A/N: Okay, for the record, Kristine's review is false. The story is not TOTALLY complete yet. I haven't even fully written the ending. Ai, sisters!
Also, I loved all the reviews I got for last chapter. I don't think I smiled bigger in my entire life. Totally love you guys!
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3:48 AM –That was what the clock read, and Flack felt ready to throw something at it for reminding him. It had been a long and trying day attempting to get in touch with his new housemate, and the poor detective still felt he hadn't accomplished a single thing. Granted, he hadn't had a lot of time to spend good quality time with Adam, so maybe he was being too negative? Everybody deserved the benefit of the doubt.
And Flack could give Adam that much.
In spite of this renewed sense of optimism, Flack's eyelids still felt like sheets of rock, and he was losing the fight to lift them open again.
"Start this up tomorrow?" Flack asked, his voice thick with tiredness.
In response, Danny let out a loud snore. Flack looked up in mild bewilderment to find the snoozing, blonde detective already lounging peacefully on his couch. Apparently, Danny was way ahead of him. Flack would've found this amusing if his brain hadn't stopped working ten minutes ago.
Leaning the chair back on its hind legs, Flack stretched a bit and got up. Like a zombie, he stalked down the hallway to his room. He paused, his ears perking up to an odd noise. It wounded like…
A whimper.
His mind screamed at him to let it go, to not be the "detective" just once in his life and get the sleep he so rightfully deserved. Still, he stood there in the middle of the hallway, hoping the noise would come again so he could locate its origin.
It happened again, and now Flack knew for sure where it was: Adam's room. Once this realization hit him, the exhaustion in him washed away, apart from a sharp stinging sensation in his eyes. Flack crept cautiously into the room. If need be, he kept an extra gun in the guest room's closet, but it didn't seem like it would come to that. As far as the detective could tell, only Adam was in the room, sleeping, albeit fitfully, in the full-sized bed.
The black-haired man switched on the small bedside lamp for further investigation. His breath caught in his throat at the sight he saw: Adam was sweating profusely, muttering things in his sleep, and looking in general like death warmed over. Flack tried not to panic. He had little to no medical experience aside from the average CPR certification, but oxygen-deficiency definitely wasn't the young man's problem.
Flack did the only thing he could think of: wake Adam up. He did this by slapping the scientist lightly on the cheek and calling his name in an urgent tone. When the younger man finally came to, Flack was relieved, but the sense of worry quickly regenerated itself as Adam continued to mutter nonsensical phrases and stare at him with fever in his eyes.
Adam was burning up. That much Flack could make out. Working fast, the tall man pulled out a washcloth from the guest room closet, doused it in cold water from the kitchen, and returned to find the young man had fallen back into his fever-induced nightmare (it was likely he had never gotten out of it in the first place). Flack persisted to wipe Adam's face with the cloth, hoping to transfer some form of coolness to the sweating lab tech's body.
It wasn't working.
Flack had continued pressing the cloth against Adam's face until the heat from his body dried out the water in the cloth. Out of pure desperation, Flack unhooked the sling around Adam's neck and began undressing him. He knew something was immediately wrong when he saw the growing blot of red on Adam's dark blue t-shirt. Not until he had carefully removed the shirt did he see the root of the problem.
The once-white bandage had been soaked many times through, now dyed a deep shade of red. His mouth set in a grim line, Flack peeled off the dressing that was definitely not provided by any sane hospital. The stitching underneath looked horrible, confirming Flack's suspicion of infection. It was the only thing that explained Adam's incredibly high fever.
What followed were new stitches (per instructions from Flack's iPhone), clean dressing, and over 500mg of painkillers and antibiotics that were originally prescribed to the detective. By the end of it, a bushed Flack sat against Adam's headboard, dabbing the wet washcloth against the young man's pale face and waiting for the meds to do take action.
Adam stirred once the fever went down some and the cool rag penetrated his burning flesh. He swallowed convulsively and squinted in the light emanating from the lamp.
"What-?" He tried, but Flack shushed him quickly.
"Don't try to talk. Just go back to sleep." Adam evidently didn't need to be told twice. He had drifted back the moment he saw Flack beside him, an odd feeling of relief flooding over him at the sight of the other man.
Flack continued to watch Adam as he slept. Knowing he would be all right was altogether overwhelming, and the tension that had built up the past hour released itself, causing the man to finally drift off into a dreamless sleep.
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As if breaking free from an abysmal terror, Adam's eyes bolted open in alarm. His body ached from the remnant of the fever the night before. Questions were spreading like a wildfire through his head of how he ended up in this unfamiliar place. Why was he lying in this bed? Why was Flack sleeping in the chair besides him? And why did his body ache so much?
Like speeding into a ton of bricks, the answers hit him head on. Flack was here because of his infected wound. The detective had given up his precious sleep to take care of Adam through the night and early morning.
Adam's heart sank at the thought. How could he have caused even more stress and turmoil to the older man's life? Was he really that useless that he had become incapable of even hiding his own problems?
Tenderly, Adam scooted out of the bed, his body protesting every second of it. Adam morosely surveyed the tired detective snoozing in an odd position against the bed, a basin full of bloodied water, bandages, and rags on the nightstand to his right. The sight made Adam's stomach turn uncomfortably but not as much as knowing he was the one that caused the spectacle in the first place.
Not being able to take being in the room with Flack for one more second, the auburn-haired scientist hesitantly walked out of the room, crept past Danny in the living room, and made his way outside into the chilly, early morning air of New York City. Adam was clueless of where his feet were taking him, but he cared just as much about his destination as he did about the chill of outside or the fact that he wasn't wearing a jacket.
He wanted to be numb to all the emotional stress of the past two days. So much of his life had changed, and every passing second brought new problems that were more out of his control than ever. He hated it.
The throbbing in his heart was almost bested by the intense shivering he was doing as he found himself walking through the park, straight to his favorite pizza parlor. If the light gray sky was any indication, Adam knew it was much too early to be picking up a slice at this hour. So, instead, the young man seated himself on the bench across the street from it, staring at the Shoppe with a sort of despondent expression, very unlike the usually-peppy lab tech.
Adam wasn't sure how long he sat like that. He just knew the chill had reached his bones and he could swear the chill was now sinking past his bones and into his bloodstream. He closed his eyes, breathing it in and wondering distractedly if someone would find him still sitting in the same position, frozen in place.
"Where the fuck have you been, Adam!" The lab tech's eyes opened wide in terror. He spun faster than one would think after spending two hours of sitting so still in the cold New York weather.
Adam wondered if it was Flack's red-hot fury that had warmed him up or the humiliation of being caught so easily. Either way, his whole body was screaming for him to run again or at least faint on the spot. Unfortunately, his body seemed unwilling to do either as he stared in shock silence at the expression Flack usually saved for striking fear into even the most hardened criminals.
"I-I can explain-" Adam managed to stutter out, his breath coming out in shortened puffs that were obvious to make out in the frosty air.
"No, you get to talk when I'm done talkin' to you! I just spent the better part of my night freakin' out of my mind, d'yous know why?" Flack's internal New Yorker was becoming all the more apparent as his rage bubbled over in his speech. Adam didn't dare even move to answer. "Because I was worried about you! Adam, you could have died if I hadn't heard you last night."
The young man's head turned downward, but Flack's growl told him to keep eye contact. To Adam's chagrin, the detective still wasn't done pointing out his flaws.
"Now I find you sitting outside, no coat on, in the middle of friggin' fall! Are you just trying to get yourself killed or just make my life that much harder?"
Those last words stung Adam the hardest and his misery-dulled eyes sharpened at the full gravity of his sentence. Suddenly, the lab tech did something he never thought he'd ever do to Flack: he stood up to him. Rising from the bench quickly, Adam muttered in a hurt but impassioned voice, "God forbid I mess up your life more than I already have."
With that, Adam started to leave. Flack was actually pretty shocked that someone, especially Adam Ross, the kid that flinched when a car backfired too loudly, would say something like that and just stalk off. But, these things did happen and Flack did the same thing that he always did when he had to deal with people just walking off mid-sentence: he chased after them.
"Hey, we're not done here, Adam," Flack said determinedly, catching up to the younger man's steady gait
"Yes, we are. I am formally declining all of your protection needs. I can't even recall consenting to them in the first place," Adam mumbled the last part but his irritated manner never left. Flack still walked beside him, his anger dissipating when he caught sight of the hurt that shown openly on the younger man's face.
Flack suddenly stopped, using an arm to halt Adam along with him. "Hey," he looked pointedly into Adam's matching blue eyes. "I'm sorry, okay? My anger sometimes gets ahead of myself. I didn't even bother to ask why you left in the first place."
Adam shook his head at the taller man, not believing the sentimental statement had escaped Flack's lips but at the same time, too busy with his own personal problems to even care. "It doesn't matter. They're not important. Just let me go."
Flack's grip on Adam's shoulder wouldn't budge though, impeding the lab tech from moving any further. "Adam, their important. Trust me."
If there was one thing that Flack was good at, it was using his sincere eyes. They worked on both sexes and it usually got him just what he wanted when he played them right. And, being the pliable lump that he was, Adam believed him.
"I-I," The anxious stutter was coming back into his speech as Adam's previous resolve melted away with Flack's puppy-dog expression. The detective offered an encouraging and patient squeeze to Adam's arm, causing the young man to close his eyes in an attempt to soothe his nerves. "I feel weak."
Flack tilted his head in confusion, thinking Adam meant in a physical sense, but nonetheless, let him continue.
"I'm weak and vulnerable and I feel like I'm the only one in the lab that doesn't seem to have a detachable gun at my disposal." Adam admitted with a sigh, as if an emotional weight was being lifted slightly just by speaking his true feelings.
"Adam that's not true-" Flack began but Adam's slight shake of his head stopped him from speaking.
Adam continued, still a bit shakily. "And I'm tired of having to be protected all the time by you guys. Because it makes me feel like 'that dude' that can't take care of himself and has to rely on everyone else to take care of his problems." The words were actually hurting him to say. "Not that you'd understand."
"You're right." Flack said and Adam looked up for the first time. "I don't understand. I have a gun in every room of my house, rely only on myself, and run into buildings without a care for my well-being. But that just makes me the person I am. You've at least got the brains to accept help when it's offered to you."
Adam allowed himself the smallest of smirks at Flack's jocular statement.
"I'd trade in my gun any day for a brain like yours. We all would. So stop focusing on all the things that you don't have and start focusing on the million things you're better than me at."
"That might be a lot," Adam replied timidly, making Flack chuckle good-naturedly.
"C'mon, let's see if Messer was able to drag his lazy ass out of bed yet." Flack said, leading the younger lab tech in the direction of the apartment.
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A/N: Okay, so I wanted to give you guys a bit more story, but if I had, I would've been giving much too much information. Haha, please don't hate me! I want more reviews. They make me glad and not sad, like the trash bags. So drop one down this dumpster now! (Okay, bad, bad pun…)