A/N: This chappie contains some alcohol abuse. If you've been reading and would prefer to just skip it I would be more than happy to provide a short summary of the chapter, just send me an e-mail or drop me a PM on the forums.
Chapter 12 Single Malt Whiskey
Vision blurring
Heart slowing down
Mind erring
Worries won’t drown
I left quite determined
My heart’s aching to remedy
There is no cure for thoughts
But from the senses to take leave
I return with heavy burdens
With guilt and philosophy
I return with a strong conviction:
The world is insanity
The paragraph blurred again. His neck was aching from bending over for the last few hours so Emmett brought the page closer to his eyes instead.
Regional chemotherapy of primary and secondary malignant liver tumors is superior to systemic therapy. The regional advantage can be further increased by flow retardation. Absorbable gelatin powder (Gelfoam) and starch microspheres (Spherex) may serve as embolizing agents because of their particle size and embolization ti-.*
He slammed the article down on his desk and stood up abruptly. He had been re-reading the same paragraph for the last half hour and it just refused to enter his brain and actually make sense.
Emmett walked over to the window and looked down at the streets below. It looked like a nice night out, calm, still, a little bit of wind stirring the branches. He sighed heavily and looked back in at his apartment. Dump was probably a better word for it. He cherished every object in there, aside from the article that was refusing to be understood, he thought as he glared at it, but when you couldn’t see the floor anymore(and hadn’t for quite a while) and could barely remember what anything other than paper smelled like it had to mean that it had gone too far.
And for what? He wondered if there would even be people left to cure once he had finally got his practicing license. He hadn’t even done half the practical work yet and there was far too much research and reading left. By that time, he thought, there wouldn’t be any bloody patients left to cure. By the time he could finally begin doing his own research and finding new cures for people, making his contribution, England would probably be under the rule of one or another of the ruthless gangs that had suddenly popped up out of practically nowhere, causing havoc and death all over the country.
He picked up one of the heavy books and threw it across the room in anger. Everything was falling apart and he was sitting here studying as if nothing was wrong, as if he couldn’t see what was going on. But what could he do? As much as he scorned the Government for its recent incompetence in handling the situation he couldn’t exactly go out into the streets and personally round up all the ruthless murderers.
He flexed a thin arm and held it out before him. He was a man of the mind, had always been, and right now he hated himself for it. Sure being a doctor would be helpful career and Doctors made a very big contribution to remedying and controlling the recent situation, but by the time he got there…
Thinking about this never got him anywhere. Emmett walked over to his desk and picked up the phone. He would call home, that would calm him down a little. Before he could finish dialing the number, however, he slammed it back down.
“Oh hello, Mum,” he said aloud to the empty room in a mock cheerful tone, “I’m just calling because I’m so stupid I can’t even understand a simple paragraph that a fifteen- year-old could probably understand. And guess what, I’ve decided to quit studying because I’m never going to be able to finish anyway, and go out into the streets and fight evil single-handedly with my scrawny little arms. Aren’t you proud of your son?”
He snorted and got up again, pacing the room. He tried to suppress his thoughts from going to places he didn’t want them to. Taking off his glasses he rubbed his nose and tried to clear his headache. Thoughts and worries always plagued him. Would he survive this stupid gang-war, or whatever it was? Would they kill someone he knew next? Was that body they had been studying last week one of the victims of an attack or had he really fallen down the stairs and broken his neck?
Suddenly, as he realized that he would never be able to dispel all these worries he knew what the only solution was; to stop thinking for a change, to go outside and breathe the fresh air and not care for once. And there was only one way to do that.
He grabbed his jacket just in case it was colder than he expected and walked out into the night. It had been almost four weeks since that attack on the other side of town, and two weeks since the attack on the school not far from here, but the air was still full of worry and tension. You could never know when it struck again.
The loud noise inside the bar had the immediate effect of making it impossible to even think. He sat down and ordered himself a drink and then he took to watching people as he sipped slowly. He was well aware that he looked rather out of place here, he always felt out of place where there were too many people, especially if most of them couldn’t spell “drunk” correctly, but today he was beyond the point of self-consciousness.
The lighting was of course, horrendous, at least in his eyes, but he supposed if you were actually drunk they would seem to be perfect (well at least that scrawny boy at the next table seemed to be entranced by them). He sipped at his glass more vigorously wondering how long it had been since he had not worried about anything, not thought about anything, not tried to figure anything out.
“Kill ‘em all!” a voice boomed from his right making his head turn, but it was not, of course an attack, merely another drunk who’s tongue did not – could not obey sense or tact.
“The filthy bastards don’t deserve to live!” the man continued suddenly getting up, “Take ‘em all out and it doesn’t matter because they’re damn murders and filthy vermin!”
Emmett found himself unable to turn his gaze from the man. He was a very muscular man; tall with broad shoulders and a strong build. “Cavemen!” The man shouted, “Animals! Don’t hesitate before shooting, they won’t do you the same kindness, they’re the enemy!”
His blood began to boil and he wondered whether this might be a member of one of the gangs before the other man began to laugh rather hysterically and continued his rant, “You’re fighting for your country, dammit, and the lives of English children depend on it!”
A quick look at the man’s jacket, which he was having a lot of trouble with and twisting around his muscular arms clumsily, confirmed to Emmet that this was an army-man off duty. He had just finished wrestling with his jacket and let it drop to the floor before getting back to his drink.
Emmett was having a hard time looking away. The sheer strength within those brawny arms was fascinating. He wished he could have been even half as strong, then maybe he could be like this man, out taking care of the menace that was killing children and could one day reach the home of his newest little niece. He could be doing something useful, become a hero and a legend bringing England back to peace and…sanity.
His own drink sat on the table half-finished as he watched the handsome man curiously, half-aware that his ploy to stop thinking about the killings had not worked at all.
“So beee…buh…pwetty!” the man suddenly burst again. He had knocked his tumbler to the floor and seemed to be unable to retrieve it so he sat back on his chair, trying to sing the praises of some beauty, but failing to make the words come out properly. Emmet suddenly looked down at the drink before him and pushed it further away with a rising feeling of nausea in his stomach.
The man he had been observing suddenly stood up, making quite a bit of commotion before everyone else went back to their own misery, and Emmett turned back to watching him. He walked very awkwardly and almost fell over three times muttering something under his breath then he suddenly burst out again: “Kill for you even!”
Emmett winced as the man bumped into a table his eyes glazed over as he made his proclamation. “Save you!” the young man continued, “Kill you for yourself!”
Just then someone passed by and jostled him bringing the soldier down to the floor. He tried getting up again but was unable to get to his feet. People kept stumbling drunkenly by and bumping into him and he suddenly gave up and let out a pathetic little laugh.
Emmett sat more rigidly watching the man who had now completely lost control of his limbs and was waving clumsily around and making rather inhuman noises that he apparently thought was profound speech. Everyone else was equally as drunk or else well on their way and Emmett realized he was the only one who was still sober enough to notice the man when the tenth person bumped into him sending him sprawling and writhing on his back.
“Never again!” Emmett told himself firmly. Never, ever again would he even contemplate taking leave of his senses like this, throwing his sanity away even for a few moments, throwing away the ability even to move his limbs, to get himself up and out of that embarrassing position.
He pulled some money out without counting it properly and thrust it by his unfinished drink and then strode purposefully over to the man. “Get up!” he ordered pulling the heavier man to his feet with a mighty effort. He had to steady the taller boy and let him lean on his shoulder as he walked as quickly as possible out of the noisy place.
The man was getting too heavy for Emmett to support and his aching limbs prevented him of thinking at all. He just walked on, concentrating hard on the drunkard’s painful antics until he reached his own door. He fumbled with the keys for a moment before wrenching the door open and depositing the sorry mess inside.
As he closed the door behind him Emmett wondered if he had had too much to drink as well. The man would probably start throwing up on his precious papers and books, Emmett thought frantically trying to remedy the situation by putting some of them away. But the soldier was soon fast asleep in the middle of the floor without any disgusting mess on Emmett’s possessions.
Still eyeing the other man rather warily Emmett sat on his chair waiting for the first rays to come in through the window and tell him he wasn’t going insane, but the sun would never rise while both boys were living.
A/N:
*medical stuff from: http://cat.inist.fr/?aModele=afficheN&cpsidt=1456151
And yes, I did just do a random google search and pull the first thing that came up :D
*whispers* Reviews make my day!
