Lola: thank you very much, I'm so glad to hear you like my writing for it since it's so much different than what I normally do. I hope it's still good this chapter since it's been awhile since I've written in first person.
I didn't notice it at first, I didn't pay much mind to his little questions.
"Do you know anything about Thomas Harewood?" he asked me one day while I was looking through a medical book, still trying to solve the same patient's case. And in all honesty if you're trying to get information out of me and me not realize your intentions, that's just about the only time – I guess it shows how well he knew me.
"Name sounds familiar," I told him absentmindedly, not really thinking about it as I read through a passage I'd read just about a hundred times before.
"Maybe a relative then," he said, his tone nonchalant and very convincingly uncaring.
That was when I thought about it, cause I did know that name – at least the last name. "Lucille Harewood?" I asked looking at him for confirmation, he only shrugged.
"I don't know, who's Lucille?" he asked.
I thought about a case file I'd read, trying to picture the words on my padd as I'd read them. "Age nine, daughter of," I paused as I remembered the names, "Rima and Thomas Harewood," I finished looking at him, seeing his eyes were narrowed as he watched me. "Terminally ill, in a coma, I couldn't find much else to try for her so I passed the case on. Does that answer anything?" I asked looking back to my book.
"Yes it does," he said, and me so caught up in a book I didn't see the gleam in his eye.
"Why'd you wanna know?" I asked, no longer really paying him any mind. He could have given me some bogus lie and I would have nodded and said, 'that's nice.'
"I work under him and heard him talking about going to the hospital," he said with a shrug as he flipped through different channels, no longer caring about our conversation either.
See, there was nothing to raise a red flag at how he asked about Thomas, at getting information about his daughter; nothing suspicious. It wasn't me being easily fooled, or too distracted, or too stupid to catch on.
Okay that was a lie, I was too distracted to catch what I was supposed to. You see, John told me he was an engineer who designed ships and weapons. Thomas Harewood was a Starfleet officer who worked in an archive, he worked at a place where people went to read. I didn't catch that, I was distracted, and when I wasn't distracted he'd been so offhand about it that it had completely slipped my mind. And he didn't act any different after either, he still slept beside me when I wasn't at the hospital or sat with me watching the news as I studied or even joined me in the shower before I'd leave, however when he spoke of it again I remembered completely our conversation. And even then a red flag didn't go off.
"Has there been a change with Lucille Harewood?" he'd asked one day after he returned to the room, sometimes having been gone when I returned – it had startled me at first, and as embarrassing as it is to admit this, I had been afraid he'd left. But he'd come back, knocking on the door and asking if he could stay – I'd hidden my relief, I know I did because I wouldn't dare let that show, not when I hardly knew him. And yet he'd seen it, cause the moment he'd walked through the door he was taking my clothes off.
And so on that day I had assumed he returned from his work. "Thomas Harewood's daughter?" I asked.
He smiled at that, brushing my hair out of my face fondly. "You really do remember everything," he said staring hard at me. "And yes, Thomas Harewood's daughter."
I looked at him weirdly, finding it strange he was asking about her again. "Not that I know of. Her file said it was incurable," I told him.
And as though he sensed my growing suspicions he nodded before speaking, and squashing them right in the bud. "I saw him at his desk crying," he said softly, his voice one of sadness. "I guess you answered why."
"Yeah," I said looking at his handsome face, remembering how he spoke of his family. He looked up at me and I gave him a small smile, seeing the corners of his mouth curl slightly before he leaned forward and kissed me. There was no passion in it, no heat that had our clothes practically pulling themselves off; it was light, and sweet, and it made my heart melt at the tenderness behind it. And again, I missed the sign that was so clear – I knew, I knew Harewood worked at an archive it was in Lucille's file. Be it my mind suppressing the knowledge in the face of my feelings for him, or the distractions of those feelings, I still didn't catch it.
He was being sweet, and gentle, and I honestly loved those moments with him; they were why I was falling in love, whether I knew it then or not. The sweetest I'd ever seen him is after we had sex, in the quiet moments as we laid naked together on the bed, the sheets half covering us and my heart racing from the exertion. He'd normally pull me to his chest, running his fingers through my hair, or along my back, listening to my breathing – maybe even my heart. And we'd talk, about nothing, about everything.
On one of those nights, after I'd fallen asleep, I was woken by a flash of bright light. "It's only a thunderstorm," he told me gently when I startled awake.
"I used to love thunderstorms when I was a kid," I told him sleepily. "Jim and I would sit on the roof and watch the thunder clouds rolling in, seeing the lightening strike. In hindsight we're lucky we didn't get struck."
I felt his chuckle rumble in his chest beneath my ear. "I take it you both liked thrills," he said amused.
"Yeah," I said smiling, it was before my mom had died; some of my best memories. "He always took it far, he took everything too far." I remembered all the fights with other boys, with my father livid and red faced as he told Jim he was worthless, of Jim's mother doing nothing.
"What happens when you get struck by lightening?" he asked, drawing me out of my sad reverie; I realize now how much him doing that meant, it meant he cared about me, in some little way.
"A lot of things," I answered, my mind now turning to all I had read about the victims of lightening strikes. "Burns, minor or major, heart palpitations, heart attack, a lot different brain damages. Some people lose certain senses based on the part of the brain that was effected. I knew a girl once who couldn't see the color red."
"They couldn't fix it?" he asked, interest laced in his voice. Whether or not it was genuine I didn't know.
"Parents couldn't afford it, and then there was the going in and rewiring her brain that made it risky. I mean the current from the lightening probably fried something in that part of her brain," I said trailing off as I stilled.
"Is something wrong?" he asked looking at me as I sat up.
I shook my head too excited. "Electrical currents can alter synapses," I said looking at him wide eyed. "God I'm an idiot, how did I miss this?"
"It's the middle of the night, where are you going?" he asked with a smile as he pulled me to him, tugging the pants I had half put on back off.
"I know how to rewire his brain," I told him amazed, finding this amazing though he didn't. "I did it, I figured out."
He looked at me questioningly. "You plan to electrocute him?"
"Yeah," I answered as though it were obvious, too excited I'd finally figured it out to care. "In small increments and doses so we don't completely alter his neurons and synapses. I mean it's still pretty much a trialed method but it could work, and if it doesn't I mean he's probably gonna die anyways."
I could always see it amazed him at how casual I was speaking of death, something that always turned the corners of his mouth up. I didn't notice that night.
"And it may even rejuvenate the cells that have deteriorated," I finished standing again and pushing my hair back as reached once more for my pants.
"Elenore," he said calling me back to him. I followed his eyes to the clock to see it was only 2:45 and I sighed as I sat back on the bed. "Come here," he said pulling me to him, laying me over him as he pressed against me. "Tell me again why this is the answer," he told me, his eyes beginning to heat. And they grew hotter as I repeated myself, adding things that came to mind that also helped my case. In the end he pulled my leg over his waist so I straddled him, something he did not do very often, and we fucked; hard and loud.
I'd like to tell you that was it, that I went to the hospital with my findings, spending the morning doing research to further prove my method, and then Dr. Phillips reluctantly agreeing and we saved the patient and I went back to the Starfleet base in America where Jim greeted me with a big hug and an even bigger smile when he saw me. I'd like more than anything to tell you that, it would mean nothing else that followed happened. But I can't.
"When are you leaving?" John asked the second night after the surgery, the day the patient started to show progress.
I laid against him, warm and secure in his arms as he held me; something no man had ever made me feel before. "The morning after tomorrow," I told him softly, honestly not happy at the idea of not seeing him again. "They'll continue to monitor his progress and they'll take it from there, our work is done."
He laid beneath me silently, running his fingers up and down my spine. "Do you want to leave?" he asked surprising me. He looked down at me, his eyes sincere and pleading; and I thought about it, honestly thought about whether I wanted to or not. And other than Jim, the only answer I could find was no. And he saw that in my eyes, in my inability to answer him. So he kissed me, soft and sweet. "Stay with me," he mumbled against my lips, asking me the one thing I had wanted him to. Cause it meant it cared, that he wanted me to stay as much as I did, that he didn't think he could to sleep when I wasn't in his arms like I did. And so I stayed. And oh how I was wrong.
So next chapter will have him being his evil self, and I'm actually kind of excited for it. I'm also very sorry for how long this took to update, I kind of lost the inspiration for it. However, I can tell you all that I am more inspired when I get reviews. So if you're still interested let me know, and I'll try to update more often.