[Scar/Dream] Heart Thief

3. Getting Along

Dream felt fuzzy as he woke up. It was hard to think. His arm faintly throbbed with pain and he shifted it, then groaned as the pain flared. He decided to keep it still. He opened his eyes but had to blink them a few times before he could get them to focus on anything.

He was laying on a bed in a dim room, and glancing to his sides, he saw white walls and medical equipment. He was in a hospital.

He exhaled and flopped his head back against the pillow. He was remembering now. He had broken into someone's house to see what valuables he could take and sell. It was supposed to be a quick job. He didn't know why he decided to investigate when he heard that noise downstairs. Why he ran right in to fight an armed robber.

He had gotten shot. Now here he was, in the hospital, his arm wrapped up and no doubt having been through expensive surgery. His heart started racing. How was he going to pay for this? The man, Scar, had said he would take care of things. But surely he wasn't going to pay the hospital bills for someone he didn't know? He was thankful but that probably only went so far.

Dream told himself that it was fine, it wasn't like he had a home address, how were they going to bill him anyway? But maybe they had ways.

He was breathing more quickly now too, wondering how much effort it would take to just get up and leave now. He could just leave his arm wrapped until it felt better, then he'd take the bandage off and be fine, right?

Dream winced as one of the machines beeped, and wondered what that was for, or if it was just a normal noise. He looked over again and realized he still had an IV in his left arm. He stared at the drip bag, wondering what they were giving him. Painkiller, he assumed. Otherwise his arm would probably hurt a lot more.

He was still a little dizzy. Definitely painkiller. Yet more for the bill. He wondered if someone was going to come in to see him. He couldn't tell what time it was. There was a window but it didn't seem too bright outside.

Dream was still worrying over his situation when the door opened and someone walked in, turning on the light. He found himself almost hoping it was Scar, and wasn't sure why. He has been nice to him, but they still didn't know each other. It wasn't Scar, though, but rather a tall man in scrubs who smiled kindly at him.

"Hey, good morning," he said, coming over to check the screen that had beeped and then tapping a button. "Did you just wake up?"

"Yeah, a bit ago," Dream replied.

"Alright, good, we were hoping you'd wake up some time around now. I'm Brad, but some people just call me Bad, you can call me whichever, alright? I'm going to be your main nurse in the mornings."

"Bad?" Dream asked curiously.

"Haha, yeah, people jokingly called me Badboy growing up because I was always so friendly, I kinda liked the sound of it, and then it just got shortened to Bad!" Bad seemed quite chipper and Dream had no idea how he managed it this early in the morning. Maybe he just drank a lot of coffee. "How's your arm feeling?"

"Well..." Dream shifted it again and grunted. "Kinda hurts, but not a lot."

"Not a lot, that's good, but could you be more specific? Here, hold on." Bad walked over to the wall next to Dream's bed and grabbed something he couldn't see, then came back and showed him a laminated paper with a line of faces on it, each looking more pained than the previous. "On a scale of 0 to 10, with 0 being no pain at all, and 10 being the worst pain you've ever felt, where would you rate your pain?"

"Uh..." Dream read the paper, which besides the faces, also had descriptions of each pain level. "It definitely hurts when I move it, but like this, I guess... 3 or 4? It's not that bad, really."