Note: An enormous THANK YOU to everyone who read and reviewed my first chapter of this fic! I'm so glad it's being well-received. :) I originally thought it would be wrapped up within two or three parts, but I think I can see it going for a bit longer than that, now; the scope of the whole project has gotten a lot larger.
To restate warnings from the previous chapter, there is much angst and P/E to be had, and this is quite AU, given the timeline and the irreversible nature of Miles's injury.
The last scene of this chapter is the idea that started the whole fic for me, so I'm excited that I got to write it already. So, thanks again to all my lovely readers! I hope you enjoy the next installment!
Begin Again
Chapter Two
"Try leaning more on the cane, Mr. Edgeworth."
Miles grunted angrily in response. Walking with a cane was simply not going to happen; was this physical therapy nurse completely daft? There was no logical way to take a step with only one leg and a metal rod for support. After two attempts that ended in his near-collapse onto the floor of the hospital room, Miles had no intention of trying such nonsense again. He stood there, feeling like he might as well have been trying to hover as to walk, and glared.
"Well, it'll be easier than a crutch," the nurse chirped, plastering on a fake smile. Miles guessed she probably hated having him for a patient. He continued to stand there next to his hospital bed and glare until she sighed and said, "Never mind, then… you can try again tomorrow."
Like hell, Miles thought, as he dragged himself back into his hospital bed. It had been five days since he had awakened in the hospital, and for four of those days, this ridiculous nurse had been coming in to spend hours with him, trying to teach him how to do things he should already have known how to do. Changing clothes was the first lesson, and he mastered that well enough for a man unwilling to look at his own body from the waist down; it was a struggle, but he accomplished it. Standing had come next, and with the assistance of a cane or a crutch that was no great difficulty. He had hoped to have the opportunity to use a wheelchair for some time before trying to walk, but the physical therapy nurse believed in a very swift recovery, and he hated her for that.
He would have just gone back home and worked on recovering there, away from the prying eyes of this falsely chipper woman, but there was no one there. And as much as he refused to admit it aloud, he knew in his heart that he needed assistance. So, with no one to help him and plenty of money to fund a lengthy stay, he had opted to take his time convalescing at the hospital instead. Unfortunately, that meant many frequent interruptions from doctors and nurses, and otherwise, long stretches of silence, since that girl - Trucy Wright - had gone home after only one night. The silence in the downtime between annoyances provided Miles ample opportunity to do some thinking - about his injury, his life now that he was disabled, and about… well. Phoenix Wright. The haggard presence that inserted himself into the midst of other, more pertinent lines of thought.
How will I stay in shape now? Jogging is out, soon became why on earth did Wright adopt a child? ; I wonder when I can return to work dissolved easily into I wonder if Wright has worked a day since the incident I seem to recall hearing about. And so Miles spent his hospital time, dwelling and pretending not to dwell, wondering and telling himself he was not lonely.
The physical therapy nurse finished making notes on the chart she carried with her, scowled, and said, "I'll be back tomorrow, Mr. Edgeworth," before leaving the offending cane propped up against the end of his bed and hurrying out of the room. Miles was glad to have her gone. He fidgeted with his bedsheets, pulling them over himself - no need to look at myself yet, he told himself, every day, many times a day. It was no easy task to adjust the sheets to his liking while staring stubbornly at the ceiling, and so it was that he did not notice that his solitude had been once again infringed upon until the culprit spoke.
"Something interesting up there?"
The soft voice made Miles start and divert his attention instead to the doorway. Phoenix stood there, staring at some point on the wall above Miles's head, one hand holding a plastic bag full of something and the other shoved into a pocket of the same pants he had been wearing when he came to collect Trucy some days ago. Miles almost asked why the unshaven man would repeatedly wear such ragged, torn old clothing, but then stopped. I suppose that answers my question about his employment, he thought idly.
"Mind some company?" Phoenix asked. Miles frowned.
"I assume it won't make a difference how I answer that."
Phoenix gave a hollow smile and crossed the room to sit on the side of the now-empty second bed.
"As I thought," Miles muttered with a snort.
"How are you feeling?"
Why won't he make eye contact with me? "I've been better. How is your daughter?" Miles spat the last word without really meaning to, and he winced. He hadn't intended to bring up that little matter already.
"She's wonderful," Phoenix replied, bristling, his words loaded with emotion. The subject of Trucy hung in the sterile air between them as years of why didn't you ever contact me? and days of how could you have a daughter that age that I didn't even know about? circled around Miles's mind. Phoenix continued to stare at anything that wasn't Miles, until finally he added, "I adopted her about six years ago. She's thirteen."
"Adopted?"
"Did you think she was biologically mine?" Phoenix barked a hard little laugh that Miles didn't like at all. "You know I never had much luck with women."
Miles simply stared. He had wondered for years what had happened to Phoenix. How could they have been in the same city and never once crossed paths? Miles had been out of the country when Phoenix had allegedly been stripped of his badge - he supposed that legend must be true, judging by the shadow that sat across from him now. Miles opened his mouth to ask another question, but instead all that he managed to utter was a soft whine, as pain suddenly shot up the trunk of his body from the place where, a week before, there had been a right leg.
Phoenix was on his feet in an instant, leaning over Miles and asking, "Are you okay?" with all previous irritation forgotten.
Miles gasped in response. This had been happening periodically over the past few days, but it always shocked him. He gripped his sheets as tightly as he could for a few moments before the pain began to wash away again and he glanced up at Phoenix, who still stood over him.
"I'm fine, Wright," he snapped. His face was growing hot.
"It's nothing to be embarrassed about," Phoenix replied, and for a moment, he sounded like his old self. "I'm surprised you're doing as well as you are already, really."
Miles exhaled sharply through his nose, a half-grunt, half-sigh that he'd become more and more prone to doing in recent years. "Did you come here for a reason today?" he asked.
"I did."
"Well?"
"Here," said Phoenix, and he fished in his plastic bag for a few seconds before shoving a disposable bowl and chopsticks under Miles's nose. "I came to bring you noodles."
Miles frowned as he took the bowl of noodles, pulled off the plastic covering, and sniffed the food. "What in the world is this for?" he asked.
"Eating, usually." Phoenix perched, this time on the side of the bed Miles occupied, and started slurping up noodles of his own.
Miles poked at his with the chopsticks before tentatively tasting a bite.
"Well?"
"These are terrible, Wright. Where did you find these?"
"I know a guy."
"That's… specific."
"Well, free food is free food." Phoenix shifted uncomfortably.
Miles convinced himself to eat more of the noodles.
Some minutes passed in silence before Phoenix looked over and suddenly, unexpectedly, met Miles's eyes with his own. Miles put down his chopsticks and gazed back into that hazy expression, wondering what could be brewing behind those blue eyes. And then Phoenix said the last thing Miles would have expected to hear in his current situation:
"Come home with me."
Miles almost laughed. "Be serious."
"I am." Phoenix looked back at his now-empty noodle bowl. "I mean, home is my old office right now, and Trucy and I sleep on the sofas, but you can have my sofa and I'll take the floor."
"Wright, I…." Miles stopped himself. He had to go about this delicately. It was more than obvious that Phoenix was offering a great personal sacrifice, but he was not going to be pitied and tended to by someone so very - well, so very pitiable himself. He took a deep breath and started again. "Wright, I have a very large apartment of my own, you know. I have no need -"
"Your apartment has two floors, doesn't it? I don't think you can get up and down the stairs."
"I'll just stay on the first floor and sleep on my own sofa, then."
"Or," said Phoenix with a crooked little grin, "you could come and sleep on one of mine and then I won't have to be worried about you falling and hurting yourself because you're too proud to ask anybody for help."
Look who's talking. Miles sighed deeply. "It's impossible to win an argument with you."
The grin fell from Phoenix's face, and for a moment, Miles regretted having said such a thing. But the moment passed, and a true, genuine smile replaced the near-unreadable expression. "Good! I'll just tell the nurse - Trucy's going to be happy that I talked you into this. It was her idea in the first place."
Miles watched as the man he had once known as a very dear friend staggered out of the hospital room. What am I getting myself into? Sleeping on a sofa in an old law office and eating overly salted noodles every day doesn't sound very promising. He would find out soon enough, anyhow, he told himself; Phoenix would be back any moment with the nurse to check him out of the hospital, and then he would be on his way to - well, to something.
And soon enough, Phoenix did return, with two nurses who protested continually about the bad decision that was leaving the hospital with next to no physical therapy experience. Miles ignored them, for the most part, though he was secretly grateful for their help as he slowly and painfully moved from his bed to a wheelchair. Sitting in the chair was more than a little unnatural, but not impossible; his leg had been completely destroyed from just above the knee, however, so his balance was off-kilter even in sitting. He tried to adjust to a more comfortable position in the wheelchair, his face burning red with shame all the while.
Phoenix made a great show of not noticing any of this as he pushed Miles out of the hospital room without a word. In fact, they were nearly to the end of the hallway in which Miles's room was located before Phoenix said anything at all.
"You know, we're on the fourth floor," he mused idly.
"I know," Miles replied.
"I'm not carrying a wheelchair down four flights of stairs."
Miles stiffened, and turned around to the best of his ability to stare seriously at Phoenix. "I'm not taking the elevator, Wright."
"And, once again, I'm not carrying a wheelchair all that way. I don't even think I could."
Miles took a few deep breaths and sat back in the wheelchair. "I can't," he said quietly. Then, "I can't," a bit louder; "I can't, I can't!" he shouted, and bent over, clutching his hair in his fists.
Phoenix looked around wildly, alarmed by this outburst. "Miles, shh!" he said, hurrying around to crouch in front of the wheelchair and put his hands on his friend's shoulders. "Miles, come on, it's okay!"
"It's not okay!" Miles reached out, found Phoenix, held onto his forearms for dear life. "It's not just now - not just this elevator - it's always, Wright, always."
"Always?"
"How will I ever take the stairs like this?"
"I… I don't know. I don't know, just yet, but for now, anyway… I have an idea."
And so it was that an empty wheelchair took three trips up and down in the hospital elevator while Phoenix Wright carried Miles Edgeworth piggyback-style down four flights of stairs to the safety of the ground level below.