Slow and Steady Part 7
Duo whistled lowly as he moseyed into the rehab clinic. "Hey, look at you and your slick new wheels."
Heero threw him a look that was functionally equivalent to flipping him off, but didn't lose his concentration as he inched his way forward.
"What? Granny walkers are sexy."
Krista showed up next to him. "Dr. Kessler thought he was ready."
"Yeah? Like, just for practice, though, right?" He didn't know how far Heero had tottered already, but he could tell it wouldn't be much farther. Ari stepped away for a moment to bring the wheelchair into position, but otherwise just watched and waited for Heero to decide he was done.
Krista nodded. "Oh, yeah, he's not ready for prime time with this thing. It's just the next step in his exercise regimen. Speaking of which... I hear you're going to be taking our Heero home for the holidays."
No matter how much he liked Heero's PTs, he had to resist the urge to say, 'he's not your Heero, he's ours.' He grinned instead and looked over to Heero, who was getting settled in his chair now and certainly not looking Duo's way. He couldn't tell if that was deliberate or not, but it didn't really matter since he was getting his way. 'Twas the season to be merry, not smug. "Yup. Don't worry. I'll bring him back in one piece."
She gestured him off to a workbench away from the action. "Wanna get the lowdown on his routine?"
"Yeah, sure. Of course."
"Heero tells me you know the drill, generally speaking?"
"Yup. Just give me the gist of it, I guess."
She filled him in on the exercises and their purposes, demonstrating when appropriate. Duo asked a question here and there, but he was no stranger to the whole physical rehab routine. When they were more or less finished, she glanced over to the others to see they were still working before she decided a quiet little chat wouldn't be inappropriate. "Are you like him?"
Duo blinked at her. "Well, no one's quite like him, but what did you mean?"
"I meant... He's got a desk job now, but he was a pretty high-class agent, wasn't he? You are, too, aren't you?"
He considered a flippant response, but decided to just nod his head in the end.
She nodded, too, like it confirmed something for her. "You must know him pretty well. You just slipped right in here, and he didn't... he's not hiding anything from you. And you aren't doing anything that annoys him."
"Which is pretty impressive," Duo joked. "Since it's not that hard to annoy him."
"Exactly. Ari and I, we've been in this business a while. We know our way around the patients, around what this kind of thing does to their emotional well-being. Took us a long while to feel our way around Heero's particular brand of dealing with it, figure out how to work with him. Get him to work with us. But you came up here, not even knowing this was happening, and you got it right off the bat. You knew exactly how much help to offer, what questions not to ask..."
He shifted a little uncomfortably. "Well... I just sort of imagine how I'd feel in his place, yanno? I'd... I'd be taking it a lot worse than he is. But I'd still want others to treat me... yanno. Like me. Not like I was broken or something. But hey, I dunno, he's had quite a few months to get used to things now. In the beginning..." He chuckled, in part because he was happily changing the subject. "He was a total brat, wasn't he? He always is."
"Actually, no, not really. Well. I mean, in the beginning, when we weren't sure it would work. When we weren't sure how far he'd go, if he'd ever regain a decent amount of sensation and control in his legs, let alone walk again... Yeah, there were times when he'd just stare at us like he was wondering why we were telling him things that obviously weren't true." She laughed softly. "But he never threw any fits, not like others sometimes do."
"Nah, Heero's not the 'fit' kind of person. He's more like a stubborn ass. At the best of times. Throw in a little sulking, while you're at it."
"I am not saying that," she said, holding her hands up in mock self-defense. "Not saying that at all. Not that a person's not entitled to a good sulk in that situation. But Heero didn't sulk. He got frustrated once in a while. But I don't think he sulked. I don't think we had the authority to force him to do anything, so he didn't have anything to sulk about."
"Ah, too bad. You missed out on some good times."
She regarded him a bit skeptically. "So, you're staying at a friend's house, I think?"
"Yeah. A little staycation, yanno? Ooh, I should ask Heero if he wants anything from home, now that you mention it."
"Big house."
"Yup." It actually wasn't particularly huge by Winner estate standards, but it was big enough for all of them, what might have been called a country villa back in the day, on the outskirts of Brussels. It had been abandoned and foreclosed upon during the war. Quatre picked it up for cheap as an investment property, fixed it up, and then never quite felt like putting it back on the market, not after three of them settled down in Brussels and it became quite the handy little place to have around.
"And your friends... they're like you and Heero?"
"What? They're cool. What do you mean?"
"Have you broken the news to them yet?"
"Not all of it yet, no. Just the part where Heero's got dibs on the downstairs bedroom."
"Will they be as accepting of his situation as you are?"
"Uh, do you know something that I don't?"
She shook her head. "No. It's just... You came at the right time, I think. You came, and you did everything right, and Heero let you right in. But it would have been really easy for him to shut you out."
Duo snorted. "He could have tried. Sorry. Go on."
She studied him for a moment before continuing. "Look... It's the holidays. Drama always seems to get amplified during the holiday season. I usually wouldn't recommend that a patient come out to his friends and family this time of year, not if he has a choice. I don't want to see Heero come back here demoralized because his closest friends did something to make him shut them out. That's all. He's in a good place right now." She poked a finger in the direction of his sternum. "Make sure he stays there."
Duo saluted. "Yes, ma'am."
TBC...
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