No Safer Place

So why didn't you go? I asked Brian, while he lined up his pool cue.

“Go where?” he said. He took the shot and straightened up, watching the 10 ball sink into the hole. Jennifer's birthday extravaganza? He shrugged. Molly didn't even go.

Yeah, but Molly and her have all that tension. You and Jennifer are all best buds.

Exactly why I don't have to go. I'm already her favorite. He took a swig of his beer. Why didn't you go? She practically raised you.

Hey, my parents raised me. They're good people. And I would love to have gone, but sick people keep coming to the hospital. It's really annoying.

He smiled at me a little. Your signing's getting really good.

Well, you know. I looked to the other end of the bar, where Derek was dancing with Gwen and Emily. Loads of practice. We probably didn't need to be signing, really, since they were all the way over there, but it was good manners in case they looked over and the music was loud in here anyway.

He wrinkled his nose at me. Yeah, I know how that works.

So is Justin having fun?

Yeah, I think so. He said the party was good, and Mel and Lindz brought Luke, so he got to see him. At some point they became the default babysitters for Justin's dad's kid. I don't think he's any more on board with the gay thing or the Deaf thing, I think he just got worn down by Debbie and Mel and Jennifer camping out on his front porch. He's an asshole, but he's also fucking spineless, so it didn't surprise me that he'd sucked at standing his shitty ground.

When's he getting back?

It was supposed to be tonight, but he wasn't feeling well so he's staying until tomorrow.

Benefits of a flexible schedule.

Yeah, it's... He shook his head a little. Honestly it's been amazing. He'll actually rest when he's sick now. It's a fucking miracle.

Derek and company had drifted from the little dance floor back to the bar, and Emily waved us over. Shots! she announced when we got there.

Brian groaned and sat down. Too old.

Yeah, yeah, we know, you're a million. Shots!

Brian's phone rang and he said, Saved by the bell, and took it out. He looked at the screen and frowned. Don't like that, he signed, small.

What's wrong? I said.

It's Jennifer. I can't imagine this is good. He looked at the others. I have to get this, sorry.

No, go ahead, Derek said, and Emily waved him off and ordered a round of shots from the bartender, who was used to figuring out her miming by now. Gwen watched her with a smile on her face.

Brian took a step or two away from us out of courtesy, but the music was a little lower now and Brian's phone voice isn't exactly quiet, so I heard him say, “Hey, Jen, what's...slow down. Okay, well are you...he what? What the fuck happened?”

Derek nudged me and nodded towards Brian, tapped his ear.

Yeah, I said. He was right, something's wrong with Justin. I would have known even if I hadn't been able to hear him. Brian doesn't make that face for anything else.

“Okay, then...Jen, stop, I just...I can't understand you when you...he...no, what do you mean, what are you talking about? Well is he...okay, just, I'll be there as soon as...”

Something's really wrong, I said. I got up to see if Brian wanted me to take the phone, but he'd hung up by the time I got over to him. He stayed where he was, staring at his phone like he wasn't quite sure what it was.

I put my hand on his arm, and he flinched.

I need to go to the airport, he said, without looking at me.

“Okay.” I scratched gently up and down his arm, trying to bring him back to life. I know how he disappears into worst case scenarios in his head when something's wrong. I know it all too well. “I'm coming with you.”

He shook his head. “You have work...”

“I'll figure that out. Get your coat.”

He kept staring at his phone. “His MRI is clear but he hasn't woken up. Why won't he wake up?”

I swallowed agains the feeling in my stomach. “I don't know. We're going to go see him, okay? Get your coat.” I went back to the bar and got mine and kissed Derek. I have to go.

He and Emily both said, Wait, what's going on?

I don't really know. He's in the hospital, it's...Brian's upset.

Gwen said, Oh my God...

I put my hand on Derek's arm. Can you call Molly? Jennifer won't tell her, she's always keeping things from her.

Yeah, of course, but what do I tell her?

Tell her...that, and tell her I'll call her as soon as I know what's going on.

Brian came back with his coat, and Derek and Emily and Gwen were immediately all over him asking what was going on, if he was okay. I don't know, Brian kept saying. I don't know, I don't know.

Gwen tugged me to her and showed me her phone. There's a flight out in an hour and a half.

Thank you. Okay, we have to go then. You ready? I said to Brian.

He nodded vaguely, looking around the bar.

“Brian.”

Yeah. Okay, yeah.

Derek and Emily kissed his cheeks, Derek kissed me and whispered in my ear that he loved me, and I led Brian out of there with my hand on his back. He struggled with the zipper on his coat while I hailed a cab.

Abruptly, he said, “Did you know you can stop breathing during a seizure? I always check if he's breathing after the bad ones. I thought I was being paranoid.”

I looked at him. “He stopped breathing?”

He kept fucking with his zipper. “I didn't know that could happen. Nobody ever told me that.”

**

Brian gave me his credit card to get tickets but was otherwise pretty useless at the airport, distracted in that way of his where he just looks pissed-off at everyone. I had to keep nudging him along, forwards in line, towards the security line, through the x-ray machine.

The TSA guy eyed us warily. “No luggage?”

“It's an emergency,” I said. Hopefully Molly had left some clothes at Jennifer's I could borrow. I didn't think I had anything at my parents' house.

“I should call,” Brian mumbled on our way to the terminal. “I should see if there's an update, I should call. He, um, he hadn't woken up, but maybe he's awake now.”

He stopped in the middle of the flow of traffic between terminal 14 and 15 and stared and took out his phone and looked at it for a long time, and I knew he was thinking the same thing I was: if there was news, Jennifer would have called.

He wasn't awake, but until he heard Jennifer say it, there was hope that maybe he was.

I said, “You know, the flight's going to board soon. Maybe we just get on now, and then we can call when we land.”

Brian nodded. “Yeah. Yeah, he won't...um, Justin won't know that I didn't call. He won't be mad. He's Deaf, so...he won't know.”

“Yeah, he won't know. It's okay.”

He grabbed my arm after a few more steps. “You can't let me fuck this up, okay?”

“You're not going to fuck it up.”

“No, you, me, Justin, Jennifer, Allegheny General, this did not...I didn't do well with this last time. You have to not let me fuck this up again.”

“This isn't like last time.”

“Sure,” he said absently. “Sure, yeah, I know.”

“Brian?”

“Yeah.”

“I won't let you fuck it up.”

He closed his eyes and breathed out. “Okay. Okay.”

He drank on the flight, and scuttled his feet on the carpet, and halfway through put his hand around mine and kept it there.

“Come on, Justin,” I whispered.

**

Jennifer called at some point during the flight. Brian listened to the message while we stood in the aisle and waited while people pulled their luggage out of the overhead compartments.

“Anything?” I asked.

He shook his head. “They did another MRI, it was still clear.”

“That's good,” I said. “Imagine how bitchy he'd be if they had to shave his head again.”

He laughed hollowly, then stuffed his phone in his pocket, suddenly angry. “What the fuck is taking people so long? Check your fucking bag, live a little.”

“Seriously.”

“I don't know what's fucking going on,” Brian said.

“We'll get the whole story when we're there.”

“No, I mean...I know all the shit that could happen, what the MRI could show, I know, you know, subdural hematomas and epidural hematomas, that's what he had last time, and...the one that sounds like a spider.”

“Subarachnoid hemorrhage.”

“Yeah, see, I know those, but...but his fucking MRI is clear? And Jennifer's saying all this shit about how long he didn't fucking have oxygen, and I don't...I don't know what this means.”

I closed my eyes for a second, and when I opened them he was watching me.

“It's bad, isn't it,” he said.

“I don't know. I don't know how long he didn't have oxygen.”

“But he might not wake up. That's what that face was. He might not wake up. Or he's going to wake up and he's not...he's not going to be there.”

“It...it depends how long he didn't have oxygen.”

“Would he have stopped breathing if he didn't hit his head?”

“I don't know.”

“He was standing when he had the seizure,” Brian said. “That's what she said. He was standing up.”

I had no idea where he was going with this. “Okay.”

“He told me that he wasn't feeling well,” he said. “He cancelled his flight, he moved it to tomorrow, because he wasn't feeling well.”

“I know...”

“Why the fuck was he standing up?”

**

Justin's the reason I decided to be a doctor.

Not because the doctors were heroes who saved him after he was bashed; I mean, they acted fast and did well, but after being a medical resident for a few years I wasn't about to call every doctor doing their job a hero. It's nothing like that.

I just remember how at the time, it seemed like none of them were moving fast enough, and that made me so, so angry. I was sitting there in the waiting room, or in that hallway with Brian, or I was just wandering the fucking floor like a ghost, and I'd see all these doctors walking so, so slowly. Leaning on the nurse's station and talking to each other. Having a snack. Joking around. And of course now I know that's because what happened to Justin is not out of the ordinary. It's not especially horrific. And you can't get bogged down in that shit or you can't do what you need to do. I get it.

They were all so brusque and businesslike about it, because this is a brusque business, but I remember I overheard one doctor giving a rundown of Justin's status to another, and at the end she said, “Jesus, and at his fucking prom, too?”

“I know,” the other one said.

“Awful. Just because he's gay. Awful.”

And then she kept on doing her job.

You don't have to be a robot in order for things not to weigh you down.

You don't have to laugh.

So I figured there needed to be more doctors like her in the world. Enter Daphne.

Right here at Allegheny, eleven years ago with these same people. And here we were again.

**

The guy at the front desk gave us visitor's badges and pointed us towards the CCU, as if we didn't know where it was. The nurse there frowned and typed. “You said Kinney?”

“No, my name is Kinney, his name is Taylor.”

“Well, we have a family-only policy—”

“They have different last names,” I said. “They're still family.”

She looked at me. “And you are...?”

Brian slammed his hand on the counter. “Will you just tell me where my fucking husband—”

“Brian!”

We turned around, as if there was any question who that voice belonged to, and Debbie crushed us into a hug. “Hi, Powerpuff,” she said to me, with a kiss to my cheek.

Brian pinched the bridge of his nose. “Please don't tell me everyone's fucking camped out here.”

“Well, that's what I wanted to do, but Jen said maybe we hold off on that until Sunshine's...well. Until he's feeling a little better. But I called her to see if she was coming for Mah Jong this week and she told me what was going on and I wasn't exactly going to let her fucking sit here by herself, they won't let me in with him but I can stay out in the—”

“Debbie,” I said, because Brian looked like he was about to vomit on the CCU floor. “Where is Justin?”

A doctor stopped on the way past us. “Are you Brian?”

“Yes,” Brian said.

“Great. I'm Jillian Trufoe, I'm Justin's doctor. Walk with me, we'll talk.”

He pointed at me. “She's coming too, she's...she's a doctor.”

“I'm Justin's sister,” I said. Brian nodded.

The doctor looked at me.

“Half-sister,” I added.

“All right. Come with me.” She led the three of us down a hall, talking briskly as she went. “So Justin came in with head trauma after a seizure. Because of his history, as you know the head trauma was our most immediate concern. A head CT in the ER and an MRI after were both clear. He has a grade three concussion, which is serious and can require a long recovery, but there's no sign of any bleeding or damage. We need a repeat MRI and that was clear as well.”

“Okay,” Brian said. “That all sounds good. Why isn't this good?”

“Normally with a grade three concussion you'd see a loss of consciousness of under five minutes,” she said. “Justin's been unconscious at this point for over two hours.”

“He...he gets tired after seizures,” Brian said, an edge of desperation in his voice. “He gets tired, maybe he's sleeping...and he's Deaf, you know he's Deaf, right? Because if you talk to him, he's not...gonna hear you.”

His doctor stopped and looked at us with the serious face they teach us in medical school, and Brian turned away and stared into the room of someone who was not Justin.

“Justin wasn't breathing after the seizure,” she said. “His mother did CPR at her house, and the paramedics were able to get him an airway en route to the hospital. But...we're not sure how long he was without oxygen. So right now we're just waiting to see where we are when he wakes up.”

Debbie put her hand on Brian's shoulder, and he looked at me with his eyes wide.

I said, “You've done an EEG?”

“We did, and it was clear.”

“So you are expecting him to wake up,” I said, and Brian cursed a little and took a step backwards.

“We're just...on Justin's time right now.”

“Is he breathing on his own?” I said.

Brian paced a few more steps away from us, and back.

“Not yet,” his doctor said. “He's still intubated for the time being. We're hoping he starts breathing over that soon.” She looked at Brian. “Given Justin's medical history, it's not unexpected that he's taking a little longer to shake things than we might hope. We're going to do this on his timetable.”

“Sure,” Brian said vaguely, still staring into a stranger's room like he was going to recognize him any second.

The doctor put her hand on his arm. “I can take you to see him now, okay? His mom's in there with him.”

Brian looked kind of surprised, like he'd forgotten about seeing Justin sometime in the last few minutes. We were losing him, I could tell, but that didn't mean I knew what the fuck to do about it. Last time I remember watching Brian, taking notes mentally on how much he loved Justin because Justin would want to know, when he woke up, how torn up Brian had been about him. And it was so much easier to think about that, to prepare for how we'd giggle about how Brian was soooo totally gone about him, than to think about...about what was actually going on. About my best friend in the fucking universe.

Now Justin already knew how much Brian loved him (if he knew anything at all, Jesus, Justin, be okay, be okay) so what the fuck was I supposed to be thinking about? How the fuck was I supposed to look at Brian now?

I needed to just be a doctor about this.

Debbie stayed out in the hallway and mumbled something about calling to check in at the diner, and I followed Brian into Justin's room. Justin was propped up and intubated, with a bandage over his forehead and a bruise spreading down to his cheekbone. Jennifer stood up from her spot next to the bed and held her hand to her chest, reaching out to us. I went and hugged her while Brian stalked around the bed, looking at Justin from every angle.

“I'm so glad you're here,” Jennifer said to us. “I don't know how...they keep saying we just have to wait, I don't...”

Brian took Justin's hand and signed a “B” into it, watching me and Jennifer like he was trying to figure out what we were doing here. “What's...” he said, gesturing to the bandage.

Jennifer cleared her throat. “Just a few stitches.”

He stared at her. “He fell on his fucking face?”

She took a shaky breath.

“Where was he?” Brian demanded. “The tile in the kitchen? The stone in the bathroom? Was he on the stairs, where was he?”

I said, “Brian, it doesn't matter.”

“How the fuck did this happen?” Brian said.

Jennifer said, “He just...”

“He told me he didn't feel well,” Brian said. “He must have told you. He doesn't feel well, he's supposed to stay goddamn horizontal until it passes, he doesn't go walking around, so why the fuck was he up?”

“I don't know—”

“Why weren't you with him?”

Jennifer put her hands over her face, and I stepped between them and put my hand on her shoulder.

This is not saving him, I said to Brian, because if we kept yelling out loud someone was going to kick us the hell out.

He breathed out hard through his nose.

She gave him CPR at the house. She called 911. This could have happened at his studio or on the sidewalk. He poured boiling water on himself when you were what, three feet away from him? This is not her fault.

Brian stared at me so long I was worried my signing was too jacked up for him to understand, but all of a sudden something in his face changed, like something clicking in place, and he whispered, “Oh God,” and walked out of the room.

I sat Jennifer down and went after him.

“Hey.” I grabbed his arm, and he shook me off. I planted myself in front of him and grabbed him again. “Hey,” I said. “You fucking just made me promise you wouldn't mess this up.”

“I'm not leaving, I just...” He looked around at nothing, tugged on the sleeves of his shirt, raked his hand through his hair. I already fucked this up.

“What are you talking about?”

“Oh God, oh God,” he said. “He should have gotten the fucking surgery.”

“What surgery?”

“Four years ago, the fucking—”

“What, the clinical trial?”

Yes.

I felt my heart in my throat. “Brian, no.”

“He knew I didn't want him to do it so he didn't do it, and...there was a seventy percent chance it would have fucking fixed him. What the fuck are the chances he gets through this without major goddamn deficits? What are the chances he lives to be eighty-fucking-five without...Christ, he's going to stop breathing now?” He shook his head. “It's not seventy percent, Daph.”

“Brian, they cancelled that fucking trial because people were—”

“People were having longterm side effects, yeah, I read the report. You know what you need to have to have longterm effects? A fucking longterm life.”

“He didn't want—”

“Who the fuck cares what he wants! You think he knows what's best for him? He's fucking brain damaged, for God's sake...”

“Brian, look at me.”

He glanced at me, then away.

Look at me, I said, and he did. I said I wouldn't let you fuck this up and I meant it. And none of this, blaming yourself, blaming Jennifer, is helping Justin. So get your fucking ass back in that room and sit down and hold his hand.

He stuck his tongue in his cheek. You know, I think you're his half-sister on Craig's side. You're kind of a dick.

Come on, asshole.

**

So we just sat in that room for a long time. Every once in a while Debbie would pull us outside for a cup of coffee. Derek called me with the girls—he was sleeping over at their place, Molly was there too—before they went to bed. Brian called Michael at some point and managed to convince him not to run the horde out to the hospital. But mostly we just sat in that tiny room with Justin, watching his chest rise and fall with the ventilator and the doctors walk in, check him, walk out, no change, no change.

Brian didn't fall apart. I thought he would, since Justin wasn't unconscious—usually when Justin's sick, when he's with us, Brian's primary goal is keeping him together by sheer force of will, and that usually involves a mixture of rolling his eyes like Justin's being a drama queen and micromanaging his every move—but I guess having me and Jennifer here was the same effect, like he still felt he needed to hold it together for us.

“He's got to be in pain, right?” Brian said, the first word anyone had spoken in an hour.

“They're giving him something,” I said.

“You think he's having nightmares?” he said, like it was slightly interesting.

“I don't know,” I said.

“He looks worse that he did when we got here,” he said.

“It's just the bruise developing.”

“He's falling apart right in front of us,” Brian said. “We're just sitting here and he's getting worse by the minute.”

I slept for half an hour here and there, scrunched up in a chair that wasn't actually as uncomfortable as it looked. Michael showed up around seven and stayed outside the window with a duffel bag. Brian took it and stayed stiff for a long time while Michael hugged him, and then he dug his hands into Michael's back and cried for even longer.

**

At around nine, Brian's head snapped up, and he narrowed his eyes while he watched Justin.

“What?” Jennifer and I said.

Brian shook his head a little, eyes fixed on Justin's face. “Something's wrong.”

Justin looked the exact same to me, but fuck if a minute later he didn't start gagging on the tube down his throat, and I whispered, “Oh thank God,” while Brian and Jennifer freaked out.

“He's choking!” Jennifer said.

“No, no, it's good,” I said. “He's breathing over the tube, it's good.” I hit the call button over Justin's bed.

“It's good?” Jennifer said.

“It means he can breathe on his own,” I said.

Brian stood at the foot of the bed, his hand around Justin's ankle. “It's not good, he doesn't like it. He's...it's hurting him, he wants it out.”

“They're going to take it out,” I said. “He's waking up, Brian, go hold his hand.”

Brian nodded and moved next to Justin, flattening his palm on Justin's chest. Hey, Sunshine, how about you open your eyes? You're missing all my best signing.

He kept choking on the tube, and his doctor came in with a few nurses. “Okay, now we're talking!” she said.

“He doesn't like it,” Brian said.

“Well, let's get it out of him. Sandra, get the mask—good. Okay, Justin, we're going to—”

“He's Deaf,” Brian, Jennifer and I said together. Brian signed it.

“Right. Can you get him to open his eyes?”

Brian gave her a blank look. “...how?”

“Mm, good point. All right. We need you to take a step back...great,” she said, and they extubated Justin and put an oxygen mask over his nose and mouth. Justin slowly opened his eyes, and Brian took a step back.

“He needs an interpreter,” Brian said.

The doctor said, “Sandra, can you—” and Sandra nodded and left.

“I can do it for now?” I asked Brian, and he nodded and stepped to the side. Justin watched him but looked away when the doctor and I approached the bed.

She said, “Hi, Justin, I'm Dr. Trufoe. Can you squeeze my hand?”

I signed it, and Justin looked between me and the doctor. His hand stayed still in his.

“How about you move one finger?” she said.

Brian cleared his throat. “He's confused, he doesn't know who to look at, can I just...”

His doctor nodded and stepped to the side, and Brian picked up Justin's hand and waited for Justin to look at him.

Hey there, Sunshine. Welcome back. Quite the production here. Think you can squeeze my hand? Justin still looked confused, but we saw his fingers tighten around Brian's, and Brian grinned. “Now what?” he asked, still watching Justin.

“Wiggle his toes,” the doctor said. Brian signed it, and Justin did. “Now if he could say something.”

“Can he sign it?” Brian said, eyes still on Justin, signing, You're good, you're doing great. “He won't want to speak right now.”

Justin looked around the room, looking miserable as hell.

Hey, it's okay, Brian said.

“Signing is fine,” the doctor said, and Brian let go of his hands.

Hurts, Justin said, and Brian nodded and bent down and kissed his forehead.

I said, Justin, do you remember what happened?

He kept looking around the room with something like panic in his eyes, and finally he said, his voice hoarse and pained and right on the edge of tears, “I want Brian, can someone call Brian?”

Brian made a noise like a trapped animal and backed up until he hit the wall.

**

Justin fell back asleep pretty quickly, and we all interrogated the doctor.

“Is this the concussion or the oxygen deprivation?” Brian said.

“It's hard to say,” she said. “It's very normal after an injury like this for him to be confused, to have some issues with his memory. It's probably not permanent.”

“He already has trouble with his memory,” Brian said. “Ever since...that's been an ongoing issue.”

“He's sedated and in pain right now,” his doctor said. “That's going to make anyone confused. With a grade 3 concussion, symptoms can last for a while. We'll do another MRI today if he's not showing any more improvement, but I would be very surprised if that's the case.” She patted Brian's arm. “This is good,” she said. “He's awake, he's responsive, he's breathing. All of this is good. Give him time.”

“When can I get him out of here?” Brian said. “I want him in a helicopter to a hospital in New York yesterday.”

“It's not a good idea to move him right now,” his doctor said. “Not when he's already disoriented.”

“He's disoriented because this is where he spent the worst two months of his life!” Brian said.

I said, “Brian.”

Brian turned to me. “He's looking right at me and he thinks I'm not here,” he said, his voice breaking. “Why do you think he thinks that, Daphne?”

I swallowed. “He's just confused.”

“He's not going to get well here,” Brian said.

**

Jennifer updated everyone and continued to keep them at bay and then went home for a shower and a quick nap. I called my mom who said she'd bring me some clothes—I'd left some ugly old stuff at her place when I moved—and Brian and I went back to keeping silent vigil while Justin slept.

He woke up a little while later, and Brian stirred from where he was half asleep next to the bed, Justin's hand loosely in his. He ran a hand down his face and said, Hey.

Justin made a frustrated noise.

I know. It feels really fucked up, I know.

I knew it was just a dream, Justin said sluggishly.

Brian pushed his hair back, carefully, from the bandage on his forehead. What the fuck are you talking about? he said gently.

All of it, he said. I knew it was too good to be true.

I still didn't know what he was talking about, but I saw the realization fall on Brian's face, and he tilted his head to the side. So all of this was a dream, huh? Nice try. I know I look good, but I don't look thirty.

Justin reached up and touched his face. You look good.

Well, you do still look about goddamn eighteen, so there's that. But hey, all this was too good to be true? Ethan, he's part of your idyllic fantasy? That whole boiling water thing? How about giving me cancer, what the fuck was with that? We're going to have words, if that was your idea of a good time.

Complaining to me about your stupid cancer when I'm lying here dying, Justin bitched.

Brian grinned and kissed his cheek, then snapped his fingers a couple inches from Justin's face. Can you hear that?

Justin shook his head.

Probably not a dream, then.

Play with my hair until I fall asleep.

Okay.

**

People came to the hospital every once in a while, drifting in and out of the waiting room and the hallway outside Justin's room, but Brian and Justin and I and sometimes Jennifer stayed in here alone, like actors in the play they were watching. The doctors came in and hour and adjusted the flow of Justin's oxygen and the tilt of the bed. He didn't have to get another MRI, because he knew who Brian was and begged Brian not to move him, and nothing was going to beat those two things. Which is probably why Brian stopped talking about bringing him back to New York, for a little while. If Justin said stay, he was staying.

I went out to the bathroom to brush my teeth and get something from the vending machine and ended up falling asleep in the waiting room on top of Lindsay for some undetermined amount of time. I dragged my groggy self back to to Justin's room, where he was vomiting again. Brian was up on the bed next to him, holding the basin, his other arm firmly around Justin's shoulders.

“The fuck are you wearing?” I said to Brian.

He rolled his eyes. “It's Emmett's, Justin puked on all of mine and he's the only person in the goddamn state over five foot seven.”

“Well, Ben, but he's a bit...broader.”

Brian glared at me and kissed Justin's temple. Finished?

Justin coughed and nodded. If you put me in a helicopter I will fucking murder you.

Yeah, yeah, I know. Brian handed the basin to me and I went to rinse it out. I don't know how long you think I can stay in Pittsburgh without coming out of my skin, though.

Yeah, poor Brian. Stop making Daphne do all the gross parts.

She's a doctor. And excuse me, all the gross parts? She's not the one who's been puked on three times this hour.

You seem less confused than last time you were up, I said.

Justin shook his head and winced a little, and Brian said, He still doesn't know what's going on, he's just going with it.

My current theory is Brian tried to kill me and now he feels bad about it, Justin said.

That's just because he's not sure who anyone is other than me.

I know it's Daphne. Justin rested against Brian's shoulder, and Brian slipped his arm under Justin's legs and hauled them into his lap. I want to go home.

You just told me not to move you.

I don't remember.

I know.

He gestured at his legs. You did move me.

You really do complain a lot, you know.

He groaned and wrapped his arms around his head, folding himself in half on Brian's lap.

Brian rubbed his back. “Can you see about more painkillers?” he asked me.

“Yeah, I'm on it.”

**

Justin spent most of the afternoon crying because he couldn't remember anything that was going on, and because his head hurt, and he couldn't stop throwing up, and mostly because he was having wild fucking mood swings and he didn't know why. He upset his mother and pissed off Brian.

Stop yelling at your mother, Brian told him, like he hadn't been yelling at her twenty-four hours ago.

Justin was mean and confused and clingy and didn't like when Brian wasn't within arms reach. Brian was exhausted and worried and irritated and didn't like not being in New York.

What day is it? Brian quizzed him.

Justin was holding his head. “I don't know. Leave me alone.”

It's Thursday.

“Why aren't you at work?”

Brian gestured to him.

“Oh. Right.”

What did you have for dinner?

“Debbie...brought something.”

Lasagna, right. You remember what your temperature was? They just checked it.

Justin gave him a look. “I wouldn't remember that on a regular day.”

Ninety-nine three. Two nines and a three. He did a little dance, pointing at Justin. You've got this.

Justin smiled a little.

What day is it?

Thursday.

Good. What'd you have for dinner?

He shrugged. Debbie probably brought something.

Sunshine, come on. You're not even trying.

“I'm tired, Brian.”

I said, He just needs to rest. It'll come back.

He's been resting all day. Justin. What's your temperature?

Justin made a frustrated noise.

Two nines, and...

I don't know! Leave me alone. His hand started shaking, and he hit the bed with the other.

Brian sighed and got back on the bed. He brought Justin's hand to his lips and said, We can take a break for a little while.

**

Justin wanted to talk to Emily and Derek, but he was on a screen ban for at least a week, so I propped up the phone and watched what they said and signed it all out to Justin. Derek talked to me a little at the end, just telling me he missed me, and I must have had some look on my face because Justin looked all smug when I got off the phone.

Oh, what, I said.

When are you two getting married?

Jesus, I don't know.

You've been dating for like...how long? I don't know. My memory's a mess.

I sat down on the foot of the bed. Jennifer and Brian were in here too, but they were both asleep, Jennifer in the armchair and Brian in a wheelchair we stole a while ago. Almost two years.

Get married already, God. I'm bored.

We have time.

When do you have to leave?

Tomorrow.

He nodded a little. You'll probably have to remind me a few times.

That's okay, I said. Brian stirred a little in the wheelchair, and I said, It was like this a lot last time.

What?

Before you woke up. Your mom would go home when it got too late, or she'd fall asleep out in the waiting room sometimes if she was too tired to make it to the car. I'd sneak out of the house and come by, and Brian would be in here, just watching you.

I remember that, Justin said.

You do not. You were in a coma.

Doesn't matter. I remember. He smiled at me a little as his eyes were closing. I remembered something. Tell Brian.

**

I don't know when I fell asleep stretched out across a few seats in the waiting room—honestly I don't even remember coming out here—but at some point here was a hand on my back and I jumped about a foot in the air.

Brian had his hands up. “Whoa, whoa. You okay?”

“Yeah, I...yeah. Is Justin—”

“He's fine. C'mon, honey.”

I got groggily to my feet and let Brian put me in my coat and lead me towards the elevator. “Where are we going?” I asked eventually. God, I don't know if I've ever been that tired. I thought vaguely that my hair must look so terrible. Everything felt like it was happening in slow motion.

“Shh.”

The air in the parking lot was so cold it felt like it was biting me. It was dark, but the sky was the kind of dark blue that made me think the sun was going to rise soon. Brian unlocked Michael's car and opened the passenger side door for me.

“We're not running away, are we?” I said.

“Daphne.”

“I'm not supposed to...let you run away.” I think I fell asleep for a second in the middle of the sentence.

“I'm going right back,” he said. “Left a little note for Justin and everything. His mom's there.”

That was about all the pushing I could do right about then, so I closed my eyes and rested my cheek against the window. His hand grazed up and down my back.

I woke up when the car stopped at Michael's house. Brian opened the front door and let me in and nodded to the stairs.

“Guest room,” he said softly. “Second door on the right, come on.”

He pulled back the covers while I took my shoes and pants off and squirmed into bed. “Here,” he said, producing a bottle of water out of nowhere, and he kissed my forehead and started to go.

“Wait, what about you?”

“I have to go back.”

“Lie down just for a minute.”

He stayed by the door, considering it, and then his face softened. “Yeah, okay.” He took his shoes off and got into bed next to me, and I fussed around with the covers until he finally said, “God, shut up,” and threw an arm over me. “This always shuts up Justin.”

I closed my eyes and listened to him breathe for a while.

“He's gonna be okay,” I said, with the last of my energy.

I thought he'd fallen asleep at first, but just before I fell asleep I'm pretty sure I heard him whisper, “Thank you.”