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Cameron opened his eyes to find two bright green ones trained on him. The little boy, hair messy and too long, face round, eyes enormous, was standing scared in the doorway to his room. Cameron mustered up a smile. "Hi, there."
"Hi," the boy said, in a voice much too small for him. Cameron could only guess what was frightening the kid: the bed rails on either side of the patient, the giant plastic death trap attached to the patient's neck, the general broken appearance of this old, sad man. Cameron would've been scared, too. It scared him further to know the patient was him.
"Are you lost, little man?" he asked the kid, hating himself a little. He didn't want to be here. He didn't want to be some Frankenstein's monster, scaring the hell out of a little boy who wandered into the wrong room. "Do you know where your mom is?"
"In a room," was the answer. "She's sick."
"I'm sorry," he said. It was then that he noticed the way the boy's arms were folded across his chest, holding a squirming mass of gray in place. "What's that you got there?"
"This is Buttons," the boy said, a little bit of color returning to his cheeks. He held it up, a miniscule gray kitten with eyes as enormous as its owner's, wriggling like hell to get away.
"He's cute," said Cameron.
"You wanna pet him?"
Whoever was supposed to be looking after the kid was probably going to be coming any second, Cameron thought. But he hadn't had anyone to see him that wasn't hospital personnel since Sam had come in a few days ago, wearing a faraway look and a giant engagement ring. Cameron was beginning to feel a little lonely and depressed. "Sure," he said gently. "I'd love to."
The boy crept over cautiously, eying the neck brace. "Does it hurt?"
"Not so much anymore," Cameron lied.
"Are you sick like my mom?"
"Sort of. I was in an accident." The kid didn't press for details, not that Cameron would've given them, and merely placed Buttons in Cameron's lap. Cameron struggled to find an angle comfortable enough to see over the rim of the brace, to watch the cat bound around on the white sheets. He could feel the tiny little claws digging into his leg, and it was a relief to him. Feeling pain meant he was still alive, goddammit. He reached and dropped his hand awkwardly on Buttons's head. It was ridiculously soft, and small, and he could feel the fragility of the little skull beneath his thumb. Cameron felt huge and bumbling and clumsy in comparison. Buttons stilled as Cameron pet him, and Cameron couldn't stop from smiling.
"He likes you," the boy observed with a shy smile of his own, as they watched Buttons nuzzle his head into Cameron's bum leg.
"Yeah," he answered. "I like him, too."
"Joey?" a woman asked, poking her head in the room. She seemed to collapse as her gaze alighted on the kid at Cameron's bedside. "Oh, thank God. I've been looking everywhere. Come on, it's time to go." She glanced at the kitten with something resembling horror. "Did you bring your cat to the hospital?" she chastised, scooping Buttons up roughly in one hand. The other hand landed on Joey's back, steering him towards the door. She looked over her shoulder tiredly at Cameron. "I'm really sorry if he bothered you."
"Not at all," Cameron said, his voice scratchy. "Best visitor I've had all day. Drop by anytime."