This was a short story, I know, but I have another one coming tomorrow, so look for it as well. Until then, enjoy this last part!
Happy Hour with Jack Dalton Part Five
Rated: PG
“He’ll be all right,” the doctor said quietly, trying not to disturb MacGyver as he lay sedated in his hospital room, his deep back wound bandaged and stitched. “He responded to surgery well, and although he lost a lot of blood, we were able to give him a transfusion. The blade narrowly missed his organs, so he is fortunately not in any more serious danger and the damage will repair itself. Still, he’s going to need some time to heal and rest.”
“Can we see him now?” Pete asked, his face lined with worry, looking beyond the doorframe, straining to see what pitiful condition his friend was in this time.
Jack stood by him silently, also anxious to see MacGyver, remembering vividly the gruesome sight of him lying in a large quantity of his own blood as it continued to flow profusely despite his best efforts to stop it. As it drained him of precious moments of life, he seemed to grow paler and more drawn as if he had no blood left in him to sustain him, an empty, dried out husk all that was left of his body. Once again he realized how miraculous it was that he survived.
“Of course. Just be aware that he may not awaken, as he was in a great deal of pain and we needed to distribute painkillers. He may be groggy for awhile.”
“That’s all right. We understand. Thank you, Doctor.”
“I’ll be nearby if you need anything.”
After the doctor left, Jack and Pete entered the room, standing over MacGyver and watching him doze. His face was no longer pinched with pain, and he looked restful as if he were only taking a nap and was perfectly healthy. It relieved Jack to see him this way after looking so wan. He had thought the situation was hopeless. After staring at him for several minutes, he shifted his sober gaze toward Pete.
“Pete, I’m really…”
“Save it, Jack,” Pete said, his voice calm and not laced with anger as Jack expected. “I know what happened. It wasn’t your fault. Robert and his men were after Mac for some time, according to their confessions.” He sighed, stroking MacGyver’s arm. “This would have happened sooner or later. Who knows? Maybe your being there helped make this thing turn out better than it might have given the circumstances.”
Jack raised his eyebrows. “You really mean that?” He asked.
Pete smiled. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but yeah, Jack. I think I do,” he said. “It turns out being a stumbling drunk for one night might have helped save MacGyver’s life.”
“Oh, now that’s a low blow,” Jack said. “I wasn’t that drunk…”
MacGyver began to stir and moan, opening his glazed brown eyes slightly.
“Hey buddy,” Jack said, smiling at him.
Pete took his limp hand. “We’re here for you,” he said.
MacGyver searched both of them with his eyes. “Wha…happened?” He asked faintly, licking his dry lips.
“You’re in the hospital,” Jack said.
“I know…how…?”
“Jack got you here,” Pete said, looking at Jack with a rare expression that for once looked like pride instead of disappointment or scorn.
“Yeah, it turns out that Robert chump had a car phone,” Jack said. “He hadn’t parked it too far away from the mansion, so I was able to call an ambulance and the police from it. I had those boys wrapped up pretty tidily, I’d say.” He grinned.
“There will be no way those men will ever get out of prison now,” Pete said. “It looks like Robert’s lust for power at all costs finally undid him.”
“Mr. Thornton, you have a phone call,” a nurse said, popping her head in the room.
“Thanks,” Pete said. He knew he had to take it, but he didn’t want to leave MacGyver’s side. Hesitating, he gently patted MacGyver on the shoulder. “I’ll be right back, I promise,” he said.
Smiling sleepily, MacGyver managed to give him a shaky thumbs-up signal, showing he understood. He watched as Pete left the room, and then he turned to Jack.
“Thank you,” he said.
“For what?” Jack asked.
“You know…”
Jack shrugged. “It was nothing you wouldn’t have done for me,” he said.
“I know, but…I got you into this…”
“Quite a switch, isn’t it?”
MacGyver grinned sideways. “I guess so,” he said. His smile fell. “I’m…sorry…”
“Look, it was all a series of weird timing and accidents,” Jack said. “How was I to know you had a bunch of crooked businessmen after you? That’s what I get for crashing your party. I just wanted to have a place to sleep. Which, by the way,” he said, rubbing a sore spot on his back where Robert had hit him, “I think next time I’ll take a hotel room for the night.”
“I thought you had a new contract for Dalton Air—lots of money, you said. You could find yourself a new place to live.”
Embarrassed, his face turning a shade of crimson, Jack looked at the floor. “Yeah, well, I was drunk. I might have…exaggerated a little,” he said. His mischievous eyes darted back up to MacGyver, and he grinned foolishly.
“Oh.”
“It’s nothing extravagant. In fact, it might not fall through now. I was supposed to meet with them today. That’s okay, though,” he said, patting MacGyver on the leg. “I’d rather spend my time here with you, anyway.”
“Yeah…seeing as how we have so much fun together,” he said, winking slowly and smiling.
“Well, next time it will be different. Maybe you and I could go to happy hour together.”
“I don’t drink. You know that.”
“Who said anything about alcohol?” Jack asked, an innocent expression on his face. “Hell, after what I just went through, I’m not so sure I want to drink anymore either, if it means I’ll wake up in a room with a bunch of tough guys roughing me up. I’m talking about right now.” He poured water into two plastic cups from the pitcher by MacGyver’s bed and handed one of them to his friend, making sure he had it, helping to prop him up so he could drink it. “To your recovery,” he said. “Cheers.”
The two of them touched the plastic cups together in a mock salute.
“Well, I just got off the phone with the lead investigator of the case,” Pete said, entering the room again. “Based on your information and their confessions, Robert and crew will be charged with murder and attempted murder.” He looked at MacGyver. “As if bilking his employees out of their life savings and polluting the oceans with their chemical waste wasn’t enough.”
“That’s good news,” MacGyver said.
Pete saw the two men holding plastic cups of water and looked confused.
“Here Pete,” Jack said, pouring him a cup of water and handing it to him. “Don’t just stand there. This calls for celebration. Join us in happy hour.”
“Happy hour?”
“Well, an improvised version of it, anyway. It’s not exactly my usual kind, but it’s the best I could do in the spur of the moment, and after all, that’s how this whole thing started.”
“I just hope next time you go to a real happy hour, it stays true to its name,” Pete said, looking at the cup of water and chuckling.
MacGyver began sliding downward, the cup he held threatening to spill. Pete and Jack caught him before this happened, taking the cup away from him and watching as he drifted back to sleep. They covered him with sheets and made sure he was comfortable.
“I guess that was more excitement than he could handle right now,” Pete said, smiling and brushing away a stray lock of MacGyver’s hair from his forehead in an affectionate, almost fatherly gesture.
“Do you think we ought to stick around?” Jack asked.
“Why not? He’d do the same for either of us, and I’ve got nowhere else to go. What about you?”
“Well, there’s always the bar…”
“Jack!”
“I’m kidding, Pete.”
The End
"If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer."
--Henry David Thoreau
brains+brawn+beauty+personality=MacGyver
