Yes, it's a little 'out' there and Bella is not your typical doc... But I had been watching back to back House Marathons when I originally wrote this. Please forgive my liberties. Edward does have a diagnosis. I didn't make it up. Google did, but I did the research. Seeing as I have no medical backing to know how far off I am from reality. Pardon any errors on my behalf.
I sat at my desk googling, yes I had resorted to googling, illnesses that made your skin fall off, made your voice husky and raw, and also caused vertigo. I figured if I looked into the things that you never saw, maybe I would figure out what was wrong with Edward.
There was a knock at my door, just as the search loaded onto my screen.
"Come in," I called as I minimized the search window. I hovered my mouse over Edward's vitals. At least the inside was still working well.
Esme stood in the doorway of my office. "Can I come in?"
I nodded. "Yeah, think I said come in before."
"Oh yeah, sorry. I just wasn't sure that once you knew it was me you would still want me in here."
"Yeah, it's fine. Take a seat. What can I do for you?"
She walked slowly across the room and took a seat in the chair on the other side of my desk.
"Doctor Swan, I wanted to say I was sorry. I have hated you for so long, and treated you so unfairly. That was wrong of me."
"Esme, if I had been in your shoes, I would have hated me too. It's all forgiven."
"Just like that? After everything I've said to you it's just forgiven?"
"Esme, look, I told Carlisle I would be his excuse a long time ago. He told you he was working late on projects with me; you didn't see the overtime pay, so it was easy to assume that he was fucking me. Your husband was like a big brother to me until he wasn't. He was a good friend and that's that. As for the shit you said and the names you called me, I can get over it. It's the past."
She smiled a forced smile. "Thanks. So, how's my son? What happened to his arms?"
"Another symptom. I was trying to do some research before you came in."
"Oh, should I go?"
Having Esme in my office and her not being a massive bitch was a change. It was nice. Maybe she could be helpful…
"No, no. In fact, can I ask you something?"
She nodded.
"Your son, he's a good guy, right?"
"Yeah."
"Honest?"
"Yeah. What does any of this have to do with my son?"
"Your opinions are jaded to be in favor of Edward. Now, think about that accident he was in, when that happened, was he the same good guy, honest son?"
"Yeah, what happened that night wasn't typical for him. He wasn't a drinker." She paused and rubbed her hand over her forehead. "For a while he stood by that he was a closet alcoholic. I think he thought it would look better, but in reality, he never had drank before that night, or again. He was young, dumb, and with Eric. Those two were always sure to cause trouble back in the day."
"And that was the same night he met his wife, right?"
"Yeah. She was amazing for him through the recovery. I don't know if I would have managed without her help."
"Good to know."
This girl sounded too good to be true.
Without properly dismissing Esme, I turned back to my computer.
Edward was still stable and I still needed a diagnosis. I needed him cured before the insides gave up too.
Esme quietly left and I pulled back up the search.
SJS was top of the list, but I wanted to look into different things that my team wasn't.
What if this girl wasn't what they thought she was? She came into the picture when Edward had almost died before and now he was on his death bed again.
I limited my search to poisons and toxins.
Unfortunately, everything I pulled up didn't fit all of Edward's symptoms.
I was about to give up and head to the lab and start with testing when I clicked on one last link.
Oh my God.
Holy shit!
I slid back in my chair so fast that it fell to the floor.
I kicked my shoes off and I ran barefoot to the lab.
One more test and if I was right, I knew what Edward had.
I ran barefoot to the lab; may not have been the cleanest of ideas, but I couldn't afford the slowdown that heels caused me.
I pushed the door of the lab open and ran smack into a body.
"Shit!" I yelled as the offender stepped on my bare toes.
"Doctor Swan, I'm so sorry. Are you okay? I should take you out to dinner to make up for it."
"Jasper, get the fuck off my toe."
"Oh, sorry." He moved his foot from my now swollen toes.
"Where is my team?" I looked around the lab and it was empty.
"Oh, they left."
"They left!"
"Yeah, well they asked me to stay here and run one last test."
"They did, did they?" They were all fucking fired! "Well I need another test ran, so move." I may have pushed my way past Jasper a bit too forceful, but whatever, I was pissed.
"Fucking assholes leaving before Edward was diagnosed," I mumbled.
"Edward Cullen?" Jasper said.
"Yeah, what do you know about him?"
"Well, here are the results for the last test your team had me run. They were positive." He handed me the paper.
"Why didn't you tell me?"
"You were upset…"
I rolled my eyes and looked at the piece of paper.
There it was, right before me. I was right. My team was right; well they finally ran the right test.
Edward was being poisoned with high levels of Belladonna. In lower levels the plant isn't poisonous and can aid in pain relief and other conditions, but in the level that he has, it was lethal.
It was almost undetectable on a tox-screen, because you would expect to see atropine on a tox-screen. Seeing as it look him so long to get extremely sick, he must had been getting tiny doses for a long time.
But still, I was shocked he was still conscious.
…Now I had to find out who was poisoning him.
I was banking on the overly perfect wife or his strange little sister.
I headed back to my office to get my shoes before heading to Edward's room.
All we could do now was let the poison work its out of his body.
I put on a mask, gloves, and a nice yellow gown. I had to look the part.
I busted my way into his room and all eyes were on me.
"We know what is wrong with Edward," I said muffled through my mask.
All eyes went wide and except for one. Got ya!
"We think we can cure him, but there is no guarantee. You all need to leave the room, though. Edward is extremely contagious and we will need to quarantine you all. Since he is obviously the carrier, I want him in a separate quarantine than the rest of you." I turned to exit the room.
"What, what is it? What do I have?" Edward asked.
Didn't he know how this worked yet after messing with Daddy-o? He was supposed to go with me and not question?
"Edward, treatment will start soon, and we will talk more in depth then."
He nodded a confused head.
I left the room, but Carlisle followed me.
"Iz- Bella, wait."
"Carlisle, I can't tell you anything more than I said in that room. I want you to go back in there and wait until my team comes down, understand?"
"He's my son."
"That didn't matter before. Look, I will cure him and make him all the better, but you have to go back in there. Got it?"
He nodded and returned to the room.
I paged my team and asked them to set up a room for the Cullen family to stay in while we let the toxin work its way out of Edward's body.
I also made a call to the local police department. Someone in Edward's circle was going to be picked up for attempted murder.
My team was used to me; granted we never did this kind of shit before.
Never had we had someone being poisoned and we had to figure out who was responsible.
Victoria and Tyler corralled the Cullens into a quarantine suite with a washroom.
They did it completely suited up as to not spread the 'virus.'
Oh, it was like playing a game that no one knew about. Such fun!
While those two did their work situating the Cullens, Angela started Edward on his treatment of saline with a nice sticker attached to it, so it looked like there was medicine in the water, and I called my dear friend, Jacob Black, Lead Detective for Lake Forest, Illinois.
"Black."
"Hey, Jake, I need your help."
"Bella, Bella, baby girl! Long time no talk. How have you been?"
"Decent, decent."
Silence.
"Bells, why are you calling?" he asked. I could tell he was confused. I hadn't called him in a while. I normally just showed up…
"I need you to come down here to the hospital. I have a patient that's being poisoned and I think it's someone in his family that's doing it. I have them all locked in a room patiently awaiting your arrival."
"Bells, as much as I appreciate the collect and call, you can't lock potential suspects in a room and wait for me to sort it out."
"Oh, no they are there willingly. They think they are in quarantine. Just look, get here so I can get those people out of my hospital."
I hung up the phone before he could respond. I knew he would be here soon enough.
"Edward," I said walking into his room.
"Why are you not all covered up?" he asked with a cough at the end.
"Because you are not contagious. You are being poisoned by one of those people you hold near and dear and I needed to get them to go away. The one that is doing the poisoning wouldn't say, 'no, he isn't contagious,' and risk outing themselves."
"So, the treatment?"
"Just saline. Need to flush your body and wait for the poison to work its way out of you. Seeing as the level of poison in your body is pretty high, you must have some desire to survive…Look, take a nap, a nurse will be in to bathe you in a few. Enjoy the silence and take time to process this all. I will be back later." I gave him a smile and took his hand in mine, gave it a light squeeze and left his room.
"How is the family of suspects?" I asked my team as I walked back into the conference room.
"Mommy and Daddy are fighting in the corner. The sister and the wife are in a stare off and the brother and best friend are playing games on their phones. The wife of the brother that hasn't been around much, she's passed out in the chair in the corner," Tyler said.
"Good to know. Did any of them ask questions?"
"Not really, they complained a tad and the wife asked why she couldn't stay with her husband since she was already infected," Victoria said.
"Of course she did. Either she wants to comfort her husband, or she knows he isn't contagious and she wants to finish him off. I called a detective friend to come sort this shit out. I'm going to head back to Edward's room. You all keep an eye on the family. Page me when Detective Black shows up."
My team willingly agreed to go baby sit a murderer, while I headed back to get to keep Edward company.
"Doctor Bella, where's my family?" Edward asked as I walked in to his room
"Just Bella, and don't you remember?"
"Remember what? I remember some crazy ass dream about you telling me I was poisoned." He laughed, which resulted in a cough. "How jacked, huh?"
Oh my…
Well that explains why he had a limited reaction before when I told him.
"Edward," I said as I pulled an exam chair up alongside his bed. I lowered his bed so we were eye level as I continued. "It wasn't a dream. You are being poisoned. Someone in your family circle is poisoning you."
"What?" he shrieked. "Have you lost your mind? That's not possible." He sounded confused; completely dumbfounded at this idea.
"I'm sorry. You tested with high levels of Belladonna. It's a lethal poison. It was probably added into your food in very small amounts. If they had dosed you with a larger amount all at once, you would have died within a few hours. Whoever did this wanted it not to look like poison; and seeing as it has taken how many doctors and tests to diagnosis you. Edward," I took his hand, "I'm so sorry."
I attempted a very forced smile, as a tear ran down Edward's cheek.
"Someone wants to kill me? Really?" His tears were running down his face. I wanted to join him in the crying. I was having a hard time holding it in. "My parents, or siblings, or my wife! Is there any way that it isn't one of them? That it isn't someone else? Or that it was just an accident."
I cleared my throat, trying to remove the lump that was currently taking up residence in there.
"Edward, the fact that the levels were what they were and you're not dead; it wasn't an accident or a onetime exposure. Coupled with the fact that you continued to get worse after you were here, it has to be one of them. They are still poisoning you."
His lower lip quivered and he shook his head. "N-now what?"
"Now, uh, now a detective friend of mine will be coming in to talk with everyone. Keep it low key. I'm going to have him play the part of a specialist and he and I will work side by side to find out who is doing this to you. I told you I would make you better. I'm standing by that promise."
"Thanks, Bella."
"Anytime. A nurse will be in here soon to bathe you; to make sure that if there is any poison on your skin, it is washed off. Plus you look like you might need to just get clean. I figure if we keep you on an IV drip of a bag every two hours, you should be feeling better sooner than later. Once the poison is out of your system, I will have someone come back in and look at those arms."
Edward didn't respond with more than a nod.
I knew this would be hard on him…maybe I should get someone to come and talk to him.
Waiting in my office when I returned was Jake. I smiled at him as he took three steps and wrapped his arms around me.
"Hey, Bells."
"Hey, Jake. Thanks for coming."
"Anytime." He pulled me back to look at my face. "Wow, B, you look like shit."
"Ha. Thanks. It's been a long few days. Look, I got this patient like I said. The family, well his father is, was an old friend. I don't think he's responsible for this. He's a doctor out on the East Coast."
"So, who do you think it is?"
I shook my head. "I've had thoughts about who I think is responsible. When I said that he was contagious and they were all possibly infected, his sister gave me a look that made me think she wanted to call my bluff, but I'm not sure."
"So how are we going to do this, Bells? I'm sure if I go in there and say I'm a detective, I won't get anything out of them."
I smiled at him.
"You are kinda stupid for a big, bad detective, huh. If I get you a white coat, do you think you can pull off playing a doctor?"
"Ah, Jakie, you look pretty good as a doctor."
"Don't call me that." He adjusted the lapel of the white coat. "I do look pretty sweet though, don't I?"
"Yeah, but don't fucking say sweet. Makes you sound stupid. I can't have that."
"Oh."
"Yeah, so just stand by me, and take notes. Only ask the pre-approved questions too, okay? We need them to believe you are a doctor, not undercover."
"You only wish I was under your covers."
"Shut it, douche."
Jake stared at his reflection, situating his coat and stethoscope. You would think he was undercover as a centerfold, not as a doctor. I think he spent more time looking at his reflection since I gave him the white coat, than I do in a week.
While my team was getting him his official doctor garb, we went over the questions he needed to ask as a detective and I made them sound medical based.
"Let's go, Jake. I need to get this shit over with. I don't want a killer lurking in my halls."
"They're locked up, not lurking."
I glared at him and he made an attempt to smack my ass.
Oh, it was going to be a long ass day. At least now I remembered why I had parted ways with Jake in any way that was non-professional.
I escorted Jake to the isolation room that we had the Cullens in.
"Hot damn! That chick is hot. Say she's not the wife."
"Sorry, she's the wife."
"Ouch."
I handed Jake the gown he needed to wear to play the part of a doctor walking into a contaminated room and we continued to get ready, while he stared at the wife.
Once isolation ready, we walked into the room.
"Cullen family, this is Doctor Black. He's a specialist in infection control. He has a few questions."
The family gave us there attention and the brother woke his wife.
"Now, do we know where Edward could have contracted this illness?"
Carlisle, of course spoke up first. "Well, since Iz-Doctor Swan has failed to let us know what my son is ill with, how would we know?"
Jake cleared his throat. "Sorry, your son has leprosy."
Carlisle cocked his eyebrow at me, but said nothing.
The chances of Edward having leprosy was slim to none and the transfer rate was even less. He knew that, but thankfully, he said nothing. The rest of the family started talking all at once of their fears and worries and so forth.
"Leprosy," the wife of the brother yelled over the rest of them.
"Yes," Jake and I said in unison.
"Oh, oh, I think I have it too," that wife of the big brother said as she started itching her arms.
Dumb blonde.
"Ma'am, what is your name?" Jake asked.
"Rosalie and," she sniffled, "I'm gonna die!"
"Rosalie you are not going to die," Jake stated back flatly.
"So, I ask again do we know where or how Edward could have contracted this?"
The room was silent.
"The longer you take to tell me, the longer you are stuck in this room."
Silence.
"Well fine then. We are going to do blood tests with you all. Little sister over there, you're first," I said.
Alice stood and walked over to me, her head down. I wanted her first because I wanted to either rule her in or exclude her. I knew if it wasn't her, she had knowledge of who it was.
"So, Miss Cullen, we are going to take some blood and your vitals if you will have a seat," Jake said.
Alice did as she was told, but you could tell she was visibly uncomfortable.
He stood and prepared to take notes as I set Alice up with the pulse ox and the blood pressure cuff.
"So, tell me Alice, where do you think your brother contracted leprosy?" Jake asked.
"I don't think he has leprosy." Her pulse stayed level. She was telling the truth.
"Oh and why's that?" Jake asked.
"Because," she paused and pulled the pulse ox and blood pressure cuff off, "my brother's wife is trying to kill him. I don't know if it's her or one of the many men she has over when he isn't there, but I know that it's her."
Jake, now interested, took a seat next to Alice.
"Have you seen her poison him?"
"Uh, well no, but ever since my brother married her, he hasn't been the same."
"And how long ago did they get married?"
"Uh, nine months."
"But they met six years ago, right?" I asked.
"Yeah, when he was nineteen, almost twenty. They've dated on and off and then one day he came home and said they were getting married. I don't know, maybe they were more and he didn't tell us about it, but it seemed off. It seemed rushed and then now, he's been sick for months. He would tell me he wasn't, but this has been a slow decline for a while. Only recently did it get noticeable, but he's my big brother, I could tell there was something wrong."
"Did you say anything to anyone?"
She shook her head. "No, well, I mentioned it to my dad once, but he told me that Edward was okay. This was back right after their wedding and he said that Edward was just getting used to being married. He brushed me off and I tried to as well, but when he got worse, I knew I wasn't a normal post wedding reaction or something."
Jake scribbled on the paper and handed to me.
Don't think it's her
I nodded back in agreement.
To keep up appearances, we still took Alice's blood before sending her on her way back to the isolation room.
Next up was Carlisle, mostly because I wanted to see what he would have to say. He told me I was full of shit, but willingly let us take his blood and ask him a few questions.
When asked about what Alice had to say in regards to how Edward changed post his nuptials, he said that Edward had been sluggish for a while, but nothing major until recently. He told me he didn't think it was anything to be worried about. He had done a physical on Edward and everything came back okay.
After Carlisle was escorted back, Tanya came in.
She looked scared. Was she scared for her husband, for the possibility of having leprosy or for the possibility she would be losing her freedom?
I didn't know, but I wanted to know. She sat in the exam chair for blood draw and I hooked her up to get her blood pressure and pulse ox.
Jake winked at her as he set up to start his questions under our makeshift lie detector.
