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The chair is too hard. His back aches after hours of sitting, and his knees, from pressing up against the edge of the bed. And his elbows tensed against the armrests have long gone numb. And the air is too cold, prickling against his skin even through the fabric of his hoodie, and too dry, leaving a dusty taste in the back of his throat. And there's a steady ache building behind his eyes, from the bright lights, from the monitors, from the crying. And he's hungry, and hollow, and bone-tired and he should be — they should be — home in bed. And, and, and...
It's too much. It's all too much, the beeping and the quiet voices in the hallway and the anxiety crawling up his spine. But he can't leave. Can't move. Can't do anything but sit here and watch the rise and fall of that chest, and stare hard at that too-still face. Stroke his hand along that still-warm arm, up and down, and clench his teeth and pray to whoever might be listening that those eyes will flicker open and hold him again, with all the love in the world. Any moment now. Any moment...
"I don't know how you do this," TK murmurs.
Carlos, of course, doesn't respond.
"I don't know how you do this so much." His voice is rough, words catching in his throat.
His father is at their place, packing up some of their things. Gabriel and Andrea were finally coaxed to leave to do the same. No one has tried to make him leave that chair, not since the jagged look he gave them the first time they tried. Everyone else is out in the hall, giving him space, holding vigil. We don't know, the doctor had said, and TK's heart had turned to stone and fallen, down and down. When, or if... we don't know.
"How you sat here." TK's breath rattles in his chest. "Not knowing... when, or if..."
"Not knowing if I even loved you." His hand still moves, up and down Carlos's arm, the one without a needle sunk into it, pausing to search for his pulse in the crook of his elbow. "Not knowing if I could even hear you."
"I don't know how you do it.”
He folds himself forward to rest his chin on Carlos’s upper arm. One hand grips his elbow, the other reaches for his face. He strokes his fingers along his cheeks, already rough with stubble, before they settle in his hair.
“I, um…” TK swallows around the lump rising in his throat.
“I’ve wondered, sometimes, what my life would be like without you in it.” Idly, gratefully. Whenever Carlos did something like bring him dinner during a night shift, or pull the blanket back over his feet on the way back from the bathroom in the middle of the night.
“We had a taste of that, a year ago.” A tear spills over his lip. Another, and another. “But now that we’re here I’ve realized… I really, really don’t want to know.”
He hides his face in the scratchy blanket for a moment, fingers still carding gently through Carlos’s hair. When he looks up, the cold air stings his eyes and nothing has changed.
“So,” he sniffs, “you have to come back, okay? Don’t… don’t leave me wondering. Don’t leave me.”
“Please.” His voice cracks on the word. “Please, Carlos.”
Any moment now, his eyes will blink open. And he’ll lift his arm, gingerly, wincing. And he’ll wipe the tears from TK’s cheeks. Of course, baby, he’ll whisper. Of course I’ll come back.
Any moment now…