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Three days.
Three days since they’d found the sheet neatly folded and Reigen’s shoes missing from the messy pile by the front door.
Shigeo had been eerily silent and inconsolable after the first day. Drifting without aim through the house, gaze lingering on the empty couch, withdrawing into himself more and more as the minutes passed until it was like he was gone too. They were fractured.
Three days and Reigen was back, pale and sleeping on the couch like he had never been gone. Shigeo clung to him like a shadow, Ritsu nursed what a mother recognized as guilt from a distance.
The mask hid the bright flush dusted across his cheeks but not his shallow, laboring breath as he slumped against the warm bulk of her husband, hands crossed at the wrists and limp in his lap. Since Reigen had returned from wherever he’d gone it was like he had lost what little dexterity he’d had. It was like he was back in that place, in the memories of that house. Reigen coughed half-heartedly, too tired to put much into it.
Akane carded her fingers through sweaty bangs settling her palm on the side of his face, flinching at the heat, out of a need to do something, and smiled when Reigen blinked his eyes open though it was clear he didn’t really see her.
“Soon now,” she said softly, kneeling in front of him, “the doctor will see us soon and you’ll feel better.” Hisao gave her a comforting look and tightened his arm around the small man, holding him up. She loosely gripped Reigen’s wrists, rubbing her thumbs gently over the backs of his cold hands.
The waiting was unbearable, like it had been before, when he had been missing and she’d watched her sons fall apart before she even had a chance to find out what was wrong. She was hyper aware of the buzzing waiting room lights, the hushed conversations of other patients, and fretted with the sleeves of Reigen’s overlarge sweater. When had things become so complicated? When had her boys become strangers? When had Ritsu-?
“Honey,” Hisao murmured gently, “he’s going to be okay.” Before Akane could respond the nurse called their name.
“Kageyama?” They stood, Reigan between them and stepped forward, almost daring the poor woman to separate them. To be fair, she looked experienced enough to brook no argument. “I’ve been informed, come this way and we’ll get him worked up.”
Worry only mounted when Akane saw his weight, he’d lost what little he’d manage to gain and more to the fever, which was still hovering at a steady 39.2 degrees. At home, no medicine they tried lowered it much at all and never for very long. He had been so adamant and so worked up when they suggested the hospital, or even a doctor, tears falling thick, fast and unnervingly silent down his face. Shigeo had been the one to change his mind, but even then it took convincing. “I don’t like that blood oxygen level.” Akane startled out of her thoughts as the nurse clucked her tongue and guided them into a quiet room. “The doctor will be in shortly.”
Hisao helped Reigen lay on the crinkly paper surface, muttering nonsense all the way and smoothing out the bunched up clothes. Reigen, trembling with exhaustion and chills, fell into a fitful doze and the two parents shared a concerned embrace. Not ten minutes later there was a soft knock on the door.
“You know I wouldn’t normally see a patient like this.” Akane knew, she had begged her personal physician over the phone to allow them to accompany him, explaining bits and pieces of the situation, of the past, of the struggle the last few days had been. Between the three of them they got Reigen upright. “Based on his numbers, he should probably be in a hospital.”
“...n’no, no hospitals…” Panting, Reigen came to life where he sat shivering on the edge of the examination table and struggled under Hisao’s supportive hand while Akane spoke up.
“His choices are important to us. Coming here was his concession.” She didn’t know what they would do if he needed a trip to the hospital. “Please, whatever you can do for him.”
The doctor was clinical, passing the disc of her stethoscope over chest and back, listening intently, humming to herself periodically.
“Mr. Reigen,” she began, waiting until she had his bleary attention. “You have what sounds like a pretty bad case of pneumonia.” A glance shushed the start of the Kageyama parents’ frantic murmuring. “That’s why your fever has persisted and you’re experiencing chest pain. Normally, I would send you to the hospital-”
“N’no!”
“Shhh.” She allowed Hisao to soothe him back to exhausted complacency. “Normally. I’m going to order some tests to confirm my diagnosis and then give you strict orders to follow when you get home, okay?” He blinked, coughing unproductively into the mask, and the doctor looked elsewhere for affirmation. Akane nodded. “If you get any worse, you need to go to the hospital.” Reigen’s wheezing intensified but he didn’t deny it. “Okay.” She patted his shoulder and Hisao helped him curl up on the paper-lined bench again. “Rest here, I’ll get back to you soon with the results.” The doctor drew Akane aside.
“It’s bad, isn’t it?” Nervous fingers played with the hair behind her ear.
“It’s not ideal, but I think if you’re careful, keep him calm, quiet and follow my directions closely, he’ll make a full recovery.” A weight lifted off her shoulders, her mind’s eye flashing an image of her boys, waiting anxiously at home for news. How Shigeo’s haunted eyes filled with tears when he reported just how sick he thought the man who’d rescued him really was.
“Just tell us what to do.”
Just over an hour later found them all home again, Reigen settled warmly on the couch, the first dose of an antibiotic in him and Shigeo, matching in a mask of his own, at his side armed with a water bottle complete with a pink straw sticking out of the neck. They were under strict orders to ply Reigen with fluids every half hour until the fever started to go down. Shigeo fussed professionally over the man as he huffed good naturedly through the boy’s ministrations. Hisao was bustling in the kitchen, fixing soup for dinner.
Akane, watching in the doorway, put her arm around Ritsu as he came to stand next to her. She smiled as he leaned wearily into her embrace. Yes, they were all home.