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The next morning I was sitting outside the hospital in my car waiting for Newbie to arrive. It had occurred to me that some people might describe this as stalking, but they were obviously idiots. I'd decided that I was going to spend as much time as possible with the kid and force him to tell me what had happened to change him. After that… well I hadn't planned that far ahead. I turned my head and almost screamed (it was really more of an intake of breath) when I saw Newbie standing right next to the window, his arms folded, looking angry. I couldn't figure out how it was that I hadn't seen him approach. Usually I always knew who was around me without looking, but for some reason the kid had actually managed to sneak up on me.

I slowly opened the car door and stood in front of him. We stood there for a few minutes staring at each other.

"Why are you still here?!" He finally asked. I shrugged.

"I want to know why you're not the bubbly, flirty teenage girl you always used to be, and I'm not leaving until I find out, princess." I told him. He raised an eyebrow.

"You know some people might call this stalking." I shrugged. He sighed and rubbed a hand over his eyes. "Look, I'm actually going to be honest with you. I don't know why you're here or what you're trying to do, but I do know that you're wasting your time. Just give it up. Please." I shrugged again.

"When have I listened to what you think you 'know'? Besides, for the first time in, well…ever, I'm prepared to listen to you while you moan, whine and generally complain about your feelings. So isn't now about the time you should be starting squealing, dancing and crying happy tears, of joy?" JD began to walk away, but then suddenly turned back to face me?

"Why do you even care? All the years we worked together, it was just constantly girls names and my being incompetent, any moment of weakness met with a punch in the face, both figuratively and literally! And now youcare? Now you want to talk to me? Well excuse me for having a problem with that." He turned away again, only to whirl back around after only a second. "In fact, you want to hear something funny? This is what you always wanted. Me out of your hair. No more girly crap. Finally 'growing a pair'. But oh no, poor, wittle Pewwy! He's finally got what he was so damn sure he wanted, and it's still not enough! What, you came back here because you're bored without your lapdog to kick? Thought you'd come here and make me suffer again, for old times' sake? And now you're here, I'm not eating out of your hands anymore, and you can't stand that, can you? Can't stand that your Newbie doesn't spend every God damn day trying to please you anymore. Well who gives a crap?" He finally stormed off. I was unable to move I was so shocked. Actually that was beginning to become a pretty regular occurrence. Also, I was at least a little proud. That was a class A Cox rant. He would never have had the guts to do that last time I saw him. Something had caused this, for better or for worse. Now if only I wasn't so sure the something had been bad…

The previous night, I'd given a lot of thought to how I could get through to JD. I'd tried treating him like I used to and it hadn't worked. I'd tried treating him like I thought he'd always wanted me to and it hadn't worked. The truth was that I just didn't know how to talk to him anymore. And that just annoyed me more. Because since Newbie was acting like me, I should be able to relate to him better than anyone else in the world. Yet I couldn't do a damn thing.

From what he'd said so far, I'd only been able to figure out a little. The reason he didn't want me here wasn't because he didn't like me, or that I was annoying him. At least, it wasn't just that, I hoped. It was that he was scared that my presence would eventually draw the person he used to be out of him. That he'd be forced to feel again. At any rate, that's what I thought, although I'd never been very good with empathising with people.

That still didn't help much. I knew that he wasn't going to tell me what had changed. He wasn't like that anymore. If I was going to get anywhere, I'd have to guess, and thus far the best way I could think of to make a start on that would be to ask around.

I entered the hospital slowly, having first made sure that Newbie was no where to be seen. I really didn't want yet another confrontation with him right now. I was about to go to the admissions desk and ask about him, like I'd done yesterday, when the intern who JD had shouted at before appeared.

"Uh…Hi." He greeted, somewhat nervously.

"Hey kid." I gave him a nod then proceeded to wait patiently (for once in my life) for him to continue speaking. He didn't. "Can I help you?" He looked away and awkwardly shifted his weight.

"Well…I-I heard some of the nurses talking about this guy that came in yesterday…" He trailed off, a faint blush touching his skin.

"Yes?" I prompted. He glanced away from me.

"It's stupid," he muttered under his breath. Tentatively his eyes returned to my face. "It's just that I saw him yelling at you earlier so I thought that you might…maybe be his…" He looked away again. I had to bite my lip to stop myself from torturing him. If this had been Sacred Heart…well, chances were he'd be too scared to come near me for at least six months.

"You heard the nurses talking about Dr. Dorian's visiting acquaintance, saw him yelling at me, and decided that I must therefore must be his best-est friend ever?" I gave him my best smile.

"Well, yeah." I glared at him. "I-I mean no…" I continued to glare at him. "I don't know?" He finally tried. I was about to turn away in disgust and get back to what I'd come here to do, but I didn't. I was curious about him. He reminded me a little of what JD had been like in his first year as at Sacred Heart. Besides, it was possible he knew something about JD that I needed to find out, so it was worth talking to him.

"Let's get some coffee, and then maybe we can talk…" I led him away with a hand on his shoulder.