"Wait, what? There's a half dozen ways your ribs could be injured that can leave you needing more in depth medical care?" He looks up at Alex with wide eyes, blinking at him innocently. "Shit, my medical degree left that off," he says, smiling at him. For a moment, the briefest of touches, he lifts his hand and touches the back of Alex's hand where it rests on his chest. "I'll have them take x-rays later, but I was too busy dealing with Jesse, and ... Shit, how has it even only been a day."
Saying it like that, making himself think about the fact that so much of his life has gone entirely upside down in a day and he's not sure how to handle it, except to keep pushing through and do what has to be done.
"Guess it's a good thing my only full time patient right now is in a coma," he says, realizing as he felt his hand against Alex's that maybe he isn't handling things as well as he things. Showing it by holding his hand out, noticing the tremor through his hand that belied more than his words or tone did.
Folding his hand back into a fist, dropping it to his lap as if that hides it all.
"I should be asking you that," he says, deflecting as best he can as he sits up in his seat more, fixing Alex with a serious look, arching a brow. "If you need to go look for anyone, try and find them, I understand that. Okay? It was good of you to come hear this face to face," he says, trying to pull together a semblance of the man he had been a couple of weeks before. Hell, even forty-eight hours before. Before Liz had told him about aliens, and before he'd had to cope with a patient that drank acetone for pain, and had killed a friend of theirs and yet hadn't been responsible.
Forty-eight hours ago when he hadn't known about aliens kept as test rats, killed because of their attempts to rescue them, or had witnessed the video of his father's murder. When he hadn't sewn up his ex-girlfriend who he'd just been trying to rebond with as friends. When he hadn't been shot, an intended murder victim. When life had been normal. Except, he knows, this is his normal now. There is now going back.
He shifts though without thinking towards Alex, towards that touch. Much as they had fought in high school, when Kyle had been a miserable asshole to Alex, there had been a time when they had been close, when if he'd been asked to name his best friend, he would have said Alex Manes, and part of him has never forgotten that.
no subject
Saying it like that, making himself think about the fact that so much of his life has gone entirely upside down in a day and he's not sure how to handle it, except to keep pushing through and do what has to be done.
"Guess it's a good thing my only full time patient right now is in a coma," he says, realizing as he felt his hand against Alex's that maybe he isn't handling things as well as he things. Showing it by holding his hand out, noticing the tremor through his hand that belied more than his words or tone did.
Folding his hand back into a fist, dropping it to his lap as if that hides it all.
"I should be asking you that," he says, deflecting as best he can as he sits up in his seat more, fixing Alex with a serious look, arching a brow. "If you need to go look for anyone, try and find them, I understand that. Okay? It was good of you to come hear this face to face," he says, trying to pull together a semblance of the man he had been a couple of weeks before. Hell, even forty-eight hours before. Before Liz had told him about aliens, and before he'd had to cope with a patient that drank acetone for pain, and had killed a friend of theirs and yet hadn't been responsible.
Forty-eight hours ago when he hadn't known about aliens kept as test rats, killed because of their attempts to rescue them, or had witnessed the video of his father's murder. When he hadn't sewn up his ex-girlfriend who he'd just been trying to rebond with as friends. When he hadn't been shot, an intended murder victim. When life had been normal. Except, he knows, this is his normal now. There is now going back.
He shifts though without thinking towards Alex, towards that touch. Much as they had fought in high school, when Kyle had been a miserable asshole to Alex, there had been a time when they had been close, when if he'd been asked to name his best friend, he would have said Alex Manes, and part of him has never forgotten that.