Leo

I slid off my apron in the backroom, while taking slow deep beats. 

 

“How many days has it been? How many weeks? Months?” I asked myself as I stared at my phone, I’d dialed the hospital, considering just calling to ask if they were awake instead of going in but I closed it instead. “Not yet. I can’t give up yet.”

 

Whenever I thought of staying home all I had toF do was think of how scared I was when I ran out of the hotel room. When I left them alone. The scars that’d I’d made in the weeks since, mental and otherwise ache. I focused on the pain, and used it to force me to stand and get moving.

 

“How are you holding up?” I felt a soft hand resting on my shoulder as a rough masculine voice spoke softly to me. I looked back and saw Kelly, my friend and one of the nicest, roughest, men I knew standing there with a concerned look on his face. I’m not sure how I looked to him but after just a moment of making eye contact he reached around me and gave me a big hug. With almost a foot in height and a hundred or so pounds in mass difference between us it was a bit like being hugged by a big muscular bear. 

 

It was also more comforting than all the words in the world.

 

“It’s OK.. It’s OK…” We stood there hugging for a while as I tried my best to hold back the tears threatening to overwhelm my practiced control. 

 

“If you need anything..” He started to talk but I just shook my head and turned away from him, wiping at the tears that formed despite my best effort.

 

“I just need time.” I replied back running my hand through my hair.

 

I didn’t want to see the sad look on his face so I looked at my locker keeping my eyes forward until I heard his heavy footsteps leaving me alone. My heart aches and I wanted to let it all out and cry to him, screaming and yelling all my frustrations. Whenever I tried to talk though I just felt my throat close up and my heart race, pounding faster than I ever expected. My breath quickened and it felt like my head was going to explode from the pressure. 

 

“How can I even explain any of it?” I cried out to the voice inside my head, demanding reprieve from a senseless world. 

 

I feel a pitiful anger flashing alive within my thoughts but I quickly smother it, worried about what I’ll say and do if I give it life. 

 

I quickly stuff my coffee stained apron into my backpack and sneak out of the cafe, using the backdoor so I can avoid talking to anyone. I knew they were worried for me but I was just too tired to try anymore for their sake and for my own.

 

I grabbed the rack of drinks I had sitting in the back room and prepared to leave.

 

I whispered out an apology to my friends worried for my health and promised to try again later. “I’ll just talk to Em while she sleeps for now.” I slid out the door, letting it slam behind me a bit more force than was appropriate. I walked to my electric scooter and flew into the streets heading for the hospital.

 

The ride to the hospital was a short one, the wind blowing in my hair left a chill in my bones as the early fall weather threatened to take a turn for the worst, promising the wrath of an early midwest winter if not taken seriously. 

 

After ten minutes of swerving recklessly along side-walks and through busy traffic I pulled up to the hospital and locked the scooter to the bike-rack outside. I was here nearly everyday now so the actions were routine. Depressingly so.

 

I walked by and gave a small wave to the receptionists who nodded me through while talking to an angry old man talking far too loudly about his very personal health issues much to the chagrin of the nurses trying to escort him out of the lobby and into a room. It looked like he was trying to leave but wasn’t able to check himself out, he wasn’t even fully dressed just wearing a paper cloth gown that tied in the back and did not hide nearly enough.

 

As I walked by I left I set down the tray of drinks for the nurses working there and thanked them, removing two particular ones before moving past and walking straight to Em’s room.

 

When I first started they would make me wait and get the doctors permission but no adays they know me and don’t bother anymore. There’s only a small handful of nurses for the entire department anyways. They have more important things to worry about than me.

 

I stopped by Em’s room in the Coma Patient Ward. It was a dark and depressing place, most of the rooms had the lights left off, turning on only when the nurses were checking in every half hour if that. After pulling some strings that I didn’t really understand, August was able to have the hospital move Em out of the communal place to their own room. The nurses were unhappy with it but for some reason no one fought too hard about it. 

 

I knocked gently at their door, before slowly opening it after just a few seconds. It was a formality only to make myself feel better, about walking into her room uninvited. 

 

“Who is it?” a voice, raspy and cracked full of pain, spoke to me from the otherside of the partially cracked door.

 

“Em?” I choked out in surprise and fear. The voice I longed for had finally spoken again after months of desperate waiting and praying but I somehow felt more unprepared than ever before.

 

“Leo?” The voice spoke back, returning my own feelings of dread and apprehension with theirs. I could tell their voice was layered with hundreds of other feelings, fears, and thoughts I could only barely begin to fully grasp.

 

I slowly slid the door open and saw Em laying on the bed with an ice-pack resting against their forehead while a litany of monitors, tubes, and cords lay next to them. On the opposite side was a nurse who looked like he had been checking Em’s vitals, jotting details down onto a laptop sitting a top a cart full of paperwork, pills, gauzes, and wraps. Anything that could be needed in an emergency. 

 

“Hey.” I whispered out, unable to say anything else. The nurse looked back and forth between us for a moment before whispering something to Em, probably asking them if they were comfortable with me being there. After a moment he spoke a bit louder pointing to the buzzer for the nurses station and stating he’d be back in a few minutes after relaying the information to the doctor. Before either of us had much of a chance to process anything else he had already slid the cart past me and was gently shutting the door.

 

“Hey.” Em replied back in kind, their lips moved like they wanted to say more but they seemed held back, unable to find the will to form the words. Instead they used their arms to push their body up, groaning in pain but forcing themselves regardless. After a few seconds I swore and moved setting my last two coffees, one a extra dry cappuccino for myself and the other a loaded pentagram for them on the desk before reaching over and helping  them sit up, adjusting the table with practiced movements to raise the headrest and minimize the stress on their body. 

 

“You need to take it slow, you’ll hurt yourself.” I chastised them without even thinking about it, before moving to readjust their blankets for them. A few minutes passed before I realized what I had done, without even thinking, moving them and making them more comfortable without ever actually talking to them about it.

 

“Ah. I’m sorry.” I muttered before awkwardly sitting down, and away from Em. Their expression seemed a little bit upset but that was probably just me projecting. I let the room go silent for a minute before forcing myself to talk, to say the thing that hadn’t left my mind in the six months Em had been comatose after their sucicde attempt. “Please… don’t go away again.” I begged honestly. It was a simple request, a painfully human and basic request, but the words seemed to echo around the room. “What happened that night… What he did to us-” I shook my head, keeping the anger out as I just focused on Em. “It wasn’t your fault… It wasn’t either of our faults.”

 

I could see tears forming at the edges of Em’s eyes but they locked onto me regardless, encouraging me to keep talking. “There’s a lot about me you don’t know.” I wiped at the tears forming in my eyes. Unable to keep from running my hands across the scars on my wrists as I thought of the really bad nights over the last six months. When the thoughts got too much to bear and I stood on a blade's edge trying to keep from falling. “Some you might have put together after that night…” “I never should have ran from you.'' The shame ached in my voice as I felt my throat close up, it was much like earlier with Kelly but this time I didn’t let it control me. I knew I had to say it all now, I had this conversation in my head and when they were sleeping so many times but now that they were here and awake I struggled to speak my thoughts and had to force it out. “I was scared and ashamed and… I never wanted you to find out about me like that. I panicked and as a result you ended up-” This time the words did lock up,I realized I had ended up crying at some point and was just sitting resting my head at Em’s side as they ran their hand through my hair gently petting it. 

 

Em gently turned my head with their finger and looked me in the eyes, I could see their stare shaking a little as emotions bubbled through. It clearly hurt them to try and talk, their voice was scratchy and sore but they forced the words through anyways, speaking softly and slowly to make sure I could understand everything they wanted to say. “Leo, you are an amazing, kind, handsome, and beautiful man. Nothing else needs to be said about that ok? I know some people might react… badly. When they discover these things, it only makes you more you to me.”

 

“Leo, I just want-” Em started but stopped what she was saying and shook her head. “I want you to know what I did… It didn’t have anything to do about you. Not really. I really like you and I want you to be happy but I’m… I’m broken Leo. Something in my head is… it’s not OK.” Em started to talk again but I grabbed their hand and held it in my own making them go silent. 

 

I thought to the time without Em these last six months and felt fear towards the direction this conversation was going. “Em… before you say anything else I just want to remind you of something I said many months ago now when you showed up at my work. ‘I’m here because I want to be.’ OK?”

 

Em was quiet before whispering. “Do what you want.”

 

Neither of us had much to say in that moment, nothing words could do to fill the void there in Em’s heart, nor in my own. 

 

I knew how much James meant to Em. I also knew that despite everything he still wasn’t caught. After posting the videos and pictures of us six months ago he vanished, his bank accounts emptied and his digital identity scrubbed off the face of the planet. I wanted to lie to Em and tell them that he was sitting in a jail cell waiting to be hung and left for dead but it wasn’t that kind of world. Both of us knew nothing ever came that easily.

 

“Hey Em, you should know-” Before I could say anymore a knock at the door interrupted us.

 

“Come in.” Em croaked out, forcing themselves to speak much louder than was comfortable.

 

“Hey sorry to interrupt” the male nurse, his voice sounding familiar but name escaping me despite my near daily visits, stuck his head in apologizing for the interruption but stepping in anyways.  “I got some information from the doctor for you, some medicine, and a fresh change of clothes if you're interested.” The way he spoke was polite but also forceful, giving me the impression of someone who wasn’t used to dealing with patients regularly, I wondered if that was the cause or side-effect of why he was in the coma-ward instead of the perpetually flooded urgent-care. 

 

Em seemed flustered and rather than answering him they just nodded their head urging him to continue. 

 

He was quiet for a second as if expecting Em to say something besides that before finally continuing on. “Right. The Doctor wants you to get some fresh air, and there doesn’t seem to be any danger of your relapsing into a coma, so she’s having you moved up to a normal room out of this wing. That will take some time though, and we want to be careful in how we move forward, so for now I was going to suggest a trip to the hospital garden. It’s a gorgeous little space in the center, I can lead you there in a minute if you’d like, your boyfriend is free to join as well of course. “

 

Em was nodding along to his words not seeming to really look for a place to interject until he said the word boyfriend. Both of us froze up in place before rapidly trying to explain we weren’t dating. He seemed extra amused by our show before relenting with a playful smile, clearly not buying a word of our claims though it didn’t sound like there was much will for denial behind our attempts. 

 

We just knew we needed to make a show of it, for now at least.

 

“Ah and the clothes.” He offered the pile, a few different sets mixed together, over to Em before stepping back. “Your muscles have suffered extreme apathy because of the long time you were asleep. As a result you probably can’t support your own weight, I don’t doubt that just attempting to sit up was hard. Since he’s just your… friend, you probably aren’t comfortable with either of us helping you sit up and get dressed. I can call over one of the female nurses to assist you if you’d like though. It will only take a second.”

 

While he talked on and on, I looked at the conflicted expression on Em’s face and came to a frustrated and sad conclusion. All the clothes were very… female.

 

Frilly things with lots of lace and flowers. I didn’t doubt that Em would look very cute in them but I also didn’t doubt that they would hate wearing them all the same. This nurse wasn’t one of the ones I usually interacted with and I didn’t make it a habit to talk about mine and Em’s personal life anyways so I can’t blame him for not thinking to grab more neutral clothes but all the same... I reached out and gave Em’s hand a gentle squeeze, a non-verbal, nearly meaningless gesture to comfort them. A promise that I’ll take care of getting proper clothes for them as soon as I leave. 

 

“It’s… It’s fine. Leo can help me.”

 

The nurse raised an eyebrow, and my own expression was slack jawed and confused as I realized that I hadn’t even been listening to what the nurse was saying and now I seemed to have been volunteered for something totally unexpected. Perhaps trusting in his instincts to avoid trouble the nurse relented without protest. “I’ll be right outside then if you need me.”

 

We both nodded and waited for him to shut the door, listening for the secure clicking of the handle. 

 

“Uhmm Em…” I started to ask why they volunteered me but stopped when I felt their nervous shaking.

 

“I… I just can’t be revealed like that. Not to a total stranger…” they whispered out their reason followed by a hasty apology but I shook my head.

 

“Oh Em…” I gave them a gentle hug, leaning over silently. “Don’t worry about it, please. Don’t apologize.” I used my finger to gently wipe at the tears threatening to overflow from their eyes. 

 

What followed as a long and frustrating dark comedy routine of helping Em get out of their medical gown, and into the clothes the nurse brought. It was uncomfortable, but less for the act of trying to medically distance myself from their nudity and more because of the pain I could hear Em in. Every groan, whispered swear word, and choked back yell as I helped them bring themselves fully together. More than a few times I nearly pulled the nurse in to help us, thinking I had hurt Em but each time they would stop and grab my hand holding me in place as we both just calmed down and focused on our breathing.

 

At a certain point I couldn’t tell who was helping whom.

 

An hour later Em was sitting on the table wearing a cute sun-dress and sandals. With such a simple outfit I thought that it shouldn’t have taken so long but one look at Em’s heavy breathing and pained expression and it was instantly obvious they were on the verge of cracking under the pain and stress. 

 

I helped Em drink a styrofoam cup of ice-water as we sat together, Em resting their body against mine. 

“I think next time some big-baggy lounge clothes would be better.” I whispered out, earning a choked laughter and a light slap to my thigh. 

 

“Jerk.” They swore at me as we sat there, listening to the beeping of machines and the ticking of the clock.

 

A few minutes passed before Em passed their cup back to me and called out for the nurse.

 

“I’m all ready.” Expecting him to come in right away. We stared at the door. A couple of minutes passed to no reveal. I quirked my head to the side before sighing and standing up to open the door. Poking my head out I looked back and forth down the darkened hallway only to see the nurse nowhere in sight.

 

“What the hell…” I muttered under my breath before shutting the door and sitting back down on the bed next to Em.

 

“I guess he must have gone to help another patient. I supposed it wasn’t fair to expect him to stand there the entire time but…” I let my thoughts hang in the air not wanting to voice the concerns in my heart. “What would have happened if we did need his help?” I couldn’t stop myself from thinking that as I tried to force a playful and optimistic smile onto my face. 

 

Em shrugged and reflected my hollow smile back at me with one of their own.

 

We both acted like the other was being genuine.

 

“I guess I can go and just ask a nurse to help us from the station…” I muttered not really wanting to leave Em alone to do that but also not wanting to seem lazy and ask them to just page the station either.

 

Em seemed to have the same thought as they tightened their grip on my hand. “Would you actually mind just… staying here with me?” their voice was so quiet I had to strain just to hear it but it made my heart race and pound all the same. 

 

“This isn’t fair. Not at all. No way am I strong enough to say no if you ask me like that.” I bemoaned this cruel universe as Em looked down, keeping their face away from me though I could see the slight tinge of a blush in their cheeks. 

 

“I’m just… I know I’ve barely been awake but I’m tired… I just… don’t want to be alone…” They mumbled their explanation aloud, driving the nails into the coffin as I gave them a gentle hug and the strongest agreement I could manage without literally standing up and shouting. 

 

“Let’s just lay down for a moment then-” Em was saying something else but a yawn interrupted them as their eyes shut and they laid down leaning back into my arms as we laid together clothed and atop the sheets, the noises of the hospital leaking through the slightly ajar door.