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When Eliot gets injured, it’s because five guys beat the shit out of him, and even then Eliot always manages to win the fight anyways. When Parker gets injured, it’s because she fells forty or so feet, and even then she gets up and tries to walk it off.
When Alec gets injured? It’s because he slipped getting out of the damn bed, caught his arm on the mattress on his way down, wrenched it, and ended up with a broken collar bone.
Parker doesn’t believe he could have possibly injured himself like that at first, but Eliot tells her it’s true when he’s done examining Alec’s arm, carefully prodding and bending it.
After Parker gets over her disbelief, they’re pretty good about it. Eliot keeps bringing him food and blankets and drinks and anything else he could want, basically putting Alec in a nest, giving him everything he needs. Alec keeps telling him he can walk, but Eliot rolls his eyes and shoves another sandwich at him, so Alec stops complaining.
Parker even plays WoW for him, because it’s damn hard to do with one arm immobilized. To tell the truth, he could probably play better one handed than she does, because she’s just learning, but he appreciates the gesture.
They both also keep trying to help him in and out of bed, like it wasn’t a freak accident, like it’s something that they can prevent from happening again. For the first four days, Alec tries to see the sweetness in it. After that, he’s just frustrated.
“I ain’t gonna break,” he snaps.
“You might fall,” Eliot says, completely calm and annoyingly rational. “Having limited mobility in one arm affects your balance.”
“I can get outta bed,” Alec says.
“Probably,” Parker says in a tone that indicates that she doubts it. “Or…you could just stay in bed. We all could.”
Well, that sounds like a damn good idea to him. It must to Eliot, too, because suddenly he’s carefully pulling Alec back into bed, until Alec’s laying in the middle, Parker curled up into his good side, Eliot on the side with the broken collarbone, carefully avoiding the break.
Alec knows what they’re doing. Knows they’re trying to keep him in some sort of bubble, knows they don’t like the fact that he’s fragile and breakable. And he knows someday soon he’ll have to remind them that he has a job to do, thank you, and they can’t keep watch over him forever.
But for now, he can get behind cuddling in bed with them. If it makes them feel better.