dreamlikenewyork | "Stuck in reverse."

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"Stuck in reverse."

Who: Jesse Hartley and Jace Turner
What: You and me against the world
Where: Still in Chicago
When: Saturday morning

Jesse had gone to the bathroom when there had finally been a moment that it was free. He was in the shower when Jace must have woken up with a tiny bit more clarity than he had been since the seizure and the aftershock ones the morning after it. When Jesse got back to Jace's childhood bedroom it was to Evan standing beside Jace's bed, where Jace was lying on his stomach with his face buried between two of the pillows flipping Evan off in lieu of words. Jace didn't even have to be looking at his big brother to bitch him out, but the message was clear enough. Jesse didn't say anything, he just raised his eyebrows slightly at Evan, who took the hint and left the room again. Things were still on the tense side and it would stay like that until Jace's condition improved a bit more.

When Jesse sat down on the bed next to Jace, there was a muffled moan of, "I said fuck off and leave me alone."

"Does that still stand with me?" Jesse asked him softly, keeping his voice low because he knew Jace's senses were on overdrive. He rubbed Jace's back, not feeling in the best of moods himself because he had hardly slept the last two nights worrying about Jace, things running through his head, which lead to a lot of staring at the dark ceiling for hours on end in case Jace woke up sick again. He wanted to go back to New York and forget the whole damn thing happened, but they couldn't go until Jace was up to flying or have him in a car for twelve hours, which wasn't a good option either.

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Jace's face still stayed buried in the pillows. "No... Fuck my life." It was a weak lamentation, the impact lessened even more when it came as a pitiful moan stifled by the pillows. He was pretty sure this had to be what a hangover felt like, only probably a hundred times worse. Not that he would know first-hand because he was on too much medication to be able to drink. There was a distinct chance if he did drink, it could be severely dangerous for him so he knew better than to even try. One of the many things he had to forgo being like he was. It was times like this that he did wish he could be normal and go out to get blinded like other people.

"I can't move, I feel too sick," he elaborated a bit. "I hate this bed, it's too soft." May as well go the whole hog while he was having a moan. There was a glorious notion about the time period between a seizure hitting and this where he started to regain his consciousness to how he was feeling. Because he was blissfully unaware of how sick and in pain he was until then.

"You don't have to move, lovely," Jesse told him and kept rubbing his back. "Do you want me to lie down with you? How much do you remember? You've been sick since the seizure. Then you had three other smaller ones, which made you more sick. When you weren't sick, you were out to it." They tended to give each other a bit of a run down if their brain short-circuited and they were out for awhile. Sometimes they didn't care or didn't want to hear it, other times they wanted to know what they missed out on.

He was wrecked. This had been a strange and emotional few days for Jesse that he felt like he had lost track of what way was up. Maybe things had been going too easy for them and that just wasn't allowed? This was what lack of sleep did to you. It made you start thinking things like this, and Jesse had always been guilty of overthinking.

This was a good reason for Jace to pull his head out of the pillows. He twisted over so he was on his side to make room for Jesse to lie with him. That was something he would never turn down, and in fact, it was something he more than needed when he was feeling like this. "Setting up for dinner, I guess. Offering to set the table and getting angry at Mom. I do have vague memory of being sick, but nothing clear. Kill me now if it happened in front of everyone. I'm just sick of being reminded over and over of all this bullshit. I'm sick of feeling worse than bullshit. I'm whining and I don't even care."

He found Jesse's hand to give him a little tug of an invitation to lie with him, but closed his eyes again. He was curled up on his side in towards Jesse. "You're upset. I can hear it in your voice. I'm sorry if I screwed Thanksgiving up, and the whole family thing. It was your first with us, it should have been nice. I've just... I've been in a bad mood, haven't I?"

"You're more than deserving of some whining, darlin'. You know I don't see it like that. It's also most certainly not your fault if Thanksgiving didn't go according to plan. That's what our life is... knowing that sometimes, things aren't going to go according to plan. We have plenty of time for other family things, it's not important, okay? What's important is getting you rested and keeping you tucked up in bed until you can get back on your feet. Everything with your condition has been at the forefront for you lately, baby. You're trying to sort through but it's taking time and it's frustrating you. I understand," Jesse murmured, kicking his slippers off and moving to drape his bathrobe over the back of the recliner by the window. It was one of those mechanical ones to help someone get out of because Jace spent a lot of time there drawing when he had been sick, he had told Jesse when they arrived.

Jace knew him better than he knew himself. He hadn't meant to be so obtuse with how he was feeling. He was just sad and flat, and it was coming through in his voice. Jace had always been a cluey, observant person. He picked up on things like this. He went to the dresser to take his meds, swallowing them all down with a mouthful of water. "I'm always upset when you have seizures..."

Jace was uncomfortable in the new spot on the bed he had landed it turning over. His face was squished in against the pillow and his top twisted up under his torso and pulling too tightly around his stomach. He listened to Jesse tiredly. "We've been sorting through shit together. It's not just me. This is not a seizure upset. You're usually calmer. Something's not right, I can hear it. Don't pretend it's not. What's the matter? Please tell me. I know I'm sick, but I can listen."

Movement had been a bad idea. There was the woozy headpain when he had turned over, but he hadn't been comfortable, and while Jesse was disrobing and taking his medication, Jace made the mistake of trying to find a more comfortable position. "Jess, babe... help, I'm gonna be sick," he warned, making a panicked grab for the edge of the bed hoping there was a bucket there or something because if he tried to stand, he was going to collapse.

Jesse was over there in a shot, grabbing up the overworked steel trashcan from Jace's dad's office and holding it for Jace to be sick into. Apparently the bucket from the laundry downstairs had gone AWOL and no one could track it down quick enough when Jace had been at his worst. Jesse hadn't been here at the time, out with Christian to try face seeing where Jace had been hit by the car, but he was filled in by Nana Turner when they got back. Jace had been throwing up over and over again right in the wake of the seizure when he had still be out of it. They had to resort to Evan giving him a shot in the butt to ease it or he would have ended up in hospital on an IV for dehydration. It happened, and it was why one of Jace's many prescribed meds were injections for nausea and vomiting. He couldn't swallow anything post-seizure for risk of choking. People didn't realise just how hands-on nursing Jace could be when he was at his worst.

Jace didn't have a lot left to throw up. He waited to make sure Jace was done and wiped his mouth with some Kleenex, and offered him some water to sip. "Just lie there until it passes, darlin'," he said softly, pushing Jaces hair back off his face. "It's just your brain trying to adjust back to normal. We can talk later, just close your eyes and try to rest."

"Uh-uh..." Jace agreed meekly because nodding was out of the question. He closed his eyes like Jesse coaxed and laid there with his cheek resting against the mattress after he sipped some of the water to rinse his mouth. Whenever he was sick or feeling awful, Jesse would be near with gentle strokes to his hair or rubs to his back. He would tuck the covers in around him to keep him warm, or made sure his pyjamas weren't twisted up and he was comfortable. It was nice to have someone who could stick by you through the good and the bad, and even the gross like now that he hated but couldn't help. "Lie with me, please?"

Jesse quickly took care of cleaning out the trash can in the attached en suite that was decked out with all the disability aids Jace needed after his accident. He was lucky that they got a massive insurance pay-out for him and at the time, he had the best of everything because his family wanted to nurse him at home once he wasn't reliant on any life support equipment. It took a little bit for Jesse to get on the bed without jolting it and navigating them both in a spot where Jace could reach the trash can if he needed it but still keeping Jesse close to him like he needed. "I don't want to talk later, I want to talk now. What's the matter?"

Jace was lying on his back, and Jesse had settled in beside him with his head propped up on his hand. Whenever Jace was well, he was always immaculately groomed. Hair styled, highly fashionable clothes, leather jackets or pants, trendy suspenders (which made Jesse ridiculously horny), jewellery. Jace loved jewellery unusual jewellery. He had both ears pierced like chains and bracelets, leather chokers, rings... anything goes, really. But after a fit, it was always safer to just divest him of anything unnecessary that he was wearing, starting with the jewellery, especially the chains around his neck that could choke him and the earrings that dug into his head when it was most sensitive. It hadn't escaped Jesse's notice that all that had been removed as usual, but whoever had done it had left Jace's engagement ring on him. Jace never took it off, not even to shower. It was a poignant thing.

He rubbed Jace's stomach softly, trying to soothe the upset a little. "Your family got a little overenthusiastic when you had a fit. Maybe a case of the age-old proverb too many cooks spoil the broth. I don't know, but I was trying to help you. I got you onto the ground so you didn't fall and hit your head, and I was trying to keep you in the recovery position, then the next thing I know I had the whole Turner family population around me giving their two cents and I got shoved out of the way. It was a bit of the kick in the nuts and just after things being emotional lately, I got upset and just left them to it. Your family is full-on in a large group, and I'm just... not a very full-on person."

"Wait... what?" Jace asked weakly, because he wasn't sure his brain was following along correctly. It didn't usually follow much of anything correctly when he was in this stage of recovery from a seizure, so it was understandably why Jesse would be hesitant to talk about something important, but he had to have heard wrong. He even blinked a few times, forehead scrunched up because it felt like it didn't make sense. But at the same time, he hadn't been to a close family gathering where he had fitted in a long time. The last was his eighteenth birthday and he had it in the bathroom so it was more a case of being found after the fact.

He put his hand over Jesse's n his stomach. "You can tell them to back off, you know. My extended family only know the very basics. This is... no. "No. No, that's... no. No. This isn't going to happen. We're getting married, no one's shoving you out of anything. I'm going to tell them. You can get them to come up here, I'll tell them. We came here because you're part of our family now, not to be made feel like you don't belong. I need ginger ale, I can go tell them."

"Oh, no, no, no. You're not going anywhere, and no one's coming in here. You're staying put and resting until you can move without vomiting." The ginger ale argument wasn't even going to gain steam. Jesse already had a can of it waiting on his side of the bed by the lamp, room temperature, opened so it lost some of it's fizz, and with a straw. He took it and caught the straw between his fingers to hold steady at Jace's mouth so he could have some. "Baby, listen to me, okay? Yes, it hurt, and yes I got upset. I got angry. I had all those emotional reactions, but this isn't anything you need to fix, and especially not right now."

He sighed, kissing Jace's temple. "Rest. Don't make me strap you to the bed. I will, you know. I'm not above bondage to get you to stay put. You need to rest your head or you'll keep being sick, and we'll need to get you to hospital on an IV. I want to talk to you about something else. Something that is heavier in my heart than any of this. After this happened, Christian came out and talked to me. I needed some fresh air to calm down and chill out. So he, um... he came with me... to the place you got hit."

It made Jace feel angry and upset that Jesse had been angry and upset. But Jesse was right, Jace just wasn't in any condition to go into full Bitch Mode right now. Motion, light, sounds, smells, they all made him feel worse for wear and bitching out would be counter-productive. "You helped me when I had a fit the first night we spent together. The morning after, I got sick. I woke up feeling sick and you knew something was wrong. You didn't hesitate at all, and whatever happened, when I woke up, I was warm, clean, secure in bed, and you were right there beside me. They can think what they like, you're one of the best people to take care of me when I'm sick. They had no right to shove you out of the way like that. I want you in the way. This is why coming here has been so friggen frustrating. I'm trying to show them I'm ready to do this, to get married, to start the next part of my life, but they still think I'm a 13 year old invalid. I couldn't even wipe my own butt back then, and now, I can manage fine with that, believe it or not."

He sighed, because he was getting worked up and Jesse was trying to stop that at every turn to keep him calm. He was pretty sure he hadn't finished his rant, but then Jesse went and said this and Jace was rendered speechless. Tears were welling up in his eyes for reasons his brain was too slow right not to isolate. "Hug me?"

"Aw, darling," Jesse murmured and shifted closer to wrap his arms around Jace. "I wish there was some other way to get through all this without upsetting you and hurting you more. You're just so precious to me, and all I want to do is take care of you. I couldn't let you go there just for me to see where it was. You're not strong enough right now, you're dealing with so much and trying so hard to keep as much of a normal life as you can. We're doing this together, and I needed to go there for you, but I didn't want you to take me. If that was just one little thing I could do to make this easier on you, I needed to do it."

Jace's tears were breaking his heart. It was funny, through all the pain and frustration Jace experienced with his brain injury, you knew things were tough when he cried. He could get angry, bitchy, snappy, even upset, but he didn't cry often. The only time Jesse knew Jace to cry had been when Jesse got really sick and Jace witnessed his fits for the first time. And now this again, because he was hurting a whole lot and he wasn't feeling well. Jesse had to wonder if, when Jace was ill like this, his family got so panicked and worried about his physical well-being, they didn't expect him to really break emotionally. Because he was a damn tough cookie and he was usually so strong. This wasn't strong. This was Jace feeling just plain sad and lost. "I love you. I love you so much, baby."

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"Stuck in reverse."

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