Elliot could hear the wind howling outside his car. He did his best to ignore it as he sat inside the vehicle, gathering the strength to get out and go into his workplace.
It had been nearly a quarter of an hour since he'd parked and he still couldn't manage to step outside. There were too many thoughts swimming about in his head, weighing him down. None of them were particularly good.
The steering wheel was warm beneath his fingers even as the inside of the car cooled while it sat there with the engine off. If Elliot listened carefully, he could almost hear the faint ticking of his watch as the seconds passed. He would be late if he sat there for much longer. Still, he made no move to exit the car.
A series of sudden knocks, sharp and quick on his window, startled him. Wide-eyed, and with his heart beating a bit quicker, he looked over and into a pair of brown eyes that watched him, silently questioning what he was doing. Hesitantly, Elliot rolled down his car window to speak to Nathan.
"Morning, Elliot," the man greeted. His cheerful tone was tinged with confusion. "Are you alright?"
Truly, Elliot didn't know. He didn't know why he had to sit there and muster up the will to go on with his day. Most of all, he didn't know why looking at Nathan only made him more upset.
"I'm fine," he said, already rolling his window back up. Nathan hurried back as the car door opened and Elliot stepped out. He hurried to the entrance of the building where he worked, not paying attention to Nathan. The other man followed at a brisk pace to keep up with Elliot.
"You sure?" Nathan insisted, and Elliot had to bite back a sharp retort. He knew Nathan was just trying to be nice and there was nothing wrong with that. There was nothing wrong with Nathan.
"Yeah," Elliot said as he pulled open the door to the medical center with more force than was probably needed. He didn't look back as he climbed the stairs, not wanting to wait for the elevator. Nathan stayed behind, probably looking at him with an offended look. Elliot didn't turn back to check.
He didn't see much of Nathan after that. To some extent, he was aware that he was avoiding the man, even if he wasn't sure why. As Elliot sat alone in a nearby coffee shop, having been able to slip away for his lunch break, he thought about Nathan. He thought about why it bothered him so much to have the friendly man around.
Elliot walked back to work without any of the answers he wished he had.
That night, he didn't dream of Allan. In fact, Elliot didn't dream of anything. He fell asleep suddenly and woke up with an odd feeling—like nothingness. There was nothing but a dark expanse of time that was usually occupied by Allan's heartbreakingly sad smiles. Elliot felt more alone than he had in a while.
The strong winds from the previous day had died down, leaving only a crisp feeling that morning. Elliot pulled his coat closer to himself as he stepped out of his car and made his way to his workplace. He noted, thankfully, that Nathan was nowhere to be seen, as he sat behind his desk and got ready for the day ahead.
"Morning, Elliot."
At the greeting, Elliot turned and mustered up a smile for the older woman standing before him. She looked at him with kind, dark brown eyes and a smile on her rounded face. Her name was Evelyn, and she was the manager of the office. She'd worked there for years and knew just about everything that went on with both the patients and the staff. Evelyn also happened to be one of the few people he made an active effort to be nice to.
Maybe it was because she had been there for so long and knew everyone so well. Maybe it was that she had dealt with people like Elliot before. Whatever the case may be, Evelyn had never looked at Elliot with pity in her eyes. She'd offered her condolences—and he could tell that she was being sincere—and then moved on. Not for the first time Elliot wondered if Evelyn had experienced a great loss herself.
"Good morning," he said, and even to him his voice sounded too soft, wrong. Evelyn didn't mention it. There were a lot of things she didn't mention when dealing with Elliot. He was grateful for that.
"Do you mind helping out in the back today?" she asked. "Trisha called in sick and we only have Nathan and Andrea back there." Elliot desperately wanted to say no. He'd been doing his best to avoid Nathan, and the man was probably mad at him anyway for the way Elliot brushed him off the previous day.
"Sure," he heard himself say instead. Evelyn smiled brightly.
"Great, go on back then. We have a lot of early appointments today so you'd best get ready." Evelyn was already leading Elliot away with a hand on the young man's back.
"Who's going to work the front desk?" Elliot asked, looking down at the short, older lady.
"Cindy can do that on her own for today. She should be here soon anyway," Evelyn answered easily, as if knowing Elliot would use that as an excuse. She probably did.
What she should have known, or at least guessed, was that Elliot would not be up to interacting with the patients for too long. At the front desk he only had to greet people and maybe ask them to fill out a form or sign up. He didn't have to worry about putting nervous patients at ease when he could barely put on a shaky smile.
Still, he had no argument left about why he should stay at the front desk. Elliot took comfort in knowing that he would be busy enough that speaking to Nathan would be unlikely.
Just as he'd predicted, the morning went by quickly. He spent most of his time dealing with patients. As much as he'd complained, Elliot found that it was easy to distract himself when he was busy dealing with people. Not to mention, Nathan had managed to stay out of Elliot's way for most of the morning. At least, enough that they didn't have to speak to each other.
That lasted until lunch time. Elliot felt that he should have probably expected for Nathan to try to talk to him as he made his way out of the building.
"Elliot!" Nathan called out as he hurried after the man. Elliot was almost at the door when Nathan caught up to him, and he figured he should at least hear what the man wanted. When Elliot turned to look at Nathan, the man looked a bit out of breath, but his usual smile was still in place. Granted, it might have looked a bit dimmer than usual. Almost nervous.
"What is it?" Elliot asked. He watched as Nathan hesitated for a moment. It was almost like he was bracing himself for whatever it was that he wanted to say.
"I, uh, I wanted to apologize," he said at last. Elliot stood before Nathan and just stared in disbelief. Of all the things he'd thought the man would say, that was the last.
"You want to apologize?" Elliot asked, not understanding why Nathan would want to do that. "Why?"
"Well, for yesterday. I'm sorry if I bothered you, I didn't mean to. It's just that it looked like you were upset," Nathan explained. In all honesty, Elliot didn't know what to say to that.
He was, as usual, a bit irritated with Nathan. But now there was also some guilt (because he'd never been particularly nice to the man and still Nathan worried about Elliot). It was a strange mixture of feelings. One Elliot hadn't felt in a long while.
"It's fine," he heard himself say, the words slipping past his lips before he could really think about it. "I was just having a bad morning. You don't have to apologize."
Elliot hadn't said anything particularly kind to Nathan. Really, he should have apologized for the way he'd been avoiding the man. But Nathan still seemed to light up at the simple words. His smile seemed more genuine now, it lit up his eyes and made him seem younger somehow. It made something in Elliot's chest ache.
"Oh okay," Nathan said with a slightly more cheerful tone. "Well, if you have another bad morning, maybe I can help? Only if you want to," Nathan added, clearly not wanting to annoy Elliot. For his part, Elliot wasn't paying much attention to what Nathan was saying, too preoccupied with the way a simple smile made him feel.
"Yeah, okay," he said, once again not thinking much about what he was saying. He turned to leave almost as soon as the words were out of his mouth and only paused as Nathan asked him if he was going to get some lunch.
"Do you mind if I go with you?" Nathan asked after Elliot nodded to him. Elliot surprised himself by giving the question any thought at all.
"Maybe next time," he said after a minute, and then turned to leave. Elliot figured that he would need some time alone to think.