Who: Adam and MK When: After the fear gas attack. Where: Psych Ward in the Hospital What: Adam plays doctor and then gets in trouble for being unprofessional Warning: idk. they're just like cute angst. like an indie movie about teenagers who like each other but have to go to different colleges or some crap.
The journey to the hospital seemed like a blur of the sirens and wrestling and shadowy figures. To MK, whose mind was still addled by the gas let loose in the suite at Caesars she called home, everyone and everything was the enemy. True, she had calmed down. Passed out in Simon’s arms outside of the villa and made it all the way to the Bellagio, Nell’s home, before a new wave of panic and hallucinations hit her as bad as before. They had tried their best to calm her down and convince her none of it was real, but to no avail. Everything was real to her, as real as the two trying to save her were. She scratched and tore into her skin more and hollered like someone was torturing her.
The paramedics were not as compassionate to MK as Nell or Simon had been, and after only a little fighting, they decided restraints were in order, ones that weren’t taken off even as she laid on her stretcher in the E.R. Even then, she continued to wriggle and scream about arachnids and people long dead. They hadn’t allowed Simon or Nell to ride along, but gotten enough information from them to patch together a vague story. The patient was MK Robinson, and some of the nurses recognized her from various ad campaigns in their women’s magazines. She also had identification on her, thankfully, which included a contact to her regular doctor, one Adam Waterhouse. A nurse contacted him soon after the patient’s arrival and informed her of the basic information and asked if he would like to come in.
The changes of environments hadn’t helped her mental state at all, and being in a hospital seemed to make it worse, in fact. She protested loudly, tugging against the soft restraints with all her strength (which, at this point, wasn’t very much). It was clear to the doctors and nurses that the woman was having a severe psychotic break and needed immediate medical attention. They knew nothing of gases or men with vendettas against her roommate. All they saw before them was a woman with a fragile mind on the brink. The doctor on duty administered mild sedatives, enough to make her body calm down, but the woman was clearly fighting some demons. They tried to wait for Doctor Waterhouse to arrive, but MK obviously wasn’t getting any better and her screams unnerved many of the other E.R. patients. Quick decisions had her moved to the psychiatric ward under heavier sedation than before. She was still awake, just barely, but everything about her was sluggish. MK still saw all the things, but all she knew was that one of the monsters in white coats drugged her so she couldn’t fight anything off anymore. Forcing her to resign herself to her fate.
Adam was too busy. Too busy with the clinic. Too busy worried about Pym. Too busy for anything resembling a real friendship. He had caught the journals between appointments, saw that another man was coming to her rescue and tried his best to shut himself off from it for the night. What he should have done was bullied his way into the fray to help save her, but if there was one thing he learnt from Pym, it was that throwing his weight around too much was a pointless exercise. Still, he was anxious for news and when the other hospital called him with a puzzled request that he come check her out, he was glad. Glad that they asked for him. That he was still connected to her.
Finishing up his appointment as quickly as he could, he rushed over to the hospital from his clinic and nearly panicked when they told him she had been turned over to the psych ward. He shouldn’t have been surprised, what with the strange panic attack her and Wren seemed to be having, but the fact that it had persisted for so long was worrisome. Dressed in his crisp doctor’s coat, Adam looked a little older than what he actually was. There were lines on his face, his hair was combed back and the authoritativeness of the coat aged his otherwise boyish features. The paperwork, the report from the nurses and memories of what he read on the journal did not help the grimness on his face.
And yet, he knew he had to try and hide it for her. Even if she was still frightened. Even if deep down he felt somehow betrayed in a childish way. Staying positive was the only thing he could do beyond increase medication and hope it passed. Finally, he made it over to where they had restrained and drugged her. Adam managed a smile and touched her shoulder. “Maddie K. It’s Adam, can you hear me okay?” He pulled out a small, dim pencil light and shined it in each eye briefly to check reaction.
While MK hadn’t been in the ward particularly long, it felt like ages. Everything was moving around her slowly, at a snail’s pace. Even as the darkness finally began to sneak back to where it came, it was slow, and she still didn’t put two and two together. That whatever she was seeing wasn’t real. Nurses shuffled in and out, checking in on her vital signs but not indulging in her demands to be set free or to explain what was going on. The morning was finally creeping in, and if there were windows in the room, sun would begin to peek through. But she didn’t have a window, and she didn’t know the time. All she knew was that the crawling sensation was ebbing away little by little.
Her eyes were focused elsewhere when something brushed against her shoulder, and instead of darting over, they dragged slowly in the direction of the offending person. She didn’t see Adam, not at first, but him, and green eyes widened slightly. She couldn’t move away, not quickly enough, but she jerked her shoulder out of his reach. “No,” she said hoarsely as she tried to move to the other side of the bed. But as she moved, her eyes dilated and finally focused on Adam looking more doctorly than she’d ever seen her. The image made her frown and narrow her heavy-lidded eyes a little more as if trying to figure something out. “Adam?” she asked, as if seeing him for the first time, sounding very much like a child.
He faltered, frowning a little down at her before turning it slowly back into a comforting smile. “Waterhouse. Normally in clinic, but they let me loose just for you.” He said it like he was introducing himself to her, already sure that he was the farthest thing from her mind. Adam pulled the stethoscope and put the buds in his ears, pressing the cold circular pad on her chest to check for heart tremors. She was healthy, just scared. Well, not just. He grabbed a nearby chair and took a seat next to her, clicking his pen awake to make some notes. “Physically, no problems. Not enough heart stress to cause any attack, no respiratory failure. Alertness in the eyes despite drugs and-” Adam’s voice grew quieter as he continued until it just vanished. He couldn’t keep playing doctor as much as he wanted to.
“Saw what happened on journals.” Adam said and didn’t mention how this was probably an attack. How there was a man baiting everyone in that room- especially Wren and MK. “You’re safe now. Was probably safe the second you were taken out of that place by your friends.” He lightly gripped the edge of his clipboard. Doing his best to keep it professional for now.
Any other day, the joke probably would have made her smile, just like a lot of Adam’s dorky jokes did. But her brain was just barely beginning to catch up, and instead of giggling, she just blinked slowly. Adam Waterhouse. Right. She remembered vaguely that he was her doctor as well as someone she was sleeping with, and of course he should be here. Of course. As he mumbled on, she rolled her head away again and squeezed her eyes shut for a minute. Nothing was making any sense at all. She barely had any memories of writing in the journals or scratching herself raw or being dragged out of Caesars by force. The shadowy figures with poison green eyes and sinister smiles occupied her headspace, and though she didn’t see them now, she didn’t understand that they weren’t real.
She shifted her head over again and shot him a puzzled look. She looked sluggish and beat up, frankly, with the angry red marks and bruises all over her body. At random moments, she would jerk as if tickled, though in her mind she was ridding herself of another assault. “No, they followed. They followed us from there, and all those spiders kept coming.” Her voice was a harsh whisper, and she looked so convinced that everything was tangible and real as the bed she laid in. As he was sitting next to her.
“You were drugged.” Adam didn’t understand by what or how, but he knew it was with some kind of drug that would take blood tests and other tiresome trials to know what it was. “Anything you saw- those spiders- they all were nightmares.” He knew the best course of action now would be to knock her out with something stronger and then leave hoping she’d forget he was ever there. But, he couldn’t do it. He thought, somehow, he could talk a little sense into her. Maybe even be a comfort.
He let the clipboard sit in his lap and reached up with both hands to lightly touch her arm. His fingers barely wrapped around her skin in some tentative sign of support. “Have to trust me. All those things figments of your imagination.”
MK shook her head slowly. “So real,” she whispered. “So, so, so real. No one understands.” Her eyes searched for his, and a flash of desperation clouded her eyes. The same kind of panic that flashed over it for hours upon hours the night before. “I could feel the spiders crawling all over me. They were everywhere.” Green eyes went awash with tears unshed, and she tugged a little on the restraints again. A few shuddered, panicked breaths pushed through her nose, and while the brush of his fingers was a comfort, she couldn’t stop the panic attack from coming up again.
“Briggs was there. The man that took Wren and me. He was there and so were his men.” Pursing her lips, she found herself wishing he would understand, that someone would understand. “And he was there. He was there, and I know he’s dead. He got killed but he was there. He wanted to hurt me.”
A more reasonable voice told him to sedate her now. Stop playing this game like there was something he could ever say or do that would stop this pain in her. Instead he fumbled with one of her restraints and let the hand closest to him free. “I’m sorry.” Adam laced his fingers on top of her hand, steadying her when she shook. “Guess it doesn’t matter if it wasn’t real. Felt real to you.” He looked down at the clipboard in his lap as if it has some answer for him and then back up at her face. Adam had grown very attached to her eyes, how the color made him feel, but now it was just breaking him down.
“Can’t hurt you. Have to trust me.” He repeated gently. “It’s okay to be afraid.” Adam knew people who didn’t fear anything and they were all trainwrecks or had certain essential parts missing. The sort of people that didn’t have anything behind their eyes anymore. He didn’t want Maddie K to end up like that.
When he released her wrist, a little bit of her panic was relieved. The trapped feeling abating just a tad. Her hand turned over under his, and her fingers grabbed his with a surprising amount of strength. She needed that, the actual, physical touch of someone that wasn’t just trying to restrain her. It made it easier to tell the difference, or it would at any rate. Her mind was still foggy, and everything still had a soft edge, almost like it was smudged. It made sense, when she thought about it, that she was drugged.
“Vents,” she said quietly. “Something about the vents? Wren said--” She trailed off and eyes widened again. “Wren? Did you hear anything about her? Or the other girls?” It was the most coherent and alert she sounded since he arrived, and the panic made her voice seem a little stronger for a moment before it fell to a harsh whisper again. “Simon said Luke got them out, but what if the things got them too?” She blinked a few times and shook her head. “M’not afraid for no reason. You think I am. I’m not.”
Adam didn’t respond right away, deciding to contact Luke later to see if he knew about the vents as well. Some sort of fear gas? That sounded like a comic book thing. “I haven’t had time to talk to Luke or-” Adam’s eyes narrowed a little and somewhere in the far back of his mind, Pym started to laugh. It was childish to feel jealousy towards a comment that was made in desperation, in pain. Still, it was there and Pym kept feeding every little insecurity that Adam felt. He coughed, clearing his head and his grip tightened a little before loosening back up to that timid friendliness that he was trying to be committed to. “I’ll speak with them once I get the chance.”
He reached over to loosen the second restraint so she could slip her hand out. “I don’t think you’re afraid for no reason, Maddie K.” Adam shook his head. “You did suffer from a bad trip. That is fact. However, if Luke and the others hadn’t shown up as quickly as they did, you could have hurt yourself. Maybe even fatally. Allowed to be worried. Scared. I was, too. About you.”
Even through the fog, MK caught the flash of harshness over Adam’s face because it was so different. She never saw him angry, even back in the Seattle days, and spotting a little annoyance in his expression made her question immediately without thought. “What? What’s wrong?” In such a state where she was struggling to understand what happened to her, she couldn’t help but focus on every other little thing that seemed off, too. She frowned deeply, but nodded. “Okay. Thank you.” She wished that she knew what happened to the other girls now, but there wasn’t much she could do there.
The second she was free from the other restraint, she turned her entire body towards him, placing her newly freed hand over their adjoined hands and ended up digging her nails into that skin a little. It might have looked inappropriate how obviously affectionate doctor and patient were to others in the ward, but MK couldn’t muster up energy to care. Her body ached and her throat was sore, and she just wanted to understand everything. Looking down, she spotted the marks all over her. “Already hurt myself, I think.” But the idea of him being worried over her, even through the fog, made her smile. “Yeah?”
He leaned towards her, almost touching his forehead to hers. Sure, people might start staring if they weren’t already, but he also didn’t care. This wasn’t his clinic, he hadn’t even prescribed her anything yet. “It’s nothing.” Adam said softly in a voice that didn’t seem to believe that at all. “Just upset at myself for not being there. Didn’t know what happened until later. Used to like being busy, but now-” He wouldn’t admit to feeling jealous. It was enough that he had convinced her to come over after that night she got drunk. On one hand, he was acutely aware that stepping too far would scare her away, but he was afraid, too. He liked what they had so far. Adam didn’t want to screw it up.
“Of course I was worried.” He smiled back at her, reaching up to lightly pull a strand of hair out of her face. “Knew you were in capable hands. Trust Luke with my life. But, still worried. Still glad you listed me as your doctor.”
“It’s okay,” MK said tiredly. “You’ve got things to do. People to save. Everything.” She waved her hand a little as if to dismiss it all. She was used to being second priority at times. That was what happened when you fell for a vigilante. Saving people came first, and everything else came second. Adam had other responsibilities, and he was right in thinking that pushing her too much might frighten her. She hadn’t had a relationship in years, nothing substantial at any rate, and rushing into something would probably send her running for the hills.
She liked the physicality of their relationship though. She always fed off of affectionate touches and the like. And she liked him, as hesitant as she was to admit it. Her eyes followed his hand’s movement slowly. “Luke is good, so good. But he went for Wren, of course. Couldn’t think of going for anyone else. Nell and Simon, they got me.” Memories were slowly coming back as if breaking through a fog. “Dragged me out of the suite.” She paused before giving him a small smile. “Well, I haven’t had time to find a new one yet. Someone’s keeping me busy.”
“I trust Nell, too.” Adam said, almost to himself. It was a godsend that Nell, stubborn as ever, was there to drag MK out of the gas. If it was just this Simon character, Adam would have just dwelled on it the rest of the night. There was a chance he still would, but that would be all Pym’s influence. He let it go for now, face lightening up a little through the stress and worry that had plagued him walking in. “Would provide a professional recommendation if I wasn’t also preoccupied by someone. Barely any time for my celebrity doctor reputation.”
He was glad to see her slowly coming back up for air. The drugs might have been holding her down a little, but at least they were numbing any leftover pain. Adam’s voice dropped to barely a whisper so only she could hear. “Want to kiss you, but doctors looking.” He smiled playfully. “Think risking my medical career would be worth it. At least I can run faster than that fat one.” He eyed round looking man who was carefully stealing glances at them.
She was drugged up enough not to question the Nell-connection, though the tiniest red flag raised up in the back of her mind. It was the second time one person had mentioned knowing the other, but she couldn’t figure out why they would. She frowned for just a moment before she lightened up again. “Oh, really? Yeah, I’ve hardly gotten my picture taken in days, y’know.” Her eyebrows furrowed, and she hoped no one caught wind of whatever the fuck happened last night and slipped it to a source. Well, fuck.
With a lopsided grin she shot Adam a mock-chiding look. “You’re a troublemaker, Doctor. People will say something. Cause a scandal.” She whispered, too, but more because her voice still refused to push through the pain in her throat. Even as she teased him for breaking the rules, she scooted forward just a little and picked up the hand still clenched with hers to brush her lips over his fingers. If people weren’t shooting them looks before, they were certainly going to suspect something now.
“At least I’m not a tease.” He responded slyly, smiling as she kissed his fingers and remembering how back at his place kissing her hand kept Pym at bay. It was so easy to slip into his angry, hurt darkness when he was alone, but it felt almost impossible when she was around. That was dangerous. He needed to find less ways to feel connections with her, so that when things went south it wouldn’t hurt so bad. That was just another thing he knew he should do, but didn’t.
From the other side of the room, a doctor cleared his throat loudly and when Adam looked up, motioned for him to come over. Adam nearly took the opportunity to run for it, but he was a damn good doctor and even though he was completely unprofessional in this particular case, he still knew enough to stand toe to toe. “Excuse me.” Adam rolled his eyes and stood up, straightening his jacket before walking with a kind of authority that was put on for this kind of situation. The doctor who called him over was actually a psychiatrist, which were just below medical doctors in Adam’s professional opinion. The conversation he had with the man was short and to the point, which was really the only thing Adam was capable of. His patient was stabilizing under sedatives. She didn’t need to stay at the hospital, but Adam suggested she get her own room for an overnight observation. And, he was even willing to step down as acting doctor if allowed visiting rights, which were clearly helping. The psychologist, like all shrinks, didn’t like being talked down to, but agreed to take it under consideration if Adam took off his doctor’s coat.
This was a hard bargain, but Adam went for it. Folding the white coat over his arm, he walked back over to Maddie K and sat down. “I’m playing nice for visiting rights.” He said like they were plotting something together. “You don’t mind if I stick with you until you ride this out?”
Though she could see Adam across the room discussing something with other men in long white coats, MK was startled by the sudden loneliness she felt. The little bits of gas still mingling in her system sparked a little panic, and she shifted her body back and forth on the bed to rid herself of the uncomfortable feeling. She didn’t like this. She didn’t like it one bit. When he returned, however, she settled down considerably, just wriggling a little bit as he took his seat again though the discomfort was still clear in her face.
“Please,” she said a little more desperately than she would have in a different circumstance. “I really fucking hate hospitals. Hate doctors, too. Mostly.” She smiled up at him, eyes still heavy but a little more alert. “You look so in charge with the coat on, y’know. Too bad the big ol’ meanies made you take it off.” She didn’t trust the other doctors, not in the way she trusted Adam, and she had always hated hospitals. Even back in Seattle, when she had to spend an overnight after one of her attacks, or the week following her kidnapping. It was so sterile and white, and the smell made her nauseous. She pulled a face. “They’re making me stay, aren’t they?” She sounded pissed as all hell, but resigned to the fact. She hardly understood what happened to her, and she couldn’t expect doctors to either. This just looked like she was losing her goddamn mind, and that had to require at least an overnight, if not a standard psych hold. And she was not looking forward to that.
“The coat is only useful for lecturing other doctors. I typically don’t like them, either.” He smirked, looking back at the rest of the room. He hated big hospitals. All the huge egos being thrown around. The way they had to rush people in and out like a train station. There was no personal touch. No human connection. Part of helping someone heal was putting their mind at ease, after all. “And, yes. Have to stay. They told me the state you were in when brought to the ER. They’re puzzled, which is the last thing you want a doctor to be. Good news is they’ll give you a room if you promise to behave yourself.”
If it were up to MK, she wouldn’t have wound up where she was at that moment. She would be in Nell’s suite drinking her sorrows away, or, perhaps, convincing Adam to bring her back to his place. They had tried the stint at the Bellagio though she couldn’t cope clearly. She groaned quietly and threw her head back on the pillow when he confirmed her fears. “I’m puzzled. Being in this cold fucking place isn’t going to help.” She bit her bottom lip hard, though its corners twitched when he teased her. “A private room? I feel like a star. You pull these kinda strings for all your patients?”
“It’s better this way. What if the gas makes you relapse? Can’t promise I can restrain you without help.” Even if Adam was much more muscular or even just meatier, it wouldn’t be a good idea to have her go home and start the cycle all over again. “We’ll figure out what happened soon enough, for now you need rest. You don’t know this, but your body is exhausted. Needs time to recharge and clear out the last of whatever did this to you.” He nodded sagely. If he was any worse of a doctor, he probably would have let her go home, but he knew better.
“And, yes of course. I could have got you in the deluxe special suite, but that’s reserved for my very dearest patients.” He gave her a sympathetic smile as if she were just a couple ranks down from being his favorite.
She frowned again, turning her head towards him. “Bad trip, huh. Yeah. To say the least.” Her brain was really, really lagging, she could tell, but the idea that a lot of stuff was in her head was making more and more sense. Of course some of the things weren’t real. She hadn’t seen Briggs or his men in over five years, and he was gone. She reached out and took his hand in one of hers again. “I’d kill for a good trip after all this, then.” She mumbled it, but it was still loud enough for Adam to hear. Oops.
She stuck her tongue at him as he poked fun at her. “Well, fuck. I definitely know my place now. I’m just some regular patient. Cool, fine, I see how it is.” MK squeezed his fingers. “I’ll get one of those doctors over there to take care of me all the time instead.”
“Indeed.” Adam hadn’t dared to do anything heavy since Pym showed up, but he was itching for it. In Seattle, he managed to keep it under wraps, but the second he left, it became a regular habit to get his mind off things. Doing something with MK would actually work out since she had a way of keeping him out of the darkness. Once this cooled down, he’d bring it up with her again. There was a chance that she’d judge him for even occasionally using, but hiding something like that from her seemed unfair and even a little pointless.
He rubbed his thumb against her hand and smirked. “Am the only doctor crazy enough to take you as patient. All of them would rather stick you in the very old people section of the hospital than give a private room.” He raised his eyebrows. “You haven’t smelt true horror until you’ve been to that wing. Trust me.”
MK used occasionally herself, mostly to boost herself after a night -- or two, or three -- of partying. Alcohol numbed her pain, but sometimes it just wasn’t enough. A little pot here, a little E there. It wasn’t anything horrible, right? Certainly nothing she needed help with. She didn’t hide it either, not really, because MK had lost the idea of shame a long time beforehand. It was just another thing to go with her party girl image. It worked, leading her life like a cliche. It fit that picture she wanted to portray.
“Jackass,” she said with a tiny grin, knowing how startled he got the last time she called him that. “Everyone loves me. You’re lucky to have me.” Whether she meant as just his patient or something more was left hanging in the air. She pulled another face. “Another reason I’m not a doctor. But I do make a real sexy nurse.” Though her arms were aching, she reached up and brushed her fingers across his cheek with a softening smirk.
Adam gave her a mock disturbed look when she called him a jackass. He couldn’t dream of another person that would call him that, but with her it was endearing. Kind of sweet, actually. “Oh really?” He leaned in so she could cup his face easier, resting his forearms on the bed. “Am around good looking nurses all day. Hard to impress. Would like to see you try.” Adam looked down her arms and across her shoulders. The bruises and marks reminded him of the party and he lightly touched the skin around them as if he were trying to recall the shape and color of each one.
He made a sound in the back of his throat like he wanted to say something, but caught the words before they came up. Things were only going to get worse, weren’t they? The attacks, the conflicts behind each door. It was just going to escalate and spiral. No one could expect to keep everything together for much longer. Especially people with such complicated histories to start out with. Adam struggled to put on a brave face for her, looking up to kiss the side of her lips tentatively.
A reddish eyebrow quirked up, and MK made a sound of fake-horror and betrayal. And sure, the idea of Adam being surrounded by a bevy of hot-ass nurses sparked up a little jealousy. Just a little. It was the drugs, she told herself, even as she gave him an over-dramatic snear. “Oh, yeah?” A retort was on the tip of her tongue, causing the corner of her lips to turn up into a smirk, but as his fingers danced across her skin, she found herself a little distracted. Her eyes followed the movements of his hand as he traced little patterns, reminded also of the masquerade party. Of wounds covered up and healed as far as everyone else was concerned. Seeing her marred skin caused a jolt of panic to shiver through her, not unhelped by the remnants of the gas in her system.
Lost a bit in her own mind, the kiss startled her a bit, and she glanced up at him with a look of slight fear and sadness. She couldn’t know that Adam was thinking about the same thing that she was -- that nothing was looking up. It had always been like this, hadn’t it? As much as she pretended it was okay, it never seemed to turn out that way. Her fingers rubbed against his cheek for a moment before she used them to nudge him closer, lips pressing against his softly, chastely even.
Adam was basically incapable of lying, especially to someone he considered very dear to him like Maddie K. He wanted so badly to tell her he’d make sure they’d be okay, that this whole thing would pass over and they’d find solutions to each problem. But, he knew that wasn’t true. He knew that he was destined to keep falling down holes of bad luck and drowning in mistakes. Maddie K seemed like she almost welcomed trouble these days. Despite their quest for good in each other, she wasn’t going to shy away from danger. And, neither was he.
“We’ll make the best of all this mess.” Adam said finally, leaning into her fingers. “That, I can promise.” Things weren’t going to turn out the way they wanted, that much he was certain, but he’d make the best of it. That was one thing he knew he could do.
MK nodded in agreement. “Yeah, we will.” Because what else could they do? She had resigned herself to a life full of heartache and loss and pain years ago, and nothing seemed to click and prove her differently. “You and I’ll figure something out.” It wasn’t a promise for the future because she didn’t do those anymore. It wasn’t even an assurance that everything would be a-okay. It wouldn’t. They would never wake up in a world where some bullshit wasn’t threatening their lives
She offered him a sad, tiny smile before pulling him in to steal a few more kisses, a little more hungrily than before. Each one quelled the panic just a little, as if they were the answers she was looking for, as if they would heal the bruises and marks littering her body. Arching back just a little, enough so that their eyes could meet, she smirked. “Bet your hot-ass nurses don’t let you do that, hmm? Unless there’s something going on behind the scenes I don’t know about.”
“Oh yes. In fact, you’re lucky I don’t have one of my monthly hot nurse inspection tonight. Usually devolves into making out and heavy petting.” Adam assured her with a grin, spending a couple more moments looking at her green eyes and then sat back in his chair. “Looks like they’re getting ready to transfer you to a room. Must consult other doctors, but will come find you. Always able to find you.” He reached to squeeze her hand and then stood, almost wishing that he was just here as a visitor. That he didn’t hold so much responsibility. Still, this meant he could throw his weight around and make sure they treated Maddie K with care.
MK scoffed with amusement. “Yeah. Inspections. Right,” she mumbled, voice clearly full of jest. It probably didn’t look right that she was so attached to her doctor and joking so readily after a severe mental break, but she didn’t have the energy to think about it. The fatigue hit like a ton of bricks, jerking mind finally reaching her body’s level of exhaustion, and it was clear as day how tired she was. She reached up a little bit to play with the fabric of the doctor’s coat slung over his arm before letting her hand drop again. “Go ahead, be a big, mean old doctor, Waterhouse. You can tell them I forced you to kiss me if they say anything,” she teased, eyes more heavy than ever. “Find me soon?” A yawn. “I wouldn’t leave me alone if I were you. There were a lot of good looking med students around.”
“I will be sure to inform all good looking young people that you’ve contracted every STD known to mankind.” Adam cocked his eyebrow devilishly and smiled. “Ten minutes. You can time me, if you wish.” He ran his hand over his coat that was hanging from his arm and straightened his back again as he walked off towards the other doctor, as if he were emptying out the part of him that made him enduring. Now he was just a hyperactively intelligent doctor who was annoyingly right about everything. Especially when it came to caring for Maddie K.