The shattered shaft

Title: The shattered shaft
Chapter: 3 / ?
Fandom: Scrubs
Pairing: Cox / JD
Rating: Chapter rating – T (NC-17 overall)
Setting: Post “My lunch” and “My fallen idol”, but before Kim. Probably partially AU, since Cox/JD are in established relationship.
Beta: Ryua
Summary: JD never really imagined what it would be to loose control over his body. Still, things change pretty drastically. Hurt / comfort theme. Please read author’s notes ;)
Author’s notes: Hand surgery research info I mentioned in chapter 2 is somewhat used here. Sorry if details are off, all I used was google ;)
Just to make things clear, each “------“ line stands for time skip. Sometimes smaller, sometimes bigger.


----------------
The shattered shaft
Chapter 3


When Carla paged him, he was standing on the roof, leaning on the rail and trying to calm down the pounding headache that currently was set on making his eyes burst out of his skull by the sheer blood pressure. He glanced at the small device, his eyes scanning the short message. ‘He’s awake’ it said and Perry let out the breath he didn’t know he was holding. Putting the pager back in his pocket, he laid his head on the cool rail, finding it a bit soothing. After that he laughed; it started as a chuckle somewhere deep in his chest, to slowly transform into something bigger, more desperate. It seemed that all of the dark feelings that resided in his chest by now left him along with the laughter that escaped his lips.

------

“How are you feeling, Bambi?” Carla asked gently as she made her way into JD’s room. It had been three days since he woke up and every time she entered his room she asked the same question.

“I’ve been better.” That was his usual reply, but given with a faint trace of a smile.

JD was getting better. Slowly, but surely. The first day was the worst; the nausea and massive amount of vomiting from the concussion made him ache in every possible way. He faintly remembered asking Carla about eight times where Doctor Cox was and each time she simply replied that Perry was doing his rounds. But in next few minutes JD was forgetting that he had already asked her that and repeated his question. The Latina nurse was really a saint to go through all that stuff over and over again.
At times the ringing in his ears was so loud he felt like screaming. The headaches made him even more nauseated and the circle closed, leaving him shaking after another hour of vomiting.

But he was feeling fine by now, only the little headaches remaining and sometimes the extra light sensitivity. For those times nurses made sure he had his window blinds closed, leaving the room half dark. What bothered him the most was his eyesight. He had discussed it with doctors on call, but people seemed to be reluctant on giving him answers. What he really wanted was to talk to Perry, but he hadn’t come near his room ever since JD woke up.

Really, Elliot had given Doctor Cox one hell of a lecture when she learned that he hadn’t visited JD ever since the first day. The grumpy doctor seemed to be annoyed by her rant, but didn’t bother to reply to the accusations. JD seemed to be doing fine with Perry’s indifference, as the pissed off Elliot reported him back the results of their one-sided argument.

“He’s just not that type of guy.” JD sighed as the blonde kept screeching her anger out.

“What do you mean, ‘not that type of guy’? He was supposed to be your partner, or maybe you have forgotten? You’ve been together for so long now and three days after you wake up he still doesn’t give a rat’s ass?!”

“Elliot.” Carla came into JD’s room, stopping her in mid-rant. “Ms. Aria had been asking for you. You were supposed to be in her room by now.”

“Frick!” Elliot panicked, gathering her charts from the small table she had dumped them on earlier. As she dashed out of the room, JD looked back to the nurse and muttered silent ‘thank you’ in her direction.

“You know he does care, right?” Carla asked gently, trying to find out in what mood JD was in right now. She never told him that Perry had been coming to his room every night while he was asleep.

“I know.” The young man rested his head back on the pillows and Carla came closer to arrange them properly and make him more comfortable. “He’s not a helicopter.”

“A helicopter?” She laughed, not really understanding what the man was talking about. She glanced quickly at his chart, checking if they had put him on some painkiller that made him become less lucid. Less then usually, at least.

“You know... hovering?” JD sighed as he closed his eyes. Carla only nodded and left the room silently, not to disturb his sleep.

------

It was a night before his hand surgery scheduled for the next morning when he woke up in the middle of the night to the sound of gentle snoring that filled his room. Trying to focus his eyes out of the sleepy haze he was still in, JD turned his head around only to see a slightly blurry image of Doctor Cox resting in the armchair someone had brought to his room, head supported on one of hospital pillows and legs propped on JD’s bed.

Somehow he knew that Perry was around. First the wristband he found in his own grasp minutes after waking up – still resting under his pillow, like a lucky charm. There were the subtle signs of his presence that gave it away; the smell of his cologne; the chair that was in a different spot every morning, even when the nurse always placed it by the door; empty plastic coffee cups in the waste basket by his bed.

JD tried to arrange himself on the bed more comfortably so he could watch the other man sleep, but involuntarily he gasped in pain as he put pressure on his right hand. Perry’s snores were cut abruptly and when he was awake, his eyes meeting JD’s right away.

“Hey.” JD whispered sheepishly, not sure if Doctor Cox was mad at him for catching him off guard. He wished he could see the details on his face more clearly, but his vision was still blurred.

“Hey.” Perry replied sleepily and the younger man sighed in relief that his voice held no anger. “What time is it?”

JD glanced at the clock above his room’s door and sighed.

“Dunno. Can’t see the clock too well.”

Perry would be giving him a worried look now, he was sure of it.

“Still no improvement with your eyes, Newbie?”

“No.” JD rested his head back at the pillows, careful not to lie down on the most painful bruises. The swelling on his face had come down a bit, but he still looked like a grotesque image of a living punch bag. “Doctor Thompson wants to do another x-ray when I’m out of the surgery. He says there is possibility that they didn’t catch in the first shot, but maybe there is a skull bone that puts pressure on the eye nerves.”

“And if not?”

JD shrugged, as much as his troubled ribs allowed him.

“Then I guess I’ll have to start wearing glasses.” There was a moment of silence when JD seemed to stare of in the distance and Perry frowned at him.

“If you are imagining yourself in pair of huge-ass glasses like Harry Potter’s then snap out of it NOW.”

“You’re no fun.” JD pouted as he came back from the land of fantasy. Doctor Cox merely snorted.

“If it ever comes to it, rest assured that I will be the one to pick your frames, Lucinda, because as much as you believe in your own sense of fashion, I’m pretty sure you would pick the most disgusting design possible, while you might look not half as bad in decent frames.”

“I never knew you dig glasses.” JD smirked with the corner of his mouth. “This opens up new possibilities.”

The older man only huffed in faked annoyance. There was a long moment of comfortable silence after that, the stillness of the room only disturbed by sound of soft breathing coming from both men. After a while Doctor Cox wondered if the kid was asleep, but soon the slight stir of his body proved him otherwise.

“Perry?”

Oh-o, coming to first names. This was an obvious sign that kid wanted to have a serious talk. The older man grunted to show him he was listening.

“I’m scared.”

He wasn’t really expecting that and shifted in his armchair slightly.

“I can’t even feel my fingers right now, or feel anything. It’s like I don’t have my hand at all.” JD shivered against his will, his vivid imagination showing him possibilities he never wanted to reconsider. “Doctor Thompson says that fixing the bones with plates or screws is out of question since the bone fragments are too small. That leaves bone grafting and fixing it with Kirschner wires and then tendons reconstruction. Perry... that’s months of recovery and there is no guarantee I will be able to use that hand at all.”

“Thompson is a good surgeon.” Perry scooted his armchair closer to his bed to take the injured hand and inspect it more closely. “I agree with him that K wire is the best option here. And yes, Newbie, it will be few months until the progress shows, but you’ll have physical therapy for that.”

JD didn’t look convinced.

“Don’t worry about that for now.” Perry let the crushed hand rest back on the covers. “How did your little chat with police go?” He tried to change the subject, hoping that JD would take the bait. He did.

“I’ve told them all I remembered, but it looked like it wasn’t what they wanted to hear. Why were they so set on asking me if it wasn’t you who attacked me?” He asked with a frown.

“You know how it goes, Carol. Because my daddy used to hit me when I was little I surely must go on a rampage every day and beat up people around me with a baseball bat like a lunatic and inflict domestic violence, blah, blah, blah.” Perry rolled his eyes theatrically and was pleased to hear JD laugh a little. “Now, I am going to go and get myself a cup of that liquid rust from nurse’s station that they dare to call coffee. When I get back you better be sleeping.” The kid needed sleep, that much was obvious. Tomorrow’s surgery would probably leave him out cold on sedative for most of the day, but right now the dark circles under JD’s eyes were not caused by his bruises but simply lack of rest.

“I might want to take my chances.” JD muttered sleepily, watching the mildly surprised expression on Perry’s face.

“No, believe me.” Perry stood up from his seat, numbed muscles tingling as they shifted. He ran his hand trough the black mass of JD’s hair on the non-injured side of his head. “I always knew you were a masochist, but you do not want to feel my wrath.”

As he walked out of the door JD’s sleepy chuckle still rang in his ears.

------

He could feel her stare as he lightly bent over the nurse’s station and filling his chart files, his unruly writing looking more and more like drunken chicken scratch. The longer he refused to sleep, the messier his handwriting became, but Perry, being himself, could not give a damn. It was early evening, he was on call and Newbie was still out cold after his surgery.

He tensed up in surprise when a soft female hand found his way to his forehead, simply resting there and checking his temperature.

“As much as I appreciate the sudden interest in me, Carla, I don’t think your wife would be pleased of the current turn of events.”

She frowned and glared at him in anger, but didn’t take her hand away for few more seconds.

“You are too tired, why don’t you ask Kelso for the day off? Your temperature is spiking a bit.”

“Ask Bobbo for day of vacation?” Doctor Cox raised his eyebrows as if wondering and then shook his head theatrically. “I might as well sacrifice Jack to all of the damn demons of seventh ring of hell. And yes, by that I mean Jordan’s family; did you know her mother used to bathe in blood of virgins? That must have been one hell of a sight. Not that I ever want to see her mom naked, god forbid.” He frowned as the hellish image came to him in quite vivid colors.

“When was the last time you ate something?” Carla apparently was set on the questioning, as her voice stayed calm but with that hidden ‘I-will-make-you-pay-if-you-lie-to-me’ tone underneath. Perry clicked his pen a couple of times, eyes still set on his chart.

“I had coffee.”

Uh-oh. Wrong answer, Perry noticed with regret as Carla’s hands traveled up to her hips and rested there. The threatening effect was a bit spoiled by her round stomach.

“That’s not what I asked.”

“Oh for god’s sake.” Perry growled, raising his eyes from the paperwork and rubbing the back of his neck tiredly. “I had lunch. A ham sandwich, if you need to know all the unimportant details so badly.”

“When?”

He looked at her for few seconds, then turned his gaze away and mumbled something incomprehensible.

“What was that?” The Latina nurse insisted, moving a bit to catch his stare but failing miserably as he went back to his chart. She took it away from him quickly, earning herself an annoyed glare.

“Some day. Yesterday. Day before that. Maybe.”

“Doctor Cox!” She huffed angrily, about to start a tirade about the importance of nutrition when Perry simply reached around and snatched his charts back before storming off to different ward.

“Doctor Cox!” Carla yelled at him again, but he merely waved his hand in dismissive gesture and fled the ICU.

Coffee was good, Perry decided, as he seated himself in doctor’s lounge and rubbed the bridge of his nose tiredly. He had been practically living on it for past couple of days. Well, not that the most of the coffee served in his hospital was even drinkable, but all in all, caffeine was good enough to keep him running. He briefly reconsidered having it distributed to his system by the IV when he was too tired to move, but shook off the idea. That seemed more like Newbie’s stupid daydream and he snarled at himself in annoyance.

------

JD was currently busy squinting at the x-ray file he held in his left hand and tried to read it in the faint light of his room. This wasn’t an easy task, considering his eyesight still showed no signs of change.

His hand ached. No, that was a euphemism and a mild one too. It burned, it wailed in agony and screamed in pain and somehow it resisted the painkillers he was currently on. Immobilized in a traction splint, JD could feel every incision that was made in the morning, even though it was late evening now; could feel every single stitch tugging at his now oversensitive skin painfully. Even the cut on his hip hurt less, where they collected bone mass from his pelvis to graft the new bones for his mutilated hand. The steady waves of pain made him distracted and he couldn’t focus on the x-ray even if his eyes were able to.

“So there is no pressure after all?” He rasped out, throat a bit sore after the hours of sedation he had been under that day. Doctor Thompson nodded as he filled one of the plastic cups with blissfully cold water and handed it to JD.

“No, your skull was subjected to heavy trauma and there are some fractures, but your eye nerves seem intact. I will ask one of our ophthalmologists to see you tomorrow; maybe he will be able to tell you more. If not, you might have to consider wearing glasses or lenses.”

JD only nodded, putting the cup away and resting his head back on the pillows.

“Now, I’ve told you this before, but the surgery went fine.” Thompson fished out few more x-rays from between his files and handed it to the young doctor. “It was a bit of a long shot to do so much in only one surgery, but thankfully, we managed to pull it off. One of the metacarpals needed only simple wire fixing, but two others had to be grafted. Three of the phalanges were completely smashed, so we transplanted those ones as well. Tendons didn’t seem too be much of a problem.” The older doctor looked pleased with himself. “The K wires that hold down the metacarpals will stay there for good, but the ones from the phalanges will have to be removed when the bones grow, so that would mean another surgery in about eight weeks. That one won’t be as invasive as last one though.”

JD flinched slightly when the message got through. Never in his whole life had he had more things wrong with his body then in this past week. Hand surgery, one or two more in the future, teeth reconstruction by the end of the week and maybe an eyesight surgery as well, if his ophthalmologist suggested it.

Thompson seemed to see his expression and for a moment he had to remind himself that the kid was a doctor, not just an average patient of Sacred Heart. He surely was aware of the risks and disadvantages of his current situation.

“Doctor Dorian, I won’t lie to you.” The older surgeon crossed his arms on his chest, for a brief moment reminding JD of Perry’s favorite stance. “Your right hand is in really bad shape; even with physical therapy you might not be able to regain full control over its movement.” He watched as JD’s shoulders sagged a little but the man didn’t protest. “However, if you stick to the therapy and if you do well in it, I believe you will recover enough capability to continue work.”

JD frowned as he handed the x-rays back to the surgeon. ‘Belief’ was simply not good enough.