Matthew had been hovering in a state of semiconsciousness for a while, when some movement around him brought him to fully alert. He’d expected it to be another nurse coming in to check his vitals and adjust various things that were rather uncomfortably attached to him. One more person fucked with that drain in his chest or the goddamned catheter, and he was going to . . .
Well, not do much. Even imagining going Hulk Smash made him hurt all over. But he might at least say something colorful.
It wasn’t a nurse, though.
It was his dad.
Followed by Emir Hashmi.
Beside Matthew, Rabi sat up so suddenly, the chair squeaked on the floor. His fingers twitched in Matthew’s.
Dad and Emir exchanged uneasy glances. Then Dad took a breath and faced Matthew and Rabi. “We came to tell you we’re going to try to make peace. Between our families.”
Matthew’s heart sped up—noticeably, thanks to the monitor next to his head. “Seriously?”
Both of their fathers nodded.
“We’ve done the Hashmis wrong for decades,” Dad said. “And we did you and your brothers wrong too. We spent your whole lives teaching you boys to hate each other.” Dad gestured at Rabi and Matthew. “And the two of you went and loved each other anyway. It’s time we learned from you.”
Matthew looked at Rabi, who was as wide-eyed as he was.
“It’s going to take time,” Emir went on. “Wounds like these don’t close overnight.”
Matthew shifted a little, wincing at his own literal wound that wouldn’t be closing overnight. “But you guys are . . .” He looked at his father. “You’re serious about this?”
Dad nodded. “We’re tired. We’re all tired. Now we’re losing sons.” He shook his head. “It’s time.”
Emir nodded solemnly, but didn’t speak.
“Do you think everyone else will agree?” Rabi asked.
Dad and Emir looked at each other, neither man’s expression offering much optimism.
“It’s going to be slow, like Emir said.” Dad shrugged tightly. “All we can do is try, little by little, to change people’s minds. Which . . .” He hesitated, and his cheeks colored slightly as he added, “Might be easier now that the election is over.”
Both men seemed a touch sheepish at the mention of the election. As well they should, Matthew decided. Their mudslinging had poured gas on a decades-old fire. If Matthew and Rabi hadn’t ignited a violent blowup, something else would have.
“Anyhow,” Dad said. “We just wanted you boys to know what’s going on. We’ll leave you to get some rest.”
“Good luck with your recovery, Matthew,” Emir said.
“Thanks,” Matthew replied.
Some nervous glances were exchanged, and then Dad and Emir left the room.
Rabi stared at the door, slack-jawed.
“Well, shit.” Matthew huffed a laugh—the best he could do under the circumstances. “I didn’t see that coming.”
“I . . . kind of did, I guess.”
“What do you mean?”
Rabi turned to him. “Your dad and I had a little chat while you were asleep. He said he was going to talk to my dad.” Gaze drifting toward the door again, he quietly added, “Just didn’t think he’d actually do it.”
“I didn’t think it was possible.” Matthew stared at the empty doorway too. “Guess we were wrong.”
Matthew’s recovery was slow but steady. As he improved beyond just lying in bed like a lump, he started getting restless and bored, and even though he didn’t want to admit it out loud, he couldn’t handle Rabi being out of the room yet. He was still too edgy about being absolutely sure Rabi was okay. And it didn’t help that the painkillers he was on were giving him vivid nightmares. He wondered if the nights he woke up panicking—nearly ripping sutures apart in the process—and calling out Rabi’s name were part of the reason the nurses pretended not to notice when Rabi showed up early or stayed an hour or two past when he was supposed to.
Matthew was still weak enough that just walking from his hospital bed to the bathroom wore him out, especially after he moved from the ICU to a bigger room on another floor. That extra eight feet or so might as well have been eight miles.
The whole time he was here, people came and went, but his mother and Rabi were there almost constantly. His mom was gone one day for Derek’s funeral. Rabi was gone another for Eshaan’s. Their absences on those days were excruciating. He couldn’t be there for Rabi, he couldn’t be there with his family, and he couldn’t be there to mourn his brother. He had mixed feelings about Derek’s death—Derek had tried to kill Rabi, but in his own way, he’d been trying to protect his brother and their family. The family’s hatred for the Hashmis was older than any of them, something they’d been born into and raised with, and it was a bizarre feeling to simultaneously sympathize with his brother’s inability to escape it, and hate him for being consumed by it. He’d wanted to go to Derek’s funeral, if only so he could process everything he was feeling and try to make sense of it, but he’d just been too weak. His parents had offered to delay it for a few days, but they needed the closure more than he did, so he’d told them to go ahead with it.
Now both Eshaan and Derek were buried. Nate had had his first hearing, and he was out on bail with another court date coming up in a couple of weeks. Rabi had clearly been unimpressed with Nate making bail when he was being charged with assault and battery and attempted murder. Not that he thought Nate was a flight risk—Nate had been so depressed and overwhelmed with guilt, he hadn’t even left the house since the funeral. It just bothered Rabi because he was pretty fucking certain that he or Eshaan wouldn’t have been able to go anywhere had they been in Nate’s position. Matthew hadn’t been able to argue with that.
Finally, over the last two or three days, Matthew had started feeling more like himself. He didn’t need as many painkillers, so his head was clearer and his dreams weren’t so terrible. He could move without as much help. He was still weak and still in a lot of pain, but it felt less like he was going to keel over and die, and more like something that was—while miserable—temporary.
He’d also noticed that his mom and boyfriend were coming to some sort of unspoken understanding. They’d regarded each other uneasily for the first few days. Enough that even Matthew had noticed despite his fog of pain and drugs. But as they’d gotten used to each other and learned to work around each other, the tension eased. When one of them left for food or coffee, they’d always offer to get something for the other. They talked sometimes. Matthew had even woken up a couple of times and found them playing cards at the table. Seeing his mother and Rabi laugh at the same time had almost moved him to tears. Almost—he was still in too much pain for any of that.
When all was said and done, it was almost a week and a half before Matthew was discharged. They would have let him go sooner, but an infection set him back a few days. Now, though, he was ready to leave. Not running on all eight cylinders yet, but definitely ready to go home. By the time a nurse was rolling in a wheelchair so Matthew could be discharged, he thought Mom and Rabi might’ve even become friends.
“I’ll go get the car.” Mom pulled on her jacket. “You want me to text you when I’m out front?”
“Good idea,” Rabi said.
Matthew’s mom left, and with help from both Rabi and the nurse, Matthew sat up. He took the steps to the wheelchair on his own, but the motion of sitting down was still hellishly painful. Anything that taxed his core muscles at all hurt like a motherfucker.
About the time Matthew had gotten comfortable, Rabi got a text.
“Your mom’s outside.” Rabi pocketed his phone. “Ready to go?”
“Definitely. Get me the hell out of here.” Matthew glanced up at the nurse. “Uh, no offense.”
“It’s okay.” She smiled. “Most people don’t want to stick around, and I really don’t blame them.”
She wheeled him out of the room, and Rabi stayed beside Matthew as they headed down the hall, down the elevators, and across the lobby. Outside, the air was biting cold, and Matthew hadn’t realized until now that there was snow on the ground. It didn’t look like fresh snow—some of the drifts were starting to melt, and a lot of what remained was already gray with dirt from the road. The trees only had a few chunks still clinging to their leaf-bare branches, and very few cars had any on their roofs or hoods.
Somehow, that made the ten days he’d spent in the hospital feel even longer. Like he’d lost an entire season.
His mom’s car idled at the curb. She got out, and as she opened the back seat, Rabi leaned down for Matthew to put an arm around his shoulders. Carefully, with the nurse’s help, Rabi eased him onto his feet. Once Matthew was upright, they paused. He tested the pavement with his shoe; it didn’t seem slippery, so that was promising. He really, really didn’t like the idea of taking a fall right now.
“You okay?” Rabi asked.
Matthew nodded, wincing at the pain tearing through his chest, and rasped, “I’m good.”
Rabi’s eyebrows pulled together. “Want to give it a second? Or go ahead and get in?” He jerked his chin toward the car and its open door.
Matthew gulped. The thought of moving, especially folding himself up enough to get into a vehicle, made him want to puke. The sooner he got it over with, though, the better. “Let’s do this.”
He was right—getting into the car was miserable, and he was seriously relieved when it was over. Rabi joined him in the back seat, and Mom carefully pulled away from the curb.
While she drove and Matthew tried in vain to get comfortable, Rabi’s phone beeped. He read the screen, then said, “Hey, Nancy? My mom wants to know if she can bring some food over.”
Matthew’s mom glanced in the rearview. “She’s certainly welcome to if she’d like. Ask her if I can make something to go with it.”
Rabi chuckled. “Honestly, she’s probably going to bring over enough to feed an army.”
Matthew eyed them both. Really? Rabi’s mom was coming over to his place with food, and Matthew’s own mom was . . . What the fuck had happened while he was drugged out of his head?
He didn’t press the issue, though. He was having enough trouble staying awake, and the motion of the car was making him both sleepy and queasy. He’d never in his life been more grateful to see his own house, and when his mom stopped in front of the porch steps, he whispered, “Oh thank God.”
Rabi helped him out of the car, and he stayed right with him all the way up the steps and into the house. The stairs leading up to the bedrooms made Matthew’s stomach turn, so he gestured toward the living room. “Let’s go in there.”
Rabi helped him into the living room and onto the sofa.
“Do you need anything?” Mom asked, forehead creased with concern. “Something to eat, or—”
“No, no.” Matthew waved a hand as the thought of eating sent a wave of nausea over him. “Not right now. I just want to sit for a while.”
“I’ll stay with him,” Rabi said.
Mom nodded and picked the remote up off the coffee table. She set it on the armrest within easy reach for Matthew. “Just let me know if either of you need anything, all right?”
“We will. Thanks, Mom.”
As she left, Matthew shifted, trying to get comfortable, and winced.
“You okay?” Rabi asked.
“Mm-hmm. Just sore.”
“Can’t imagine why.” Rabi touched his knee. “You sure you don’t want anything?”
Matthew smiled. “Just you.”
Rabi laughed shyly, and winked. “You might have to give it a couple more weeks before we do any of that.”
Chuckling, Matthew rolled his eyes. “Shut up. I meant just sit with me.”
“That I can do.” Rabi carefully wrapped an arm around Matthew’s shoulders. “You doing okay?”
“Yeah. I’m doing pretty good.” Matthew sighed, leaning into Rabi. “This is so much more comfortable than a hospital bed.”
Rabi kissed his temple. “Aren’t most things?”
“Fair point.”
“So what now? You want to watch a movie or anything?”
“Nah, I’m good.” Matthew rubbed his cheek against Rabi’s shoulder. “But if you want to, go ahead. I’ll probably just fall asleep.” Man, he really was tired now. He’d been able to get through the last couple of days with a few catnaps here and there, but the ordeal of leaving the hospital had him utterly spent.
“I still can’t believe our families are straightening their shit out,” Rabi mused after a while.
Matthew nodded. “I know, right? And how the hell did we go from our dads kind of tolerating each other to our moms doing food?”
Rabi chuckled, rubbing Matthew’s arm gently. “We did a lot of talking while you were tripping balls.”
“I believe you mean ‘sleeping.’”
“Part of the time, yeah. But anyway, we talked a lot. She knows my mom deals with things by cooking loads of food, and I guess I got her curious about Pakistani food.” He shrugged. “So I guess we’ll see how this goes.”
“Yeah, I guess so.”
It seemed like such a small thing, but given the rift between their families, eating together was huge. And . . . possible? Like, something that was really going to happen? People were actually putting in the effort to be in the same room without things going to shit?
Whoa.
Matthew wasn’t naïve. He didn’t believe for a second that his father’s homophobia or Islamophobia had been magically cured, or that the families would suddenly become inseparable BFFs, but he could believe that the tentative truce was sincere. The Hashmis and Swains didn’t have to like each other to coexist, and coexisting was a lot less painful than the alternative.
As he leaned into Rabi, Matthew smiled.
Maybe there was hope for this town and these families after all.