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Harry glanced at his reflection in the window overlooking the hospital car park. His hair was greasy, because he’d been running his hand through it nervously. For something to do he took his scarf and folded it, making a headband. It would at least stop him from making it any worse.
Nick’s instagram made a really useful scrapbook of exactly why he was lying here. Or why the doctors suspected he was lying here. He’d been away for two days filming a segment about pop-up festivals. He’d not been into it, complaining to Harry that in his day they were just called raves and they didn’t cost £50 to get into, but he’d trundled off, waving sad little Vera goodbye and promising that he would definitely look for fairies when he got to the arse end of Wales. Their daughter had just chirped ‘Daddy come back?’ and raised her cute little eyebrows. Harry had answered ‘soon’, and left it at that.
So there was the instagram of the campsite, and the instagram of the waterfall, and the instagram of Nick swimming in the waterfall captioned with ‘THEY’VE BOTH FROZEN OFF!”. Then there was the instagram of the cup of tea, then the rash, then the paramedic, and finally, the hospital. Nick had contracted some kind of infection and gone downhill pretty rapidly. He had been delirious and then unconscious, all of this happening while Harry was speeding down the M4 not knowing whether to stop and look at his phone for updates or just put his foot down and get there.
The doctor had talked for a bit, but all Harry wanted to know was that Nick was going to be okay, and he was. Antibiotics were kicking in, painkillers had been thoroughly administered, and Nick would wake up soon. The doctor had warned Harry that Nick was going to be more mental than usual. “He might be a bit out of it, he had short term memory loss when we brought him in, he thought he was in London and kept asking for a poached egg on toast. He might be confused when he wakes up so we’ll assess him and then come and get you.”
That had been two hours ago and Harry was still waiting. He look at the picture of Vera in her pyjamas that Gemma had sent him and wondered whether Nick would remember to ask about her.
“Mr Grimshaw?”
Harry’s head snapped up. “Erm, me? I’m with Nick Grimshaw.”
The nurse nodded like he was a particularly stupid animal. “You’re Mr Grimshaw’s husband? He’s awake if you’d like to come in. Don’t worry if he acts a little strangely, he will have some memory loss but he’ll recover.”
Harry followed her into the private room and beamed at Nick, whose eyes were barely open. He took hold of Nick’s hand and gently kissed his forehead. “Hello. How are you feeling?”
Nick just stared, his brow furrowed. “Yeah.” He croaked, and Harry had flashbacks to when he used to wake up blurry and confused at 5.30 in the morning for the Breakfast Show.
Harry sat in the chair next to the bed and kept Nick’s hand gripped in his. “Do you know where you are now? You’re in hospital in Wales.”
Humming and shifting in the bed, Nick still looked confused. He started to smile, but it was weird. Harry knew that brand of smile and he hadn’t seen it in quite some time.
“Did the doctor send you in to wake me up? Like Sleeping Beauty?”
Harry giggled. “That’s right, you’re Sleeping Beauty and I’m the handsome prince.”
“You are so pretty. You’re the prettiest boy I’ve ever seen, what’s your name?”
Ah, Harry thought. It was your flirty smile. You haven’t needed that one in a while. “My name’s Harry.”
Nick tried to grin but it appeared to tire him out. He was like a cross between sleepy Nick and incredibly drunk Nick. So basically Friday night Nick. “Are you a model? Are you a real nurse?”
“I’m your husband.” Harry waited for this to sink in. It was like watching something from the Muppet Show, all big eyes and over the top expressions.
“You’re my husband?” Nick’s voice was verging on falsetto. “How long?”
“Two and half years.”
“Oh my God.” Nick looked at the ceiling like the answers were written there. “You are the prettiest boy I’ve ever seen, baby. Do we call each other baby?”
Laughing, Harry squeezed his hand. “Yeah, sometimes.”
“Wow, I won the fucking lottery with you. What’s your name?”
“Harry.”
“I’m Nick, I’m on the telly.”
“I know, darling.”
“Darling, do we call each other darling?”
Harry sighed and grinned at him again. It was probably going to be a long night. “Yeah, we do.”
Nick went quiet all of sudden. “I can’t remember.”
“Hey, it’s alright.” Harry put his arms around Nick, stroking his hair and leaving a kiss on his cheek. “You’ll remember when your painkillers have worn off. You’ll remember everything.”
“I love you, probably.” Nick’s eyelids started to droop and he fought against it.
“If you need to sleep, just sleep, I’ll be here, I’m not going anywhere.”
“Have we got any kids?”
“Yeah, we’ve got a little girl. She can’t wait to see you.”
“Okay. I might have a sleep now, can you bring the baby tomorrow? Have we got a baby did you say?”
Harry couldn’t keep the smile off his face. He wished he’d been filming this, Nick was unintentionally hilarious. “Yeah, we’ll see her tomorrow. Have some sleep, I love you.”
“Do you?”
“Yep.”
Nick hummed one last time and fell asleep. Harry kept hold of his hand and made himself a bit more comfy in the chair. He snapped a quick picture of Nick sleeping open mouthed, just for bribery purposes, and fired off a few ‘he’s fine’ texts. To amuse himself he tweeted that Nick had short term memory loss and everyone should tweet made up facts about him with the hashtag #wakeupGrimmy. Finally he took one last look at Vera in her pyjamas and made it his lock screen so that Nick could see it as soon as he woke up, then he rested his head by his husband’s hand and tried to sleep. Weird day. Yet another brilliant, weird day with the Styles-Grimshaw family.