Chapter Text
By some miracle, something the doctors themselves couldn’t even explain, Henry had survived two bullets to the head. The first 12 hours (of which I was heavily sedated after being shot) they hadn’t been sure he’d make it, but he did. I had survived my wound, too, but I was perfectly fine, the bullet having missed any vital organs. Henry, on the other hand, was unconscious for another two days.
I had overheard a conversation outside of my room between the doctors and Henry’s mother, who seemed to like me quite a lot. He was awake, and he’d be okay, but he was having trouble speaking, and his left side (which he’d already had issues with) had trouble moving. Hand twitches, leg movement, he could probably still walk , is what they’d told her.
I wanted to see him. I had to see him to make sure he was okay, to see that he was alive. They hadn’t been there, hadn’t watched him the very moments before and after he shot himself, and although I had been a bit delirious at the time, having been shot just moments before, I remember the blood. There was so much blood. I still have nightmares about that day sometimes, so does Henry.
I didn’t see him until the next morning, holding onto a nurse as I got led down the hall to his room. I was fine, really, but my abdomen was sore, and it made it hard to walk. He was awake when I got in there, and I thought he would be in worse shape, but he was sitting up in bed, reading a book. He had bandages on his head, which made sense why, but it still worried me. I was worried about him.
I didn’t say anything as I sat down in the chair beside his bed. He didn’t even look up from the book, but he murmured a small “hello”, although his voice sounded quite rough. I stayed quiet for a while, not sure what to say. What could I even say to him? He’d shot himself in front of me, in front of all of us, and he’d survived.
“Hi,” I said after a few moments. He finally looked at me, and I felt like I could throw up. Henry had always been pale, but he looked dead, as if he’d died on the table and they’d let his corpse go cold in the hospital bed. I didn’t want to think about Henry being dead.
Another silence fell between us. It wasn’t awkward, really nice actually. It reminded me of the quiet nights we would spend in his apartment over the winter. He would sit on that armchair in his living room with a book, and I would sit on the couch, usually just basking in the silence and thinking. In that moment I wished I could go back to those moments, when I was the one in the hospital bed, before I figured out what they’d really done and before Bunny was dead. Sometimes I wish I’d never come to Hampden in the first place. Maybe I should’ve stayed in Plano, taken over my father’s business, settled down, found a wife, and had some kids. The idea still sounded awful, no matter how much worse reality was.
“Richard?” Henry’s voice pulled him out of his thoughts. “Did you hear what I said?”
“No, sorry, what did you say?” I asked, looking at him again. He smiled at me, and I had to act like it didn’t put a strange feeling in my stomach.
“My mother wants you to come to St. Louis with us,” he said. “When I get discharged.” It became increasingly apparent that Henry was having a great deal of trouble speaking. I didn’t want him to strain himself.
“Oh,” I said. St. Louis? His mother wanted me to go with them. I didn’t know very much about Henry, especially not about where he was from or his family. I’d met his mother, but I was delirious the entire time. She just came to see me for a bit. She was pretty, tall like him. The same blue eyes and dark hair.
“You’re not going back to Plano, are you?” Henry asked.
“No, no,” I said quickly. I hadn’t even called my parents. I didn’t have them listed as emergency contacts. I didn’t have anywhere to go for the summer. I couldn’t stay in Hampden. “I’ll go with you. Are you alright, though? Do you need some water?” I knew my voice had come out rather worried, but I really was. Henry, although often quiet, had never struggled to speak what he needed to. He shook his head. It was rare to be able to read Henry’s face, but I saw the frustration there when he wanted to say something else. His voice had failed him. He felt a loss of control.
“What are you reading?” I asked him. He handed me the book. It was, very surprisingly, something in English, clearly very old, though. I skimmed through it then looked up at him again. “Can I read to you?” I still remembered all the times he read to me in the hospital. It was four of the longest days of my life, but he was there almost the entire time, a book in his lap, the monotone sound of his voice filling the room and lulling me to sleep most nights. Henry nodded, and I opened the book to where he had left off.
—
Henry wasn’t discharged for another three weeks. I had been discharged after only a few days, and Mrs. Winter had paid for a hotel room for me for the following weeks—although I spent more time in the hospital than anywhere else, except for the week Henry had been forced to stay in the psychiatric ward. Mrs. Winter was extremely warm and welcoming. I don’t know what I’d done to impress her so much, but apparently Henry spoke about me when he called her.
We sat in the airport lounge, and when Mrs. Winter left to get coffee, Henry lit a cigarette. I looked at him with wide eyes.
“Should you really be smoking?” I asked, the question coming out before I could stop it. Henry huffed a little in response but didn’t put it out. He was in another one of his bouts of silence. Apparently, he hadn’t spoken since before they put him in the psych unit. I didn’t say anything after that and let him finish his cigarette. He put it out just as his mother was coming back. She sat down next to him and he gently reached for her hand and squeezed it.
I’d never been on a plane before the flight from Vermont to St. Louis. I wasn’t scared. I knew there was no logical reason to be, but it was a bit nerve wracking. I sat in the window seat with Henry between me and his mother.
The plane ascended, and I looked out of the window as the city below got smaller. After a while, I looked back over at Henry, and he was fast asleep with his head against his mother’s shoulder. I held back a smile as I heard a small snore come from him.
I rarely saw Henry asleep, only a few times in the hospital. He looked oddly at peace, a rare sight. I wished, at that moment, that I could take a picture of him just to remind myself that he wasn’t always so cold.
—
I’d never been to Missouri before, so as the driver took us through the city, I stared out of the window. It was cold, even for the end of May. I looked back over at Henry, and he had a book in his lap, although he looked like he may be falling asleep again.
I looked out of the window again and a grand estate came into view. It was bigger than Francis’s aunt’s house in the country and the Corcoran’s place. The large front gates opened, and the driver pulled into the long, twisting driveway. The estate was farther out from the city than I expected; I could see miles of trees extending from the back of the house. It reminded me of the weekends in the country with the rest of the group. I remembered the first weekend I spent with them there, the early morning when Henry told me he always slept better out there. Was it because it reminded him of home? “You’re not very happy where you’re from, are you?” “The others really don’t understand that sort of thing, you know.” The conversation played over in my head. I’d never felt as seen and understood as I did at that moment. Henry always had a way of doing that.