The Long Haul

Chapter 13

Alex and Emma had been in the room for five minutes now, and Alex was resting in a chair beside her friend, her leg bouncing incessantly as drunken paranoia took over. Her eyes jumped around as she was scanning the people who walked by the room. She knew this was the ER where her brother Will worked, but she hadn't seen him much to her relief. She didn't know much about his work life, but she was fairly certain he rarely worked the night shift. However, that didn't do much to calm her drunken nerves. Because that was the last thing she needed - to run into her brother and then have him go narc about what she was up to, which clearly wasn't something Jay would approve of.

Emma had just thrown up another time in the gray basin the nurse had given her. "UGH! This fucking sucks," she complained as she threw her head back against the pillow. "Whyyyyy!" She was still feeling disoriented - like she'd taken 10 shots instead of 3, but the vomiting was starting to slow down thankfully now that she was resting in an ER bed.

Her friend's voice momentarily tore Alex from her lookout mission. She grabbed Emma's hand with reassurance. "The doc will make it better, Em. Hang in there." She comforted the best she could in her state of mind.

Just then, a doctor pulled back the curtain and walked in. A gasp escaped Alex's lips as she immediately threw herself to the floor out of sight behind the bed. Luckily, the doctor had turned to grab some hand sanitizer, so he missed the dramatic hiding.

"Hi, I'm Dr. Halstead. It sounds like you aren't feeling well, huh?" Will asked as he approached the bed.

"OH MY GOSH!" Emma exclaimed out of drunken excitement despite feeling like shit. "Alex, he has the same last name as you," she announced as she looked around to try and find her friend.

Alex cringed, knowing her cover was fully blown. "Fuck," she whispered harshly at herself.

"Alex?" Will called out, confused about what was going on. "Is that you?" He leaned over to try and see who was hiding.

Realizing that she had no other choice, she slowly stood back up and waved without making eye contact. "Hi."

Will's eyebrows flew up in surprise as he caught sight of his sister, looking somewhat disheveled. "What are you doing here? What's going on?" The brotherly questions came out of his mouth before he had a chance to think them through.

Alex rolled her eyes, resisting the urge to snap. "It's not what you think. Emma texted me saying she wasn't feeling well, so I brought her here."

Will took a moment to absorb the confusing situation. He wanted to dwell on the fact that his sister was here, and clearly trying to avoid him, but his medical training kicked in as he shifted his focus to the patient. "Why don't you tell me what happened..." He looked at his iPad quickly. "Emma."

Emma groaned again, her head spinning. "I swear I only had like a few drinks. This isn't normal. I keep throwing up, too."

Will's eyes danced over to his sister to see if she was going to elaborate or add any details. Alex hesitated, but caved. "Yeah, she did have some drinks, but we think someone might have...slipped something into one of them."

Will's expression subtly shifted from surprise to concern. "Okay, we'll run some tests to figure out what's in your system." He glanced at Alex, the doctor in him momentarily overshadowing the brotherly concern. He needed to make sure she didn't have whatever this was in her system as well. "Did you drink too?" The slightly glossed over look in her eyes answered his question, but he needed to hear it from her.

Alex sighed, her frustration evident, but she went with the truth. "Yeah, but not what she drank. I'm okay. Just worried about Em."

Will nodded, quickly jotting down some notes before signaling a nurse. "We'll give her something for the nausea while we wait on the test results." A nurse walked in and Will gave her some orders to draw blood so they could get to the bottom of what was slipped to the teenager.