A much longer followup to the little teaser I posted a lil bit ago.
WARNINGS: BBU-adjacent, semi-explicit medical procedure, only mildly researched field medicine
Sebastian gives Jaime a scarf to cover the band of metal affixed around his throat, and a medical mask that will, in addition to its actual hygienic purposes, obscure the bottom half of his face. It’s the best he can do, he supposes.
This work is sort of a game of Russian Roulette sometimes, where everyone shows up hoping the other person has an empty chamber. People are vetted as best they can be in such an underground operation, but it’s not impossible that someone untrustworthy slips through the cracks. It’s why real names are never used and why Sebastian is taking any additional risks when it comes to potentially identifying Jaime to the wrong person.
The patient is a man who looks to be older than both Jaime and Sebastian, and with his age comes a well-earned wariness. He shrinks back when they enter the hotel room. (People rarely feel safe enough to offer up their own homes for these meetings).
The man who opens the door for them—who presumably set up the arrangement—looks so much like the man perched on the end of the bed that Sebastian does a double take.
“He’s my brother,” the man offers. “My twin.”
Sebastian has a lot of questions, but not enough gall to ask them out loud.
There’s no way this man is the holder of his own brother’s contract; family members aren’t allowed. And the patient on the bed is very plainly still trapped in the system, judging by the collar fastened around his neck. Is his brother actively trying to get him out? Is tonight the first step on the road to escape? Or does he have an arrangement with the person who does hold his contract? Seems unlikely but not impossible, but regardless, it’s none of Sebastian’s business. He’s here to offer medical care, and when he gets a better look at the man on the bed, he can see that he obviously needs it.
There’s currently a towel—once white, now stained a deep red—wrapped tightly around his forearm.
Sebastian crosses the room slowly, aware of how the man stiffens as he draws closer. When he reaches him, he drops to one knee, putting himself below eye level.
“Hi,” he says. He has to actively stop himself from continuing the thought with an introduction, with asking his patient’s name in return. “I understand you have a pretty nasty cut on your arm. Do you mind if I take a look? I’m not going to do anything right now except look, I promise.”
The man’s eyes shift quickly from Sebastian’s to his brother’s, taking a brief detour to where Jaime still hovers near the door.
“It’s okay,” the brother tells him softly. “They’re here to help you, M—” He catches himself before he lets the name—whatever it is—slip.
The man on the bed returns his gaze to Sebastian and lets out a slow, trembling breath. He gives the barest of nods and relinquishes the tight grip he has on the towel, holding his injured arm out like a sacrifice.
Sebastian tries not to think too much of it when the man turns his head sharply away at the sight of the medical gloves he pulls from his bag. It’s hard to ignore the small, subdued flinches at every squeak and stretch of nitrile.
He is quick and efficient as he rolls back the blood-soaked cloth, careful not to let his fingers brush skin. The cut is deep. He knew it would be; the kind of people who have connections to this network don’t call on them unless they’re absolutely desperate.
“It needs stitches." Sebastian makes sure to speak directly to his patient, looking him in the eye rather than the person who brought him here. “I have a local anesthetic with me. Two injections, given the length of the cut—just here and here. Then you won’t be able to feel a single stitch after.”
The man’s eyes move to his arm, tracking the length of the cut.
“It’s up to you,” Sebastian says. “Everything we do here is ultimately up to you, okay? I can give you my honest medical opinion, and I can answer any questions you have as best I can.” He waits until he has the man’s eyes again before continuing. “I can tell you that, without suturing, this cut will keep reopening and your risk of infection increases. I can also tell you that the injections will hurt far less and be far faster than being stitched up without the anesthetic. But it’s your call.”
When the man speaks for the first time, his voice is rough and raspy. “You’ll… You’ll wait until it’s numb? Before you start?”
Sebastian’s teeth grind from the effort it takes to keep his face neutral.
“Yes,” he promises. “Absolutely. After a few minutes we will test it, and we won’t start until you tell me it’s okay.”
The man looks once more to his brother before he nods his assent. “Okay.”
Sebastian drops into work mode, relieved to have a clear plan ahead of him now. So much of this work feels like helplessly swimming upstream, but this particular thing is something he knows how to fix.
“Let’s get set up on a stable surface,” Sebastian says, standing up. “I brought disinfectant with me so we can make this as sterile as we can, under the circumstances.”
Jaime, to his surprise, is moving before Sebastian even finishes the thought. He makes eye contact with Sebastian and points toward the hotel desk pushed against the far wall.
“That’s perfect.” Sebastian nods, inappropriately pleased with Jaime’s quickness. “Let’s pull it over here. You can stay on the bed,” he tells his patient, “and I’ll take the chair on the opposite side. That will give me the best positioning, I think.”
Jaime helps him drag the desk across the carpet, careful not to bump the patient’s knees as they settle it in front of him.
When Sebastian pulls a container of disposable wipes from his bag, Jaime holds out his hand. Sebastian blinks, then hands them wordlessly over.
Jaime is quick but thorough, wiping down the full surface of the desk as Sebastian gathers the rest of his materials. He unpackages and lays down a sterile prep mat, pulls out a syringe and a vial, then unrolls his suture kit. He doesn’t miss the way his patient’s breath hitches and he looks away from the gleaming steel.
“These tools have been thoroughly disinfected ahead of time,” Sebastian says, mostly to distract his patient from his anxiety. “But we’ll do another alcohol pass before we get started.”
This time, Sebastian takes the initiative to invite Jaime into the fold. He holds out the box of gloves and a couple of alcohol wipes, and he sees in his eyes that he and Jaime are similar in this regard: much more at ease with a clear directive on what comes next.
As Jaime diligently cleans his forceps and suture scissors, Sebastian settles into the rolling desk chair across from his patient and changes into a new set of gloves.
“I’m going to start by wiping down the injection site for the local anesthetic,” he narrates, ripping open another alcohol wipe. “Can I touch you? Just with this pad, nothing sharp.”
He nods again, eyes squeezed shut.
The room is pungent with antiseptic, and he can’t miss the effect it has both on his patient and on Jaime. Jaime is keeping his reactions under wraps, but Sebastian knows him so well by now—and isn’t that a quiet revelation?—that he can recognize the tightness around his eyes.
“I’m going to inject the anesthetic now. Two quick pinches, and then you’ll start to feel your arm go numb pretty quickly. You ready?”
His patient lets out a slow, controlled breath. Sebastian shoots a quick look toward the man’s brother, wondering if he should suggest coming over to hold his hand, to offer some kind of comfort. But he doesn’t know either of these men, doesn’t know their relationship at all. Currently, the brother is pale as a ghost with his back against the opposite wall, watching with one hand pressed over his mouth.
Sebastian wishes he could find a window of opportunity to get his patient alone and ask the question—how did this happen? Did someone do this to you? Did the person who brought you here do this to you? But what could he do with the answer, realistically, should it be the one he fears?
Don’t focus on that. Focus on what you can fix.
“Let me know when you’re ready,” Sebastian nudges gently.
After a terse, quiet ten minutes, Sebastian double, triple, quadruple checks that his patient’s arm is fully numb. He reassures him twice that he can and should be completely honest about whether or not he still has any sensation, that they can wait a little longer if they need to. When his answer doesn’t change, Sebastian gets to work.
Unfortunately, even with the anesthetic, his patient is trembling so badly that it’s getting hard to keep his lines clean. Sebastian rests one hand on the man’s elbow to stabilize him, hopefully light enough that it won’t read as restraint.
Sebastian tries to keep his head down and stay focused on his work. He’s certain this man just wants this to be over, and Sebastian isn’t keen on dragging it out either, but when the man’s ragged breathing increases to a concerning rate, he has to make the offer anyway.
The frantic breathing pauses altogether for a couple of seconds, as if the man has been caught in his fear and is holding his breath, awaiting punishment.
The words startle Sebastian, because it was exactly what he was going to say, but they come instead from Jaime’s mouth.
Sebastian looks over at him. Jaime is looking intently at the patient, and Sebastian realizes it’s the first time he’s spoken aloud since they entered the room. With his mask still in place, his voice is slightly muffled, but unmistakably kind.
“This isn’t like how it is there,” Jaime says. “I promise. He isn’t like those doctors. You’re allowed to tell him to stop, and he will listen.”
At this, Jaime meets Sebastian’s eyes—only for a fleeting second—before his attention is back on the patient. Sebastian lets himself stare a few seconds longer. He can’t help it.
Maybe it helps that the mask obscures the thin line of his mouth, or that the collar around his neck is still hidden by the borrowed scarf. But the Jaime he’s looking at now seems more confident, more certain, than he’s ever seen. There is absolute conviction, Sebastian realizes, behind the words he’s saying.
In that moment, Sebastian realizes he’s getting a glimpse of the person behind the walls that the system has forced Jaime to build around himself, and he doesn’t want to look away.
“Do you?” Jaime asks the man. “Want to stop for a minute?”
The man is looking up at Jaime through pleading, bloodshot eyes, his jaw trembling with the effort of keeping his mouth shut. Jaime casts another quick glance at Sebastian before stepping decisively forward and reaching for his scarf. He unwinds it from around his neck as he lowers himself onto the edge of the bed beside the man, careful not to jostle him. Sebastian’s chest lurches but he doesn’t say anything, just watches as realization dawns in his patient’s eyes, his entire expression shifting to one of shock, and then… something like relief.
“I don’t need a break,” he says.
Jaime takes this without question, just nods once, then wordlessly offers his hand. The man only takes a moment to consider, then takes it, firm and desperate. As the two of them hold hands, the man screws his eyes shut and turns his head toward Jaime’s shoulder, not quite making contact, but taking shelter in him nonetheless.
Jaime looks at Sebastian and gives a single nod.
Sebastian gets back to work.
Jaime waits until they’re shut away in Sebastian’s car—parked a couple of precautionary blocks away from the hotel—before he speaks.
“I know I wasn’t supposed to take off the scarf.”
Sebastian looks over at him. The scarf is back around his neck now, re-secured before they ever stepped out of the hotel room, but the mask is gone, leaving only the faint pink indents on the bridge of his nose.
Sebastian notes, with more than a little pride, that his statement was not phrased as an apology.
“It was your call to make, and you made it,” Sebastian says. “I’m not upset with you.”
Jaime is quiet for a moment. “I know,” he says finally. “Thank you. For helping him. He’s probably not lucky about a lot of things, but he was lucky to have you.”
There’s something in those words that Sebastian doesn’t let himself examine too closely, but they soften the air in the car anyway.
“And thank you for letting me come with you.”
“You were right.” Sebastian shrugs. “You were helpful. You made a really shitty situation a little less shitty for someone.”
“I guess I have some experience in that area. From the opposite side of the desk.”
Sebastian starts the car and begins maneuvering his way out of a bad parallel parking job, grateful for something to do with his hands so that he doesn’t do something stupid like lean across the middle console and pull Jaime into his arms.
They’re halfway home when Jaime clears his throat. “We made a pretty good team, didn’t we?”
“Yeah,” Sebastian agrees. “We did.”
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