A/N: I've been trying to get this chapter up all weekend!! It's here now. Thanks for all of the wonderful reviews, especially those from Mogul and BrokenWaffles, you're fantastic. Also, 3 cookie points to tyger663 and LackofColorHere for pointing out the Psych reference. Yes, I do watch it too much.

Fun Fact: Loth started summer classes Tuesday, arrête le français!! Franchment, c'est ennuyeux.

Raising a Hand

By LQ Aredhel

Chapter 21

"Say something happened that changes the way I react to certain things. How long would it take to go back to normal?"

He'd practiced the question over and over in the last few days, anticipating the moment when Dr. Rice would ask him what he wanted to talk about. He expected some kind of answer, too, but Dr. Rice just looked at him carefully above his notebook.

"I'm afraid you're going to have to be more specific, JD," the doctor admitted. "I'm not sure what you mean."

JD looked around the room, concentrating mostly on keeping his breathing under control as he desperately tried to find a way to say it without ...saying it.

"Say...say something happened..." He couldn't even say it, couldn't even think about it clearly because the idea was so distant from his mind after so much time fearing Daniel's rage, his violence, but not his touch.

"What happened, JD?" Dr. Rice asked calmly. He didn't even appear curious, just genuinely concerned. For a moment, JD considered spilling it. All of it. But if one more person knew...he couldn't expect Dr. Rice to react like Dr. Cox had. Dr. Cox actually understood what he was going through.

"Forget it."

They moved on to discuss JD's relationships with his friends and coworkers, something that actually made him relax and forget the huge issues looming before him. He avoided the topic of Elliot altogether. But she plagued his mind on his way home.

He hadn't seen her since that night, but two days later Carla had come home from work pissed at him and ranting about how to treat a woman right. She said he broke her heart. She didn't even mention the fact that she thought he was gay and in a relationship with Dr. Cox. It would have been nice to have things back to normal if it hadn't meant that he devastated Elliot along the way.

He'd had nightmares constantly after that night. Constant reminders of the fact that he was tainted by the things Daniel had done. He felt more and more tainted every day. And when Elliot had touched him, it was like even more poison had seeped into his skin.

Who needs relationships anyway? he thought one night when he locked himself in his room. He and Elliot were horrible together; he and anyone were horrible together. He sabotaged every relationship he'd been in anyway, so now he had a great excuse for things not working out. He couldn't...he was no longer comfortable being touched. So I'll never have sex again. So what? The thought wasn't comforting at all.

Which was why he'd try to relay his problem to his therapist...without actually letting him know what the problem was. But it hadn't worked out. There was really only one person he who he knew would understand him. Well, he hadn't wanted to go home anyway. He would have just stayed in his room all night.

Dr. Cox wasn't at home when JD arrived at his apartment, which took a surprisingly long time to walk to from his neighborhood. He sat against the wall next to the door and waited three hours until the older doctor came trudging up the stairs and stopped dead in his tracks.

"Susan," he began, his face dark and tired, "what are you doing?"

A wave of guilt suddenly washed over JD and he stood. "I'm sorry, Dr. Cox. I was just..." What could he do about JD's problems anyway?

But before JD could leave, Dr. Cox opened the door and shoved him into his apartment.

The older man dropped his things in a corner and went straight for the scotch. "Do you know what the lovely Nurse Carla has been accusing me of?" JD felt his face flush: he never imagined that Carla would take her ideas to his mentor. "Apparently we're the newest item, and if I hurt you not even one of my 'silly rants' will be enough to get my balls back from Gandhi." He drank two consecutive shots and poured a third. "So now that you've made another indiscreet private visit to my apartment, how can I help you, princess?"

Okay, so he wasn't in a good mood. Now that JD look closer, Dr. Cox looked about as crappy as Carla said he did: he was pale with bags under his eyes and he looked like he just wanted to pass out cold. No wonder he was drinking.

I'm sure I'm helping in that area, JD thought morosely.

"I'm really sorry, Dr. Cox," he began, backing toward the door. The other man held up a hand to stop him.

"Seriously, what's the problem?"

JD watched him, waiting for some kind of sign that he was anything but sincere. But Dr. Cox just angled his drink around and stared angrily at the chair in front of him.

"I-I..." Okay, this was his chance to get it out, to actually find out how to solve this stupid problem. He didn't want to freeze up every time someone touched his stomach. He didn't want to go without sex for the rest of his life.

"Sit down, Newbie." JD suddenly realized that Dr. Cox was seated in the chair he'd been glaring at before. Must stop zoning out.

He sat stiffly on the edge of the couch and took a deep breath.

"Okay," he began, "here's the thing." It sort of ended there. Nothing he was thinking would come out. "Okay," he started again, then recited: "Say something happened that changes the way I react to certain things. How long would it take to go back to normal?" There. Dr. Cox should have enough information to fill in the blanks. That wasn't so bad.

"You mean the rape."

JD flushed again, the white noise rushing through his ears. He rubbed his forehead, urging it away.

"JD," Dr. Cox said again, his voice low and even. "You're talking about being raped aren't you?"

JD took a deep breath and tried to laugh away his discomfort. "I wish you wouldn't call it that," he mumbled in an attempt to lighten the mood.

"Of course, what would I know? I'm only a doctor who deals with this sort of thing on a regular basis." JD barely noted him pouring himself another glass of scotch and drinking it down. How many before he started to really feel the effects? Would this be easier if he drank some, too? He always hated scotch, but it wasn't really about taste at this point—.

"Are you in therapy, yet?"

JD shook his head, smiling the best he could. Of course Dr. Cox would figure that one out, even though the only people besides JD who knew were Dr. Kelso and Dr. Rice, and probably his receptionist, JD guessed...

"You are." It was sort of a question, and JD realized he hadn't answered yet.

"Yeah, it's just..." He doesn't quite understand me like you do. Yeah, that doesn't sound gay as hell. "I can't really talk to him about it, you know?"

Dr. Cox glared into his drink. "Yeah."

JD took a deep breath, sinking back slightly into the couch. He knew Dr. Cox would understand. "Elliot sort of...came onto me a few days ago, and...I just sort of ... wasn't there. And afterwards, I couldn't breathe. I couldn't calm down, I could barely talk to her. Now she's mad at me, and I'm just... I don't know how to get things back to normal."

He looked up at Dr. Cox's worn and sad expression and knew that this was like all the other questions. There was no quick fix to forgetting about Daniel and transitioning back into his old life, and there was no apparent reason for Daniel trying to kill him after all they'd been through together. There was no answer to this. There was nothing Dr. Cox could say to make it go away.

JD still waited, in rapt attention, for him to say something...something profound and meaningful that would at least make him hopeful about this entire goddamn situation. That one day things could be better.

But Dr. Cox poured JD a glass of scotch and sat back with his own drink. And JD downed it and didn't even taste it and then had another and another. Eventually, if only just for the night, everything faded away.

The next morning, JD never felt so great about feeling so horrible: there was nothing like a debilitating hangover to limit unpleasant thoughts. He gulped down some water, noting that Dr. Cox's things were gone from the corner, and that his bedroom door was opened on an empty room. He must have had a shift early in the morning.

JD washed the glass and folded the blanket that he didn't remember having the night before. He glanced at the empty scotch bottle in the trash can and wondered if this was the beginning of his life as a drunkard; he really didn't mind it. It helped to block out the bad things. Maybe Dr. Cox was onto something.

When he arrived back at his apartment, Elliot and Carla were standing in the kitchen. They were silent when he stepped into the room, both watching him with guilt in their eyes that clearly said they'd been discussing him only moments before. JD fought the urge to retreat to his room, lock himself in for the hundredth time that month. Carla quickly left and Elliot rushed up to JD before he could back away a safe distance.

"JD," she began thickly, pain floating in her eyes, "what happened? Please, just tell me what's going on now."

He backed away, covering by making his way to the chair in the living room. She sat on the couch.

"I guess I'm just not ready," he confessed, choosing his words carefully. It was true, and it was safe. "I mean, after..." he paused, god, he couldn't even remember her name!! "Julie. After Julie. It's been hard to really feel that way again."

She looked incredulous. "It's hard to feel that way again? JD, I love you! How can you not feel that even a little bit? I know we've been through this before, but...how can you do this to me?"

She was crying now and leaning forward on the couch like she would jump into his arms any second, and JD knew that it was time for him to comfort her...somehow...but he was frozen in the fear that she would try to kiss him or touch him somehow and he would screw up again and she would realize that he was insane and she would figure it out and they would all figure it out and everything would be over. How much would Turk trust him after that?

"I don't know what to do, JD," Elliot continued, her mascara bleeding down her cheeks. "I don't know what to do to convince you that we should be together. I love you, and that should be enough. Tell me what to do."

Fix me.

He shook his head. "Elliot, I..." He swallowed thickly, avoiding her eyes. "It just wouldn't work out."

She let out a sob, and he rubbed his hand through his hair. His head was still throbbing, dulling the guilt stabbing at his insides. What else could he do?

"Let me take you to a movie." He barely realized he'd said it when her head shot up and her blue eyes chiseled a hole in his migraine.

"Forget it." She gathered her purse and marched to the door. "Fuck you, JD." Slam.

He was alone in the house again. He dragged himself into his room and face-first onto his bed.

Today. Today was Saturday. He had another session with Dr. Rice on Monday. Just another two mornings to get up and shower and dress and brush his teeth and maybe eat something if Turk is around. He was getting better about eating, at least. Maybe he could go out and buy some scotch and drink until everything blurred again like it did last night. It was only ten a.m., but no one was around and no one would notice if he was lying on his bed and not thinking about Daniel or stabbing or sex or rape. Those things could all fade away.

Maybe he'd go when his hangover wore off; it was deliciously debilitating at the moment. It didn't let any real thoughts inside.