Face the Blood - Yvette and Logan

[x-penance.livejournal.com]

Yvette wakes from the surgery and finds Logan there.



Logan had spent a long time next to Yvette's bedside. Sometimes he had company, sometimes he didn't. Didn't matter to him. She was a good kid and if he was a praying man - which he wasn't - he be putting in a good word with the Almighty for her to pull through. But as he wasn't, he just kept watch over her sleeping form so that she'd have a friend nearby when she woke up. He'd even foregone his customary cigars and he hadn't had a beer in ... hours. Maybe days. The only time he left her side was to take care of biological business - go get some grub, use her suite's bathroom, that kind of thing.
"Hey, kid." he told her unconscious form as he pulled out his totally-against-hospital-regs whittling knife and a stick of wood out of his pocket. "Might want to consider waking up soon. You're missing all the excitement just laying there." he teased as he brushed a coil of her too-soft hair out of her face.

There was a brief flutter of her eyelids, the barest whisper of a moan at the touch and slowly Yvette opened her eyes. Her lips parted to speak, but all that escaped was a dry squeak. She felt like she'd been hit by a truck, but as bad as she felt, she had to admit, somehow she felt better than she had been. The fact she was waking up at all, for a start - she hadn't really expected to.

"Hey kid." he said with a smile, spotting her eyelids fluttering open. "Welcome back." he told her.
Seeing Logan got a faint smile from her, a brief turning up of the corners of her mouth. "Logan," she managed, and licked her dry lips. "Have you been here long?"
"Long enough." he said. "How you feeling?" he asked her, then poured her a Dixie cup full of water. "Here. Sip this." he said. "Slowly."

"Better," she managed, after sipping greedily at the water. It was like being irrigated, every pore crying out for moisture - with her kidneys failing, they'd had to be careful of her fluid intake, hydrating her intraveously instead. "It hurts, but I do not feel so sick as I did before?" It ended as a question, her eyes seeking his for answers.

"Yep." he said with a small grin. "You're on the mend, kiddo. Knew you were a fighter." he said warmly.

"But the transplant? I thought... Did they find the other donor person?" Not that she was looking a gift horse in the mouth, but they'd told her she was as good as dead without a new kidney.

"We got it covered." he said. No need to bother the kid right off the bat with whose kidney she was currently using. Besides, he was an asshole and wouldn't be missing it. Or anything else. "Your only job is to relax and heal up, you hear?" he told her.

"So... I am not dying?" Hope suffused her pale and pinched face. "I will be okay?"

"Yeah." he told her. "You got a long run ahead of you, kid." he said, stroking her forehead and moving more hair out of her eyes.

Yvette closed her eyes again, this time as a wave of almost overwhelming relief swept through her. She'd accepted her death, yes, she'd said her goodbyes... but when it came down to it, she was still only sixteen. There was so much she wanted to do and now she'd get to do it. When she opened her eyes again, they were bright with unshed tears. Reaching up with a slightly unsteady hand, she touched Logan's cheek. "Thank you," she murmured. There were so many people to thank, she doubted she'd get to all of them, but at least she could make a start here.

"Your job is to get healthy, you hear me?" he told her with as close to a warm smile as he ever got. "Just take it easy. Got a bunch of people here lookin' to spoil you rotten, so sit back and enjoy it, kid." he said. "And you might want to watch where you step." he joked.