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Something's Not Quite Rightby Anneack |
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Characters: JDThanks to Antoinette for the beta and Blackraptor for a place to post. This was written in response to a challange to use Z words.
JD yawned as he waved at Josiah on his way into work. Josiah smiled and help open the door for him. Something had zapped that boy’s zip. Usually he bounced in grinning from ear to ear and stopped to chat for a minute.
“Buck, JD’s headed in. He, well, he doesn’t seem himself,” Josiah passed his concern along to Buck, the young tech’s adopted older brother.
“On my way,” Buck responded instantly. He had been at=2 0a girlfriend’s house last night so he had not seen JD that morning.
With all the people checking in and out it was a zoo. After a near collision with a woman and her zit faced teenaged son, an artful zigzag had Buck over to his young friend almost in time to see him before he disappeared into the employee only area.
Thankfully Buck knew where he was headed. “Vin, Chris, JD is headed up your way. Something ain’t right with the boy,” Buck informed them, passing on Josiah’s concern as well.
The two men acknowledged the warning.
“Reckon JD was okay when we went for ziti last night,” Vin offered.
Chris nodded. They would see what was amiss when JD arrived momentarily. The more he thought about it though, JD might have been fine yesterday, but he hadn’t been his usual zany self for a couple of days now.
Ezra checked his zipper before heading out of the men’s room. A gentleman did not have wardrobe malfunctions.
A groaning from one of the stalls raised his eyebrow. Gentlemanly behavior did dictate a certain zone of privacy around a man in the lavatories. However, he was obviously in some distress.
When a familiar form was seen sliding to the floor in the stall and retching, manners be damned, Ezra moved!
As the door was locked, he slid under the door narrowly missing hitting JD or the toilet.
JD looked up at him the picture of misery and suffering. Certainly he lacked all of his usual zest for life.
“I’ll get you seen to immediately,” Ezra assured him, while holding him and keeping his hair back as another bout of wrenching hit the young man.
“Vin, please get Nathan, we have a medical emergency in the men’s room on the main floor. It’s JD,” Ezra spoke into his microphone.
“Chris is already on his way, I’m calling Nathan now,” Vin informed them.
“Thank you, Mr. Dunne appears to be in a great deal of discomfort,” Ezra said, unlocking the stall door and helping JD to lay down.
Chris and Nathan came barreling at almost the same time. Both sucked in a breath at the sight of the young man with zero color to him and sweating profusely.
Ezra stepped back and Nathan came along side of JD.
“Easy JD, let’s see what we can do for you,” Nathan soothed as he began examining him. Somehow the doctor managed to calm his patient while mumbling the readings to himself.
“Alright, I’m gonna try something. Does it hurt if I press here?” Nathan probed.
“No, not worse than everything there is,” JD groaned.
“Okay, how about on the other side?” Nathan gently prodded.
JD screamed and almost passed out.
“Chris, call 911 and get an ambulance, I’m pretty sure we have a case of appendicitis,” Nathan instructed.
The blonde already had his phone out.
“Pe..people die of that,” JD stammered.
“Just relax, JD, I don’t think it’s burst yet,” Nathan soothed.
Twenty minutes later, Buck and Nathan were riding to the hospital with JD in the ambulance while the others followed.
“Nathan, how is he?” Chris asked as he and the others joined Buck and Nathan in the waiting room on the emergency surgery floor.
“It ruptured right before they got him open so the doctor doesn’t think peritonitis will set in, but he’ll be here for a few days to be sure,” Nathan told them. They had all come, but once the emergency was past they had had to go back to get things in order for the rest of the day. Once JD was awake they would all be staying with him.
“The surgery went okay?” Chris asked.
“It was his appendix just like Nathan said, they took it out and he’s being moved from recovery to a room now,” Buck assured them.
“What caused it to act up now?” Chris looked at the two men who had talked to the doctor.
“No one knows what causes an appendix to go south. Usually something gets blocked or inflamed so that bacteria builds up and then you get an infected appendix,” Nathan gave a basic answer.
“Okay. Why did you want me to get a stuffed zebra for you?” Chris asked holding out the plushy.
“Tradition,” Buck told him taking it.
As one the men moved to the private room Orin had arranged for.
“Hey guys,” JD said weakly.
“Here,” Buck trust the stuffed animal at JD. “It’s from all of us.”
JD grinned, the first real one all week, even if it wasn’t up to his usual wattage. “I told you about Stripes?”
“Yep, your ma got him for you the one time you were in the hospital and you lost him right before you moved to Las Vegas. Well, Stripes has returned,” Buck smiled broadly.
Chris gave one of his half smiles. Buck never forgot anything. He would thank him later for thinking of this.
“Why where you in the hospital before?” Josiah asked, curiously.
“I was about three, I had to have my adenoids removed. I had had almost non-stop ear infections and strep-throat. They found out I was about seventy percent deaf, when they took out my adenoids I was fine,” JD yawned.
The security computer tech settled on the bed clutching Stripes II like a child and fell asleep. Buck and the others settled into chairs to wait. Their youngest was safe and they would see to it that he stayed that way.END