Work Text:
Bright light. A blunt pain. Already he wished to fall back to sleep, preferably resting his weary head upon two pillowy, brotherly mounts. He gingerly reached up to touch the throbbing heat at the back of his head.
“Oh, I wouldn’t do that,” said a voice attached to a face attached to a boy—Allan, Aaron, Arby?—sitting by his bedside. “It was pretty gnarly. The nurse had to shave a lot of your hair off. Father is devastated. He fears that your already thinning hair won’t survive the regrowth.”
“What the fuck is wrong with my husband?” Maekar growled at Baelor’s terrified nurse.
“Gosh golly,” Dyanna mumbled from beside him, “how much time do you have?”
Maekar ignored her.
They stood shivering in the cold corridor, still wearing only their workout gears, having rushed to the hospital straight from their Sunday pilates class. Aerion had called two hours earlier. Informed him that Baelor was in an accident—a rogue speeding car, Aerion heroically and photogenically pushing Baelor out of the way, but January ice sent Baelor sliding head first into a pavement.
“You said that it’s not serious!”
“It is not, Mr. Targaryen. I can assure you. The injury your husband sustained is fairly surface level. We do expect a full recovery.”
“Bummer,” Dyanna muttered.
Maekar gave her a stink eye. “Di, please. Not now.” Turning back to the nurse, he demanded, “Then why in the loving fuck is he crying?”
“You seem confused. That’s alright. I am only here to help.” Aerion flashed a jubilant smile. “Let’s go through some basic questions to jolt your memory, shall we?”
There began a low, rhythmic brass coming from the pit of Baelor’s gut that sounded suspiciously like JAWS theme song. It intensified the longer he looked Aerion in the eyes. Some kind of animal instinct that the mind forgot but the body remembered.
“Question one: are we related?”
“Yes, we’re family.”
“Elaborate please. Family how?”
In his heart, a tumbleweed rolled over where love was meant to be; Baelor concluded that he and Aerion must only be distantly related. Focusing instead on the minutiae of Aerion's features, Baelor saw another face—a beautiful, angelic, eye-rolling face, with plush lips shaping around the sound of a dolphin-noised slur.
“You are Maekar’s boy.” His little brother's name was an anchor in the whirlpool of low brass thumping.
“Uh huh, and… ?”
Baelor squeezed his eyes shut in concentration. Try as he might, the name of Aerion's sire wiggled out of his grasp like a wild fish, slapping his face and jumping back into the forgetful ocean.
“Confusion is common among head trauma patients. It is a distressing time for your husband. Perhaps your company would soothe him.”
“But that’s the problem. He only cries when he sees me!”
“Let's move onto question two: does the date August Twentyfifth mean anything to you?”
Brain cells colliding in space, sparking flickers: a three tiered cake, a dance, an older silver-haired gentleman giving a smashingly drunken toast about how Sunday school teaching of “loving your brother” wasn’t meant to be taken carnally.
“It’s a wedding date,” Baelor approximated.
“Whose wedding?”
Water rushed back. Sparks extinguished. No answer nor lottery numbers revealed themselves in the trail of smoke. Baelor sadly shook his head.
“It was Maekar’s wedding,” Aerion answered, then paused meaningfully, expecting a reaction.
Maekar, yes—Maekar was a vision in a double-breasted suit. Baelor remembered wetness pooling in his eyes and his mouth at the sight. The older gentleman, their father, had walked Maekar down the aisle, and slipped into Maekar’s hand a prepaid SIM card while whispering loudly, “Shelter's number is on the back.”
Whom Maekar might need shelter from, Baelor drew a blank.
On cue: a moose-dying wail. The noise came from the inside of Baelor’s private inpatient room.
“It is rather impressive, honestly. Like a Bellagio fountain.” Dyanna mused, hands mimicking water shooting out of her eyes.
The nurse nodded in agreement. “With your consent, Mr. Targaryen, I’d like to call in student doctors to observe the case.”
“No! He’s going to die from dehydration if it continues!”
“Oh, he’ll be fine, Mae. Let’s not forget: Baelor blackmailed your parents by fasting for ten days before they finally agreed to your marriage.”
Maekar sighed at this well trodden argument, “Blessing. He asked for their blessing.”
“Same difference. Point being, he’s made of tougher stuff. Whatever nightmare his demented mind has cooked up, he’ll get over it.”
“Last question.” Aerion leaned fully forward. Palms tented in front of his face. Shadow dripped over his eyes. “Who is Dyanna Dayne?”
The name fizzed and burned. Corrosive. Cut deep into the core of him like lovers etching their initials into a tree trunk—which Maekar had done as a young teen. The heart-shaped M+D signage taunted Baelor so much that he recalled scraping it off with his teeth.
“A friend. Of Maekar.” The words tasted like tree barks in his mouth.
“Oh, you’re so close,” Aerion grinned, veneer-white. The brass grew deafeningly loud, quaking Baelor’s very bones. “She’s a very good friend. His best friend, in fact, as all spouses should be to one another.”
Brass like drums, drums in the deep.
“S… Spou…”
“Why yes. Spouse. Your goodsister.”
The brass exploded into a Leviathan, bursting forth from black water. A screaming, all-devouring mouth.
“Baelor, I’m coming in,” Maekar announced himself.
Baelor uncurled from fetal position, looking up. Maekar’s chest entered the room first, followed by the rest of him—all cladded in pilates skintights.
Horny and aggrieved, fresh tears sprung free.
Dyanna took a peek over Maekar’s shoulder and decided that the show would be equally entertaining from the backrow. “I’m gonna wait outside.” She gave Maekar a quick peck on his cheek. “Go tiger.”
Maekar turned to thank her for holding his hand on the car ride to the hospital, but before he could utter a word, Baelor made a sound like he had been shot, forcing Maekar to rush to the bedside instead.
“Brother, are you in much pain?” Maekar reached out a hand. On his ring finger, a plain band of silver. Not the ancestral engagement ring worn by the likes of Visenya and Alysanne and Naerys.
Baelor gasped, clutching his chest.
“Baelor! Tell me what’s wrong!”
Maekar grabbed Baelor by the shoulders. The ring was biting cold where it touched Baelor’s skin.
Unbeknownst to him, Baelor did propose to Maekar with their family ring. But toddler Daeron had swallowed it one day—a rookie first-time parent mistake, and by the time he had pooped it out, Maekar had declared it tainted and gotten himself the new elegantly plain ring.
“Maekar,” Baelor rasped. He looked at his brother with red-rimmed eyes, tears unceasing. “Are you happy with the way things are?”
“What? What does that have to do with anything?”
“My dearest, my most beloved, heed me for once,” Baelor begged. “Are you content with your life? Your choices?”
“I mean, I guess.”
“You truly are?”
Maekar rolled his eyes. “Yes. Fine. Baelor, it’s been good.”
A bloodcurdling cry ripped from Baelor’s throat. He lurched forward, throwing himself into Maekar’s chest like a driver slamming into an emergency airbag.
“How could this have happened?! When did I lose you?! Hmmmmmff!”
“For fuck’s sake! Don’t you dare get snot on me!”
“So,” Dyanna addressed the nurse, eyes never leaving the pathetic scene in front of her, “how long does ‘confusion’ usually last?”
“Well, the worst of it should pass after 24 to 48 hours.”
Dyanna hummed at the answer. She sat down on a waiting chair, settling in, making sure to maintain a clear view of the drama inside the room. “That’s too bad.”