Chapter Text
Jack is somewhere between REM and dozing when his phone starts vibrating across his bedside table. It isn't loud, but the low, persistent buzzing against wood is enough to jerk him awake.
He groans quietly into the pillow, half tangled in sheets and half pinned beneath Tate’s leg thrown lazily across his waist. The apartment is warm and dark and comfortable in that heavy middle-of-the-night way where waking up feels like the last thing you'd ever want to do.
For a second he considers ignoring it, but then the buzzing keeps going, persistent, and so he slowly cracks one bleary eye open. 02:53 glows dauntingly across the clock, and Jack groans again, the noise reverberating through his entire body.
Beside him, Tate barely stirs, soft blonde hair spread across the pillow, breathing slow and deep, completely oblivious to the noise. She’d flown into Jersey quietly two days ago, no social media, no paparazzi, no fans clocking them together yet. Just the two of them hidden away for a little while.
Jack had missed this - missed her, missed the normality that they can act out only fleetingly. He knows it won't be long until people are catching wind that they're together, snapping photos and selling stories to tabloids and instagram gossip accounts.
His phone buzzes again, and Jack sighs, blindly reaching for it, still mostly asleep... and then he sees Luke’s contact photo and he's immediately more awake than before. Maybe something subconscious in him knows why, but for now he's still too bleary-eyed to consciously realise.
Luke's contact picture is stupid. Nico had taken it in the locker room months ago after practice - Luke sitting backwards in his stall with his curls shoved beneath a beanie, cheeks flushed pink from exertion, aggressively flipping off the camera whilst eating a protein bar. He looks both ridiculous and adorable, and Jack had laughed so hard he'd nearly cried, and then proceeded to harass Nico for three straight days until he'd finally sent the photo over.
Now, the image flashes across the screen at nearly three in the morning and something cold slides instantly down Jack’s spine. Because Luke never calls this late.
Never.
Jack answers at last, his fingers struggling over the answer button twice before the call fianlly connects. “Lukey?”, his voice is rough with sleep.
There’s silence on the other end. Not total silence - there's faint, laboured breathing, but there's no words, and Jack’s stomach drops instantly, because he knows.
He knows.
He knows before Luke even says anything. Perhaps he's known intrinsically all along, because he's experienced years of this, years of childhood bedrooms and hospital rooms and road trips and hotel floors and whispered conversations at two in the morning.
Jack knows what post-seizure silence sounds like. He pushes himself upright immediately, careful not to jostle Tate too much as his brain catches up all at once, “Luke?”
Nothing for another second, a terrifying coldness sliding up Jack's spine. He's already moving. The sheets rustle loudly as he slides out of bed, one hand gripping his phone tighter against his ear. Cold hardwood hits his bare feet as he walks quickly from the bedroom into the stark darkness of the hallway.
Behind him, Tate shifts slightly but doesn’t wake fully. Jack sighs in relief, before turning his attention back fully to Luke, to his baby brother.
“I...” Luke’s voice cracks badly through the speaker, “I had a seizure.”
Jack closes his eyes briefly. There it is. He'd known it was coming. “Okay,” he says immediately, voice sharpening into focus, “okay, hey, you with me?”
“Yeah.”
“You hurt?” He hopes that Luke is with-it enough to realise if he is injured, to know where hurts and where is numb. Sometimes, Luke doesn't realise things right away after a seizure - Jack remembers as a child when Luke chewed a hole through his lip and didn't realise until Quinn rather bluntly pointed it out.
Luke breathes heavily a few times before replying timidly, “My head."
Jack sucks in a breath, “Yeah, probably," Luke's head always hurt after a seizure, "Did you hit it?”
“I don't know.”
“Okay. Okay,” Jack rubs a hand over his face hard, “Are you bleeding?” He hopes not, doesn't want to be calling an ambulance at three in the morning.
There's a pause, and Jack has to physically tell himself that that's fine. Luke’s just taking time to process - his brain's still half-scrambled, he's fine, he's not in danger.
“Bit my tongue.” Luke's voice is so quiet, so fragile.
Jack holds back from rolling his eyes, even though there's no way that Luke would see it anyway, “No, I meant your head, idiot.” He tries so hard to be casual, to act like this is the most normal thing in the world.
But then a tiny, tinny laugh crackles faintly through the phone, and Jack exhales quietly in relief at the small sound. That's good. Laughing is good. That means Luke can't be in too bad shape.
“Alright,” he says, gentler now, “Can you sit up for me?”
“Maybe.”
“You gotta try, Lukey.” Jack leans against the kitchen counter whilst he listens to Luke struggle around on the other end. Rustling blankets. Uneven breathing. A soft groan that twists something painful in Jack’s chest. Luke sounds like he's struggling, and all Jack can do is listen.
God, he hates this. Hates that Luke’s even still having seizures at his big age - hates that he can't physically be there beside him - hates that he's so obviously struggling, all alone.
When they were kids, Jack used to wedge himself into Luke’s bed after seizures, body caught halfway between Luke's faded Snoopy plush and the wall, because Luke hated waking up alone afterwards. Sometimes Luke would barely even remember it the next morning, but Jack remembered every second. The sweaty skin, the confusion, the feverish way that Luke clung without meaning to when he was still foggy and scared.
Now Luke lives alone in another city and Jack has to settle for phone calls.
He hears Luke finally settle upright with a shaky breath.
“There you go,” Jack says softly.
A hum answers him. Luke's still with him. He's probably fine. That's good.
Jack stares blindly out the dark apartment windows for a second, organizing thoughts, assessing automatically. Luke’s talking appropriately, his breathing is okay - there're no obvious emergency signs. He's still postictal though, exhausted, probably more scared than he's ever let on to being, but he's not in immediate danger. He isn't dying, he just needs support, someone to hold his hand like a makeshift Snoopy plush.
Jack knows his brother well enough to hear it even through the silence, and so, he does what he’s always done - he talks. Not about the seizure, not really about anything of substance, he just talks. He lets his mouth run ahead of his brain for once, his hands drawing patterns on the tanned skin of his thigh.
“You know it rained before practice today?” he asks casually, like this is a normal conversation happening at a normal hour, “Not even proper rain either. That gross Jersey mist rain. The kind that makes your hair weird. I mean, you probably already know, but...”
He trails off, because of course Luke already knows - Luke was there - but then a tiny snort echoes through the speaker, and he's suddenly encouraged to continue.
“And Nico chirped me for like ten full minutes because apparently I only wear black - which is rich coming from him. Also, I only wear black like 60% of the time, not like Quinn. I swear Quinn needs a personal stylist, because he's bringing down my reputation too now!"
He's rambling again, but Luke breathes another faint laugh, so Jack just keeps going.
“Tate’s here, by the way.”
A quieter sound this time. Interested.
“We’ve been hiding from paparazzi like fugitives - real dramatic stuff. She made me watch some documentary tonight about octopuses.”
“Octopi,” Luke mumbles automatically.
Jack grins despite everything, “There he is.”
It's silent again, but it's easier to process now. Luke’s breathing steadies a little through the phone. He's okay, he's fine.
Jack starts pacing slowly through the apartment as he talks, voice low in the darkness.
He talks long and hard about anything that pops into his head - about practice, about his neighbour asking him for tips on his gold swing, about the book he’s reading and how boring one chapter was.
About a random memory that surfaces suddenly of seven-year-old Luke losing his shoe in a lake during one of their summer holidays.
“You cried for like an hour over that sandal,” Jack says, a smile gracing his lips.
“I was upset,” Luke mutters weakly.
“You made mom so scared that she was looking up replacements on Ebay for two weeks straight afterwards."
That gets a real laugh - small and scratchy and exhausted, but real.
Jack closes his eyes briefly at the sound. He can picture Luke clearly now - curled miserably on the couch, hoodie sleeves over his hands, hair sweaty and flattened in weird directions. He's probably still pale and shaky, but coming back slowly.
Jack keeps talking and talking, because silence after seizures is dangerous sometimes. Not medically, but emotionally. He knows how Luke gets, knows those bright puppy-dog eyes, that pathetic lopsided pout. He knows that he needs noise, stimulation, something big and unavoidable to bridge the gap between his misfiring brain and the conscious world.
Abd because he knows that silence leaves too much room for fear. Luke hates silence, and so Jack fills it almost automatically, like its a human reflex. Maybe by now, it is.
He disucsses the weather, hockey, Tate, food, Quinn’s terrible texting habits, more embarrassing childhood stories. Literally anything that enters his brain. And gradually (read: very gradually), Luke starts responding more consistently.
It's just tiny noises at first, but soon they grow into
actual words, and before Jack knows it, his own throat growing raspy from overuse, Luke is laughing. Quietly, but still laughing.
By the end of the call Luke sounds stable, human again. He sounds more sleepy than scared, and Jack knows that his job is done. He leans against the kitchen island, relief slowly uncurling through him. “You gonna try sleeping?” he asks eventually.
“Yeah," Luke mumbles in return.
“You got water?”
There's a pause, but for the static crackling of the phone line, and Jack rolls his eyes automatically. “Luke," his tone is pointed; he knows that Luke will get the point.
“I’ll get it.” He doesnt hear any movement from Luke's end, but he's got to trust him.
“Promise?” he asks all the same.
“Promise," Luke murmurs back, voice thick with sleep.
Jack hesitates. He hates hanging up after seizures, just as he's always hated leaving Luke alone afterwards too. But Luke sounds okay now, he should be fine.
“Text me tomorrow morning,” Jack says softly.
“Kay.” There’s another pause, a longer one this time, before Luke tacks on in all but a whisper, “Thanks.”
Jack’s chest aches. “Anytime, Lukey.”
The line clicks dead a second later and the apartment falls silent. Jack stands there for a long moment staring at nothing, his warm phone still pressed loosely in his hand.
His pulse is only just starting to come down when he hears soft footsteps pad into the kitchen behind him.
Tate appears in one of his hoodies, hair messy from sleep, concern written across her face. “Jack?” She calls out gingerly, not entirely sure what to do.
He looks over immediately.
“You okay?”
Jack nods once automatically, though he’s not entirely sure it’s true.
Tate steps closer carefully, “I heard most of that.”
And of course she did. The apartment isn’t that big.
Jack rubs tiredly at his jaw. He isn't sure what to do or say, all of his energy long since used up with Luke.
“He okay?” she asks politely, offering him a small smile.
“Yeah,” Jack swallows, "yeah, he will be.”
Tate studies him quietly for a moment, before asking another quesiton. “What happened?”
Jack looks down at his phone screen again and Luke’s stupid contact picture grins back at him, middle finger raised proudly at the camera. Something twists painfully in his chest, because nobody knows anymore - not really - not outside of family, and the ever-shrinking circle that Luke allows.
No teammates. No media. No girlfriends.
Luke likes it that way. He hates being looked at differently, hates the concern, the feeling weak and fragile and sick and broken - and Jack understands that as well as he ever could, but god, sometimes he wishes that Luke would just let more people in, because hearing your little brother sound half-conscious and alone at three in the morning never really gets easier.
Tate touches his arm gently, “Jack?” She sounds properly worried, like she's expecting him to tell her something big.
He forces himself back to the present, because maybe she needs to know. "Just...” He exhales quietly, “Luke has epilepsy.”
The words sit heavily in the kitchen air, and Tate blinks in surprise, like that was the last thing she'd been expecting him to say, “What?”
“He’s had it since he was a kid,” Jack’s voice stays low automatically, protective even now, "it's mostly controlled. Usually.”
Mostly.
Usually.
Tonight apparently not.
Tate’s expression softens immediately. “Why didn’t you tell me?” she asks, voice so gentle, so calm, so unlike how Jack feels right now.
He gives a tired shrug, “I don't know - I guess it's not really my thing to tell?" There isn't much more to say really - Luke’s condition has always felt strangely sacred in the Hughes family. It's not necessarily a secret, it's just that Luke is private. He hates the pity that comes with people knowing.
Even now, Jack can remember being twelve years old and standing guard outside hospital curtains like he could physically keep bad things away from his little brother if he just stayed alert enough. Some habits never really leave.
Tate squeezes his arm gently, “Is he on his own?" She already probably knows the answer to that - she's been to Luke's apartment, knows that he doesn't have any roommates.
Jack nods once, thinking back to Luke alone on that couch, sweaty and hurting - scared enough to call.
Tate leans into him sleepily, “You should go there tomorrow.”
Jack wraps an arm around her automatically, because she gets it. “Yeah,” he says quietly into her hair, “probably.”
Because yeah, Luke had sounded okay by the end, but Jack knows his baby brother, knows that the worst part of seizures isn’t the seizure itself, but the confusing, debilitating postictal slumber.
It’s waking up afterwards and realizing that nobody’s there.
It's the fact that even when you think that you're doing fine, one seizure can come and wipe away all of that progress.
Yeah, Jack thinks, he'll go to Luke's place at early as possible in the morning, probably let himself in, because there's no chance that Luke will be awake before him. Maybe he'll message their mom and see if she can find Snoopy and post him down.
Snoopy did always make Luke feel better on bad days as a kid.