Page 163 of Untouchable

“Harp—please—” Parker pleads, his voice unsteady.

“Your friend should listen to you, Parker,” the doctor says, and Parker seems to wilt under his gaze.

"Call security to remove someone from his boyfriend's hospital room? No, I think I'm okay," Harp says with a laugh that comes out half-snarl. He’s decided that it doesn’t matter that he doesn't understand what the hell is going on. He wants this man out of the room and he wants to talk to Parker alone. "Do I need to go find Parker's realphysician?"

“Oh, your boyfriend?” the doctor says, turning to Parker. “Interesting. Your standards have certainly plummeted since we were together.”

Everything clicks into place, then. All of the things that Parker had said or half-said or implied about his ex—The Ex—the boogeyman whose specter still haunts Parker and make him doubt himself. It takes a moment for Harp to get a handle on his boiling blood.

The dynamic is suddenly clear and exceptionally easy to navigate. The ex is done speaking to Parker—Harp knows that much. He will not be turning his back on Harp another time.

Harp steps between them, forcing the space with his bulk. When he speaks again, Harp knows that he looks and sounds supremely unimpressed.

"I know how tempting it must be to stay and catch up with Parker," Harp says, flat, "but I'm afraid you'll need to leave your phone number and move along. He's had a difficult afternoon and he should be resting right now."

* * *

The expressionon Cole’s face sends a jolt of panic zipping through Parker’s core. It’s subtle, but Parker knows all the signs—the slightest flare of his nostrils, the tightness in his jaw, the certain dark glint in his eye. He’s sizing Harp up, calculating Harp’s weaknesses, and Parker braces himself for when Cole inevitably goes in for the kill—

Cole looks past Harp, and Parker quails.

“Dr. Miller will be in shortly,” he says, his voice and face suddenly utterly distant and inscrutable. “You’ll probably need stitches.”

He sweeps out of the room, and Parker slumps over in relief.

Gently, Harp takes Parker's chin, turning his face up, and Parker melts into the touch, closing his eyes and sighing. Harp steps forward and gathers Parker up against his chest. Simply being in Harp’s arms quells the anxiety, lessens the sting of unexpectedly seeing Cole.

"Jesus. I don't know what I'd imagined but... not that guy,” Harp says, his voice dark.

“I know,” Parker says in a small voice. “I’m sorry—”

“Why are you apologizing?” Harp says fiercely.

“Well, because—I mean he was a dick to you and—”

"Jesus, Parker," Harp says, stroking his cheek. "He really did a number on you, huh? I can see how."

He presses a kiss to the top of Parker’s head.

"I never would've brought you to this emergency room if I'd had any idea."

“I didn’t know either—” Parker says. “I mean, I knew he was, like… still living in Mink Creek but he was doing all these rotations and stuff—”

He melts into Harp a little further. He’s ashamed—ashamed of how Cole acted, ashamed that he’d once been so in love with him, ashamed of the fact that he’s so out of sorts from seeing an ex he hadn’t even spoken to in almost a year. With Harp holding him tight, though, all the bad feelings seem a little further away.

“He wasn’t like that in the beginning,” Parker says. He’s not defending Cole at all, but he has a desperate need to explain himself to Harp, to make Harp see he wasn’t a complete idiot. “He was… different. I didn’t even quite know… how bad it was, you know? It was… it was Mindy, actually, who kind of… reality checked me.”

He clears his throat.

“I guess—I just don’t want you to think that—like—ah, fuck, I don’t know,” he stammers. “I’m embarrassed. That I let him treat me so bad. And that… for a long time, I thought it was worth it, putting up with all that, because it meant I could… still be with him.”

Parker trails off. Saying it out loud only makes him feel more pathetic, as though the harsh fluorescence above is highlighting every scar and pore and bruise of his psyche. He just wants to curl up in Harp’s arms and fall asleep and put as much time between him and this hellish afternoon as possible.

* * *

Fifty different thingsflash through his mind that he wants to say to Parker about this man who's just walked out of sight—this complete stranger. He wants to insult him, to cut him down with the vilest insults he can think of.

But this is someone Parker loved at some time, and Harp had learned the hard way that we can't hold people responsible for those they love... even if we always feel responsible in the end.

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