you knew the game and played it.

Jude almost scrunched his face up when he approached. “A little queasy, huh, cupcake?” Maybe the comment wasn’t needed but this was Jude after all. He almost rolled his eyes in response, “Nah, I’m good. The same thing I told the police. A little blood never killed anyone although you look like you’re about to hurl.”

“What? No. I’m good.” Usually it was Casper’s personality betraying his god awful lies. This time, it was, well, also everything else. There was literally no way to hide that he wasn’t exactly comfortable, but the other looked like hell and somehow Cas decided that he had to come through for once.  “Some blood, sure. But that’s-” He pressed his fist against his lips for a quick second, trying not to pass out or be sick (or both). “That’s like, a whole lot of blood.”

bobbie didn’t exactly expect the surprise from the other, most people knew that they complimented most people, if not everyone, men, women, anybody who classed themselves as anything different, they never knew boundaries, nor did they care for them. a soft laugh tumbled past their lips as they downed their shot and wiggled their brows at cas, “you’re so cute,” they breathed, “it’s just a drink, not a marriage proposal. you’re a good looking guy, deal with it. another?”

This time around, Bobbie’s compliment stuck with him a little easier. Sure, he was still flattered, but this time all he did was smile to himself. Casper was far from getting used to it, but at least he could try not to be weird about it. “It’s not something that happens a lot, that’s all,” he shrugged, trying to go for casual but just assuming that he didn’t quite get there. “I don’t exactly give off the kind of vibes that say ‘Come on, approach me.’“ Fact. His nerdy charm worked well in record stores and obscure hipster cafés, but he sure wasn’t the kind of person that people frequently flocked to when he was out partying - if you could even call it that “I might not be a social butterfly, but even I know that you don’t say no to free drinks. So sure, thanks.” 

“oh–oh, my god ! i’m so sorry. yes, of course.” how embarrassing. “i wish i could blame it on prosopagnosia, but really i just am bad at recognizing people out of context you know? if you had a backdrop a frozen peas behind you, i definitely wouldn’t be offering this horribly embarrassing explanation.” the words trailed off as she laughed. “it’s fine; you’re fine. i think as a nurse there’s a requisite where you’re creepy good at picking things up about people. i had a boss once that had her diploma on the wall in her office and her last name before sh was married was something super german. i just like saw it in there one day while we were talking in the lobby, she mentioned having taken german as a foreign language–i took spanish–and i mentioned like ‘oh, hey. that makes sense since your maiden name is german.’ it was super awkward when i realized she thought i was a crazy person, because why should i know her maiden name.” 

still, between the creepy calls and the texts, even the most innocent exchanges could make fiona’s skin crawl. generally, she’d learned to brush them off. “one time that guy read my address aloud.” she confessed, uneasily. “i couldn’t tell if he was checking to see if my id was fake or being a creep, but i guess i’ll find out if he shows up at my house with a pack of la croix and a tub of ben & jerry’s.”  a brave smile, she laughed it off, though she was still concerned that there was someone lurking outside some nights–making her husky macready growl at any exterior disturbance. maybe it was just a raccoon.

“i mean, sure, it’s a possibility.” unlikely but not impossible, fiona concedes, not wanting to break the trust but neither wanting to endorse that he might actually have anthrax without evidence warranting it. “the chest x-ray and the sputum samples will help. you’ll probably get an order for a flu swab too, which sucks, but emergency medicine is like rule-out medicine, so we’ll check you for the heavy hitters. send some labs. you said you were nauseated–have you been vomiting or just feeling like it?”

“i have asthma too. sometimes i get really bad acid reflux and it upsets my stomach and makes me short of breath.” she confessed, embarrassed about the time she’d gone to the urgent care for chest pain and sob that had ended up being gerd, despite countless patients doing the same in the er. stupid dumb chest nerves can’t even differentiate between sources of pain, she thought to herself. she probably wouldn’t have even bothered had she not had her own heart arrhythmia. brows furrowed as she came to another realization, fiona clears her throat. “if you’re not comfortable having someone you know, well, sort of know anyway. I could ask one of the other nurses? we always have a healthy rotation of travel nurses and they don’t know anyone.” in a town like elm wood, she was bound to care for people she knew, but she at least always offered a switch in case they were uncomfortable.

There was some mild comfort to be found in Fiona’s story, reminding Casper that he wasn’t, in fact, the only person in the world to make himself look like an idiot every chance he got. 

He nodded along with her explanation, almost excited to find out what was wrong with him this time. Almost, because more than wanting to find out what it was, he wanted to know that it was anthrax. He wanted to be right about this, even if it was just to prove that he wasn’t crazy. “Just feeling like it.” But then again, that might just have been the above average amount of social interactions he had put himself through these past few days. Casual conversation almost always made him feel like he was about to throw up. 

“No, no. Don’t worry, it’s fine.” He could see where she was coming from, but his medical history wasn’t exactly a well-kept secret. Half his friends probably knew too many quote-unquote funny anecdotes about dumb accidents and trips to the ER. “Do you get this a lot?”, he asked, now curious. “People coming in that you actually know?”

Jude had been doing good by his standard of ‘good’. He wasn’t getting in fights, wasn’t getting arrested for stealing anything, and other than his attitude problem – no one had much to say in complaint of Jude until that night. The bar had been busy and while most knew to keep their shit together, some didn’t exactly get the memo. Enter some guy harassing some girl, add Jude into the mix, and the bar almost became an all out brawl. Eventually, the fight had been broken up and of course some jackass had to call the police but at least Jude wasn’t getting arrested that night.

All Casper wanted to do was go home after a long shift. Nothing more than that. What he really, really didn't want to do was stumble over some dude covered in blood, especially if they were scarily cool in their natural environment and managed to now look even more intimidating. “Wow, that’s a lot of blood,” he pointed out as the color drained from his face, obviously not being very helpful. “I think I’m gonna be sick. Wait. No, I won’t be. ...okay, maybe.” Turning away for a second to take a deep breath, he turned back t face him. “Okay, okay. I’m good. Do you need me to like, call an ambulance? Take you to the hospital?”

THE SWAN QUEEN —— ft. @dcntslccp

“good job, sweetie!” nova praised as the girl completed a rather advanced piece. it wasn’t like cas to be late and after a short while, she’d assumed that he was running late, but wanted to double check. everything that had happened had forced her to question perfectly reasonable circumstances lately. she pulled out her phone and dialled the number, though before even the first ring sounded in her ear, she heard the door to the studio open. nova placed her hand on the girl’s back and guided her out to meet her brother, a small smile in place, “you’re late,” she teased.

Casper pushed the studio door open force, wheezing as he stumbled inside just to see Nova and Charlotte already waiting for him. “I am. So sorry,” he managed to say between heavy breaths, slumping over, hands on his knees. “My car broke down, so I had to take the bike.” He stood up straight after a while, not even rambling for once in his life, just because he was too occupied with breathing. Pressing a hand on his burning side stitch, he held the other one out for his younger sister. “God damn, I’m out of shape,” he muttered, mostly to himself as he took a final deep breath. “I hope having to wait for me wasn’t too inconvenient for you?” 

INTIMIDATION IS NOT A SONNET —— ft. @dcntslccp

if there was even the remotest possibility that bobbie had a chance with anybody in this town, they often knew it, however, there had always been one person that they’d never attempted anything with and it almost seemed like fate when they walked into the bar to find him sitting at it. perhaps they shouldn’t have, perhaps the other was enjoying some time with his friends, or even alone working on, well, whatever it was he did, but they did it anyway, closing their distance and helping themselves to the vacant seat beside him. “hi gorgeous, drink up,” bobbie urged, sliding a shot glass over to cas, wiggling their brows with a playful grin.

Casper wasn’t much of a drinker, but declining an offer was not only rude, but also required a lot more courage than he had to offer. Also, Bash always called alcohol a social lubricant and while he wasn’t sure if he agreed to that, there was no harm done in trying. It’s not like he could become more awkward anyway. “Gorgeous?”, he snorted still, almost feeling like there was some underlying punchline that he was missing as he picked up the glass, frowning before it even touched his lips and pulling a face once he downed it. “So, to what do I owe the honor of compliments and free drinks?”, he pushed, still not quite believing that this was something people just did because they were nice. As pathetic as it sounded, Cas almost expect the other to bring up how their laptop was broken or their phone didn’t connect to the wifi anymore and needed someone to fix it for them.

awkward encounters ft. @dcntslccp

Levi was lost in their own thoughts which seemed to be the case over the last few days. After their conversation with both Dove and Ivan, that gave Levi a lot to think about and it probably didn’t help that they were sleep deprived. That didn’t exactly help when it came to being aware of their surroundings and they eventually found themselves crashing into another. “Shit,” they breathed out under their breath, eyes scanning the ground briefly to make sure neither of them had dropped something. “Shit,” they repeated, “sorry.” They finally looked up, a moment of recognition flashing on their face. “Casper, right?” Well, this was awkward. “You, uh, have that podcast?”

For someone as clumsy as Casper, crashing into other people was nothing out of the ordinary. In fact, he was perfectly ready to mumble an apology and keep walking, avoiding confrontation, if it hadn’t been for the other to start apologizing first. “Right. And you’re Levi,” Casper nodded, his expression slipping from a friendly smile to something mildly panicked at how dumb he was being. Not like that was out of the ordinary, but still. “I mean, you obviously know that so I don’t even know why I said that.” He felt the awkward silent thicken between them, burying his hands in his pockets to stop himself from fumbling, eyes on the ground for a solid second before he gleefully jumped at the opportunity to talk about his favourite thing in the world. “I do have a podcast!” Too happy. A little too excited. But it was rare that people he knew actually knew of his podcast, let alone possibly even listening to it. “You want to be on it?” Smooth.

“I’ll take a large popcorn, medium sprite and a pack of twizzlers,” Casper smiled widely, leaning on the counter the way he always did when he waltzed into the cinema this late. “Kidding. I was wondering if you want me to help you out?” He remembered vividly how at first, he’d pretend to just be in the area, buying a ticket for the last show of the night, no matter what movie it was, just to hang around to help Rowan close. It was a nice thought, knowing that they had moved past that, that now they were at a point where him coming over to give her a hand wasn’t considered creepy anymore. Especially since he tried to avoid sleeping and was up late enough anyway. “I’d totally still accept a pack of twizzlers as payment though.”

“well, that’s not normally the first drug i get a demand for.” fiona smiled brightly, the joke an attempt to diffuse some of the tension. “you don’t want to shoot straight for something harder like vancomycin?” it’s a fine line between building rapport with a patient and pissing someone off, but fiona walks it well. compassion comes more naturally to her for those she doesn’t know as well–patients she can care deeply for over the span of a few hours instead of outside friendships which demand a consistent nurturing. gesturing for him to take a seat on the stretcher, she logged into the computer with a quick flourish of her password and pulled up a stool to sit level with him. “why don’t we start with ‘hi, i’m fiona. i’ll be the nurse taking care of you today. can i grab your vitals and have you start from the beginning?” 

reaching for the blood pressure cuff and pulse oximeter, fiona leaned back in a futile attempt to focus on the screen thrust in front of her. “the problem with google doctoring–” she smiled gently as she affixed the cuff and oximeter before pulling the maroon stethoscope from around her neck–affixed to it was a little lego chewbacca flashlight keychain she used when assessing pupilary repsonses and she reached to still it before attempting a listen at his lungs. “–is that some symptoms are so vague, they could be anything. i mean, those same symptoms could be the flu, pneumonia, pregnancy, gerd, or almost anything–but we’re going to get you checked out, okay?” she patted him on the shoulder reassuringly, before returning to the computer to blow in a quick assessment note. 

“when did you first start noticing these symptoms? and, aside from google, what brought you to anthrax? any recent exposures or contact with chemicals you’re not used to?” she’d once had two patients brought in at the same time because they’d lit a flea bomb off in their house and stayed inside. “we’ll get a chest x-ray and your lungs sound clear to me, but the doc might have someone from respiratory check you out and see if you need a treatment. any other medical history or do you take any medications?”

“No thanks. I read online that vancomycin can make your fingernails fall out and that’s just all kinds of terrifying.” There was a breathless chuckle in his voice, almost as if he tried to sound like he was joking but gave up midway. Casper followed her gesture reluctantly, feeling a lot more comfortable standing up and pacing, but he knew this procedure well enough to know that it would be over much sooner if he played along. 

“Oh, I know who you are. We’ve met. At the grocery store?” Honestly, Casper was used to not really being noticed, but somehow he was sure that Fiona would remember him. Just because small talk at four in the morning in the frozen food section didn’t seem to be a natural occurrence even for people who weren’t as socially inept. “One night that big dude who works weekends asked for your loyalty card and said ‘Wow, Fiona. What a nice name.’“ Again, a moment of hesitation followed by immediate regret and a mental note to please, for god’s sake, think before you speak. “Not like I’m a stalker or anything, I just noticed that. I notice a lot of things, not about you in particular, but just like, in general. You know what? I’m going to stop talking now,” he rambled, again, rubbing the back of his neck and trying his best to avoid any eye contact at all. 

Casper narrowed his eyes at her, already feeling like she was trying to bust his story when he was so sure this was what it was. “Well, no chemicals, but anthrax spores can cling to infected wool and I bought this really cool woolen sweater at the thrift shop last week.” Maybe not the most common way to get infected, he supposed, but not something that would be out of the realm of possibilities as House, M.D. had taught him. “I have asthma. And hypertension, hyperthyroidism, a bunch of allergies, generalized anxiety disorder, ADHD. So I take Ritalin for the ADHD, Benadryl for the allergies, Tapazole for the thyroid thing, and beta blockers for the anxiety and hypertension.” A beat of silence, looking up as he tried to wreck his brain for any other things that were wrong with him that have actually been confirmed by a doctor. Just because it seemed like this girl was yet another skeptic who didn’t really believe in all the things he had self-diagnosed with. “I think that’s about it?” 

Casper was waiting behind the curtain of his tiny emergency room cubicle, pacing up and down, sitting down on the bed, getting up to pace again. He seemed on edge, more on edge than usual, even by his standards. Maybe that was just what being days, nay, minutes away from dying did to you. 

“I need ciprofloxacin,” he sputtered the second someone drew back the curtain, holding out his arm, already mentally prepared for his intravenous infusion. Hesitating for half a second before he widened his eyes, he realized that he must have sounded like a crazy person. “I’m not a junkie or anything. Can you even get addicted to antibiotics? I mean, even if you could, it’s not like I am. It’s just that I have pulmonary anthrax, you know?”

“I googled the symptoms and it all checks out. See?” Fishing his phone out of his pocket, he held it in front of the short ginger’s face, way too close for her to make out any of the words on the screen probably. “Shortness of breath, flu-like symptoms, nausea and I might not be coughing up blood yet, but I swear I could start any minute now.”