Chapter Text
“Alex! Alex, you are NOT going to believe this!”
Alex paused, one hand resting on the spine of a book to save his place. “What am I not going to believe?”
He continued moving his fingers along the books on the shelf. This was where the hospital normally kept the children’s books, so the title he was looking for should be here. Besides, the braille edition of Harry Potter was massive - it was hard to miss. The Chamber of Secrets, in fact, was five volumes in paperback, which were more like massive paperbound notebooks than normal novels. They were hard to hide. And yet…
“Also, have you seen Harry Potter?”
Footsteps clambered to a stop beside him and Margaret answered, “Uh… let me look… oh, it looks like somebody put them over on top of the other bookshelf.”
“What’s going on? And why are people rearranging the shelves anyway?” Alex shuffled to his right and reached up towards the top of the next bookshelf, finding all five volumes and running his fingers along the edges to figure out which was the one he needed.
“I don’t know about the shelves, but Foxfire is coming! They’re supposed to be here within the hour! Here!”
Finding part 2, Alex pulled it down then turned towards Margaret. “The band?”
“Yes, the band. Who else? And Alex, they’re going to visit Pediatrics! Isn’t this amazing?”
It actually was pretty amazing. Foxfire was one of his favorite bands - he’d been listening to them for years. Still, it was a little funny that Margaret, a normally unflappable pediatric nurse was suddenly acting like she was 16.
“Yeah, that’s really cool. Are they gonna visit the kids or is there some kind of event?”
“No event. I think they’re just going to visit a few rooms and see some of the kids. I’m sure their team will explain more once they get here. Hopefully you’ll get a chance to meet them too!”
Alex felt heat creep over his face. As much as he liked the idea in theory, in practice he knew it was usually better not to meet your heroes. Foxfire had made some amazing songs that really moved him… but he wasn’t so sure he wanted to find out they were a couple of divas or assholes in reality. “I think I’m just gonna go read with Jack. We’re starting part 2 of The Chamber of Secrets today, so…”
He excused himself and made his way back down the hall towards the pediatric rooms. At the nurses’ station, he confirmed that Jack was still in the same room, then made his way to 207. He quickly ran his fingers across the braille plaque with the room number just to confirm he had the right room before knocking.
Jack was happy as ever to see him, and Alex felt a small pang. Any time people found out he volunteered at the hospital hanging out with kids they acted like he was doing something special and amazing. It didn’t feel amazing; it felt like so little. He’d spend a couple hours hanging out with sick kids and then he’d leave. Meanwhile these kids were here all day, sick, in pain, and most of them alone a lot of the time. He was hardly a hero for doing the bare fucking minimum a couple hours a week.
“Alex! Did you bring it?”
“Sure did!” He held the big paperbound book in front of him. “Part two!”
He sat in the chair next to the bed and collapsed his cane, tucking it into the seat with him before carefully opening the book.
“Is it just like the other one?”
“Yep. Wanna see?” Alex leaned over and held the opened book towards Jack so he could look. His entire family had been in a bad car accident, and Jack was currently stuck in bed between surgeries to fix a broken pelvis.
Alex could feel Jack running a hand over the braille. “That’s so cool. I can’t believe those are real words.”
Sat in the back of a dark SUV, Henry stared out the window at the streets they passed. So far, there’d been no sign of anyone following them, which was a relief. At first he’d worried that traveling in a big vehicle like this might attract attention, but since they’d been on the road they’d seen plenty of SUV’s on the streets in Austin. Apparently it was a popular choice here.
His sister must’ve been having similar thoughts because she suddenly said, “Does everyone in Texas drive a truck?”
“Apparently so,” he muttered. It was their first trip to Texas. Their last tour had covered North America as well as Europe, but they’d only hit a few of the major cities in the US. After winning two grammies for their latest album, they’d decided to be a little more thorough this tour.
Austin had actually been Pez’s idea. His family’s foundation was considering opening a youth shelter here, so he’d been several times to visit already. “You’ll adore it there, Haz. When they say everything is bigger in Texas, they really mean it,” he’d said. Of course, they’d been discussing food at the time, but Pez had made it sound suggestive with a waggle of his eyebrows.
Whenever they had more than a day or two in a city, they tried to find some youth charity or children’s hospital to visit. So by the time they’d flown in from LA the day before, Shaan had already scheduled them for a visit to a hospital today.
Actually, he’d probably had it planned since before the tour started, but he’d just told them about it yesterday. Which was exactly what they paid him for. He was the one who kept everything organized and made sure they got to where they needed to be.
They parked in the staff parking at the back of the hospital, and entered through the staff entrance. A hospital administrator was waiting there to shake their hands and introduce them to a nurse who would be taking them over to the pediatric wing.
Henry and Bea followed the nurse, Shaan and a couple of their security team trailing after. They’d been doing this for five years now, and Henry still wasn’t completely used to having to bring an entourage with him everywhere he went. Though admittedly, he’d certainly been grateful for their team at times when crowds had suddenly appeared, pushing towards them in the hopes of getting an autograph. He loved their fans, but he loved them in very small doses. The idea of being swarmed by a hundred people at once terrified him.
They arrived at the pediatric wing, which stood out from the other areas of the hospital they’d passed through with its cheerful murals on the walls, and brightly colored accents.
“These two halls here are all pediatrics,” the nurse was explaining as they arrived at an area with a nurses’ station where the main hallway split into two. “Feel free to visit any of these rooms. All the doors have large windows, so you can see if the room already has a visitor. Just knock before you go in.”
They thanked her, and started making their way down one of the hallways. Shaan and their security lingered back near the station, having no need to follow them room to room.
They passed by a room with a toddler sleeping in a crib, and then another with an older child who appeared to be asleep. The next room had a boy who looked like he was probably 12 or 13, so they stopped in to say hi. He had no idea who they were, of course, but he seemed happy to have a chat.
They kept going, room by room, entering any where the patient looked like they might like a visit. Bea stayed behind to talk to a girl who’d asked who they were and had launched into a deep conversation with Bea about music. Apparently she was a bass player too, so she was thrilled to speak to another female bass player, even if it was one whose work she was not yet familiar with.
Henry, meanwhile, paused outside the next room. Inside was a gorgeous man who looked to be about his age. He had a visitor’s badge stuck to his shirt, and was touching something in his lap and speaking to a boy in the bed who appeared to be absolutely enraptured by what he was hearing.
After a moment of study, Henry realized that the man was telling a story - Harry Potter, to be exact. And through the door he could hear that he was doing different voices for all the characters, causing the boy on the bed to giggle.
“He’s a regular.”
Henry turned to see a nurse at his shoulder. He cleared his throat. “Well, he seems to be a hit.”
The nurse hummed in agreement. “Jack’s family was in a terrible car accident. His mother is upstairs with a pretty serious head injury that will most likely affect her sight. So we asked Alex to read to Jack. Show him that blind adults can still be awesome and read stories.”
“Right…” Henry looked again at the scene in the room, suddenly realizing that the object in the man’s lap was a big book and he was running his fingers over it as he talked. “In case… in case his mother is also blind.”
“Exactly. He’s a good one, Alex.”
Suddenly Henry found himself wondering all sorts of things about Alex that were absolutely none of his business. He turned and nodded to the nurse with a smile before moving down to the next room.
Bea caught up with him a couple of rooms later while he was chatting about Star Wars with a little girl wearing a Rebel Alliance beanie on her head.
“I rather like Princess Leia,” she chimed in, entering the discussion on favorite characters.
“Oh me too!,” the little girl agreed. Then she paused. “You have a funny accent like he does,” she said, pointing at Henry.
Bea laughed. “That’s because he’s my brother! My icky baby brother.”
A boy two rooms later asked if they could read him a particular story that the hospital apparently had somewhere, so Henry offered to go ask at the nurses’ station.
Just as he was walking by room 207, Alex stepped out, a big paper book in one hand, and a white cane in the other. Henry swallowed. It felt rude not to say anything, even if the man couldn’t see him, but he wasn’t entirely sure how to introduce himself.
After a split second’s hesitation, he cleared his throat. “Uh, Alex? Hi, I’m Henry. Sorry, a nurse earlier gave me your name. My sister and I saw you reading to Jack earlier.”
The man turned towards him, beautiful brown eyes landing somewhere in the vicinity of his left shoulder. “Oh, hi. Yeah, Jack’s a sweet kid. You guys having a good time visiting?”
“Yes, very much so. We like doing things like this when we can. I… uh… I take it you know who we are?” God, Henry could kick himself. He sounded like a complete idiot.
The other man either didn’t notice, or was too kind to mention it. He only smiled. “Yeah, Margaret, one of the nurses, mentioned it earlier. It’s great to meet you. I’m actually a big fan of your music.”
“Thank you, that’s very kind.” Even though it’d only been a minute since he’d left the other room, Henry kinda wished Bea would come looking for him and save him before he put his foot in his mouth. “My sister is in room 227 if you want to say hello. There’s a boy looking for a book called Dog Man? I was going to ask the nurses about it.”
“Oh, well I can help with that. Follow me.” Alex started down the hallway, his white cane sweeping side to side in front of him. As they passed the nurses’ station, Alex called “going for a book!” and then made a sharp turn into a larger room Henry hadn’t noticed when he’d come by. It appeared to be some kind of recreation room with a colorful tile floor, and tables against one wall. The far wall had a couple of bookcases standing side-by-side, filled with what seemed to be children’s books.
Alex set the big paper book he’d been carrying on top of the second shelf, where Henry could see others were stacked that looked just like it, then turned, gesturing towards the first bookshelf. “This area is supposed to have the books for the younger kids, and this area,” he gestured towards the second bookshelf, “is supposed to have books for kids that are a bit older. Though apparently someone has recently been moving things around, so I can’t guarantee the accuracy of anything that I’m saying. And Dog Man is a series… did he happen to mention which one he wanted?”
“Er… no, I don’t think so?”
“Well then I guess you can just grab whichever you like. Personally, I’d recommend either A Tale of Two Kitties, or Brawl of the Wild. Ideally, you’ll see all the Dog Man books shelved together, but those aren’t braille so I’m afraid you’ll have to find them on your own.”
Henry couldn’t help but smile at the Dog Man titles. “Sorry, I have to ask… have you read all the Dog Man books? You seem to be an expert.”
Alex laughed. “Nah. When the books aren’t in braille the kids have to read them to me, so who knows? They could be making it all up.”
Henry chuckled along with him. “Well it seems entertaining at least.”
“Oh definitely more entertaining than the things I normally read.”
“What do you normally read?”
“Until very recently? Law books. I just graduated from UT Austin with a degree in Communications, but I’ve been studying to potentially go to law school. The university has kind of a pre-law track — it’s not a degree, but they guide you on how to prepare if you want to do law school after you graduate.”
“Wow, congratulations on graduating. That sounds… stressful.”
“Oh it most definitely was. I still haven’t really decided yet if I really want to do law school. I may take the year off to decide. I want to help people… and law always seemed like a good way to do that… but the prospect of another three years of intense study… I’m just not sure about that at the moment.”
Henry nodded. “Understandable.”
So Alex was gorgeous, smart, and easy to talk to. Henry tried to think of some way to extend the conversation, not quite ready for it to end.
“So did you find it?”
Henry was startled out of his thoughts. “Find what?”
“A Dog Man book? Oh my god did you already forget?” Alex laughed.
He had a nice laugh. “Ah, I’m afraid so!” Henry leaned forward and, spotting the series of Dog Man books, took the first one he could get his hand on. “Here’s one. For Whom the Ball Rolls,” he read, “this looks exciting. The picture on the front looks like a parody of the Indiana Jones movie Temple of Doom.”
“Classic. Well, I hope you enjoy it.”
They walked together back towards the nurses’ station. “Very good to meet you, Alex,” Henry said.
“You too, Henry. Have fun in Austin.”
Back at the hotel, Henry told Bea about meeting Alex. Which may have been a mistake judging by how incredibly unimpressed she was with the way he’d handled it.
“Henry, you absolute twit! How did you not ask for his number?!”
“I — very easily? I just didn’t?”
He sighed. “It was just a normal conversation, Bea. I’m still allowed to have those, aren’t I?”
She rolled her eyes. “Of course you are, but he was teasing you, you were laughing and enjoyed talking to him. You said he was gorgeous…” she waved her hands in a “So then?” gesture.
“So what?” he asked, at the risk of Bea throttling him. “A lot of people are gorgeous, and funny, and smart, and kind.”
“Henry! He was probably flirting with you. Or, even if he wasn’t — even if for him it was nothing but a normal, friendly interaction — why not keep talking to him? Good friends are hard to find, you know that.”
“He’s hardly a good friend, Bea. It was a three minute conversation.” He didn’t know why he was being so obstinate about it. While it was true that their conversation had been relatively brief, he had enjoyed it immensely.
Still, even before they’d become famous he hadn’t been in the habit of giving his number to people he’d just met. Henry liked to get to know someone first — really get to know them. It was easy to present yourself a certain way when you barely saw someone.
“It’s your phone number, Hen, not your bank account numbers. What’s the worst that could happen? He posts your number online? You can change it if that happens. But I’m betting it won’t.”
“Fine! Fine. I’ll ask Shaan if there’s a way to reach out and get his number. Happy?”
Bea grinned. "Yes."