"Kjaere" (Nick/Greg, 10/12)
Aug. 1st, 2009 11:51 pm![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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nickngregTitle – Kjaere
Author -![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
black_dahlia63
Characters – Nick Stokes, Greg Sanders, various OC’s
Spoilers - Fannysmackin’
Rating – PG
Warning – Serious angst, but hey…people kind of expect that from me by now, right?
Disclaimer – not mine, don’t sue.
Thanks go to Lin.
Previous instalments here.
July 10th, 9.30 p.m
He should have been asleep in bed long since, but it was as though all the strength had evaporated from Nick’s body and left him powerless to move. He lay on the couch he’d collapsed onto after he’d checked on Emily and found her asleep; he was staring dully at the TV where Conan O’Brien was making his audience laugh uproariously, and so many things were occupying his mind - but foremost among them was the way Emily had sat in Greg’s lap the afternoon before Madison’s party, giggling as she told him about something that had happened at Angie’s house.
She didn’t giggle very much now. Unless there was something she couldn’t manage on her own and she needed Nick’s help, she hardly even spoke; when she did communicate she was whiny and clingy, having seemingly regressed two years in a matter of weeks, and three nights previously Nick had resorted to putting a waterproof sheet back on her bed.
He’d tried to be positive for so long now, to tell himself and Emily that there was going to be a happy outcome – but with every day that passed, this seemed to be further away than it had ever been.
Because at least while they could see Greg every day there was hope, but this was not going to continue for very much longer; Greg was going to need to be moved soon, and the insurance company had remained implacable. And what scared Nick more than anything were all the times when he’d lain awake and thought that maybe it would be easier to send Emily to Dallas, just for the summer -
Not both of them, he told himself silently. I’m not losing both of them, and that was when the phone rang; and because he knew that Greg’s parents wouldn’t be awake this late at night, Nick got up and walked into the kitchen to lift the phone from its cradle on the wall.
“Hello?”
“Well, there you are,” a familiar voice said. “You’re difficult to get hold of – I was starting to think your answering machine wasn’t working.”
“Hi, Luke,” Nick replied, pulling a chair out from the kitchen table and sinking down onto it. “Yeah, I’m sorry, man, I’ve been meaning to call you, but -”
“No big deal,” was the answer. “How are you guys? Everything okay?” and the casual question made Nick’s heart ache – because it must have been the best part of a month since he’d been in touch with Luke at all, and where the hell would he even begin to explain how far from okay everything was?
“Nick?”
“Sorry,” he said. “I’ve just come off a week of nights, I really ought to be in bed,” and he didn’t much care that he was lying. “We’re fine, honestly.”
“You sure?” was the immediate response. “Better not be bullshitting me here.”
“Wouldn’t dare,” Nick replied. “You’d call my mom,” and the thought that he hadn’t talked to her himself since – well, he wasn’t sure how long – made his throat tighten.
“Bet your ass I would,” Luke said immediately. “When I ask someone to keep in touch, I mean it.”
“I’m sorry,” Nick told him, squeezing his eyes shut to stem the tears that were never too far off these days when he was alone. Luke meant well, but what would he be able to do to help? “How about an email tomorrow, and I’ll catch you up on everything?”
“I’m holding you to that, you know.”
“I know you are,” Nick said. “Tomorrow, I swear – yes, I’ll tell her hello,” and he hung up – then, leaning against the kitchen wall, he cried until his chest hurt.
***********
July 17th, 3.30 p.m – Hog Heaven, Daytona Beach.
There had been no email the following day as Nick had promised, or the day after that – and now, a full week after he’d made that call to Vegas, there was still no news.
He knew it wasn’t his business, that he should stay the hell out of whatever was going on, but it didn’t stop Luke from worrying.
The door of his office had remained closed all day, with instructions that he was not to be disturbed – and this had included lunch, leaving him to exist on mugs of coffee while the others had gone to the Mexican place on the next block. He sat at his desk, surrounded by a drift of paperwork that had barely been touched, trying to tune out the music coming from the shop – Slipknot, which meant that the damn trainee had won the coin toss after they’d returned from lunch – and he was in the process of lighting yet another cigarette when there was a knock on the window. He ignored it, not even looking up to see who it was, and in the next instant the door opened.
“Jefe, I gotta talk to you.”
“What part of ‘leave me the fuck alone’ didn’t you understand?” Luke asked, still not looking up as the door was closed and the music reduced to a barely tolerable level again.
“None of it,” Sol said. “You’ve been like a bear with a sore ass for too damn long now – what’s wrong with you?”
“I’d tell you if I wanted you to know, wouldn’t I?”
“Is it something to do with her?” came the response, and when Luke realised that he was holding the photo again he jerked his hand away as though he’d burnt himself.
“It’s none of your damn business, is what it is,” he replied. “Was there anything else?”
“Yeah, there was,” Sol snapped back. “Look at me when I’m talking to you, damn it,” and Luke was so startled that his head came up sharply. “It might not be any of my damn business, but you’re going to go wherever you need to go to take care of it before I lock you out of the shop.”
“Oh, it’s like that, is it?”
“If it needs to be,” was the answer, and although Sol’s arms were folded uncompromisingly there was a softness on her face that made the backs of Luke’s eyes prickle with tears. “How long have we been friends, jefe? Long enough for you to bust my ass when you think I need it, right? Well, now it’s my turn,” and she stepped forward to perch on the corner of the cluttered desk. “Is it Emily?”
“I don’t know,” Luke said, running a hand through his hair. “Nick told me they’re fine, but – well, I just had this feeling he was bullshitting me, and I haven’t heard from him in a week,” and he crushed his cigarette out in the overflowing ashtray. “I should just forget it,” he said, trying to shore up a wall that was close to being broken down. “It’s not my problem if he doesn’t want to tell me the truth.”
“If you’re worried about them, you should go out there,” Sol told him. “If you get bawled out for it, so what? Not like that hasn’t happened to you before.”
“All right, I’ll call the airline when I get home,” Luke said wearily. “Happy?” but the expression on the Latina’s face gave him all the answer he needed. “What, you want me to do it now?”
**********
July 17th – just after midnight.
“I don’t know how long I’ll be,” Luke said, the phone cradled between his ear and his shoulder as he crammed clothes back into his overnight bag. “I’ll let you know once I get there, Marty, okay?”
“What about the calendar shoot?”
“We can reschedule it if we need to.”
“What the hell are you going to Vegas for, anyway?” the voice on the other end of the phone asked, and a chuckle echoed down the line. “Just tell me this isn’t one of your hook-ups -”
“Yeah, that’s exactly what it is,” Luke replied, something burning in the back of his throat at the one question his PA had no right to ask. “I’ll tell you all about it when I get back,” and he snapped his cell phone shut again, ignoring it when it rang a few seconds later and Marty’s number showed on the display. He finished packing the overnight bag that was already bulging dangerously, and once he’d zipped it shut he carried it into the living room where he dropped it on the floor before walking back out onto the balcony; he sank down into the lounger again, but his hands were shaking so badly it took him four attempts before he managed to light a cigarette.
“Don’t go to Vegas, don’t have them come to Florida,” Alan had said, “because you haven’t crossed any boundaries yet, but you’re not far off” - and Luke knew the minister had been right, but damn it, he couldn’t just let this go.
You don’t have to fly out there, a little voice said. Nick doesn’t even know you’re coming - so you can just rip that E ticket up and nobody’s any the wiser, right? and Luke’s only response was to sit on the balcony, lighting one Marlboro from the tip of the previous one in a steady stream, until the pack was almost empty and the taxi honked its horn out on the street an hour and a half later.
**************
July 18th, 11.00 a.m – Las Vegas
The flight had been delayed by half an hour, and a baby had screamed almost incessantly two rows behind him - what the hell was that kid’s mother doing taking it on a plane that early, anyway? he’d asked himself irritably – ensuring that he’d gotten hardly any sleep during the eight-hour flight. The first thing he’d done once he’d checked into his hotel was to order a pot of coffee from room service and to drink the entire thing; once he’d done this, leaving himself feeling jittery but at least able to keep his eyes open, he took his cell from his pocket and dialled a number his mother had given him.
“Hello?”
“Good morning, Jillian, it’s Luke – how are you doing?”
“I’m very well, thank you, Luke. What can I do for you?”
“Well, I’m in Vegas on business and I have some time to kill,” Luke lied, “and I was hoping you might tell me where I could find that son of yours – if he’s not working, of course,” and when an almost inaudible sigh echoed down the phone, the hairs on the nape of his neck rose on end.
“I can tell you where to find him,” Jillian said. “Do you have a pen?” and when Luke assured her that he did, she dictated an address which he scribbled on a sheet of hotel notepaper. “I couldn’t tell you if he’s at work or not, though, because I’m afraid we haven’t spoken in a while,” and there was a short silence. “How much has he told you about what’s been going on over the last two or three weeks?”
“Not enough,” Luke told her as he recalled the phone call that had taken place less than a week previously. “Maybe you’d better fill me in.”
***************
12.20 p.m.
Scanning a double column of buzzers next to the lobby doors of the building, he finally spotted one labelled Sanders/Stokes - and once he’d taken a deep breath, he abandoned his last chance to stay out of the situation and pushed the button.
“Hello?”
“Knock, knock,” Luke announced, and a second or so later his smile finally faded completely.
“Luke – hi,” Nick said, and the flat way in which the single word was delivered told Luke that he’d been right to come here. “What are you doing here?”
“Candy gram,” Luke replied. “You going to buzz me in, or are we going to talk through this thing all day?”
**********
“You want some coffee?”
“That’d be great,” Luke said, although he was fairly certain he’d already exceeded the FDA recommended amount of caffeine for about the next week, and he sat down at the kitchen table. “Cream, no sugar if you have it.”
“What are you doing in Vegas? Finally opening that shop?”
“I came to see you,” Luke said, no longer caring about what boundaries he was about to cross. “I haven’t heard from you in a week, and you’re not answering my calls,” and his ears picked up an exasperated sigh. “What’s going on, Nick?”
“I’ve been busy,” Nick replied wearily. “And nothing’s going on, just bullshit with the insurance company, but I’m dealing with it,” and he walked to the fridge, where he took out a carton of milk. “Please tell me you haven’t really come out here just to see us -”
“I was worried,” Luke said, and then he saw movement out of the corner of his eye; turning his head towards the kitchen doorway, he saw a mass of red hair surrounding a pale face, and he wiggled the fingers of his left hand. “Hey, Miss Emily,” he said with a smile, but the little girl – who was still wearing pyjamas - merely stared at him for a second or two before disappearing down the hallway.
“I wouldn’t,” Nick said wearily, setting two mugs down on the table as Luke pushed his chair back. “She isn’t exactly talking much at the moment,” and Luke recalled a long weekend in April when Nick and his daughter had chased each other along a stretch of Daytona beach; Nick had been tired then, but what was happening now was obviously something much worse.
“Dealing with it?” he murmured softly, standing up and turning to look at Nick’s stricken face. “The fuck you are – no, you just stay there,” and he made his way along the hallway.
********
He rapped softly on the half-open door that bore pink wooden letters spelling out Emily, and when there was no answer he looked into the room.
“Can I come in?” he asked quietly, and when there was a nod from the figure bundled up beneath a bright pink comforter Luke stepped into the room and closed the door. “What are you doing in bed?” he asked as he crouched down on the floor next to the bed. “It’s nearly lunchtime, isn’t it?” and there was a whispered reply that he didn’t catch. “What did you say?”
“Don’t feel good,” Emily said around the thumb that had found its way into her mouth. “My belly hurts.”
“Do I need to go and get Nick?” Luke asked, and when Emily shook her head he remembered a story his sister had told him about a tactic her six year old had used to try and get out of going to day camp. “You know what?” he said, shifting closer so that he was leaning against the bed. “I wonder if your belly hurts because you’re sad about something?” and during the silence that followed he saw Emily’s eyes brimming with tears. “Can you tell me what it is?” but Emily shook her head. “How come? I thought we were buddies -”
“I don’t want Greg to go to Encino,” Emily whispered, and she sniffed loudly. “I heard Nick talking on the phone about it when I woke up one night, and I asked Angie where Encino is – and she said -” and her face screwed up before tears began to roll down her cheeks. “She showed me in a book where it is, and I won’t see him every day if he goes there!”
“Oh, honey,” Luke said, “come here,” and he rose on his knees to lean over the bed and put his arms round Emily, who struggled briefly before giving in. She cried for what seemed like a very long time, her hands clutching at Luke’s T shirt; and when her sobs eventually tailed off into hitches of breath, Luke drew her down onto his lap.
“You wait here, okay?” he said, something clenching in his chest as he looked at Emily’s tear-stained face. “I’m going to go and talk to Nick -” but he broke off when the little girl shook her head in apparent alarm. “Why not?”
“’Cause he’ll know I heard him on the phone,” Emily whispered, her eyes almost swollen shut. “He’ll get mad, and last time he got mad he used a swear -”
“Well, here’s what we’ll do,” Luke told her, reaching to smooth her hair down. “Can you get dressed for me?”
*********
The expression on Luke’s face when he’d returned to the kitchen had brooked no argument, and so Nick had put on his jacket and fetched Emily’s booster seat from the hall closet before the three of them took the elevator down to where Luke had parked his rental car.
Emily fell asleep with her thumb in her mouth almost as soon as the car started moving, and she didn’t stir when they reached the underground parking lot at Luke’s hotel; Nick scooped her up into his arms and allowed Luke to shepherd the two of them into the elevator, which they rode to a floor where Nick thought he and Warrick had once investigated a case.
“Okay,” Luke said eventually, once Emily had been tucked into an immense bed and he and Nick were sitting at either side of a dining room table in his suite, “you tell me what’s really been going on, and I don’t want any bullshit – because that little girl in there’s told me more than you have,” and Nick – face to face with his inquisitor, finally unable to protest that he and Emily were fine – obeyed. He talked for almost a quarter of an hour, staring down at his hands as he spoke and willing himself with the last of his strength not to cry; he didn’t look up once he’d finished speaking, and after what seemed far too long a pause Luke cleared his throat.
“Jesus, you’re in a mess, aren’t you?” he asked softly. “Have they talked about getting a lawyer involved?”
“Who? G’s parents? No, they -”
“Don’t tell me they wouldn’t,” Luke said, and something in the tone of his voice made Nick’s head come up. “I’ve seen it happen, Nick,” he went on. “You want me to tell you about the guys I know who got flown home when they developed full-blown AIDS? Didn’t matter how long they’d been with their boyfriend, didn’t matter how cool their folks had always been with having a gay son – when it came down to it, mom and dad were the ones who knew what was best. You guys aren’t married, you know, you’ve got no real say in what happens – and if you don’t get them on side, you’re fucked.”
“Who’s on my side?” Nick hissed fiercely, finally looking up. “His parents want me to see him every week or so because they’ve got money for a good rehab facility that our insurance won’t pay for, my mom wants the three of us to move back to the ranch,” and he clenched his hands into fists so tightly that his knuckles turned white. “This is where we live, this is where our apartment is, it’s where our life is, and nobody gets that,” he said, a dull hopelessness in his eyes. “You tell me how you’d fix it for us, Luke, because everyone else has got an idea.”
********
He’d driven them home, after promising to come and take them out for lunch the following day – and now he was standing at the window, watching the fountains but not really seeing them as he tried to think about what he was going to do.
Pack a bag and come back to Daytona with me, just for a few days; that had been the first thing he’d wanted to do, to take them away and just let them put themselves back together. But then he’d thought of the raw pain that had been in Nick’s eyes, about Emily’s distress -
This is where our life is, and nobody gets that.
She showed me in a book where it is, and I won’t see him every day if he goes there!
- and he’d known that it wasn’t about what he wanted, it wasn’t about what he might feel even after all this time, it was about what Nick and Emily and Greg needed.
And Christ, he was wondering why he’d come here and gotten into this, but he wasn’t backing down now.
He couldn’t
To be continued.
Author -
black_dahlia63Characters – Nick Stokes, Greg Sanders, various OC’s
Spoilers - Fannysmackin’
Rating – PG
Warning – Serious angst, but hey…people kind of expect that from me by now, right?
Disclaimer – not mine, don’t sue.
Thanks go to Lin.
Previous instalments here.
July 10th, 9.30 p.m
He should have been asleep in bed long since, but it was as though all the strength had evaporated from Nick’s body and left him powerless to move. He lay on the couch he’d collapsed onto after he’d checked on Emily and found her asleep; he was staring dully at the TV where Conan O’Brien was making his audience laugh uproariously, and so many things were occupying his mind - but foremost among them was the way Emily had sat in Greg’s lap the afternoon before Madison’s party, giggling as she told him about something that had happened at Angie’s house.
She didn’t giggle very much now. Unless there was something she couldn’t manage on her own and she needed Nick’s help, she hardly even spoke; when she did communicate she was whiny and clingy, having seemingly regressed two years in a matter of weeks, and three nights previously Nick had resorted to putting a waterproof sheet back on her bed.
He’d tried to be positive for so long now, to tell himself and Emily that there was going to be a happy outcome – but with every day that passed, this seemed to be further away than it had ever been.
Because at least while they could see Greg every day there was hope, but this was not going to continue for very much longer; Greg was going to need to be moved soon, and the insurance company had remained implacable. And what scared Nick more than anything were all the times when he’d lain awake and thought that maybe it would be easier to send Emily to Dallas, just for the summer -
Not both of them, he told himself silently. I’m not losing both of them, and that was when the phone rang; and because he knew that Greg’s parents wouldn’t be awake this late at night, Nick got up and walked into the kitchen to lift the phone from its cradle on the wall.
“Hello?”
“Well, there you are,” a familiar voice said. “You’re difficult to get hold of – I was starting to think your answering machine wasn’t working.”
“Hi, Luke,” Nick replied, pulling a chair out from the kitchen table and sinking down onto it. “Yeah, I’m sorry, man, I’ve been meaning to call you, but -”
“No big deal,” was the answer. “How are you guys? Everything okay?” and the casual question made Nick’s heart ache – because it must have been the best part of a month since he’d been in touch with Luke at all, and where the hell would he even begin to explain how far from okay everything was?
“Nick?”
“Sorry,” he said. “I’ve just come off a week of nights, I really ought to be in bed,” and he didn’t much care that he was lying. “We’re fine, honestly.”
“You sure?” was the immediate response. “Better not be bullshitting me here.”
“Wouldn’t dare,” Nick replied. “You’d call my mom,” and the thought that he hadn’t talked to her himself since – well, he wasn’t sure how long – made his throat tighten.
“Bet your ass I would,” Luke said immediately. “When I ask someone to keep in touch, I mean it.”
“I’m sorry,” Nick told him, squeezing his eyes shut to stem the tears that were never too far off these days when he was alone. Luke meant well, but what would he be able to do to help? “How about an email tomorrow, and I’ll catch you up on everything?”
“I’m holding you to that, you know.”
“I know you are,” Nick said. “Tomorrow, I swear – yes, I’ll tell her hello,” and he hung up – then, leaning against the kitchen wall, he cried until his chest hurt.
***********
July 17th, 3.30 p.m – Hog Heaven, Daytona Beach.
There had been no email the following day as Nick had promised, or the day after that – and now, a full week after he’d made that call to Vegas, there was still no news.
He knew it wasn’t his business, that he should stay the hell out of whatever was going on, but it didn’t stop Luke from worrying.
The door of his office had remained closed all day, with instructions that he was not to be disturbed – and this had included lunch, leaving him to exist on mugs of coffee while the others had gone to the Mexican place on the next block. He sat at his desk, surrounded by a drift of paperwork that had barely been touched, trying to tune out the music coming from the shop – Slipknot, which meant that the damn trainee had won the coin toss after they’d returned from lunch – and he was in the process of lighting yet another cigarette when there was a knock on the window. He ignored it, not even looking up to see who it was, and in the next instant the door opened.
“Jefe, I gotta talk to you.”
“What part of ‘leave me the fuck alone’ didn’t you understand?” Luke asked, still not looking up as the door was closed and the music reduced to a barely tolerable level again.
“None of it,” Sol said. “You’ve been like a bear with a sore ass for too damn long now – what’s wrong with you?”
“I’d tell you if I wanted you to know, wouldn’t I?”
“Is it something to do with her?” came the response, and when Luke realised that he was holding the photo again he jerked his hand away as though he’d burnt himself.
“It’s none of your damn business, is what it is,” he replied. “Was there anything else?”
“Yeah, there was,” Sol snapped back. “Look at me when I’m talking to you, damn it,” and Luke was so startled that his head came up sharply. “It might not be any of my damn business, but you’re going to go wherever you need to go to take care of it before I lock you out of the shop.”
“Oh, it’s like that, is it?”
“If it needs to be,” was the answer, and although Sol’s arms were folded uncompromisingly there was a softness on her face that made the backs of Luke’s eyes prickle with tears. “How long have we been friends, jefe? Long enough for you to bust my ass when you think I need it, right? Well, now it’s my turn,” and she stepped forward to perch on the corner of the cluttered desk. “Is it Emily?”
“I don’t know,” Luke said, running a hand through his hair. “Nick told me they’re fine, but – well, I just had this feeling he was bullshitting me, and I haven’t heard from him in a week,” and he crushed his cigarette out in the overflowing ashtray. “I should just forget it,” he said, trying to shore up a wall that was close to being broken down. “It’s not my problem if he doesn’t want to tell me the truth.”
“If you’re worried about them, you should go out there,” Sol told him. “If you get bawled out for it, so what? Not like that hasn’t happened to you before.”
“All right, I’ll call the airline when I get home,” Luke said wearily. “Happy?” but the expression on the Latina’s face gave him all the answer he needed. “What, you want me to do it now?”
**********
July 17th – just after midnight.
“I don’t know how long I’ll be,” Luke said, the phone cradled between his ear and his shoulder as he crammed clothes back into his overnight bag. “I’ll let you know once I get there, Marty, okay?”
“What about the calendar shoot?”
“We can reschedule it if we need to.”
“What the hell are you going to Vegas for, anyway?” the voice on the other end of the phone asked, and a chuckle echoed down the line. “Just tell me this isn’t one of your hook-ups -”
“Yeah, that’s exactly what it is,” Luke replied, something burning in the back of his throat at the one question his PA had no right to ask. “I’ll tell you all about it when I get back,” and he snapped his cell phone shut again, ignoring it when it rang a few seconds later and Marty’s number showed on the display. He finished packing the overnight bag that was already bulging dangerously, and once he’d zipped it shut he carried it into the living room where he dropped it on the floor before walking back out onto the balcony; he sank down into the lounger again, but his hands were shaking so badly it took him four attempts before he managed to light a cigarette.
“Don’t go to Vegas, don’t have them come to Florida,” Alan had said, “because you haven’t crossed any boundaries yet, but you’re not far off” - and Luke knew the minister had been right, but damn it, he couldn’t just let this go.
You don’t have to fly out there, a little voice said. Nick doesn’t even know you’re coming - so you can just rip that E ticket up and nobody’s any the wiser, right? and Luke’s only response was to sit on the balcony, lighting one Marlboro from the tip of the previous one in a steady stream, until the pack was almost empty and the taxi honked its horn out on the street an hour and a half later.
**************
July 18th, 11.00 a.m – Las Vegas
The flight had been delayed by half an hour, and a baby had screamed almost incessantly two rows behind him - what the hell was that kid’s mother doing taking it on a plane that early, anyway? he’d asked himself irritably – ensuring that he’d gotten hardly any sleep during the eight-hour flight. The first thing he’d done once he’d checked into his hotel was to order a pot of coffee from room service and to drink the entire thing; once he’d done this, leaving himself feeling jittery but at least able to keep his eyes open, he took his cell from his pocket and dialled a number his mother had given him.
“Hello?”
“Good morning, Jillian, it’s Luke – how are you doing?”
“I’m very well, thank you, Luke. What can I do for you?”
“Well, I’m in Vegas on business and I have some time to kill,” Luke lied, “and I was hoping you might tell me where I could find that son of yours – if he’s not working, of course,” and when an almost inaudible sigh echoed down the phone, the hairs on the nape of his neck rose on end.
“I can tell you where to find him,” Jillian said. “Do you have a pen?” and when Luke assured her that he did, she dictated an address which he scribbled on a sheet of hotel notepaper. “I couldn’t tell you if he’s at work or not, though, because I’m afraid we haven’t spoken in a while,” and there was a short silence. “How much has he told you about what’s been going on over the last two or three weeks?”
“Not enough,” Luke told her as he recalled the phone call that had taken place less than a week previously. “Maybe you’d better fill me in.”
***************
12.20 p.m.
Scanning a double column of buzzers next to the lobby doors of the building, he finally spotted one labelled Sanders/Stokes - and once he’d taken a deep breath, he abandoned his last chance to stay out of the situation and pushed the button.
“Hello?”
“Knock, knock,” Luke announced, and a second or so later his smile finally faded completely.
“Luke – hi,” Nick said, and the flat way in which the single word was delivered told Luke that he’d been right to come here. “What are you doing here?”
“Candy gram,” Luke replied. “You going to buzz me in, or are we going to talk through this thing all day?”
**********
“You want some coffee?”
“That’d be great,” Luke said, although he was fairly certain he’d already exceeded the FDA recommended amount of caffeine for about the next week, and he sat down at the kitchen table. “Cream, no sugar if you have it.”
“What are you doing in Vegas? Finally opening that shop?”
“I came to see you,” Luke said, no longer caring about what boundaries he was about to cross. “I haven’t heard from you in a week, and you’re not answering my calls,” and his ears picked up an exasperated sigh. “What’s going on, Nick?”
“I’ve been busy,” Nick replied wearily. “And nothing’s going on, just bullshit with the insurance company, but I’m dealing with it,” and he walked to the fridge, where he took out a carton of milk. “Please tell me you haven’t really come out here just to see us -”
“I was worried,” Luke said, and then he saw movement out of the corner of his eye; turning his head towards the kitchen doorway, he saw a mass of red hair surrounding a pale face, and he wiggled the fingers of his left hand. “Hey, Miss Emily,” he said with a smile, but the little girl – who was still wearing pyjamas - merely stared at him for a second or two before disappearing down the hallway.
“I wouldn’t,” Nick said wearily, setting two mugs down on the table as Luke pushed his chair back. “She isn’t exactly talking much at the moment,” and Luke recalled a long weekend in April when Nick and his daughter had chased each other along a stretch of Daytona beach; Nick had been tired then, but what was happening now was obviously something much worse.
“Dealing with it?” he murmured softly, standing up and turning to look at Nick’s stricken face. “The fuck you are – no, you just stay there,” and he made his way along the hallway.
********
He rapped softly on the half-open door that bore pink wooden letters spelling out Emily, and when there was no answer he looked into the room.
“Can I come in?” he asked quietly, and when there was a nod from the figure bundled up beneath a bright pink comforter Luke stepped into the room and closed the door. “What are you doing in bed?” he asked as he crouched down on the floor next to the bed. “It’s nearly lunchtime, isn’t it?” and there was a whispered reply that he didn’t catch. “What did you say?”
“Don’t feel good,” Emily said around the thumb that had found its way into her mouth. “My belly hurts.”
“Do I need to go and get Nick?” Luke asked, and when Emily shook her head he remembered a story his sister had told him about a tactic her six year old had used to try and get out of going to day camp. “You know what?” he said, shifting closer so that he was leaning against the bed. “I wonder if your belly hurts because you’re sad about something?” and during the silence that followed he saw Emily’s eyes brimming with tears. “Can you tell me what it is?” but Emily shook her head. “How come? I thought we were buddies -”
“I don’t want Greg to go to Encino,” Emily whispered, and she sniffed loudly. “I heard Nick talking on the phone about it when I woke up one night, and I asked Angie where Encino is – and she said -” and her face screwed up before tears began to roll down her cheeks. “She showed me in a book where it is, and I won’t see him every day if he goes there!”
“Oh, honey,” Luke said, “come here,” and he rose on his knees to lean over the bed and put his arms round Emily, who struggled briefly before giving in. She cried for what seemed like a very long time, her hands clutching at Luke’s T shirt; and when her sobs eventually tailed off into hitches of breath, Luke drew her down onto his lap.
“You wait here, okay?” he said, something clenching in his chest as he looked at Emily’s tear-stained face. “I’m going to go and talk to Nick -” but he broke off when the little girl shook her head in apparent alarm. “Why not?”
“’Cause he’ll know I heard him on the phone,” Emily whispered, her eyes almost swollen shut. “He’ll get mad, and last time he got mad he used a swear -”
“Well, here’s what we’ll do,” Luke told her, reaching to smooth her hair down. “Can you get dressed for me?”
*********
The expression on Luke’s face when he’d returned to the kitchen had brooked no argument, and so Nick had put on his jacket and fetched Emily’s booster seat from the hall closet before the three of them took the elevator down to where Luke had parked his rental car.
Emily fell asleep with her thumb in her mouth almost as soon as the car started moving, and she didn’t stir when they reached the underground parking lot at Luke’s hotel; Nick scooped her up into his arms and allowed Luke to shepherd the two of them into the elevator, which they rode to a floor where Nick thought he and Warrick had once investigated a case.
“Okay,” Luke said eventually, once Emily had been tucked into an immense bed and he and Nick were sitting at either side of a dining room table in his suite, “you tell me what’s really been going on, and I don’t want any bullshit – because that little girl in there’s told me more than you have,” and Nick – face to face with his inquisitor, finally unable to protest that he and Emily were fine – obeyed. He talked for almost a quarter of an hour, staring down at his hands as he spoke and willing himself with the last of his strength not to cry; he didn’t look up once he’d finished speaking, and after what seemed far too long a pause Luke cleared his throat.
“Jesus, you’re in a mess, aren’t you?” he asked softly. “Have they talked about getting a lawyer involved?”
“Who? G’s parents? No, they -”
“Don’t tell me they wouldn’t,” Luke said, and something in the tone of his voice made Nick’s head come up. “I’ve seen it happen, Nick,” he went on. “You want me to tell you about the guys I know who got flown home when they developed full-blown AIDS? Didn’t matter how long they’d been with their boyfriend, didn’t matter how cool their folks had always been with having a gay son – when it came down to it, mom and dad were the ones who knew what was best. You guys aren’t married, you know, you’ve got no real say in what happens – and if you don’t get them on side, you’re fucked.”
“Who’s on my side?” Nick hissed fiercely, finally looking up. “His parents want me to see him every week or so because they’ve got money for a good rehab facility that our insurance won’t pay for, my mom wants the three of us to move back to the ranch,” and he clenched his hands into fists so tightly that his knuckles turned white. “This is where we live, this is where our apartment is, it’s where our life is, and nobody gets that,” he said, a dull hopelessness in his eyes. “You tell me how you’d fix it for us, Luke, because everyone else has got an idea.”
********
He’d driven them home, after promising to come and take them out for lunch the following day – and now he was standing at the window, watching the fountains but not really seeing them as he tried to think about what he was going to do.
Pack a bag and come back to Daytona with me, just for a few days; that had been the first thing he’d wanted to do, to take them away and just let them put themselves back together. But then he’d thought of the raw pain that had been in Nick’s eyes, about Emily’s distress -
This is where our life is, and nobody gets that.
She showed me in a book where it is, and I won’t see him every day if he goes there!
- and he’d known that it wasn’t about what he wanted, it wasn’t about what he might feel even after all this time, it was about what Nick and Emily and Greg needed.
And Christ, he was wondering why he’d come here and gotten into this, but he wasn’t backing down now.
He couldn’t
To be continued.
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Date: 2009-08-02 09:24 am (UTC)I hope that Luke can offer some hope, and help.
Excellent update.
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Date: 2009-08-02 09:26 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-08-02 09:35 am (UTC)I was happy to see the return of this story, great updates, I hope Luke can help. The guys need a break and hope.
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Date: 2009-08-02 09:41 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-08-03 08:40 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-08-03 08:44 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-08-03 09:04 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-08-03 09:11 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-08-04 05:13 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2009-08-04 05:18 pm (UTC)