Nobody Disagrees
Title: Nobody Disagrees
Author: A.
Characters: Kathryn, Nick, Franny, Egan, Lizzie, Felicia, Jeremy, Malcolm, Lucas (in that order)

Word Count: 979
Rating: R
Summary: No moment is without its consequences.
A/N: I think this is the first piece of The Nine fic. Not surprising. Anyway, the style is deviating a bit from my/the norm, and I'm not really sure it works. Spoilers for the unaired pilot abound.

Here’s thing about over – nothing ever really, finally, is. You make it out of the bank, fifty-two hours seeming like a drop in the bucket compared to the life you have yet to lead, and you’re pretty sure that you can make it back to normal – whatever that used to be. The problem is, you’ve got a scar on your lip and a new haircut (half-blunt cut, half long – two parts of a whole that don’t quite fit together) and everybody looking at you can tell that you’ve changed.

There are pieces of a moment embedded in your skin and everyone can see that but you –

When you get the news that Eva is dead, you freeze in place. The doctor – Jeremy’s – eyes are hollow. Yours probably are, too. You are so struck by the sudden change in atmosphere, which is no longer pervaded by hope, that what comes most naturally is simply to stand there. When Franny rushes toward you, your arms circle tightly round her shoulders and you register faint surprise that you manage that, even, because you’re running on autopilot right now.

You vaguely remember feeling this way the first time you shot somebody. You are drained and useless, putting on a stoic face to prove that you’re strong enough to handle the pain. Trouble is, you’re not –

It’s a little bit your fault. It’s crazy and stupid to think that, but what? Are you supposed to be rational right now? Your sister is dead and she wouldn’t’ve even been there if you hadn’t gotten her the job. If she hadn’t been there, then maybe it’d be you lying on that gurney and maybe her son would still have a mom who’d tell him all sorts of good things about you, because you don’t speak ill of the dead.

Yeah, you wish it’d been you instead, but you’re kind of glad all at the same time which makes you feel like a horrible person, which you’re not. You think. You don’t want to be. You just like living, that’s all –

It’s kinda nice being the hero – hearing other people talk about how you “saved the day.” Nobody needs to know the truth, you know, that you’d been planning to uh, kill yourself, you know, anyway. Anyway, right. The point is, if you’d died in there it wouldn’t have been any skin off your nose, but you’re pretty glad you’ve got a second chance. And while there are some people who know your secret, you don’t expect them to rat you out. Because you sort of, you know, saved them. They kind of owe you.

You’re still thinking about that boat –

You were going to tell him. Really, you’d planned to do it; you figured he’d be happy. You figured he’d make a great dad, and maybe he’d marry you and you’d get that life that your mother always wanted you to have – the doctor husband, the happy family, the house in the country. And he’s a great guy, really he is, but after everything in the bank you don’t really know if he’s the guy for you. That just makes things awkward and uncomfortable and you’re not sure what to do.

You think an abortion’s out of the question – after all the death, there should be some life somewhere. But you just want a little bit of space to breathe, even if you don’t want to forget. Somehow you don’t think he’d understand –

So, you don’t remember anything. Two days of your life? Totally blank and you don’t know where they went. Your mom keeps trying to talk to you and your dad’s suggested therapy, maybe you guys could go together or something, maybe you could work through the pain. What your father doesn’t get is that there is no pain. There’s nothing.

You’re pretty sure you’d be okay with the pain if you could just have an idea of what was causing it –

The first time you lost a patient, you were an intern, and your resident told you that it was okay, you win some and you lose some. You knew that was true – you’d read The House of God and Kill as Few Patients as Possible and all of the other necessary reading that wasn’t actually required in medical school. Still, whenever a patient died under your care you were always left with the most horrible knot in your stomach, like maybe you should have done more. Could you have done more?

All you can do is your best.

The thing is, this time it’s personal. You kept Eva alive after she got shot. On the floor of a bank in the middle of a crisis, you kept her alive – she didn’t die until you got her into the hospital and into surgery. That is driving you crazy. You know that you did everything you could for her, but that doesn’t change the fact that you were operating on her after sixty-plus hours awake.

So, yes, you do feel like a failure. You could have been a hero, maybe, but instead you’re retreating inside yourself and all because of a stupid moment –

Everything that happened that day happened in your bank. You’re never going to feel safe again and you know it, but that’s not your major concern right now. You let your daughter down. If you’d just sent her off with the car keys, or if you’d had a safer profession (though, with all of that bullet-proof glass, what was there to worry about?) then maybe that light would still be shining in her eyes.

You think she might hate you now (even though she’s given no indication of any such thing) and you wouldn’t blame her –

The point is, nobody was supposed to get hurt – not your brother, not Eva Rios, nobody. You think the wrong person died that day –

Nobody disagrees.