Chapter 4
That summer, Thor spent as much time with Loki as he could. He hardly went out with Jane at all, but he and Loki never talked about it. Loki spent a lot of the time on the couch complaining that he was too hot or too cold or too thirsty while the rest of the family went in and out of the house. Thor was the only one who reliably never got irritated with him, and for that, everyone was silently grateful.
Loki had been home for only a few days when he had a reaction to his new pain medication. Thor smoothed his hair back while he vomited into the toilet. Thor wordlessly filled a glass of water and rubbed circles into his back as he handed it to him. He hated it, on some level, that he had had more physical contact with Loki in the past week than he had in the last few years. He hated it that these were the moments he was going to treasure when he left home. "I'm sorry," Thor told him while Loki swished the water around in his mouth.
Loki spat and looked blankly forward. "Don't be," he said. His voice was slightly hoarse, and when Thor looked at him, he didn't look sad or in pain; he just looked tired. "You don't have to do this."
"I do," said Thor, and he kept rubbing circles into Loki's back. "You're my brother."
"Loki?" called Frigga, and a moment later she had run up the stairs and was leaning over Loki. "Oh, darling. Let's get you back to bed. I'll make you some chicken soup and call the doctor to get you a new prescription."
"Thanks, ma," said Loki.
Thor moved aside and Frigga gripped the handles on the wheelchair. She wheeled Loki into his bedroom. It took both her and Thor to get Loki back in bed. She sat on the edge of Loki's bed and smoothed back his hair. Loki looked up at her with strangely bright eyes. "Thor," she said without looking up, "Will you go get me that bowl? It should be downstairs under the sink."
When Thor was gone, Frigga took Loki's hand in her own and looked at him sadly. "Loki."
"What?" he asked defiantly.
"I'm your mother," she told him quietly as she stoked his hand. "You don't have to be strong for me."
Loki swallowed, and swallowed again. His mouth curved down in sad line. She hugged him, and he made a noise that might have been a cough or a sob.
When Thor's heavy footstep sounded on the first step, Frigga released her son. Loki quickly wiped away the wetness from his face and Frigga handed him a tissue. By the time Thor reached the room looking concerned, Loki was lying with his head turned to one side and his eyes closed. Frigga took the bowl from Thor and placed it beside the bed, and then they quietly left the room.
After the door had closed and the sound of their footsteps, accompanied by Thor's worried tones and his mother's soothing ones, had receded, Loki clenched the sheets in his fists and cried quietly into his pillow. Eventually, his tears dried and he stared blankly at the wall. "Thor," he whispered, because that was really all there was to say.
On a rare evening when Thor felt like he could be out of the house, he met Jane at her house and they took a walk. The weeds growing on the side of the road were dead and dry, and the strip of dirt between the weeds and the road turned to dust under their feet. Jane was looking at the stars as they walked.
"I know this sounds bad," she said, "but I hope we get to see a tornado while we're at school. Not the little dinky ones we get down here, but a serious one."
"It doesn't sound too bad," Thor told her. He took her hand and threaded their fingers together. "But if I didn't know better, I'd think you wanted to be on one of those crazy storm chaser shows."
She laughed. "I do, Thor. Maybe not the show bit, but can you imagine seeing one up close? Following its path? Maybe developing better early warning systems?"
"Not dying?"
"Hey!" she cried, but she was smiling. "I would be safe. Oh, speaking of, can I come over to dinner at some point? I want to thank Frigga for that scarf she got me. That was so nice of her."
He smiled at her. "Sure! Um."
She looked at him. "What?" He chewed on his lip. "Loki? Really? He's still not feeling well?"
"No, he's fine." Thor hesitated. "I just think . . ."
Jane stopped walking and took Thor's other hand in her own. "Thor. What is it?" When he said nothing, she squeezed both his hands. "You never really tell me how he's doing. Are you ever going to tell me how he fell out of that window?" she asked softly.
Thor shook his head. "I don't want to talk about it," he said in a low voice.
She made a quiet noise. "Is that why you've been spending so much time with him? Do you think it was your fault?"
"No!" Thor frowned. "I'm not taking care of him out of guilt."
"Then why don't you want me to come over for dinner? I know he's never like me, but I could bring Darcy. You know they both have that sarcastic streak–"
"I feel like this is the last summer I'm going to get with him." He smiled sadly. "He's my little brother. You can understand that, can't you?"
Jane's expression cleared and she smiled in response. "Yes. Though I think if I spent that much time with Darcy, we'd kill each other."
Thor laughed and kissed her on the forehead. "Oh, don't worry. I'm expecting an assassination attempt before the month is out."
Jane let go of his hands with a roll of her eyes. "You're right. We should probably keep him and Darcy separated. Who knows what they'd come up with."
Thor chuckled and put his arm around her waist. They started walking again into the deepening dusk.
One night after a particularly humid and boring day at home, Thor made a bowl of popcorn and proclaimed a movie night. By the time the popcorn had been reduced to only a few stubborn kernels and their parents had gone up to bed, Thor and Loki were on their second movie of the evening: Die Hard. Loki was leaning against one arm of the couch with his feet propped up on Thor's lap, and Thor had rested one hand on the cast that covered Loki's calf and ankle. Loki was watching the movie with interest, but Thor's gaze kept drifting back to Loki. Thor unconsciously ran his hand across Loki's ankle, even though Loki wouldn't be able to feel it through the bandages and the plaster.
There was the sound of breaking glass, and Thor looked up at the screen to see John McClane wincing in pain. There was a lot of blood, and Thor squeezed Loki's ankle tightly. When he looked back at Loki, Loki was watching impassively as McClane began to limp away with glass buried in his foot.
"Doesn't that bother you?" Thor asked.
"Why would it?" said Loki without looking away from the screen. "I fell from a second-story window. I imagine that walking on glass feels a whole lot nicer."
"Loki . . ."
Loki looked at him. "It happened, I'm over it. Stop freaking out about it, Thor." He turned his leg sideways to knock Thor in the chest with his foot. Thor curled his fingers over Loki's cold toes and absently rubbed them.
"I just wish you wouldn't act like it was nothing," Thor said quietly.
Loki shrugged and turned back to the movie. "Well, both of us can't be drama queens."
Thor chuckled. He moved his hand back to the safety of Loki's unfeeling ankle. "I guess I need to stop complaining about the heat all the time, then."
Loki tried to smack him on the shoulder, but Thor ducked out of the way easily with a hearty laugh. He didn't feel that sorry for his brother.
They watched the rest of the movie in contented silence. When it was finally over, Thor picked up the remote from where he had it balanced on Loki's knee and turned off the TV. He opened his mouth to ask Loki what he had thought, but then he saw that Loki's eyelids were drooping. Thor smiled. "Want me to carry you up to bed?"
Loki was too tired to do more than nod. Thor gently lifted Loki's feet off his lap, stood, and scooped him up in his arms. Loki's head lolled against his shoulder and his breath tickled Thor's throat. Loki felt like he weighed half a ton, but it was worth it to feel him so relaxed in his arms, like Thor was the only one in the world who could protect him.
"Ma and pa won't carry you, you know," Thor told him as he began his slow ascent of the stairs.
"I know," Loki murmured. "But I'll be able to walk by the time you leave for school." He yawned widely, and Thor tried to repress an answering yawn unsuccessfully. "Don't make me sleep on the couch."
"I won't." When Loki had first gotten home from the hospital, their parents had offered to move his mattress downstairs while he was recovering, but Loki had vetoed the offer immediately. Despite the trauma he likely associated with his room, he clung to the familiar space, and Thor would certainly not deny him that.
Thor reached the top of the stairs. "Open the door?" he murmured into Loki's hair. Thor quickly moved his head away; he had most certainly not just pressed a kiss to the top of Loki's head.
If Loki was thinking the same, he didn't give any sign of it. He reached out a hand and grabbed the doorknob to his room, but it took him two tries to open it. When he had finally opened the door, Loki let his head fall back on Thor's shoulder with a quiet sigh. "It's just the painkillers that are making me so tired," he told Thor.
"I'm sure," said Thor amusedly as he walked into the room sideways, opening the door the rest of the way with his shoulder as he did so.
"Mmm," said Loki, and that was how Thor knew that Loki was legitimately exhausted. Thor set Loki down on one side of the bed before pulling the covers back on the other side. When he went back to pick up Loki again, Loki had turned his face sideways to bury it in the pillow, and he did not look like he wanted to move. Thor smiled and picked him up anyway. He tucked him in without getting his pajamas out for him, because Loki did not look awake enough to handle changing his clothes.
When the blankets had been arranged around Loki the way Loki liked them, Thor paused and looked down at Loki. Loki had closed his eyes and he already looked asleep. Without thinking about it, Thor leaned over and kissed him gently on the forehead. "Goodnight, brother."
"M'night, Thor," Loki mumbled without opening his eyes. Thor smiled, turned off the light, and left the room, closing the door behind him as he did so.
The storm that had been rolling in all afternoon broke around three in the morning. Thor was woken by a loud boom of thunder. He frowned slightly and rolled over with the intention of falling back asleep. A bright flash of light burned through his eyelids, and another rolling boom followed almost immediately after.
Loki.
Thor sat up and threw off the covers. The floor was cold on his bare feet as he walked to his door and slipped out of his room. There were no lights on and the house was absolutely silent as though everyone was sound asleep, but he knew better.
Thor pushed open the door to Loki's room gently. Loki was lying rigidly on his back. Thor paused at the door, waiting to see if Loki had somehow managed to sleep through it. When there was another flash of lightning, Thor saw that Loki was looking at him. Thor wordlessly pulled back the covers and crawled into bed beside him.
"I hate having to sleep on my back," Loki whispered. There was another flash of light, and Thor's chest ached at the expression on Loki's face.
"I know," Thor murmured back. He rested on his side facing Loki, but he kept a safe distance away so they wouldn't accidentally touch. He wanted to reach out to Loki and brush his hair out of his face, let him know that Thor was there, but he didn't dare. Loki rejected Thor's touch more and more often now, and Thor didn't want to push him to the point where he would kick Thor out of his room entirely. Loki was proud, but Thor could tell from how tense he was that he was terrified. Thor wanted to tell him, You could have called for me, but he didn't want to hear Loki say that he didn't need Thor. He hated it when Loki lied to him.
Thor was just drifting off to sleep when there was another bright flash of light. A cold hand found his and held on to it. Thor remembered a time when that hand had been small, but it had still held onto his so tightly. Thor squeezed it gently and soon fell asleep.
Thor was woken the next morning by someone poking him repeatedly in the shoulder. "What?" he grunted. He opened his eyes to find Loki looking at him haughtily.
"I need to pee."
Thor closed his eyes and buried his face in his corner of Loki's pillow. "Nn' minute."
"No, now." Loki pushed him this time, hard.
Thor lifted his face out of the pillow. "Are you going to be like this when you're old?" he groaned.
"Are you planning on being there when I am? Help me get to the bathroom." Thor's head plopped back onto the pillow. "Thor." No response. "Thor."
"Ow!" Thor jolted upright. He snatched Loki's hand and yanked it away from his stomach. "How are your hands so cold?"
Loki grinned maliciously. "Are you awake?"
Thor mumbled something unintelligible and got out of bed. He walked around to Loki's side and threw back Loki's covers. Loki dutifully put his arms around Thor's neck. Thor put an arm on his back and another under his legs and lifted him into his wheelchair. "You do this yourself all the time," Thor huffed into Loki's shoulder before he let go. "Demanding little brother."
"Lazy asshole of a brother," Loki retorted. "Besides, I smell pancakes. Get downstairs fast and they might still be hot."
Loki was right. Thor rubbed his eyes and sighed. "Fine, you win."
"Ha," Loki said over his shoulder as he wheeled himself towards the door. "Don't forget to come back to help me down the stairs." Thor grinned at Loki's back. Loki really was a little shit most of the time, but at least it made it easy to tell when he was in a good mood.
Loki was in a good mood. Huh. Thor smiled and took the stairs two at a time. "Ma?" he called. "Do I smell pancakes?"
I'll always be here, Thor had said.
You had better be, Loki had replied with a smile.
Loki was still in a wheelchair when Thor left for college. He watched solemnly from the front porch as Thor waved, got into the car with Jane, and drove away.
