“The...The surgeons?”
“Yes.You were in there for three hours.”
“I don’t remember any of this.Nothing at all until waking uphere.”
Sashashrugged.He turned the sheet over, gave it a knife-edge crease.“You wouldn’t.”He glanced at Clara, but she was safely out of it,her face a tear-smudged blur behind her damp hair.“You had abullet removed from two inches under your heart.You lost so muchblood they’re still pouring it into you now to try and tank you up.You got through the surgery okay, but then you went into a comaand...”
“A coma?Are you kidding?How long?”
Sashashook his head.“I am so tempted to tell you it’s 2019 and BorisJohnson is Prime Minister.Three days.”
“Three days...”Laurie leaned back on his pillows.His throatwas sore from the tube.His skin itched under the electrode pads,and he sensed that, if not for a muffling opiate layer, he’d be ina world of pain.These discomforts dried up into ash and blew away.“You were here for all that time?”
“Yes, I was.”A calm answer to a calm question, but Sashastopped flattening the sheet and took a fistful of it, crushing itinstead.“Where thefuckelse would I have been, Laurie?”
Laurieinched towards him.Clara had him pinned down on one side, but hecould still reach far enough to lay a hand on Sasha’s face.“I’msorry.I’m sorry.”
“I thought you were dying, you bastard.For threedays.”
“I’m so sorry.Come here.”
Sashastood up.For a moment Laurie thought he would turn and walk away.His face was wet with tears but almost expressionless beneath them,as if the lonely fear of those three days had burned something outof him.Then he sat down on the very edge of the bed.He glanced atthe IV tube, at its connections to the port in Laurie’s wrist andthe bag overhead, as if that had become a habit.Most of thelife-support machinery had now been rolled away, but if Sasha hadhad three days here, Laurie was willing to bet he’d have learnedhow it all worked.“They were good to you?”Laurie asked softly.“The doctors and everyone—they let you stay?”
“They were great.They gave me pillows and a blanket so I couldsleep in the armchair over there.”He chuckled, shuddered.“Icould’ve had a ringside seat at your deathbed any time Iwanted.”
“And the papers you were working on—those were about YosiriCuza?”
“Yes.He’s being recalled for a re-examination of his case.He’s on his way back now with his wife and kids.I’m writing up areport to show he’s of good character and deserves refugee statushere.Thanks for delivering my envelope.”
Laurieswallowed.He couldn’t even take the whole credit for that.“I’mglad it helped.”
“It did.Alan Briggs was fired for corruption.I’ve beenreinstated into my job, if I want it.”
“Good.That’s brilliant.”The words sounded so bloody lame.Laurie was ashamed of them.Sasha saved him from having to findmore by suddenly letting go of his rigid poise on the bed.He puthis face into his hands.Laurie got an arm around him in time toguide his collapse.“Oh, Sasha.Sweetheart.”
Hehuddled against Laurie’s side.Clara gave a restless snuffle and heheld himself still, but she quieted again.His last constraintsdissolved.Blindly reaching out one arm, he encompassed as much ofLaurie and the kid as he could manage and held on.He broke intobitter tears.
Laurietried to sit up.If he’d still been the dream-hawk in the Romanianforest he could have spread his wings over both of them.But he wastied down in wires and pain and couldn’t reach them.He had nothingto muffle the sound of his own tears: one sob and then another rangout harshly in the quiet room.He choked on the third and a painlike something trying to unzip his skin shot down his back.“Oh—fuck!”
Sashajerked his head up.“Loz!No, lie still, okay?”He dragged a handacross his eyes and captured Laurie’s wrist before he coulddislodge the IV.“You have to keep that where it is.”He cupped hispalm around the back of Laurie’s neck and eased him back onto thepillows.“I’ve got you, I’ve got you.You can’t move around toomuch, and you can’t...”His voiced cracked, and he rested his browagainst Laurie’s for a moment, eyes closed tight.“You’ve got totry not to cry.”
Lauriewanted to ask him why.But one side of his face was burning as ifhe’d just landed headfirst on gravel, and he flashed back to thebrick shed in the woods—to Stefan Petrica, and a gunshot so closeto his skull that the echoes of it were rebounding still.He’dforgotten.He’d been shot in the face as well as the back.Sashawas cautiously dabbing a tissue under his eye, along his jaw.“Isthat...Is it bad?”
“Is it hurting?”
“Mm.”
“You’re getting salt in it.Stop crying.”
“I will if you will.”
“Okay.”Sasha pressed a kiss to his mouth to try and seal thatshaky deal.“You’ve got a nick out of the skin over your cheekbone.Some burns from the gunpowder too.It’s the least of your problems,all right?You’ll still be my beautiful Laurie.”
Sashawas right.The very least of Laurie’s problems.He nodded, thenlifted his head to seek another of those velvety kisses that tastedof home, of sleepy, sunny awakenings in his lover’s arms.He wasstill alive to feel them.“Yeah.It doesn’t matter, doesit?”
“Not one bit.”
“Bloody stupid thing to worry about.”
