Chapter Text
“Hey, Jude…”
The sounds of bombs went off in the distance, the glowing light of sunrise slowly unveiling the faces of all the men gathered in the trench.
“Don’t make it bad…”
Jared’s boots were soaked through, his socks squelching with every movement of his feet. The air was cold enough to burn his nostrils as it entered and exited in haste. He sat with his back to the trench wall, legs curled up so his knees rested against his chest, rifle sitting heavy in his lap. His breath made clouds of gray smoke as it hit the air, tainting the otherwise perfectly clear, dark sky.
“Take a sad song…”
Chad was sitting right up against his side, their upper arms brushing against each other everytime they shifted. Six other men were sitting along the wall, three on either side of Jared and Chad. The nerves in the air were tangible.
“And make it better…”
Their unit has been stationed in Iraq for months, now. The eight of them knew each other like brothers. They were the only family they had out here. Cohen, Padalecki, Murray, Collins, Roche, Speight, Welling, Brown. They fought the good fight together. Always trusted one another, never hesitated.
“Remember to let her into your heart…”
Cohen liked to sing. Whenever they were far enough from enemy troops, he filled the silence with his favorite songs from The Beatles. None of them minded. In fact, it was a welcome distraction. The unmistakably American sound of their music was a nice reminder of home.
“And then you can start to make it better.”
They were miles deep in Iraqi territory, all lined up in a trench for the night. It was nearly time to move, the sun starting to rise on the horizon. In the morning, they would have to cover more ground, make it back to camp. They were only a few more weeks away from returning to home base in the US. But for now, they listened to Cohen sing and gazed up at the stars above.
‘Hey.’ Murray whispered from beside Jared, leaning into his ear.
Chad Michael Murray was his best friend. They’d been stationed together long before this particular deployment. They loved each other like brothers, and trusted one another with their lives. Jared didn’t have anyone else. His father left him and his mother when Jared was barely double digits, and his mama killed herself less than a year later. He was in and out of foster homes until he enlisted at 18.
Jared slightly turned his head to give Chad the cue to talk.
‘Three more weeks, man.’ He whispered in an exasperated voice, ‘only three more weeks.’
Jared sighed and repeated softly, “Three more weeks.”
‘Think we’ll make it to camp before sundown?’
Chad seemed to be in the talkative mood. Jared knew him well enough to know that he got that way when he was anxious. He didn’t blame him; any minute now they’d be walking out in the open again.
‘I hope so.’ He answered simply, keeping his gaze pointed up at the sky.
“Hey Jude, don’t be afraid…”
Jared ignored the chills going up his back and arms. He closed his eyes for a moment and just listened to Cohen’s voice. He was exhausted, but not sleepy. That may seem paradoxical, but… while he hasn’t slept for longer than a couple hours in several days, it wasn’t safe to sleep here. Not in enemy territory. Not during the night. He couldn’t get himself to fall asleep if he tried.
“You were made to go out and get her…”
‘Cohen, wrap it up. The sun is up. We’re moving out.’
That was Sterling Brown, the leader of their unit for the current mission. He was tough, but respected. Ambitious, but not unsafe. The soldiers liked him. Still, at the sound of his voice, Jared felt his entire body tense, and immediately started doing breathing exercises to keep his anxiety tamed. Some adrenaline was good, but too much led to mistakes.
Chad reached across and squeezed Jared’s knee, offering a little slice of comfort in the moment of intense trepidation.
“Here we go, brother.” He whispered and Jared nodded stoicly.
They rose to their knees first, and then to their feet. All eight of them stood tall, spines rigidly straight and chins tilted up.
“Alright, men, we’re moving out. Everybody know their partner?” Brown asked.
“Yes sir.” Came from all seven other men simultaneously.
“We stay low.” Lieutenant Brown commanded, “Welling leads the way.”
They all nodded and turned on their feet so they were behind Tom Welling in sets of two. He was the genius that could read landmine-maps like nobody Jared had ever met. He always took the lead through the territory, avoiding bombs in the ground and keeping them safe. They were all thankful for him.
“Moving out!” Brown announced at once in a quiet, yet commanding tone.
Then they were moving.
Jared put his mind in autopilot so he could focus intently on the air, the ground, the bodies behind, beside, and in front of him.
One step.
Two step.
Three.
Fo-
It happened in seconds. Nothing in the world could’ve prepared him.
A deafening crash rang through his ears and then he was hitting the ground. Chad fell on top of him, the weight of his body pressing down on Jared’s spine.
Pain. Shock. Numbness.
His head slammed into the hard dirt below and his vision went fuzzy.
The sky was red. All he could see were figures lying bloody on the ground and all he could hear was intense ringing and muffled shouts of agony and fear.
He blinked and his vision cleared only slightly. But it was enough.
Enough to see Matt Cohen a yard away from him. His face was torn to shreds and his eyes were stuck open but unblinking. His jaw was stuck agape, as if frozen in a permanent scream. He was dead. HE WAS FUCKING DEAD.
Jared tried to cry, to scream, to move… but nothing.
Blinding pain seared through his skull and his back, and all he could do was succumb to the blackness when it came.
He lost consciousness to the sound of Chad screaming his name and the thought that ‘at least nobody will miss me.’
——————
Jared’s eyes jerk open and he pants in harsh, exasperated breaths as he makes sense of his surroundings. The ceiling above him is white, the air is clean, and it’s quiet except for the sound of moving cars in the distance. Jared takes a deep breath to center himself. He’s home. He’s in his own bed. He’s okay.
His head is pounding and his chest feels tight. After a few minutes of counting his breaths, he’s able to close his eyes again and inhale normally. A single tear falls down his face, and he doesn’t make a move to wipe it away. He lets it cut cleanly down his cheek and gather at the dip of his chin.
As he lies on his back, he tries to push away the residual fear tearing through his body and brain. It’s an impossible feat.
Because while that may have been a dream, the nightmare was very real. It happened 6 months ago in Iraq.
That day, they walked right over an uncharted landmine. The only survivors were Jared, Chad, and Misha Collins. They lost five men in one fell swoop. Five men that would never see their families again. No more Beatles songs for Matt Cohen, whose frozen-screaming-face still plagued Jared’s dreams every night. Five men who would never return home. The guilt Jared felt was immense. How the hell did he survive? He had nobody that would miss him. He was expendable. So, why?
Misha Collins lived across the country in Maine. He was rendered paralyzed from the neck down after getting shrapnel embedded in his spine. Jared hasn’t spoken to him since. As for Chad, well, he walked away the cleanest. Deaf in his left ear and a bum knee. He got lucky. Jared, on the other hand…
His back was torn to shreds. Nerves pinched and muscles strained. The doctor said it was a miracle from heaven above that he didn’t fracture his spine. Hours and hours of surgeries and emergency room visits finally left him with nerve damage and horrifically dark and raised bruises. For weeks, he was wheelchair bound. He couldn’t feel below his hips for a month. Eventually the feeling came back, with physical therapy and a lot of luck. Now, six months later, he couldn’t feel his toes at all and parts of his feet. It could’ve been a lot worse. That wasn’t the bad part.
No. The bad part was the concussion.
His head was strapped down in a neck brace for eight days to stop him from moving it. The doctor said he was one minute movement away from permanent brain damage. When the brace was removed, the pain started. It was white hot agony unlike anything he’s ever experienced before in his life. A horrific sharp stabbing that seared through his skull and rendered him immobile. The doc said the headaches would fade with the concussion, but they never did. So, he got a new diagnosis: PTHD.
“Do you mean PTSD?” Jared had asked with furrowed brows.
“No.” The doctor responded, crossing his arms and sighing.
PTHD as in Post Traumatic Headache Disorder.
PTHD as in stifling pain every single day of his life.
PTHD as in never leaving his house at whim again.
PTHD as in no more army. No more purpose. No more value. No more life.
Jared was finished. He went home to an empty apartment and cried himself to sleep. Suicidal thoughts entered his brain, but he shoved them down. He’d lost so many friends in the explosion. They didn’t have a choice. He couldn’t be a stain on their legacy by taking his own life after they were forced to give up their own.
So he kept pushing. Chad visited him every day to check in, but eventually Jared got fed up and yelled at him to stop mothering him.
“I am perfectly capable of living on my own! Just get the fuck out!”
“Jared, you're still hurt. You need help!”
“Well, you aren’t helping!”
“You’re a selfish bastard, you know that?!”
“I’m selfish?!”
“Yeah, you are! You don’t care about anyone else as long as you get to sit in your own pile of pity! Well, I’ve had enough!”
Chad had left after that, slamming the door behind him and never looking back. It’s been weeks since they last talked.
Jared sighed and reached up to wipe his eyes. He turned over to look at the alarm clock by his bed and saw that it said 3:08pm. He had laid down for a nap at 2:00 after a headache left him exhausted and too drained to continue working on his laptop. He decided to take a quick nap and sleep it off for an hour or so before his appointment at 4:30.
He needed caffeine, now. Badly. If he was going to get anything done, he needed a boost. So, he got up, changed into jeans, threw a pair of boots on, and walked into the kitchen of his apartment. He yawned as he started the coffee maker, leaning heavily on the countertop as he grinded the beans down.
His head was still hurting a bit and his eyes were heavy. But, he’d already had three headaches today, so he should be good to go for the rest of the day. Silver linings…
At first the headaches were highly unpredictable and constantly changing. One day there would be seven minor ones and the next he’d have one giant one that left him bedridden the entire day. As the months passed by and the incident grew farther and farther behind him, they started to become much more regular. He still didn’t know when they would hit, but he did know that they came at a max three times a day, minimum one. The pain levels were pretty similar, barring the occasional migraine that drained him completely and left him practically paralyzed.
But all in all, he felt more comfortable going out in public when he knew he already had two or three headaches that day. It meant he probably wouldn’t have another one. Back when they were completely unpredictable, it was much riskier.
Still… Routine check-ups were an absolute bitch.
It wasn’t the redundant questions, touchy hands, or lumpy bed. It wasn’t even because of the head scans, or the blood tests, or the fact that he always had to stay overnight for one thing or another. No… it was the constant reminder of what he had lost and just how broken he was.
When he was home for a while and got a good enough grasp on his routine that he could work around the headaches and find ways around slowing down, he felt great. Better than that, he felt normal. Like a real, true functioning human being.
It was when he had to haul his ass to the hospital every month and a half that he felt dehumanized and insecure. Normal people don’t need to see a doctor anywhere near that frequently. Plus, to state the obvious, he hated hospitals. There were too many bad memories attached to ever feel comfortable in a hospital room again. Too much trauma. Too much fear and grief.
It was also one of the only places he actually had to secure transportation to. Jared put a lot of effort into making sure everywhere he needed to go was within walking difference. His drivers license had been revoked after he was examined and deemed unsafe for the roads. If he ever got one of his headaches while driving, it would end very badly. So, to go to the hospital was a pain in the ass because he had to take an uber or the bus and sweat his ass off the entire way because he was anxious that he was going to erupt in pain and collapse in public.
Thankfully, he avoided that today.
After he finished his coffee, he ordered an uber and the rest was easy.
As he stepped out of the black Nissan, he handed the driver -Tony- cash and nodded in acknowledgment. Then, he quickly walked into the hospital. It was sort of embarrassing how well he knew this place. He made quick work of signing in and within ten minutes, was sitting in the waiting room of the neurology department waiting for Doctor Smith.
Six months ago, Jared was treated in a base hospital in Iraq for four days to get him stable before he was heli-vaced back to the states. Doctor Samantha Smith was the neurologist assigned to him in Austin. Throughout his recovery, they bonded. It was the hardest time in Jared’s life, and she showed him complete kindness and empathy. She’d lost her sister a year before in a car accident, and let him confide in her about losing his best friends. They bonded over loss, and Jared trusted her. As much as coming in for these appointments sucked, he liked seeing Sam. She was always compassionate and understanding. He couldn’t help but relax in her presence. Maybe it was because she was sort of like the mother he never had.
Either way, when she came into the waiting room, he couldn’t help but smile.
“Hi, Jared.” She greeted with her own kind smile, little wrinkles appearing by her eyes and forehead.
Jared stood up from his chair as she approached him. He sighed as she pulled him into a gentle hug.
“Good to see you.” She acknowledged as she pulled away, leaving a hand on his bicep.
Jared nodded, “You too, Dr.Smith.”
She laughed a little, “How many times do I have to tell you to call me Sam?”
Jared smirked, “One more.”
She rolled her eyes playfully and started walking away, gesturing for him to follow, “Come on, we’re gonna start with a head scan, okay?”
Jared nodded, but asked slightly nervously, “Do you think you’ll find anything?”
Sam turned to him and assured, “I just want to double check on some things. Nothing to worry about, but it’s been two months since the last one. I want to make sure nothing has changed. It’ll only take a few minutes, okay? Now, I would also like to get a read on your brain waves when the headaches occur. Since they happen in the morning, unfortunately that means you will have to stay overnight. Is that going to be a problem?”
Jared sighed, not surprised.
“It’s fine.”
Sam smiled knowingly, “I know it’s not ideal. But we need to make sure that brain of yours is working the way it’s supposed to. As long as the results don’t show anything concerning, you’ll be out as early as noon tomorrow.”
Jared nodded, not letting the disappointment show.
“Alrighty.” She nodded, “Follow me.”
Jared did as told, though he easily could’ve found the room himself. He’d been there plenty of times. Turns out when you have PTHD, the docs like to do head scans. Lots of them, for that matter.
Sam took him to the MRI and handed him off to Dr. Beaver, the radiologist.
“Ok Jared, I’ll have a nurse take you to your room as soon as you’re done, and I’ll be back to check on you at 7:00. Sound good?” Sam smiled.
Jared tilted his head slightly and repeated, “Sounds good.”
Dr.Smith closed the door behind her as she left the room. Jared turned to the radiologist.
“Ready to get started?” He asked.
Jared sighed, “Ready as I’ll ever be.”
He lied down on the magnetic machine, breathing in and out in shallow breaths as the claustrophobia sank in. He closed his eyes and let his mind float away.
Another machine. Another hospital. Another night spent away from home.
Another day in the life of Jared Padalecki.