"There's nothing more we can do. The best thing right now is to make him comfortable."

Aurelius would always remember the look on his fraternal twin brother's face when the doctor at Crowne Memorial said those words. Blank, stark shock, a brief flash of denial, Gus's tanned complexion going pale. Aury himself had no reaction. He'd known it was coming. Tried so many times to tell Gus, too.

The trouble with Augustus, though, was that he wasn't a quitter. Aury was just... tired... and was ready for it all to be over. To have his last days be calm and quiet and as peaceful as possible. He was tired of the chemo, the false alarms that a donor had been found, the machines and wires and IVs and the smell, that thin, sour hospital smell. Gus wouldn't have any of it-- Aury was just giving up too easy, he'd say, and march off to look for some option they hadn't tried yet.

Which was exactly what he was going to do if Aury couldn't convince him to park his overeager behind for just a minute.

"I'll go back to the library," Gus said when the doctor had left. "New medical journals come in all the time, we could--"

"Augustus." Aury dredged up enough strength to put a hard edge to his voice. "Take me home. I want to die in my own bed with my nose in a book, and I want you to stop throwing money into this bottomless pit. It's not getting any shallower, trust me. I'd like for you to be able to afford to buy food after I'm gone."

"Aury, don't talk like--"

"Just. Take. Me. Home."

He felt bad later for snapping. Gus had given so much since their father had passed on, and he knew for a fact that the trust fund was shrinking faster than puddles in the Sahara. Gus was supposed to go to college on that money. The condo in Founders' Falls was a distant memory. Now the brothers shared an apartment in one of the rougher sections of Kings Row, a cramped two-room affair that was clean enough for a couple of bachelors, likely because neither of them had spent much time in it. Gus had endured this drastic downsize in lifestyle without a single complaint. Aury was phrasing an apology in his head on the ride home, but Gus cut him off as he helped him into the apartment.

"I know what you're about to say, but don't."

"I was testy. It was uncalled for."

"You're sick. I think you'd have been well within your rights to chuck a bedpan at me."

"Only if I hadn't used it yet."

Gus snorted and helped Aury ease into a plush leather recliner-- the sole reminder of the posh penthouse of their pre-leukemia days. Everything else had been sold once the medical bills started rolling in. Their new furnishings could only be called spartan at best, dormitory at worst. There was a new couch, though-- and Aury suspected Gus himself had had to assemble the thing partly due to the offputting slant the legs had.

Old habit kicked in and Aury reached for the remote, only to discover that the TV displayed only static. Gus cringed when Aury turned a questioning glance on his brother.

"Had to drop the cable. Nobody was watching it anyway," Gus said.

"Had enough of it in the hospital," Aury replied, and sank further into the chair, still weary from the trip. Wearier, rather. He was in a constant state of exhaustion to begin with. The walk from the elevator might well have been a marathon. He switched the set off and discarded the remote. "Good riddance anyhow, nothing but bad news and worse soaps."

They were silent for a few moments. Gus sat on the couch, fidgeted, then got back up again. "Want something to eat?"

"Not right now. Maybe later." Eating was an adventure in nausea and upredictability, when he felt like eating at all. If he could keep something down, though, he'd use it as something to take his meds with. Anything more was pushing it.

"Right. Well... I'm going to go get some dinner, I'll... I'll save you some in the fridge." Gus ambled towards the door, keys still in hand. Aury could hear him hesitate behind him, shoes scuffing on the hardwood floor. A heavy pause stretched out.

Aury didn't turn around. Gus finally left.

Neither brother could say who was having the worse time.

-----------------------------

Dying was an exercise in ennui for Aury. He spent most of the next three days reading, sleeping, and waiting for his brother to put in an occasional appearance so that they could talk. He knew Gus was still running around trying to dig up a miracle, no matter how fiercely he denied it. He was home so rarely that no excuse of grocery shopping or laundry would cover it. Aury was, in fact, insulted that he thought he could lie to his own twin, but he could let it go. The infliction of helplessness was just as bad as leukemia.

It was getting old, however, and Aury wasn't of a mind to be patient much longer. It was going to be over very soon, he could feel it. He wanted Gus to be there, not discover his cold body hours after the fact.

It was about two in the morning when he heard the door open. Aury shook himself out of the light doze he'd sunk into and fought to wrench his eyes open.

"Gus." His voice came out as a dry croak. He slowly muscled himself into a sitting position in his bed. "Gus, you there?"

"Aury."

It was Gus, his figure in the bedroom doorway outlined by the dim lamp at Aury's bedside. He was holding something and staring at Aury with an oddly wide-eyed, desperate expression.

"What's wrong?" Aury was having trouble sitting upright.

"I found a way."

Aury frowned, squinting in the low light. His body complained stridently, begging for rest. He wouldn't be able to fight it much longer. "What are you talking about?"

"I found a way to save you." Gus's voice was just above a whisper.

"No, no..." Aury's frustration warred with his exhaustion and he struggled just to form words.

"Just relax, you're going to be all right now." The thing Gus was holding was a book. He opened it, and Aury could swear he felt the temperature in the room drop a few degrees. A sudden surge of inexplicable fear lent him a moment of strength.

"No, Gus, listen to me, I just want you to be--"

Gus turned a few pages with a papery crackling. "You're going to live." And he began to speak, strange words, strange rhythms. Aury's strength at last failed, and a darkness that wasn't sleep overcame him.

He was sure it was death, for what else could make his soul feel as if it were twisting in on itself?