thalia/j.r. (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
thalialunacy2) wrote2013-07-24 08:46 am
thalialunacy2) wrote2013-07-24 08:46 am
Always the Last Place You Look: One
1
"I don't care about whose DNA has recombined with whose. When everything goes to hell, the people who stand by you without flinching - they are your family." ~ Jim Butcher
“No,” he says flatly.
“Merlin—”
“I won’t do it, Jenny.”
“But Merlin—”
“I’m not working Christmas.”
Merlin’s well-meaning but often callous manager grips his arms and turns him to face her. He has to look down, which should give him an advantage, right, but her heart-shaped face and delightfully plump frame emanate a sternness he doesn't dare cross.
Most of the time.
Today, though, and about this: “I’m not! I just won’t do it.”
“Merlin.” Her voice is softer this time. Softness wrapped around steel. “I can't rely on anyone else. You’re the only one who can run this shop alone, and you’re—“
She purses her lips together, clearly reluctant to finish the sentence. Merlin shrugs out of her grip and reaches to straighten a perfectly straight stack of cups. “The only one without family, I know, I know.” He rubs his eyes, hating the pity he can positively feel in her gaze, even while he knows it’s coming from a good place. “This is rubbish, Jenny.”
“I know, Merlin, and I can’t make you do it.”
Merlin huffs. “That’s right, you can’t.”
“I can’t.”
She’s looking at him warily, expectantly. He rolls his eyes to the ceiling. “Fine. I’ll work your bloody stupid holiday.”
Not like he’d had any plans, anyway.
So for the next few days, Merlin imagines that at Christmas, he'll see her, his perfect goddess will be a perfect holiday goddess, and something will happen. She’ll come in, smile at him, wish him Happy Christmas, and hand him something incredible. Something perfect, like his mum's globe.
And then he’ll have a wonderful story to tell the perfect children they will surely have shortly thereafter.
He’s certain of it.
And he’s almost correct. Except not really at all.
On Christmas day, he bounces around the shop like a slightly uncoordinated spring. He's the only one working, there are about two-point-five customers every two hours, and plus he's jittery: he had stayed up late with a novel (not his, mind) and the compensatory espresso just serves to make him twitchy because he doesn't habitually partake. (The irony of his working in a coffee shop is not lost on him, but a job's a job and when your sole talent is making your own stories come somewhat-haphazardly true, you learn to settle.)
But she doesn't show up at her usual time, his goddess, and his heart begins to sink back down from where it's been dancing all up and around his oesophagus. Eventually, the afternoon finds him sitting on his stool, staring out of the window, and thinking melancholic thoughts.
Why should she be here on Christmas day, after all? She should be with family, with her parents or–God forbid–her husband and–God forbid—her children.
Merlin slumps even further, absently twirling the milk thermometer and imagining just how gorgeous her children would be, were they to actually exist— Then the bell above the shop's front door jingles.
Merlin's heart sings even before he can see her face.
She's dressed smartly, like she is every other day, in a muted suit that probably cost more than Merlin makes in a year. She's bloody gorgeous, her dark hair up and her makeup merely emphasizing, not overpowering, her piercing eyes.
He's already got her drink mostly made by the time she's at the counter, which is part of the ritual, and it's always the same amount of cash, which he may or may not normally clutch in his hand long after she's gone from sight.
But today, today it really is Christmas, because, with God as his witness, she smiles at him, and does something else she’s never done before– She hands him—
…a tip.
A tip.
Merlin stares down it. It's not the world, he'll admit, but it's a fine start. He feels his heart kicking in his chest. He feels his lungs filling up with glorious air. He feels the joyous weight of fate gathering around him. He feels like the God damn King of Prussia.
But he's apparently just the King of Being Unable to Speak Properly. Her “Merry Christmas!” rings in his ears as she turns away, but he has only nodded his head jerkily, like a puppet on a string. His words have abandoned him, those fickle bastards. Perhaps in payback, he understands, but that doesn't make it right.
As she walks away and out the door, his heart is pounding so loudly in his ears that he can’t think of anything else. He’s contemplating which receptacle, sink or half-full espresso trough, would be best for the sick he’s sure is about to come up, when he finally registers the commotion outside.
And commotion it is. As it generally is when a person gets mugged, which Merlin can clearly see through the front windows is what's happening, and with a shout he's running towards the door.
But the gentlemen who'd thought his goddess would be an easy target had clearly not understood whom they were assaulting. By the time Merlin gets out the door, she's kicked one of them in the shin, kneed the other in the groin, and finally got so annoyed she's actually thrown her bag at them.
"Go on, then, take my bloody purse! You use one single piece of financial information in there and I'll have a pack of lawyers after you faster than you can say—"
But she's interrupted, and Merlin watches, horrified, as one of the tossers snarls, curses, and shoves her against the wall before they both take off. She crumples like a windsock.
"Oh my god, oh my god," Merlin chants mindlessly as he dashes the last few metres to her side. "Please please please."
And he's not even sure what he wants. He just knows he wants a better beginning than this.
Turns out she’s not a goddess after all, because she's reacted very badly to getting shoved into a wall: she's fainted. Merlin’s there just in time to catch her before her head hits the ground, and feels like a grand prince in a fairytale—
Until he sees the blood.
"Oh god oh fuck oh god—" He reacts instinctively, clutching her more closely to him as he assesses the situation. This must jostle her, because for a moment, for the smallest, smallest of moments, her eyes are open, and bright, and looking at him.
Merlin's heart just about tears out of his chest. He blinks the sting away from his eyes and smiles down at her. "Hello," he says, his voice rough even to his own ears.
And for a moment, he swears she almost smiles.
Then her eyes flutter shut again, and there's a blare from a car horn, and Merlin realizes he's crouched awkwardly in the middle of the street with an unconscious, bleeding, gorgeous, probably exceedingly rich woman in his technically unwelcome embrace.
Oh God.
He closes his eyes, and wishes for a pen and paper harder than he has in years.
They don't appear, of course, but, as luck would have it, a taxi does. Merlin gratefully deposits her inside and breathlessly instructs the driver to just "Get to the nearest hospital, please for the love of God quickly!"
The driver looks askance, then suspicious, and Merlin rolls his eyes, desperate. "She's not dying, and I didn't do this, and you can ring the police when we get there if you wish but I should like to think you'd want her bleeding onto your upholstery for as short a time as possible. So please let's go!"
To which the cabbie grumbles, but acquiesces.
It's the longest ride of Merlin's life.
And then, once they get to A&E, things flash by so fast, Merlin feels as though he's in a film. A really, really unpleasant film in which the sad, gangly protagonist has just realized he doesn't know his dream woman's name.
He's an idiot.
And he's so flustered when they ask, "Are you family?" that he can't do anything but shake his head. He's distracted, see: He can see her being wheeled out behind the inquiring intake nurse, and she's so pale, and thin, and the lights are so harsh and he can't help but think of his dad, his mum, all the times he's stared at someone he loved in a hospital bed.
He doesn't realize he's trembling until he feels a hand on his elbow.
"Here, love," a kind, if weary, voice says as the hand guides him to a seat along the wall. "There now. Sit for a moment." There's an older woman in nurse's clothing leaning over him, not intrusively, just kindly. "She's going to be fine."
He blinks up at her. His eyes hurt and he doesn't know why. "She is?"
"Best of the best, here. And you got her here just in time." She pats him, and it's so maternal it just makes everything hurt worse. But she doesn't mean it to, he knows she doesn't.
So he blinks again. Clears his throat. "Yeah, alright."
She tsks, not unkindly. "I'll just go and get you a nice cuppa, then, sound good? Well, it's not that nice, but it's the best we've got and anything would do you good right now, you look a fright."
He manages a smile at that, and as she walks away he feels a little ashamed of himself. He doesn't even know the woman he just brought in here, after all, and here he is, acting like they're at the very least bosom friends.
He looks wistfully at the door through which his felled goddess had disappeared. Bosom friends, that would've been nice. He supposes. But…
"I was meant to marry that girl," he breathes to himself, to the bustling hospital air around him, to her.
To the woman whose name he doesn't even know.
And, little does he realize, to one very nice older lady who's just got back with a cup of tea.
The tea does the trick, stereotypes be damned. Merlin can finally focus, with enough blinking. Can finally think, though sludgily. Enough to decide he's going to wait at A&E a little longer, at least. The shop can stay closed. He needs to see this through, for himself. Just in case. In case of what, he's not sure, but the more tries not to think about Prince Charming kisses and fate, the heavier the thoughts sit in his mind.
He looks around to distract himself. The place is decorated for the season, which for some reason jars him. He'd basically forgotten, he supposes, because he had to work and then, oh yeah, rush a bleeding woman to hospital.
It occurs to him what a fantastic story it'll make for the grandchildren. And he smiles at the thought. He crosses his arms and leans back in the chair, finally beginning to feel warm again.
The tea-bearing nurse—Alice, of course her name is Alice—ushers him into a room an hour later, explaining, probably in tiny terms, what's wrong with his goddess, but Merlin barely hears. He can't take his eyes off the still figure in the bed.
His chest feels like a tangle of lungs and heart, sewn together tenuously by a web of anxiety.
Even with her eyes closed, her face bruised, and her chin slumped into her chest, she's the most beautiful thing he's ever seen.
He breathes in and out, watching her chest rise and fall. It's the only movement. For a moment, it's deathly silent.
Then, out of bloody nowhere, there's a booming voice. "What is this!" says a tall older man with the most incredibly overbearing presence Merlin has ever witnessed. "What's going on here! I demand an answer!"
There are no question marks anywhere near those sentences, and Merlin can only stare as a small river of people parts around him on their way to the bed, their exclamations of worry falling over Merlin like a wave and pushing him back to the corner of the room. All he can do is fade thankfully into the background and watch as they cluster around their fallen… comrade? Sibling? Hard to tell; Merlin squints, tries to gauge their characters and part in all this, because, as he keeps being reminded, he knows nothing about this woman.
And it's a strange little crowd. “Oh my Christ she’s so pale,” a pale blonde woman says as she flails about, her long hair practically crackling with fright and nervous energy. Merlin, for a moment, pictures it standing straight out, like in cartoons when someone gets electrocuted.
Then she reaches out fitfully to her right, obviously searching for something, and with ease of practice and love a man reaches a hand over for her to catch onto. He has curly sandy brown hair that falls smartly about his temples, and is very bearded and serious looking. He gathers her gently to his side, leaning down to brush his lips against her hair. "That's just the lighting in here, darling," he says firmly. She sniffs, and nods, and unburies her face from his chest just enough for Merlin to see the tears in her eyes.
"And you know Morgana loathes the sunlight," another woman's voice says shakily, trying for levity, and Merlin searches out its owner—a lovely girl with brown skin and dark, curly hair, eyes like a doe. Her hands are clasped together, wringing almost, as if she wants to envelope the whole room in a hug. In fact, she radiates such magnificent caring energy, Merlin has no trouble picturing her arms reaching around them all, enveloping them all in it.
He feels his heart start to unclench.
So fascinated is he by this raggle-taggle group that he almost misses the little but staggeringly important bit of information he's just been given.
Morgana.
Her name is Morgana.
"And who the hell are you?"
Merlin focuses in on the sharp-eyed black man who just questioned him, and realises he must've said his last out loud.
Well. Dandy. The little cavalry's all turned to him, suddenly, and Merlin very much feels like a deer about to be run over by an incredibly attractive group of lorries. And as he's berating himself for that flimsy simile, the man repeats the question, sounding even more piqued.
"Erm—" Merlin has no idea, literally no idea how to answer. "Well, you see, I—she—"
He's saved, though. By the tea-bringing nurse, although she's sadly sans tea this time. "Oh, leave the poor boy alone," she interrupts, gliding into the room and tucking her arm around Merlin's elbow. "He's a hero. He saved the woman he loves."
Merlin feels his ears heating up. Because who doesn't want their mad crush to be divulged to a room full of strangers? "Well, that's very kind of you, but—"
"The woman he loves?" The booming voice is back, and Merlin nearly flinches. He feels like he's been caught writing 'Mr Harford smells of wee' on the chalkboard in school. Again. "Nonsense."
"No nonsense. He's her fiancé."
Merlin chokes.
All the words crash together in his brain and fall to the ground in pieces. The group around him, though, have plenty of words. Which they all say at once.
"Her what?" squeaks the blonde girl.
"She's engaged?" says the sharp-eyed man.
"To this skinny piece of awkward in a bottle?" says a new voice, coming from a man Merlin hadn't noticed before, which is strange because he's put together like a model, hair in his face and artful scruff on his cheeks. His eyes are a little bloodshot, though, Merlin notices. Shadowed.
"Gwaine, don't be unkind," admonishes the hugging girl. The Gwaine man defers to her, muttering a completely insincere apology, but his expression stays guarded.
"Wait a minute," the bearded man is saying, "I thought she was mugged?"
The nurse nods, beaming. "This lad found her injured and brought her here."
All eyes swing to him, and as this part is actually true, he can only nod awkwardly. He scrambles for a segue into, 'Yes, but that doesn't mean engagement in this country, last time I checked—' but is interrupted yet again.
"Head wounds like this," the nurse continues, "the first hour is very critical. If he hadn't, she certainly wouldn't be on the road to recovery like she is now. She's very lucky she's with such a wonderful young man." And the tenor of the room has shifted in favour of her ridiculous mistake, the group cherishing the hope Merlin represents to them— Merlin can feel it, so he starts to speak again, tries to speak again, but—
"Oh, Morgana!" The blonde is staring at Merlin, her eyes huge and watery. "I mean, I know we don't see her all that often, but I would've thought she'd at least—"
The booming voice ends it all. "—tell her father!"
Ah, so that explains who the scary bloke is.
Merlin can practically see the smoke coming from said bloke's nostrils, and doesn't think he's imagining the red in his eyes. "Listen," he starts, "I'm sorry, but I should really let you know—"
But it's too late, because he's cut off by the confirmation of his theory on the huggy girl, because she has enveloped him in her arms somehow and it's so—it's so—
It's been so long since he's been shown affection, at all. By anyone. She holds him so tightly. He can feel her tears on his collarbone.
And something inside of him bursts open.
The doctor arrives then, just in time for Merlin to slip out after the nurse while the rest of the party is distracted by the explanation he's already heard—coma, brain waves, prognosis looking good, blah blah blah.
He grabs the nurse's arm, probably not gently. "Why on earth did you say that?"
She looks down at his hand, then up at his face, utterly bewildered and not a little annoyed. "Say what?"
He winces and loosens his grip. "Sorry, it's just—I'm not her fiancé!"
"Well! Then why did you say that you were?"
"When?! When did I say that?"
"When you were waiting!" She gestures back towards the scene of the tea. "I heard you!"
Merlin thinks, can practically hear his brain ticking, until— "Oh, bloody hell, I—" He flings his hand out in an exasperated gesture. "I was talking to myself!"
The nurse blinks, then cuffs him lightly in the arm. "Well, next time, tell yourself you're single, and end the conversation!"
He glares. "Helpful."
"I'm not trying to be helpful."
"Isn't it in your job description? Especially when you—" Oh god her glare of death. Merlin tucks his metaphorical tail between his metaphorical legs. "—absolutely didn't cause this in the first place and have no obligation to help me at all?"
She purses her lips at him, but her face softens just enough. "All I can advise is that you've got to tell them."
The truth of it is stark. "I know, I know, and I will, I just—" He finds he has one hand clutching at his middle. "She held me so tightly. And her—Morgana's—father, he's like the wrath of God himself, and I'm man enough to admit that he scares me, and the rest of them— they were so—" He throws his hands up. "Bloody buggering hell."
She pats him on the arm. "You'll do what's right. I know you will."
Merlin sighs. "Yeah, all right, just—let me back in there, I guess."
"Excuse me?" a sonorous male voice interrupts. Merlin turns to find another handsome man (what is it with this hospital?), this one even with the bonus of being exotic-looking and in—no joke—a fireman's kit. He's also giving them a look of earnest inquiry. "I'm looking for Morgana Pendragon's room, I was told she's here?"
Alice looks from him to Merlin, then has a hand on Merlin's elbow again, and is smiling like she knows something. "Of course, dear. This young man can show you the way."
Merlin gapes. "I—" Alice subtly but not gently pinches him, and on the soft flesh inside his arm, too. "Oi! I mean—I will! Yes of course, I can show you."
"Alright…" The man looks at him, clearly a bit curious, but follows as Merlin leads them down the hall and into Morgana's room. "I'm Lance," he says, kindly but somehow also very formally.
"Oh!" And here it is, here's Merlin's shining chance— "Well, glad to meet you, despite the circumstances. I'm—"
"Lance! Darling!" The hugging woman—he really needs to find out her name—sounds full of relief, and she comes right over and gives the fireman—Lance, apparently—a kiss on the cheek that is chaste but speaks volumes. Merlin is somehow not surprised.
"Gwen, this is—"
"Morgana's fiancé, we know."
"Morgana's what?" Lance exclaims, charmingly nonplussed.
Merlin girds his loins, opens his mouth— but then doesn't have time to answer because Gwen—Gwen! What a perfect name—has turned to him, and set a soft hand on his arm. "Only I just realised I don't know your name! I'm so ashamed. We really shouldn't've overwhelmed you earlier, and I apologise. It's just that we never see her, and I think with the holiday and all—" She blinks up at him. "She was with you for Christmas?"
Merlin feels his jaw tighten as he contemplates truth and white lies and psychological damage— "Well, yes, but—"
"Oh, that's lovely," the blonde sighs from where she's suddenly at his other side, clutching his arm and sounding a bit like a swooning maiden. Merlin tenses; he just doesn't think he can handle any more fainting women today. "We always wanted her to find someone."
She's so clearly sincere, her eyes wide and wet, that Merlin's insides feel like they're being squeezed. "Yes. Well. The thing is—"
And at that moment, as luck would have it, his mobile rings.
He pulls it out of his pocket, and the name on the screen makes him wince. "Oh, bollocks."
Gwen's immediately concerned, of course she is, and Merlin wants to hug her. "Everything all right?"
"Yeah, it's just – it's my boss. I was the only one at the shop today, and I just sort of –left it—when all this—" He waves at Morgana's still figure helplessly. "—happened."
"Oh, dear."
"Yeah, and she's rather—stern. Erm, I've got to go? I'm really sorry to leave everyone like this, I'd love to stay and explain everything to you, but—"
"Why don't you come over for dinner tomorrow?" Lance says, and Merlin's never even thought to apply the word 'gallant' to a real live human being before, but it's all he can think whenever Lance speaks.
"Oh, yes!" Gwen exclaims. "I can't believe I didn't think of it sooner!" She clutches at Merlin's hands. "You really must. We're doing Christmas then, because Lance and Morgana both had to work today—although Morgana probably wouldn't've come anyway, she never does—" She winces. "Not that I can speak ill of the—Oh god, she's not dead, she's just—"
"Gwen." Merlin squeezes her hand. Apparently it's not possible to resist this woman. "I'd love to, really, but I've got to work."
"Oh, nonsense," Gwaine cuts in. "They can't make you work Christmas and Boxing Day, now, can they?"
Merlin tries to smile charmingly. "Well, as a favour, and especially after today…"
"Nonsense. We'll tell her, if you like. We'll tell her that her most dedicated employee…" Gwaine cocks his head. "What did you say your name was, again?"
"I didn't," Merlin responds, not a little wryly.
"Ah."
Gwen squeezes his hand, her face pleading for his forgiveness. "God, I'm so sorry." She gestures at the rest of the group. "We're usually not this boorish, I swear."
Merlin shakes his head with a smile, a genuine smile, because they're just all so lovely. He's surprised to find he almost doesn't want to leave.
Excepting the whole perpetuating-a-blatant-misunderstanding-involving-large-life-decisions thing.
His phone pings again. He groans and stuffs it back in his pocket, then backs towards the door. "It's been lovely to meet you all. I'll try to make it tomorrow." It's not quite a lie, he reasons; he'll ask, although Jenny will surely say no. At the door, he gives a probably pathetic little wave. "And my name—it's Merlin."
Then he runs for his life.
As he's waiting for the lift, he sees an orderly coming his direction, clearly intending to speak to him. "Come on, come on," he murmurs to the lift. But it doesn't hear him, apparently, because the kid gets to him and shoves a box at him.
"Here, these are your wife's things. Morgana Pendragon?"
Merlin wants to curse a blue streak. Or stomp his foot. Or both. "She's not my wife."
The kid doesn't seem too concerned. "Alright, your… fiancée, then."
And he's off before Merlin can argue, and he's kind of too tired to at the moment, anyway. The lift doors open, and he's nearly through them, when—
"You're Morgana's fiancé?"
Merlin does swear, this time, but keeps it somewhat under his breath. He bodily puts himself between the lift doors, using the box as leverage, and turns to find himself being assessed by a new blonde woman, this one wearing a preponderance of eyeliner and surveying him narrowly.
"Yes?" he says.
"I'm Morgause, Morgana's colleague at Pendragon Industries?"
Merlin inclines his chin in what he hopes is polite acquiescence. "Right."
Morgause, however, is not dim. Much to Merlin's chagrin. "She didn't tell you about me? That's strange."
"Oh?" It's pretty much a squeak at this point. Merlin's not proud of it. But she's looking at him like she's thinking of how many ways she knows to kill him, and he's already having a rather difficult day.
"Yes, very strange," she continues, still eyeing him warily. "Also very strange she's engaged to you, seeing as she was sleeping with me just a few months ago."
The only reason Merlin's able to keep hold of the box is the lift doors squeezing them together. "Beg pardon?"
"No need. I would daresay your relationship isn't the healthiest if you didn't know." She looks vaguely satisfied at this, and Merlin is a little affronted on Morgana's behalf. Clearly breaking things off with this woman had been a good idea on her part. "Not telling her father, or that nasty brother of hers, I understand, but a fiancé?"
"Ah… Yes… " Merlin edges sideways, further into the lift, trying to put together any sort of sentence that will get him the hell out of this hospital. "Well, it all happened very quickly, love at first sight and all that. We have a whole lifetime to learn each other's secrets, yeah?"
She is clearly not convinced. "I suppose."
"Right, lift's here!" He gets all the way in, and has never been so happy to shout through closing doors in his life. "Nice to have met you!"
As the lift descends, he stares down at the box in his arms. It seems to house the normal things, like a purse and a handkerchief and a mobile. It's thrilling, in a way, to have her most personal of things. But he feels like a thief.
Like a really, really bad thief.
He leans his head against the lift door and curses his fate.
Hours later, even once back at home with his books and his frozen dinners, he's still cursing. At least internally. And very colourfully indeed.
He tries to sleep, though, he really does. Settles in with an utterly useless novel, his cat pushing at his hand so he has to practically contort himself to turn pages, and gives it his best go.
Finally, at around one, he heaves the covers aside, shoves on jeans and a hoodie, and makes his way to the hospital. It costs him an arm and a leg, but once he's there, once he walks into her room and sees her, pale and serene, he knows it was well worth it.
He stands around awkwardly for a moment, staring at the surely uncomfortable plastic chair beside the bed and knowing he doesn't deserve to sit in it. That it's supposed to be for family.
Not that he even knows what that means any more.
To hell with it, he thinks. So he sits. He stares at Morgana—Morgana!—for a while, until the silence starts to get to him. Until the words start to press upon him.
"So," he starts, completely mortified to be talking to a person in a coma, but unable to do much of anything else. "I bet you're wondering what I'm doing here," he says wryly.
And suddenly, with the truth of that, it all comes tumbling out. "My name is Merlin, right? Merlin Emrys and I honestly have no idea how this all happened. I work at the coffee shop you frequent, Mellow Tone. And that's mostly what I do. I work. A lot." He thinks a moment. "I mean, not that I'm complaining. I have a flat. A cat named Eomer, and please don't judge me for that, because he was a gift. I never have to share a bathroom. I have sole possession of the remote control."
Her face remains impassive. "Alright, that wasn't funny anyway." He exhales. "And that's the thing. I can't complain but the fact remains that I've never—I've never had somebody I could laugh with."
He hates the way words sound out loud. The fingers of his left hand curl, clutching around the ghost of a pen.
"Although I'm sure you wouldn't know about that. You've got your friends. Whom I've met, by the way. They're lovely. They probably laugh a ton. Not that they did today, of course, though, sorry," he amends, reaching out unthinkingly to touch her, then freezing. "Sorry." He winces. He's acting like a tit and the day's not even started yet.
"And you probably have a boyfriend stashed somewhere," he says offhandedly. He thinks of mad Morgause. "Girlfriend? Who knows."
He takes in the lines on her face, ones he's never been able to see before, around her eyes and mouth; tiny ones but there nonetheless. "I just hope that they make you laugh, whoever they are. That you saw them, and you knew. That it's something you can tell your grandchildren about, someday."
And he can picture it, absolutely: her as an old woman, those lines deeper and that raven hair gone elegantly grey, in a rocking chair with a blanket and a cup of tea, telling a gaggle of grandchildren a story by the fire.
But he sees himself nowhere in this picture.
He rubs a hand across his face. He's just so tired. "At least, that's what I hope. Because this— Well, this is bloody ridiculous, is what this is. And I hope you've never experienced it. I hope that you didn't fall in love with someone before even learning their name. That you didn't wonder every day if you'd ever get to wake up with anybody in your bed again."
A corner of his mouth quirks up, completely ironically. "That you've never spent the night confusing a woman in a coma."
The words fall out of his mouth and dissipate into the sterile air.
But not before reaching the ears of the fireman standing just outside the door.
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