Medsi

[Jay Carpenter]

His new cast was sleek, some futuristic white polymer sculpted perfectly to his hand and halfway up his forearm. He kept flexing his fingers like it might suddenly disappear, like he’d imagined the whole thing. The doctor had asked, as they always do, how the injury occurred. Jay had scratched the back of his neck and muttered something about a wall, a really dumb moment, and too much adrenaline. The doctor, stone-faced, informed him that punching solid concrete was, in fact, an excellent way to break bones. A solitary “yep” was all he replied.

Jensen had flickered through his mind for half a second. One call and the guy would probably materialize right there, but Jay couldn’t stomach the thought of that kind of pity. Better to suffer than be seen suffering. That was the rule, right? Especially after bringing this on himself.

Not that he was suffering now. No, whatever they’d shot him up with had turned the sharp pain of reality into something soft and fuzzy and far-off, like a memory you weren’t sure actually happened. His brain felt pleasantly unglued, thoughts floating up and away like helium balloons. Even the led lighting had lost its usual sting. He blinked a few times just to see the shadows bend. That was trippy.

Outside, the city air was colder than he remembered, but in a good way, like mint on the tongue. He and Natalie hadn’t really agreed what came next, just moved forward like inertia would carry them somewhere. Jay stood on the sidewalk for a moment, head tilted, watching the road like a taxi might appear.

And then, somehow, a car actually pulled up. He blinked again. “Huh. That actually worked.” he said aloud, deeply impressed with his own luck.

A slow, satisfied smack of his lips followed. He felt great. Dangerous thought. 
“Alright,” he said to Natalie, leaning in slightly like he was about to share state secrets. “Two options. Kremlin…” He raised a finger solemnly. “Or Radiance Hotel. Technically I have claim to both. Probably.”

A lopsided grin followed, like half his face was unglued from the other half, “dealer’s choice,” he nodded, suddenly needing to steady himself as he climbed into the car.

[Natalie Grey]

Natalie was relieved to finally be free of the hospital, an additional tension she hadn’t even noticed she’d been carrying until they were out in the cold, clean air of the street. Jay was floating by then, eyes glassy from the morphine and whatever else was still lingering in his system. She wasn’t about to disabuse the miracle of the car with the more mundane truth: that she’d messaged Toma while the doctors were applying the cast. So she only chuckled a little at the wonder in his tone, and told him to ask the universe for something else to see if his luck held.

In the meanwhile his options for sanctuary were abysmal, but she listened to the solemn logic anyway. In other circumstances a hotel would have been an easy option, and closer given the hour, but even if it hadn’t been that one, the idea of rootlessness tonight twisted a knotted pain in her chest. Not for the loss of the apartment, but for the fragile balance life had become in the aftermath of Mexico. She didn't want more temporary, ephemeral survival until the next disaster or break down. Not for either of them. Nothing but restrained affection showed in her expression, and a softer patience than the one in the waiting room. Tonight’s fears were packed neatly away by now, and for the prosaic crisis of where to go in the early hours of the morning she was entirely unruffled.

“Dealer’s choice,” she agreed easily, reaching to gently cup his head so he didn’t bash it while he wobbled into the backseat. Toma’s eyes were amused in the driver’s mirror when Natalie joined him, to no great surprise. Natalie met the gaze without comment.

She dozed while they travelled, head light against Jay’s shoulder. Sleep threatened a deeper tide despite everything, though she roused by the time the car hit the gravel of Belizna’s drive. By then fingers of sunrise were glowing on a deep purple horizon, and the castle loomed like a shadow in the lightening gloom. She’d spoken about it to Jay before, but she wasn’t sure what context he retained of her activities in Moscow while he was fighting through the motions to survive grief. A renovation project was quite removed from the majesty of the reality though, even though it was still very much a work in progress. Habitable, though. For the most part at least. She’d already been living here the majority of her time prior to Emily’s wedding, and that was several months ago.

She touched his leg to see if he was awake. “Third option,” she murmured with a coy, slightly sleepy smirk. “Belizna.”

[Jay Carpenter]

He smirked at Natalie’s claim for dealer’s choice, then realized a second too late that he had no idea where they were going. He didn’t ask. He wasn’t familiar with this part of the city, and he let himself assume they were drifting somewhere toward the center.

Natalie shifted against him, her weight settling into something still. The city blurred past the windows, lights smearing together in the middle of the night. Whatever they’d given him dulled the edges, but he hated the way it also threatened to blur him. He hated that slipping feeling, like losing his grip on himself one molecule at a time. It had been a hell of a day.

Leaving Natalie’s flat without knowing it would be the last time he saw it intact. The surprise of Matias. The wall. The crack and flare of pain when his fist gave out. His casted hand traced slow, absent circles over Natalie’s fingers where they rested in his lap. He remembered those same hands clenched tight at the ball, nails biting into her palms while he hauled her out of that building in Sierra Leone. They looked delicate now. Fragile. But he knew better. There was steel under the skin. His own hands felt filthy.

He tried to push Nox out of his head. Forced the thought down, swearing again that he wouldn’t dig it back up. But the question gnawed anyway. Was it really Nox he’d been desperate to reclaim? Or the version of himself that existed when their friendship was at its peak. Before the States, before Cayli, before the long shadow of murder and torture settled into his soul? Back when he texted dumb pictures of Stetsons and despair and thought that counted as honesty.

No. It wasn’t Nox he wanted back. Not really. Not in that same way. It was the past.

He’d been clawing at it like Nox himself was some key to time travel, some door back to a life that no longer existed. And the way Nox had looked at him. Shit. Half longing. Half apology. Completely alone. Standing there naked in his room while Jay hovered in the doorway like a coward. He might as well have tried to fuck a ghost.

Which meant the truth was uglier than he wanted to admit. Jay had been the asshole.

He’d used Nox. Used the closeness, the attention, and the heat like a drug. If he’d cared at all, it had been shallow and self-serving. Something to fill the hollow spaces without ever asking what it would cost someone else.

He rubbed a hand over his face and leaned his forehead against the cool glass of the window.

Yeah. That tracked. Jay as the villain. If their lives were a movie, the audience would be rooting for him to rot alone by the end.

And yet. He looked down at Natalie, dozing peacefully against him, trusting him with the simple weight of her body. The question hit him like a sucker punch.

What the hell was he doing with her?

She deserved something solid. Someone whole. Someone who didn’t feel like half a man stitched together by duty and bad habits. Not someone only half alive, half present, half somewhere else even when he was right beside her. The guilt pressed heavier than the drugs.

He fought sleep as long as he could. Stared out at the passing city, counted breaths, tried to keep himself upright. But the hum of the vehicle and the fragile safety of the moment finally dragged him under.

Belizna was the third most preferable option. He’d never seen it himself. Only the version Natalie painted with her words. It felt like her world, and he approached it with the same caution he would a freshly mopped floor, afraid of tracking his mess across something clean.

Dawn washed the building in pale gold when they arrived.

Jay watched the light creep along the edges of the place and wondered not for the first time whether this was a new day. Or just the same failures, drenched in better light.