Warning: Frustrating conversations ahead
Chapter 45: The Gap II
Days blurred into each other. Following her surgery, they kept her on a twenty-four hour watch until she was stable. After she screamed every time a blond nurse entered, she was administered a heavy dosage of sedatives in addition to the morphine. It took days before she was cleared for a police interview, before she could sluggishly explain to Sheriff Stilinski, with his star back and all, that Kate was alive out there.
He didn't believe her.
They had next of kin who ID'd the body, who confirmed it was Kate who was both dead and buried. Joe screamed until her lungs ached, tried to make him understand, give him enough circumstantial evidence to order an exhumation — the surveillance tapes, the SUV, her phone, everything she could think of.
He had been thoroughly understanding; understanding at how several traumatic events could blur into each other causing a so-called super trauma. Joe was not proud of what she called the Sheriff. The nurses, Aunt Mel in front, fought her down into the bed and gave her something to make her sleep.
Sleep. Recover. Heal.
Her dad called. Panicked, worried, a thousand miles away. He apologized over and over that he couldn't be there, he was trying to get a flight out, but it was impossible. He was on an assignment and if he left, good people might die. Same excuse as always. Stuttering, she told him about Kate. He listened. Very understanding. Just like the Sheriff. Confused, blood-loss, multiple traumas, but... Kate was dead. No evidence to the contrary.
No one could find Jimmy Carter to confirm her story. Her car still sat outside the station the morning after the shooting — empty. No sign of him or any weapons, but the backseat smelled of bleach. It did not help that she lied when asked about the location of the so-called torture and assault; she had to. It would expose too much.
Protect the werewolves.
Protect her stupid cousin who sat hour after hour by her side, the only one believing her about Kate, because he could tell she was not lying. But he couldn't do anything about it, Kate had vanished again. He was hurting too, because Aunt Mel would use every excuse in the book to avoid him. She'd seen him the night at the station in his other form.
"She needs time," Joe murmured and held Scott's hand. "She's confused. Give her time."
Scott meant they did not have much time, but said little else. Sometimes he looked like he wanted to ask her something, but he never did. She never found the courage to ask about Allison.
Stiles brought balloons. His bruises had cleared up and he smiled like he always did, but there was an edge to him. Something hard in his eyes. Something that might never heal. He gave her the facts of what happened. Of Matt's body found in the river, of how the machine guns had been the Argents, of how Allison's mom had committed suicide, a fact Joe pretended she hadn't known. They found a lot of pictures at Matt's place, by the way, and the ones of Joe and Alex did not come close to what Matt had of Allison. He'd edited himself into the pictures of her.
No pictures of Kate, he told her, after she asked him to check. Kate had said Matt liked the Argent-girls. Had she used him, like she'd once used Derek? Had she twisted him enough to set him on the path of Allison? Joe tried to push Kate out of her mind, but she saw her everywhere. Every tall woman walking past, every nurse with similar hair color, every shadow moving in the dark. Kate, waiting for an opening. She was out there, Joe knew she was out there, even if no one believed her.
And Joe had another concern.
After several days, she finally convinced the nurses that she was fine using the bathroom on her own. Not that it bothered her too much when they helped her, the morphine took the edge of any modesty issues, but what she really wanted was the opportunity to look at herself in the mirror. More specifically, undo her bandages and study her ribcage in the mirror. Joe was no expert, but she was healing faster than normal. A lot faster.
Not werewolf-fast, obviously, but still. It should take a month to recover from the surgery alone, probably half a year to heal fully from the bullet piercing through her rib cage. And at this rate, she would be fine in just a week, maybe less.
"Is it because of you?" she asked Derek when he came at night. Despite her repeated insistence that he should not, because the Argents were more bloodthirsty than ever, he still showed up at least once every , she might not have argued too hard, because she hated being alone in the room no matter how much Kate Argent seemed to have gone underground again.
Sometimes he stayed for minutes, other times for hours — it was hard to tell anyway with all the medication they had her on.
"Are you asking if I bit you?" Derek said as he put his palm next to her bandage, alleviating her pain more than the morphine ever could. Innocent, platonic touch, born out of necessity. Joe rested her head back on her pillow, too high to bother with deep thoughts. Just liking that he was there. "Because then you would have been fully healed already."
"Not if you bit me," Joe mumbled — there hadn't been time for that and she would have noticed. "If it's because of the mate-bond."
He seemed to consider it, but shrugged. "Never been a mate-pair with one human before, so there's no way of knowing."
They kept their voices low, Derek always listening if anyone approached. Argents had people working everywhere. Most of the time they did not talk.
The bullet had entered a few inches beneath her left breast and missed all vital organs — a fortunate angle probably due to the gun being trapped between her and Matt in the confusion of the machine gun fire and smoke bombs. Now Derek sat in a chair next to her hospital bed, one hand on her at all times. He claimed he was just taking pain, not healing her, that was beyond his abilities. Joe had her doubts. What else could explain the accelerated recovery time?
She watched him for the duration of the time he was there. Shamelessly, as she could blame the morphine if he ever questioned her prolonged staring, which he never did anyway. Not sure he even noticed. An all-consuming anger had taken hold of him and she wished he would be more angry with her and less with himself.
Joe wanted to talk to him about everything. About Kate and him. About Paige. It just felt like a violation, and she never worked up the nerve — she needed to be clear-headed for that conversation. She knew she was supposed to have learned about those things from him, when he was ready, if he ever became ready to share. Not have her nose rubbed into it by Kate. It created a gap between them, filling up with unsaid words, but he still showed up every night, taking away as much pain as he could, but his eyes became harder and he looked at her less and less.
Three questions she could not bring herself to ask.
She could not take away any of his pain either. He healed on the outside and hurt on the inside. And she watched his frown grow deeper with each passing day. He was hiding something from her, but she did not know how to ask the right questions.
Did not know if she wanted to know the answers.
Reprieve came in a surprising form. After Joe was sure she was going to lose her mind of boredom and caffeine withdrawal — even her paranoia about Kate popping out of the shadows had subsided from the sheer monotony of her days — Aunt Mel knocked on the door to her hospital room before entering on soft feet.
"You got a visitor," she said and fiddled with her hands in front of her. Nervous. Worried. "And I'm giving you special permission to use the emergency cord if you want her to leave. Okay? Okay."
Her turned out to be Alex. She took off her beanie while entering, holding it in front of her, twirling it around. "Hi, Joe. How are you feeling?"
"Like I'm gonna need more morphine." Joe looked for escape routes, but was only in a hospital gown so the nurses could change her bandages easier. Not willing to walk bare-assed in front of Alex or resort to the dramatic option of pulling the emergency cord, she remained in the bed with the covers up.
"I, uh, heard about what happened," Alex said and took Derek's chair next to Joe's bed. It sounded like she was trying hard to sound casual. "From Kelly. You don't have to talk about it. It's too soon and I'm not the right person to listen anyway. Guy who works here is good though, I had practice with him when I got licensed."
Joe grimaced as she sat up straighter in bed. A few more days and she would be healed completely. Not natural and she knew the doctors were amazed at the recovery time. The emergency cord looked pretty inviting now — Alex was pussy-footing as she would have put it herself, something was on her mind.
"Nice to know. You in town for Maddy?"
"Yeah." Sighing, Alex leaned back in the chair without looking at Joe. Legs spread, taking up space. She had a very masculine posture, either cultivated or just force of habit. "About that..."
"So you do remember? Jesus Christ, Alex." The anger flared up, but the morphine numbed it. She glowered at Alex anyway. "I'm not gonna go behind your back and tell her, but-"
"You don't need to," Alex said slowly. "She already knows. Don't give me that look, okay, I'm gonna marry the girl, of course I told her. When I sobered up that same morning."
Joe had no qualms about being jealous, unlike Derek, and her eyebrows rose. "And she was okay with it?" Joe wouldn't have been.
"Uh, no." Alex flipped on her beanie again, smoothing it down in the back. "Definitely not. But she appreciated my honesty, after we were done yelling and crying and..." She took a deep breath. "And made me realize exactly why I wanted to marry her in the first place."
"Okay?"
"I'm here to apologize, Joe," Alex murmured and was looking down at her ripped jeans, "for my behavior at the rave."
"And it took me getting shot for you to work up the nerve?"
Alex looked sick. "I, uhm, I think I might have a problem..."
"Of sticking your tongue down other people's-"
"I think I drink too much sometimes."
The words rushed out, obviously rehearsed, but not giving off the impression of being fake. Every single thing Joe had been in the midst of saying died out to nothing.
"What?"
"Or, uh, Maddy thinks I drink too much sometimes."
"What?"
"I've been going to some meetings." Alex nodded, as if to encourage herself to keep talking. "That was part of the deal with Maddy, that I stopped drinking and tried to get help and- I, uh, I deal with a lot of shit in my job, you know? Some of these kids I work with, they've been through hell and back and, well, I'm good enough at my job to recognize I could be self-medicating to avoid dealing with the fallout." She tapped her hands on her thighs, a fast and nervous rhythm. "I know that's not an excuse. It's just an attempt to justify it."
Joe said nothing, not sure what to say. She was waiting for Alex to yell 'Sike!' and laugh. It never came. Part of her hoped this was some sort of drug-induced hallucination. What?
"Three weeks sober," Alex said with a fake cheery smile and held up something that looked like a keyring. "Which is not something I thought I would ever need to brag about. Haven't had alcohol since the rave when I messed up so bad I nearly lost Maddy. Kinda put things in perspective."
"Oh Jesus Christ," Joe muttered and glanced at the emergency cord. "Are you serious?" She swore when Alex nodded again, same shaky movement from before. "Shit."
Of all the things Alex struggled with, Joe would not have guessed it was substance abuse. There had not been any signs of that when they were dating. Okay, Alex always liked a drink and she liked to party; it had been an issue when they dated because Joe was fine going out once or twice a month, but not every available night like Alex had wanted. Getting blackout-drunk every weekend was normal in college though. Not a warning sign. As negligent as Joe had been those last few months though, maybe there had been other signs she had missed? Or didn't want to see?
"Alex, why- why didn't you say anything?"
"Because we're not friends, Joe. We've been a lot of things, but never friends. I just, I need to be honest and..." Alex gave her a crooked smile. "You were right. I projected a lot of my insecurities onto you and our relationship. I hated the fact that you were bi. Hated that my competition was literally everyone. Because so many girls I liked were just testing the waters with me, y'know, like a little college experiment. Hated seeing you with Derek at the rave. Not because I want or wanted us to get back together again, because I still think you're a bitch and... I dunno. At the meetings they say we're not supposed to try and rationalize the mistakes we make when drunk; just face it, be honest and apologize."
"Alex, it really is fine," Joe tried to intercept, not caring about the name-calling. "I'm over it. We're both over it."
"No, Joe, we're not." Alex rubbed her face tiredly and slumped down further in the chair. "I'm not. You know, the reason I'd been drinking so much at the rave was to work up the nerve to ask you about the engagement announcement because Kelly said I had to. That's why I came to find you and then I saw you with Derek and- I lost it. I'm sorry if I messed something up between the two of you. I have no way to justify it. I got so angry and-"
In many ways, Alex and Joe were quite similar and Joe wondered if this was how Derek felt when Joe rambled on. There was a reason 'fifty words or less' had been her and Alex' game.
"I feel like absolute shit for not warning you or giving you a heads up about my and Maddy's engagement." Alex shook her head, tore off her beanie again, only to adjust it and put it back on. "It was a big deal to Maddy that I was going to announce it at that dinner because she's insecure about not being cool enough for you guys and she's insecure around you because you're like, a faculty favorite and- Jesus Christ, Joe, I messed up! So bad! I never even told her all those things I said to you. I never should have said those things to you either, they were just the last remnants of what I wanted to say when we broke up."
"They were kinda true, though?"
Alex was not even listening to Joe's attempts to stop the flow. "Then I thought about calling you, after the rave. Couldn't work up the nerve without booze, booze was a no-go, so I figured I'd just tell you early at the dinner, you know, figuring you owed me that much to let me go ahead with it. That obviously never happened when your boyfriend told me, very clearly, to back the hell off."
"Obviou- what?" Joe repeated before her words caught up with her. "Boyfriend what?"
"Don't get me wrong, he seems like a nice guy, but kind of intense, you know? He made it pretty clear that I'd have to go through him to talk to you and by then I was so over it I didn't bother trying anymore. Sorry, Joe, but you did owe me that."
The incident in the bathroom hallway replayed in Joe's mind. Okay, she would have to deal with that later. She cleared her throat, because Alex had a point — Joe probably did owe her that. "Alex, the engagement is fine. The announcement was fine. If you're happy, that's all that matters."
"Don't patronize me, Joe," Alex snapped and her face scrunched up. "I drank too much, I'm not an invalid. The announcement is one thing, I feel bad for the stupid kiss, okay? You don't have to be the bigger person. Yell at me. Call me names. Please, just don't-" Joe had never seen Alex actually cry. Her skin would blotch red, her face locking in a disgusted scowl, but never tears. Not now either. "Don't be so goddamn nice."
"I'm not nice, Alex, but what do you want me to say?" Joe pleaded with a heavy sigh. "That you're a bad person, that you've made mistakes, like we all do eventually? You're not immune, Alex, just because you're a therapist. I'm sorry, I'm in the hospital recovering from a gunshot wound after a lunatic shot up the entire sheriff's station, it puts things in perspective, okay? You love Madeline, right?"
"I do!" Alex said loudly and now large red blotches stained her cheeks. "I do, so much I don't get why I would do anything to try and ruin that, not even to get back at you, it's-"
"And at one point, you loved me. I'm not rubbing it in your face, Alex, I swear there's a point to this. If I'm being rational, I know you were trying to help me with all that stuff with Dad, but at that point we were so bad for each other that everything we did to each other got corrupted. It's...intent and motive, again. You did it because you cared, but you did it really, really wrong and I reacted really, really bad."
Alex let out a harsh laugh. "No shit?"
"And since my way of dealing with things is ignoring it, we never got closure. You hating seeing me with Derek's got nothing to do with feelings you have for me, it's feelings related to the whole situation with the break-up."
"Break-up? Joe, you just left! I spent weeks waiting for you to come back. Expecting you to come back. Failed my first final because of you, nearly lost the apartment when I could barely cover the rent while you holed up in the neighbor town-"
"I know," Joe cut in, glad of the morphine now to take the sting out of Alex' words. "I messed up and for what it's worth, I'm sorry. That's what I'm saying. Trauma's trauma. You wanted to hurt me at the rave, not because you want me back, but because I hurt you."
Silence reigned for a few seconds.
"Forgot how rational you can be," Alex muttered eventually, but looked less on the verge of throwing up now. "Your logic's sound, Joe, but your delivery is kinda blunt."
"Again, recovering from a literal gunshot wound," Joe pointed out and then pointed to the small pill cups on the table next to her bed. "And drugged up, so..."
With a heavy sigh, Alex leaned forwards on her knees. "I really did come here to apologize, Joe. I never meant to add to your burden-"
"Oh shut up. If you want to get yelled at, call Kelly. I let it slip you never asked me about the announcement s0 she's plenty pissed."
Joe sighed as she adjusted in the bed.
"Alex, I'm sorry for what happened between us, I'm glad you're getting help and I'm glad you're getting married. That's it. I don't have the energy to be anything else. Okay, so, seeing you wandering around Berkeley holding hands with a Sophomore threw me for a loop, but to my defense, it had been a pretty weird day already."
"I'm sorry for springing that on you," Alex mumbled through her hands. "I didn't even meet Maddy at Berkeley, I met her through this convention-stuff. I never deliberately tried to hide it, I just..."
"Never deliberately tried to tell me either?" Joe guessed and shrugged when Alex gave her sad eyes, ringed with black. "Alex, I really mean this, it's fine. You don't owe me an explanation to what you do with your life and likewise-"
"Yeah, yeah, you don't owe me one. I get it." Alex looked sideways out the window, tapping her knuckles together.
"Can I ask you something?" The question had been nagging Joe for a while now. "What did you tell Maddy about me? I mean, why does she hate me?" Some comments had Joe worried she was the reason for Alex' alcoholism and Maddy knew about it.
"She doesn't hate you. I told you, she's insecure. You're what, a year from getting your doctorate and she's two years older than you and a Sophomore. And when we found you drugged up at that gay bar, she thought you might be a bad influence. It's not rational, it's just how things work. Come on, you're not a little jealous of Derek's ex-girlfriends just because they're his exes?"
Only one name came to mind and that was a painful path to walk down. Hard to compete with a girl who he loved so much he was willing to kill for her, even if it was her he killed.
"Surprised he isn't here," Alex said when Joe temporarily zoned out, "considering how he was literally glued to your hip at the dinner. Thought he was gonna rip my head off every time he looked at me and definitely when he talked to me. Guess you told him about that kiss, huh?"
"Yeah," Joe said absentmindedly. "It's fine. He was just looking out for me. He says he's not the jealous type."
Alex threw her head back and laughed hard. Then her eyes widened in shock. "Oh shit, you're serious? I thought it was a joke, what- no way! He said that? Dude, Joe, I know you're not that observant, but- are you kidding me? He couldn't have been more territorial if he held up a poster saying 'She's mine' in large red letters!"
"What?" Joe tried to think back to the dinner. There had been the constant touching, but nothing beyond that. Maybe because she'd been so quiet it came across as him talking over her rather than saving her from engaging in conversation? It seemed insignificant now anyway.
"Don't get me wrong, there's no red flags or anything, just very clear, very obvious body language. Maybe it was just towards me, which does make sense, I guess, proving a point or whatever." Another sigh, as if this pained Alex to say. "Which is Maddy's motive, I suppose when she said I had to invite you to the wedding."
It took a few seconds for the word to sink in — the conversation had taken a turn for the worse.
"Are you kidding me?" Joe snapped and straightened up in the bed, now tempted by the emergency cord again. "No! Why would she even want me there? Oh my God, no way."
"Like I said, to prove a point. She's the one coming across in a bad light if we invite everyone else and not you. That's what we get for shitting where we eat, Joe. Look, I don't really care and it's not until October anyway. You'll get a proper invitation, God knows we're spending a fortune on those, and-"
Alex made a face. "Just do me a favor and RSVP? So she knows I asked at least. It's not black tie or anything. Maddy's folks got a place up in Santa Rosa. Rustic theme. Burlap, hayballs and goddamn cowboy boots, I guess. Plus one, so bring Derek or whoever you want."
October seemed like far away and the thought of attending a wedding with Derek just made her squirm. "Yeah, we're not gonna come. I'll RSVP, don't worry, but..." First they had to survive until October. "Are you inviting any of her exes?"
"Yeah, two of them, who are now dating, and one of them has dated the same girl as me before, so don't worry. It'll be awkward for everyone."
"Alex, I am so not coming to your wedding."
"Hey, I gotta be sober for the entire thing, so I don't know what you're whining about. It's okay, you can laugh. It's funny even though I'm borderline alcoholic. Humor's a form of therapy, remember?"
Joe blew air out of her mouth, this was turning into a lot, why not add to it? With a sigh, she said: "Then I hope you're gonna find this hilarious. Do you know anything about a private folder on my phone? With pictures of...us?"
Alex' mouth opened in a perfect 'O'. "Ohhh my God, you still have those?"
"I didn't know!" Joe protested. "I didn't know I had a private folder! I didn't know there were private folders-"
"Oh my God!" Alex said again and fell forward laughing. "You've been sitting on compromising pictures of us for the last two years without even knowing it? God, Joe, take a computer science class."
Joe gave Alex the finger. Her computer literacy was fine. "What pictures? I don't remember taking any-"
"Umm, if I recall correctly, they're from that beach trip to Santa Monica."
"Oh."
"Yep."
"Ohhh."
"Yeah. Give me your phone, I'll show you how to delete them."
Unfortunately Joe did not have her phone as it was still considered evidence, but Alex walked her through how to get to that folder, which was private for a reason. The pictures, now that she remembered them, were not that explicit, just provocative enough that she would be slightly embarrassed if someone in her family stumbled upon them. That beach trip to Santa Monica seemed like a different life.
That night when Derek came to see her, Joe had managed to change into some sweats instead of that stupid hospital gown. The morphine seemed to have the opposite effect on her now, making her agitated and she paced around her small room, ensuring that the blinds were down completely.
"Should you be walking around like that?" Derek asked drily, watching her from where he stood by the door. After she was cleared as a witness and the perpetrator was found dead, the state police did not find it necessary to guard her door anymore and Derek had entered the normal way instead of through the window.
Joe glared at Derek, feeling more alive now than ever. It was as if Alex and her normal world with her normal problems had burst some kind of bubble, like she was finally waking up from some long daydream. Real life was not straightforward, it was messy and unpredictable, because people were just people after all. Joe had no idea how long Alex had been 'drinking too much' like she put it, but it had to have been a while for her to seek help for it and it left Joe with this horrible sensation of how she might have ignored Alex' problems in favor of her own. Despite how bad things were when they broke up, she still cared about Alex.
And she cared about Derek, but she was getting the distinct impression that he was visiting her because he felt he had to, not because he wanted to and it pissed her off! He hadn't said anything and that was the main problem, wasn't it? He hadn't said anything other than learning the basics — not the details — of what had happened.
In order to answer his question, she lifted her sweatshirt without any bashfulness to show him the nearly healed flesh— she was wearing a soft jersey bra for modesty alone because God knows it didn't offer any support. Her wound looked like a burn scar by now, including the surgery incision, so it was obviously not natural.
Joe shuddered when he trailed his fingertips over it.
His eyes were laced with concern as he looked at her, reading her face for any clues she could give. "Does it hurt?"
"You don't feel it? It's like a bruise," she said with a shrug to cover for the rising blush. Her shudder had not stemmed from pain. Either they had reduced her dosage or she was building up a tolerance, but she did not feel high enough to let him take away her pain like the previous nights. With a clearer head, touching him felt anything but platonic.
Dropping the shirt, she kept walking. She'd spent too much time in bed, feeling both lethargic and weak. "Alex came to see me." His face did not betray any kind of jealousy — in fact, no emotions at all — and Joe decided not to push that angle tonight. "What'd you say to her at the dinner?"
"Nothing." Derek sat down in his usual chair and dragged a palm over his growing stubble. Untrimmed, losing that neat line. "Just that if you wanted to talk to her, you would."
"You should have told me," Joe pointed out, hearing the annoyance evident in her tone. Something told her he might have been a little more outspoken than that. "She was going to warn me about the engagement announcement." No answer and she huffed, trying another tactic. "We're invited to their wedding in October."
"Do I need to rent a tux?"
He sounded so apathetic she wanted to scream.
"Dude, I'm not going to my ex-girlfriend's wedding," Joe mumbled instead of sceaming. "It's farmhouse anyway."
As usual, Derek sat in the chair with his gaze focused elsewhere. She'd seen him more the last week than she had ever before and still felt they had never talked less.
"Can I ask you something? Don't give me that look, you still owe me three questions."
Instead of the instant rebuttal she expected on how she'd broken their agreement, he studied her for a short while with a neutral expression. "You already asked your three questions."
"Did not." Joe scrunched up her face and tried to remember if that had come up the last few days. The morphine made her loopy, but not completely out of it. The way he looked at her made her pause slightly in her pacing. Her heartrate picked up at the prospect of actually asking those three questions she had thought about up in the cavern. "Did I?"
He shifted his focus slightly to the side before it came back with determination. Counting on his fingers, he listed: "What the hell is going on, how long have you been like this and what the hell are you doing?"
"Nice try, but you didn't even answer those."
He let out a breath, as if annoyed, but straightened up in his chair with an expectant look. "Doesn't matter, you lost out on our deal anyway."
"Deal was one pill and not coming to the depot," Joe said without hesitation. "So I held up my end."
A few seconds passed while she waited for him to take the bait. Her stomach churned again at the thought of those questions, but she would ask them if only to get a real response from him. Joe wasn't stupid, she knew damn well she broke their agreement by going up to the cavern and she wanted him to call her out on it. Like Alex said, yell at her. Call her names. Don't be so goddamn nice, although Derek wasn't being nice, he was being...something, but it wasn't nice.
For once, Derek didn't bite.
She shook her head again, noting how limp her usually wild hair felt. "This isn't one of the hard ones, Derek. I just wanna know what happened that time at the high school, when Jimmy and I found you bleeding out in the grass." She'd promised herself she'd ask him if she survived and so far she was still breathing.
Derek raised his eyebrows, obviously not the question he'd expected. "Peter ripped my lungs apart."
"Dude, seriously?" She paced further. "But that was before you knew it was Peter, right?"
"Yeah." He looked somewhat suspicious when he asked: "Why did you want to know that?"
"I don't know, just something I thought about, realized I didn't know. Filling in the blanks or whatever," Joe murmured and tried to work up the nerve to ask what she really wanted to know.
What had happened to him? Had he not felt anything at all when she was up in that cavern? Why was he at the sheriff's station in the first place? Why wasn't he angry with her? What was he doing now? She didn't want to know why he wasn't out looking for Kate, she didn't want him doing that without her anyway. If Kate wanted to separate them, it had to be for a reason. But there were so many things he obviously wasn't telling her!
She went to stand in front of Derek, forcing herself into his line of vision. "Can we talk about everything that's happened? Are you ready for that?"
Derek's dark scowl told her 'no'.
"Can I tell you what happened with me?" Joe asked and rested on one hip. He looked on the verge of saying something before she continued: "Or are you gonna make that all about yourself, make it your fault I got hurt? Even though I distinctly remember making all of those decisions myself? Like, I decided to go check up on Jimmy and I decided to disarm a psycho high school kid with a gun?"
His flexed jaw and flared nostrils told her she was hitting a nerve.
"Oh, sorry, is that interrupting your scheduled self-loathing for the night?" Joe demanded, not giving a damn about tact or keeping her voice down. Any emotion was better than whatever this was and she could handle him being angry with her. "Derek, come on! Please just talk to me! Haven't you ever heard that communication is key to a healthy relat-"
Joe froze, already too deep in by quoting Cosmopolitan at Derek Hale, even if it was via Aunt Mel's advice. Derek's eyes had snapped up to her face at the mention of relationship, even though she didn't technically say the whole word. For a second they just stared at each other, neither giving in.
"You nearly died," was his flat reply and Joe rolled her eyes. Again with the cliches!
"Yeah, duh. You've nearly died a bunch of times already! The clinic, the school parking lot, the pool, the rave-"
"That's different."
"How?"
His grip tightened on the armrests of the chair. "That wasn't your fault."
Derek must have realized his mistake immediately as he closed his eyes in defeat even before she could suck in a frustrated breath.
"Excuse me?" Joe snapped, but managed to keep it low enough so the nurses wouldn't rush in here. "Didn't I just say that I made those decisions myself?" Joe walked around the chair, too angry to remain still. "How many times are we going to have this conversation? I'm not one of your stray kids you picked off the streets, okay?" She gestured to herself. "I'm a grown woman perfectly capable of owning my mistakes."
Derek took a deep breath, but did not exactly sound as calm as he probably hoped. She was getting to him. "I just meant that it's my fault you're involved in this in the first place."
"No, it's not!" She span around to face him, throwing her hands out in exasperation. "You said so, remember? There's no why or why us, it just is what it is. And anyway, with Scott I would have been involved no matter what. It's not your fault! None of it is!"
Met only with ringing silence following her outburst, Joe dropped her head back and made a noise of despair. And he said she was frustrating?
Finally, Derek shifted in the chair. He flexed his fingers around the armrests and his voice came so low she had to lean in further to hear it.
"When that gun went off," he started slowly, looking to the side instead of her, "when I felt that bullet run through you — I thought you were gonna die and..." Derek trailed off, his face expressing more emotions than usual, but as usual, coated in a top layer of anger. "And I thought I was dying too."
Finally some progress! Joe stopped pacing for half a second. "I get that! We don't know what happens if the other one dies."
"No, Joe," he growled and seemed to clutch at the chair arms like it was supposed to give him strength. "I meant that it hurt so bad-"
"Yeah, because we share pain, that's a given. The pill must have worn off by then."
He closed his eyes in defeat, inhaled deep through his nose. When he finally talked, the words came at that careful pace he sometimes used. "It didn't hurt physically."
His words left an uncomfortable silence in the room.
"Oh," Joe said, finally realizing what he was trying to say. "Yeah, okay, that's how I felt that time at the vet clinic. With the stupid bullet filled with flowers or whatever," Joe waved her hand around, "I literally felt like my heart was gonna stop because I thought you were dying. And this was waaay before I had any idea what was going on. I didn't even like you!" An unbidden smile tugged at her lips. "I thought I'd gone soft."
It did not have the desired effect to lighten the mood. He did a half-shrug without looking at her. "Soft's not a word I'd use about you."
"Then that second time," she continued, determined to make him crack, only noticing a slight twinge around her ribcage when she gestured and failed to notice his darkened expression, "when Peter — apparently — tried to tear your lungs out. It was one thing feeling that, but I've never been so scared in my life when I thought you were bleeding out on Jimmy's kitchen table because you were too thick-headed to go to a hospital."
Derek's voice was quiet and he looked at the floor. "I know."
"You know?"
"That you were scared. Fear has a particular pungency to it," Derek bit out, as if annoyed he would have to explain. "You were reeking off it when you came into the station."
"I do not 'reek'," Joe protested and he closed his eyes instead of looking at her. "And I was not scared of Matt Daehler."
"I meant before Matt," Derek said tiredly. "Before you even found the first deputy. I could smell it the whole time. You were terrified and I had no idea how to get you out of there without drawing attention. I never want to-" He cut himself off. "It's not a pleasant smell." Now he did look at her, glancing upwards to where she still stood in front of the chair. Something soft, something vulnerable in his eyes. "Especially not from you."
"You think I liked seeing you paralyzed?" Joe countered, resting her weight on one hip. "You think I liked the idea of you getting torn apart by your betas before that? I don't know about smells, but it doesn't feel good either."
"I heal, Joe."
"Apparently I do too."
Biting in whatever he wanted to reply, he got up from the chair and turned his back on her in favor of looking out the window where the blinds were still down. Just as she thought she'd gotten him to crack, he sealed himself off again. Straight back, tight shoulders, he was obviously agitated and she wondered if it was because of her injuries he refused to take it out on her.
"Did you find Jimmy yet?" she asked, determined to get something out of this conversation and he shook his head. "The apartment, cavern, my car — nothing? No," she searched for a wording that didn't sound like she was making dog-jokes, "trace or scent of him?"
Another miniscule headshake. A sick feeling spread in her stomach unrelated to her almost healed gunshot wound.
Afraid of the answer, she asked slowly: "You did look for him, right?"
Derek scoffed. "We looked. He's good at covering his tracks." She saw how his shoulders drew together as he sighed. "A little creep in high school, still a creep now no matter what he looks like."
The sick feeling spread. "Please don't talk about him like that. For all we know, the Argents took him from my car and-"
"How would the Argents even know he's alive?" Derek asked and she saw how cold his expression was in the reflection of the windowpane. Something about his question felt off, like he was leading up to something else.
Joe forgot all about her plan to rile him up to get some actual response from him. Her voice was barely a whisper when she said: "Because of Kate." As he tilted his head a bit forward, a single resignated nod, she found herself sicker by the second by the suspicion creeping in. "What?"
"Are you sure it was Kate?"
His question made her stumble back into the chair he had left vacant. The small twinge in her ribs went unnoticed. "If I'm sure?"
Another curt nod as he glanced at her over his shoulder.
"Of course I'm sure, Derek. What, you think I did that to myself? Beat myself up? Chafed the skin off my own wrists for kicks?"
"No," Derek said and finally turned around. He softened his tone a bit. "But if Carter can return from the dead and change how he looks, who's to say he can't manipulate you to believe this was Kate?" He raised his voice when she scoffed loudly. "We searched everywhere and there's not a trace of her, her car or anyone else ever being in or near that cavern."
Joe had been shaking her head as Derek talked and she kept doing it. "Maybe she's good at covering her tracks too? She's a hunter, right? Isn't that the first thing they learn?" She tried to gauge the sincerity in Derek's expression and found it excruciating. "You think Jimmy did this to me? Why? Why would he do that?"
"I don't know," Derek said quietly even if his eyebrows pulled together in obvious sympathy, an expression that grated on her nerves. "Why would Kate? You're the one who tried to save her life, remember?"
"If I remember?" Joe repeated with tears in her eyes. It was hard to tell if she imagined the bitterness in his voice or if it was there. Question number one. "Yes, I frickin' remember! And I spent hours up in that cavern paying for that mistake." She gestured loosely to the air, unable to put what happened that night into actual words. "Derek, Jimmy almost died because of me. He had a literal hole through his stomach because I led her to his location, because I was too stupid to cover my tracks."
Her voice turned shrill as she shot up from the chair again.
"Because I was too stupid to realize she wasn't dead in the first place." Joe paced the floor, aware of the mild twinge in her ribs. "Because after the funeral, when I had a feeling something was off, I should have done more about it. Because I broke into the hospital security room to check the surveillance tapes and they'd been altered," she swallowed the heavy lump in her throat, "and I wasn't sure if that was because someone had come to finish the job or if she survived and escaped, but I should have done something."
Joe rubbed her fingers into her hair, trying to hold the tears back every way she could. "I should have told my dad, but I was so angry with him because he thought everything was okay just because he hijacked some helicopters to come save me and I didn't trust the cops because Kate had sounded so goddamn sure of herself that she was untouchable and I didn't tell you because I thought maybe you had killed her and I wouldn't blame you if you did and-"
Out of breath, she sighed deeply and turned her back on Derek with his concerned expression.
The blatant skepticism almost had her doubt herself now. No, Christ, she knew what happened. Jimmy could have tricked her, sure, but he had no motive. Kate however had at least two. She had said she remembered everything, that meant she remembered Joe's promise of making sure everyone knew what kind of monster Kate was. And Jimmy wrote that article, ensuring that the Argents' influence could not squash the news before it reached the public. Revenge is a pretty decent motivator, ask the kanima.
There was something else too.
"Separate the mates," Joe mumbled, mostly to herself. "That's what she said. She had to separate the mates. And she knew about Victoria, she knew the Argents were coming after you, I-" Her brows furrowed as she tried to recall the night she had done her best to push away so she could manage to sleep. "She had Jimmy for days, she waited for the right opportunity to get me up there and," Joe ignored the immediate darkening of Derek's face, "I think she was prepared to keep me up there for a while as well."
Without thinking, Joe had started pacing again and now she winced because the wound in her side was not completely healed after all. Prepared to apologize to Derek for the pain, she found him staring into the air with a disturbed look on his face.
"You don't know Carter. He might be working with the Argents."
"Isn't that impossible? I thought you guys and hunters don't mix." Derek glanced to the side, obviously holding in some kind of reply and Joe squeezed her eyes shut in frustration. "Jimmy didn't do this, Derek. He knows where I live, why would he bother getting me up to the Perserve?"
"Because he knows you?" he asked slowly and she could see how the swell of his bicep bulged under his shirt as he dug his fingers into the windowframe he was leaning against. His bright eyes came up to stare her down. "Knows that you're an idiot who's prone to walking straight into any kind of trap, no matter how obvious? What the hell were you thinking, Joe?"
The anger she had waited for.
"That Jimmy was in trouble, which he was. I admit I made a bad call, okay? Trust me, I had plenty of time to regret it when Kate strung me up-" She cut herself off when Derek turned his head to the side, obviously holding back another scoff. "How can you not believe I'm telling the truth about this?" It was hard to breathe and she bit her lip again, not even registering how the dry skin cracked. "Derek, I know what happened. Use your stupid lie detector-powers for once and believe me when I say it was Kate."
"I don't think you're lying, Joe, I think you believe-"
"Don't do that."
"-that's what happened, but how can you be sure?" He sighed, obviously hating it had come to this. The next words came slowly, each blow carefully positioned to maximum impact. "According to Melissa, you have a history with hallucinations. And it got pretty bad at one point, right?"
He might as well have punched her in the stomach. Responses flooded her mind, too many to pick one. "You talked to Aunt Mel about me?"
"She talked to me," Derek corrected, at least looking somewhat ashamed, "because she's concerned about you and thinks we're..."
"Well, we're not," Joe bit back immediately. "I did not hallucinate this, Derek." The evident disbelief on his face made her shout: "I am not fucking hallucinating!"
He didn't even flinch, probably could smell her agitation from miles away. Joe bit her teeth together and tried to calm down somewhat. Shouting was not swaying him and judging by his expression, he only felt sorry for her and she hated it. Swallowing the heavy lump in her throat, she took a few deep breaths before she managed to face Derek again with both hands on her hips.
Joe lowered her voice, although it was a miracle none of the hospital staff had come to check on her yet. "There's a progression to this stuff, okay? Last time I hallucinated, I had slept maybe five hours in a week. There were plenty of other warning signs long before it got so bad I couldn't tell what was real or not. You saw me the day before, right? Did I look sleep deprived? Emotional? Aggressive? Did I space out at odd intervals?"
He kept quiet even if he shook his head, watching her without any discernable emotions on his face.
"Derek, I don't want her to be back. I wish she died that night, I wish I hadn't tried to save her, I wish I hadn't called my dad, but she's alive, Derek, I swear and I can't do this without y-"
The almost-healed wound gave a sharp throb and she broke off with a groan.
Letting out an impatient sigh, Derek pushed off from the wall and, before she could think, placed his palm on the side of her sweaty neck. The pain subsided instantly, pulling into him and she kept her gaze on the floor, unable to take his clouded expression up close.
She hated this.
The words rushed out before she could stop them: "I don't blame you for not wanting to believe she's back."
His hand twitched, but he remained at arm's length.
"But I need you to trust me on this, Derek, I can't do this alone." As if it could soften the blow, she placed her own hand on top of his. Somehow fire meeting fire made it bearable, and she tried to pull on his strength for courage to look at him. "She told me how you met."
Derek froze and for the first time this night, she saw a crack of uncertainty.
"She told me," Joe's voice shook and she swallowed as she tried to regain control, "she told me she was working as a guidance counselor." The dry air of the hospital room tickled her throat as she tried to take a deep breath to steel herself. This was the part Joe had dreaded since she woke up from the surgery and she closed her eyes before whispering: "And she told me about Paige."
A sudden onrush of coolness as he withdrew his hand, but Joe did not even think about the pain.
"I don't know why she told me, but she-" Joe blew air out of her mouth, trying to force the words out. "I wish I didn't know- not like that, I mean-" Now the tears welled, morphine and fatigue not giving a damn about her dignity. "I'm doing this all wrong. I know I'm doing this all wrong, Derek, I just-"
Squeezing her eyes shut, she tried again: "Kate told me about what happened with you and her and..." Joe shook her head, tears raining down. "Don't make me repeat everything, please, I don't think I can."
Hearing nothing but his breaths, she managed to look up at him through her own cloudy vision. His eyes were wide, not seeing anything. Not in this world at least, especially not her. Surprised? Ashamed? Panicked? There was a lot of emotions swirling underneath an otherwise calm surface.
Instinct made her take a step towards him. She wanted to do anything to get rid of that expression on his face, but he stumbled back, arm up to keep her at bay.
"Please, I just need you to believe me. I don't care about the stuff she told me, it doesn't change anything. Okay? Nothing. But she's back and we need to stop her and I can't do it on my own."
He wasn't even looking at her, nothing to indicate he heard her. Chest heaving, sweat glistening on his forehead like he was seconds away from a panic attack. Could werewolves even have panic attacks? Would she even be able to help him if he did?
A fresh bout of tears cascaded down her cheeks. "Derek, please, for once listen to my heartbeat. It doesn't change anything."
Not what she thought of him. Not how she felt about him. Nothing. She just had to make him understand that Kate was still out there. Joe had to make him understand she needed his help.
He swallowed hard, as if pushing down everything, burying it completely. Not sure how well it worked when he still could not look at her, but at least he got his breath under control long enough to say: "I have to go."
The words were clipped and business-like. No room for emotions, no room for weakness.
"Please don't," she whispered and maybe, if she wanted to, she could believe he paused briefly before tearing out of the room. Maybe, if she really tried, she could believe that. Did not matter because the door clicked shut behind him and she was alone again.
Joe fell back down in the chair — his chair — and buried her face in her hands.
"Okay, Miss Vampirella," Aunt Mel said and pulled the curtains apart, letting actual daylight into the room. Joe only half-joked when she hissed in the bed as she'd cooped up under the covers after Derek left last night. God she'd messed that up. Her head throbbed of dehydration after crying until she got her new dosage of the morphine.
Aunt Mel pulled up Joe's charts. "They want you on another CT-scan later today. They're worried something's gone wrong since you're recovering so fast. Joe?"
"Hm?"
"Why are you recovering so fast?" Aunt Mel looked tired and had her no nonsense-face on. "This is like, miraculous speed. Does it have something to with...Scott?"
"No," Joe said slowly, not sure if Aunt Mel was asking if it had something directly to do with Scott or what Scott was now. Or all of the above. Joe suspected it had something to with Derek and his painkilling-touch, but now that she thought of it, she'd healed pretty fast after her last run-in with Kate too. All of her scratches and bruises had disappeared in days. Could the bond between her and Derek be enough that she 'borrowed' some of his healing factor?
She shrugged in the end. "I'm not sure. Maybe. Have you talked to him?"
Aunt Mel looked ashamed to shake her head. "Not really. I just- there was so many things I didn't understand that night, that I still don't understand, and after lying to the Sheriff for hours, I...I need some time." Aunt Mel looked to be checking Joe's monitor-stuff, but apparently it was just a front while she was thinking. "Derek. He's also..."
"Yeah." Joe saw no use in denying it.
"But you're not...?"
"No."
"And Stiles?"
Joe's eyebrows rose. "No?"
"Okay. I just- so many things happened that I'm not sure what's real or what I just had a nightmare about later." Aunt Mel rubbed her forehead and shook it off when another nurse entered the room, looking for her.
People kept coming to visit her. Professor Kane showed up with a large bouquet of flowers and it was strange to see the Professor out of her normal academical habitat. Joe offered to walk around the hospital with her instead of being confined to the room — Joe was antsy to get out of there by now. She felt like a sitting duck ready to be picked off by Kate.
"Sarah offers her apologies that she cannot be here today," Professor Kane explained as they walked the small path in the hospital garden, which was really just the green field between parking lots. "She bids you a speedy recovery, although it seems you are well on your way to that."
"I've finished a new draft of the paper," Joe said in response, ignoring the part about healing so fast. At least being confined to a room made her productive. "I'll e-mail it to her later today."
Professor Kane's loafers subbed on the ground. "I daresay work was not expected in your condition. Are you trying to impress Sarah, Miss Delgado?"
Joe shrugged. "Kinda feel she hasn't really seen me at my best yet."
"Your mediocre surpasses many's bests." Professor Kane smiled thinly and they walked further. "And your brushes with the supernatural? Any more rising concerns?"
"Yeah," Joe said, glad the Professor brought it up. "If the kanima-master dies, what happens?"
"The kanima always finds a master. It doesn't have a purpose without a master. It will attach itself to a new one almost immediately. The only way to break the cycle, is to break the kanima's hold on its subject."
"You mean killing it?"
That earned her another raised eyebrow from the Professor. "Absolutely not, Miss Delgado, and I must say I am a bit disappointed that was your initial suggestion. The kanima is a result of emotional issues with what was supposed to be a regular shapeshifter, inner turmoil altering the gene. Remember that I am a professor at the Sociology and Pscyhology-institute."
"You mean the kanima should go to therapy?"
"A concise summary, sure. A kanima has no identity of its own and will take host in likeminded shapeshifters, usually ocurring at the first full moon."
"Okay, but deep-set issues like that would take years of active therapy to work through," Joe said with a sigh. They did not have years, even if she managed to snatch Jackson Whittemore off the streets to hand him over to Alex and her youth rehabilitation center.
"He's an adolescent? Not uncommon for young adults to have problems associated with an inability to access, and gain from, an internal sense of self. Relational safety, self-validity and self-exploration are the three main branches of treatment." Professor Kane sniffed in disdain when they rounded another corner. "There are those who would take the short route with these options, I'm sure. But long term solutions require long term perspective."
Joe kept walking for a few steps before realizing that Profesor Kane had stopped. She stood with a rigid back and hands crossed over the strangely patterned tunic she wore. Sharp eyes glinted behind her glasses. "Alan."
Doctor Deaton had come strolling down the same path they were on. He held the same strict facial expression. "Bridget."
"Uh, hi?" Joe said, feeling very much like the third wheel. "You guys know each other?"
"Our paths have crossed," said Doctor Deaton with a friendly smile at Joe that disappeared in a flash as he looked at the Professor again. "Outside the walls of your college campus, for a change?"
"Hm," Professor Kane made a slightly amused sound, completely devoid of humor. "I see you have removed your white coat, Alan. Afraid of being mistaken for a real doctor?"
Joe felt like she had trespassed into distinct adult territory. This banter went back and forth for a while, neither Doctor Deaton or Professor Kane willing to throw in the towel. They must have done more than cross paths, as their jabs seemed to reference a lot of shared history. Sometimes Joe got the feeling that she was the only one who hadn't known about the supernatural world prior to Scott's bite.
"...and that brings me to my main concern. What are you doing here, Alan?" Professor Kane finished up some complicated three-sentence insult that you probably needed a PhD just to understand and tried to stare down Doctor Deaton.
Doctor Deaton smiled good-naturedly and put his hands inside his pockets. "I suppose I could ask you the same question, but for some of us less academically inclined, it is easy to see that you are here visiting an injured student. I was hoping to get a quick word with Miss Joe here myself."
"No." Professor Kane's answer came so swift that Joe had to turn around to look at her.
"Excuse me? What the hell is going on here?" Joe asked, looking between her former boss and former mentor. "All due respect, Professor, but I think I can make my own decisions. I've known Doctor D for years."
With a sour look towards the veterinarian, Professor Kane leaned in so that Joe got a good whiff of whatever herbal stuff the woman used to wash her hair. "Be careful at taking his words at face value. The Emissaries always have a hidden agenda. And considering what he has let happen on his watch-" The Professor cut off, as if she had said too much. "Then I'll take my leave. Miss Delgado. Alan."
She strode off in the direction of the far parking lot, leaving Joe blinking behind. What the hell was an Emissary and what had happened on his watch? She asked this verbatim to Doctor Deaton, who gave her a worried glance.
"Hm, Derek hasn't told you then?"
"No, but whatever it is, I can just add it to the long list of stuff we don't tell each other," Joe muttered, more interested in how much Doctor Deaton actually knew about her and Derek. He'd seen them at the clinic when Scott was hurt, sitting too close, Derek helping her stand. Did he know about their bond or just thought they were dating or something?
"He hasn't told you anything?"
"Again, no. What's going on?"
Doctor Deaton nodded to himself, as in deep thought. "He is taking this worse than I thought. If he feels he can't trust you, how will he fare with Scott..."
"The guy's got trust issues, no doubt about it. But, uh, what is going on?"
"Have patience with him, please. He'll come around."
And just like that, he left as well. With raised eyebrows, Joe shuffled back into the hospital. Weird.
This chapter's got no business being this long, but it happened. SORRY for the frustrating conversations, but emotions are running high, Joe is high and neither she or Derek are good at expressing themselves. It got a lot sadder than intended and I promise we're due some good ol' fluff in a few chapters.
If you want a little peek into Derek's mind, I'm posting another one-shot from his POV as chapter 2 of "The Realist". The one-shot is set between chapter 44 and 45 of "The Skeptic", because Joe did ask her three questions, she just doesn't remember it.
THANK YOU GUYS so much for the feedback on the previous chapter! I tried to write it as a nailbiter and it seems I did succeed! And again, sorry this chapter did not give as much closure as probably necessary and just raised new questions, but again, we'll get there.
Also, two milestones: we broke 400 reviews AND 100 favorites! That's crazy and I'm so incredibly happy! Thank you thank you thank you!
Long author's note, sorry, but I again want to thank you guys for taking the time to read this story and leave reviews, you are so awesome. Please let me know what you think of this chapter as well. I'm done with all Christmas presents, so I can get back to writing again :)