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Edgeworth didn’t remember ever going to bed. He had a fairly strict ritual he usually followed every night while in the middle of trials. Trudging through the front door, changing out of his suit and folding it on his dresser, plugging in his phone, brushing his teeth with his eyes half-closed, and finally falling into bed for a nice five hours of sleep.
He was quite confused when he woke up and felt a mattress and pillow under him and blankets tucking him in without any memory of getting there.
But then he felt a familiar tight ache in his chest and heard a familiar beeping, and he realized that no, he hadn’t put himself to bed. He had chased a suspect with Wright in the dead of night until he collapsed to the wet ground. He had crashed hard onto his right side. The blossoming pain in his shoulder had done nothing to distract him from the pulsing, squeezing pressure in his chest.
He opened his eyes. The room spun just a little. Not like the sky had hours before when he stared up at it in fear. On his right was an IV drip and a clamp on his finger attached to a machine, letting the world know that his heart rate was higher than it should have been. On his left was Phoenix Wright glaring at him.
Glaring at him and holding a bag of grapes.
“Why do you have grapes?” Edgeworth asked. Talking, he found, left him a bit breathless.
“I had Maya bring them for you,” Wright said. “I hoped you might choke on the seeds.”
He threw them on the bed, on top of the sterile-blue blanket. Edgeworth looked at the packaging. There was a painting of a sunny vineyard that stretched for miles and above it, in bold font—
“Those are seedless.”
“Shut up.”
“Why,” Edgeworth coughed and tried disguising it as him clearing his throat, “are you angry?”
“Because I was just told by Gumshoe that you have heart arrhythmia and that you’ve had it for years. And for some reason, despite us being friends, you never thought to tell me until I thought you were dying last night!”
“It’s not a big deal.”
“It’s not a big deal? You literally almost had a heart attack. I almost had a heart attack.”
“And we’re both fine.”
Wright crossed his arms over his chest. He pointed his glare to a whiteboard across the room which declared Edgeworth as being a fall risk and having last been examined at 5:50 am. Nursing staff always made him feel old. A fall risk. It was just a heart condition. He was an otherwise healthy, young man.
Who just so happened to collapse every so often when said heart condition took its toll on him after long trials and stressful cases. Or high-speed runs outside abandoned warehouses at night.
“I don’t think you’re fine, Edgeworth,” Wright said, still giving the whiteboard a look it certainly didn’t deserve. “You look like shit right now.”
He didn’t exactly want to know what he looked like. He imagined it wouldn’t be surprising. It would be like every time he found himself waking up in a hospital or on the floor of his office or an evidence room. The same pale complexion. The same dark smudges under his eyes. He always looked like a corpse as Gumshoe said.
“I’m fine.”
Wright still didn’t look pleased, but at least his eyes had softened. He looked Edgeworth up and down probably in search of a tell or some evidence to prove that it was a lie. But he seemed to give up after only a few seconds. Obviously, Edgeworth wasn’t well. But it would be impossible (and pointless) to get him to admit to it.
“So what do you need to do?” Wright asked, and it almost sounded like, What do I need to make sure you do?
“What do you mean?”
“To, you know, manage it. Do you take medication or something?”
“I do, but it’s not very effective.” Edgeworth flexed his right hand. He hated the IV catheters. They were uncomfortable and stiff. “It’s not effective enough, I should say.”
“Not enough to keep you from keeling over at a crime scene.” Wright rubbed his eyes. “Is there anything else they can do?”
He looked tired. There was a faint shadow of stubble across his jaw. He was still in his suit, though the tie and collar were loose and his jacket was tossed over the chair he was slumped in. He must have been there the entire night. Probably begging nurses and doctors to let him stay past visiting hours.
No. Persuading them. Wright was a lawyer. He probably had a neat list of reasons why he should have been allowed to stay that the staff couldn’t argue with.
But Wright was also Wright. Those lists of reasons definitely came out in a begging tone and were accompanied by his puppy-dog eyes.
“There’s an option for surgery,” Edgeworth said.
“Oh.”
Edgeworth threw the blankets off of him, disrupting the grapes. Wright jumped up to help him and then to grab his hand when he tried pulling his IV line out himself.
“Let’s call someone to do that.”
So, Edgeworth waited as patiently as he could while the call button blinked. Wright ran his fingers through his hair. It didn’t have the usual sharpness to it, the gel or pomade or whatever strong hair product he used washed out by rain and time. It was still slicked back but curled at the ends, falling close to his neck. Edgeworth thought it looked quite nice. Maybe that was what Wright looked like in the mornings or even late evenings. Without the stress carving a deep frown on his face, it would have been pleasant to see him so relaxed.
“What’s the surgery?” Wright asked.
“It would be to implant a defibrillator.”
“They can stick that in you?”
“They can. But it’s not exactly the most practical thing to have done. Not right now.”
Wright nodded, satisfied with the answer for the moment. Edgeworth wouldn’t tell him that practical timing wasn’t due to risks of the surgery or the severity of the condition but instead his own stubbornness. There wasn’t much time to carve out for recovery. It would mean weeks of light work. His own definition of light work—no long nights at his office, no on-scene investigations. It was too much to give up for the time being. He had told his doctors so for two years.
Edgeworth scanned the room. He saw his suit, folded somewhat neatly, on a chair against the wall. His jabot sat on top. Mud was caked on the frills. He remembered desperately trying to pull it off after falling to the ground. Wright had finally untied it for him. His phone had been wedged between his shoulder and ear as he tried to explain to a dispatcher that his "partner" had collapsed. His fingers were slick as he fumbled at the knot before loosening it enough to pull over Edgeworth's head.
The rest of Edgeworth's suit was probably covered in mud as well. Wright’s knees had a faint dusting on them. They looked as if they had been haphazardly scrubbed (probably in the hospital’s bathroom as Wright had clearly not been home).
“What time is it?” he asked.
Wright checked his watch. “Almost seven.”
“We still have three hours until court, then. Did you manage to save the evidence we found?”
“What?”
“We have trial at 10, and we need the evidence—”
“I know. But you’re not really planning on showing up to court, are you?”
“Of course I am.”
“You can’t!”
“Why not?”
“We just had this conversation. You almost had a heart attack.”
“And I’ve told you I’m fine. Besides, there’s no one else that can handle this case. You and I have already worked on it for two days now. No one else in the prosecutor’s office will be able to catch up on what we’ve been doing—not to mention, what we have been doing isn’t exactly looked graciously on by the office.”
There was no other option. Besides, it wouldn't be the first time Edgeworth picked himself up and went right back to work. He didn't have the luxury of taking time off, and it was unnecessary as long as he could still stand.
Wright grabbed his jacket, keeping his head down.
A nurse walked in. When she saw Edgeworth sitting up with his legs dangling over the edge of the bed, she frowned and put her hands on her hips. She was an older woman—used to difficult patients, then. Wright passed her on his way to the door.
"For someone who's supposed to be a prodigy, you're not very smart."
Edgeworth rolled his eyes. Always with the dramatics.
“Wright—”
“I’m tired. I’m going to try to sleep as much as I can before the trial.” The nurse began pushing Edgeworth back down into bed. “By the way, I did ask Maya and Gumshoe to grab the evidence and take it back to my office. They’ll be happy to know you’re fine.”
The nurse pushed on Edgeworth’s shoulder. He laid back against the pillows. His breathing came a little hard. His chest ached more than it had minutes ago. A touch of embarrassment made his face flush.
Wright walked out the door without looking back.
After all, Edgeworth was fine.