Nick sat at his desk, looking blankly at nothing, just a direction toward his desk. It was all nothing and numbness for the past few hours. Numb feelings, nothing in his face, numb hands, nothing to help him feel less...rotten.
The guilt was the only thing that he could feel. That he was able to feel. It was as if every single emotion in the dictionary had been replaced with guilt.
His brain was singed with the image of Ellis' face, the scar splitting his right half sickeningly and the blood dribbling down to the floor creating puddles of the rubicund colored fluid.
Again a new and heart jerking sound ripped out of his chest like he had just been struck with a bullet. Tears filled the palms of his hands as they dug into his sockets with determination not to let them fall on the desk.
The metallic reek of blood had filled his head again. It was his mind playing tricks on him, subconsciously punishing himself for letting this happen. He grappled onto the rim of the metallic wastebasket sitting lifelessly on top of his desk waiting for his stomach bile to fill it.
Through the loud hacks and belches of puking he heard the faint familiar tapping at his door. In between his heaves of vomit he groaned out a 'come in'.
He could tell it was Talen when he noticed the recognizable beat of his heels hitting the floor. It was actually a great relief because he knew Talen would be on his side rather than his more rationally chastising one.
He sounded like he was trying to justify his actions by admitting he was being chastised. As if that would help restore the situation or automatically fix Ellis' mangled face. Selfishly he was punishing himself to defend himself.
He threw up even more.
"Jeez Nick. You've never blown this much chunks even after the whole steam rolling incident with the Palazzos. What's gotten into you?" Talen covered his nose with his sleeve, wafting the air around him to air out the sour smell.
After thumping limply on top of his desk, Nick made a fist in his hair and pulled it to ease the cerebral pain away with physical. It was surprisingly cathartic in an over dramatized way.
Talen's voice rang inside his head like deep bells. He now was grasping onto any opportunity to be distracted. Nick was not afraid to mentally discipline himself. However he could not deal with the fact that he was so selfish that he was using punishment as an excuse to makeup for this whole night.
"Ta-len? Am I a…buh-bad person?" Nick blubbered the question out, covering his mouth as a small amount of excess bile raised to his throat.
Talen resisted the large and tempting urge to roll his eyes. Instead he pulled on his most innocently goody goody face and shook his head sympathetically.
"Not at all! You didn't know about this. If you ask me I think its Spencer's fault I mean, he was the one who had sliced and diced the kid's face."
That was a lie. If the lie had been any bigger he was sure it would have exceeded the size of the whole housing place.
But he wasn't going to tell Nick that it was his hands that gripped the rubber end of the knife and cut through the leathery feel of the hick's face. He wasn't going to mention that he had heard the earsplitting shriek behind the soundproof walls followed by the squishing sound of muscle and tendons ripping.
Besides, Spencer was due for his 'payment' sooner or later. He was a mockery to the whole family.
Nick's head snapped up so fast that it was a blur. His eyes stared widely at Talen with questions swimming through them.
"Spencer? He-he did it?" There was a burning and searing fire that jolted like electricity around his body. He could imagine it on the idiot's face as he damaged hisEllis.
He stood up, his mind was peppered in so much fury that his decisions were going to be hasty and probably lead to more problems.
He could not care less.
Furiously he stood up, wedging the dizzy feeling in his head away just to walk fast past Talen who was holding back his fit of amused chortles.
He busted the doors open from his office and walked to the rec room where the boys hang around. Since the room had no door he just sped into the room and located his target.
Once he saw the mossy brunette head lying leisurely on the sofa his fury turned up to full high.
He went inside the kitchen walking past the rec room and the curiously worried eyes.
He came out after a few muttered curses and sounds of objects thrashing around.
He walked toward the couch knife in hand, his eyes still boring at Spencer.
"Get up." Nick ordered.
Spencer slowly and apprehensively stood his eyes glued onto the silvering metal of the knife. He swallowed down the urge to run.
Nick stepped closer, dangerously so.
"Kill all sons of bitches." He whispered under his breath and took another step.
"Mr. Bianco?" The doctor's voice sounded out behind him.
He didn't even realize that his teeth were ground together when he allowed his whole face to relax and his body unstiffens from the rage that had tensed it.
He forgot all about the fueling burn and turned around shoving the butt end of the knife behind him into Spencer's chest for him to take.
"I need to talk to you." The words were stoic, no expression of good news or bad news.
Nick swallowed thickly and nodded. He followed the doctor out of the room and into the hallway once again. He brought all his defenses up abruptly. Hardening his neck so he wouldn't choke on his own sobs. Keeping his eyes wide open, letting the air of the room burn them rather than tears. Getting ready to turn the heartbreaking and soul crushing news into a literal inferno of anger.
"He's going to be okay." The doctor had to get it out of the way or else Nick would have not paid attention to anything he needed to say.
Nick's legs turned into a two logs of jelly as he swung his stance. He balanced an arm on the Doctor's shoulder and held himself steady, letting out a tempo breaking breath.
He was going to be okay. He was not going to die or bleed out. He was going to live.
"Oh God…Thank you." Nick pinched his eyes willing the tears to tear ducts they had come from.
"He's currently staying on your bed in your room. I had to move him to more suitable-"
"I don't care about that, he could have every room in the god damn Boston area, just tell me how…he is." Nick finally found his balance and just lent against the wall his vision stabled on the doctor.
"He lost an amount of blood, but not enough to severely hurt him. He sprained two of his ribs and we stitched up all the cuts around his body…"
Nick waited for the most devastating part.
"…We also had to stitch up his laceration. Nick," He said with a hopeless tone, "It took up sixty stitches for the wound to finally close together. It was hard, very hard, but we got it together before he lost more blood. No doubt it'll be a scar though and probably will be the rest of his life."
Nick nodded like he had a pole taped to the back of his neck. It was evidently forced, along with the beckoning of tears glistening in his eyes.
He had heard it.
The painful truth about Ellis' disfigurement. He wanted to explode about how unfair the world was. How they had spent six months together going through hell and now that when life was going back to normal, Nick had ruined it for the boy.
"Can…Can I see him?" His pitch squeaked before he cleared his throat.
The doctor bit his lip. He looked as if there was more.
"Nick…By my diagnosis the young man will have a mild case of psychogenic amnesia. When he wakes up, he wont remember most of tonight. Maybe bits and pieces of it, but not enough to create a coherent picture. Im telling you this so if you do stay near him, please be cognizant of his condition and the sensitivity of it." Doctor Martello said.
His lips parted open in an unhidden shock. Ellis might not remember this.
That is actually…
"So that means he won't remember me? I mean he wont remember I was here tonight?" Nick waited for an answer patiently and eagerly.
Doctor Martello shrugged. "Most likely not. If you want to keep this business I would suggest taking advantage of that." With that only left hanging in the air, the doctor said a curt good-bye and left.
As he walked the familiar passageways down to his own bedroom where his sleeping and broken survivor rested he thought of the advice the doctor had given him.
Taking advantage of things was one of his strongest talents.