Chapter Text
Gavin jolts awake.
He’s inside. He’s...
In bed, he’s inside and in his bed and the window is open and he’s clean? He’s clean and not face down in the fucking mud outside and—
Where the hell is his...
Where the hell is his twelve gauge?
It might be in his closet. He has to get out of his bed to get there.
He flutters out of bed and immediately onto the floor.
Oh, his mouth—on his way down, he busts his lips on the edge of bed, night stand, and then the hard wood floor. His teeth have cut the insides of his mouth, and now he tastes copper.
He spits, and then sees that that’s way more blood than spit and finds himself choking on more of it. That’s, what the hell, that is too much blood, it’s just flowing.
Whoever is in the house with him has heard him and starts to hurry over. Reed covers his mouth and runs as fast as— he cannot stand.
He crawls as fast as he can to the closet. There’s his gun, good old ol’ reliable!
The bedroom door rattles open and the gun is aimed.
“Gavin?”
A familiar, round face peaks through the door. Reed throws his hands up in annoyance.
“Jesus Christ Tina, what the hell!”
“Why the hell are you bleeding? I'd only left you for all of ten minutes!”
“What are you doing in my house?!”
“Why do you have a gun?!”
“What am I doing in my house?”
Tina sets the bowl of hot water and a single towel on the night stand. She sees the trail of blood and where it starts there.
"This is just awful, Reed.”
She takes the rag and starts gathering the Sheriff back into his bed.
“Put the gun down.”
“No, he’s here. I’m sleeping with this motherfucker.”
The Deputy squeezes the man’s hand roughly until he has to let go of the firearm. He hisses as she unloads it and frog marches him to bed. She starts rubbing his face clear of the dirt and the blood still dripping from his mouth.
She is not gentle. She wipes at him with a furry.
“I thought you was dead, Gavin. You’ve been gone for days. Your niece was worried sick." Reed sucks in a breath when he wipes at a particularly caked on bit of dirt. "You ought to apologize to her if you’re not gonna apologize to me.”
“She—”
The words get caught in his throat. He wants to call her scum, vermin, a liar. But Chloe has done so, so much for him.
“I don’t want to talk to her right now.”
Deputy Chen grabs his face to make him look at her.
“You are not serious.”
He levels her with a stare. Tina has to fight off the desire to choke him.
“Reed. You have been missin' for three whole days. When we finally figure out where the little hell hole you live in was, there you is face down in the fucking dirt, three feet from death's door. I do not care about what has you spooked this time today, but you ought to at least show your face to that poor girl. She's been crying since she figured something was off."
The Sheriff hardens his face. Deputy Chen just sighs and continues to clean the beaten face before her. He swats her away.
"Leave me, woman. I'm not a child and you are never going to be a mother in this life," drawls Reed. "Stop fussing over me."
This earns him a good box over the ears.
"Boy! You better thank a good lady's good graces! You should count yourself blessed that you have a woman fussing with you," she let out a rough laugh, "even with your love for male company."
The Sheriff is still trying blink away the sting. He raises a hand to his lip when she rinses the rag. His bleeding has slowed.
"What lady,” he mumbles. “Where is she?"
Another boxing. This one is instantly soothed by the rag as she wipes the last of the blood and outside grime from him.
She is a good woman, Reed thinks to himself. She deserves better than spending the evening cleaning up after his nastiness.
She's well enough off though, she's much like him. She also doesn't enjoy the 'company' of the opposite sex, and has a pretty little thing to flirt with on the north side of town. If she's not on a late shift today, she'll probably go to see her when she deams her work here finished.
He'd tried to give her an early out, but she's stronger than a few mean words.
"I'll be back, I have something cooking for you."
Chen is gathering the bowl, she's going to clean it out. She turns and points a firm finger at him.
"Stay in bed, don't touch that gun."
"Close the fucking window," he spits.
She rolls her eyes as she does so. "Sure thing, boss."
Her spurs chick, chick on her way back into the kitchen.
He still gotta get out of here, he’s gotta make up for lost time. He can’t do that when he’s got no strength to stand, though.
He'll let Chen take care of him right now. Then he'll be gone tonight. That's it.
As soon as she's done, Richard will be moving in to get him.
Slimy bastard.
Tina returns with healthy helping of stew.
Obviously she brought in a few things, with consideration to his diet— like the fact that he doesn't eat pork. Today's an exception though; she had claimed he was out for three days, but he didn't really believe it until the smell wafted over like that. There were potatoes and carrots in it, he could smell them, they made his mouth water.
“Here, Gavin. Please eat something.”
He suddenly feels weak and dizzy, the thought of eating makes his stomach clench and unclench from the lack of sustenance.
“Alright.”
She helps him sit up, helps him eat, and helps out of the bed so he can get to the bathroom. Now that he has eaten, his body is starting to obey him again.
“Will you be fine on your own?”
Gavin nods. “I should be, now.”
“Alright. The rest of stew is still in the kitchen, please don’t forget to eat.”
“Alright. Of course.” He gives her a bashful smile. “Thanks Tina.”
She leaves him.
Suddenly he’s on his feet, pulling out a chest to pack all of his belongings into. The Sheriff is burning up trying to get his things folded correctly, his breaths were becoming choked as he flutters to the kitchen to gather his reserves for when he’s on his own when he skips town.
At one point he got dizzy, and instead started writing notes to all of the people he knew and would be worried about him once he left.
He got up again, to throw blankets in his wagon out back and saw that that one of the wheels, the one he’d been meaning to repair for some time now, still needed repair. The skin of the wagon needed patching, too, and so that needed to get done. As soon as possible.
It wasn’t until much later that evening that he needed to stop. He was tired.
But Reed would be damned if he was going to sleep now.
He pulled up a seat to his usual spot in the middle of den room, shot gun in hand, ready and poised for the night.
The Sheriff sits. He waits. He watches through the night.
...
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...
...
...
...
Hours must have passed at this point. Sheriff Gavin Reed has managed to stay awake the whole night thus far.
It was nothing new to him. He'd done this dance hundreds of nights since his release.
But then the knob shakes and now Gavin has his gun at the ready.
The door opens.
"Who-- who is it? Chen? You know better than to just show up unannounced."
The door simply remains ajar.
"Who is that?"
The door remains ajar. Gavin swallows hard.
"GUY, you better SHOW YOURSELF! Announce yourself!" Gavin's hands begin to shake, but his voice does not waver.
"I'll ask you one last time."
The door creaks a bit, but does not move.
"WHO IS IT!"
The door shuts. Softly even.
Gavin lowers his gun.
Ok. Alright.
That's the most action he'd ever gotten on a night like this.
More than enough adrenaline to stay up now. He's not tired anymore.
No siree.
That's more than enough adrenaline to keep him up watching that fucking door.