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Freestone paid for the house—was paying, Brian supposed. He wasn’t sure. Freddie, who could handle things like saying, “Uh, maybe an apartment would be cheaper, since we can’t, y’know—“ had been the one to fight that battle, but clearly, he’d lost. Or, well, Brian wasn’t sure. It hadn’t felt exactly like loss in Freddie’s head, and since Jim (or Miami, as Freddie had dubbed him) had fixed them the best they could, Freddie, Roger and John were the only people whose thoughts Brian could hear anymore. So Freestone was a mystery.
The house was tucked away in the dense landscaping of the city. Brian was fairly certain there were other houses around, but the trees were doing a good job of giving lie to that notion. Roger had spent the whole first day sitting with his feet in the pool, even though Brian had been a little worried about the temperature. It was late spring, but still a little chilly.
Roger had shrugged off Brian’s unvoiced (but not unheard) concerns and asked, aloud, “Doesn’t this kind of remind you of Lake District?”
Brian could remember that Roger’s family had taken them to The Lakes when they were kids, but when he tried to search for anything concrete in the memory, it slipped away. When he was halfway to panic trying to find something, Roger said, “It does, Bri. It looks like it, the trees, and maybe those poets would eviscerate for daring to compare their beautiful lakes to a pool, but fuck 'em, water is water.” The laughter than inspired was enough to distract Brian from the beginnings of a panic attack, but not enough to make him forget the hole in his memory.
John used Google and showed Brian pictures later. He still couldn’t remember, but at least he knew what Roger was talking about.
There were five bedrooms—one for each of them and one for a study or place for guests to stay. John found his way into Roger’s room before they even went to sleep the first night, and Brian held out for all of an hour once the nightlights came on before scuttling into Freddie’s. The beds were all queens, easily big enough for two, especially when neither of them particularly felt like having their space.
After a month, and several discussions, Freestone — Phoebe, as he’d insisted they called him— took away the beds in what had been John and Brian’s rooms and made them into studio spaces, one for art, another for music. The original guest room stayed that way. Phoebe found people to convert the walls of the room into library shelves, though, entire with a sliding ladder, for hard-to-reach books. The living room was so technologically forward that Brian was sometimes afraid it was smarter than him, but John and Freddie loved it. It did anything and everything they asked it to.
The library room had a windowseat that Brian liked to curl up on, in the sun, and read from. He fell asleep there more times than not, but he almost always woke up in bed, Freddie at his side.
In Freestone’s research center—it was called Developing the Future, but Brian kind of hated that, even after Miami had very earnestly explained the whole business model of his and Phoebe’s joint venture—Brian could find his way around fairly easily. He didn’t wander out in the halls all that much, because they were generally stark or covered with tech, and either way, made him uneasy. And Miami had fixed their room up to be a haven of soft places and music.
The house was hardly huge, or anything, but the shifting nature of it—there was rarely the same song on the stereo when he woke, and Freddie was forever putting different things on the wall—made it so that Brian found himself taking a tour of it each morning, remembering what was what.
Freddie worried that there was something damaged in Brian’s memory, Brian could hear, even though Freddie tried to hide those thoughts. Brian didn’t think it was his memory. He was pretty sure it was a kind of systematic craziness, except that he wasn’t certain he would be able to diagnose that in himself. He asked Miami at one point, and Miami said, “I’m a neurology researcher, Brian, I-- That’s not really my area of expertise.”
Still, he asked around and he found Tony, who was an honest-to-God therapist. Tony said, “There are certain kinds of mental imbalance that can’t be detected in the person experiencing them. I’m not persuaded this is one of them.”
“So I’m crazy?” Brian asked, and really, it wasn’t a surprise, just mildly devastating.
“I hate that word.”
“Mentally imbalanced.”
“I suspect, in your case, permanently traumatized is more on track.”
“Permanently.” The word hurt going down Brian’s throat.
Tony raised an eyebrow. “Were you expecting to wake up fine one day?”
“I can’t always remember where the stairs are. Or how to tell time. How many days there are in a week. My own name.” Other stuff that Brian wasn’t going to talk about.
“There’s a difference between healing, and being fine. You don’t remember where the stairs are most likely because you had the right of movement, choice of where to go, taken from you. Our brains cope with a loss of self-government in different ways. Telling time would have only told you how long they’d had you, it wouldn’t have let you know when it was going to be all over, even if you’d had some way of figuring out the passage of hours, days. Same for the days in the week.”
“My name?” Brian asked.
“Bet you never forget Roger’s, or Freddie’s, or John’s.”
Brian didn’t. “Mine seems kind of important.”
“It is. Now. Was it really then? Weren’t there other things that were more important? What did knowing your name get you?”
Brian flinched from the question, shying away from the voices talking to him through the experiments, they way they cooed his name, asked him questions he couldn’t possibly answer. “Yeah. Okay.”
“It’s been slightly less than a year. Your body has hardly fully healed. And we know, relatively, how to treat bodies.”
“But not the crazy,” Brian said.
Tony said, “What did I say about that word? Don’t make me kick your arse,” quite formally. “You’re taller than me, but I could do it.”
Freddie started working for Phoebe from the house, as an designer in his pamphlets department. Freestone, Inc., printed a ton of information for volunteer medical aids on how to get clean water, keep insects out of beds, and other basic health steps to take when in their assigned communities. Phoebe had evidently come up with the idea for the company—a mid-sized pharma outfit that turned the profits back on developing countries—when he’d gone to visit Paraguay with his family in his teens. Phoebe had found Miami in his dorm room at uni, and the two of them had been kind of unstoppable.
Roger pitched in with basic admin stuff that didn’t involve going into any of the offices, and John started taking classes from an online university in non-profit organization. Brian would sit in on John’s classes, but more often than not his head would start pounding half way through and if he didn’t medicate quickly and take a nap, there was a hellish migraine to pay. The medtech company that had been illegally testing on human subjects—them—had taken him more often than the others and integrated more undeveloped tech into him. Miami and the surgeons had done their best, over the year, to slowly remove as much of it as they could, but it had left him with a significant amount of scar tissue.
The others had symptoms as well. Roger was all-but blind in the sunlight, which he seemed to be taking well. Freddie had explained, “I think it makes him feel like a vampire.”
John still dragged Roger outside during the day, but he’d let Roger lie on the poolchairs with his eyes closed, just so long as he got some fresh air. They would swim at night, both of them uncoordinated and still too-white in the water, but it was getting better.
John had lost pretty much all sense of touch to his shoulders and upper back. He could probably be hit with a two-by-four and he’d feel the impact knocking him forward, but nothing else.
Freddie’s voice went in and out. One moment he could talk just fine, and the next it was days before he could say anything vocally. The first time it had happened, once they’d figured out what was going on, and gotten him calmed down, Freddie had taken up residence in Brian’s mind and refused to leave. Brian hadn’t wanted to kick him out, or anything, so it was fine.
None of those things debilitated the others. Brian, though, he couldn’t do anything that meant serious concentration for over thirty minutes—not even read. He had to stop, then, rest, and hope that he could remember whatever the fuck it was he’d been reading when he was ready to go again.
He knew Phoebe and Miami would give him something to do if he asked, would find something, but the whole point was to actually be useful, like the others, not more of a burden just to boost his own self-esteem.
Brian was pretty good at hiding his feelings from the others when he wanted, but he slept almost inside Freddie’s skin each night, so bleed-through was inevitable. Freddie thought, I need you, darling. That’s all Miami has to know. Even if you weren’t enough on your own, there’d be that.
Brian said, “Okay,” aloud, and forced himself to go to sleep.
It took Brian a while to do all the research. Computer screens tended to make his head hurt faster than print books, and he wasn’t going to print this stuff out for just anyone to find. While he was biding his time, he figured out little ways he could help—cutting veggies in short doses, setting the table, doing laundry, finite tasks.
He figured out how to get himself into the city, and to an organization that helped people like him. Well, not people like him, but people with mental illnesses. It helped to get them jobs, set them up in apartments. Brian saw the numbers that Miami talked about over dinners, or just afternoons on the deck. He knew that Phoebe and Miami were using their money to help stop things like malaria and smallpox. They didn’t need to be supporting a useless freeloader like Brian with it.
The walk from the house to the bus station took a long time. The surgeons that had been brought in to work on Brian’s body had been the best of the best, but it had taken much longer than anyone had hoped, and the damage just hadn’t been wholly fixable. For walking around the house, or the yard, it was fine, and swimming was the best, his body weightless and somewhat capable in the water. Anything more was a struggle, but Brian could do it. He just had to put his mind to it and be patient. (The latter of which was not really one of his strengths, but he liked to pretend.)
By the time he’d gotten to the bus station, all he wanted to do was call someone to pick him up and go home, but he’d left his phone at the house specifically for that reason. Instead he dragged himself to the ticket window, bought a ticket and climbed on the bus.
He slept the whole of the way into the city. Navigating inside the city was rougher than he’d expected. He’d grown up outside it, and it was nothing like this, not in the way where people just bumped into you walking past and barely paused to say “excuse me.”
Brian found his way to a bathroom stall, where nobody could touch him and worked on breathing. When he could, he got out and continued his journey. One more bus, and then a three block walk, and he was at the center.
They were kind, but they talked to him really slowly, and yes, Brian was brain-damaged, but not in that way. He could understand speech at full tempo, thanks. After a while, he started talking bizarrely fast, just to counter it in his own head. The receptionist seemed startled. He wanted to tell Freddie about it, Freddie would laugh—sometimes the people at the office treated Freddie the same way. Generally they ended up fired, but still, Brian had seen it before.
Brian made himself focus. Freddie wasn’t here. He was, he was here, and this was his life, and he could do this. No problem.
They found him within three days. It kind of pissed him off because he was doing fine, okay? The apartment was more of a room with a toilet and a bed and a sink, and his job involved sorting paper clips into different-sized piles, but it was a job, and he wasn’t just sitting around, leeching off of other people. He felt like an adult, or as much of like one as he ever was probably going to. Sometimes he could remember the things he’d wanted to do before. He’d been twenty-two, at least, he was pretty sure. There had been plans for a Phd, maybe even a band. It wasn’t this. But this would do. This was life, and Brian could handle it.
Miami showed up at his front door with an unsure smile. “Um. Evidently I was the one least likely to hit you.”
Brian crossed his arms over his chest. “Was I a prisoner?”
Miami looked so horrified that Brian kind of felt bad for asking it that way, but only kind of. Miami said, “No, of course, not,” and then started babbling. Brian let him for a bit before pulling him inside.
Miami looked around, as if unsure what to do and then sat down miserably on the bed and said, “Freddie’s… John won’t leave his side.”
Brian thought about cracking a snide remark, but he couldn’t, not about Freddie. “I left a note.”
“You left a note saying you were going to the city to actually support yourself.” Miami produced said note from his pocket and waved it around. “And not to worry!”
“It was straightforward.”
“You’re seriously such an arsehole.”
Brian blinked at Miami, who looked almost as surprised by the assertion as Brian was. After a moment, Brian said, “Well, yeah.”
Miami got up then, in Brian’s space and Brian had to fight not to back away, even if he knew Miami wouldn’t hurt him, not really. Miami snapped, “Roger tried so hard to find you he vomited from the strain.”
Brian had felt something, later in the first day, but he’d thought it was just his imagination. They didn’t have that kind of range. “I—“
“Shut up,” Miami said softly, not even mad, just exhausted sounding. “Freddie won’t even fucking sketch, Deaky won’t let anyone turn on the damn stereo, they’re freaking the fuck out, Brian.”
“I can’t stay there because it makes us all more comfortable, Miami.”
“Why not, Brian? What makes that such a bad idea?”
Brian’s head was hurting, and he knew he was going to regret this conversation later, for one reason or another. “Because-- Because for nearly three years, I was just a body. And I don’t want to be that, anymore.”
“You think-- I. What? The others, they could care less—“
“I don’t mean like that. I mean, that when I’m there, that’s all I am. I’m just space being taken up. I don’t even have the functionality of being an instrument of experimentation. I’m just…” Brian shrugged.
“You’re just the only person who knows how to get Roger to talk to his family at all anymore, and the only person who will actually listen to John talk about his electrical design ideas for hours and respond, and the only person in the world who can bring Freddie out of a nightmare and actually keep him out of it. You’re just the only one in the house who makes sure that Freddie eats, because Deaky forgets, and the only one who notices if Roger is doing too much work, pushing himself too far, and the only one who can get John to focus on things like if he’s cold or if he needs his hair cut. Yeah, that’s all you are.”
“They don’t need a babysitter,” Brian hissed.
Miami fidgeted, but said, “Not— not a babysitter, but they do need you, Brian. How could they not? How could any of you not need each other after-- I read those files a million times trying to undo the damage and I still don’t have any idea, can’t have any idea, what it was like. Only that the four of you do, and you have each other, and seriously, you think something like money’s more important than that?”
Brian was having a hard time concentrating, but he said, “I think money’s pretty important to people who don’t have it.”
“I lived on Ramen and crackers for most of my undergraduate and graduate years. Trust me, not this important.”
Brian rubbed at his eyes. “Are they mad?”
“They just want you back.”
Brian said, “Okay,” before curling up on the bed, head in his hands, and giving into the pain.
Brian woke up in the middle of a human puppy-pile. Freddie murmured, “Miami gave you some stuff. For the pain.”
Yeah. Brian didn’t feel up to talking.
Freddie answered, Do that again, and I will kill you myself, darling. Slowly. I’ve been taught lots of tricks.
“Sorry,” seemed kind of lame, so Brian just curled himself deeper into Freddie. Roger came with him, but that didn’t surprise Brian. He’d been able to feel him listening. He was still sounding kind of sluggish, but Brian imagined that if he’d tried to mentally reach someone that far away, his brain might have actually exploded.
John chimed in with, We’re getting a cat. To alert us. If you try again.
Freddie mentally rolled his eyes. A cat would be a useless alarm. We’re getting a cat because Deaky’s allergic to dogs and I want something that’s nicer to me than you wankers.
Brian mouthed at Freddie’s neck, the closest area of skin to him. Roger sighed. Ew.
Brian ignored him. Freddie relented. Maybe I just really like cats.
Brian smiled against Freddie’s skin. I can take care of her.
Good. Deaky forgets to feed things.
John’s Hey! was not as impassioned as it might have been. Roger snickered. Brian said, softly, “I’ve noticed.”
Freddie didn’t speak for the better part of 72 hours after Phoebe deposited Brian back inside their house. Brian was fairly certain Freddie actually couldn’t speak, but nonetheless, it accomplished its goal of making Brian feel like a right cunt.
When he finally did speak, Freddie’s first words were, “Are you fucking crazy?”
“According to the shrink, possibly.”
“Fuck you,” Freddie said, in the same way some people asked what was for breakfast, or whether they should wear a sweater.
Which was fine, Brian could feel the intent. “We all remember the Dettol incident.”
Freddie shuddered. Dettol had been the golden gateway into Brian’s advanced stage but as-of-yet unnoted PTSD. Brian had opened a bottle to clean off the kitchen counter and spent the next six hours in a state of utter panic. Evidently, it smelled like disinfectant to him. The only things they could use in the house were non-chemical based cleaners. It was a pain in the arse.
“PTSD isn’t crazy.”
“I feel like there’s an entire world of not-crazy people out there who would probably feel differently if they’d seen that go down.”
“There’s an entire world of arseholes too, darling, that doesn’t mean I consult them when I want to know what to think.”
Brian thought about that for a while. Finally he said, softly, “I feel crazy, Fred.”
Freddie looked at him, and Brian hugged himself, not knowing how to explain if Freddie didn’t just know. It had been so long since he’d had to explain anything to Freddie, since Freddie hadn't just intrinsically understood. Eventually he tried, “Half the time I don’t even know if this is real, if I didn’t just create it. Then I tell myself that I couldn’t remember any of the songs, and I didn’t even know some of them, so it must be real, but it doesn’t feel like it.”
Freddie reached out to grip Brian's shoulder, a steadying gesture that was enough to make him continue
“It’s not fair, to me or to you lot, for you guys to be the only thing real in my head.”
“Maybe,” Freddie admitted. “But you don’t get to make that decision, Bri. That’s not fair, either.”
“I’m sorry,” Brian told him, and he was, but it didn’t change the way he felt.
Freddie kissed him softly but thoroughly and rubbed a thumb lightly along a scar that curved over the back of Brian’s neck. After a long while he pulled back and said, “One of Phoebe’s mailings got totally fucked and I need to hand feed the envelopes through the stamp machine. Wanna hand me envelopes?”
“Kinda, yeah.”
“Maybe you are crazy, dear.”
Brian laughed. It hurt, but the good kind of hurt. Brian had sort of forgotten that kind of hurt existed. It felt nice to be reminded. “Yeah, maybe.”
Brian linked their hands together as they walked to find the envelopes, and let the soft, shy smile Freddie gave him keep him tethered to the present. Maybe he was crazy, but maybe that was okay so long as Freddie kept looking at him like that.