"When can I leave?" Levi asks the next time he wakes. The pain is sharper, so they must've lightened the drugs. His mother is where he left her, his sister too, both of them kneading their hands.

     "Hush, Levi, you've just woken up."

     His mother calls for the nurse. The nurse comes, doses him with morphine, and Levi goes back to sleep.

     It's hard to keep up with time when they keep knocking him out. Diazepam when he wakes up dripping sweat, crying hysterically with a heart rate like a hummingbird. Morphine for when the pain is so bad he can't see anything but darkness. It's easier at night, when his mother and sister are home, and he can see the stars from his window.

     Jackie is Levi's favorite nurse. She works the night shift. She comes in and says, "Want me to close that?"

     She points to the curtains. Levi shakes his head.

     "You've been good," she says as she looks at his heart monitor. "Your recovery is remarkable, Levi."

     "It doesn't feel remarkable," he mumbles back. This must be the fifth or sixth week, he thinks. But what does it even matter. There's nothing he needs to rush back to, anymore. "Do you have my morphine?" he asks quietly.

     "Are you really still in that much pain? We might have to have the doctor look at you." She sits down on the bed and looks at him levelly. "Where does it hurt?"

     Levi places a hand on his chest. When he takes a breath, it feels tight. "Everywhere, honestly."

     She looks at him, quizzically. "You only fractured a few ribs. They ought to have healed by now." She reaches over, moving the gown to the side so she can palpate his chest. Levi doesn't flinch. "They're fine." Her stare hardens. "You haven't been having any pain, have you?"

     Levi can't explain his pain to her. He can't put into words what it feels like. It's like breathing under water but not drowning, just bearing the whole experience. He can't describe how agonizing everything feels now. The effort it takes to open his eyes, to look at this world that's one without Gideon in it. He is in so much pain it amazes him that it doesn't radiate through his skin and make everyone a victim.

     "I shouldn't be here," he mutters lowly. "I can't be here."

     "What do you mean?" Jackie asks, raising an eyebrow. "Where should you be?"

     "I should've died, too," he says and he instantly regrets it because that's the kind of thing that'll get him a psyche hold, which isn't what he wants. He wants to go home, so he can figure out the cocktail of medications he needs to self-medicate himself enough to not feel anything ever again.

    "Should've died too? Who died, honey?"

     Levi starts to say his name but it's hard. His face is wet with preemptive tears. Jackie hands him a tissue, but he doesn't pat his face dry. The tears dribble down his chin, into the neckline of his hospital gown.

     Finally, Levi says, "Gideon" and it comes out like a sob.

     Jackie looks confused at first. Then she reaches over and hugs Levi, pulling him into her chest. "I'm so sorry, oh god, I'm so sorry, Levi. Oh no, this makes so much sense now."

     Levi clutches at Jackie's shoulders, dampening her scrubs with snot and tears. It's more real, now, he thinks, with Jackie's acknowledgement. The pain quakes through him. He feels nauseated.

     "Oh hey, Levi, calm down. Come on. Do just like we worked on. One breath in. That's it. You're okay, you're okay."

     "Please, please, stop telling me I'm okay. I am the exact opposite of okay."

     Jackie pulls away from Levi, holding him at an arm's length. "Oh god, Levi, I'm so sorry no one told you. Dear lord, you've been carrying this around for weeks, haven't you? Your friend's okay. Gideon's alive."

     It is a lethal dose of shock. It winds Levi. His chest aches like she just pulled his lungs out and snapped them back into place like releasing a rubber band. "What?" Levi asks hesitantly, trying to figure out how to breathe again. "No. No. Don't lie to me."

     "Levi, your friend is fine. All he does is ask about you. You saved his life. Search and rescue said they found you pulling him out of the truck. That thing went up in flames. You both could've died. But you saved him."

     Levi stares at her skeptically, disbelieving. He knows there's only one way he'll be able to accept this truth.

     "I have to see him," he says quickly.

     She shakes her head. "He's been saying the same thing. You both are just too injured to be walking around the hospital. Y'know, he tried to bribe Charlotte to wheelchair him into your room."

     "Wheelchair?" Levi's pulse quickens. "What happened? What's wrong with him?"

     She pauses, hesitates really. "I really can't answer that, Levi."

     "But he's okay?" Levi asks quickly.

     She nods. "Yes, he's making a great recovery. You both are. Which is why you need to stay in bed. To keep making that recovery." She holds up the vial of morphine. "So we don't need this, do we?"

     Levi stares at her seriously, placing his hand on hers. "What I need is to see him, Jackie. Please."

     She shakes her head. "We've just gotten your heart rate under control, Levi. You haven't been out of that bed since you were put in it. I just, I can't."

     "I love him," Levi says and it's not. It's not bad at all. He's not scared to say it. "He's the love of my life and I thought he was dead. Please, please, just push me past his room. I just need to see him with my own two eyes and then you can send me right back to bed."

     Jackie stares at Levi, her expression muddled. Ultimately, Levi's little declaration wins her over and she readies him for transport, removing what she calls a condom catheter and taping down his hep lock after taking him off of his IV.

     Levi's not steady on his feet. Jackie says he'll likely need a few weeks of PT so she gets a wheelchair for him, instead. "I can only give you ten minutes and then you need to be back in this bed, understood?" she says as she wheels Levi around the nurse's station and to the other side of the floor. It's late, at least on hospital time and most of the patients have their doors closed and the lights off.

     "He might be sleeping," she whispers when they get to his room.

     "That's okay. Ten minutes, right?" Levi asks as he starts to push the door open with his foot and wheels himself in. He glances back at her and she nods, tapping her wrist where her watch is. Levi nods too, his heart sitting heavy in his throat.

     The TV is on in Gideon's room, playing the Simpsons, but the volume's too low to hear it. The bright lights flash across Gideon's body. He's sitting upright, eyes slanted as he dozes off.

     The sight of Gideon locks something up in Levi's throat. Tears fill his eyes and he can't stop it, can't will them away, doesn't want to. Pathetic really but he wants to throw up he's so disgustingly happy to see Gideon.

     Levi can't really maneuver the wheelchair well and hits the corner loudly as he rounds it to enter his room.

     Gideon's eyes jolt open to the sight of Levi rolling into his room, eyes flashing bright blue and wide. It takes him a second to register what's happening. Levi thinks he should stop crying, because he's full on crying now, with fat tears coming down his face, but the more he looks at him the worse it gets.

     Gideon starts crying, too.

     "Oh god, we're so fucking gay," Levi manages to say, his voice thick and unusually emotional.

     Gideon laughs but its short and empty. Levi rolls over to the side of his bed, and takes his hand. One of Gideon's arms is in a sling. His leg has a heavy plastered cast, too, that goes up to his hip nearly. And his face is worse for wear.

     But he's still Gideon. The boy Levi loves.

     He needs to say that, he realizes. But he can't make words. It's an unusually long silence punctuated only by the hiccups Levi can't shake. He closes his eyes, dropping his head down so he can kiss Gideon's palm. Gideon turns his hand, running it up Levi's face to move through the side of his hair that's still there.

     "You," Gideon says lowly. "Scared me. So much."

     Levi lifts his head, eyebrows furrowed. "Are you kidding me?" Gideon's face stills, the heat in Levi's voice surprising him. "I scared you? I watched you die, Gideon. You were gone. You were — I was — I thought I lost you. I kept waking up and thinking how am I supposed to go on without you?"

     Fuck the ten minutes, Levi thinks and he stands up, barely able to keep his weight on his feet. Gideon's staring up at him, confused, his mouth gaped.

     "I can't do this." Levi is choked up trying to find the right words. He goes with, "Gid" and he's crying again, which is stupid because he's here and this is real. Gideon reaches over and tugs on his hospital gown, pulling him down into the bed.

     Levi crawls up the bed, flinging himself onto Gideon's chest. "I'm not saying this right," Levi manages to get out. He lifts his head so he can look at Gideon.

     "Saying what right?" Gideon runs a thumb under his eyes, pushing away the tears. "Please don't cry."

     Levi tries again. "I thought you were dead."

     "I know, but I'm not. I'm here. I'm right here."

     "I'm an idiot, Gid," Levi says finally. "And a coward."

     "You're not." Gideon shakes his head. "You're so brave, Levi. You flung yourself into that truck with me. Even with it on fire. You saved my life."

     Levi leans upwards on Gideon's chest, grabbing his face between both his hands. "Listen to me. I am an idiot. But I'm smart enough to recognize when life's giving you a second chance. I'm not screwing this one up."

     Gideon is nodding his head. He places his hand on Levi's. "You don't have to say anything more. I get it."

     Levi frowns. "I'm screwing this all up, aren't I? I've got like four minutes to say so much shit you should've heard from me months ago and all I want to do is kiss the shit out of you."

     Gideon's raises an eyebrow, looking devilishly handsome, bruises and cuts and all. "Do you need an invitation?"

     Levi didn't but he still takes his time leaning in, keeping his eyes opened so he can see the way Gideon's eyes flicker from his lips back up to his gaze.

     "Don't tease me, " Gideon says hoarsely so Levi closes the distance and fills his voids with Gideon. It feel like a first kiss in that excited and new kind of way but like a wedding kiss too, familiar and finally.

     When Levi pulls away, he says, "What I'm really trying to say is: I love you, Gideon. There wasn't a second when I didn't. I'm sorry it took me so long to say it. But I promise I'll never stop saying it back now."

     Gideon tips Levi's chin upwards, kisses him softly. Levi moves, trailing kisses all along his face like he's taking photographs with his mouth. Like his mouth is a paintbrush that's going to make a Picasso out of Gideon.

     "If we pretend to sleep, maybe she'll let you stay," Gideon says as he reaches around Levi to get the bed controls. He lowers it and Levi sinks against him.

     "I haven't slept since I've been here," Gideon says quietly after he turns the TV off and they're in nothing but darkness. "I just keep thinking about that night."

     "They said I saved your life," Levi whispers against his chest.

     Gideon hugs him closer, dropping his head so it rests against the top of his. "You always have, Levi."

     They didn't have to pretend to sleep for long.

     And Levi didn't have to pretend he was straight at all, or ever again.