A/N: Thank you for all the reviews!

Hank jolts up like he's been shocked and runs to Evan, possessed by an unidentifiable force.

It's only about six feet away from him, his brother and the now-still convertible, but it feels like he's on an airport runway, this long stretch that is impossible to canvass within seconds by foot.

But finally Hank reaches Evan, dropping to his knees on the pavement, on the shards of glass from the convertible's windshield and for once, his hands can't immediately land to the patient (to Evan). They're shaking, unsteady, coupled with his pounding heart and just hovering in trepidation.

Divya is at his side saying something but Hank doesn't hear her (can't hear her) because he's too busy fighting the force that isn't letting him touch the fragile being that's morphed from his brother.

He gently rolls his brother over to face him, holding his breath as he does so. "Oh, Ev..." Hank whispers, eyes darting over his brother's complexion which has become some sort of canvas - an array of small cuts on his forehead, cheek and chin, a bruise blooming along his jawline. And that's just his face. Hank doesn't want to think about the dangers underneath Evan's button-up shirt or the fact that one of his legs is dangerously bent.

"Hank, I've already dialed 911," Divya offers, her words trying to placate the man but they just fall flat to the doctor, who is too busy checking Evan for a pulse (why had he not thought of that earlier?).

Thankfully, he does have a pulse - as dangerously slow as it is - and just as Hank is about to lift his brother's shirt to examine the rest of him, Evan's eyes open, a gradual movement that has Hank completely distracted, moving back to his brother's face.

"Ha...nk?" Evan asks, voice carrying a pain-filled rasp.

"Evan!" Hank blurts, because that's the only word he can say right now, the only one that's important.

"What...?" Evan continues, his blue eyes scuttling across the scene around him: the crashed vehicles, Divya running back and forth to the injured drivers and finally Hank himself, who for once isn't the picture of tranquility. He looks almost...afraid of Evan. Evan wonders briefly if he had done something to scare him right before everything had gone hazy.

"Evan, you were in an accident." Hank rushes to fill in, watching the way his brother's breathing seems to get more labored. He keeps it short, keeps it simple because if he expands any further on that word, accident, he's not sure he'll have good control over his breathing either. He thinks back to the moment when Evan had shouted his name and the strength with which he had shoved him. Evan had seemed so...determined not to let the car hit Hank.

"Wha...'bout you?" Evan asks, eyes flicking down to the blood on Hank's hands that had come off of his own shirt.

Hank's eyes follow the invisible path Evan had created. He looks at the blood in surprise for a moment and then remembers whose it is.

"No..." Hank manages. "No, Evan, I'm okay. Just...just stay focused on you, alright?" he watches in surprise as Evan's hand slowly rests on his arm.

"Glad…you're okay." Evan says between breaths. Hank just keeps staring at him with that weird look, like he's not sure whether he's terrified or relieved, hanging in a balance.

Hank notices the look in Evan's eyes, the way he's regarding him like he's half-insane and says quickly, "Yeah, I am, let's just worry about you, alright?"

Evan's eyelids start to descend downward. "Don't…worry 'bout…me."

"Evan!" Hank warns, feeling something inside him pull. Because the thing is, the horrible, simple truth of it is that Hank has seen this before, knows this route that patients go on. And it's not a particularly good one.

Evan's eyes snap open once again.

"Just…stay awake." Hank finds himself pleading with this version of his brother.

Evan's eyes still look like they are straining to stay open and Hank has never felt so hopeless. He feels like he's been stripped of all power, forced to watch the way pain unfolds across his brother.

Behind him, Divya is talking to the Escalade woman and telling her to please sit down and some small part of Hank knows Divya can't handle all these injuries on her own but he can't (can't) leave Evan here on the road, surrounded by strangers vying to get a glimpse of the chaos.

"Hey, Ev!" Hank takes his brother's hand, gives it a firm enough squeeze, demands, "Stay awake!"

Evan blinks. Two slow, heavy movements and then his eyes stay closed.

OoOoOoOo

Hank is no stranger to hospitals. Having spent years as an ER doctor, he's seen some pretty traumatic injuries and rarely, death. But never before has he seen it through the eyes of the distressed companion - the mother/father/brother/sister/wife/husband ratio that never failed: patient gets wheeled to hospital, mother/father/brother/sister/husband/wife nervously frets in the waiting room crying/pacing/wringing his/her hands and then the doctor walks in and either gently sits them down or begins the diagnosis standing.

But see, the thing is, Hank doesn't want to fit in this equation, this cut and dry approach that can so easily fit him into the fold. Because he's not the mother/father/brother (well, he is)/sister/wife/husband. He's the concierge doctor, the big brother, the one who is supposed to do the saving. But it's not him behind those doors – it's him that has to sit in the cramped, plastic chair and pretend like he cares about People's 100 Sexiest Men. And since when the hell is Johnny Depp considered attractive?

Hank's fiddling with the corners of the magazine's cover, folding them back and straightening them when the doctor walks in. He immediately jumps from his chair, not saying a word, just staring at the woman before him.

"Hi, I'm Dr. Hartman." The woman reaches for his hand and Hank dismissively shakes hers, eager to know the condition of his brother.

Hank is barely listening to the doctor, who goes through the formalities of introducing herself and knowing who Hank is and gosh he's such a great doctor and poor, poor little brother of his, he's got a broken leg and some bruised, broken ribs but he will be fine, miraculously and that is all Hank needs because somewhere in there, there was the word fine.

"…he's on the third floor, room 112-"

And Hank's off, running.

OoOoOoOo

Hank has been hesitant in his life about a lot of things. He was hesitant when he proposed to his girlfriend back in New York because it was one hell of a step (and look where it got him), he was hesitant about this new life in The Hamptons, where everyone and everything are all hiding behind facades made up of how much money they make and what parties they throw and he is hesitant about one thing in particular, at this very moment and that is the opening of Evan's hospital room door.

He's not sure why, exactly, his hands are shaking, his heart racing. He has done this before, created a pattern, really, of the ER doctor that delivers the news, outlines conditions and apologizes when all is lost. But right now he's not that collected doctor with the calm tone and gentle gestures. He's a statistic, a variable, a typical role in this entire thing. But that's all logic and there can't possibly be any way to retrieve it in the murky mess that is Hank's mind.

Opening the door, if you look at it objectively, really is the hardest part of the process. Opening the door means looking at the patient (at Evan), seeing the bumps and bruises (from the car) and then having to sit down and wait for the patient (for Evan) to wake up. But somehow delaying the process seems like a much simpler idea, almost a coward's way out. Hank has never felt so uninhabited from his own body - just looking down at himself, a stranger that can't function without a means, a map handed to him on how to operate. But really, there isn't a map when it's your brother.

Finally, Hank finds his hand floating up to the doorknob and opening it, holding his breath when he steps into the room and unwillingly looks over at his brother. At such a distance he can't really assess the injuries (he knows them by definition, knows the exact ones Dr. Hartman had explained) and he wonders if he should move any further. He can't stand the little modicum of apprehension at the back of his mind that has him so…scared to just go into Doctor Mode.

He moves closer to Evan's bed, one step at a time. And when he finally gets there…he forces himself to look, really look.

A particularly large gash on Evan's forehead had needed stitches, which is the most brutal, face-wise. There is a collection of minor scrapes and bruises on his cheeks and chin but otherwise generally okay.

As for the rest of him…Hank's eyes travel down to his brother's ribs, where two had been cracked and another bruised from the car's impact. Looking even further, Hank takes notice of the cast on his brother's left leg and winces at the memory of Evan's body being thrown down the road.

All in all, as Dr. Hartman had said, Evan is pretty fortunate. He could have been much worse off or really…the other thing…but it's still a pretty traumatic day, not counting the weeks he and Evan hadn't spoken at all, not counting the way his brother had flinched at such a simple touch on his shoulder.

Hank knows there is so much more to think about and discuss but for now he'll just lean back in a cheap plastic chair and wait for his brother to re-enter the world.

OoOoOoOo

Evan waking up sort of goes like this:

"Hank."

"…"

"Hank!"

"…"

"Hank!"

"…"

"HANK!"

"Jesus, Evan!" Hank shouts and since it's the first time he's said his brother's name in a long time, he smiles about falling out of his chair with urgency at the sound of a voice.

"I can't help it if you snore louder than a polar bear," Evan says, eyes illuminated once more.

"Really? You couldn't have picked a different animal? A lion, maybe?"

"Hank, you are nowhere near as majestic as a lion." Evan rolls his eyes and Hank smiles through his annoyance because after two days of anticipation his brother is finally awake and joking, despite the tight lines at his eyes, like maybe he's holding back that he's in pain.

There is a sudden shift change in the atmosphere and Hank knows that he has to say this, has to get everything out.

"How are you doing?" he asks first.

Evan rubs his eye. "Well, I've been awake practically the entire morning and have been pestered by three different nurses all who have"-he pushes himself up in his bed-"asked me that same question."

"And?"

"My chest hurts a little and my leg feels weird," Evan admits, avoiding Hank's concerned gaze. "But I wouldn't mind some food other than runny eggs and warm milk." He looks over at his barely-touched breakfast.

"You first, food later." Hank instructs, looking outside the room for a nurse.

OoOoOo

It's later, evening, when Evan wakes up again from his pain med-induced slumber. This time Hank's waiting – just idly leaning back in his chair, counting the tiles on the ceiling and wondering how exactly to start his apology (because, really, Evan pushing him out of the way of a speeding car even though he'd been a complete asshole to him before merits something).

"Hey," Evan says slowly, attempting to form words through a raspy voice.

"Hey," Hank says back, still waiting for the vertigo to pass, the one that tilts his world every time Evan opens his expressive eyes.

Hank looks down at his watch. "It's about eight 'o clock."

Evan nods and then looks over at his brother. "What? Why are you looking at me like that?"

Hank breaks through the dam, the apprehension. "Evan…you were in a serious accident." (Except accident doesn't really sum it up quite so correctly).

Evan looks at his brother like he's got amnesia or something. "Yes...I was aware of that when I felt my body roll over the car."

Hank shakes his head. "You don't…you don't understand how serious it was."

"Because I don't know medical terms to comprehend it?" Evan asks, immediately anticipating a Hank Medical Lecture with the jargon he learned from years of schooling. He starts to say something else but Hank cuts him off, blurts, "You jumped in front of a car!" because he can not hold this in, keep this information only to himself. "You could have died!"

Evan seems to flinch.

"Do you have any idea how stupid that was?" (how brave, how selfless?).

Evan starts to speak up, to say something and then stops as Hank continues.

"You really scared me, Evan." And there it is, raw, full of purpose, honest.

And then something in Evan opens, something equally as passionate – if not more so – than Hank's outburst.

"You would have been killed if I hadn't done something!" Evan shouts, true anger finding its way through his words because Hank can not just sit here and yell at him for saving his life.

Hank stops, pauses mid-rant and sees the way Evan's eyes are wide, the stance he's holding, even sitting down in the bed, the way his words seem to have been wrenched out of him. It almost feels like Evan's kept the declaration clandestine for years, even though it's only been a few days.

"I…I saw the way you were standing there." Evan says, gesturing to his brother. "You weren't going to move!" at Hank's lack of response he adds, softer, "You…you were going to get hurt."

Oh, Ev, Hank wants to say. Because the hell of it all is that Evan is concerned for him getting hurt when Hank – metaphorically, anyway – had been the one to hurt his brother. But despite the weeks of the cold shoulder, here Evan is, honest and wide-eyed and almost…vulnerable in his delivery. Hank wants to say something, wants to say a million things but he feels like his mind is a slate wiped clean and all previous notions of saying anything remotely close to what he wants to have evaporated. His brother's sentence was so simple and yet the complexities are not lost on him.

So what tumbles from his mouth is, "Thank you."

Evan looks bewildered and Hank doesn't blame him. He sits there for a moment, wishing there's some sort of guide for a man who has virtually everything laid out already for him but can't seem to function when emotions come into play.

Finally, he says, "Look, Ev, I'm sorry about…before."

Evan blinks rapidly as if trying to reject the conversation. "You don't have to say anything."

"No, I do," Hank interrupts before his walls of stability completely tumble down. "I was wrong to say those things about you. I'd…I'd had a rough day and was unfair by letting it out on you." It's difficult to say these things, to expose this side he refuses to display. He's a doctor; he can't afford to make mistakes. And yet here he is, opening up to the biggest one he's made yet.

Evan is caught between wanting to diffuse the eerie feeling he's acquired about the fact that this conversation is happening at all to continuing to listen to his brother.

Hank is looking at him like he's this fragile being and he can't help but be a little curious as to where this is going.

"I know I don't exactly…express my appreciation for…what you do," Hank looks right at Evan because he has to. "And I should because honestly, you do a lot for…for HankMed."

"Thanks…" Evan says slowly, almost wary of this version of his brother.

Hank still has more to say, more to elaborate on and he pushes himself to get it out now. "I shouldn't…be focused on your mistakes so much. I mean, I make mistakes too. It was a mistake to say all of those things to you, it wasn't fair. And now it's…well you're sitting and you shouldn't have to be."

Evan's luminous eyes seem to harden. "Is that what you think? That it's your fault I'm here right now?" the severity of his tone shocks Hank. "Well, it's not," he continues sharply. "Hank, I pushed you out of the way for a reason. You think a petty fight would stop me from being your brother?" his chest his heaving now with determination. "You weren't exactly model material, yeah, but crap like that doesn't matter when…" he stops, noticing the look on Hank's face.

"I…" Hank can't speak. When did his brother acquire this language, this way of speaking that has him feeling almost…reassured for his mistakes? "I'm sorry, Evan."

Evan looks like he may want to say more but he just says, "Thank you." All solemn and serious and just when Hank thinks he's lost some part of his brother, Evan cracks a smile and asks, "So how about that food now?"

OoOoOo

Two weeks later, Hank and Divya are sitting across from each other in the guesthouse kitchen, going over usual HankMed business.

Evan has been released for four days already and Hank has refused to let him get out of bed for anything, despite his attempts.

"And then I think we should write these down…" Hank hands Divya two papers. Divya nods, reaching for a pen, when a familiar voice interjects, "Wouldn't it be easier to type those, Henry?"

Hank turns around to see Evan, clad in a bathrobe, looking earnestly at the two of them. Since the accident, Evan has managed to get his usual color back, but his typical demeanor is a little slowed, thanks to the broken leg. Which is ultimately why Evan is supporting himself against the kitchen island right now.

"Evan!" Hank scolds, immediately standing up to help his brother back to bed. "What do you think you're doing?"

"Hank…" Evan seems to whine. "I'm so bored just lying in bed."

"And while I appreciate your uncharacteristic feelings toward laziness, you really do need to stay in bed." Hank shoots Divya a 'give me a minute' look and helps support Evan in his walk back to his bedroom.

"Easy, easy," he says, lowering his brother onto the bed and gently pulling the covers over him.

"Can't I at least sort out bills or something?" Evan pleads.

"Divya and I are sorting everything out," Hank says to him. "You need to rest."

Evan groans. "For how much longer?"

Hank just gives him a look. "Good night, Evan," he reaches behind him to shut the door when he hears Evan say,

"Hey, Hank?"

Hank hesitates, fearing something is wrong.

"Don't let Divya touch the Coleman file. I want that."

Hank smiles. "Yeah, okay, Ev."

"And Hank?"

"Yeah?"

"Sinceee you're not allowing me to get up, could you get me something to drink?"

"Okay."

"Hank!"

"What?"

"And maybe something to eat? But don't cook anything. I don't wanna have food poisoning on top of all this."

"Uh-huh."

"HANK!"

"WHAT NOW?"

Evan grins. "Love you."

Hank smirks. "Like you."

The end