REAL, michael j. fox

Chapter 20: The Aftermath

Song Selection: Let's Hear it for the Boy by Deniece Williams

Throwing up the stress ball in my office, feeling safe in the solitude I found myself in for a brief moment only allowed for my thoughts to succumb my silence. The static noise of the negativity caused for me to groan in annoyance as I slammed my head into my desk to give up. Hearing a faint knock at the door, I sat myself up again and cleaned up quickly. "Come in." A familiar pair of eyes peeked through before stepping in as he carried two cups of coffee in his hands.

I smiled gratefully at this, sitting back up confidently to kiss Michael. "So I didn't surprise you all that much by coming over then?"

"No, you did. It's just a happy surprise. Besides, you should be heading over to Paramount by now don't you think?" I reminded him, leaning against my desk questioningly.

He shrugged, raising up his coffee. "I stopped for a coffee, you love coffee, so I decided to also stop by here and bring you some," Michael explained rather simply as I couldn't help to roll my eyes with a chuckle over this. Leaning up to kiss him again I sighed, pouting to him in front of me. "Bit distracted there, Doc?"

"We've discussed this Mikey, we're not keeping the nickname and that's that."

Hearing the faint knocking at the front of my office door I cleared my throat, Michael stepping back from me so I could lean back onto my desk. "Come in."

Peeking through the door, Jodie stepped in timidly to have me notice Michael looking for her sympathetically over her obvious embarrassment. "Sorry Dr. Hall, I just have the labs ready for Thea that you sent me out for." She looked to the two of us back and forth once again. "Sorry again."

"I was just leaving anyways, it's alright," Michael explained, leaning over to kiss my cheek, "I'll try to call once I get some time at the studio." I nodded, smiling as he left and seeing him say a quick goodbye to Jodie before going on his way.

Sighing under my breath, I extended out a hand to be passed the charts from her to look through them carefully. "And we already ran her EKG?"

"Right and there was still the apparent arrhythmia you noticed last time she came in." I nodded solemnly, groaning slightly over her labs. "And her anemia doesn't exactly help with her oxygen inflow."

"No- no it doesn't." I handed back the chart to her and tossed on my coat once again. "I'll go in to schedule for her surgery sometime by the end of this week, just go ahead and follow up with the Rodney twins I've got to scrub in on a call from trauma." Without much hesitation, Jodie left the room once again as I went along towards the OR room.

***

I stayed slumped in the dark for a moment at home, deep in thought for a second picturing some scans I had taken of Thea to rationally think some strategy for her. "Earth to Cat-" Breaking away for a second, Megan chuckled under her breath over my sudden surprise. "Should call you deer if you're always gonna look like you're caught in the headlights of a car."

I rolled my eyes at this, pushing her away from the counter to step away from my quiet place and back to the party I was attending tonight. "Next time Michael takes me to another party like this I'm not mentioning bringing you along, you know."

She laughed at this. "One of these boys will in your place then, just you wait and see," She explained to me while she raised up her drink. I smiled, staring back down at the counter again for a moment. "You doing okay? You've been a bit more focused these days. I mean- you still have yet to tell me what happened at your mom's place?"

"She's still got photos of us in the living room you'll be glad to hear," I tried to steer away as I took a sip of my own drink.

Taking notice of my behavior, Megan only laughed along at this. "Knew the witch couldn't help to like me."