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There hasn't been a good reason Clara Murphy's been to the hospital in the last two years. In fact, she thinks the last time she's had any sort of decent memories of this place was when she held David in her arms for the first time after a particularly hard birth. Burn wards take up most of her memories, followed by a few hard therapy sessions in an office in a wing not to far from where she is now. David's in surgery, flashes of his arm bent at a wrong angle, unconscious but still breathing, an ambulance showing up.
She didn't even have time to call Alex, her cell phone forgotten on the counter in the kitchen at home, next to their uneaten dinner. Time was nothing more then a social construct here and the first half hour by herself went by in a blink and then slowed as doctors moved by with patients with IV poles and hospital gowns, other families waiting along side her with their own medical needs. Her chest aches, her head hurts. It's nearly 10pm now, she's been here for 3 hours.
She hears the heavy foot falls and familiar mechanical whirs and blinks, turns her head and he's standing there, a deer caught in the headlights for a brief moment, a bag in each hand. Standing to meet him, she hesitates for a moment before Alex makes the move to close the gap between them. His jaw works for a moment.
"Sorry I got here so late. Repairs. Dropped by the house. I brought a couple things from home. Phone, charger, clothing." He murmurs, holding the backpack and grocery bag up before setting the bags down on the chair beside she occupied. "Brought some food, just in case you were hungry. Food here is shit."
She nods. She lived off hospital food not too long ago, Alex laying prone in the ER, David paralyzed with fear at the flurry of emotion around them. Her vision narrows and blurs, sometime in those seconds she'd taken Alex's hand into hers, his fingers relaxed and open between her palms. She goes to explain what happened, but her mouth shuts, her teeth clattering together.
David's taken a shine to watching the news online and in recent months, it's one of the few times she's watching David actually come alive. Video's of Alex scaling walls, breaking windows and pulling himself through into burning buildings. Photo's of Alex mid jump over a chain linked fence pursuing a criminal. Alex speeding recklessly through traffic. One time during one of the more colder evenings, Alex slipped on black ice on his bike and slid a good 10 feet and needed his leg repaired. David only saw the bits where his father came out unscathed, not feeling the pain anyone else would have. 'It's so cool', David would say.
Until he tried scaling that fence for himself in their back yard. It'd recently been rebuilt, a good foot taller to give them more privacy. David, being a grown child of 11 years hauled himself over and straight down the other side of the gate, landing on his shoulder and hitting his head hard, landing 20 feet away from where she had found Alex months earlier unconscious. This was going to be something to unpack in therapy. His arm was broken, requiring a bit of surgery for some more delicate things, looking to see if anything happened to his back and neck.
"How is he?" He asks, stacking his prosthetic hand on top of hers. "Have you've been in to see him?"
She gets lost for a moment, their hands a pile of in front of them, cool metal against warm skin.
"I'm sorry."
"Hey now." He murmurs, dipping his head down to her, something about the ambient noise of the suit calming her and she exhales. "This isn't your fault. If anything it's mine."
The neighbors had called 911 when they heard her scream. Her memory fails her now after getting into the ambulance. She didn't feel him pulling his hands from hers to guide her to a chair.
"I'll get you some coffee."
And then he's gone, the soft whirring sound of his cybernetic parts fading out of ear shot, the thumps of his feet disappearing with it. She busied herself with the bags Alex left behind. She trusted him whole heartedly, idle hands and all that and he delivered. In the bags he left are a change of clothing for David and herself, her phone and charger, a few packs of unopened hockey cards, food in a foil dish that smelled of something that she recognizes as something she loved but just couldn't stomach yet until she knew David was going to be alright. Her eyes blurred with tears. Alex was returning, his foot falls matching the thumping in her chest.
"Did you drive?"
"Had Norton's people drive me here. Got them to take me back home to pick up this stuff, grab dinner before coming here." He says softly, handing her the coffee. "David's going to be alright."
She nods once as she takes the coffee, sips it and puts it on the chair next to her where she's pretty sure it will remain untouched for the rest of the night. She pushes herself up with a sigh, closes the small distance between Alex and herself and presses her cheek to his chest, listening the to soft sounds that come from within his sternum as she tries to guess what those noises are. Not quiet a heart beat, mechanical in nature, inner most workings that keep him alive. Soft whispers of mechanical life. His arm slides around her lower back as he presses her against him.
"I packed your prescriptions in there too." He says quietly.
Pills prescribed for her shortly after the incident with Alex, small things to calm her nerves. There's weeks where she feels like she doesn't need them anymore, days where she feels like she needs more. Alex opened up a few months back that there's stuff running through his system to make him feel more 'adjusted' as he put it. Anti depressants, the same anxiety prescription she's on. A whole new wave of unease sits in her stomach when she remembers all the stuff Alex has been through.
"You're going there, aren't you?" He asks. "You're getting lost, talk to me."
She pulls back to reach up and run her thumbs over his cheekbones, down to the metal framing his jaw. Her works her mouth, nothing comes out.
"You're exhausted." He points out. "Christ, Clara, you're practically dead on your feet."
She feels herself sag against him and huffs a laugh. "Com'on, Clara." He chastises, humor returning to his voice. "Sit down, I'm keeping watch now."
***
She doesn't remember falling asleep, but she's woken up in a completely different room in the hospital, asleep on the couch covered in one of Alex's old jackets, the first one she must have grabbed off the back of the chair. Alex is sitting on a couch, opposite her, a clip board in hand, scanning the page before him.
"Alex? How'd we get...?"
He sets the clipboard down beside his leg on the couch. "You passed out pretty hard." He explained. "My pacing was... a mood killer for the rest of the patients. Got moved here. Must have been tired, didn't move an inch when I picked you up."
"What's that?"
A whisper of the mechanics echoes in the room as he looks down at the clipboard. "Insurance things. They needed some further information. Figured I'd be useful and get it filled out while you slept."
Clara pulls Alex's jacket on, crosses the room to him and sits down beside him and looks through the work with him when he passes it over. "He's growing like a weed." She points out, tapping the paper where David's height is marked. "He's finally eating more."
"How's he sleeping?" Alex asks. "Still crawling into bed with you?"
"He's sleeping about as well as either of us are."
She doesn't want to think about too much how Alex sleeps at night. Alone on the dock, as a whole clinical room around him filled with computers shut down, systems filing away brain waves for the morning.
He looks tired.
"How are you holding up?" She asks. "Do you need to get back?"
He frowns, mouth a taught line as the light drains from his eyes for a moment before life returns to them. "Have a while."
"Do you mind if I try and get some more sleep?"
"I'll keep watch."
***
It's just after three in the morning when Alex wakes Clara up and they follow a nurse to a private room David is hunkered down in. Alex pushes a chair up beside his son's bed. They're keeping him over night again, to be safe. David is barely coherent, there's Redwings games he's missed and he's lamenting about it to his father who assures him he'll get them for him to watch back home, as he pats the cast on David's arm gently. Clara sets her things around the room before she goes to Alex and places her hands on his shoulders and they watch the last bit of fight leave David as he falls back asleep.
"Time for you to go, Alex." Clara presses her lips to the back of his head before she leans in over his shoulder.
He tips his head back against her shoulder as she sinks over him, clasping her hands near his sternum and presses her forehead to the soft Kevlar of his neck.
"I have a bit more time..." He insists reaching over and taking David's hand into his, arm casted for the next 8 weeks.
"Enough time to get you back home, docked and ready for this kid tomorrow." She insists back.
She steps back and lets Alex stand to full height, taking her face between his hands, watching her lips. "Tell him I'll be back when he wakes up."
She clutches his wrists, runs her hands up his arms, fingers running along the cording and plating of the suit. He looks exhausted. It's a very careful kiss when he leans in. Slow and safe.
"Guess I'll see you both in a few hours." He says as he pulls back, a wry smile on his lips.
"Get out of here." Clara taps a knuckle on his bicep as he moves around her. "It's my turn to keep watch."