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A crack splits the night and Carlos falls.
Face first, landing hard in the mud. It doesn’t happen in slow motion, but in a blink. One moment there, upright and looking right at him, the next, down.
And gone. He knows it, deep in his gut.
He doesn’t need to scramble over to the body, examine the neck, like Tommy and Nancy do now. A jolt of pain as his knees hit the ground. At least they said I love you when they left this morning. Nancy crumples, hugging her chest. Tommy turns him over, closes his eyes. Gray fog gathers at the edges of his vision.
Gone. Carlos. Gone.
An inhuman sound grows in his ears, and he realizes it’s coming from him, from some unknown depth inside him where something fundamental has broken. His lungs spasm with it, he can’t draw breath. The gray fog rolls in, and when Tommy looks up at him, tears streaming down her face, everything shatters around him, and he flies, hurtling through the air as the wind howls and the fog swirls around him —
TK sits up with a jolt, his heart hammering in his ears.
The sun is rising, warm yellow light pouring through the windows. Carlos is on his back beside him, eyes closed, one arm trailing onto his side of the bed. His chest rises and falls with deep breaths. And TK crumples, drawing his knees to his chest, his whole body shuddering as he sobs.
Carlos is awake in the next instant. “TK. TK, hey. Breathe. Breathe.” One hand strokes firmly up and down his back and TK cries harder, terror and pain and sheer relief flooding out of him. He turns and collides with Carlos’s chest, and Carlos pulls him in tight without a word, and his face is slick with tears that soak into Carlos’s shirt. Carlos holds him, one hand still rubbing slow circles into his back, the other stroking through his hair, as TK gasps for breath.
He’d been dreaming, then. That must be it. Because Carlos’s arms around him are warm and solid, the hand soothing across his back is real. His heart beats away beneath TK’s cheek, steady and sure. TK comes back to himself slowly, breathing easier with every second, until he calms down enough that he’s only trembling, and Carlos wraps him up impossibly tighter and presses a kiss to his hair.
“Better?”
TK nods against his chest, not trusting himself to speak just yet. Carlos sighs in relief, and TK feels him relax. They sink into each other, and TK’s heart begins to slow.
“Mi amor,” Carlos murmurs against TK’s forehead. “What happened?”
“Bad dream.” TK’s voice is a hoarse whisper. I watched you die, he wants to say, but holds back. It was just a dream, after all. There’s no need to worry him. “You’re here now,” he says instead, clutching at the back of Carlos’s shirt.
“I’m here,” Carlos says, tipping TK’s chin up to look him in the eyes. “I always will be.”
You won’t, TK thinks, but he doesn’t say that either.
***
The neighborhood is eerily familiar. Something about the way the lamplight falls across the pavement in great orange gashes, the way the houses seem to sit in waiting. TK feels like he’s been here before.
He adds it to the list of weird deja vu moments he’s been having all day. It’s been an uneventful shift. This is the first call they’ve had in almost 12 hours. But he swears Paul broke that same mug yesterday, and that he and Nancy restocked the rig yesterday too. “I wish,” Nancy had groaned when he mentioned it, before thrusting a dozen boxes of gloves into his arms.
TK turns to face the house again and the way it flashes red and blue in the glow of the police lights stops him in his tracks. “Something’s wrong,” he mutters.
“What’s that?”
He whips back around to face Tommy, securing their patient in the ambulance. “Nothing,” he says hurriedly, hopping up to help her.
“Let’s get going,” Tommy says, half to herself as she monitors the patient’s vitals. “She’s stable for now, but we’re in shaky territory here.”
TK hops back down wordlessly, circling to the driver’s seat —
Shouts ring out from across the street and TK freezes. He remembers.
He can only stumble forward, the horrible realization like a punch to the stomach, as Carlos and two other officers run across the wet lawn to intercept the man running toward them, face contorted in fury, brandishing a gun. “Carlos!” TK yells. “Carlos!” Carlos looks over his shoulder as he sprints past. “Stay put!” he cries. “Don’t —
A crack splits the night and Carlos falls.
Face first, landing hard in the mud. It doesn’t happen in slow motion, but in a blink. One moment there, upright and looking right at him, the next, down.
And gone. He knows it, deep in his gut.
He doesn’t need to scramble over to the body, examine the neck, like Tommy and Nancy do now. A scream tears its way out of his chest as he sinks to the ground.
Again, he realizes, in some distant part of his mind. Again. The gray fog gathers at the edges of his vision and Tommy looks up at him, tears shining on her face, and TK is yanked backward as the world dissolves around him —
TK sits up with a jolt, chest heaving. “Carlos,” he chokes out. “Carlos!”
“What?” Carlos jerks awake beside him. “What is it? What’s wrong?”
“I —” TK turns to him and the words die on his lips. Worry pools in Carlos’s eyes, pulls at the corners of his mouth. What can he even say? You died. You died in front of me. And then you died again.. As soon as he thinks it, his fear shrinks to almost nothing. It was a dream. One of those dreams where you think you’ve woken up, but you’re really still dreaming. And now he’s actually awake, and Carlos is actually alive in front of him, and TK reaches out to smooth over the crease in his brow to confirm it.
“Sorry,” he says softly, willing his heartbeat to slow. “I just… had a bad dream.”
“Oh,” Carlos says. “Can I kiss it better?”
“Always,” TK smiles against his lips.
***
But TK catches the mug right when Paul drops it. He rattles off the inventory they need without looking, and Nancy looks unnerved. All day long, it's a feeling he can't shake, in the marrow of his bones. Something is very, very wrong.
When the call comes in, twelve hours later, his heart drops like a stone. He remembers.
The cops are there already when they pull up. Like before, TK realizes with a jolt. Carlos meets them out front, waves them through the door, and this time TK stops and grips his arm instead of brushing past with only a nod.
“What is it?” Carlos frowns.
And again, what can TK say? I think you’re about to get shot? Please don’t make me watch you die again?
“Just… be careful,” he pleads. “The … the guy who did this could come back.” He thinks that's what happened, anyway. His memory is foggy, but that's his best guess.
“Neighbors confirmed he leaves every night and doesn’t come back for hours.” Carlos’s frown deepens. “We’re all clear. Is everything —”
“Strand!” comes Tommy’s frantic yell from within the house.
TK throws one last pleading look at Carlos. “Please, just be careful,” he says. “I love you.”
“Love you too,” Carlos says automatically, looking more confused than ever. “Are you okay?”
“TK!” Tommy cries, and TK sprints away, hoping it’s not too late.
It’s the same patient, he realizes, blood running cold. With the same wounds, lying on the same floor in the same house. He hands Tommy what she needs before she even asks, moving on autopilot, and Nancy looks at him, unnerved again. They manage to stabilize her, secure her in the ambulance, and TK hops down just in time to hear a shout go up, watch Carlos and two other officers run toward it.
He runs toward them, heart pounding, and Carlos turns and his eyes go wide with terror and one hand flies out to push him back. “TK! Get back! Get —
A crack splits the night and Carlos falls.
Face first, landing hard in the mud. It doesn’t happen in slow motion, but in a blink. One moment there, upright and looking right at him, the next, down.
And gone. He knows it, deep in his gut.
He falls to the ground beside him, clutches at him, pulls him close to his chest as the fog rolls in. His head sags forward and he props it up, blood running out over his fingers, and Carlos’s eyes hold nothing in them and his face slips from TK’s grasp as he’s yanked backward, wind roaring in his ears —
TK sits up with a jolt, his breathing ragged, tears streaming down his face. Again. He feels Carlos stir beside him, and lies back down to bury his face in his chest before he can sit up. “I’m sorry,” he croaks, clinging to his shirt. “I’m so sorry.”
“For what?” Carlos murmurs, rubbing his back. “You can always wake me up, for anything, you know that.”
"No, I —
The words stick in his throat. I just watched you die, again. I failed to save you. He looks at his hand, slick with blood only seconds ago.
"I... I keep having these bad dreams," he says softly, letting his eyes fall closed. Flashes of the night play behind his eyelids, the gunshot, the blood, the way Carlos drops to the ground in a heap. He opens them again, shivering.
"About what?" Carlos is so gentle with him, always. TK clings to him tighter, now that he knows what'll happen if he lets go.
"You." He takes a deep breath. Whatever this is, whatever hell he's in... holding in his emotions will do him no good. "Dying."
"TK..."
"Just like that." TK burrows closer, wraps himself like a vine around Carlos, hides his face in the crook of his neck. "I can't save you. You're gone."
Carlos is quiet. TK feels his chest hitch beneath his own and looks up in time to see a tear trace its way down Carlos's cheek.
"Baby, no." TK wipes it away with his thumb. Another tear escapes, trailing after the first, and Carlos whimpers. His arms close tighter around TK. "Don't," TK whispers. "Don't, it's okay."
"No, it's — it's not —" Carlos takes a deep, shuddering breath. "I... I do too."
TK sits up. "What? You do?" So whatever this is, he's not alone. I have Carlos, he thinks, his heart racing. I have Carlos. It'll be okay.
"Of course I do," Carlos whispers, staring at the ceiling. "How could I not? How could I not dream of you — disappearing into a grain silo, blowing up in a minefield? Shot through the heart? Flatlining in a hospital bed?"
"Oh," TK says, because of course. Of course that's what he means. "I... sorry."
"Don't apologize." Carlos breathes out, steadying himself. "It's not your fault."
"I..." What else can he say? What could he say to that? So whatever's happening to him, he's alone. There's nothing for him to do but to bury his face in the crook of Carlos's neck again, breathe him in, say a silent prayer to whatever force in the universe is listening that that was the last of it, that things will be different today.
"Hey," Carlos murmurs after a while. The sun has risen higher, golden light slanting across the wall. "C'mere."
"I'm here," TK chuckles. They're as close as they can be, wrapped around each other beneath the blankets.
"No, I mean..." Carlos moves, and TK whines a little at the loss as he gently extracts himself from TK's arms and stands up, running a hand through his hair where it falls over his eyes. Carlos holds out a hand and TK takes it.
"Come here," Carlos repeats, pulling TK to his feet. TK goes willingly and Carlos pulls him close again, their foreheads resting together. TK's arms slide home around Carlos's waist. They sway together in their own little patch of sunlight, to a music only they can hear.
"I'm here," Carlos whispers. His breath is warm against TK's lips. "You're here. There's only us. In this moment, right now."
"I'm here," he whispers again, and TK grounds himself in it, in the sound of his voice, rough with sleep, in the warmth of his arms, in the beating of his heart. "I'm right here."
Maybe if he holds tight enough to it, TK thinks, it won't slip from his grasp this time. He's right here he repeats, again and again in his mind. He's right here. He'll be okay. He's right here.
***
It doesn't work.
A crack splits the night, and Carlos falls.