Chapter Text
Theo immediately jumps up from his chair when he sees that Liam is opening his eyes and runs to the side of his bed.
“Hey, Sunshine. How are you feeling?” Theo asks carefully, trying to intertwine his fingers with Liam’s but the other boy takes his hand away before he can do so.
Liam looks a little lost, his eyes taking in the surroundings as if he is searching for something. And then his gaze settles back on Theo. The chimera couldn’t miss noticing the ghost of a smile on his lips and his blue eyes being glazed and not as bright as usual. The last rays of the setting sun that is shining through the window are the only things that light up Liam’s features.
“Hey. I’m fine, I guess. Where am I? How did I get here?” Liam demands slightly confused, his voice still raspy due to the fact that he has just woken up.
Theo hesitates for a moment, looking down at his hands as if they are holding the answer to finding the right words to tell Liam what had happened to him. Once again, tears are welling up in his eyes.
“You- you got shot. We had to bring you here. Here as in the animal clinic. We almost lost you. I almost lost you. But Deaton managed to save you. You have been unconscious for nearly a whole day,” Theo presses out, his teary eyes still focused on his now trembling hands.
Liam nods slowly but his eyes are telling a different story when they widen in shock.
“I got shot. Oh my god, I got shot. How did I manage to get shot? And why am I in an animal clinic and not in a hospital?” He asks more to himself, not as calm anymore as he has been just moments before. But Theo can’t blame him. This is a lot to process, even for Liam.
“You took a bullet for me. One of Monroe’s hunters aimed his gun at me and the moment he pulled the trigger, you jumped in front of me. You’re my hero now. But don’t ever do this again, I was scared to death. I couldn’t live without you, Sunshine. And of course we couldn’t bring you to a normal hospital, you know that they don’t have the right equipment and stuff, and so we brought you here,” Theo tries to keep his voice as steady as possible, but the concern in his tone betrays him. He doesn’t want to worry Liam right after he has woken up, but he isn’t able to hold back the strong emotions he is feeling, either. He has been holding them in for far too long already. Since Liam had gotten shot. He had tried to block the emotions out and to think rational. But now that Liam is finally awake they are slowly crawling back from the corner he had pushed them in.
Liam nods again. Though, he still looks confused, lost. In any other situation, Theo would have found it adorable, but this is completely different. It is serious.
“Why would I take a bullet for you? I mean, I might be a nice person but almost dying for a stranger is not on top of my bucket list. And why couldn’t you-“, Liam cuts himself off when he sees the shocked expression on Theo’s face, his mouth gaping open and his eyes wide.
“What- what- did you just say?” Theo stutters, caught off guard.
The Beta frowns deeply. “I’m sorry if I offended you in any way, but I think that no one would die for a stranger,” Liam explains himself and shrugs.
Theo is about to lose it completely. “Are you joking? If you are, then it isn’t funny.”
Liam’s frown fades when he raises an eyebrow, pure confusion written all over his face. “Nope, I’m dead serious. I mean you seem like a nice guy but I still wouldn’t die for you.”
"You don't remember me, do you?" The chimera's voice is nothing more than a whisper. He could feel his expression dropping, his eyes widening in shock and his mouth becoming a thin line. He has no control over his chemo signals or heartbeat anymore. And at this moment he doesn’t care in the slightest. His whole attention is on Liam now. He waits for his answer even though he already knows what it will be, extremely scared to hear the words spoken out loud.
And so Theo holds his breath as he watches Liam shaking his head slowly and forming the words he doesn’t want to hear, “No, I don’t remember you. Should I?”
He needs a moment to process that it is real and then it clicks in Theo’s mind. Everything starts to make sense. But he still has to make sure that his theory is true. Though a big part of him hopes that it isn’t.
"Do you know who you are?" Theo asks, fear gripping at his heart as he is bracing himself for the answer that would follow.
Once again, Liam frowns deeply. "I'm Liam Dunbar, but why would you ask me that? After what you said I had expected that you knew who I was. But since I don't know who you are, introducing yourself might help to refresh my memories."
Theo doubts that. He can’t believe what is happening right now. His boyfriend doesn’t recognize him. He is a stranger to him. It takes him a moment to grasp it completely before his whole world comes crashing down on him. This can’t be happening. Not to him. It has to be a dream, a really bad dream, a nightmare. One of Tara's tricks. But this is even worse than one of his nightmares. In his nightmares he only relives hell, but when he wakes up he is back in reality, back in Liam’s strong arms that are holding him while he gently assures him that everything is going to be okay. That he will be fine. And Theo knows he will be. He always is when he is with Liam. But this time he isn’t going to wake up. Liam can’t comfort him. There is no one who will tell him that everything is going to be alright, at least no one who can convince him.
All the emotions he has stored in the back of his head and even more than just them are flooding his mind, threatening to drown him. They are like a tsunami that can destroy a whole city. It only needs something that is causing it, an earthquake. And his earthquake is sitting right in front of him. The tsunami is flooding his mind before it becomes all too much. He can’t handle this. He turns around to storm out of the room, to escape the scenery that is tearing his heart apart. He has to clear his mind. The panic tightens his chest. His breathing gets heavier and every attempt to steady it as well as his heartbeat fails.
But Theo stops dead in his tracks when an all too familiar hand cups his arm. But it doesn’t feel right. Theo looks down at the hand and then up to the owner of it. Liam is watching him through his thick lashes, concern drawn on his face. His eyes a piercing bright blue, the glaze slightly fading. He sees Liam's lips forming words but he can’t hear them. The pounding of his fast heartbeat is too loud, drowning out all the other noises.
He frees himself out of the beta's firm grip and runs out of the room, heading to the parking lot. He fumbles with the keys in the pockets of his jeans until he manages to unlock his truck. He opens the door on the driver's side and climbs into the car. Then he crawls onto the seat, his head and trembling hands resting on the steering wheel as he is trying to steady himself so that he won’t fall. But Theo is still falling… mentally. Tears are welling up in his eyes but this time he doesn’t hold them back. He lets them stream down his cheeks while he begins to sob so hard that his throat is burning like fire. Even though he lets everything out, his chest still feels tight, too tight.
Theo doesn’t know how long he has been sitting there. It could have been minutes but also hours. All he knows is that he still isn’t okay when the last tears have escaped the corners of his swollen eyes. He is exhausted. And not only because he has been crying. He feels like a part of him is missing and he isn’t ready to admit that he exactly knows why he feels this way yet. Theo has hope. Hope that Liam's memories will come back, they have to. He can’t accept the possibility that they are gone. That his Liam is gone forever. He will help him to remember. He would try anything to get him back.
So he snaps out of his shock the best he can. He has to think logical now, rational like he already has done when Liam had been unconscious. He knows that something like getting shot can cause a post-traumatic amnesia. It would take some time and then the memories would come back. Probably. Though, there is also a voice in the back of his mind that is doubting that. A voice he knows all too well. Tara's voice is telling him things like: “But what if they don’t? What if Liam would never remember? Never remember you.”
But Theo won’t give up. He is a fighter, a survivor. They have already gone through so much together. And he knows that Liam would never give up on him. So he pulls himself together and opens the door to climb out of the truck. To go back into the animal clinic. Back to Liam.
They are standing on the front porch of the Dunbar-Geyer-residence. The place Theo has learned to call home. And he had never been more nervous to go inside. To face the woman who is like a mother to him. The woman who has welcomed him with open arms in her home and in her heart.
Back in the animal clinic, he had tried to convince Liam that everything is alright and that he doesn't have to worry about him. He had steadied his heartbeat and had put on a fake smile, and he knows that Liam still hadn’t believed him due to his swollen eyes that had betrayed him. Theo had told him about his post-traumatic amnesia and had lied to him when he had said that he is pretty sure about him getting his memories back in a few days. He hates lying to Liam. The words had felt like needles on his tongue. But he had had to do it, for Liam and also for himself.
Then he had explained to him why they even had been on a mission in the first place. He had had to tell him that he is a werewolf which, obviously, had come as a shock to Liam. And Theo had found out that the beta apparently doesn’t remember anyone. Only his own name.
So he had left out the part in which he would reveal to him that they are boyfriends. He had just told him that they are pack and live together. He hadn’t wanted it to get too much for him. Liam already has to process a lot and their relationship isn't the first priority right now. Though, deep down Theo knows that he is just deceiving himself by pretending that telling him about it sometime later would be better. But he ignores that thought, pushes it to the corner of his mind, where his emotions are already revolting.
Due to being a werewolf Liam's body had recovered really fast. He is still weak and so Theo had had to steady him when he had gotten out of bed and had taken his first few steps. The chimera had practically carried him to the car and heaved him into the passenger seat. And then they had taken off, heading home. The drive had been really awkward. Neither of them had known what to talk about and so they had sat there in an uncomfortable silence. The song on the radio and the tires on the road had been the only sounds that could be heard. Until Liam had cleared his throat and tried to make small talk, but he had failed miserably. Theo had grinned at his attempt. Apparently not even losing his memories had made him better at it. And at the same time, Theo had felt the strings around his chest tightening even more.
And now they are standing in front of the entrance of their home. Only the door separates Theo from the worst conversation he will ever have in his life. Maybe not the worst, but it is high on his list of conversations he doesn’t want to have. Jenna doesn’t deserve this. She deserves the world. Telling her that there is the possibility that she might lose her son, or not get him back, is even worse than going back to hell and getting his heart ripped out over and over again. Compared to what would follow now it sounded like a vacation.
The moment comes faster than expected when Jenna opens the door to let them in. Her lips break into a wide smile that makes her look like the humanization of the sun. The smile probably is heritable because Theo has seen it on Liam's face so many times already. It always makes his blue eyes shine with either excitement, joy or just happiness. Theo loves when he can read Liam's emotions in his eyes. He loves the way they change their colors from a lighter to a darker shade of blue. Sometimes they even mix and swirl around and then they look like the ocean before a storm. Theo can really get lost in them, has gotten lost in them several times already.
Jenna brings him back to reality and down from cloud nine when she greets them happily and tells them that the food is in the fridge if they are hungry. "As always, the caring mother," Theo thinks and grins to himself. He slips out off his shoes and hangs his jacket on the coat stand. Then he glances over to Liam who looks like he would rather be somewhere else. The beta shifts uncomfortably and his lips are curled into a shy smile.
"Everything okay, Sweetheart?" Jenna asks while she put a hand on Liam's back which causes the beta to cringe.
Theo saves Liam by grabbing Jenna's wrist and pulling her towards the kitchen even though he knows that Liam can hear them anyway. Then he let go of her wrist and looks at her apologetically.
Her disapproving look doesn’t help the slightest to calm Theo down. His hands are sweaty and trembling, and his heart beat a little faster than usual. But she has to know and so he tells her. Tells her everything. He starts by telling her from the mission they had been on, the moment Liam had gotten shot, how they almost had lost him, Liam's post-traumatic amnesia, and ended with the moment when they had been standing on the front porch. Jenna is listening to him the whole time, never interrupting him, nodding understandingly. But Theo can see tears glistening in the corners of her eyes which she strongly tries to hold back. And when he finishes, she takes a step forward, flinging her arms around him, embracing him into a tight hug. A hug, she knows both of them need more than ever now and Theo is holding onto her as if their lives are depending on it.
Dinner is really weird. Liam still looks like he'd rather wanted to be somewhere else. He takes the food Jenna is offering him and murmurs something that sounds like a "Thank you", then he microwaves it before he takes a seat on the dinner table with Theo and Jenna. There is no conversation, everyone is sitting there in silence, munching on their food. After that, they are doing the dishes and go to bed.
Theo can hear Liam breathing steadily next door where he is laying in his bed, in his room. The bed in which they normally are sleeping in together. It has been their bed, but now it isn't anymore. Theo has taken the guest room. It has been already his room once. It feels like it’s been a lifetime ago, in another life without Liam by his side. Like it is now. There is no we and they anymore, now there is only Liam and Theo separately. And Liam isn't even aware of it. He doesn't know. He doesn’t feel like something, someone, is missing. And Theo kind of hates him for it. Not because it is his fault but because he is jealous.
His sunshine has been taken away from him. And what is even worse was that it is still shining but not for him anymore. Liam is there. He can see him, touch him, but he can’t be with him. He misses him. He misses his warmth, his smile, his laugh, his bright blue eyes full of love and tenderness. And he really misses him right now. The bed is too hard, too cold without Liam by his side. He feels goosebumps covering his body- but not in the good kind of way, no, it is more like a cold winter breeze kissing your skin, leaving a thin layer of ice behind. The darkness in his mind threatens to drown him. He is afraid that the ground will break open again and that Tara’s hands will pull him back into hell where she awaits him to rip out his heart over and over again. And he knows that he would deserve it.
He had let everyone down. Tara, when he had betrayed her when he had stolen her heart, Liam when he couldn't protect him, the whole pack because they might lose their baby beta and Jenna who he didn't only let down but also had betrayed. He had promised her that he would protect Liam with his life. That he would never let anything happen to him. When Theo had told her that, she had just looked at him with her teary blue eyes, had taken his hands into her own, nodded so slowly and so understandingly and had breathed out a quiet "thank you". It had been the moment in which she had welcomed him to the family. When he had known that she would always have a place in his- his sister's- heart.
Theo hates himself for what he had done to all those people. The guilt and regret had become the strongest emotions after he had come back from hell. But then he had found Liam who had taught him all about love. How it was to love and be loved. And then just like that rays of sunshine had started to break through the dark clouds of guilt and regret. New emotions he hadn't had felt before became a part of him. Kindness, caring, joy, hope and most importantly love. Liam had caused all those emotions. But now the dark clouds are slowly starting to overcast the sky of his mind again and he can hear Tara laughing, can hear the sound of his heart getting ripped out of his ribcage mercilessly, his sister claiming what had been hers all along. Like she had done in hell and like she still does in his nightmares.
Liam had been anchoring him whenever he had had a nightmare. Until Theo began to have less to none. But the chimera knows that they will come back eventually, now that he had lost the only person that could prevent him from reliving his nightmares, his anchor. Theo doesn’t know how he could live without the warmth that had always covered his body at night. Without the touches that had made him feel like home whenever Liam held him in his strong arms. It hurts like hell knowing that the boy he loves so deeply is just next door but won’t come over to make him feel safe and secure again. Not in the next couple of days or weeks, maybe even years.
So he has to deal with it on his own now like he had done before Liam had become such a big part of his life. But he knows that he can’t do it completely on his own, so he had stolen one of Liam's pillows while the beta had been in the bathroom. And now he is focusing on the so familiar scent with all his senses.
Scenting it.
Looking at the pillow as if he could see Liam in it. As if he would hide behind it. As if he would still be there.
Listening. He doesn't really know to what though. Probably to the heartbeat in Liam's room, he guesses. The only thing that could calm him down right now.
Tasting the scent by putting his lips on the pillow and inhaling it. It almost tastes like Liam and it causes him to imagine his soft kisses on his lips.
Touching. The only thing he could touch is the pillow, hugging it closely to his chest. Holding onto it for dear life.
He grasps the pillow tight in his arms until he drifts off into a dreamless sleep.