Disclaimers: I don't own Saw or any of the characters, unfortunately.
Other: Hey! Finally, it's Friday. A weekend full of fanfic. :D Anyway, I'm sorry for taking so long to update chapter five. It's also the shortest chapter so far. I felt that Lawrence had to be grumpy for once. Everyone has one of those days, and Lawrence is no exception. So both characters had their change for this chapter. For those of you who have been waiting...The next chapter will be quite smutty in a way. ;D Enjoy reading this short chapter. I promise the next chapter will be better. :)
As the weeks went by, Adam began taking down the wall that he'd built ever so carefully around his heart. He didn't sulk and smoke as often as he did at first. He was more prone to following Lawrence around and talking. He never talked about what happened last year, or about family. Just random things, like videos he'd watched on the computer, photos he'd taken. Simple subjects like those. When he wasn't talking to Lawrence, he was using the very expensive and extravagant camera Lawrence had bought him. That camera was like a part of Adam. Just like Diana with her baby doll, Adam always had the camera with him. He didn't live with Lawrence, and they hadn't made any physical contact since the time Adam had slept in Lawrence's bed after having a gruesome nightmare three weeks ago. Sometimes Lawrence would brush Adam's hair out of his face, but that was as far as it ever went. They didn't discuss their relationship. They were friends, for now. Life was getting better. Adam was recovering bit by bit.
One afternoon, Lawrence came home early. He simply said that they didn't really need him today. But he seemed very stressed out. Adam followed him everywhere he went, talking non-stop. Not only was he talking so much, but he talked so fast. It was starting to bother Lawrence. Normally, Lawrence enjoyed the times when Adam spoke to him. He didn't mind the way he spoke, as long as he was talking, Lawrence was happy. But not today; he'd had a terrible day, his paper work was piling up faster than he could fill them out, and a patient hadn't survived a surgery. He wasn't in the mood for Adam's ramblings. He was hoping that by being silent, Adam would get the hint and leave.
But Adam was in a very good mood. He'd taken plenty of gorgeous photos, and was waving the developed photos in Lawrence's face. The smell of drying chemicals only made Lawrence's headache worse.
"And look how awesome they turned out! I mean, it's so bright and windy outside, so I didn't think my photos would turn out right, you know? But they came out perfect! Look at this one. It's that one oak tree in Central Park. Look how beautiful the details are! You can see every hint of shadow. The leaves are everywhere, and –"
Lawrence interrupted Adam much harsher than he'd intended.
"Would you stop pushing those things in my face, kid? I don't care!" he snapped, shoving Adam away from him. He'd forgotten how light the kid was; the boy actually fell backward onto his ass. Adam looked up at the doctor, startled, confused, and hurt. He licked his lips and looked down at the photos, which Lawrence hadn't even glanced at.
"Oh, uh, yeah, of course, I mean, they're just photos. Nothing important, you know? I'll just…I'll just go, um, you know, label them, or something," Adam mumbled. He clumsily got up and backed away from Lawrence, gazing down at his photos.
Adam disappeared into Lawrence's home office, the door clicking shut softly behind him. Lawrence stared at the door, shame and horror suddenly flooding him. What had he done? The kid was finally opening up to him, and Lawrence just pushed him away, quite literally. He knew it was hard for Adam to act happy. He was traumatized for life, the kid. He couldn't sleep without the lights on, he always checked the closets before going to bed, and he never slept peacefully. He always woke up after only a few hours of sleep, and he regularly had night terrors. Not only that, but Adam was prone to panic attacks. Lawrence took three aspirins and washed them down with a glass of cold water. He could hear Adam messing with drawers in the office, searching for a sharpie or some other writing utensil. After a few minutes, the shuffling stopped, and the radio in the home office clicked on. Hard rock, or maybe heavy metal (Adam had once explained the difference to Lawrence, but the doctor had completely forgotten. Not that he honestly cared – they were both loud and annoying genres of music.) was heard. It wasn't being blared, thank God.
Lawrence rested on the couch. He decided to tackle his problems one by one and organize them away into the file bins of his mind. This procedure normally lessened the stress and confusion. Problem number one: His paperwork was absolutely towering in his office at the hospital. There were three stacks of them. Lawrence never had an issue with paperwork. But ever since Adam came into his life again, Lawrence had taken many days off or left early to check on Adam and make sure he was taking care of himself. So, because of this, the paperwork had piled up. Solution: He would simply take home half a stack a day, and finish them periodically; taking rests in between each sheet to avoid stress.
Problem number two: A patient had died. There was nothing he could do about that. He had done the absolute best that he could do. But brain tumors are complicated, and there was only a twenty percent chance of the woman actually surviving the surgery. People die. He was a doctor; he should know better than to sulk about death. He just wouldn't allow himself to mope.
Problem number three: Alison wasn't giving Diana to him on the days she was supposed to. If Alison wanted to take Diana to Alison's mother's house on Saturday, which was when Lawrence was supposed to receive her, she would simply take Diana. No phone call, no nothing. It angered Lawrence greatly. Solution: He would call Alison and talk it out. If she continued doing this, he would talk to his lawyer. It wasn't fair of Alison to keep Diana on Lawrence's days.
Problem number four: Lawrence had a headache. Well, he had. He'd taken the aspirin, and already the headache was barely noticeable.
Lawrence felt so much better now. His stress was now under control, and he felt more relaxed. He decided he'd go take a hot bath to completely erase the stress that remained before apologizing to Adam. Maybe they could go out to dinner. The doctor walked down the hallway, but noticed with unease that something was different. He couldn't really figure it out, but there was just something that had changed.
Oh, well. Lawrence thought, going into the bathroom. He stripped his clothes off, plugging the drain of the bath tub, and turned the hot water faucet. After a good while, the tub was full, and he twisted the faucet 'off' before lowering his body into the bathtub. The hot water swallowed his body, and he sighed, closed his eyes, and scrubbed at his tan flesh with a bar of Dove soap. Long curls of steam floated lazily into the air, and he watched them through half-closed lids, massaging shampoo into his blonde hair. Just as he ducked his head under the water to rinse the shampoo out, realization washed over him, and he shot up. Water splashed everywhere as he strained to hear the music that Adam had been playing. But there was nothing. Only silence. And that was not normal. He leaped out of the tub, nearly slipping on the huge puddle on the tile floor, and grabbed his bathrobe, throwing it on.
Any other person would've been bewildered by Lawrence's behavior. Yeah, so Adam turned the music off, who cares? No. That was wrong. Adam hated silence. He was always playing music, or listening to his iPod that Lawrence had bought him. And if it wasn't music, the TV was on, or he'd sit in a room where people were talking. He rarely spoke himself at these times; like at the dinner table, for example. He'd sit there and silently listen to Diana and Lawrence's conversation. Something was wrong if Adam wasn't playing music.
Lawrence burst into his home office, his gaze sweeping the room, until it landed on Adam. The kid was lying on the floor, the radio only a few feet away, having been ripped out of the wall. He was curled up into a very tight, secure ball, his arms wrapped so tightly around his knees that the muscles in his biceps were jumping, his knuckles white, his head buried into his knees. He was breathing so fast and shallow that Lawrence briefly wondered if he was having an asthma attack. His flesh gleamed with sweat, and his whole body shook badly, blood streaming from his nose, tears trickling down his sweaty cheeks. Lawrence rushed over to the small, quaking body, and knelt down trying to unfold Adam's body. But he wouldn't budge.
"Adam," Lawrence said, brushing the back of his palm across Adam's forehead. The kid jerked violently as Lawrence pressed his hand to Adam's chest. The doctor could feel Adam's heart racing unbelievably fast. For a moment, he didn't know what was wrong, and was considering calling for an ambulance. Then it struck him; Adam was having a panic attack. Adam had only had a panic attack one other time near Lawrence, but it was very small compared to this. The kid had simply started shivering and hyperventilating, insisting that he couldn't breathe. He had then crumpled to the floor, sobbing hysterically, crying that he was going to die. It was scary, but not as terrifying as this.
Lawrence grabbed Adam, who still wouldn't uncurl, and held him tightly in his arms.
"You're alright, Adam, you're okay. I'm here, I've got you, and everything's going to be just fine. Relax, love; I've got you," he murmured softly into Adam's ear, running his fingers through Adam's damp hair. The kid didn't respond in any sort of way; he simply continued making those strangled, gasping breaths. Lawrence moved his hand under Adam's shirt and stroked his sweaty back.
"Calm down. Relax each muscle one by one, and control your breathing. Focus your breathing. You're not going anywhere, and nobody's going to hurt you. You aren't going crazy. I'm going to sit here with you until I know you're alright," the doctor said softly but firmly. Adam jerked his head. It might've been a nod, but Lawrence couldn't tell.
After ten minutes of stroking Adam's sweaty, shivering body and calmly telling him what to do, Adam's breathing slowly started evening out. And after twenty minutes, Adam's shivering was dulled to a tremble – a normal 'after-shock'. The kid lost all tension in his body and lay weakly in Lawrence's arms, uncurling his body from the painfully tense position it had been in. Adam was silent, simply trembling and sweating, and then finally sobbed. Lawrence shifted Adam so that the kid's head was resting against Lawrence's shoulder. Adam was too weak from the panic attack to do anything but just sit in Lawrence's lap and cry himself to sleep. Panic attacks were very frightening and exhausting, Lawrence knew, and carried him to his bed. He laid the kid out on the bed and then left the room.
Lawrence walked into the bathroom, grabbed a towel, and then went back to his bedroom, where he dried the sweat from Adam's arms, neck, and face.
He was worried, of course. He hadn't known how long Adam would suffer through the attack. Well, considering the fact that Lawrence held him for about half an hour, and he had been in the bath, wondering what was different, for fifteen minutes, Adam had been having the attack for at least forty five minutes. Panic attacks could last for hours.
The doctor stretched out on the bed beside Adam and stared up at the ceiling, a new thought popping up in his head. He loved Adam…a lot. The problem was convincing the kid.
Thank you so much for reading. Please review. :)