Love in Chains Ch. 18

He stared at me, shocked and then his face broke into a smile. "You can be a scary lady; do you know that Mir?"

"You ain't seen nothing yet hun." I said in a truly terrible American accent and he laughed, then yawned broadly.

"I am tired."

"Then why don't you lie down on the bed, it's enormous. There's plenty of room for the two of you and I am sure that it would be comforting for Nye too, if he wakes up in the night, to have some human contact."

"Do you think that's allowed?"

"Do you think I care?"

He grinned again. "Yep... truly scary."

But he obediently got up onto the bed and cuddled close to Nye, who sighed and settled back against him. In five minutes they were both sound asleep.

Kane spent the night curled up next to Nye and at some point they found their way into each other's arms. I sat in the chair and watched them sleep. They looked so right together, not like Nye and Adam had. They had never looked anything other than what they were, not a loving couple but a hunter and his prey.

At some point a nurse came in and made disapproving noises - until I removed her from the room and told her in no uncertain terms why she was not going to interfere. After that no one disturbed us and I fell asleep closer to being at peace than I had for a very long time, more than six months.

When I awoke next morning Nye and Kane were still asleep. Again, a nurse tried to disturb them and this time she was older and a lot more persistent, with a lot of talk about 'hospital policy' and my brother's 'best interests'. I told her that I had known my brother for a lot longer than she had and I knew more about his 'best interests' than she ever would, which of course was a terrible conceit on my part but I was in full blown protection mode and I didn't care.

After a fairly heated argument which attracted a lot of attention the doctor was summoned and tried to take me into a side room to discuss the situation. I refused to leave the door unprotected until I had elicited a solemn promise that no one would disturb the boys while we talked.

The doctor was a different one to the person who had spoken to us the previous day. He was young and initially condescending but I was having none of it.

"Look, I have already heard all the bullshit about 'hospital policy' and 'my brother's best interests' but he is sleeping peacefully with a smile on his face and I think he deserves that unless his life is at risk which, from what I have been told so far, it isn't so..."

"I completely agree with you."

"What?"

"Natural sleep and rest are the best possible medicine for Aneurin at this time."

"What? But then why... why all this?"

"Because I don't appreciate a scene on my ward and it's not fair on the nurses... who have their duties to perform."

"I know but not at all costs. I tried to talk to her, to be reasonable, but that battleaxe was doing a 'jobsworth' on me and..."

The doctor was smiling. "I am sure that nurse Bryant won't be best pleased to be referred to as a 'battleaxe' and she was carrying out her duties entirely appropriately... but she should have called me sooner. I'll have a word."

"Thank you." I felt deflated. I had been spoiling for a fight and he had taken the wind right out of my sails.

"But now that you are here I would like to speak to you about your brother."

That got my attention. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing is wrong. Don't worry. We've had the test results back from the lab and it's pretty much what we expected.

"There are traces of some serious drugs, heavyweight psychotics which have been administered over a period of time... at least a couple of weeks." My heart flipped and my stomach dropped but the doctor smiled kindly.

"Don't worry. Physically there doesn't seem to be any long term harm done. He has a slight heart arrhythmia which I am confident will resolve itself with rest once the drugs are out of his system."

"So he is going to be alright... for sure?"

"Physically yes... Apart from the cuts and bruises on his feet there really isn't much wrong with your brother that good long rest won't cure. But those drugs were powerful stuff and from what I heard from Doctor Myers about how your brother was when he came in yesterday I am very concerned about his mental condition. Something like this could take years to get over. How was he when you spoke to him last night? Did he know who you were?"

"At first he was very confused. He found it hard to form words or make sentences and looked like he didn't really understand what we were saying to him but... he did open up after a while. He told us that his friend, Luke was dead and that he was made to watch and was told it was his fault...then he acknowledged that he knew it wasn't."

The doctor visibly relaxed. "That sounds very promising. I've worked before with kids who have been through this and after a time it literally breaks their minds, separating their personality from their consciousness. They can develop multiple personalities, or severe disassociation disorders or even schizophrenia. The fact that Aneurin is able to talk about what happened, even if it is in a disjointed and hesitant way, and especially to accept that it wasn't his fault despite being told it was... these are all very promising signs.

"I would still like him to speak to the hospital psychiatrist but my original concern that he might need to be moved to the psychiatric wings seems less pressing."

"What? That was never mentioned. No, that would be very bad for Nye. For fuck sake... he's been a prisoner for long enough."

"Calm down, Miss Davies. Haven't I said that I don't think that is going to be necessary."

"Don't think..."

"We'll cross that bridge when we come to it. I will arrange for the resident psychiatrist to speak to him this afternoon and we'll take it from there. Okay?"

"Okay... but I am NOT letting you lock Nye away in any secure unit or psychiatric hospital... not even a ward on this one."

"Let's just see how it goes."