Tymber Dalton - Safe Harbor

They had rented a small furnished apartment near the hospital, closer than the hotel room and cheaper in the long run. It was on the ground floor and accessible by wheelchair.

They hoped it wouldn’t be long before they could bring Mac to their temporary home. They didn’t want to talk about what-ifs, if their home in Tarpon Springs would be impractical, or if they’d have to install an elevator and convert a bathroom for him.

They didn’t want to talk about a future where they might have to sell the Dilly.

They didn’t talk about it at all. They talked about when Mac got better, not if.

Clarisse stood at the end of Mac’s bed, massaging his feet and running through his range of motion exercises while Jason talked.

Over the past weeks, Mac had seven surgeries for his brain injury and facial reconstruction to fix the damaged bones. The last had finally healed, somewhat. His hair, now longer than he normally wore it, had grown in choppy and uneven over his surgical scars.

She was focused on Jason when she noticed his expression. When she followed his gaze, she realized Mac’s eyes were open. Her happy yell alerted the nurse.

Jason hooked an arm around Clarisse’s shoulders and gently guided her out of the cubicle while the nurse called in a doctor and they checked Mac. Twenty minutes later, one of Mac’s doctors walked out, smiling.

“It’s a good step. He’s not really awake, but it’s a good step.”

Jason held her while she cried. They let them back in a few minutes later to be with him. His eyes were still open, and he blinked occasionally, but he showed no signs of comprehension. She held and stroked his hands, whispering to him, begging him to respond while Jason called Sully.

By the time Sully returned to the hospital, Mac had closed his eyes again and wouldn’t open them.

Clarisse didn’t want to leave him. It took Sully whispering a stern order in her ear and Jason’s help to pull her from Mac’s bedside. That night, when she refused to eat because she wanted to return to the hospital and visit Mac, Sully pulled her over his lap and spanked her, hard, until her tears flowed.

As she sobbed in his arms, he held and soothed her, hating himself, knowing she was barely holding things together. He hadn’t had the energy to give her the structure he knew she needed and craved now more than ever, most of his energy diverted to keeping a façade of strength together for her. But tonight, she needed that from him.

“You can’t make yourself sick, baby,” he murmured. “He’ll wake up really pissed at me if I let you do that.”

That elicited a snurfly snort and a lopsided smile from her. When she sat up, he handed her a tissue. “I want him back,” she said. “I want him back now .”

He tucked her hair behind her ears. He remembered his own recovery. While not involving brain trauma, it had still been long and hard and he expected that to be a walk in the park compared to Mac’s journey. “I know, sweetie. Me too.”

The next morning, Mac’s eyes were open when they walked into the cubicle. Mac hadn’t been on the respirator in over a week, and Sully choked back a sob when he saw Mac’s sweet brown eyes staring into space.

He leaned over the bed and pressed a kiss to his lips, then whispered in his ear. “I’m ordering you to come back to me, slave.

Our life is empty without you.”

Clarisse took up her position next to the bed on Mac’s left side.

She laced her fingers through his hand and waited.

Mac would blink on occasion. He closed his eyes again around ten that morning. Sully didn’t try to push Clarisse’s limits at lunchtime.

He left her with Mac and went downstairs to eat. He brought her back a sandwich and a bottle of juice, which she reluctantly ate without too much prodding. At four, when the nurse checked Mac’s vital signs, he opened his eyes again.

Sully watched Clarisse’s hopeful look. He’d finally found a comfy position in the hospital recliner chair he occupied. He could watch Mac’s face without moving and twisting his already sore leg any more than necessary.

Then Mac’s eyes shifted position, falling on Sully and staying there.

Sully’s heart seized. There was something…there. Or was he deluding himself with wishful thinking?

After several minutes, Mac’s gaze still hadn’t left Sully. The nurse left. Not wanting to get Clarisse’s hopes up, he said, “Sweetie, my leg is killing me. Can you run down to the gift shop and get me some Tylenol or something and a cup of coffee?”

“Okay.” She stepped around the bed and kissed Sully before leaving.

Sully watched Mac’s eyes shift, following her departure before they returned to him. With his heart pounding in his chest, he leaned forward and clasped Mac’s hand. “Brant?”

Mac stared at him, then slowly blinked twice.

Sully choked back his own tears. “Blink again, two times.”

He did.

Sully looked around, saw the nurse was tending to another patient.

Sully leaned even closer, brushed Mac’s hair away from his face and left his hand on Mac’s cheek. “Once for no, twice for yes. Answer me this. Do I call you my pet?”

One blink.

Gripping Mac’s hand a little harder, he smiled. “Are you my slave?”

Mac blinked twice.

Sully’s composure shattered as he dropped his forehead to the bed and sobbed. That’s where Clarisse found him five minutes later.

The neurologist came in and spent an hour evaluating Mac while Sully and Clarisse huddled in the waiting room. When the doctor finished, he found them there and sat with them, a smile on his face.

“This is good. Very good. He’s showing a lot of improvement, the brain scan shows cognitive function. He’s also responding appropriately to yes-and-no questions. We’ve talked about this. He’s going to need therapy and lots of it. He might have issues with his verbal and motor skills. He might have memory or cognitive impairment. But this is a step in the right direction.”

Sully clutched Clarisse to him and cried with her as they celebrated the news.

For the next week, Mac didn’t make drastic improvements. He did start following them more with his eyes, and if questions were kept to yes and no, he could hold very simple conversations. Slowly, he regained a little control of his hands, could squeeze when told to.

Sometimes he rotated his hand for yes, shook it a little for no.

Seeing the familiar gesture made Clarisse and Sully smile.

Sully sat alone with him one afternoon, having sent Clarisse to the apartment to eat and nap. He would sit and stare at Mac with his fingers laced through Mac’s. Mac had drifted in and out of consciousness all day, occasionally squeezing Sully’s hand or responding to comments. The nurse had checked Mac’s vitals and left Sully with Mac’s afternoon feeding dose. Sully and Clarisse had learned how to feed Mac through his feeding tube and insisted on being the ones to do it when they were present.

Sully stood and washed his hands, then hooked up the feeding syringe. He smiled at Mac. “Ready for chow time?”

Sully didn’t think he imagined the sudden tilt to Mac’s mouth.

Sully laid the syringe on the sheet and leaned in close. “Brant?”

Mac’s lips twitched in a faint smile. “…ssster.”

“What?”

Then Mac’s mouth opened and he slowly licked his chapped lips.

They coated them with lip balm several times a day, but some dryness still occurred. “Yesss, Massster,” he breathed. Then his lips returned to the faint smile, obviously proud of himself.

Stunned, Sully didn’t process what Mac had said for a moment.