he absently felt the side of his face with the other.

"How'd it go?" Casey asked as he stood up.

"Fi'," Kelly gave a muffled answer around the gauze pads he was biting down on, "This whole side's numb." He handed the cup to Matt and told him, "I'll get the bill paid an' we can go."

Casey looked at the cup that was full of gauze squares and there was also a card with instructions, he glanced over them while Kelly wrote the nurse at the front desk a check, then the two of them left.

"So how'd it go?" Casey asked as they got in his truck.

Kelly felt his cheek with his fingertips as he explained, "Because there was a big hole, they couldn't just rip it out...or whatever they do...part of the time it felt like they were trying to pry it out with a screwdriver...and they sanded part of it...and then they cut part of it out."

"Ouch."

"I didn' feel a'thing," Kelly said. "Gotta change the gauze eve'y 15 minutes."

Casey nodded. "I told you it'd be over soon."

Kelly nodded wearily but there was a small smile on his face. "Thank God."

"How're you doing?" Casey asked Kelly later that morning.

Severide took the gauze pad out of his mouth and looked at it, "Still bleeding, I thought it'd be over by now." He tapped his cheek and said, "The Novocaine's starting to wear off."

"And now the fun starts," Casey murmured as he wondered how many pills Kelly was going to need while he was recovering.

"Matt?"

"Huh?"

Kelly folded the gauze and put it back in his mouth and said sheepishly, "I...well, I'm sorry about last night."

"About what?" Casey asked, confused.

Kelly shrugged, "Just everything."

Casey thought he got it but he still wasn't sure he got it. He merely responded, "You were in pain, it's understandable."

"Ma'be, but, I'm still embarrassed about the whole thing," Kelly replied.

Casey thought for a minute and said, "I won't tell anybody if you won't." He noticed Kelly looked a little pale and just a little 'off' and asked him, "You tired?"

"Relieved," Kelly answered.

Casey nodded, "Since we don't have anything we have to do today, why don't you lie down and take it easy?"

"Sounds good."

Kelly went to his room, chucked the gauze in the trash, laid down on his bed, heaved a huge sigh of relief at having that over with, and in time fell asleep. A few minutes after he was, Casey came in and slipped a dish towel under Kelly's head to catch the bloody saliva when he drooled in his sleep.

Kelly woke up a few hours later and stumbled out of bed, he could smell something cooking but couldn't identify it. He headed out to the kitchen and saw Casey taking something out of the oven.

"How're you feeling?" Matt asked.

"Well...I got the feeling back in my face...not sure if I can taste anything yet," Kelly answered. He looked at the stove and saw that Casey had made meatloaf and a big pan of mashed potatoes.

"The instructions on that card said only soft food for the next 24 hours," Casey told him, "I figured this is as soft as anything."

"It looks great, thanks."

"And..." Casey added with a knowing smirk, "I'm guessing it's going to be a while before you eat nut clusters again."

"Oof, don't remind me."

"Or Turtles, or peanut brittle, or anything with nuts for that matter, or toffee, or gingerbread..."

"Goes through about the whole list, doesn't it?" Kelly replied.

"Well," Casey went over to the fridge, opened the top door and took something out of the freezer, "We might have something to hold you over until then."

Kelly squinted one eye curiously at the red carton Casey put on the table, "What's that?"

"Something new, hot cocoa and marshmallow flavored ice cream," Matt answered.

Kelly laughed, "Sounds promising. When'd you get that?"

"I went to the store while you were asleep," Casey said.

Kelly managed a small smile, more so on one side of his face than the other. "Thanks, Casey."