Somewhere in Blackpool

Serenity smiled brightly. "Hello, Elroy! How are you?" She seemed rather friendly.

"Just great." He pulled up the same chair from yesterday right next to her bed. "Can you move yet?"

"Well, not the broken arm, but everything else is okay. My hips are bruised, though, my ovaries have a 17% chance of something going wrong if I get pregnant now, my legs hurt, I can't sleep without a doctor watching me in case I flatline, and I had a wonderful visit from the idiot couple that ran me over. God, they were idiots. Wouldn't stop apologizing, wouldn't shut up..." Serenity ranted off.

"That's why we look both ways!" he exclaimed with the enthusiasm of one of those children's PSA announcers.

Serenity giggled, but quickly gathered her wits. "Well.. I have some rather bad news. I need you to do me a favor."

"Sure, what?"

"Apparently these doctors are allowed to tell me how to live. I sort of need to live with another person, mostly at night, you know, for the head trauma. I could have some kind of seizure in the bath and drown.." Serenity rolled her eyes. "But there's no way I'm going to a homeless shelter. So I need you to tell me if you know where Olivia is. Or, if you have some really big house in Florida that you were hiding from me, and it's on the beach, and there's dolphins, and piles of gold.." She trailed off, mumbling.

Elroy considered his options. Either nag the shit out of his parents until they gave him a shack on the island, or leave the pretty blonde girl to die and go get a cheeseburger, since he was particularly famished. He'd skipped lunch that day, you see. Now that he thought about it, maybe the nagging wouldn't take too long. Elroy was the good child, after all. His stomach growled.

"Umm..." Serenity raised her eyebrows. "Were you even listening? I want to live in Florida.." She started staring at the ceiling again, convinced she should've died in the car crash. Even if she healed up properly, she still had hospital bills to pay. They weren't giving her a room out of the kindness of their hearts.

"My parents like you, right?"

"Well, I guess. Your mom didn't kick me out of your house when I was freeloading there. Does that count?"

"And considering your recent loss, and adding on this injury... I think you're set."

A slow smile spread across Serenity's face. "Perfect. You're smarter than most people give you credit for, you know?"

"Don't I?" he said with a laugh.

"Alright then. All set. Do you think there's anything that would make them take more pity on me?"

"Doubt it."

"Swell, then. I get out of here in a week."

"Alright. How about we go over there tomorrow, then?"

"Alright. As long as it doesn't involve playing the piano. Or, um, chopping up onions. I can't do those things with one arm.."

And she fell asleep and woke up and IT WAS TOMORROW.

Meanwhile, in a little gray-brick building on the east side, Elroy was hard at work balancing things, one on top of the other, upon his desk. He was quite amused by this, and it was a lovely break from number-crunching.

And suddenly, somebody burst into his office. "Elroy!" Serenity squealed, grinning widely. "I have a gigantic surprise for you. Can you leave now, or should I have a talk with your boss?"

That tower of various objects was toppled. "Oh, look! Look what you did!" He threw his hands up. "Thanks a lot!"

"Oh, gosh, I'm sorry. But honestly, this is great. Really. You have to come with me, I just spent the entire day doing this!"

"How about... go home. I'll be off in about-" He paused to look at the clock, clicking his tongue. "Twenty minutes."

"Elroy, please?" Serenity asked. "I worked really, really hard on this. And it's beautiful. And life-changing."