I pull up a stool and sit at his level so I’m not looming. “This needle is smaller than a mosquito bite,” I say. “Mosquitoes bite you all summer without asking. I at least give you a heads-up.”
He wrinkles his nose. “Mosquitoes don’t tell you first either.”
“True,” I tell him. “But they don’t try to bribe you with stickers or candy afterward.”
He studies me like I might be trying to trick him. “Will it hurt?”
“Yes,” I say. “For about two seconds. Then it’s done, and you can tell everyone at school you barely flinched.”
He thinks it over, biting the inside of his cheek, and then, with the resigned dignity of someone making a decision under protest, he holds out his arm.
I take the blood, talking to him the whole time about superheroes and video games so he doesn’t fixate on the needle. His mother watches over his shoulder, mouthing thank you at me. He glances at her once, nods, and tries to look brave.
The rest of the shift passes in its usual rhythm. The place hums with muted machines, distant laughter and cries, and the occasional squeak of sneakers on linoleum. I’m in maroon scrubs, and just putting them on reminds me of George. I force myself tofocus on the work, though my ribs ache like I’ve been holding my breath too long.
That part of my life is officially dead. It feels dramatic as hell, but unfortunately accurate.
I go home after my shift. Most nights I work on the fundraiser. Marcus sometimes invites me out to meet up with the old circle for drinks, and I go even though I don’t feel like it. I don’t think I’m any fun to be around anymore. For how long? Who the fuck knows.
I’ve heard enough from patients and friends talking about heartbreaks to know this is the part where they say they lose their appetite, that nothing tastes right anymore, and that they can’t keep anything down. I always thought that was too dramatic.
Turns out it’s not.
Half the time I stare at food until it goes lukewarm because my brain keeps pulling up memories I didn’t ask for.
I haven’t had a decent night of sleep since I left San Diego. Some nights, I lie there staring at the ceiling until morning, or I end up fucking crying myself to sleep. And sometimes, I wake up with my chest hurting so bad I have to sit on the bed and remind myself I’m not fucking dying, just heartbroken. Like some poor bastard in a country song.
But of course, I’m Lance, and bouncing back is what I do. I don’t let things stick. I don’t drag shit out. I’ll give it a few more days and I’ll be fine. I always am.
That’s what I’ve been telling myself for many weeks now. What a load of bullshit.
This is the part that really gets under my skin. Missing someone should be manageable. People move. Friends leave. Long-distance relationships exist. Humanity somehow survives airports every day.
What I was not ready for were the small things that keep creeping in like they won’t let go.
The smell of the parking garage at the clinic on cold mornings, that mix of oil and concrete that gets on me before I even have coffee. A certain make of truck in Seattle traffic showing up often enough that it feels like every other car on the road has turned into it. I can’t even pick up a fucking takeout menu without hesitating like an idiot.
None of them should matter. They’re all small, forgettable shit. I stick with being pissed off because it’s the only part I can get a handle on. Irritation has edges. The rest of it doesn’t give me anything to work with.
But sometimes, I’m not even mad. I’ll just be doing something completely normal and suddenly realize I’m one second away from crying in public like a middle-aged man going through a messy divorce.
I’m done with this guy. The old me had his shit together and was fun to be around. This new one is tired and annoying, and I’m stuck with him.
42
George
Sunday afternoon, I stand at the edge of the parking structure on National City Boulevard and watch the last of the cars trailer out—a guy from Escondido backing a ‘67 Camaro onto a flatbed, waving at me like we’re old friends even though I’ve only met him four hours ago.
Two days of this. The fundraiser came together faster than I ever expected once Trevor found the venue, and faster still once it started actually happening. Cars from three counties, families walking the rows with their kids, my guys explaining engines and paint jobs to strangers who’d never have found out about my shop any other way. More people showed up for something tied to it than I’ve ever seen show up for anything in my life.
Carter finds me near the trailer, hauling a barrier toward the truck. I grab the other end without being asked.
“Miguel would’ve been proud of you for this,” he says, looking out over the emptying lot.
I stand there holding the metal in both hands, thinking he’s probably right. I think about how much of this I actually built myself versus what kept arriving, handed to me by people who cared for me enough not to ask first.
The veteran business coalition had gotten back to me in four days, weeks before any of this. Oscar—Lance’s friend from Seattle, the one who actually knows this landscape—told me to expect a week, maybe ten days. Four days meant somebody opened the file the afternoon it arrived and decided it couldn’t wait. Their program officer, Dolores Vega, called me directly on a Wednesday morning in late October while I was under a truck, grease on my hands and half the exhaust still loose.
