Between the pair of them, they managed to wrestle the man toward the car where they set him across the back. At first, Allie volunteered to sit in back with the man, but neither of them knew who the man was and it seemed less dangerous to have the larger of them there to subdue him if necessary. 

Not that Garin would have managed to subdue the guy if he truly woke up. The fact was, their “find” was a good foot and a half taller than five and a half foot Allie, and seven inches or more taller than Garin, himself. He looked like a good looking, half dead version of Frankenstein's monster, truth be told. 

As Allie pulled onto the highway, Garin ran his hands brusquely up and down the man's arms and began to rub his chest through the jacket which was far too small to really cover the poor guy up at all. Allie indicated that she kept a blanket in the carry-all behind her seat and while it proved to be nothing more than a small, well worn quilt, it was still something and Garin stuffed that around the guy's lower half. Hands and feet would be the least of their worries if he started to die on them. 

“So tell me,” Allie murmured as she sped up and merged with traffic, “he got track marks on those pretty arms of his?” 

“What?” Garin looked down. He'd been so caught up in getting the guy covered and getting him help that he hadn't stopped to look at his arms. “I'll look,” he breathed, reaching down and pulling at the jacket until he could see the guy's arms. His eyes widened. He wasn't fully aware of drug use signs, but what he'd taken at first as being just strange shadowing was indeed a series of scarred tissues and marks up along the inside of the man's elbow and along his arm. “Shit.” 

“Thought I saw those,” Allie shrugged. “The fact is, he's strung out, in a park in nothing but his skivvies, and he's probably coming down from a bad trip. We can take him to the hospital and if he's on something hard, it's probably best we do because detox can kill a guy, no matter how strong he looks – or we can find out where he belongs, get him to one of his buddies, and let them dope him up again.”

“Hospital,” Garin said firmly. 

“He won't thank you for that. The bills alone might knock him back a block or two and he's probably just waiting to get his next fix.” Allie glanced at him by way of her rearview mirror. “Garin, lovey, drug addicts aren't the kinds of guys you help like that. They don't really want help. They just want to be left alone. It's a form of suicide – getting away from the shit in their lives that make them not worth living. You do this, he's not going to thank you.” 

“Hospital,” Garin frowned.

~~

The man didn't react much to anything said or done to him. He seemed to be in his own little world at this point. By the time they reached the hospital, he was warmed up enough to fight off hypothermia, but still acting strangely. Drugs could probably be blamed. He put up another, pitiful fight as he was taken into the ER. He didn't seem to mind the fact that he was making a fool of himself, while in his underwear, in front of everyone inside. He just wanted to get away. 

The staff took him back fairly quick, if not just to get him out of their waiting room. It took several doctors to wrestle him into a bed as his struggling intensified. The man was clearly not happy to be in the hospital. They quickly strapped him down and sedated him before attempting to treat him. When he saw the needle coming at him, the man began to fuse and struggle more than ever. He managed to choke out a few threats at the nurse before she stuck him. A nurse insisted that Garin and Allie wait out in the waiting room while they ran tests. It was a couple hours before anyone got back to them.

A doctor came back with a clipboard full of notes and walked them into a more private room to discuss further action. "Well," He began. "We ran some tests; some of the results won't be in for a few days, but from what we've got so far, it seems that your friend is a long term methamphetamine and steroid abuser. It's not a pretty combination. Psychosis, aggression, liver damage, paranoia..." He looked down at his notes; the list of scary words seemed pretty lengthy. "A guy his size could be very dangerous while coming down off this stuff. He'll need to be kept here a while before the worst of it's over. Even then, once he's back out there, he'll probably go right back to it. Some of these addicts are in here so often, they're on a first name basis with the staff. He doesn't have any ID on him, I doubt he has insurance, he probably doesn't have money to pay for treatment, he's covered in scars, which tells me that he's probably a violent individual. It's not looking good. I hate to say it, but the best thing you could do for him is probably call the police and let them take him in. He'll get free healthcare, three meals a day, and he may learn a thing or two." 

The doctor seemed to have thrown professionalism out the window. He'd seem far too many cases where drug addicts ran themselves into the ground and died, sometimes taking other people with them. He couldn't keep a clear conscience while he let the guy walk out the door, not without at least trying to talk sense into the ones who brought him in. 

~~

With her arms around her hips, Allie sighed and glanced over toward her friend. “Thought as much. Have the police been called?” 

Garin stood back up from where he'd sat in a chair. “Wait, you aren't going to treat him?” he asked, his mouth falling open. “You've admitted him!” 

“Only preliminary measures have been taken,” the doctor frowned. “But without insurance, next of kin, or a police notification, I can't do more than give him a sedative and call him in. For right now, he's just another John Doe going through detox.” The doctor's eyebrows rose and he held out his hand. “It is unlikely anyone can afford to put him through rapid detoxification considering the cocktail he's been taking and the withdrawal, while unpleasant, is more for the meth than the steroids and therefore, not completely lethal. But the state does not, at least, not until the new health care laws are in effect, take on withdrawal and drug abuse without a larger diagnosis. He's more likely to hurt someone and get himself thrown into a cell to go through withdrawals than he is to die from what is going to happen to him.” 

Garin lifted his hands in the air at them both. “So we call the cops and he goes through all this shit in a cell?” One hand came up, palm out in denial even as Allie stepped in to grab his elbow. “No,” he shook his head. “No. That's mean!” It sounded petulant, almost childish to say it aloud, and yet he hadn't any other way of describing it. 

“It's that or call his buddies and he doesn't even have a cell on him, Garin,” Allie tried to reason. 

“Or,” the doctor looked at Garin carefully, “someone who knows him and loves him can take him home, wring him out, and have a long, hard conversation about staying off this shit forever. I know you say you just found him and that's all fine and dandy. I'm not about to implicate anyone here. He's obviously pretty far into this and has been for a long time. But it's also fairly obvious he hasn't had much care and sometimes, I've seen folks come through after someone kind reached out a hand to help when they really needed it.” 

Allie clung to Garin's elbow and took her turn at staring at the doctor in outrage. “That is bullshit,” she snapped. “The last thing any drug abuser needs is some co-dependent fuck to take them on. Garin, this guy, he isn't your family. He's some stranger who is probably crazy as well as coming down. He was naked. In the cold. And high. In the middle of a park. You do not take something like that on. He isn't a project. He's a drug abuser – Listen to me!” She got between the two men and grabbed her friend's arms, shaking him slightly. “I've lived with the drugs, I've seen the shit it does to people. You do not take this on because next thing you know, it'll suck you in and once you grab on, you won't let go until, even though you don't know a thing about him, he's taken everything from you. I love you and I am saying no. Do you hear me? No.” 

Garin swayed under Allie's gaze. He knew the stories she had lived through. They were close friends and with a bit of alcohol and a bad boyfriend or two, they'd both spilled enough pain to one another to get it. She had lost two siblings and a father to drugs (lost, she called it, even though they were still alive, if not well, in Florida) and he had lost a mother to suicide. He had a penchant for taking in lost cases and it was never good. He knew her reasons, could see how serious she was, but the doctor's tiny branch of hope that a bit of kindness might save the day was his weakness. If only someone had reached out to his mother, maybe he wouldn't have had to find her body. If only he could save one more person, maybe he could save her too. 

They both knew the messed up reasons they had for doing things and they supported one another as best they could. It wasn't as if Allie would walk out on him for it, but the pain was clear in her eyes and the stone hard resolve just as obvious. Still, Garin's shoulders slumped and he looked away from her in shame as he muttered, “We'll take him.” 

“Retard,” Allie spat and stalked from the room as Garin watched her go. 

The doctor looked as if he meant to take his words back, but Garin turned to him once more. “I'll take him. Do I need to sign him out or something?” 

“At this point, unless you're ready to give us his name and address, you gotta do nothing more than take him with you, kid,” the doctor rubbed his hand on his forehead in frustration. Drug cases were always more complicated than they needed to be. 

So it was, as the sun was going down that evening, that Garin and Allie had stuffed a half aware giant into the back of her car, drove him two miles to the other side of town, and then proceeded to stuff him into Garin's small brownstone, bundle him up the stairs, and drop him onto Garin's pull-out bed closest to the bathroom. Both of them were exhausted as they stood over his body and panted at the exertion of the stairs combined with his greater weight. 

Exhaustion did not mean Allie was subdued. She turned toward the kitchen with Garin following and huffed indignantly. “Don't think I'm going to lift a finger to help that asshole or you, outside of helping you tie him down,” she snapped as she pulled a chair out and sat at the kitchen table. She watched Garin go about and make them coffee. “The minute he's aware enough to get a friend's name out of him, you send him packing. He won't want some stranger watching over him. And if you're not careful, he'll slit your throat and make off with everything.” 

“Including my maidenly virginity and my set of silver spoons,” Garin grinned at her, setting the percolator to boil. “I got it. You're a love. What do the pamphlets say?” 

“Fuck the pamphlets,” Allie said in frustration, “look it up on the internet. Withdrawals for meth suck the big one, but it's the steroids that are going to be scary. I'll help you watch his heart rate for the first couple of days. I'll make you some broth and stuff, jello, that kind of thing. And we wait. Shouldn't be more than a couple of days of no sleep for you unless you send him off to get his next fix. That'll clear him up real fast.” 

Garin nodded in sad agreement. She was right. He couldn't get too attached to the outcome here. He knew from her experiences that drug users were more than likely to abuse those who cared for them. A bad trip wasn't about to stop this guy from wanting to get out of there. Still, what else was he supposed to do? He gave her a helpless smile. Allie sighed. 

“Yeah,” she said shortly. “I get it. And I don't approve. I'll call Spence and we'll get a team on him. He really might need restraints at some point of time and you can't do this alone. You're lucky I love you.” She aimed a finger at him as she went to call in reinforcements. 

Garin felt the warmth that came from the unconditional way Allie accepted those she did love and with the coffee on the stove, returned to the family room and his newest project. The guy looked worse for wear, sweating and uncomfortable and still bundled in that stupid coat. With a gentleness which had little to do with who he had before him and more to do with Garin's own manner, he got the man out of the coat and sat down on the side of the pull-out. He began to mentally catalogue what he would need for the guy while simultaneously trying to keep a lid on his spending in case he didn't have the guy around for more than a few hours, or until his buddies came for him, as Allie had said. 

The man's eyes were half open and he looked toward Garin almost as if he could see him. Garin gave a small, careful smile. “I'm Garin. You're safe. We're gonna take care of you.” He noted how simple he sounded, once again, as if he couldn't help acting like he was nine again. Funny how time took you years away from something horrific and yet you didn't move a single step. “You gotta name?”

~~