When the Dust Settles

Chapter Five:

Delete

Wyatt

"I'm on my way." I strap the vase of flowers into the passenger seat of my car, toss my phone into the cup holder, and start the engine. It'll be a good ten minutes before the heater really starts working, and the drive isn't even that long, so I just pull out of my apartment parking lot and head to the hospital.

Theo's coma was short-lived. Yeah, that whole, "In a coma for thirty years" thing fortunately only happens infrequently, unless you're in a soap opera. Theo is being discharged today, into the loving care of his family. I suspect that it will be a long time until I see him again. I feel this is my last chance to say goodbye, and I dare his asshole dad to keep me away. Or to keep Mason away, for that matter. The man who waited outside Theo's room until his dad had security called… numerous times. Mason just returned in some sort of disguise. A nurse's outfit. A bowler hat and fake mustache. It was effective, but it also made Theo laugh, and that made it worth it for Mason.

Theo doesn't laugh much these days. Not since he was paralyzed below the waist. The doctors hope he'll fully recover and walk again, but it's not a possibility without rigorous physical therapy. His parents, the wealthy motherfuckers, offered that therapy under the requirement that he move back in with them until he was fully healed. Theo said no, of course…but Mason was there in his bowler hat, standing in defeat beside the security guard sent to escort him out. And Mason insisted that he go with them. Anything to give him his legs back.

I steer my car into a parking spot a few hundred yards from the front doors of the hospital, gathering the flowers into my arms. Flowers are a cheesy gesture, but I couldn't find anything not-cheesy. Better to be cheesy and traditional than cheesy and weird, right? Mason is standing beneath a tree, sulking with a cigarette between his lips. He looks like he belongs in a forest at night with a knife.

"Stop that," I huff at him, my breath a vapor. He scowls.

"Stop what?"

"Scaring everyone away from the hospital."
Mason cracked a smile, shoving me in nonchalance, but nearly upending me in the process. The tension between us turned to friendship in the month after Theo's accident. Mason isn't so bad. Actually, he's good. Great, even. When he told me his version of their love story - his and Theo's - I decided that I liked Mason.

"Flowers?" Mason scoffs.

"What did you get him? A butt plug?"

He chortles. "No. I got him this." He reveals what is tucked under his arm. A steel frame with a photo inside. Him with Theo, kissing with red cheeks.

"The first one," he explains, sighing. "We're lucky enough to have a photo of our first kiss. We'll be able to show this to our kids and grandkids one day." The optimism in his eyes brings the skeptic in mine roaring to the foreground. Quick to read it, Mason glares at me. "It'll happen. Don't be a dick."

"Yeah, sorry, you're right."

We're in the hospital, walking the familiar path to Theo's room. I pop my head in to find that, gratefully, his dad is nowhere to be seen. "All's clear," I call to Mason, who is deftly avoiding the eyes of the nurses who are quite familiar with him. He's kind of hard to miss anyway.

"Flowers!" Theo claps his hands, laughing. "And I thought I'd never see the day!"

"Yeah, well, wait until you see the butt plug Mason got you." I set the flowers on his bedside table and affectionately tousle his untamed curls. I feel Mason's fist connect with the meat of my arm in a punch that says "shut up." Ouch.

"Here," Mason says awkwardly, handing Theo his gift. "Remember?"

"What are you, nuts? Of course I remember." Theo reaches up, pulling Mason down for a quick kiss.

"When are they taking you?" Mason asks while I sit in the guest armchair and pretend to flip through my cell phone in a shoddy attempt to give them some privacy without leaving the room. After all, I want to be around Theo too. I'm saying goodbye too.

"Dad just left to get the transport people. Just a few minutes, I guess."

"Damn." Mason kneels beside the hospital bed. "Call me every day, OK? And send me the address. I'll sneak in through your bedroom window if I need to."

"It's on the second level," Theo says with a laugh.

"I can climb."

"My goth Spiderman?"

"Of course."

"You two are disgusting," I huff, unable to stop myself. Theo laughs, but Mason sends me a glare, and I feel like an asshole. Mason obviously isn't comfortable with any sort of cute verbal affection, and my making fun of it is a real asshole move.

When his dad arrives, there's a little bit of yelling. He berates a nurse for letting the gay boys in again, and we're escorted away, like usual, by a bored, overweight security guard. Mason and I stand outside the hospital, both feeling hollow and directionless.

"You're late," I mutter, eyeing Micah as he speed-walks toward the circulation desk. He grins.

"Ah, yeah… My puppy sort of… ate my shoe."

"Your only shoe?"

"Well, one of two."

Micah looks at me like I am an idiot just as I lean forward to see that he is wearing the well-chewed shoe anyway. It glistens with slobber and I can see his big toe.

"What an odd, odd creature you are."

"You used 'odd' twice." He grins. "I feel privileged." And I realize that he could be perfectly cast as Doctor Who.

We set about the work day, but a thought is nagging at me.

"Hey," I say, clearing my throat, avoiding eye contact. "Have you… you know… heard from any of them?"

I fear I'll have to explain more, but Micah stops organizing books and sighs. He knows exactly who I'm asking about.

"When I left, Nolan and Bennett were broken up."

Another thought… "Why did you leave?"

There it is - that flash of brokenness, like lightning striking a tree and then returning back into the clouds, gone in an instant. He shrugs his shoulders, eyes fixated on the book in his hands.

"I got accepted into the program here at Cameron. It's a good school."

I can tell by the way his hands shake slightly that he's covering something up. Something happened to him, and I have the strong sense that Bennett has something to do with it. So here we are, injured by different assholes, but basically in the same situation. Deftly, Micah scans the books from the drop box, and I consider him. Such an unthreatening, warm, open door of a person. And yet, every time I look at him, all I feel is a cold draft.

Micah

Five missed phone calls. Eight unopened text messages. All Bennett. Delete.

It's been a while, my dear readers, but life has me in cycles of book-binging and then writing. And I'm in a writing cycle. : ) I hope you're all still out there, and I hope you're still interested to know the "how" behind Micah/Wyatt.