Chapter Text
Adrienne felt awful. She had been poked and prodded and drawn out across this uncomfortable cot by McHenry as Rush sat preparing something on the table. She felt nauseous as he pushed on her stomach, feeling the ghost of bile rise in her throat. After a few dry heaves, she luckily managed to spit up something, settling her stomach for just a moment.
She wished to push him off her trembling figure as she felt more liquid rise in her throat. Adrienne groaned, trying weakly to murmur out a warning before the liquid spewed from her lips, but alas, to no avail. McHenry poked her in the stomach perfectly as the bile rose to her mouth, forcing Adrienne to vomit all over his front and her own lap.
The Colonel cringed at the feeling, rising from his position on the cot slowly to wipe himself off. “I do not know what you expected her to do,” Benjamin Rush replied, “She did try to warn you.”
“It is difficult to tell the difference between refusal of treatment and a warning,” McHenry grumbled in response. “If she did not insist on fighting my treatment, then this would not have happened in the first place.”
He then walked back over to Adrienne, next forcing her mouth open to inspect her throat. He was pleased, though by what she could not tell. The soreness in her jaw from having it roughly held open overshadowed any victory of a satisfactory examination. She was exhausted, wishing for nothing more than to be left alone as she usually was with the silence and cold. They never brought her such pain.
Adrienne wanted it all to stop.
Her stomach ached with pain, small bruises forming from all of the days of previous but similar treatment.
Her stomach ached with pains of hunger. She had not been fed anything since first waking from her coma-like state. Nothing substantial, at least. And surely not enough to withstand all of the purgings she was put through daily.
Shivering, Adrienne struggled with attempting to lay down the moment his hands released her, only to be caught by her shoulder and propped back up in the cot. She ached, shivering as if she did not have a thin layer of sweat lining her skin, sticking to everything it touched.
“I have only the bandages to rearrange,” McHenry spoke, more to Rush than herself, his patient, “I shall apply the last of the sugar of lead she shall need for the wound to help itself. Then we may better focus on attending to the infection at hand.”
“Then, there is no more discharge?” Rush asked nonchalantly, not looking up from his work.
“None,” McHenry confirmed.
As his hands reached out for her again, she tried to pull herself away from them, weakly pushing out protest, begging to the best of her ability for some respite from the pain. Adrienne knew that the lead-covered bandages were meant to be uncomfortable, but she did not expect them to burn. They did not burn like an open flame over her wound, but rather like the carpet burn she had become familiar with throughout most of her childhood. They burned across her pale skin, leaving irritated and sensitive skin with brightly tinted lines of pink in their wake. It often felt like she was being bound in a coarse rope, restricting her comfort and stationary position.
McHenry reached out for her chemise, and she tried her best to shy away from his hand, using up what little strength she had left. However, her efforts were in vain as the hands soon found their way around her torso, cloth bandages in hand.
Once the outer linen bandages were finished, Rush stood, placing his leafy mixture into a cup, pouring hot water over the leaves to brew a remedial tea. He approached her with the mug in hand, explaining that it was a mix made of sassafras and dogwood to help with her infection. Benjamin Rush also included that she would need to drink three mugs a day as a filler for her meals, crushing such hopes she might have had about soothing the ache beneath her bandages.
It was then, when the two men then retired from the room, calling for her maidservant to prepare her in a clean chemise, free of her own bloody bile.
After Ona had retired from the room, allowing her mistress to moan in pain upon filthy sheets, not due to be replaced until the day following, did a familiar redhead entered the room.
Adrienne whined slightly at the sight of the blue uniform, her delirious pain induced state, causing her to fail to respond to Colonel Hamilton’s presence with any dignity whatsoever.
“Do not sit up on my account,” he assured her, standing just inside the bedroom’s door rather awkwardly. He approached her with a bundle in his hand. Had she been lucid, she would have realized the parcel as a napkin.
He had taken to looking at the table, noticing the churned flora in the mortar bowl and the pot of hot water beside it. “Is this intended to be a brew of tea?” he asked, picking up the mug rush had left uncleaned on the table. “It appears to be just about as edible as it looks,” Hamilton snorted, placing the mug back down on the table.
He thrust out the napkin to her practically just above her lap for her hands to grab. He watched as Adrienne unfolded the corners weakly. “It is bread,” he stated, “I figured that you would be in need of something a bit more substantial than air, or in your case tea, so I snuck it from tonight’s dinner preparations. From the kitchen.”
She murmured out a thank you, eagerly attempting to use her remaining energy to eat as many of the slices she could. McHenry and Doctor Rush would not take kindly to finding such a thing. So, if she intended to have any, it had to be while Colonel Hamilton was present so that he could return the napkin and hide their trail. Adrienne ate about a slice and a half before allowing the Colonel to retire with the remains, not wishing to further tempt her stomach after today’s purging.
“They ought to get a fire started in here soon,” Hamilton remarked as he wrapped up the bread. Rising to his feet, Alexander looked over at her and began as if he wished to say more but decided to start over before so much as uttering a single word. “This changes nothing between us,” he said- who he was convincing was unclear, “I still loathe you as much as I have always loathed you, but that does not mean that it is acceptable for me to watch as you are killed from a healable malady.” And with that, he gave her a curt nod, making his way out the door as quickly as possible, likely to join the rest of the staff for a meal she was forbidden from participating in for the foreseeable future.
Adrienne finally allowed herself to collapse into a fitful sleep, the pain in her torso dragging her under as the pangs of hunger subsided significantly beneath the burn of the lead soaked bandages.
Adrienne’s head was pounding as if McHenry had seen it fit to drop a massively large book upon her right temple. The incessant pounding became so horribly painful; it jolted her from her sleep at the very same moment a pair of boots approached the door. “McHenry?” a voice called out through the door, its owner’s hand wrapping around the door frame.
Adrienne cried out in pain at the voice’s volume, looking towards the door to see who was so loud. John Laurens’s blonde queue sat behind his neck, neatly tied with a ribbon as green as his aide de camp sash.
“Oh,” he said in a small voice. John clearly had not expected her to be alone, or awake, an awkward mood falling between them. John ushered himself into the room, politely averting his eyes aside from her indecent figure as he spoke. “May it be my place as to inquire on the success of your treatment, Miss Fairfax?” Adrienne opened her mouth to speak but quickly closed it as her eyes blew wide in surprise. “Miss Fairfax?” John asked cautiously, stepping closer to her in order to ascertain the cause for her sudden shift in demeanor. He reached out to place his hand on her own, squatting down to the height of the cot, “Are you alright?”
Her eyes did not get any smaller, letting out a panicked whimper as she failed to answer his question. Before he could question her further, however, her stomach emptied itself once more unto the Lieutenant Colonel’s boots. He grimaced, at the sight, noting the thin layer of sweat across her forehead as he replied. “I assume that treatment is not progressing as hoped then.”
Adrienne panted, attempting to mutter out an apology and roll herself from the cot to assist him in cleaning the boots, but John’s steady hand upon her shoulder halted any further movement. “That is quite alright. Please do not strain yourself for me,” he assured her in a most comforting tone that did well to soothe her guilty constitution. John tenderly rearranged her back on the bed, draping the blankets over her. “I am more than capable of cleaning my boots, but perhaps you will allow me to assist you, madam?” he questioned. “I am sure that your temperature would much improve with your hair pulled back.”
She nodded weakly, allowing him to pull a ribbon-like the one in his own hair from the uniform breeches. He looked meekly from Adrienne and the ribbon back to Adrienne as he explained, “I tend to lose mine halfway through the day, so I have learned to carry extras.”
He continued talking as he pulled her hair into a neat braid. “I have always preferred to forgo a braid in the mornings. It allows me to sleep in a short bit longer after Harrison makes his rounds.” Adrienne smiled, laughter failing to grace her voice.
But John recognized her attempted show of amusement and continued. “I am always the last of us aides to be in the office downstairs, usually sporting a rather large bruise from either knocking my head on the ceiling or being rolled out of bed,” he explained. “It is really a terrible habit of mine, comes from one too many years of doing nothing, I suppose.”
He finished off the braid, neatly tying the ribbon into a bow. One of his soft hands fell to hold Adrienne’s own weak one, squeezing her tiny hand lightly with his much larger one. John offered her a small smile before he spoke, “I cannot stay much longer, my dear. I have a few letters that are urgent for delivery that must be distributed, but I shall do my best to visit once more.” He propped himself back upon his feet, stopping halfway to press a soft kiss to the top of her head. “Get some rest if possible. You shall need your strength.”
The sound of boots coming up the stairs to the garret room alerted John as he sat in the room’s chair, scrubbing away at his boots. The Lieutenant Colonel remained scrubbing the remaining throw up from his shoes as he glanced up to see who had cracked open the door. He sighed, sitting up straight, allowing the rag to fall from his hand to rest beside his boot, “Alexander.”
“Ah, so you are awake then?”
John scoffed, “Dear God, do you all honestly believe me to be that horrible of a late sleeper?”
Hamilton just shrugged as he entered the room, “It is already past breakfasting hours, and we haven’t a glimpse of you yet.” He threw himself down to sit on the edge of one of the cots, “I was sent to investigate.”
The tall blonde tsked, bending down to pick the rag up once more. “You may descend those stairs and tell our dear old secretary that I am both awake and dressed, my dearest Alexander,” he reported, tone entirely dismissive. “You may also remind him that I lost a game of cards to Meade and have donned his courier duties for the week.”
Alexander scrunched his nose, recalling that none of the aides actually possessed their own horses, with John and Meade being the exemption. “That is precisely why I do not keep a horse.”
“And here I thought that it was so that you might escond with mine whenever it so conveniences you.”
This time it was Alexander’s time to scoff at the other officer, “That would not be in existence if it was not for the ordeal of my command.”
John had begun to wipe the last of the vomit from his riding boots, “I promise you, my dearest Ham, you have not missed out on anything by remaining at your desk.”
“Of course,” The redhead scoffed, dropping back to lay on the cot, “it is only honor and glory. How on earth could I have the audacity to be upset about being left out of that?”
“Has it ever occurred to you that the General keeps you close to preserve your talents?” John questioned. “Because if there is a single aide in his office with the potential for a future, it is you.”
“Don’t be ridiculous,” the redhead dismissed from his position on the edge of the cot, “Each member of this office has more of a secured future than I could ever hope for.”
“That,” the blonde grunted, “was precisely my point. If we win this war, the Marquis will return to his title in France, Harrison will return to his law practice, McHenry will continue to be a surgeon or physician, Tench will take the reins of his family business, as will I in my lordship. We have had our legacies determined for us already. You have the potential to do anything you so desire with the connections and aptitude for just about every field of work available. Dare I be so bold as to say that you would make an excellent politician in the future.”
A silence swirled around the room before Hamilton sighed, “Would it kill this household to not give me a lecture every 5 minutes?”
John sat up, looking at the shorter redhead as he sprawled out without an ounce of grace across the cot. “If I did not care for you so I would toss this rag at your face and allow you to suffer the consequences.”
At this, Hamilton raised his head off the bed to look at the rag in John’s hand. “What are you wiping off those boots that takes such time?”
“Vomit,” John replied shortly, “I had a letter for McHenry. He was not there.”
The gears turned in Alexander’s head, his eyes lighting up as he crackled in attempts to suppress his laughter. “She puked on your shoes?”
Ben Tallmadge ducked into the war tent in camp that Washington had taken up residence in for the time being. Billy Lee holding back the tent’s flap so the Major could make his rather suddenly arranged meeting with the General.
The man in question stood with his back to the door, his proud shoulders confidently squared. ‘So this is one of those meetings then,’ the Major noted, preparing himself for the argument that was sure to come. “You asked to see me, sir?”
“Yes, Major Tallmadge,” the General affirmed, not turning around to face the young man, “I had wondered why a report on your failings some days prior has not yet crossed my desk?”
Benjamin cleared his throat, swallowing before he began. “I was not aware that it required a report, sir.”
“Explain to me this, Major,” Washington spoke immediately with a cold tone, “I hired you as a member of my staff specifically so that you may be my head of intelligence, and, so far, you have seen it fit to forward me a report on every other activity you engage in except for the actual intelligence for which I hired you. Why is that?” Benjamin was silent for a moment, unsure if the question was truly meant for him to answer. “Well, Major?” Washington prompted him, “I do not have an entire day put aside to listen to you paw around the silence for an excuse to justify such actions.”
The Major swallowed thickly, biting his tongue to avoid entering into an argument with the man before him. “You are correct, sir. My apologies.”
Washington slammed his fist against the desk, turning quickly around to face the Major. “Oh, do not become a coward now,” he all but snarled. “Where has your spine run off to, Major?”
Benjamin opened his mouth to reply, his words not anywhere near as confident as he had hoped, “I am afraid I do not understand, sir.”
“Do not play with me, Major,” the General scoffed, “You have never been known for your ability to follow orders without an argument. So, I shall ask once again. Why has a report on the assassination affair that occurred some days ago not yet crossed my desk?”
“Because as you have failed to notice, Mr. Sackett is dead,” the Major spat, dropping his facade and allowing his voice to drip with passion, “And unlike yourself, I have taken the time to respect and mourn for the man, as he deserves.”
“You will excuse me, Major,” Washington’s voice boomed, “but I prefer to concern myself with the living.”
“Then please!” Benjamin pleaded, “Enlighten me as to what could possibly have you so concerned that you refuse to mourn for a man that you dared call a friend.”
“My charge, Lady Fairfax, was shot by the impersonator who slit the throat of Mr. Sackett,” he stated plainly, temper controlled as he spoke without shouting, “As it stands, I am currently more occupied with her treatment than I am with making wishes that I cannot possibly come true.”
At this, the Major went silent, a sudden regret sinking into his features before he schooled his face into a stone-cold slab. “It is still not probable cause enough to dismiss his life so freely, sir.” With this final statement, Benjamin nodded curtly to the General and exited the tent without permission.
“I heard she puked on your shoes.”
McHenry’s voice carried through the workroom as he spoke loudly to John from its doorway. “You should have told me, you know.”
“I did not think it of consequence,” John dismissed, dipping his quill into the inkwell atop the desk, “She holds a bullet wound infection. I remember throwing up on many a person’s shoes after my last injury as well.”
McHenry sighed, leaning against the doorway, “I have her on a purging treatment at the moment, so any vomiting could be signs of superfluous bodily activity.”
“You mean the additional vomiting comes from her consuming food?” John asked skeptically, scribbling away at his translations.
“Precisely,” Mchenry affirmed, “And on such a note, she is not to have anything in her system besides the remedial tea prescribed by Doctor Rush.”
Laurens scoffed, dipping his quill in ink once again, “Dear God, man. What deal of pain do you intend on putting her through, purging on an empty stomach?”
“I intend on getting her out from the Marquis’s cot as soon as possible,” McHenry retorted, “For all of our sakes.”
“Preferably before the General freezes to death of hypothermia in that tent,” Hamilton added, inviting himself into the conversation, as he so often does. “John, I think you placed one of your letters on my desk.”
The Lieutenant Colonel turned around in his chair, furrowing his brow, “Depends. Who is it from?”
“Your Father.”
John turned quickly around in his chair, picking up his quill once again. “No, I think you can keep that.”
“Laurens,” Hamilton warned, “Ignoring your father may not be the best idea at the moment.”
“Right,” he grumbled to himself, “because that is the only cause for my being here.” Meade, who sat beside Laurens, tensed in the shoulders at his grumblings, and John sighed, “Of course, give it here. I will read it after I finish composing this translation.”
Hamilton tossed the letter at the back of John’s head mere moments before he had begun to move in order to face the redhead. “Take your letter. And be sure to actually reply to it this time?”
John said nothing, opting to remain silent and bite his tongue, then hash out an entire spat in the work office. The blonde bent down in his chair and grabbed the letter, squaring his jaw firmly in absolute disdain as his fingers passed over the familiar imprint of his father’s seal. The office was tense already, poor Meade jumping slightly in his chair as Laurens all but pounded the letter down on the desk. But nevertheless, John persisted, refusing to leave the office and give Hamilton any form of satisfaction he so desperately craved. The tall Lieutenant Colonel purposefully picked up his own quill as if he was oblivious to the tension of the room and immediately went back to scribbling away, allowing himself to become lost in his translations, begging to be capable of forgetting about the letter from his father. Even if the relief of stress and anger aimed at the letter’s existence was for no more than a moment.