Page 45 of Breakdown
He wasn’t going to win this argument. Tears pricked at his eyes, hot and unhappy. “I am so goddamn sorry for what I put you through. I was a shit brother to you for so many years—”
“And I was a bad sister who wouldn’t...couldn’tlet you go long after it was time,” she interrupted, placing her hands on his shoulders. She appeared older than her thirty-four years, etched by their father in a way that Peter wasn’t, that maybe he just hadn’t noticed until now. “You know I was just trying to protect you right? And God knows Dad left us with a fucked-up sense of what that looks like but what I was pushing you into was...inexcusable. It wasn’t fair and it wasn’t right and I just lost sight of...”
Peter hugged her, hard. “I know. It’s okay.”
She held it for a long, loaded moment before she pulled away, the grim composure plastered on her face painful to look at for too long. “Promise you’ll visit me in jail, huh?”
He nodded, swallowing hard against the lump in his throat. “Yeah. We’ve got a good lawyer. We’ll have you out in no time.”
“Sure. Now take Nik and get out of here. Take Mom too, I’m not sure I’m ready for any further emotional growth this evening.”
Cynthia had freed him from the restraints, but Nik was still standing in place. Blank and quiet, his posture painfully stiff, he was staring at Erik on the garage floor. Peter knew Nik wasn’t seeing Erik, not really; he was looking at Helena.
“Come on, Nik,” Peter said gently, offering his hand to pull Nik to his feet. “We gotta get going.”
Nik didn’t really seem to hear him, but he stood all the same, gripping onto Peter’s hand like it was a life preserver.
Peter pulled him close. “I’m sorry,” he murmured into the soft, worn collar of Nik’s flannel shirt. It wasn’t fair to make Nik relive the worst night of his life. “You shouldn’t have had to see that. I shouldn’t have—”
“No,” Nik hummed into his hair. “It is okay. I am just so glad you are okay.” He twisted his fist into the fabric of Peter’s t-shirt.
Helpless, Peter could feel the shudder-pull of Nik’s trembling breath in his chest, the rigid way he held his shoulder, the sticky blood on his face. The man he loved was hurting in too many ways right now. He couldn’t just pack Nik in a car and drive six-hundred miles north like this. Peter held onto him for as long as he dared. “Come on.”
Cynthia made a watch tapping motion but didn’t say anything. She just observed, glancing over from time to time at Erik’s corpse with something like wonderment in her eyes. She sighed and mouthed “five minutes.” Prior experience suggested to him that she was going to stick to that so he needed to hurry.
Nik gripped his opposite arm against his chest, grimacing with every movement as Peter led him to the only part of the workbench that hadn’t been reduced to splinters by the truck. It was thankfully out of view of the waiting room. “I’ll be right back,” he said. Nik nodded, dazed and too quiet by half.
Peter hurried back after grabbing what he needed. “Let’s take a look at you,” he said as brightly as he could, setting down the first aid kit on the bench between them.
Using a sweatshirt long abandoned in the lost and found, he fashioned a sling for Nik’s shoulder. As he tied the sleeves around Nik’s neck, he noticed that the thing was ludicrously emblazed with the phrase#Dadlife.Peter couldn’t seem to help himself. He giggled horribly at the pure cosmic absurdity of it, the whole night slamming into him all at once.
Nik didn’t seem to find it so funny. “Peter...?”
“It’s just that he’s not anymore, right?” Peter tried to explain, unable to catch his breath. “Alive, I mean.” He was overwhelmed and lightheaded. He snorted with laughter and then choked back a sob.
Nik watched Peter with growing worry, one eye half stuck closed with drying blood, the other with the pupil blown wide, a telltale sign of a concussion. Only one of them was allowed to fall apart at a time, and it couldn’t be Peter right now.
But Peter was crying, couldn’t seem to help that either.
“Peter,” Nik repeated, his face filled with soft concern.
It only made him sob harder. “He’s gone. He’s finally fucking gone, Nik.” He was never going to hurt Peter ever again. He wasn’t going to hurt anybody. The relief was oppressive in its magnitude, taking the quintessential building blocks of Peter apart from the inside.
“I know.” Nik cupped the side of his face, patiently swiping the tears from Peter’s cheek with his thumb, holding the weight of it for Peter with his one good hand, all gentle, dependable understanding. Like he always was. Like he was always going to be, for the rest of their lives together. Because they were safe now.
“Sorry,” Peter apologized after a minute, his voice watery, unable to get it completely in check.
“Do not be,” Nik soothed, stroking the side of Peter’s face in tender circles until something quieted, raw and aching, and moved back into place in the rational part of Peter’s brain.
It was time to go. “Let’s get you patched up, huh?”
Nik nodded gingerly. He understood the value of being able to fix something.
With a light touch, Peter began to clean Nik’s face, careful not to dislodge the tenuous scab forming at his temple. He was going to need stitches.
“You don’t want to get an infection,” Peter cautioned, his voice too choked up for his liking. He shook his head, tried again, and landed on the easy tone he was looking for. “A guy I knew? He told me someone in his shop stepped on a nail. Boom, dead in a week. Tetanus.”
Nik laughed softly. “That story sounds made up. Perhaps he was just trying to find an excuse to talk to you.”
