by Aiden Bates
Mrs. Coletti looked up at him with one dull, reddened eye. "I walked into a door." Her voice was little more than a rasp.
Alex sighed. He couldn't do much about her situation if she wasn't willing to admit it, for crying out loud. "Well, I can get a cast onto that. Come back in six to eight weeks and we'll see how it's healing. Avoid walking into any doors, falling down any stairs, et cetera." He lowered his tablet. "Look, Mrs. Coletti. You get that I'm a mandated reporter, right? I don't get a choice. If I suspect abuse, I have to report it."
She didn't lift her eyes from the floor. "I know."
Alex snorted. She probably did know. The X-rays told the story. She knew, and nothing came of it. "Do you want to talk with a social worker?"
"No, thank you."
"All right." He sent her on to orthopedics to get the bone set and the cast put on, and moved on.
On his way out of the bay, he caught a glimpse of Coletti's husband. He glowered at Alex as Alex walked past. His knuckles were scraped and raw.
Alex kept walking.
He headed back to his office and sat down to make his report. The report, thankfully, was just a form. He could get into it directly from the patient's chart. He had no idea if the reports went anywhere. If Mrs. Coletti's response was anything to go by, he didn't think they did. At least there would be a paper trail to follow when the bastard finally killed her.
He noted the particulars of his suspicion, including his observation of the husband's scraped and raw knuckles, and sat back. Sometimes it was hard not to get discouraged. Fortunately, he had plenty of other cases to remind him why it was all worth it.
Rick Wade walked into his office ten minutes after Alex hit send on his report. Rick looked relaxed and content, like nothing could possibly bother him. Having his husband back in town seemed to be good for him. Alex couldn't help but envy his boss. Not that Alex wanted a hot movie star for his husband—no, not at all. He didn't need that level of media scrutiny into his private life, thank you very much. He just wished he could find someone who made him half as happy as Dylan made Rick.
"Hey, Stodgeapottamus. Got some good news for you." Rick winked at him, and Alex shook his head. He couldn't deny that he had a certain stodginess, but he preferred not to think of himself that way.
"Silver Oak is relocating to the Caribbean?" Alex asked the question with a perfectly straight face.
Rick scoffed and sprawled into one of the available seats. "Are you kidding? You'd get so irritated by the people tracking sand onto your clean floors and running around in flip-flops you'd explode. And that, my friend, is just not sanitary. No, your neighbor is moving back home today."
Alex took a second to figure out what Rick was talking about. "Wait, you mean that loud jerk?"
"You mean the hero DJ who saved a bunch of human trafficking victims and almost died for it?" Rick sat up a little straighter. "Yes, that guy."
"Ugh." Alex passed his hand over his face. "I knew it was too good to last. I don't suppose he's just packing up his things and moving back under whatever rock he crawled out from."
"Nope. Moving back into his condo, just like any other patient being discharged." Rick fixed him with a meaningful look that made Alex feel about ten years old. "And he's bringing the girl with him, too. What was her name again? Carmela."
"Wait, what?" Alex was on his feet before he realized he'd finished speaking. "He's doing what?"
"He was certified as her emergency foster parent." Rick leaned forward, elbows on his knees. "Why shouldn't he be? She apparently feels safer with him than with anyone else, possibly because he took a bullet for her." Rick emphasized the last phrase with exceptional firmness. "You know, that tends to leave an impression."
"It doesn't take much to get shot." Alex snapped the words out without thinking.
"It does when you're not the one they're gunning for." Rick stood up now too. "Come on, Alex. What's going on with you?"
"The guy's not qualified to take care of a goldfish, let alone a traumatized teenager." Alex pointed at the door, as if his wretched neighbor were just outside. "Come on, Rick. You saw him. He's all pierced, like a pin cushion! And tattooed! He's a goddamn DJ! He makes his living encouraging addiction and irresponsibility! How in the hell can anyone encourage him to even think about having contact with children?"
Rick crossed his arms over his chest. "Are you done?"
"No!"
"Be done." A hint of steel entered Rick's voice. "This is a guy who has been working hard every day of his life, trying to keep his head above water. He speaks Spanish, he's been the most attentive to her needs of anyone she's dealt with so far. She needs someone like that. She needs an advocate."
"So let them send a professional, someone who's been trained! Not some punk yahoo not much older than she is!" Alex grabbed his hair and tugged.
"Look. It's already done, but I can't see a better solution for this situation. I only wish they could find an equally good solution for all those kids." Rick sighed.
"My parents are trying to get certified as foster parents, to help out. How come they didn't get fast tracked like this jackass did?" He put his hands on his hips.
"I don't know. I don't work for social services. Maybe it's got something to do with the fact that he's not a stranger to her." Rick sighed in exasperation.
"I've got to—I've got to go do something about this." Alex stormed out of the office.
He knew where he wanted to go. He wasn't sure he was going to go there, though, until he stood before the open door of Derek Brown's room. A small part of him that was still rational reminded him it was not a good idea to go inside. The determination had been made, Brown was going to be Carmela's foster parent for the time being, and there was nothing Alex could do about it. He needed to maintain his professional distance.
At the same time, who would Alex be if he didn't do the right thing?
He pushed his way into the room. "You can't be serious, Brown!" he bellowed, pointing at the tall, slim figure sitting on the bed. "You must be clinically insane if you think you're a suitable candidate to take care of a child!"
The other figure in the room let out a little scream and jumped onto the other side of the bed. Derek Brown leaped to his feet and kept his body between the bed and Alex. His dark eyes narrowed. "Doctor," he said, in a voice that was half a growl. "Do you mind not traumatizing my guest?"
Alex cast his eyes over to the other side of the bed. A dark-haired, dark-skinned girl huddled there, trying to make herself even smaller. "Is that the girl?"
Derek snorted. "Her name is Carmela." He turned, just enough to look at Carmela. He didn't turn enough for Alex to see his back, but he directed his attention to Carmela and spoke in Spanish. His voice was soothing, and if Alex weren't burning with rage right now he might have been lulled by it.
Carmela unfolded herself slowly and stood up. Her large brown eyes were glued to Alex, and it wasn't a good feeling. She did her best to keep Derek between herself and Alex. It did more to bring him up short than anything Rick could have said.
"Carmela understands English just fine. She's having trouble remembering how to speak it." Derek set his jaw as he turned back to face Alex. "Do you think you can maybe explain your objections in a calm manner, or do you want to bring up your complaints to the social worker in private?"
Alex sucked in his cheeks. He wasn't used to patients calling him out like this. He knew he deserved it, but it still burned. "Look. You're about as responsible as the average street cat. You can't take care of a child, any child, never mind a child that's been traumatized."
Derek folded his arms over his chest. "The court's already made that determination. And you don't actually know me." He met Alex’s eyes. "In fact, we've lived next door to one another for what, three years? In all that time, you've never once introduced yourself or made the slightest attempt to know me. You're not in a position to know if I'm responsible, if I'm irresponsible, or if I'm Satan himself. You like to sit around and judge
people, and issue directives to everyone else in our complex, but you don't actually know a goddamn thing you're talking about."
Alex dropped his jaw. "I make my judgments based on what I can see, with my own two eyes. You're up at all hours, you've got enough holes poked into yourself you're like a medical experiment, you've got no damn respect for yourself at all, you're a rock DJ for crying out loud!"
"Oh, and someone who has two jobs and works late can't possibly be responsible." Derek snorted. "And believe me, guy. You might be an ER doctor, but you don't know the first damn thing about trauma. If you did, you wouldn't have burst in here shouting and scaring this young person half to death."
"Don't you go telling me what I don't understand, you uneducated—" Alex got control of himself just in time. "Look. I'm just looking out for Carmela's best interests here."
"Because you know better what Carmela's best interests are." Derek scoffed. "Not the courts, not the therapists, not the guy who's survived the foster system, and not Carmela herself. You."
"As a matter of fact, yes. It's obvious that no one has considered that Carmela would do best placed with a family, not an uneducated single scruffy omega." Alex glanced at Carmela, whose face had gone from terror to rage in an instant. "It's only in a familial setting that she can get back to what she's supposed to be."
"Have a lot of familiarity with the long-term effects of childhood trauma, do we?" Derek's pretty, pink lip curled.
Alex shook his head at himself. Why should he be thinking about this guy's lips? Okay, he was objectively good looking but he wasn't anything like Alex’s type.
"Look," Alex tried. "Don't you think she'd do better with two parents?"
"I think we're going to worry about long-term placement after we've gotten through the current crisis. We may not even need a long-term placement. And that, my dear Dr. Brennan, is none of your damn business. Carmela is not your patient." Derek sighed. "Look. I'm sure on some level you're trying to do what you think is right, but in this case you're being an ass. Maybe you could go find some doctors' conference room or lounge or something and go be an ass there? My brother is going to be here any minute, and we're going to go home."
Derek smirked then. "And you should be thrilled to know that since I'm on medical leave for the next few weeks, I'm not going to be coming home at an hour you don't approve of. So maybe you can chill with the constant harassment. 'Kay?"
Carmela snickered and covered her mouth with one hand. Alex turned on one heel and left the room before he could do something he regretted. He was an alpha, he knew he had a temper. He still had enough control of himself to know not to lash out.
On his way out of the room, he found Rick coming up the hallway with Derek's foster brother. Amadi Brown recoiled as they got closer. "Ugh. You again."
Rick huffed out a little laugh and shook his head. "Damn, Alex. You're just making friends everywhere you go. Mr. Brown's here to help his brother and his guest get home. Do you want to help with the discharge process?"
"No, I do not." Alex headed back down to the emergency department, but not before he heard Amadi mutter "what a prick" to Rick.
What was it about those two that rubbed him so far the wrong way?
It wasn't those two. It was just Derek. Derek had irritated Alex since the day Derek moved in. Alex hadn't even seen him. He'd just heard noise in the condo that had been vacant for years. It was change, and Alex didn't care for change. That was it, pure and simple, and everything had snowballed from there.
Maybe it was time for Alex to move out of the condo. He needed a quieter environment, and he could stand to be farther away from Derek Brown.
None of that addressed the current problem. His personal issues with Derek Brown didn't erase the fact that Derek Brown was no fit parent. He was going to have to keep a close eye on that situation. Carmela might think she felt safest with Derek around, but what did she know about safety? Who knew what her home life had been before she'd been trafficked?
Alex was in an ideal position to watch over her, and to make sure she would be safe. In theory, a child advocate would be coming from Albany to help out. Surely this advocate would be able to see reason and help convince everyone involved to put Carmela where she belonged, with a proper family. In the meantime, Alex would watch carefully.
Fortunately for him, Derek wasn't a terrible subject to watch.
Chapter Four
Coming home might have been the weirdest feeling for Derek since his mother's funeral. He hadn't been back to his condo in days, and somehow in those few days everything had changed. For one thing, Derek was seeing everything through a never-ending haze of pain. For another, there was another human being in the condo, all of the time.
Both of those were things Derek could live with. He could call up Dr. Wade tomorrow and say, Look, I can't take it, give me some pills, and Wade would cheerfully load him right up. That made the pain something Derek controlled, if he thought about it the right way. Carmela was someone who needed him, and his protection. It was protection he was uniquely qualified to offer. Derek wasn't foolish enough to think they were going to make a long term family out of this situation, but he could give her a place to be while they figured things out. That, too, was something under Derek's control.
The neighbor? Dr. Alex Brennan? That was not under Derek's control, and now that Derek understood the situation better he hated it even more.
He didn't see the wretched doctor the day he and Carmela moved back to the house. That was for the best. Derek had too much else to coordinate. Other people helped out with things like grocery delivery and clothing donations for Carmela, seeing as how she didn't have anything of her own. It was nice of them to drop things off, but Derek still had to tell people where to put things. Amadi and the lady he was most definitely not dating, Rashida, did most of the heavy lifting, but Derek still had to give a lot of direction.
The day after Derek and Carmela got home, they sat down with Amadi and established a routine. Amadi would come by once a day and do anything that required lifting or two hands, like dishes. They could use the microwave for themselves, and he'd help them with meal prep once a week until Derek was able to use his hands again.
Carmela was more than willing to help out, but Derek wasn't about to ask her to cook for him. "That's so not your job," he told her with a grin. "Your job is to relax and get better, just like mine."
The day after that they got a visit from the social worker, who brought a therapist along with her. This therapist was bilingual, much to Derek's delight. "Eventually we're going to get to meeting at my office," she explained, for both Derek and Carmela. "But right now, under the circumstances, I think it's okay for me to come to her. It's not like you're up to driving, right Derek?"
Derek had to laugh at that one. "I could probably pull it off in an emergency, but yeah. It's not the best idea." He looked over at Carmela. "You know what? We should look into getting you your learner's permit, once you're ready. Whatever it is you decide to do going forward, at least we can minimize the amount of time it takes to get you your life back."
Carmela shook her head. "I don't know if I'll ever get my life back, you know? I'm afraid to leave the apartment."
Derek nodded. He could feel the therapist's eyes on him, and those of Ms. Myles. Everything had to feel like a test, all of the time. "Hey, do you know what? I know exactly what you mean. When I first—when my dad—when my mom died, I couldn't even speak for like a month. And it did feel like the world had ended. But I found a way to land on my feet again. It wasn't the same, but I'm strong and I found my way through it. You will too."
Both Myles and the therapist relaxed. He'd passed their exam. "I'll give you the room," he told them, and then he turned to Carmela. "My door will be open. Just give a yell if you need me, okay?"
She smiled up at him. "Okay."
He retreated to his room with a book about mass incarceration. He might as well use the time wisely.
The appointment lasted
about an hour. When Derek was summoned out to the living room again, he found a tearful Carmela curled up on the couch with a box of tissues. He took a seat beside her and let her initiate contact by putting her head on his shoulder. "Rough session, huh?" He put his arm around her shoulders. "It will get better, I promise."
"I know." She sniffed loudly and wiped her nose. "I know. It's just a matter of getting there."
He thanked Myles and the therapist for their time, and found something mindless for himself and Carmela to watch so she could recover. Amadi came over that evening, and helped them with the dishes before scolding Derek for making his own bed. "You know you're not supposed to be doing that for yourself." He wagged a finger at him. "You should be chilling, taking it easy. That arm isn't going to heal if you don't let it rest."
