To Heal All Wounds

Reintegration Mentor

A week after dinner at the Harrington-Buckley estate and Billy was languishing on one of his rare days off. One that his boss had actually forced on him after he looked at the schedule and noticed that Billy had worked 8 full days right in a row. Just about threatened to fire him if he didn't take some days off, but Billy had negotiated it down to one day off followed by a half day. He'd be taking a hit to his paycheck, but when he woke up around noon, Susan seemed happy to hear that he was taking a day off and even fixed him toaster waffles for lunch to "celebrate."

He was lounging out in the May sunshine, clad only in basketball shorts and a pair of sunglasses when the crunching of tires on gravel interrupted his still hard-won peace. He'd just wound down enough to relax. Just gotten his brain to shut up enough to let him close his eyes. Just sat down and the ants under the skin of his legs had just stopped matching up and down the muscles.

His immediate reaction was to jump up, brain already formulating excuses for why he was just sitting around, ready for a sharp word or a sharper blow, but he fought it. He gripped the arms of the deck chair so hard his knuckles went white and ignored the way the ants returned to their marching. There wasn't a threat. There hadn't been a threat since he came back. But it didn't matter. Even if he rationally knew that it was just someone coming home for lunch. Even if no one had seen hide nor hair of Neil since six months after Billy had vanished. It didn't matter because his belly still dropped out of his body and his heart still kicked up. Just like it did when Susan woke up at night to use the bathroom, her footfalls so much softer than Neil's but eliciting the same response.

"Gettin' some sun?"

The voice nearly sent Billy out of his skin before he registered who it belonged to. It held none of the derision he'd expected, none of the malice and barely-contained anger that he knew. It soothed the grip of his hands against the armrests and calmed his heart, allowing him to settle back against the worn straps of the backrest.

"I would be," he drawled, not bothering to sit up straight or open his eyes as footsteps approached. "If the sun ever showed up in this ass crack of a town."

As if to prove his point, a feathery little cloud drifted in front of the sun, shading out the already watery spring light. Billy scowled up at the sky in response, but all this did was force the sun farther behind the wispy cover and elicit a slight chuckle from Steve as he dragged the other chair over closer to Billy. The easy companionship of it warmed him better than the midwestern sun ever could.

"I guess anything is better than nothing. Not going to get that California glow back, but it'll be something."

"You tellin' me you noticed my 'California glow' too, Pretty Boy?"

Abashed silence and the sound of Steve digging his toe into the gravel amused Billy enough to warrant a small chuckle before he took mercy on the other man.

"S'beers in the fridge inside if you want," Billy drawled with an evenness in his voice that surprised him, gesturing vaguely with his own bottle. Steve grunted his thanks and retreated, followed by the sound of the trailer door swinging open and closed loudly, and then again signaling his return.

"Susan at work," Steve asked with a groan as he sat. Billy only nodded and adjusted his body in the seat, shifting his weight from one hip to the other as he began to ache.

They sat in companionable silence for a moment before Steve broke in with, "could get you one of those folding mirrors that ladies use to tan. I think Mrs. Wheeler has one."

"She does," Billy confirmed around a drink of his beer. "She lays with it at the pool."

"Yeah, but that was three years ago," Steve answered and Billy went still. It wasn't like he forgot it was just... it wasn't always at the forefront of his mind. It was too abstract, too large to be constantly at the front of it all. Too much to handle, and so Billy simply did not. And sometimes when he remembered that he had been gone... been dead for three years, it stopped him in his track and ran him cold.