“Another warning? As in, this is not the first warning you’ve gotten?” A grin illuminated her face, something that might have been construed as wicked if it wasn’t so amused or nosy. Sabine leaned further into her palm and nodded, ushering him to wordlessly continue. “I’m still a doctor. I just didn’t want to be stuck in an emergency room. It’s not like they revoked my license or anything … but I like the moving, too. There’s always something different and I don’t have to fill out hospital paperwork as much.” She shrugged, bobbing her head slightly in her chin, “Anything fun about cars? Or are they significantly less interesting than tanks and humvees?” Teeth pillowed themselves into her lower lip before she couldn’t stop from grinning again. “I kind of want you to get yelled at again, Speccy.”

      “Yes, but I don’t think the man has the heart to get rid of me. And I’m thinking a distant disaster is more interesting than seeing to someone’s rash. I can’t blame you.” “It’s significantly less interesting than tanks. Tanks I worked on while they were revving up to get moving. Cars...” He enjoyed his job to a degree, the bittersweetness of it was bearable many days and on the occasion put a smile to his tiers. But to explain it to someone else, he didn’t want to complain as much as he didn’t want to put it in good light. “Cars mean some man hovering over me, monitoring my with folded arms like he could do better or some woman waving away my explanations until she sees the bill and then wants to understand everything. Any other time it’s fixing and sending it off. I don’t mind it, nice to have the work but nothing to brag about.” And as if he forgot about hiding himself from prying eyes and questions, Felix was grinning wildly and using only three fingers to finish off another drink. “You could do that by getting me more drunk and then escorting me home. You up for that, Doc?”

         “And if I tell your land lord? What happens then?” As if she could actually do it. Of course Sabine had no idea where he even lived, considering she had just discovered he was in town. “Paramedic actually, but I still have my degree, yes. I mean … I’m still a doctor.” Cheek pressed into the palm of her hand, elbow resting on the bar to support herself — though her attention was on Felix wholly. Her new drink, for now, forgotten until he drank again to remind her. “Do you still fix things?”

THE MEDICAL LEAVE

“Most small towns have their local drinkers, I don’t know where ours go,” Paige shrugged. She thought about the question. What did she do when she wasn’t working too much. “Well I’m writing a book. So I guess that’s something.” Not that she was writing it much by choice– it was something that had been requested by her family.

      “So when there aren’t any patrons here, and you’re standing here with supposedly nothing to do you plop out a notebook and scribble something down? You don’t mind something being spilled on it or some nosy person peeking at it?” His lips flatlined. Small talk was almost as strenuous as the absence of others speaking, the absence of static from poor television most bars seemed to have or the forced laughter of some drunk woman. Silence was a disease that crept into his mind and rotted his thoughts with paranoia and unease. Small talk was a brick wall: finding topics to speak about, commenting on small details of people he’d rarely see wrapped in some form of caring to try-- an unfortunate motivation he lacked at any given time. “Well good luck with that.”

“Well I was never one to turn down alcohol,” Belle answered, smirking in slight annoyance. Though it wasn’t a bad thing, was it? Everyone liked a drink every now and then.

      “No, I meant myself, but you’re welcome to come along if you’d like. It’s not everyday a woman turns and shouts at me and claims it justified though it had nothing to do with me...” He pursed his lips, shook his head and laughed lightly. “Never mind. I get it all the time but it usually has to do with work.”

         “Any dents left over? Soft spots tend to be quite soft.” The bartender gave a small nod once he passed her drink over and Sabine returned it in thanks. She came her regularly after shifts that she was sure she wouldn’t be called immediately back ( there was a strict rule about drinking on the job, obvious with her field ), and the face of this particular tender was more familiar than not. She’d never bothered to get a name but it was enough that they’d seen each other nearly every time she came by. “The drink. I usually keep to myself when I do it.” Which wasn’t any form of admonishment toward him — instead she remained facing him, more intrigued in his presence than anything else. The familiarity was oddly calming. “The drink was better than the bed. Still is, but the bed ultimately wins every time. And you? Why specifically here? It is late, why aren’t you in bed?”

      “A few here and there but they’re not that soft.” And as the bartender swung around for hers, Felix’s order became heavier than the glass of beer he finished off, with a thanks murmured off his lips. Any dents to his head only had psychological effects, haunting his head when the air around him was too still and there wasn’t enough noise to occupy his thoughts, identifying each and their proximity to him. That was the blessing in a bar, the crowd of multiples gathered for their own purpose, unified over their legal drug of choice. Felix was in the middle, listening to the hum of it buzzing. Coupled with a few drinks meant a restful sleep in the solitude of his apartment. “You’re right, it is past my bed time but don’t tell my landlord. I, too, came for the drinks and I’ll show up inebriated, tripping over my feet.” He sounded too satisfied with his explanation, smiled a little too wide at the thought as the drinks were presented to him, smaller glasses, higher kick. “But I’m not a doc who needs to mind my liquor. You’re still a doc, right?”

“It’s a small bar and not a lot of people come out during the week,” Paige shrugged. It was the truth and she didn’t see it as a bad thing, they more than made up for it over the weekends. It just left her a little bored during the weeks. Picking up the glasses she poured the drink and handed it over.

      “I wonder why.” His lips pursed and he reached for the first shot, downed without a blink as if the text he was reading was anything other than boring to take in or keep up with. Silence. Felix wasn’t fond of the concept either, needing these drinks just to sleep at night to save him from waking from its infectious and creeping presence. But instead of filling it with ramblings, short talk or other it was normally filled with metal sliding on metal, or horrendous metal music in the background. Clearly, he wouldn’t have the peace of either here. “So if you don’t have work, what do you normally do then?”

“It probably has something to do with me just being in a mood because of him.” Honestly that wouldn’t surprise Belle at all. She’d had a whole speech ready that included phrases about fucking oneself with a cactus.

      “Not really my business so I wouldn’t know.” It was the politest way he could think to sum that he wasn’t interested in knowing or understanding her situation, or the supposed his, only that she had unjustly done it to him. “Probably could use a drink, though.”

         With a few good gulps her drink was gone. Somewhere along the line, maybe it was always in her Irish blood, Sabine had learned to drink as hearty as her grandfather had … and as quickly, too. A tap to the bar let the tender know she was ready for the next drink, though her attention was still more fully on the Specialist. “Took one too many knocks on the head? I thought you were thick-skulled, but I suppose it makes sense that something would eventually find the soft spot that does the trick.” A wise smirk tipped the corner of her lips, but the Lieutenant was jesting. It was evident in her tone, more lively than it had been the past few days. “I’m not saying I can’t handle the forty-eight. Just grumbling about missing my bed doing it. I’m allowed to grumble. Just like you’re allowed to pretend you can sleep while you’re standing up without someone noticing … or without falling over.”

      “Yeah, something like that. One knock was bound to make an impact of some sort,” he replied, though the ending words trailed off into a mumble with the same poor temper of leaving his service looming behind them. There was a blast strong enough to impact his head, but instead of his thick skull taking the damage, his arm did and ultimately used up his usefulness. It brought a stale taste to his pallet-- unsatisfied and fully displeased-- the same that came with each realization, each time he remembered he missed the action and wasn’t permitted back. If it had been his head... who knew what would have happened. His drink began its disappearing act quickly after hers, washing away the taste and swallowing the thoughts for the sake of enjoying her company. “You’re allowed to grumble, and drink while you grumble instead of grumbling into the bed you’re grumbling for. Came out for socializing, or the drink? Which one was better than your bed?”

         There was something about her title that always had Sabine snapping-to attention. Though now … now it wasn’t quite right, was it? She was former military, and being called Lieutenant was just out of respect for the position she was released at. Few civilians knew what she was there, she never really spoke about it, after all … but tired eyes found the hands that smacked the glass almost too-hard into the bar counter and traced them up to the face. Familiarity rang a bell like a gong, one that pulled the corners of her lips into an easy, if not lazy, smile. A pact honored. “I don’t remember you being so cheeky, Specialist.” Immediately she shifted to turn her body toward him more, curled into the bar stool in such a way that gave him more full attention. Familiar. Their words matched — phrases uttered about one-another the first time they had spoken. He was mostly a stranger, but oddly apart of her from birth. “You have no ideas? About what it’s like to be up for forty-eight hours straight?”

       And what started as a lazy greeting of a grin turned into a full toothed smile, with a cascading glance from her, his drink and then to the floor with amusement. Without mind to it, his right hand hid into his lap and left hand took over for lifting his drink: his left wrist that bore her existence into his skin when he had purposely made faces for her benefit, when he hissed and moaned about his injuries for more attention than they were worth and her first words to him came to clean up his act. “Then your memory is failing you in more than one way. Don’t worry, mine is too,” he gleamed, glass hovering near his lips while he spoke and fulfill the deed when he was finished. Glass settled once more to the wood top, Felix leaned into it, cozying himself in his seat. He couldn’t say he did that much for any place-- his feet were always ready to move, antsy if they remained still for too long. Even bars couldn’t keep him long for wanting to move onto the next. For the woman with whom he made a ‘what-if’ deal, he was settling himself to comfortably stay. “No, I learned how to nap while on my feet. More or less, I cheated. Here I’d think you’d know how to handle forty-eight hours, and a little bit more than that.”

“Right? And I can just stand here and pretend I have a million other things I could be doing,” Paige answered with a grin, shaking her head. It was so quiet and she hated it– hated being alone with her thoughts which was why she worked in a bar after all. She crossed her arms, leaning back against the fridge and waiting for him to decide.

      “You don’t? Business that bad you don’t have other things to do?” A little sanctimonious and definitely none of his business, the nonchalant dismissal of work didn’t settle with him right, nor did the backhand of her statement. “I’ll take two shots of Jameson.” He looked at her incredulously, but left it at that letting his focus shift over to the television screen, the closed caption that blocked most text behind it while reading across the screen at a pace that didn’t match the speakers.

“I’m hoping it sounds like they deserve for me to go off at them because trust me the asshole does deserve it.” Belle shook her head, “Now I’m not saying I wish bad things on them but I wouldn’t be too upset if something happened.”

      “It doesn’t sound like that,” he sighed, glancing to the side to see if anyone else’s attention had been pulled. With pursed lips he returned his gaze back to her and shrugged. “I don’t know the person to say they deserve it. I didn’t and you were ready to go off on me.”

         “I’ve worked some shitty shifts in my life, but I have to say the 48 hour stretch is the worst.” The evidence of one such shift was written in the bags under her eyes, but the Doctor needed to decompress after a hard day’s ( or two ) work. Shifting herself into the empty stool at the bar, Sabine waited for the bartender to catch her eye before ordering. Her words were mostly to herself, but thinking aloud was a bad habit of hers anyway.

       “You’re sure about that, Lieutenant?” His glass landed on the bar top harder than intended, near slipping out of his hand as he seated himself next to the familiar face that seemed near a ghost of a memory, or a ghost from his memories returned. His fingers rapped against the wooden counter as he shifted into the accompanying seat beside her, smile too proud and too revealing despite the closed lips. “Here I thought there was something worse than that. Can’t I know what it’s like though.”

It had been a slow night at the bar and Paige was starting to go a little bit mad. There was only so much she could wipe down the bar and there was no point setting anything else up when there was no one there. The girl look up when she heard the door opening, smiling at the other person. “Hi. What can I get you?”

       Not even a foot in the door and he’d been tackled with unbridled readiness to be helped and taken care with a pep he expected from waitresses with high-waist aprons and not the bartender who served legal drugs. It was foreign and garnered an audible, single laugh in his momentary pause at the door before he approached and settled into a chair. “How about I sit a second before that, alright?”

          It was coincidence; a giant stupid coincidence, but one nonetheless. Meeting the targets of her private cases on the street would always be prepared to be avoided, but it couldn’t be helped. And when she saw the familiar face walking in her direction, Alexandria gasped, frozen on her spot. It didn’t look like they’ve seen her, which gave her a few seconds to glance around and walk to the first person she saw. “Hi there,” she said softly, smiling sweetly. “I know it may sound weird, but can I pretend to be talking with you to avoid some unwanted company?”

      The bandanna twisted around his fingers faster when the woman approached, rubbing vigorously at the grease hiding in the threads of his fingers with no hope of working their way out. He listened, and he hummed in acknowledgement, and finally lifted his gaze while he set down his wasted efforts. “Start talking, then, and it better be interesting.”

“Okay first of all fuck you and second of all–” Belle turned around to actually face the person behind her, face dropping when she registered that it was the person she thought it was, “Oh fuck. Sorry, I thought you were someone else.”

      “Right.” The languid lift to his tiers dropped faster than it had appeared, with brows high on his face. “Whoever they are, doesn’t sound like you like them much.”