Finals week. Want to die. Enjoy.

Raising a Hand

by LQ Aredhel

Chapter 8

Sitting on the couch and wrapped in Daniel's arms, JD quietly cried and talked on and on about Mrs. Barsol, and about being unable to reach out to his friends any longer. He even admitted to Daniel that he felt trapped and a little afraid of him.

"But it's worth it, it's worth it," he frantically repeated as though he were the one doing the comforting. Daniel rubbed soothing circles across his back.

At one point, JD realized the Daniel's breath and clothes smelled strongly of alcohol; he remembered Daniel drinking the last time he was there, and he couldn't help but wonder how the beer would affect him.

"I'm sorry about not coming over the last few days," JD finally admitted, pulling away and looking into Daniel's sympathetic and bloodshot eyes. "I thought maybe it would be better, but it wasn't."

Daniel just nodded and smiled lazily. "Maybe the next time that happens, I could just go to your work and ask your friends where you are. One of them would probably know." His words were slow and slurred.

JD stiffened as he imagined Daniel wandering around the hospital asking for him, revealing things about him to everyone he knew. "It won't happen again," JD promised. "I won't ever stay away again, I swear." Daniel smiled bigger, and JD knew that it really was worth it.

"I know," was all Daniel said before pressing his lips to JD's and allowing the younger man to taste the stale beer on his tongue. Daniel gently laid JD down on the couch and began exploring his body with his hands, pulling off his scrubs top and pressing his chest against JD's.

JD could only concentrate on pushing the panic away from his mind. He continued telling himself that it was worth it, and he really believed it; but the feel of Daniel's smooth muscular chest pressed against his, his hands running down JD's thigh...it didn't feel right, and all JD's body wanted to do was run.

Even though his body was reacting exactly the way Daniel wanted it to, JD still involuntarily jerked and pulled away when Daniel put a hand in his pants. Both men froze, JD in fear, and Daniel in shocked anger. They stared at one another. Daniel looked like he was trying to say something, but nothing came out, and his face became more and more red.

JD was almost relieved when Daniel lifted his fist, then he felt blinding pain just below his ribs and his breath left him. He vaguely noted through his pain that Daniel was holding his arms, preventing him from curling up into a ball or falling off the couch. JD coughed, desperately trying to take in air.

When he could breathe again, he expected Daniel to just send him home like he did last time. He didn't expect to feel his pants being yanked off.

"You're still so ashamed of me, of what we do," Daniel said, throwing the scrubs bottoms across the room. "Still so concerned with yourself. Don't think I don't realize that you never want me at the hospital. You don't want your friends to see me, to know who I am and what we've done. Because you're ashamed."

He's right, JD admitted. I'm ashamed of him. I'm a horrible person. No matter what he told himself, the feel of Daniel's hands running down his sides to pull off his boxers was still cold and wrong.

Daniel noticed the shivers run through JD's body. "I guess you're usually the one who's wasted during this part, right?" He slapped JD across the face and threw the boxers off. JD screwed his eyes shut at the pain. "You won't even look at me when you're sober." Daniel looked at him steadily for a moment, and JD tried to look him in the eye, even though his cheek and stomach were burning and he was shaking from fear of what Daniel would do next.

Daniel mumbled something softly, lowering himself next to JD's naked body. He wrapped one arm around JD's back and used the other to caress his hair while quietly whispering into his ear, "It's okay, Johnny. Things are bad now, but they'll get better. Your patient is in a better place, and you're with someone who cares about you. Someone who understands you. Everything else will just fall into place."

JD felt himself relaxing into Daniel's soft touch, relishing the feeling of being held. And he knew it was worth it. Even when Daniel wandered into the kitchen to drink another beer, then roughly dragged JD off to the bedroom. He knew it was worth it afterwards when Daniel was sleeping soundly by his side, his arms flailed possessively over the beginnings of a bruise on JD's stomach. Even when JD couldn't sleep until after he'd showered in Daniel's bathroom, he still settled into Daniel's warm embrace. It was worth it to feel wanted and needed, to feel that little shred of comfort in his otherwise empty life. Because that's how his life felt now: empty except for Daniel.

Carla was livid when JD walked into work an hour late; he'd pretended to be asleep while Daniel prepared for work this morning, then (after finding his clothes scattered across the living room) took a cab to the hospital.

"JD, where have you been?" Carla demanded, rushing around the counter of the nurse's station. "You left your scooter here all night and then you didn't show up for work! I was about to call the police!"

JD had forgotten all about Sasha.

"Right, sorry, Carla," he sheepishly replied. "I stayed at a friend's, and he picked me up from work last night."

"Not the friend you met at the bar, I hope?"

Ah, so she has been paying attention.

"Yes, actually," JD replied, feeling a little defensive.

"Is that where you meet all of your dates, princess?" Dr. Cox asked as he slid some files across the counter and started to write on one. "Whoever buys you a drink is the lucky winner, right?"

Instead of thinking of a fantastic comeback, JD found himself concentrating on keeping his stomach out of the way of Dr. Cox's elbow, which was jerked around as the older doctor wrote on a patient's chart. JD's abdomen was still sore from that punch last night, and he was unsurprised this morning to find a large green bruise just above his naval. The absolute last thing he needed right now was for his mentor to bump into him and watch him flail around on the ground in pain.

"No response is always an admission," Dr. Cox informed Carla before marching off again. Carla just smiled and shook her head.

"I'm sorry about Mrs. Barsol," Carla said softly. "I know you two were close. Turk said you're taking it pretty hard?"

JD shrugged; he admitted to himself that he felt a lot better about Mrs. Barsol after spending time with Daniel. The sharp pain of her loss had dulled since then. "It's no big deal," he assured Carla. "It's a hospital, death happens, and I'll get over it."

That earned him a big grin from Carla. "You're so grown up!" she squealed, almost Elliot-like, and JD just gave her a strange look as Turk slid up next to her and grinned at both of them.

"JD!" he cried happily before his face became serious. "Me, you, Carla, Elliot, tonight, karaoke, whaddya say?" He eyed JD like he was trying to read his mind.

Of course, JD's mind was completely focused on Daniel; he had abandoned him for three days straight, so there was no way he could miss going to his house tonight. He silently promised himself that he wouldn't disappoint his friend again.

"I really can't," JD finally said. "I kind of already have plans."

Turk looked devastated. "What plans?" he demanded. "You don't have to work, and everybody's going to be at karaoke. Karaoke, JD!"

"I know, I just have something that I need to do…" he trailed off.

"JD is going to hang out with his new bar friend," Carla revealed; JD wasn't sure whether she was sticking up for him or trying to get him into more trouble.

"Bar friend?" Turk asked. "What bar friend, I'm your bar friend."

This was going too far. "Look, I can't do it tonight, but maybe another time," he decided, even though he couldn't imagine ever standing Daniel up again. Still, it was hard to turn his friends down without offering them a little bit of hope.

Elliot skipping up to JD later and asked if he wanted to ride with her to karaoke; he explained again that he wasn't going and tried to ignore the pang of regret when he saw the hurt look on Elliot's face.

"But Turk's been planning this forever," she whined. JD could only shrug apologetically and feel the knife drive deeper into his stomach.

Turk bugged JD a couple more times until Turk's shift ended at 2 p.m. When JD grabbed his lunch, none of his friends were in the cafeteria, so he sat alone until Dr. Cox fell into the chair across from him.

"So what new injuries do you have today?" Dr. Cox asked with a fake smile plastered across his face. "Wait, don't tell me, I love guessing these; my sister and I used to play this game all the time. Okay, you're slightly hunched over when you walk, you don't swing your arms and you've been avoiding any swinging elbows in the midriff section, so I'm going to go ahead and say a big black and blue bad boy on that flabby twelve-year-old tummy of yours, am I right?" He settled into a charismatic smile and watched as JD stumbled over his words.

"Uh, well, it's still kind of … green…and my stomach isn't flabby, I do cardio," JD replied lamely. Why wouldn't Dr. Cox just leave him alone?

"Yeah, that's what I thought." His smile disappeared and he leaned in close. "Look, Newbie, if you want me to cut you off from your patients until you get some mental help I can, because this can't continue."

"I don't need mental help, I'm not hurting myself," JD argued back. "I can't believe that you would even think that. I'm just clumsy, and I heal slowly."

"Yeah, I'll say. The bruise on your cheek has miraculously returned."

JD's hand instinctively went to his cheek; it was a little sore. Why did Daniel have to hit him in the same spot twice? Ouch.

"Look, I don't know what's going on," Dr. Cox began, "and this is your last chance to tell me. If you want to take the world on your shoulders and never accept help from anyone about anything be my guest, but don't expect it to be lollipops and rainbows along the way."

JD just stared at him for a moment. It was painful, knowing that the second and last time his mentor was actually reaching out to him, he wasn't going to accept his help. He wasn't going to tell Dr. Cox about Daniel, there was no way. "Why do you care?" he finally asked.

Dr. Cox looked taken aback. He put on a hard face. "I care about the patients under your care who won't be getting what they need because you're too worried about the pain in your stomach or too dizzy from your concussion to read their charts right or—"

"I get it." He didn't care about JD, he cared about the hospital, the patients. It was noble enough, especially for Dr. Cox. But it wasn't what JD had been hoping for. He threw away his half-eaten lunch and left Dr. Cox sitting at the table alone.

That night at Daniel's apartment, JD talked for over an hour about his relationship with Dr. Cox, about their little spats and about how much he looked up to the older doctor. Daniel didn't say much during this time, just listened and massaged JD's shoulders.

"It's like, all I've ever wanted was for him to treat me like an adult, like an equal. Or at the very least see me as a valuable member of the hospital. But even when he's actually reaching out to me, like today, he treats me like a child, and then reminds me that he doesn't give a shit about me. It's just…it's so tiring…."

Daniel 'mm-hm'ed behind him and slowly ran his hand across JD's stomach. "I am sorry about that, you know. I was pretty drunk."

JD just nodded and swallowed thickly. He still didn't understand why Daniel had been drinking that night, or the time before that, when he only ever drank ginger ale when they first met. Daniel was fairly calm now, so JD decided to try asking about it.

"So, why did you start drinking?" His voice was small and timid.

Daniel sighed behind him and stopped rubbing his shoulders. "Well, I guess old habits die hard, you know?" JD just raised his eyebrow and turned to look at him. "I used to drink a lot when I worked in Chicago. That's actually how I lost my job and my boyfriend. So I moved here and decided to stop drinking. I kept some beer in the house for you, I guess it was just too tempting."

"I'm sorry," JD replied, feeling responsible.

"Well, this way we can drink together and both get tipsy," Daniel said, smiling warmly. "Although I have a ridiculously high tolerance and yours is pretty low. I actually drank three beers before you got here, and I'm perfectly fine, right?"

He did seem normal, so JD nodded.

"Yeah, I just feel a lot more relaxed, that's all." He proved it by slowly kissing the back of JD's neck, leaving tingling trails across his skin. "Do you want a beer before we start the movie?"

Their routine barely changed throughout the next week. JD would show up and talk (although Daniel often touched him and kissed him during this part), then they would drink some beer, watch a movie (sometimes make out during the movie), and finally stumble into the bedroom and fall into bed. JD tried to have at least five beers by the time the movie was over just so that he could relax and not think about what was going on; it was so much easier when he didn't think about it. The first couple of nights he wasn't drunk enough, and when Daniel started touching him in certain places, he winced or jerked away and earned a slap or another punch to the stomach. The stomach punches always knocked the wind out of him, leaving him dizzy enough to get through the most painful part of the night.

Afterwards, JD made it a habit to shower and curl back into bed. In the morning, he let his hangover completely take over his head so that he couldn't think about anything else. He always waited until Daniel had left for work before getting out of bed; it was just another way to avoid thinking about what happened the night before. On days when he didn't work until 9 a.m. this was fine, but on his 7 a.m. days he was often an hour or two late. Fortunately, by the time he made it through work and returned to Daniel's in the evening, he was desperate enough to talk to someone that he could push everything to the back of his mind and forget the price of his friendship.

JD avoided his friends during this time; the hurt looks on Turk's face when JD turned him down night after night was too painful, and all Elliot did was whine about how depressed Turk was. He still made small talk with Carla, who seemed to be tittering between being proud of him for handling his own problems and yelling at him for hurting Turk's feelings. In the end, she didn't really say anything.

What hurt the most was Dr. Cox, physically and emotionally. Dr. Cox was true to his word: he never again asked that JD confide in him, but he still made small comments in the hallways about JD's 'boyfriend' getting in a good punch (when JD came in to work with a light bruise on one cheek or another), and he always seemed to know when JD's stomach was sore, because he would find a way to sneak up to him and 'accidentally' elbow him there. It was cruel, even for Dr. Cox, and JD wasn't sure what exactly his mentor expected him to do in return. What sort of message was torturing him supposed to be sending? Ultimately, JD just ignored him like he always did and tried not to let it get to him.

He knew that he was drawing away from his friends, and he knew it probably wasn't the best thing to do, but he didn't really have any other choice. He was only happy when he was with Daniel, and he had to keep Daniel happy in order to keep himself happy. It was really as simple as that. Except…the more time he spent with Daniel, the more miserable he felt when he was away from him. He began to eat less, to talk less with patients and nurses, and he even considered quitting work so that he could just stay with Daniel all the time. It was his safe-haven, his sanctuary to sit in Daniel's living room and feel completely at ease with everything in his life, getting more and more drunk as Daniel kissed his way down his neck. Everything else dulled as this sharpened. All he had to do was tell himself that it was worth it in the morning.