Author: Regency

Title: Nothing Worse

Pairing: Hill/Bill, because we never get any of that.

Rating: G, maybe PG

Summary: The pain meds do absolutely nothing.

AN: Someone’s gotta comfort the girl.

Word count: 1,089

Disclaimer: I adore them, but I don’t own them. They’re the wonderful products of an amazing time. They belong to themselves and each other. I just borrow their image.

~!~

It would be this arm, she thought, wincing.  The arm she used to do most things like shake hands and sign her name was exactly the arm she couldn’t afford to have out of commission.  Yet, here she was, moderately drugged and still in pain, with her right arm hugged close to her chest.

Fractured elbows were a bitch. As if tripping on her heels weren’t indignity enough, she’d fractured her elbow attempting to prevent some greater injury from befalling her. Her Blackberry had gone skittering across the stones walkway and all hesr weight had slammed onto her right arm with an ungodly crack. Her left arm was saved from a similar fate by the grace of her oversized purse.

When it happened, grace was the last thing on her mind. She thought she must have cried out as her Secret Service bundled her up like so much cotton and packed her in the car.  Her senior agent stabilized her wounded joint throughout the trip with a bodily hold.  She’d been grateful for his presence because she thought she might have vomited otherwise.  The pain radiated outwardly, up towards her shoulder and down to the very tips of her fingers.  It wasn’t childbirth but it was hardly a paper cut. It was the kind of pain that gave her a healthy respect for painkillers.

She was exercising that respect ad nauseam now. Curled up in bed, out of reach of anything that could possible jostle her, she was in aggravating amount of pain.  She had already taken as much as she could safely take while remaining conscious.  Frankly, she couldn’t remember why staying awake seemed like a good idea anymore.

“Honey,” said a voice she knew too well.  “You up?” If it didn’t hurt so much, she might have rolled her eyes.  I wouldn’t call this up. At the moment, she was too sluggish to manage that either.

“Mmmhmm,” she faintly vocalized and in came her not-so-quiet knight. He lingered by the door, guilt tingeing his upside down smile.  He hadn’t been there, he hadn’t pushed her, but he felt guilty for so much that he was even taking on this. She yawned—and regretted it. “Oh, God. The pain meds do nothing,” she groaned, willfully ignoring the stinging in her eyes. Any motion made by any part of her body sent vibrations to the only part that wasn’t working. Hurt so bad, she couldn’t see straight.

“What can I do?” he asked, his frown deepening to new depths.  She knew he hated seeing her in pain like this; it wasn’t a wound he could kiss away or promise to improve. This hurt belonged to nature, the doctors, and her.  She could see he wanted to reach out and touch, but was keeping his distance out of fear of making things worse.  It was a fear that had become his constant companion and she’d never wanted that.

“Talk to me,” she breathed and coaxed him nearer.  “Distract me from how much this hurts. And keep an eye on the clock so I can dose myself before this thing flares up again.” She scowled at her arm and willed it to just be better. There were things that needed doing—right the first time!—by her that would probably be fouled up by one of her proxies. She adored her staff, had picked many of them herself, but as a perfectionist, she never trusted anyone else to do well what she could do near flawlessly.

He was smirking as he pulled up a chair to the side of bed. “It won’t mend itself just by you glaring it, Hillary. But it might get up and leave if you keep it up,” he teased.

“So help me, I might yank it off if it doesn’t.  It’s been less than twenty-four hours and I’m going crazy.  I heard these kinds of fractures take months to fully heal, if they ever do. I don’t have months.” She sighed, stopping short of enough motion to cause a spasm. That was another thing she was growing to hate, the muscle spasms that came from holding her arm so still for so long. They aggravated the injury and jumpstarted the pain when it deigned to die.

“You’ll be fine,” he assured, one hand moving instinctively to brush her cheek.  She hummed softly at the contact; light, tender, and soothing without a notion. Unbeknownst to her, her lips had turned up in her characteristic crooked smile.  Not making things worse, she thought, content to linger under his fingers without talking, her eyes slipping closed.

As though catching on to her line of thinking, he massaged the taut lines of her face, pressing gently on pressure points till the tension lessened and dissolved.  She exhaled softly against the palm of his hand.  His thumb brushed delicately against the corner of her mouth.  The drugs didn’t prevent her from responding to his nearness, only intensifying the stark contrast of pulsing hurt and alluring touch. How she wished she wasn’t injured right now.

Just the same, she sensed him shift and even in the dim lamplight felt his shadow cast over her. His lips touched hers but never jarred her.  Save for this kiss, he didn’t lay a hand on her. Another wish; she wished he would.  He braced himself somehow, some way, leaving her too dizzy to ache in the old way and ready for the new. She groaned in misery when he pulled away.

“Better,” he had the gall to ask, looking for all the world like a schoolboy who’d lost his favorite playmate.

She exhaled, “Indescribably.” She traced her lips with her tongue.  “You would kiss me like that when I can’t reciprocate.”

He grinned his crooked grin and said, “I can wait.” Along with gall, he had the nerve to touch her again; still lovingly, but with a devilish wink that made her shiver about as much as the stroke of his curious digits through her hair. Comforting—yes—but oh so delicious, too.

Felt so good that she regretted the sudden surge of medicinal relief that began to pull her under.  The agony had diminished to a dull, if constant, thrum. Her deepening breaths didn’t cause anymore shockwaves.  She didn’t really mind when the mattress slightly moved. And when an arm came around her, gathering her close and gingerly bracing her injury along the way, she didn’t stir even slightly.

She guessed the pain meds did something after all—but the hands had never hurt.