Not Alone

[midorisakura]

 

Disclaimer: I do not own the characters of this work of fiction, and no profit, monetary or otherwise, is being made.

A/N: Written for GGE 2014 exchange (Someone aka Me) and the cotton candy bingo round two square: injury

Summary: Sweets tries to pass off an accidental injury as, 'nothing,' fearing that Booth will view him as incompetent. (Features a fatherly Booth, and some fluff.)
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“So, what’s up, Booth?” Sweets tried to keep his voice as nonchalant as possible, tried not to wince as he sat down at the table, across from Booth, and realized that he’d failed at both when Booth frowned and raised an eyebrow.

 “What happened?” Booth gestured toward the side that Sweet didn’t even realize that he was favoring.

“Nothing,” Sweets said, keeping his voice light, and shrugging the shoulder not attached to his left side, which felt like it was on fire.

Booth leaned back in his chair, spreading his hands out across the diner’s table, both of his eyebrows raised in challenge. It was a classic interrogation method, and, if Sweets was feeling better, he might string Booth along by parrying his questions.

As it was, though, Sweets felt like crap, and he wasn’t up to carrying on the usual verbal volley with Booth. Not that he didn’t want to, because he did. He looked forward to their mid-week get together, if for no other reason than to debate with Booth. It was intellectually stimulating, and often came with an almost visceral sort of satisfaction that brought a spring to his step, and saw him through the rest of the work week.

“What’s wrong?” Booth leaned forward, arms on the table, frown fixed firmly in place. Worried. Booth didn’t do worried, and that caused Sweets’ gut to clench.

Sweets shook his head, and scrubbed a hand through his hair. It was embarrassing, and he didn’t even really know where to begin, didn’t know how to tell Booth what had happened without making the other man laugh.

“I’m fine, Booth,” Sweets said, and he forced himself to smile, trying to wave off Booth’s concern.  

“You’re not fine, Sweets.” Booth was crouching beside him, pushing aside Sweets’ jacket with deft fingers before Sweets had even registered that the man had left his seat. It was more than a little unsettling, and Sweets’ head swam a little.

The ibuprophen he’d taken that morning had not done its job very well, because Sweets’ side was now aching, and he couldn’t hold in the sharp intake of breath when Booth’s fingers gently skimmed his side. He flinched away from the touch, and batted at Booth’s hand, further exacerbating the pain, and seeing stars for his effort.

“You’re not fine,” Booth hissed, lifting Sweets’ shirt from the waistband of his pants, and completely ignoring Sweets’ sputtered protests.

“Booth,” Sweets kept his voice low, all too aware of all of the eyes that were now on them, watching curiously as Booth pawed at his side.

Sweets tried to move away from Booth’s fingers, but Booth found the gauze that had been taped to his side, his fingers stilling, and his eyes, filled with questions and accusations (Why didn’t you tell me?), darting up to Sweets’.

“When did this happen?”Booth’s eyes were boring into Sweets’, and the lie that Sweets had ready on his lips fell away.

Sweets looked at the tabletop, at his hand fisted on it. He sagged, letting go some of the tension that had been building up inside of him over the past forty-eight hours since he’d been injured at the Community Center.

It hadn’t been the kid’s fault. Hadn’t really been anyone’s fault, so Sweets had gone to a local clinic to get the knife wound cleaned and stitched – it was itching now. He’d made up a story for the doctor and nurse practitioner, saying that his hand had slipped when he’d been slicing some vegetables for a salad.

He’d probably said too much, giving away the lie, babbling like he’d done when he was a kid, and was telling the doctor that he was clumsy, that he’d fallen down the stairs. He’d never told the truth when he was a kid, before he’d been adopted by the Sweets’. The truth would’ve just resulted in more injuries.

But that was in the past, and this was now, and lies wouldn’t work with Booth.

“It was an accident,” Sweets said, opting for the middle ground with a half truth.

Booth merely raised an eyebrow, and hauled Sweets out of his seat, once again ignoring Sweets’ protests, as well as the now gawking patrons at the diner. Booth pulled Sweets’ shirt down, over the gauze, hiding the evidence of the wound, and he wrapped an arm around Sweets’ shoulder, and guided him out of the diner, and to his SUV.

Had he not been in so much pain, Sweets would’ve put up more of a protest. As it was, his attempts at pulling away from Booth left him slightly winded, and set his side on fire. For such a minor wound, it certainly caused him a lot of pain.

The doctor had told him that he’d been lucky, that the blade had only sliced through the outer layers of epidermis. It was long and angry looking, but it wasn’t deep.

The kid who’d accidentally sliced him had been wielding the pocket knife like it was a shield, trying to protect himself. He’d only lunged when he’d felt cornered and threatened. Sweets had known that it was going to happen a split second before it did, but had been powerless to stop it, even though it felt like it was happening in slow motion.

He’d been foolish, thinking that he could talk the boy down, that he could gain the kid’s trust in such a short amount of time. He’d known better than that, but hadn’t listened to the voice of caution in the back of his mind, which, incidentally, sounded a lot like Booth, the voice that had told him not to crowd the boy, to give him space.

Booth helped Sweets into the passenger seat, and buckled him in, treating him like he was a kid, which, given the circumstances, Sweets couldn’t really blame him. Besides, it kind of felt nice to be taken care of for a change.

“So, you gonna tell me how that happened, and why you decided to come to work when you should be at home, resting?” Booth looked at him through the rearview mirror as he signaled, and pulled into traffic.

“It was nothing, really,” Sweets said, letting his eyes close, and his head rest against the back of the seat, because he just couldn’t face Booth right now. He’d ignored the man’s voice when not-there-Booth was giving him advice through his subconscious, and, though Sweets knew that Booth hadn’t really been talking to him when he’d been facing that kid with the knife, he still felt a little guilty for not listening to his subconscious Jiminy Cricket version of Booth.

“Sweets, that’s not nothing, just…” Booth’s voice did something funny to Sweets’ stomach, and he chanced a look at the man, using the rearview mirror as a barrier between them.

Booth’s eyes, normally guarded, were filled with something that made Sweets look away again, because the look in them brought tears to his own eyes. Disappointment? Worry? Sorrow? Pain? Sweets couldn’t put a name to the look, just knew that he didn’t ever want to see that look reflected in Booth’s eyes again.

“It was an accident, at the Community Center,” Sweets said. “The kid didn’t know what he was doing. He had a knife; I thought I could talk him down. He was just a scared kid, and…”

“You got too close to the knife, didn’t give the kid his space,” Booth finished, and Sweets nodded.

“It isn’t deep, just long and…”

“You should be at home, resting, not meeting me for lunch,” Booth interrupted. “And definitely not going into the office.”

“It’s fine,” Sweets said. “I’m fine. I’ve got a couple of stitches, and they gave me some sample packets of pain meds. I’ll take them after work. It’s no big deal; I’ve got it under control.”

“No, you don’t. You look like a frickin’ ghost, Sweets,” Booth said, and Sweets glanced at his reflection in the passenger’s mirror.

He was pasty white, and there were beads of sweat on his forehead. He hadn’t looked like that when he’d left his home that morning. He’d been fine. The skin around the stitches hadn’t been puckered, or red – signs of infection that the doctor had told him to keep an eye out for.

“I was fine this morning,” Sweets said weakly, his voice coming out a little shaky, and, unfortunately, whiny.

“I’m taking you home,” Booth said, and Sweets would’ve protested, but a look at Booth’s eyes, hardened and angry, in the rearview mirror, caused the protest to dwindle before it even made it to his lips. “Bones is going to take a look at that ‘accident,’ on your side, and you, my friend, are going to rest.”

Sweets wanted to say, no. He wanted to tell Booth to take him back to his office, or to his own place, but when he opened his mouth, nothing came out, and he shut it with an audible snap. He was tired, and his side ached, and maybe he could extend his vacation by one more day, just until his side no longer felt like it was filled with millions of tiny red ants biting their way out of him.

Sweets let his eyes slip closed again, and didn’t fight the pull of a sort of hazy half-sleep when it came. He heard, but didn’t register the quick call that Booth made to Bones, had only a vague sense that they were talking about him, and that something had been agreed upon.

He was floating, in spite of the itchy ache in his side that wouldn’t let him lose consciousness completely. It was an odd sort of feeling, and, if he had been anywhere else, with anyone else, he’d have been terrified. But, with Booth, he felt safe and secure, and like everything would be alright.

“C’mon, Sweets,” Booth’s voice was coming at him from a distance, and Sweets shook himself, tried, and failed, to wake up.

His head was in a fog, and then he was moving, only partially aware that his feet were making a half-hearted effort at moving on their own as Booth carried him into the house, and then to a room that he was all too familiar with as he’d been a guest in it once upon a time. It felt like home, and Sweets barely took notice of Booth tending to him – taking off his shoes, and tucking him under the sheets and blankets, brushing the hair off his sweaty forehead.

Later – after Bones had looked in on him, prodding and tsking and scolding him, and making him feel better, even though he was decidedly sicker (his injury having become infected after all) – he rested.

Three days later, on the way to work, “You should have called me,” Booth said, flicking his eyes to the rearview mirror. Though he was well on the road to recovery, and was no longer in a ton of pain, Sweets felt uncomfortable meeting Booth’s gaze in the mirror, and he looked away.

“I didn’t want to bother you,” Sweets said, and the words sounded lame, even to him. “I’m not some incompetent…”

“No, you’re not incompetent, I didn’t say that.” Booth’s voice was a little pinched. “I don’t think you’re incompetent. Do you think I think you’re incompetent? I just... you're not alone, okay?”

Sweets met Booth’s eyes in the rearview mirror and was surprised that the hurt, kicked puppy quality of the man’s voice was reflected in his eyes. Swallowing, Sweets nodded.