“Where are you? Are you at the hospital?”
“Y-y-yes.”
“I’m on my way. I’ll be there as
soon as I can.” He quickly changed out of his uniform, jumped into his car and
sped to the hospital, praying that Mitch would be okay. A half-hour later he
arrived at the Emergency Room. As he entered the waiting area Cameron flew into
his arms crying hysterically. He hugged her tightly. “I’m here, Cameron” He
said softly, not saying the usual platitudes of ‘he’s going to be okay’ and
stuff like that. After a few minutes she calmed down. “Have they told you
anything yet?”
“No, other than he’s critical
and they don’t think he’s going to live.”
“Oh, God, Cameron, I’m so, so
sorry. This is all my fault.”
She pulled away from him
slightly. “How is this in any way your fault?”
“When I woke up this morning,
there was a note on the nightstand from Mitch which basically wished me luck on
my exams.”
“So what does that have to do
with the accident being your fault?”
Aaron wouldn’t look her in the
eyes. Blushing, he responded. “This is kind of embarrassing.” He rubbed his
hand across his face. “At some point during the night I kicked the covers off
me.” He paused trying to figure out his next words. In a quiet voice he
continued. “I woke up on my back. I-I-I was hard, and the head of my dick was
sticking out of my underwear. I’m sure he saw it and was bothered by it, being
straight and all. I don’t know of any straight guy who wouldn’t be bothered by
being alone in a bedroom with a gay guy whose dick was hard and exposed. I
never meant for that to happen. I’m…I’m…I’m so sorry, Cameron.” He buried his
face in his hands as the tears started to fall.
She sat down next to him and put
her arm around his shoulders. “Aaron, you have nothing to apologize for.
You...” she began.
He jerked away as if her touch
burned him. “How can you say that? How can you even stand to touch me? You took
me into your home. You and Mitch have both gone out of your way to help me, and
this is how I repay you, by possibly getting your fiancé killed.” He was so
filled with self-loathing he couldn’t stand himself.
“Aaron, you were asleep. It was
really hot last night. You are a young, healthy male. You show me one guy, gay,
straight or bi that can intentionally stop themselves from getting an erection
in the morning, especially when he’s asleep.”
“Still…”
“Still nothing” She interrupted.
“Mitch watched plenty of porn when he was younger. The sight of another guy’s
hard-on wouldn’t upset him. The only way it would have is if you had stripped
naked and made a pass at him which a, you wouldn’t have and b, you were asleep
so you couldn’t have.”
“Ah, there’s something you need
to know about the first night I stayed with you guys.” He said, nervously. She
looked at him puzzled. “The next morning when he came out of the bathroom as I
was going in, I kinda checked him out. I’m sorry. It’s just a natural reaction
for me. I didn’t mean anything by it.” He said, his words rushing out of his
mouth.
To his surprise, she laughed.
“The only time he doesn’t get checked out at least three to four times a day by
both men and women is when he stays home all day. Aaron, we don’t know what
happened. It could have been someone driving drunk or speeding or falling
asleep at the wheel or a dozen other reasons. There is one thing I know beyond
a shadow of a doubt. You were not
responsible. Stop blaming yourself.”
A doctor came into the waiting
room. “Is there someone here for Mitchell Lewis?” She asked. Cameron
immediately approached her. “Are you a family member?”
“No, I’m his fiancé. All of his
family lives on the mainland.”
“And your name is?”
“Cameron Carothers.”
The doctor consulted the chart
in her hands. “He has you listed as next of kin. Please, let’s sit down.” She
took a seat next to Aaron. “Miss Carothers” she began, glancing at Aaron
“wouldn’t you rather sit somewhere more private? No offense intended towards
you, sir” She said to Aaron.
“It’s okay Doctor. This is Aaron
Suarez. He’s a close friend. Whatever you have to say, I want him to hear it as
well. I’d be telling it all to him anyway and I’d rather he heard it straight
from you.”
“Okay. I’m not going to lie to
you. He’s in critical condition, but he’s somewhat stable. He has numerous
internal injuries and has lost a lot more blood than we would have liked. It’s
going to be touch-and-go for the next few days. Quite frankly, the head injury
is what worries us the most. We can’t even do a CT scan or MRI because it’s not
safe to move him at the moment although his EEG shows normal brain activity for
someone in his condition. There is one other thing. His blood alcohol level was
0.23, way over the legal limit. I’m so sorry. I wish I had better news. If
anything changes, I’ll let you know.”
“Can we see him?” she asked in a
voice choked with emotion.
“Not yet. I’ll have someone
contact you as soon as he’s stable enough and we can move him into the ICU.”
Barely holding it together, Cameron thanked the doctor who nodded and left.
Suddenly Aaron made a mad dash to the men’s room where he barely made it into a
stall in time to empty his stomach. Full of self-recrimination, he sat on the
toilet and cried. This is all my fault.
What do I do now? How to I make it up to them? Ten minutes later he exited
the men’s room and almost knocked Cameron down as she was standing just outside
the door.
“Aaron, are you okay?”
He turned away from her and
started literally beating his head against the wall, calling himself every vile
name he could think of.
“Aaron, stop it. This isn’t
helping Mitch.” He turned and looked at Cameron, his eyes dull and haunted. He
slammed his head back against the wall one last time and slowly slid to the
floor, unconscious. Cameron ran and got a nurse who immediately called for
help, a gurney and a doctor.
“What happened?” Doctor Adamson
asked as she examined the unconscious man and wrote out the orders for a head
and neck CT scan. In a very short time Aaron was whisked to Radiology.
“I’m not really sure. Right
after we spoke with you about Mitch’s condition he suddenly ran into the
bathroom. When he came out, he started hitting his head against the wall,
calling himself all sorts of bad names and holding himself responsible for
Mitch’s accident.”
“Is there any way he could be to
blame? Were they out drinking together?”
“No. He was on duty at the Air
Force base when it happened. I know because when I got the call about Mitch, I
called him. When I couldn’t get him on his cell, I called his work number and
got a hold of him there.”
“Did they have any kind of
argument?”
“No.”
“Then why do you think he feels
responsible?” the doctor asked, trying to figure out what was motivating
Aaron’s behavior.
Do I tell her or not? If I’m not careful, it could be the end of
Aaron’s career in the military. “Doctor, can we keep this strictly between
us, you know, doctor-patient sort of thing?”
“Well, he’s currently my patient,
so anything you tell me concerning his behavior will fall under doctor-patient
confidentiality.
“Okay.” She proceeded to tell
her everything that Aaron had told her, leaving out only the part about Aaron
being gay.
“So you think that he was intentionally
harming himself out of guilt?”
“I’m not sure it was
intentional. I think he was trying to punish himself because he believed he was
responsible for Mitch’s accident, and hearing that he might die made him
believe that he would be directly responsible for his…” she broke off, unable
to speak the word ‘death’. “Anyway, it would go against his strongest beliefs.”
“And what would those beliefs
be?”
“That all human life is sacred
and must be protected at all costs. He’s an extremely dedicated Firefighter and
would literally give his own life to protect the lives of others.”
“Ah, I see. That explains his
behavior. If he’s as dedicated to his beliefs as you say he is, then believing
himself to be the cause of another person’s death, however untrue that might
be, would tear him apart, make himself doubt himself and his convictions.”
“That would certainly fit the
Aaron I know.”
As they were talking a very
groggy Aaron was wheeled back into the ER. “I believe a talk with one of the
psychologists would be helpful. Thank you for your help, Miss Carothers. If you
will excuse me, I need to check on him and see what the tests revealed.” She
left and consulted the reports from the Radiologist. Before going to talk with
Aaron she asked for an update on Mitch’s condition. “Mister Suarez I’m Doctor
Adamson. How are you feeling?”
“I have the mother of all
headaches.”
“I’m not surprised. We’ll get
you something for that shortly. You have a concussion. We’re going to admit you
for overnight observation. If you’ll give me the number to your superiors we’ll
let them know where you are.” She caught the stricken look on Aaron’s face.
“Don’t worry, son. We’ll tell them that you hit your head and was knocked
unconscious. Keeping you overnight is standard procedure for a head injury that
results in a concussion and the loss of consciousness. Miss Carothers explained
to me what happened this morning and there are two questions I must ask you.”
She noted how Aaron’s face turned deathly pale. “Did you have an argument with
Mister Lewis, an argument of any kind?”
“No.”
“Were the two of you out
drinking together earlier?”
“No. Cameron –Miss Carothers–
called me at work and told me what happened to Mitch uh, Mister Lewis.”
“Then, despite whatever you may
think to the contrary, you are not responsible for his accident. However, I
think you need to talk to someone about it, so I’m going to ask one of the
staff psychologists to stop in and talk with you in the morning. Just talk,
that’s all. Now if you’ll excuse me, I’ll go have the nurse give you something
for the headache and get you admitted.” As the Doctor reached the door, she
turned back to Aaron. “Oh and by the way, Mister Lewis’ condition is improving.
We’ll be moving him soon to the ICU.”
“So he’s going to make it?
“We’re cautiously optimistic.
It’s still too soon to say with any certainty.”
“Thank you, Doctor.”
Shortly after Aaron was settled
into his room his station Chief knocked on the doorframe. “Aaron, may I come
in?”
“Sure, Chief.”
“I got a call from the hospital
telling me you were here and I wanted to stop by and see how you are doing.”
“Thanks for coming by, Chief.
I’m doing okay. They’re only keeping me overnight for observation and letting
me go tomorrow.”
“Why are they keeping you? What
happened?” The Chief asked, concern showing in his face.
“After I got the call that my
girlfriend’s cousin was in an accident and was critical, I rushed over here.
When I ran from the parking lot, I wasn’t watching where I was going, tripped
and hit my head on one of the columns and knocked myself out, giving myself a
concussion. I’m sorry, Chief. I didn’t mean for this to happen. I was only
thinking about getting to my girlfriend as quickly as I could.”
“But you’re okay other than the
concussion?”
“Yeah, keeping me overnight is
standard operating procedure.”
“Good. I’m glad you’re okay. I’m
sure you have quite the headache.”
“That’s the understatement of
the millennium. It feels like my head is in a vise and someone keeps tightening
it.”
“How’s your girlfriend holding
up?”
“Not well. She and her cousin
are extremely close. If he dies, she’ll be beyond devastated.” Well, at least the part about Cameron being
devastated is the truth. It bothered him to lie to his Chief, but if he
told the complete truth, he’d probably get kicked out of the Air Force. His
last station Chief was okay with him being gay, but he was pretty sure his
current Chief wouldn’t be.
“Okay, well, I’ll let you get
some rest. If you need anything, don’t hesitate to call the station.” He
gripped Aaron’s shoulder in a caring gesture.
“Thanks Chief. I’m sorry that my
carelessness is going to leave you shorthanded at the station.”
“Don’t worry about it. We’ve got
everything covered. You just get better. If you need a ride back to base, call
me.”
“Thanks, Chief, but I’ll be
okay. See you tomorrow.” The Chief took his leave and headed out.
Shortly after he left, Iukekini
came in. “Baby!” he exclaimed as he pulled Aaron into a fierce hug, tears
flowing down his cheeks.
“Can’t…breathe” Aaron croaked.
“Oh, God, I’m so sorry. Are you
okay? When Cameron called me I was so scared. What happened?”
As Aaron told him about Mitch,
tears fell down both their faces. “I don’t know what I’ll do if Mitch dies, or
is paralyzed or has brain damage or something because of the accident. It’s all
my fault.”
“No, baby, no.” Iukekini said
gently. “You’re not responsible. If what you said was true, Mitch obviously has
some issues he needed to work through. He just did it the wrong way.”
“I don’t know how I’m going to
make this all up to Cameron and Mitch.”
Cameron chose that moment to
walk into the room. “I’ll tell you how you can make it up to us.”
“Just name it and I’ll do it.”
“You promise?”
“I promise.”
Cameron smiled inwardly. How
easily he fell into her trap. Aaron was the only person she knew that would
rather cut off his arm than break a promise.
“Okay. I have your word, right.”
“Yes!” he responded without any
hesitation whatsoever.
“Good. You can make it up to me
by stop punishing yourself for something you had absolutely no control over and
stop feeling guilty because you did nothing wrong.”
“But…” he began.
Cameron put her hand over his
mouth to shut him up, effectively cutting off his protest when she said
“remember, you promised to do whatever I asked.”
Aaron realized then that he’d
been neatly tricked. He grinned as she took her hand away from his mouth.
“Bitch, you tricked me.”
“I had to. It was the only way
to get you to stop beating yourself up over this.” She turned to Iukekini. “I
don’t know what issues you think Mitch might have, but it’s the only thing that
makes sense. Drinking and driving is something he’d never do, especially after
losing his first wife and six-month-old son to a drunk driver two weeks before
his third wedding anniversary.”
Both men looked at her in shock.
They both vowed to themselves to never get behind the wheel if they’d been
drinking, even if it was only one beer. “I swear that is something I will never
do, Cameron.” Aaron said softly, but with strong conviction in his voice.
“Me too” Iukekini quickly
replied.
“Anyway, now that we’ve gotten
the guilt thing out of the way” she glared at Aaron as if challenging him to argue
“I came to see how you are doing and to let you know that they moved Mitch into
the ICU and were able to replace the blood he lost through a nick in the artery
in his shoulder from a piece of flying glass. His internal injuries were from
him hitting the steering wheel before the airbag deployed. For some reason, his
seatbelt didn’t lock when he was thrown forward like it should have. He was
wearing it properly according to the paramedics. He has some abrasions on his
arms and face from the airbag, but there won’t be any disfigurement. They were
able to do a CT scan and his neck is broken. It’s too early to tell whether
he’ll…” her voice faltered. Aaron reached out and took one of her hands,
Iukekini the other. “he’ll be a quadriplegic or not.” She lost it then. Aaron
pulled her into his arms and let her cry on his shoulder, his thoughts turning
to how he’d be able to make some kind of healing oil or ointment. He still had
the book Clark gave him on oils and incense when he was learning how to make
magickal candles.
“When will he be allowed
visitors?”
“I don’t know, probably not
until he regains consciousness. His parents are flying in from the mainland
tomorrow.”
“Let’s hope that’s soon. I need
to see him.”
“You need to worry about yourself.” Cameron said vehemently.
“Not in my nature.”
“Well, it is now. I can’t be
worried about both of you.” She turned to Iukekini. “You need to talk some
sense into your boyfriend, or maybe you need to fuck it into him.”
Both men blushed as they
remembered that Aaron was supposed to spend the night with Iukekini the
following evening.
“That’s better. I’ll let you get
some rest. I’ll see you guys later.”
“I’ll walk you out. I need to
get back to work. My lunch break is almost over.” Looking at the door to make
sure no one was walking by Aaron’s private room he bent down and gave him a
quick, but loving kiss. “I’ll be back later. I love you.”
“I love you too. See you later.”
A week later, a nurse was making
his rounds when he stepped into Mitch’s room just as he regained consciousness.
“Aaron?” he said softly. The nurse immediately pressed the button on his Vocera
unit. “Find Doctor Adamson.” He said.
“Finding Doctor Adamson…” The
unit responded.
After a couple of seconds the
Doctor responded. “Ryan? What’s up?”
“Mitch Lewis is regaining
consciousness. He’s asking for someone named Aaron.”
“I’ll be right there.”
A few minutes later the doctor
entered Mitch’s room. “Mister Lewis I’m Doctor Adamson. How are you feeling?”
“Like I was run over by an
aircraft carrier” He slowly croaked out. “Where am I? What happened?”
“You’re in the ICU at Pearl
Harbor Memorial. You were in a car accident a week ago.”
He was silent while he slowly
digested that information, “a week?”
“Yes. When you were brought in
you were in critical condition. We weren’t sure if you were going to make it or
not.”
“Am-am I going to die?” His
voice was choked with fear.
“No. We were able to replace all
of the blood you lost and the internal injuries you suffered were not as severe
as we initially thought. Let’s take a look at you.” She pulled the curtain
around the bed and removed the covers then took a reflex hammer and slid the
tip along Mitch’s left foot, from heel to toe. She smiled as she saw Mitch’s
leg jerk. She repeated the process with his right foot, observing the same
reaction. She proceeded to touched both feet and legs at various spots, asking
if Mitch could feel the touch, receiving an affirmative response each time. She
continued to touch Mitch at various spots on his abdomen, sides (discovering
that he was extremely ticklish) and arms, very much pleased that there appeared
to be no loss of sensation anywhere on Mitch’s body below the neck as they had
initially feared.
“Well, Mitch, it looks like
you’re in pretty good shape, all things considered.” The doctor smiled at him.
“Do you remember what happened to you?”
Mitch thought hard, but nothing
came. “No, I don’t. When will I be able to see my fiancé?”
“How about tomorrow? We want to
run a few more tests. I’ll give her a call and let her know she can visit you
tomorrow.”
Mitch’s brow furled. “Her? My
fiancé’s a he. His name is Aaron. Aaron Suarez.”
Doctor
Adamson thought fast. “I’m sorry. My mistake. If you’ll give me his number,
I’ll call him. Who is Cameron Carothers? She’s been here several times asking
about you.”
“She’s my cousin.” He frowned
again. “I’m sorry, but for some reason I can’t remember Aaron’s number.” He
said with a little fear in his voice.
“Don’t worry about it, Mitch. A
little amnesia is not uncommon in cases like yours. Now that you’re awake, you
memory will return in a few days. I’ll get your fiancé’s number from your
cousin. Rest now and I’ll check in on you tomorrow.” She left the room and
retrieved Cameron’s number from Mitch’s chart.
“Hello?”
“Miss Carothers? This is Doctor
Adamson. Mitch has regained consciousness.”
“Oh, Doctor, that’s fantastic!”
She could hear her tears through
the phone. “Miss Carothers, there is something serious I need to speak with you
about. Mitch is claiming that you are his cousin and that he’s engaged to Aaron
Suarez.”
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