RP Log: Caoimhe and Sturgis Characters: Caoimhe Sullivan and Sturgis Podmore Setting: A room in the Spell Damage Ward at St. Mungo's Hospital, early afternoon. Summary: Sturgis gets his chance to talk to the girlfriend everybody knows he has now. Warnings: Language, again. Blame Sturgis.
From what Sturgis had been told, Caoimhe had woken up about twenty minutes ago. Marion Banges was there, and then Doyle got the first honours, of course, which suited Sturgis just fine because holy shit, he felt like someone had been kicking him in the face for the past few days and he needed to get himself in line. No sleep, shitty hospital food, and constant worrying about Lupin and his family had not made Sturgis the cuddliest hitwizard on the planet. Sturgis hated worrying. It was useless, didn't get anything accomplished, and gave him lines on his forehead, but unfortunately, the hospital waiting room was an environment which cultivated worrying.
He splashed some water on his face. Dried off. Still looked like hell. But Caoimhe was awake, and if he focused on that, then maybe he'd get through another few hours without closing his eyes properly.
Sturgis entered the room as soon as Marion had left it, side of his mouth quirking in half-smile. She looked small and pale in the hospital bed, and so damn glazed he wasn't sure if she'd even remember this encounter later. He took a chair next to her, sought her hand, and gave it a squeeze.
"Hey," he said, and goddamit. Relief had left a lump in his throat.
Glazed was a good word for how she felt at the moment. Everything had been such a rush since waking up, and thank god Marion had been there when her eyes opened to explain it all to her. She didn't remember much after the first hit, just bits and snatches of light and color and sound. She knew from Marion and Doyle that she had been lying face down on this bed with her back one big bandage for around 36 hours, but she still felt like it should be Tuesday night. Caoimhe was rattled and still exhausted and still hurt, and she couldn't even keep one thought in her head long enough to really worry about anything properly.
Talking to Marion had helped, and talking to Doyle had both helped and hurt at the same time. Caoimhe was terrible at highly emotional situations, and in her current state she wasn't even able to engage in her usual simple withdrawing from them because she was too much of a wreck herself. She had ended up crying, and she hated crying (who didn't, really?), and she didn't even really know how to deal with the fact that crying had sort of made her feel better.
And now Sturgis was here, which she had both hoped for and not really expected.
"Hey," she softly replied, her hand tightening on his. "Sorry." Caoimhe couldn't say exactly what she was apologizing for, but Sturgis looked such a mess that she felt like she should be apologizing for something.
"You scared the shit out of me," came the blunt reply. Sturgis didn't think he could hold onto her hand tightly enough. "How're you feeling? Need something else for the pain?" Because if there was one thing that Sturgis Podmore didn't believe in, that was overmedication. "Lupin's okay. We're looking into the perps. Figure it's related to Greyback; they were tossing revenge on you for killing that werewolf two months ago."
This was the conversation that she had not had with Marion or Doyle. The two of them were of a softer sort, making sure that she was okay and trying to offer comfort and looking for some for themselves. Sturgis was doing the same, though, she could see; he just had his own way of going about it. Caoimhe supposed she needed both sorts.
"They've given me as much as they can without knocking me out again," she murmured. "Need to be awake a little longer." Jon and Kamal and Ulhas were still out there, and she needed to see Doyle one more time and make sure he wasn't going to do anything foolish before she went ahead and let them put her under again for a while.
"You think they'll try again?" she asked, because she was lucid enough to know that might be something to worry about. Really, she probably already should have been watching her step better at work than she was.
"I'm more worried about them going after Lupin," Sturgis answered, never one to sugarcoat matters. While he'd not gone into detail with what exactly Remus had been up to on his mission that had taken him so far away from the library, he suspected that Caoimhe had probably figured it out. "They recognised him. Probably the reason they didn't finish the job on you, actually, aside from Lupin's quick-thinking. I'll have to send that kid a gift basket."
The idea of Sturgis Podmore sending gift baskets was funny. Caoimhe would have laughed, had her sense of humor been functioning properly. Instead, all she could manage was a faint smile. Then, somewhere in there, the rest of what Sturgis had said clicked for her, and the smile vanished, its place taken by worry and recrimination. Remus had been recognized, and now he was really in danger.
"I should've been paying attention," she murmured, her eyes closing for a moment. "When the lights started going out. I just wrote it off, and...Moody's going to smack me as soon as I can stand again, and I'll deserve it."
"Shut up," Sturgis said with his usual degree of tact, leaning forward to press his hand against her cheek. "Yeah, if you'd been paranoid as fuck, you might've twigged to what was happening, but from what Lupin said, you were hit as soon as even he realised, and he's got creature-of-the-fucking-night reflexes. Worry about it later."
He glanced down to her body, covered by blankets and gauze alike. "Rumour has it that you're gonna have some wicked scars. This is all how superheroes start, you know. You workin' on an alias?"
That was when the tears started welling up in her eyes, because shallow though it was, she had definitely worried about what he'd think of the scars she was most definitely going to have. Six long gashes of Dark magic weren't going to just go away, and while at least it was her back and not her face, it was still going to be ugly. She had been worried about if he was going to think this business was her fault, too - because Merlin knew she was feeling a bit like it was her fault, herself.
"Captain Catalogue?" Caoimhe weakly suggested, sniffling a little bit. She squeezed tighter on his hand, because that seemed a better idea than actually trying to reply with thanks or acknowledgment of the fact that he was really being incredibly good about all this. "I'll try again when I'm feeling more creative."
"Bookish Badass?" Sturgis attempted. "Lady Library? Late Fee Lady?" He shrugged. He'd never been the creative type, not really. "Yeah, you'll come up with something good later when you're not seeing triple. You could always stick to that nickname you'd gotten a few years back - what was it? Tequila Tecaoimhe?" He'd first gotten ahold of that little nugget when he'd looked into the members of the Order. It wasn't a background check, he'd told himself at the time, but hey, now the information certainly came in handy.
Mostly, he was just extremely relieved. Her tears were something that'd caused him a moment of panic, but then he'd seen that they were happy tears. Thank God. Sturgis was godawful with crying women. "Don't you ever scare me like that again," he told her, and if the words were a little more rumbly in his throat than usual, or his eyes a little more intense, well. Sue him.
The reference to the nickname the barman at Kelly's had tagged her with when it had been her friends' post-Hogwarts hangout of choice made her smile again. It had been a long time since she and Marion had been knocking back drinks that way - before Benjy, even, they had more or less already grown out of it. Getting teased about it now was silly, but under the circumstances a little bit of silliness didn't go at all amiss.
Getting her hand up to her face to wipe her eyes took some effort. With the muscles in her back still knitting back together, nothing that connected to them was really working all that well either. She ended up just turning her face into the pillowcase as she looked away and looked back, and that more or less did the job without having to worry about lifting her arm anymore. And when she turned back, there he was looking at her, really looking at her in a way that she didn't think had ever happened outside the bedroom before. She hadn't been paying attention on the library steps, but she was paying attention now in spite of the haze of pain and potions - it wasn't too hard if she focused on just one thing at a time, and right now she was focused on him. There was something in his voice that she couldn't quite place, and somehow she knew that it meant the same thing as that slight darkening of his eyes and the tight set of his jaw.
"I won't," she promised quietly, even though she knew very well that she couldn't make those kinds of promises any more than he could. They both knew what they were risking, and that spending some time scared was going to be an occupational hazard for a good while yet. Right now, though, Caoimhe just wanted to pretend that everything was going to be all right and she'd never cause him another minute's worry.
He accepted the lie. Wasn't it the same lie he'd told Lydia a few nights back? Yeah, we'll catch the werewolves. Everything'll be fine. Who knew what everything would be in a few mere weeks from now, but damn if Sturgis wasn't going to cling to hope like a lame seagull to a sinking barrel. "Good," he said, his voice even again even if his eyes remained locked to hers, and goddammit when had he'd turned into such a five-year-old girl? "I'm gonna hold you to that."
Sturgis leaned in and kissed her then. It was nothing like their passionate kisses following Frank and Alice's wedding, nor even the playfully knowing ones they'd engaged in from time to time after. It was sweet and relieved and something that his mates back at the DMLE probably would've mocked him for, but goddammit. Caoimhe was gonna be okay.
Had he not kissed her then, she would have asked him to; it was good to know that he felt that same need she did. There was a gentle reassurance in it that calmed and relaxed her like nothing else so far today had. Caoimhe closed her eyes and let that wash over her, softly returning the kiss until it broke, light as a whisper.
"I need to stay awake for Jon and the Nehrus," she murmured at last, "but I'm gonna need another potion soon. You'll come back later?" The last note was hopeful. She knew he would be busy with work and the Order, but she still hoped she'd see him again soon - maybe when she could manage to be functional for a little longer.
"Yeah, I'll be around," he answered, because while he'd gotten away with being nearby while she was unconscious and possibly-dying, he suspected that his boss would be having none of it now that she was out of the black. "Just write something in your journal or send a message, and I'll be here, okay Sully? You do have your journal, yeah?" He'd buy her a new damn one if not.
Caoimhe's brow furrowed as she realized that she had no idea whether she did or not. She'd certainly had it with her at work, but she didn't know if her shoulder bag of papers and notebooks and such had made it here or not. It likely went down on the library steps, so hopefully one of the investigating hitwizards had brought it here to meet her.
"Probably? Ask Marion," she decided, and offered a tiny smile. "She's in charge here."
"Can do," he answered with a slight smile. A glance to the door told him that Doyle was already wanting back in, and Sturgis was loathe to monopolize Caoimhe from anyone. "You get some rest," he ordered her, slowly lumbering to his feet. "I'll be a little ways away if you need, me, okay? Take care of yourself, Sully."
He'd almost - almost - called her 'love'. And while he'd done it offhand before, with the way they'd just carried on, he had a feeling that bringing up the word now might complicate matters beyond what either of them were emotionally interested in dealing with. And so she was Sully to him at the moment- faithful, organized, charts-building Sully.
That more than worked for her. She'd had enough emotional intensity over the last few minutes, and besides - no one else called her Sully. It had come to sound like a term of endearment over the past few months anyway.
"You too," she replied, finally letting go of his hand as he stepped away toward the door. Sturgis wasn't exactly the world champion at taking care of himself, not when it came to things like eating and sleeping and drinking things that weren't coffee, whiskey, or coffee with whiskey in it. Hopefully his ex-wife would send him some real food - which was almost a funny thing to wish, and made Caoimhe smile faintly. Under the circumstances, though, it made sense, and figuring that someone would look after him let her close her eyes for another few seconds until Doyle came back and murmur "See you soon."