The One Where Everybody's Scared, Part 4

LaVieEnRose

Three days after I got out of the hospital, I finally woke up feeling like I might not die before breakfast. This was, all things considered, a pretty major improvement, since I'd spent the past two weeks feeling like I wouldn't survive sitting up. I looked at the clock and it was just after seven. Brian wasn't there, and the past few days he'd woken me up before he went to work to kiss me and pour some water down my throat and nag me about eating, so I knew he must still be in the apartment.

I got up, slowly, feeling the grafts stretch on my chest and stomach, and padded into the living room. “Brian?” I said, craning my head into the kitchen. Nothing, but there was a pot of coffee brewed, so I poured myself a cup and saw him through the balcony door, drinking out of his favorite mug and reading the paper.

He raised an eyebrow at me when I came out. Well well well, this is quite the development. Look who's vertical.

Hi.

He pulled me down and gave me a kiss, his hand on the back of my neck. Feeling better?

I nodded. Breathing better too. Hear?

I do. He studied me. Do you want to come to Kinnetik today? I was hoping to go back to work on Monday, but that was still four days off. So far I'd really just been sleeping the whole time Brian was gone. And most of when Brian was home.

Why, do you want me to draw something?

He shook his head. Just to hang out.

I sipped my coffee. I usually like hanging out at Kinnetik, and I did want to get out of the apartment. More importantly, I knew what was going on, that Brian was antsy and nervous and feeling sort of clingy, that it was one thing to leave me alone all day when I was just going to slug around in bed and another when I could be up and about and doing things where he couldn't see me. And it was paranoid and unnecessary, but after what I'd just put him through it was hard to really blame him.

Problem was, I was also already feeling kind of nauseated and dizzy and the thought of going all the way into Queens made me so, so tired.

Maybe tomorrow? I said. I think I need another day to just sleep. Is that okay? Maybe it would be enough reassurance if he knew I wasn't going to be wandering out into the world without him.

He gave me a strange look, like he was amused by how weird I was. Of course it's okay.

I mean, I don't want you to miss me too much, I said smoothly.

He rolled his eyes.

Crying into your briefcase...

All right, all right, enough already.

I smiled and set my coffee cup down and went over to the railing and looked over the city. I used to be scared of heights when I was younger, but...I don't know, I guess when enough scary stuff happens to you, you stop being afraid of stuff that could happen because the stuff actually happening is enough all on its own. Or maybe that's some pseudo-intellectual bullshit and I just grew out of it, whatever.

I felt a tap against the back of my ankle, and I turned around. Brian had stretched his leg away from his chair enough to nudge me with his toe. It's funny. I think about how he used to say, “Hey,” all softly to get my attention, and if I focus enough I can almost kind of hear it still, and I get a little sad, but I also like the weird ways we have now, even if it means I'm constantly picking up shit he throws at me.

You rang? I said.

Brian kept his eyes on his paper. Stay away from the edge, okay?

I tilted my head and looked at him, but he didn't look up.

“Yeah, okay,” I said, and I came over and kind of crowded into him. He raised his head, finally, and moved the paper off to the side, and I straddled his lap and kissed him.

He got to be a little overprotective right now. I could be patient.

**

I managed to stay up watching TV until a record ten AM after Brian left for work before I gave up and went back to bed. I woke up around two, answered a text from Derek, thought about taking a shower, and promptly fell back asleep and didn't wake up until the light was low outside and Brian's hand was running down my spine.

“Hi,” I said.

He kissed my forehead. Hi. Good nap?

I can't believe I'm still this lazy.

Imagine if you'd gotten this sick when you were a teenager. You'd have slept for a week.

I think that literally did happen when I got sick as a teenager.

Brian considered this. True. Have you eaten? He went to the bathroom to wash his hands, and I pulled my shirt off in preparation.

“No.”

Want me to order in? Or we could heat up something Ben and Michael left. He sat down on the bed next to me and studied the healing burns. He dabbed the antibiotic cream on them, so gently, checking my face every so often to see if he was hurting me. He was, but I tried not to show it.

No, I'll make something. I winced as his finger caught on my skin, and he rested his other hand on my arm, soothing me. I breathed out, slowly. Tomato soup? Grilled cheese?

He shrugged. We can't keep eating like this every time you get sick or I'm going to weigh three hundred pounds.

I could always get sick less often.

Could you?

Maybe not.

He finished up with the cream and eased me back into my shirt. He was so gentle, his hands coming around to cup the back of my head when it came through the neck.

I'm going to make you keep putting clothes on me after I'm well, I said.

He considered this. Do I still get to take them off you?

Oh, I guess.

Then all right. He gave me a hand out of bed and waited patiently while the room swam in and out of focus. I went into the kitchen, coughing a little into my elbow, feeling the floor vibrate behind me as he followed me. You know, it's too bad you didn't come in today, Brian said, climbing up on the bar and sitting there, legs dangling. Your friend Leo came in, from the hearing aids?

Aw, yeah. I would have just been crashed out on your couch though. I was useless.

We had some new client come in too who is apparently the most gorgeous thing on God's green earth. Everyone in the office was mesmerized.

I got out a pot for the soup. Not you?

He shrugged. She's a woman.

You can still tell when women are attractive.

Brian shrugged. I don't know, can I? I guess Cynthia's pretty. And Daphne.

Wait, seriously, you can't tell? I opened a can of soup into the pot. I make this really nice tomato bisque from scratch, but that felt like waaaaay too much work. I thought that was just some shit straight guys said about men because they're paranoid of seeming gay.

So you can look at a girl and think, okay, she's hot?

Of course. It's just aesthetics. Like looking at a painting. Not to mention at this point we're so media-trained that we know what we're supposed to find attractive, like, culturally. Don't tell me an ad man doesn't know that.

This is why I need you in my art department, Brian said. One of these days I'm going to steal you away from Marie. I'll pay you better. I'll buy you an even bigger canvas.

I turned on the stove. I miss my canvas.

Maybe we can get down to the studio this weekend. If you're feeling up to it.

And you just sit there while I paint?

I've spent the past two weeks just sitting there while you slept. Painting will seem very exciting in comparison. Plus, you're sitting around watching me work tomorrow. He nodded to the stove. Do you want me to do that?

No, I'm fine.

He watched me. Okay.

I made sandwiches, fried them on the stove, and tried not to worry too much about the way Brian never, ever took his eyes off me.

The past few weeks had been, to put it mildly, fucking awful. I got to sleep through some of it, but I don't think I'll ever forget how it felt the first day, when they cleaned out my burns for the first time, or how fucking terrible I felt when I started getting sick and I was so cold and couldn't breathe for the life of me. I was so confused that I barely knew where I was most of the time, and sometimes Brian wasn't there and that was the most upsetting thing of all, and like...as if there weren't already enough pressure on him, you know?

God, I just felt so fucking bad about what I'd put him through. If you look at what a mess I was when all he did was break his ankle...fuck, I can't even imagine how I'd be if it had been Brian in that bed instead of me. I mean, I freaked out the whole time he had cancer, and he had a ninety-nine percent survival rate! No one's ever come right out and told me what they were guessing for me when I was at my worst, but I'm guessing it was a lot worse than ninety-nine percent. And he'd had to hold everything together for my mom, and for me, and all our friends texting him all the time, and to manage the language barrier with the doctors and nag everyone about my allergies all constantly and otherwise just be totally, totally on his game. And I keep fucking doing this shit to him.

So basically, if he wanted to bring me to work with him, if he wanted to stare at me when I was near a stove, that was pretty fucking reasonable. I couldn't let it go on forever, and at some point we would need to have the big heart-to-heart and maybe he'd start to ease up, but...fuck, he could have whatever he wanted for the time being.

I made him dinner, pulled him into the shower, and helped him relax the best way I knew how.

**

I woke up the next morning feeling like I could actually take a deep breath. I showed off to Brian, who raised his eyebrows and said, Okay, save some for the rest of us.

I might wear actual clothes today, I said.

He pulled me up, hooking his arms underneath mine. Come to the office with me, then. He kissed me at my hairline. You can sleep on the couch if you want.

One of these days you're going to get sick of me.

Oh, ship has sailed on that one, he said. What he actually said was train go sorry, which is a ASL idiom, and God, it was so fucking cool seeing him pick that stuff up. But you come back around.

I yawned. Like a bad pop song.

The fuck would you know about that, he said, and I laughed.

We got coffee and bagels on the way to the train and took the 1 to Times Square, then the Q into Astoria. I love the Q train because once you get into Queens it's above ground, and you get the most amazing views of Manhattan. I've been on it a million times and I still always turn and watch the moment the train comes up and the skyline just hits you. Brian always laughs at me and tells me I look like a tourist, but I don't care.

Cynthia jumped up from her desk and hugged me when I came in. Okay, careful, Brian said, speaking too. Some of his skin is still newly attached.

You look great, Cynthia said to me, which was sweet, though I'm pretty sure she didn't know how to sign you sort of still look like death warmed over, so I had to take it with a grain of salt.

Should I call Stephanie? Cynthia asked.

No, that’s okay. I didn’t really need to know what Brian was saying on his phone calls, and if Stephanie was here I’d feel weird about just ignoring her to draw or nap or whatever.

Brian and I went down the hall to his office, passing a few of his executives who I vaguely knew but whose names I couldn’t remember, so I just nodded at them. One of them mumbled something to the other on the way by and Brian rolled his eyes.

What did he say?

He didn’t know it was take your child to work day.

I stifled a laugh. Someone’s getting fired.

Brian pointed at himself as he opened the door to his office for me. Someone's getting Botox.

Kinnetik has one of my paintings as soon as you walk in, one in the art department—Maybe it will show these boring assholes what art is supposed to look like, Brian complained once—and two in Brian’s office. The space is this renovated theater, which is amazing, but it means Brian’s office doesn’t have any windows. His place back at the Baths didn’t either, so I guess he doesn’t care. It would drive me crazy!

He sat at his desk and opened up his laptop, pulling one of his little fidget toys onto his his lap to play with. Brian's inability to do anything without also doing something else is so, so goddamn cute. And is part of what makes him such a great signer. You need anything? he asked me.

I settled myself on the couch and pulled a sketchpad out of my backpack. I'm good.

What are you working on? he asked, scrolling through his email.

“Sketching what I want to do for the upper right corner of my canvas,” I said, out loud so he didn't have to keep looking up from his work.

Your voice sounds normal again, he said. You've been really hoarse.

“Yeah, my throat doesn't hurt anymore. How about you, what are you doing today?”

I have a call with Ted in an hour to talk about business back in the Pitts, except I'm sure it's mostly going to be him interrogating me about how you're doing.

“Well, I'm very interesting.”

Cynthia found a new account she wants me to court, so I'm going to do some investigative work and find out who's representing them now and what they're getting paid, see if it's even worth our time. But she's usually right. And HR just finished their final round of interviews for a new representative, so they need me to approve the candidate. I don't know when that is.

“What was Breyer here for yesterday?” I asked.

Brian leaned back in his chair. Well, their last ad was a hit with a different age bracket than we'd expected, so now we're wondering if... and he kept going and told me what he was planning and bounced ideas off me and you don't really care about the details, and frankly neither did I, I just cared about the fact that Brian was telling me and he wanted my opinion. I'll never, ever get over that. I think sometimes about when Brian and I met, and I'd watch him with other people and kind of be amazed, because even though he's always been the more quiet of the two of us, he's always talked to me. I mean, hell, he told me about him and his gym teacher after he'd known me for twenty-minutes. And after I saw that he wasn't like that with everyone, that he answers his closest friends with two words if he can manage it or a deflecting joke if he can't, I started kind of holding my breath every time I asked a question, worried I was one day going to push too hard or ask something too personal and I would be relegated to the same treatment they got. And I think a part of me still worries. I don't know, I think I'm going to wake up every day a little surprised that Brian Kinney loves me, and I think I'm good with that.

So anyway, I just sat on the couch and let the conversation wash over me until he had to do his phone call with Ted, which involved a lot of exasperated faces I tried not to laugh at, and at some point I stopped drawing what I wanted for my canvas and started drawing him again. Sue me, it's hard to concentrate when my favorite subject is right in front of me, looking devastating and dominating in his suit.

After a couple hours I was fading, though, and Brian watched me with amusement from his desk. Just go to sleep, he said.

But I'm supposed to keep you company, I said, totally already hauling my legs up on the couch.

I do somehow manage to get through the day without you most of the time, dearest. Don't put your fucking shoes—Justin, take your goddamn shoes off.

You are so fucking irritating, I said, pulling the throw pillow over my head.

Brian gave a sigh so dramatic I could almost hear it and came over to the couch, taking his suit jacket off as he walked. He lay it over top of me, then yanked my shoes off so hard it almost pulled me off the couch, and I snickered until I fell asleep, curled up small under his jacket.

He woke me up in the middle of an unsettling dream, and it took me a while to get my bearings. You okay? he asked, and for a minute I thought I must have been yelling in my sleep or something, but the dream hadn't gotten to that point yet and Brian was waking me up really gently, not in the urgent way he does when I have a nightmare.

I nodded and sat up, and when I went to rub my eyes I noticed my right hand was twitching. “Oh,” I said.

I'm keeping an eye on it, it's okay. You feel all right?

Yeah. Tired. I yawned. Hungry.

He kissed me. Let's go get lunch, then.

He took me to a Greek—because, you know, Astoria—sidewalk cafe near his office, and I had the most amazing gyro of my life. Brian watched me in disbelief as I wolfed it down. I'd say you have your appetite back.

Yay me.

How's the hand?

Behaving. One of the many perks of New York over Pittsburgh is how people don't stare at us when we sign in public. In Pittsburgh, we're an exhibit wherever we go. Here, we were probably—I mean, it's not like I could tell for sure—one of like five different languages being spoken just on this block. Par for the course. I feel like between being Brian Kinney's boy toy, the subject of a fairly high-profile Liberty Avenue hate crime, a sign language user, and now apparently someone who's at risk for falling down and having a seizure at any given moment, I've really gotten enough unasked for attention to last me a lifetime. It's nice to blend.

A woman walked past us, stuffing stuff into her a purse, and a tampon fell out and landed on the sidewalk next to Brian. He leaned out of his chair and got it and called after her, but she didn't turn around, so he shrugged and placed it on the table. Got you this.

Thank you.

Did you see that MoMa's going to run a Andy Moore exhibit?

No shit, really?

Brian nodded, sipping his espresso. Starting the Monday after next. I have to go back to Pittsburgh that weekend, but we can go during the week if you want.

Yeah. I'm gonna be so fucking swamped catching up with work, though. Doesn't matter. I'll make it work. I don't want to go without you.

You know you don't have to rush back to work, right?

Marie's not going to let me take off forever.

I don't care about Marie.

I gave him a look. I need to care about Marie. Jobs don't grow on trees for Deaf guys with no college degree and nothing on their resume but being a busboy.

You can focus on your art. I'll keep you in pretty things.

Why are you being weird? I said, even though I knew, but...at some point I needed to start gently asserting some boundaries on this.

I'm not being weird, he said, unsurprisingly. I just don't want you rushing back before you're ready because you're afraid of losing your job. If you lose it...we'll deal.

I'll be okay by Monday, I said.

If you say so.

I do, I said, and my hand took that opportunity to spasm on the table.

Brian gave me a look.

I do, I said again, and he sighed and shrugged and asked our waiter for the check.

**

The rest of our day was nice. I napped some more in his office, and sketched, and played solitaire on my phone. He pulled me into the bathroom and we fooled around, and even though he was still too skittish to really fuck me so we just blew each other, that was a pretty fucking good time. We got out of there at a reasonable hour, and he held my hand on the way to the subway, and when we got home we reheated some casserole Michael made and watched a schlocky horror movie on the couch, my feet on his lap.

Are you going to go out? I asked him. You can if you want.

Oh, I have your permission?

Yeah.

He rolled his eyes.

You're welcome.

Maybe after you're asleep.

I rolled my eyes back. Michael and Ben aren't here anymore. You don't have to sneak out.

He grinned. But I want to tuck you in. He grabbed me by the knees and pulled me closer, and I laughed and kissed him.

He didn't end up going out, though. We took a shower and messed around and I fell asleep with the lights on while he stretched out beside me with a book, and when I rolled over a few hours later the lights were off and he was wrapped around me from behind, his breath warm against my ear.

“Please don't worry like this,” I whispered into the dark.

**

I was alone when I woke up the next morning. I hated waking up to that big empty bed. We needed to get a dog or something.

There was a note on the nightstand next to me. Had to run to the office because Marcus is an idiot. Should be back by 11, will bring bagels. Go back to sleep. B.

I didn't feel like going back to sleep, though, and I definitely didn't feel like waiting until eleven for a bagel. I had a bit of a headache so I took a few Advil and took a shower, and it occurred to me that this was the first shower I'd taken by myself since before the whole incident. The bathroom felt totally huge without Brian in it. In the interests of continued firsts, I decided I'd take the monumental step of actually leaving the apartment by myself. I wanted to go to the bakery a few blocks away and get a cherry tart, and maybe one of the eclairs Brian loves. He would totally complain, but then he'd devour it the second there was no one around to prove it was him who ate it.

It was sweltering outside, but this early in the day it was still bearable. I walked to the end of the block and waited to cross over to 10th avenue, watching the cars streaming by, waiting for the walk signal.

And as I stood there, I sort of...realized that I'd had a headache when I got up, and that the last time I had a headache I'd had a seizure.

I'd had a seizure and poured boiling water on myself and almost died.

The cars stopped and people started crossing, but I just...

What if I had a seizure in the middle of the intersection? I could get hit my head on the pavement. I could get fucking run over. What the fuck was I doing just walking around out here by myself? I almost died in my own fucking home and here I was just out in the goddamn world when there were a fucking million things that could happen to me, there were so many people, and oh my God, I almost died, I almost fucking died.

Someone put a hand on me and I jumped about a foot. It was a woman, and she was talking to me, and she looked concerned and maybe like she was apologizing, and I didn't have the capacity to figure out any of that so I just signed sorry, I'm Deaf, and walked away as fast as I could, but I couldn't get back to my building without crossing the street again so I was just trapped, and I was crying and hyperventilating and making my fingers bleed trying to hold onto a fucking building and oh God, what the fuck, what the fuck.

I called Brian.

The split second where his face changed, when he went from greeting me to seeing I wasn't okay, was so, so fucking hard to watch. He started walking down the hallway, fast. Where are you?

11th and 60th. A block away from our apartment.

What the fuck? Justin, go home.

I can't. I need you.

He nodded. Okay. Sit down, okay? Sit down on the sidewalk. I'm on my way.

**

It had been forty-five minutes and I was still crying. I couldn't even really believe it. I wasn't sobbing anymore, but I was sitting on the couch just kind of breathing hard and I kept touching my face and it was still wet. Brian had fed me a Klonopin, so I was waiting for it to start working while he Skyped my therapist. She's Deaf, so obviously I was completely capable of calling her myself, except for how at that moment I wasn't capable of anything. I wasn't even really watching what he was saying.

He closed his laptop and put his hand on my back. Lauren says she can see you at four today, okay?

I nodded and wiped my face again.

He kissed my cheek, lingering with his nose against my temple. I'm going to make you some tea.

I'm sorry, you had work to do, and I...this is so stupid.

He stood up and lay his hand on my head. Shut up.

He went into the kitchen to make some tea, and I took some slow breaths and tried to fucking get a hold of myself. After a minute I said, “How are you being so calm about this? I'm acting like a fucking psycho.”

He turned around and looked at me over the bar like he was trying to decide whether to say something, and it kind of dawned on me.

You knew this was going to happen, I said.

This specifically? No.

But something like it.

He poured a mug of tea and brought it back out and set it on the table in front of me. I was hoping I was wrong.

Everything was coming together in my fucking screwed up head. It was for me, wasn't it. All that stuff you've been doing.

He shrugged a little.

God. God. I thought you were being overprotective because you were freaking out.

I figured.

But you...

I was hoping maybe it would help if you knew I was watching you. Maybe you'd feel safer. I could tell you didn't feel ready to be alone.

Sometimes the fucking...the depth of Brian, the goddamn sensitivity of him, it just fucking floors me. Even after all this time, even when I know him better than anyone ever has, I'm still goddamn amazed by just...by how fucking much he is sometimes. I can't let myself think about it too much because I get so fucking frustrated by how little everyone else understands him, how they're always trying to twist him and box him and manipulate him just so he'll look more like them, when really...I mean, who does that? Who else would bring me to work and tell me I don't have to go back to work yet and sit there and make sure I know I'm being watched when I'm cooking because he knows I need it, who else would even fucking know that? He just does all these things for me without ever expecting me to acknowledge or even notice them, he just does them because...

After all this time, I swear, it still floors me.

I shook my head slowly, soaking it all in. I really thought I was okay, I said. I wasn't trying to...

I know. He played with my hair. Willful denial is my thing, not yours.

I rubbed my face. What the fuck is this? Now you're dealing with shit in the moment and I'm the one falling apart after? Switching places, this is progress?

This isn't switching places, Brian said. You weren't bottling shit up. Your body doesn't feel like your own so you're scared right now. You barely got a chance to be scared because you were fucking unconscious. You can't...you almost died. Of course you're scared.

What about you?

I already cried for a week. Remember that bit about how you were unconscious? Drink your tea.

God. I picked up my mug and drank a few sips.

You know, if you think about it, this really is progress, Brian said. A few months ago you wanted to die and now you're terrified of it.

I choked on my tea. Oh my God, you are such a dick.

Got you to smile, though.

I set my cup down. I swear, I had no idea I was scared.

I know. Lauren'll sort you out.

But you knew, I said.

He shrugged one shoulder, a sad little smile on his face. I guess I know you pretty well.

We sat there for a little while, kind of just loosely holding each other as my breathing slowly returned to normal. Brian dropped a few kisses on the top of my head.

Eventually I said, Am I too pathetic for you to fuck right now? Because I could really use the distraction.

Brian chuckled. You've been too pathetic for me to fuck since you were seventeen. It doesn't seem to stop me.

But after he'd pulled me up and to the bedroom, and we were kissing on the bed, he paused, leaning over me, and for a second I thought maybe he'd changed his mind and I was too pathetic to fuck, and I swear I almost started crying again, as if that would help my case.

What's wrong? I said.

Nothing.

I promise you're not going to hurt me, I said. I'm healed, I'm good.

I know you are, he said, and he produced a condom out of nowhere, the way he always does, and handed it to me, and I swear I was about to unwrap it and put it on him before I realized what was going on.

He watched me, his eyes big and dark.

Come on, he said. Let's make that body feel like your own again.

So a lot of things helped, in the end. Just acknowledging that I was scared did a lot, and therapy, of course. Some of it was pushing through things that scared me and seeing that I could survive them, just like after the bashing. And some of it was just time. It always is.

But I'm not going to pretend like having proof that I still had a body that could fuck Brian Kinney until he begged for mercy wasn't pretty damn huge.

**

I went back to work on Monday like I'd planned. Brian walked me to the gallery.

You sure? he asked me, and he ran his hands up and down my arms.

No, I said, and he laughed a little.

Call me if you start bawling again.

Fuck you, I said, and after that it all felt a lot better, I don't know.

Sometimes I think all you can do for shit like this is not take it too seriously. If you're going to be freaked out and you can't even figure out if you're being irrational or not, if there is strong evidence on either side...and if you can't really do anything about it, and if you're just ready to feel better...I don't know, I think at some point you just have to kind of shrug and laugh and have a really, really hot boyfriend who brews you some tea and spreads his legs and then makes fun of you. I think that might be the only way this shit is really survivable.

It also helps to have a really, really massive canvas.

Marie gave me a huge hug and then put me straight me to work, so I didn't get a chance to sneak down and see my canvas until lunch. I smiled and smelled it and looked up at the corner I'd sketched out, and then at the ladder I'd need to climb to get up there.

I thought about falling off the ladder, breaking my head open, dying alone on the floor of my studio.

And then I took a deep breath and climbed up it anyway.