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Bryan was never much of an easy sleeper. Even on better nights, with Michelle holding him under the sheets against the bump of her belly, temperature that perfect place between cool and warm, he’d always struggled with drifting off.
Now, though, he can hardly sleep at all.
Michelle knew what happened in Raccoon City – everyone in the goddamn world had to know, after the bombs – but she didn’t know what happened to him. The gashes on his face, the puckered, warped skin covering his back, his chest, nearly everywhere but a neat little section of his face, like he’d taken an acid bath and just managed to hold some of his head out of the water. He refused to talk about it, and after a while she stopped trying to force it out of him. Maybe it was how pale he got when the topic shifted to his “extra shift.” Maybe it was the way he abruptly quit drugs, quit drinking, too easily for someone like him. Or maybe it was all the times she’d wake up for a glass of water and find Bryan in the kitchen, staring into empty space.
And he was staring into empty space, but mostly it was to drown out the churning inside of him by focusing on some spiderweb or dust bunny on the cabinet.
And every time Michelle confronted him (tried, more like) he would always have a new favour of “I’m fine” to dish out. He’d hurt her enough; it was the least he could do to get off her back.
Since the — since Raccoon City, Bryan couldn’t stop thinking about what happened. It haunted his every living moment. He could barely step into a car without a wave of paranoia sweeping over him, knocking the breath from him. Unexpected sounds made him nearly jump out of his skin. He avoided mirrors now, avoided being touched, much to Michelle’s chagrin. When he slept (which was rarely, nowadays), his dreams were filled with teeth and writhing, screaming meat.
He sat at the kitchen table, one hand on the wood; the other in his hair. He knew he looked like shit, though thanks to Michelle’s persistence and the last dregs of his personal dignity, did not smell like shit. The bags under his eyes could pass for bad makeup. It was a warm night — warm morning, actually, probably. The last time Bryan looked at a clock before sitting down, it read somewhere around 11. Since then he just sat at the kitchen table, both wishing for and dreading sleep.
“Bryan? Babe?” Michelle, stumbling out of their bedroom, rubbing her eyes. She paused when she registered his position. “Are you… ok?”
Bryan lifted his head, a monumental effort, and smiled that smile that always made Michelle laugh. “Me? I feel like a million bucks.”
Michelle did not laugh. Her eyes narrowed as she drew closer, gently taking his face into her hands. Then her eyes widened. “Oh my god. Why — why are your teeth bloody? What happened?”
Her words faded under the ringing in Bryan’s head, under the sweet tang of iron in his mouth. His teeth were — why were his teeth bloody? Why was there blood in his mouth? Why did he —
And just like that, he was there again. Sterile white, dry chemicals being blasted into his face, fear, rage, and beneath it all a swelling hunger. Teeth upon teeth, gnashing and grinding against meat and bone. Arms and legs and pain. Stretching and contorting, growing. Swelling. Blood on his skin, blood in his many new mouths, sweet and acrid. Being afraid and being so, so primally hungry. Lines blurring between thought and action, dissolving like powder in water.
Was this real? Oh, god. Was any of this real? Or was he still in Racoon City, a monster roaming the streets with too many arms and legs and eyes, consuming anything that moved, deluding himself into thinking he survived? Was he so desperately selfish that he’d rather fantasize about Michelle than face what he’s done? Blood in his mouth. Blood on his teeth.
“—tongue, Bryan, please, please. I’m here, I’m here, it’s okay.” Michelle. Holding him close, pressing his head to her chest so he could hear her heartbeat. Her arms wrapped around him like a blanket, gentle so that he doesn’t press against her stomach too hard. “It’s okay. I’ve got you. Shh. I’ve got you.”
It’s then that Bryan realizes his chest is heaving, feels the cold lines on the still-sensitive part of his face. He’s crying. Quiet, hiccuping tears seizing up his chest and making him gasp for breath. He inhales her scent — soft and warm from sleep, with traces of the lotion she uses. Her heart is beating a little faster than usual.
After a few moments, he hesitantly brings his own arms up to embrace her. He’s shaking. She leans into him a little more, shifting so the baby won’t get crushed between them. The baby. His baby.
“Is this real?” He sobs, shaking. “Is this — is this actually real? Am I, I’m — I can’t. I don’t…”
“Shh,” Michelle whispers into his hair. “I’ve got you.”
“I just — I just — I, I can’t —”
“Bryan,” Michelle says firmly. “Slow down, babe. Deep breaths, okay? Take a deep breath for me.”
He does. It rattles his lungs, filling them with the smell of Michelle and their apartment. The word echoes in his head: selfish, selfish. For wasting the cure on himself, or for fantasising about a normal life while chasing and slaughtering in a mutated, monstrous body. Selfish either way.
He curls deeper into Michelle, dwindling into trembling whimpers and she massages his scalp. It feels so real. It feels so real. He clings to her like a lifeline.
“Not too tight,” Michelle whispers. “You’ll squeeze him right out of me.”
The ridiculousness of it makes Bryan laugh, a little hysterical giggle that almost sends him into another bout of hiccuping. "That's not how babies work."
She plants a kiss into his damp hair. “C’mon. We gotta do something about your tongue. Chewed it real bad.”
She’s right. His tongue hurts like a bitch, though he only really registers it now. Fuck, she’s worried about him. It strikes him again how fucked up that is — Michelle, many months pregnant, working full time, having to look after his deadbeat ass. This is what he's working against. This is what he's trying not to forget.
He takes a deep breath, rubbing his face on her nightshirt and shuddering away the doubt and paranoia from his body. Hold it together. He nods, looking up at her and smiling. Closed lips, this time.
“Yeah,” he says, “don’t want to ruin your shirt. It looks too good on you.”
Michelle laughs and looks away, blushing. She’s so beautiful, even at ass-o-clock in the morning dealing with her mutilated boyfriend drooling blood all over her. Bryan can't help but think of the baby, and hope that they'll take after their mother: patient, kind, beautiful, a little sharp, always reliable. Sitting here, he can even pretend that everything is alright. That his skin doesn't constantly ache from being stretched and snapped, that the closed holes on his chest and shoulder don't feel like eyelids sewn shut. Here, Bryan can pretend that he'll have a normal family without infections or mutations or blood on his hands.
If this isn’t real — if this really is some delusion his new brain is dreaming to keep him from hurling himself off a bridge or building somewhere in Racoon City — he doesn’t want to wake up.