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The flight from Boston to LAX was long and uneventful. Cody slept during part of it, until a trio of infants began to wail, each feeding into the other's misery. He frowned and rubbed his eyes, pulling his seat forward and picking up the newspaper.
At the terminal, he tried calling the Riptide, but got a strange clicking noise in reply. Fine. I'll just take a cab.
King Harbor bustled with its usual dinnertime crush. The cab picked its way through crowds of late-summer tourists, and Cody felt relieved when the familiar sign for Pier 56 came into view. He paid the cabbie and grabbed his luggage out of the trunk. The 'Vette sat without its cover, looking a little dusty, and the Jimmy was even worse, spatters of mud on both sides. He frowned, but tried not to get upset over it. Just needs a wash, that's all. He turned to the ocean.
The fresh salt air filled his lungs and he felt some of the irritation of the past two weeks begin to recede. Can't wait to take a fishing trip. He almost laughed. I need a vacation from my vacation.
The wheelhouse doors were ajar, and he started down the steps into the salon, almost running into Murray, who was coming up from below. Murray stopped and stared. Then he looked at his watch. Then he looked back up at Cody. "Have I..." He blinked hugely. "My watch must have slipped out of sync with the Atomic Clock somehow—"
"No, Murray," said Cody, grinning. "I came home a day early."
"A day early?" Murray backed down the rest of the steps. "But..."
"Just a little homesick," said Cody smoothly.
"It's...ah...great to see you." Murray yawned, covering his mouth with one long-fingered hand. "Really great." He had dark circles under his eyes and his clothes were rumpled, as if he'd slept in them. He looked over his shoulder a little nervously.
Cody followed his gaze, and his heart stopped in his chest.
The salon was a disaster.
"What happened?" breathed Cody, staring in shock.
The floor was covered with dirty clothes, papers, and mail. Computer printouts littered the bench seat and the table. Empty pixy stick wrappers were spread out over envelopes and maps of King Harbor. A sweatsock was glued to the table with spilled Mountain Dew.
"Murray," said Cody slowly and carefully, "is this someone else's boat?"
"Huh?" said Murray, adjusting his glasses and blinking. "Oh, no, Cody, this is your boat. This is the Riptide. How odd. Do you think this is someone else's boat? I wonder if you could be suffering from reduplicative paramnesia. Did you—"
"So this is my boat." Cody glared at him. "My boat. Which looks like it hosted a Mardi Gras party. What the hell happened to my boat, Murray?"
"You might consider keeping your voice down—"
"Tell me what happened to my boat!"
"Murray?" Nick's voice came from the hallway, and Nick came into view a moment later, rubbing his eyes. "What's up, man?" Murray made a worried sound.
"Maybe you can explain what happened to my boat," said Cody.
Nick looked up at him, and blinked, and then blinked again. "What the hell...is it Friday? I thought today was Thursday—"
"It is Thursday," said Cody in a very strained voice. "I came home a day early. And I see that you've redecorated."
"Redecorated?" asked Murray. "Oh, no, Cody, this is all temporary. We were planning on cleaning tomorrow. Nick even called Dooley—"
"Please tell me you did not just say that you were expecting Dooley to help you clean." Cody closed his eyes and prayed for strength.
"Well, I don't think we'd be able to get all of the garbage off the boat by ourselves," reasoned Murray. "The broken dishes alone are a full bag."
"Broken dishes?" said Cody, opening his eyes, horrified.
"And the TV—" began Murray
"Murray—" said Nick, sounding desperate.
Cody immediately turned to the shelf behind the bench seat. The TV was missing.
"Cody, look, we'll replace it." Nick was across the salon now, one hand clutching at the edge of the table. "It's just a TV."
"It's just a TV," echoed Cody, crossing his arms over his chest. Murray's eyes flashed from him to Nick and then back again. "It's just some dishes. Some clothes. It's just every single item that I own." He plucked the sodden sweatsock off the table. "This is unbelievable. I leave you guys for two weeks. Two weeks. It looks like a hurricane came through here." He shook the sock at them. "I thought I could trust you both."
Murray's face fell. "We, ah, were a little preoccupied..."
Nick leaned heavily on the table, looking pale. "Look, we didn't expect you home today. We were going to clean up—"
"What, and go buy a new TV? Some new dishes? Pretend nothing ever happened?" Cody felt his anger ratchet even higher, and he dropped the sock to the floor, disgusted.
Murray looked confused. He blinked owlishly. "The chances of successfully purchasing the exact model of TV and the precise set of dishes are quite small, actually. The dishes in question—"
Nick silenced him with a look, and then turned back to Cody. "We were going to tell you. We weren't going to hide it. Just...clean it up a little."
All of the stress of dealing with his mother for two weeks came to a head. "Nick, you're grown men! I trusted you with my boat."
Nick winced. "I know, man, I know."
"I also trusted you with my car. Is the inside as bad as the outside?"
"Actually, it's worse," said Murray. "I would rate it an 8.6 on the scale of—"
"What else?" said Cody, seething. "Did you pour beer all over the Ebb Tide? I'd hate for her to be left out of your pigsty program."
"Pigsty program!" hooted Murray. "That's great, Cody!"
"I swear, we were going to clean it all up," said Nick, leaning more heavily on the table. He rubbed his eyes with his other hand. "We didn't know you were coming home early."
"Is this what you do every time I visit my mother?" asked Cody. "Just pig up the whole boat, toss your beer cans around, strip off your dirty clothes wherever you want? And then wait until the last moment and clean everything up? I'd expect that kind of behavior from a kid in college, not a guy in his thirties."
Nick looked like he wanted to reply. His mouth opened and closed. They both stared at him.
And then his eyes rolled back in his head and he crumpled into a heap on the floor, his head only missing the salon table by inches.
Of all the reactions Cody'd been expecting, this was down at the bottom. Maybe not even on the list. He stood there, stunned.
"Nick!" said Murray. "He was supposed to be in bed—" He crouched down next to Nick and touched his arm. "Nick, can you hear me?"
Cody's heart jumped into his throat, and he knelt down, turning Nick onto his back.
"I'll call Doctor Harris," said Murray anxiously.
"Doc Harris?" Cody grabbed Murray by the arm before he could scurry away. "What's going on? Tell me now."
"I will, just let me call him first..." Murray shrugged out of his grip and grabbed the phone, punching in numbers.
"Nick, buddy, c'mon, wake up," said Cody, slapping him lightly on the cheek. He noticed how pale he was, the dark circles under his eyes, a bruise on his jawline that he hadn't noticed because of Nick's heavy five o'clock shadow. "Nick?"
Nick's eyelids fluttered for a moment, revealing the whites of his eyes. He groaned.
"C'mon, buddy." Cody slapped him a little harder.
Blinking, Nick looked at him, confused. "Cody? Why are you home?" Cody opened his mouth to answer, and then Nick closed his eyes and groaned. "I remember." He tried to sit up.
"Stay still," ordered Cody, hand on his shoulder to make sure he stayed put. Nick looked a little paler and his eyes weren't tracking properly, moving from left to right, back and forth. "Nick? Are you with me?"
"Yeah." Nick blinked again. "Boat won't stop rocking."
Fear washed through him, and he looked up at Murray, who was hanging up the phone. "Murray, I need to know what's going on."
Murray hesitated, looking at Nick. "Nick didn't want to ruin your visit—"
"Ruin it how?"
"Well, the last case, the Hathaway case...do you remember the car that you stole?"
"The one that Nick hotwired?" asked Cody. Nick shivered, and he grabbed a blanket from the mess on the bench seat and covered him with it.
"Yes, that case. Well, the car belonged to a city councilman's daughter, and there was a loophole in their insurance. Their car wasn't covered, and they demanded that we fix the damages." Murray adjusted his glasses. "Under California's legal statutes—"
"Get to the point, Murray." Cody pulled over an empty cardboard box and propped Nick's legs on it. Nick hissed in pain.
"Wait—" said Murray.
"Murray?" called out Doc Harris.
"In the salon!" shouted Murray.
The doctor came in through the wheelhouse, his garish Hawaiian shirt a welcome sight. "What happened?" he asked brusquely, leaning over Nick, fingers searching out his pulse.
"He was talking to us and passed out," said Cody.
"Passed out while he was lying down? That's unusual."
"He was standing—"
Doc Harris cursed. "Stubborn kid. All right, let's get him below."
Cody was more bewildered and frightened than ever, but if Harris wasn't calling an ambulance, then it must not be serious. Together they hefted Nick up and managed to negotiate the stairs and the narrow hallway. Cody helped Harris settle Nick on his bunk, and then efficiently stripped off his clothes. Cody gaped. Nick was bruised everywhere. A white bandage was taped over his left side, and his left knee was dark and swollen.
"Doc—"
"He'll be fine, if he just takes my advice and rests." He glared at Nick, who blinked slowly, looking confused. "I need to put a new dressing on. Give us some breathing room."
Cody obeyed, his head spinning, and went upstairs, where Murray was sitting behind the salon table, head in hands, snoring. "Murray," said Cody softly, touching his shoulder.
"...I can't. Lasers don't grown on trees, you know..." Murray frowned at him. "Wait. You didn't just ask me for a high powered oscillating laser, did you?"
"Murray, tell me what happened." His patience was nearly shredded. He felt sick to his stomach.
Murray yawned. "Well, during the Hathaway case you and Nick..."
"I know, I know, we stole someone's car so we could follow the kidnapper. You were saying something about insurance loopholes."
"Well, our insurance agent gave us two choices. Either we repair the damage, or our insurance premiums would treble. Permanently. I did a cost analysis, and we realized that we had to come up with five thousand dollars in less than two weeks."
"Why didn't you call me?" asked Cody, aghast.
Murray blinked, looking like he was falling asleep again, and Cody shook his arm. "Oh! I...well, Nick didn't want to ruin your visit. He thought that if we both did some freelance work, we could come up with the money. So I took on a software project and he found some piloting work. Only it wasn't going to be enough, and then Sharky approached us about doing some night watchman work at his junkyard, and Nick took that job, too. And then we were approached by a new client, only she wasn't telling us the whole truth, and she was involved with some very unsavory characters. Let me just tell you that I find that honesty and integrity are very important characteristics, and in their absence—"
"I get it, Murray, I get it. Now tell me about the unsavory characters."
"They were unscrupulous to the extreme!" said Murray. "She asked us to investigate a local businessman, but in the end she was really only using us to fleece him. When Nick found out what she was after, he had the businessman hide the item in question in a safety deposit box. She was convinced that Nick had it, though, and she sent some very ill-mannered men here and—"
"—and they roughed Nick up." Cody rubbed his temple.
"Oh no, it wasn't them. Nick tried to stop a burglary at the junkyard and the thieves beat him up."
"What?" asked Cody in disbelief.
"The unsavory characters were actually here on the boat, and armed, and Nick did shoot one, but ended up getting a rather bad cut. The dishes were an unfortunate innocent bystander in the situation, as they were stacked in the galley, and the gravitational pull combined with the equilateral force..." He yawned.
"Damn." Cody wound an arm around Murray's waist and picked him up bodily. "I think I've heard enough. How about you take a nap and I'll sort through everything else."
"We were just going to bed when you got here," said Murray, nodding sleepily. "I'm so tired, I don't even think I could program in BASIC right now."
"That's great, because you don't have to." Cody guided him down the steps and into his room. He pulled a set of pyjamas out of his dresser drawer. "Think you can get dressed?"
"Sure," said Murray, swaying.
"I'll take that as a no." Cody made him sit down on the bed and then helped him with his shirt. Murray couldn't seem to figure out the buttons and kept yawning. Eventually he was safely ensconced in his pyjamas, tucked in bed, and Cody pulled the blankets up and pulled the shades over the hatch and the other windows, darkening the room. "G'night."
There was no answer from Murray, except for a long snore.
Cody sprinted back to the other stateroom. Doc Harris looked up at him. Nick was on his side, covered with blankets, eyes closed. "Is he okay?" asked Cody softly.
Harris stood up and headed for the salon, Cody following. "He'll be fine, if he takes it easy. Very easy."
"What do I have to do?"
"Change the dressing a couple times a day. Ice down—"
Cody tried to remember what Murray had said. "The dressing for..."
"Don't you know?" Harris sighed. "Look, he's got a long, shallow cut on his ribs. It's not very deep, but bled pretty bad before he got to the ER, according to Bozinsky. And he sprained his knee. Mild sprain, but he still needs to stay off it as much as possible and ice it every few hours. Nothing you can do for the bruises, of course. But make sure he sleeps. He's really fatigued—like he's been on patrol, on point, for days."
Cody swallowed. "I didn't realize."
Harris gave Cody a comforting slap on the back. "He'll be fine. He'll bounce right back, you'll see. Give him a few days, though. And make sure he eats. Looks like he's lost a few pounds, too." He headed up the stairs into the wheelhouse. "Bozinsky, too. That kid can't afford to lose anything more. He'll disappear." He waved goodbye.
"Thanks, Doc," said Cody.
"You'll get my bill," called out Harris as he left through the wheelhouse doors.
Cody crept back into their stateroom, but he hardly needed to; Nick was awake, blinking. "Cody?" he said, slurring.
"Nick, you need to sleep." Cody closed the blinds and then sat down on the edge of the bunk. "You're pretty worn out."
"Just can't fall asleep." Nick sounded frustrated, his visible hand clenching into a fist.
"Did Doc Harris give you anything?"
"Tylenol. Took a couple already." He yawned.
Cody moved closer to the head of the bunk. "Good."
"So tired." Nick sounded frustrated and exhausted.
"I know." He put a tentative hand on Nick's shoulder, feeling the bunched muscles. Nick was wound tighter than a drum. Gently, he began to rub.
"Don't hafta..."
"Shh." He put both hands on the back of his neck and began to loosen the knots. "Just relax, Nick."
"Mmm." Nick's hand uncurled. "Sorry..."
"It's okay." He rubbed at the familiar knot Nick always got in his right shoulder when he flew too many hours.
"Didn't want you to come home...find the mess..." Nick's eyelids drooped and closed.
"It's okay, Nick, it doesn't matter. What's important is that you're alive. And that you need to recover."
"Even though I'm acting like a kid in college?" One eye opened and fixed on him.
"I'm sorry. I'll apologize more when you wake up next, okay? But for right now, you need to sleep." Cody let his touch get softer and softer, and Nick finally fell asleep.
Back up in the salon, Cody stood and surveyed the mess. "I don't even know where to start," he muttered to himself.
There was a box of trash bags on the bench seat, so he grabbed one and began to throw away the empty pizza boxes and paper plates. After he'd finished that, he went to work on the clothing, gathering it into a pile. It was mostly Nick's, but there were a few pieces of plaid, too. He stacked the papers as best as he could and folded up the maps.
"Hey, dude, what's goin' on?" asked Dooley.
"Shh!" said Cody automatically.
Dooley gave him a weird look.
"Nick and Murray are sleeping," whispered Cody.
"Oh. I just came over to help them with their project a little early. Guess I'll stop back tomorrow. Later, bro!" He took off, clearly delighted to not have to work.
There was the sound of water running, and Cody cursed and went down to the head. The door was closed. "Nick?"
"Yeah." The toilet flushed, and then Nick emerged, looking unsteady and haggard.
"C'mon," said Cody. He put his arm around Nick's waist, careful to avoid the bandage, and helped him get into bed again.
Nick yawned and rubbed his bloodshot eyes. "Heard someone aboard..."
"It was just Dooley." Cody pulled the covers up. "You have to get some sleep, Nick."
"Can't...just keep thinking...thought someone was coming aboard..."
Nick was jumpy, and no wonder, considering the events of the week. He'd been like that after they'd come home from 'Nam, and Cody knew just what to do. "I'm here now," he said in his most soothing tone. "Just sleep." He stroked Nick's arm, the back of his neck, keeping his touch gentle. "No one's coming aboard. You don't have to worry, I'm here, and I'll watch over you. And Murray. Just sleep. I'll take care of everything."
Nick's eyelids drooped and he yawned. "Thanks, man."
"I'm right here," promised Cody. Nick had worn himself out, watching out for Murray, trying to fix everything himself, and Cody felt a surge of affection for him. "Love you, man. Just sleep."
Nick murmured, "Love you, too," and then his breathing evened out and the tension slowly bled away.
Cody stroked his cheek one more time. What was a mess, compared to the great friendship he shared with both of them? He smiled, and made his way back up to the salon.