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Jude, what are your favourite and least favourite things about your job? ^_^
For this ask game “Least favorite…” His expression hardens, huffing a bitter chuckle. “Seeing friends ‘n stuff die. I guess… ‘M kinda worried about Eli, y’know?” He pauses, face unwinding. “And, uh, favorite?” A grin twists over his face, sort of devilish almost. “Getting to take the fangs of those, those things once they’re finally dead. I put ‘em up on my wall in all of their glory.”
that wearing-your-clothes meme you didn't reblog. [conrad to jude]
@thestrayco
In retrospect, the first time might have been perfectly innocent.
Thing is, even if you fall in love with your best friend, you don’t really expect there to be a next step. It’s a thing that can happen when you’ve got a lot of shared history; just a little brain fart, some transference, whatever. It happens and it passes and you move on.
But when instead your rational brain takes a holiday and your said best friend giving you his blessing to date his ex-girlfriend results in a complicated series of events, starting with kissing in a locked on-call room and followed hours later by dragging him from the room of a dead cancer patient and somehow adopting a dog?
Honestly, there’s no rulebook for that.
So when, the next day, they have to burst the bubble just enough to make it to work — yeah. Conrad borrows a shirt. Too big for him by miles, especially at his current weight of… seventh grader. Gaping at the neck so after thirty seconds Jude could draw Conrad’s collarbones from memory. It’s appealing. And it’s sort of hot. And it might be — in fact it probably is — perfectly innocent.
But time goes by.
Though they still nominally live at separate addresses, it’s been a while since they spent a night apart, when they weren’t both working. (Or a day. Whatever, it’s shift work, you make do.) A while since they haven’t made some agreement about whose place to go to when a night shift ends, even if it means sharing a bed for a couple of unconscious hours before someone has to sneak out and back to work. After a few weeks like that, the wardrobes are thoroughly mixed, and Conrad always has a pile of clean laundry at Jude’s place.
So borrowing a t-shirt which reveals not only those gorgeous collarbones but the bruises Jude left on them the night before? Yeah, it’s not innocent, and it’s hot as fuck.
Not like Jude hasn’t been aware of his possessive streak since he started dating, but no one’s ever brought it out of him like this.
“You don’t mind?” Conrad’s eyes are all crinkly, but there’s a testing note in his voice as well. They’re still navigating things. Jude’s throat is dry. So is his mouth.
“I don’t mind,” he says, evenly, stretched out on the bed, sheet barely keeping him decent.
He needs sleep, yes. He needs Conrad more.
Conrad doesn’t kiss him on the way out the door. It’s calculated. He just smiles that smile and Jude knows he’ll be on his knees in the on-call room in a handful of hours making sure Conrad knows exactly what Jude thinks about his boyfriend borrowing his clothes.
—
On the one hand it feels like moving in together is nothing more than a convenient technicality; Jude could, he supposes, rent a storage locker while he is away, but leaving Conrad those few items of furniture he likes enough not to post on Craigslist (the coffee table shaped like a cartoon bacteria cell, the old chest, both of his bookshelves) and his clothes makes it feel more like a promise that this isn’t just an informal breakup. He’s coming home, and when he does, this apartment will be his home. Conrad is his home, all ribs and determination and ingenuity.
—
Jude leaves his favorite t-shirt, unwashed, folded beneath Conrad’s pillow. He thinks about it all the way to Port-au-Prince.
‘ i’d like to stay like this for awhile. ’ [conrad to jude]
nsfw meme – no longer accepting – @thestrayco (conrad)
Jude has been through some shit in his life.
It’s just facts. Tough start to life with a father whose best friend was Jack Daniels, and who was neglectful on his good days, that was always fun. Joined the army because there was no way he could afford medical school otherwise, and wound up in Afghanistan (though even on a bad day, he can’t regret that, not with what it brought him). Joined Médecins Sans Frontières because he couldn’t make himself fit in the real world, and got his fucking leg mangled beyond repair, though — that’s the cherry on the shit cake, that’s for sure.
He’s sick to death of this fucking hospital. He’s sick of meds, he’s sick of medical students trying not to barf as they are instructed on debriding his stump — they call it the wound site to his face, but he can hear them bitching in the corridors, he knows. He’s miserable, sick of being cooped up. And he’s never going to be who he was again.
And he can’t even complain, because he can’t do that to Conrad.
So he’s quiet and miserable and uncommunicative, giving one-word answers to most of the people who come through. Mina, not so much, because he likes the way she doesn’t pull her punches. He’ll get the hang of a strapped-on prosthesis and in a year, maybe less, they’ll install a permanent fixture, which will mean a better kind of prosthesis with more freedom of movement. She does tell him he can ride a bike again if he’s not an idiot in the meantime, and that, he can’t believe, but he nods and smiles tightly.
He wishes Conrad didn’t feel obliged to keep sitting in here with him. He should try to at least have some fun. Whether it’s eating with his friends in the staff cafeteria or having a few drinks across the street after work — anything, fucking anything. Just something more fun than watching television with his broken boyfriend and falling asleep in his chair.
––
Jude is learning to hate and fear sleep, so it’s good that sleep often eludes him.
It’s past eleven, and he’s been staring at the same line in this terrible book for at least an hour when the door opens.
“No,” Jude says, tossing the book onto the dresser. “Please, Conrad, go have some fun. Go to the bar, anything. Don’t let this thing suck all the joy out of your life. Go home and play with Cookie.”
Conrad doesn’t say anything, just toes out of his shoes and kicks them under the chair, and pulls the top of his scrubs off, leaving a thread-worn, long-sleeved t-shirt and the strangely appealing scrub bottoms. It’s a good t-shirt. Shows off the muscles in his arms about as good as the pants show off his perfect ass.
It’s almost delicate, the way he swings his legs up onto the bed, on Jude’s good side, and eases against him. And it’s pure habit that sees Jude gather him up until his head is resting on Jude’s chest.
“I’d like to stay like this for a while,” Conrad says, stretching an arm over Jude’s stomach. “And I’ve had a rough day, and I’d really like you not to argue with me, if you can manage that.”
Thing is, Jude isn’t the only one who’s been through some shit in his life, and he really fucking needs to remember that more often. He kisses Conrad’s head.
“Stay as long as you like,” he says, grateful beyond measure.
❝ I want to go home... ❞ [conrad to jude]
randoms. – @thestrayco – conrad.
Jude’s hands hurt, which is strange, in a distant sort of way. He looks down, and notices that he has been gripping the edge of the bench for so long that he’s in very real danger of tearing through the wood, or else breaking his fingers.
Well, fuck.
He lets go, and shakes his hands out, and then notices his jaw aches, too. Grinding his teeth. He stretches his jaw, and tries to relax.
It’s stupid, really. Conrad has been brilliant. Warm, charming, but dropping all warmth when he talks about the steps he, and Nic, and Devon had all taken, which had led to the unavoidable conclusion that Hunter — and Jude loves him always, but maybe even more so right now for not mincing words — has been poisoning healthy patients with chemotherapy, for years. That she murdered a patient with a potassium overdose. He apologizes insincerely for the word ‘murder’.
Conrad can look worryingly young, sometimes, but not today. Today, he looks every bit his age. He sounds educated, calm, and so saddened by what he knows. No one but Jude would even have noticed the way his eyes are just a little too wide, too much of the white showing.
The prosecutor nods firmly at the judge. Calm, confident. Jude has to admit, he’d underestimated him, on first meeting. The guy is good. Of course, you probably don’t get to be a prosecutor for the FBI without being good, but still, Jude is surprised.
“No further questions, your Honor,” he says, taking his seat.
“Dr. Hawkins,” says Hunter’s attorney, standing, pretending to be reviewing a sheet of paper in front of her. She could be Hunter’s sister, and they definitely use the same stylist. “How would you characterize your relationship with the defendant?”
Jude’s hair rises. Conrad shrugs, and he gestures ‘who cares’. “Right now, I’d say it’s pretty strained,” he says, but there is a sheen of sweat on his forehead. Several jurors laugh. They love him.
“Yes, very clever,” the attorney says, moving until Hunter is directly in Conrad’s line of sight. He doesn’t take the bait, looking placidly at the attorney.
“But it wasn’t always, was it. She was your teacher. Your mentor.” A pause. “Your lover.”
Conrad pales, and adjusts himself in his seat again. Jude can’t actually place himself bodily between Conrad and the attorney, but he wants to. He’s going back to the plan of ripping Hunter’s arms off, in his head.
“We need an oral response, Dr. Hawkins.”
“Teacher and mentor, yes. ‘Lover’ might be stretching the definition somewhat.”
“But you had a sexual relationship.”
Everyone in the courtroom who knows Conrad is gaping at him. He looks so small, in the witness stand. But they’d anticipated this.
“Yes,” Conrad says. Jude is so fucking proud of the way he keeps the panic out of his voice, but Jude is quite sure the word ‘Oleander’ is currently flashing neon in Conrad’s head.
“And when she ended things, you were angry. Is that correct? That this is nothing more than a twisted revenge plot against a woman who once made a very poor decision?”
“Objection,” the prosecutor says, on his feet. “Your Honor! Where do I even start?”
“I’ll withdraw it,” the attorney says. “How did you feel when Dr. Hunter ended your relationship?”
Jude’s blood is rushing in his ears, and sore hands and jaw are suddenly the least of his problems.
Conrad takes a breath, and turns to the back of the courthouse, making eye contact with Jude. Jude smiles, fiercely, and nods. Nothing they say is going to change what she did, or how he and Conrad feel about each other.
—
On the bench in the corridor outside, Conrad looks defeated, his eyes rimmed in red. Jude takes a seat alongside him, propping his walking stick against the pockmarked wood.
“You were fucking amazing,” he says, but Conrad barely stirs. Jude squeezes his shoulder. “Total badass. The jury loved you. And that sounded so petty. She…”
Conrad bristles. Jude stops and lowers his hand, but they bump shoulders briefly. Conrad doesn’t want to hear this, not right now. They sit in silence, for a few minutes. Jude has the feeling Conrad doesn’t even realize how much time has passed, but eventually, he covers Jude’s hand with his own. Jude takes it, and gives it a squeeze.
“I want to go home,” Conrad says, and Jude nods.
“Yeah, me too.”
❝ you’re having a flashback, it’s okay.. Just focus on me. ❞ [conrad to jude ]
randoms. – @thestrayco – conrad.
It is so, so good to be home.
On crutches, sure, because there’s still a lot of work and healing to be done before Jude can manage the prosthetic anywhere near full time, and there are all those stairs. But he’s so sick of the hospital, the smells, the food — alright, so people have been bringing him better things to eat since the day after his last surgery, but there have still been an awful lot of unidentifiable ‘casseroles’ on the menu the last few weeks. Sick of the sounds, the electronic beeping, sick of snatching minutes at a time with Conrad.
He’s going to stretch out on the couch and get fat, now. It should be fun.
He and Conrad celebrate with pizza, a few beers, snuggling on the couch (notably more comfortable than snuggling on a narrow hospital bed). They celebrate by letting Cookie jump all over Jude, delighted beyond measure to have the matching set of humans back. They celebrate by sharing the better part of a pint of triple chocolate ice cream. These two are out of control, they know how to party. They celebrate with quiet kisses. There’s been no privacy in weeks.
They celebrate by talking about the wedding, too. Stupid stuff, like flowers, like what kind of cake, like should they buy suits or just show up in scrubs because something is bound to go wrong and send them skedaddling back to Chastain. Jude still isn’t sure he can go through with it, tying Conrad’s fate to his own, with a lifetime of having to settle for less then he was, but Conrad won’t even listen to it. So he’s won for now.
They talk about the quiet job offer made by the new CEO of Chastain, open-ended, for Jude to come back on staff if and when he’s ready. Jude likes her. She’s warm, but efficient, with hair the color of iron and hands that have held a lot of bodies together, but she gave up surgery at the exact moment she needed to, and he respects that. He’s planning to accept. Teaching just doesn’t appeal, not yet. He’s got too much to contribute, if staying on his feet for hours at a time becomes possible again.
So much to celebrate.
For good measure, Jude pretends to take his oxy and Conrad pretends not to notice he doesn’t. Sometimes in a relationship it’s the little things that mean so much.
It’s a raucous party all around, and at about half past nine that night, they head to bed. They fool around kind of aimlessly, for a while, glad to be able to do so without the risk of getting caught, but they’re both tired.
Conrad falls asleep first, tucked in Jude’s embrace. Not surprising, the hours he’s been working; you get good at sleeping when you can. He’s warm, and reassuringly real and present.
Jude hasn’t even admitted it to himself, but he’s nervous. Sleep has been the enemy, last few weeks. They’re just dreams, but they’re rough. And all of his sleep has been drugged. He lets his mind wander to the pills in the kitchen. Maybe he should just be a good boy and take them, fuck knows his leg hurts bad enough. He closes his hand over Conrad’s wrist, nuzzles into the back of his neck, and breathes in his scent. No way can he have a nightmare with Conrad in his arms, right?
—
Sifting through a drawer filled with rubbery jelly, the shitty pineapple flavor. Finding sand in the bottom of the drawer, when he’s looking for pain medication. He calls out for help, but his mouth is too slow, and his voice comes out sounding more like the song of a humpback whale than anything resembling human.
As the door opens, there is gunfire, and then he smells Haiti, again, the verdure, the humidity. His father’s whiskey. Sand. Cordite. Sand and cordite? Is he in Haiti, or Afghanistan? Fuck, he’s in trouble — truck full of supplies. Truck full of what? Some prescription painkillers, yeah, but mostly, it’s vaccines, clean water.
Oh, yeah, they steal the meds, sell them back. It’s almost like Jude forgot. Idiot. Idiot, being dragged from the driver seat of the car, now. He tries to climb back in, but there’s the sound of gunfire, and then nothing works. Nothing hurts, though, not at first, and then there it is, the feeling of his lower leg losing all integrity; fuck, it’s so wet. It’s so wet. Warm, though, and in honesty, he’s stopped caring about the meds, they can have those. He drags himself a foot or two away –––
It hurts, after all. He glances back. His foot is facing the wrong direction. Blood, bone, meat.
Jude’s never been big on crying. A tear or two usually does it, when necessary.
Turns out, though; he can scream, when the need arises.
—
“You’re having a flashback, it’s okay… just focus on me.”
Jude pushes the hands away. He’s too hot, pouring sweat, trying to catch his breath. His face is hot, his eyes sting, and he can barely feel his fingers, or his nose, just a tingle. Blood rushing from his extremities into his large muscles, Jude knows the drill. Fight or flight. Bad dream. Just a bad dream.
“No,” he says, when he can speak. The bedside lamp illuminates everything softly, and Conrad’s cautious hands are welcome. “Not a flashback. Just a nightmare.”
He can still smell everything, though. And he is shaking. He takes a deep breath and reaches for Conrad’s hand.
“Just a nightmare. I’m alright.”
Sand. Humidity. Cordite. Whiskey. Blood.
He can’t lie down. He scoots further up the bed, to rest against the headboard. He’s disoriented for a moment until he remembers there’s only one knee to bend.
“You know, you don’t have to be alright,” Conrad says, sitting up properly, now. Cross-legged on the disheveled bed covers, his expression serious. Jude smiles at him because Jude is fine.
Sand. Humidity. Cordite. Whiskey. Blood.
“I’m alright,” he says again, cheeks suddenly burning, tears pouring down his face. His hands are shaking. No, all of him is shaking. “I’m alright, I’m alright…”
“Focus on me,” Conrad says again like it’s the simplest thing in the world to do. Jude forces himself to look at him, so kind, so concerned, his eyes wide and bright. Fuck. Fuck, he shouldn’t have to do this. Running a hand over Jude’s arm, keeping him together.
“I’m not alright,” Jude says, scrubbing a hand over his face. “Am I?”
“No,” Conrad says, as Jude collapses against his body. “But you will be, Jude.”
“My hands are shaking.” [conrad to jude]
One accident, two cars, five people, an uncountable number of catastrophic injuries; yeah, Conrad’s hands are shaking. Jude’s hands will be shaking as well, once he’s been sitting on this uncomfortable plastic chair for another three minutes and the adrenalin starts to drain off. No one is fond of concurrent surgeries, but these were not exactly planned.
It still seems unlikely that anyone is going to survive, but for now, all they can do is try to rest. Not like anyone is going to be able to leave the hospital at the moment. Time to find an on-call room. At least he and Conrad don’t need separate bunks. No one even gives them a second look anymore.
Jude looks down at Conrad’s hands. Yeah, they’re shaking. He reaches out and takes both hands in one of his. “They’ll stop.”
Conrad barely responds, doesn’t move.
“We need to rest,” Jude says, with a yawn. Conrad only looks at the ugly grey linoleum, and Jude starts to think he’s missed something.
“Your hands aren’t shaking like his hands shake,” Jude says, letting go of Conrad’s hands to lay an arm across his shoulders. His voice is barely above a whisper. “You know why your hands are shaking. It’s been a long time since Afghanistan, but this was combat medicine, babe. You were pulling out shrapnel. I heard you pulled a gear shift out of a guy’s chest.”
Conrad shakes his head. “Yeah. Did that. Did that too soon.”
“They guy was bleeding out. He got here too late. You didn’t —”
Jude’s hand rests across the back of Conrad’s neck, and he shifts until Conrad has to at least look at him, if only for a moment.
“You’re not blaming yourself for this, right?” Jude says, incredulously. “That guy’s spleen was Alpo, and he was bleeding internally from… everywhere.”
“His blood pressure was starting to stabilize.”
“Only because there was nowhere further south for it to go. Conrad…”
He reaches for Conrad’s hands again, and leans in until their foreheads touch. Too tired to think of something else to say. There goes his own adrenalin crash, probably delayed a minute or two by whatever Conrad is currently torturing himself with. Jude feels a single shudder cross his shoulders, the onset of a terrible headache, and raises the hand that was on Conrad’s neck between them.
“Mine are, too,” he says. “Come on, we need to get some sleep.”
@thestrayco – platonic requests for affection
“my kink is being right.” [ from conrad ]
@thestrayco - random sentences
If there weren’t a hundred people milling around, pausing to shake Conrad’s hand or pat him on the shoulder, Jude would pin him to the wall right now. That was the most tense MM conference he’s ever seen, and the results?
Spectacular. Bell might be a rodent, but there are things even he can’t bluff his way past.
Jude rests a hand on Conrad’s hip for a moment, and lets it drop away again. No need to hover too close in this moment of glory. Let everyone have a little piece, as long as the rest belongs to Jude.
It’s not even that he’d had any doubts about the truth; he’d just doubted, seriously, the ability of the short-sighted administration to accept that this fuckup rested squarely on the shoulders of their beloved Chief of Surgery. He’d thought Conrad was a goner, through no fault of his own.
“My kink is people knowing you’re right,” he says, as the crowd thins. Bell is long gone. Humiliated in his defeat. Good. “Dr. House,” he adds, because no one — no one — can make a diagnosis like Conrad can. There’s not a brain in this hospital that knows how to make the leaps, no one who puts people at their ease until they let loose some tiny detail about their lives that finally solves the puzzle. It’s unfortunate that Conrad had been kicked off the poor guy’s case for a few days, resulting in unnecessary and ultimately failed surgery.
“I’m due in surgery in ten minutes, but I’ll see you at home,” he murmurs, close to Conrad’s ear. “Take Cookie for a walk and get ready to find out about some of my other kinks.”
Conrad raises an eyebrow.
“I’ll make sure you’re back on the floor tomorrow. Go home. I’ll see you soon.”
“bro, you look so cute right now. dude, you are so fucking adorable.” [ conrad, being a shit ]
@thestrayco – random sentences
“Have I ever mentioned that you’re a total asshole?” Jude says, but he’s grinning. Maybe he doesn’t speak quite that clearly. After all, he did just slide in the mud and eat tree. His nose is bleeding, his front tooth feels loose when he probes it with his tongue… but he feels fucking great. So what if it’s going to take a little longer than he thought to get the hang of the bike with the prosthetic? He’s got all the time in the world, now, and he’s never been afraid of a blood nose or a skinned knee.
Conrad hadn’t looked doubtful for a second that he could do it. Difficult to put it off in the face of such open enthusiasm, and there had been the promise of a long, hot bath afterwards. He’s done being self-conscious about what’s left of his leg. Can’t feel like a total freak with Conrad making crinkly eyes and joking about all the extra room in the tub.
He spits blood into the churned-up dirt and lets Conrad examine his nose. Pretending he can’t see the way Conrad’s eyes and lips are tight at the corners, the fact he’s right in the middle of finding a way to blame himself for this. Conrad reaches for Jude’s face, and Jude takes his hand, and gives it a squeeze. This might be well-trodden ground, but there’s no need to tread it now, when they’ve had such a fucking good week.
“Cute. I am gonna make you pay for messing with this face,” he laughs, when his breathing has evened out again. “Come on, I should probably still get an x-ray.”
