aceso | { old west au }

{ old west au }

It's fruitless to wish for a bit of breeze out here in this arid land, but Christine has the sash on her little office's window pushed up high to catch any stray breeze that forgets it's not supposed to be here. She sits at her desk, sorting through order forms for more supplies to be sent from the east. It's not that she's necessarily running low, but that she's overly cautious. One never knows when there will be some sort of disaster out here. Maybe there will be a collapse at the silver mine, or by some cruel twist of fate they'll get rain that doesn't stop and leads to flooding. It's better to be prepared.

Even though the window doesn't let in a breeze, it lets in the sound of someone's boots stomping across her little porch and she lifts her head to anticipate the opening of her door. It does a moment later, and someone she only recognizes by face comes in.

"Ma'am," he greets. "There's been some sorta scuffle outside of town. A guy went and got himself stabbed."

On hearing that, Christine shoots up from her seat, face full of alarm. "Goodness! How long ago did this happen?" Quickly, she begins gathering some supplies.

"Dunno," the man answers. "I was just walking by, and this guy says he'd been stabbed." Christine shakes her head in disbelief. There must be something in the water in this town. People are far too apathetic for their own good.

"It never occurred to you to fetch a wagon and bring him here?" she asks incredulously.

"Ehhhh," the man replies, tone utterly indifferent. "I dunno. That sounds like a lot of work."

"Unbelievable," she mutters, pushing past him with her bag. "At least point me in the right direction. East of town or west?"

"West," he answers, following her outside before tipping his hat to her. It looks like he'll be of no further assistance to her. Hopefully she can get the stabbed man up to his feet, or the injury isn't as bad as he thinks. She sets out that way with a hurried, determined step.

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It had just been such an innocent misunderstanding-slash-argument, how was he to know that the guy would get stabby when he got angry? Church doesn't get stabby when he gets angry. He just gets loud and ornery. He was kind of hoping for some help with the whole being stabbed thing, but apparently the fella that passed on by seemed to be not in too much of a hurry. Fuck's sake, he'll just limp his way back to town and stitch his own stupid ass back up, no problem, he's fine, he's not bleeding or anything, this is all fine.

He really must be losing more blood than he thought, because he's pretty sure he sees a pretty lady coming, and that's, what, an oasis? A mirage? Is the heat getting to him? "Hey!" He waves a hand not pressed to the wound in his side. "Hey, pretty lady! Can you get a doc? A man's got himself stabbed." Namely, himself, but maybe it sounds better than 'help god damn some crazy fool had a knife and I got too ornery' in front of a hopefully single woman.

Christine is scowling as she gets close enough to see the injured figure having to walk himself back to town. Honestly, if she hadn't moved here, it seems like the whole town would have perished due to apathy. No one else seems to notice that there's a man bleeding here! Raising her skirt above her ankles, she holds it out of the way so she can jog over to him without getting the fabric tangled around her legs.

"And that man is you, I see. Now hold still. I'm the doctor." She's not even going to wait for the surprise and protest from him, choosing to set down her bag instead to get out a few supplies.

"Oh." Despite the dizziness, the near delirium, the fact that he's still bleeding, he just. Stares for a bit, in awe, in confusion. Pretty lady's a doctor.

"You want me to get on the ground?" Yes, Church, that would probably be a lot easier than trying to do this while standing, you stupid fuck. "Wait. Were you comin' for me?"

"What I would like is to get you inside somewhere, but let's see how bad the injury is." Her lips purse together at what she now has to admit. "I'm afraid if you get down, you won't be able to get back up without pulling the stitches I'll probably have to give you. Do you think you can walk any farther?"

This would be easier if someone would give them a lift, but most people seem to have gotten out of the sun and are taking it easy. Don't they have jobs to do? Why is everyone loitering around inside?

"Already dragged my way this far; if I'm not dead yet, probably won't drop dead before I get through your door." His smile is lopsided, but it's definitely a smile, tipping up his hat like a gosh darn boy. Yes, of course he recovered his hat from the scuffle before going. What is he, an animal?

"Don't think it's too bad, but I'd still like to not have a hole in my gut if it's all the same. All my blood's supposed to be on the inside if I'm not mistaken."

He should maybe ask for a hand in helping him along. Is he going to ask pretty doctor to help carry any of his weight? No. No, he's not.

A reasonable response, but his charming smile throws her for a loop and she's left struggling for an answer to what he says. Honestly, she's usually better than this and after realizing it, she narrows her eyes and vows not to get distracted again.

"Indeed it is. If we can return to my office, you can sit on my exam table and I can get a good look. In the meantime..." She very gently places some gauze near where his hand is clutching at his side. "Place this over the wound to keep more of your blood on the inside, if you please. Now, let's get going, and tell me if you start feeling faint."

"More faint than I'm already feeling?"

He wants that to be a nice joke, but he is stabbed, and he has been walking, and bitching the entire time. But he's good to go. Keep going. To pretty doctor lady's office. Wow, she has an office. And she's pretty and a lady and a doctor. He presses the gauze and winces.

"The faintness I'm feeling when I look at you. Is what I mean. What I meant to say."

That response leaves Christine staring at him for long enough to be deemed uncomfortable by some before she murmurs, "You have lost a lot of blood." Because that's the only explanation for a stabbed man to be flirting with her right now, isn't it? She can't fathom anything else.

Gently, she steers him towards her office, shaking her head in disbelief. This town sometimes feels like an absurd fantasy place from a children's story where everyone acts the opposite of normal.

"What happened out there? How did you come to be stabbed?" Maybe she should just keep him talking to keep him conscious. Plus shouldn't someone be arrested for this crime?

"Oh." He was absolutely going to make up a really awesome story, later, after the stabbing had been fixed, because it's hard to make something up on the fly when hobbling back into town. "Yeah. See, I was facing down this nasty varmint of a guy, uh, cattle rustler, bank robber, you name it, he's probably done it." Already aiming too high, my friend. "And no one else was taking care of him, so I cornered him, see, and he drew his gun, but I knocked it out of his hands, and we had a scuffle in the dirt, son of a bitch had a knife on him and got me good and escaped off god knows where, and now I'm here. I think I should get a badge of honor. A parade, maybe. Compensation from the local government. For my terrible injury facing down that dastardly asshole."

While Christine is invested in this at the start of the story, by the end she's clearly come to understand that not all is as it seems. Her eyes narrow and she glances up at him with a questioning stare.

"And why have I never heard of such a person? Cattle rustler, bank robber, and more? Why isn't a description of such a person up on flyers around town, or on the board in the post office?"

In other words, she knows you're full of it. At least they're nearly at her office now, so he won't have to keep spinning yarns to stay conscious.

"Uh...he's from...a different town?"

Good save. Awesome.

"Maybe you're new?" She has an office. "The local authorities don't want people to know how much they're fucking up." That's even worse. "Letting someone like that slip through their fingers." Don't double down on it.

"All three of those possibilities at once, hmm?" she says with a disapproving glare at him. Whatever really happened out there, she doubts this man is as innocent as he seems. At least he probably can't do anything while so injured.

And so she leads him into her office and the little exam room off to one side. A hand gestures to the table while she continues moving to set down her bag.

"Have a seat and remove your shirt, please. Then I can start the exam."

"Yyyyyes, those are, uh, all possibilities that could all be true--"

But hey, let's change tracks for a second! "Oh yeah, I can take my shirt off." Stop. "The plus sides to getting stabbed." Stop.

The good(?) thing is that taking his shirt off stretches the wound and makes him wince and, thankfully, shut up for a second. Man, taking off his shirt in front of a pretty lady could really be sexier if he wasn't sweaty and dusty and stabbed.

"Are you always like this, or is it the blood loss?" Christine doesn't look pleased, and she's not thrilled to have to be seeing him without his shirt on because odds are she'll blush, and she very much does not want him to see that. She'd never live it down and it wouldn't be a good look when she's been trying desperately for people around here to take her seriously as a female doctor.

But once the shirt's off, something clicks and she goes into doctor mode, ignoring everything else about his form except for the injury. She hums at the sight of it, pleased to see it's not as bad as it could be. She quickly opens a bottle of iodine and tips it onto clean gauze.

"This will sting quite a bit. Do you want something to bite down on?"

"A man's liable to take offense to that." Not that he's too capable of being mad right now. Later, sure, maybe, but honestly it means the gal's got a sharp mind on her and a quick tongue. And who can't appreciate that?

The iodine makes him wince just seeing it. One hand drifts to his belt like he's going to take it off so he can bite the leather, but then he sets it back down on the table. "I'm good. I can take a licking and keep on ticking."

Might be stupid to try and show off what a big tough man he is. But it can't hurt. (Oh wait. It's about to hurt. Shit wait maybe he didn't think this entirely the way through-)

A man's liable to take offense to any words that come out of a woman's mouth, is what she thinks but doesn't say aloud. She's not here to dive into a debate about male and female roles and how she's crossed the boundary between the two. It would simply fire her up and most men would interpret that as her being a "hysterical woman." Christine isn't going to give him any ammo there.

Instead she nods and pressed the damp gauze to the wound before he can reconsider. She knows the iodine will make the wound clean, but it will also cause a great deal of pain as it works its way in. It's such an unfortunate thing to know that the way to help someone feel better is to put them through more pain first. If only it wasn't so. Her compassion for people means it gets to her every time she's trying to heal and she knows she's harming them in reaching that goal.

"I'll sew you up as quick as I can," she says with sympathy. "If you can just hold the gauze here, I'll thread the needle and it'll be over before you know it."

To his credit, he doesn't scream. Mostly because he's gritting his teeth too hard for it to come to come out like a scream instead of a grit gruff groaning, a long sound of pain and hissing after. Hold it there, god, let him hold himself first.

"Okay," he says quickly, panting, holding while his other hand is curled around the edge of the table enough to turn his knuckle white. "Can take a couple little stabs to one big stab." So long as it's fast.

Her hands move fast, threading the needle and getting into position. She's down on her knees beside the table with a face full of determination. Christine will make this as quick as possible because the less blood he loses, the better.

Hopefully he doesn't take notice of her peeling away one edge of the gauze to poke the needle in, what with how tight he's gripping the table. While he focuses on redirecting his pain, she makes a quick stitch and pulls the thread tight to pull the skin back together.

"Nearly done," she says, though it's a little white lie. She's only just begun, but it's better he think the worst is nearly over.

"Yeah yeah yeah," he murmurs through his teeth, trying to sound like this is just. Normal shit. It's not; he's had his fair share of scrapes, but he can't say he's been stabbed in the gut before and gotten stitched up by a pretty doctor lady.

But it's fine! This is perfectly fine and a normal part of living here. Obviously. A lifestyle choice.

"Good fingers." Is that a weird flirt, is that flirting, maybe he shouldn't try flirting while this is going on and while it hurts. Stupid. One of these days he's gonna learn to shut his mouth, but apparently today is not that day.

What? How does she have good fingers? Christine isn't sure whether to find the notion amusing or strange. Maybe it can be both. She merely hums in response and continues stitching his skin while contemplating that this man is a strange one. She feels she should attribute his behavior to the blood loss, but what if this is his normal mode of operation?

"So what's your name anyway?" she asks in order to keep his mind occupied. And because it's something she should probably know so she can bill him for this.

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{ old west au }

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