A/N: What can I say? I am so, so, so, so sorry for the long update, but I blame school! BURN YOUR HOMEWORK WITH ME, MY DARLINGS! Hehe. Anyway, read on!

6: Shaken Foundation

"So," Lawrence says uncertainly and walks in the door. "How are you?"

Adam closes the door behind him, and once again, he locks it quickly. Too quickly. And Lawrence's eyes, who after years of studying medicine and watching patients in shock, are very good at catching nervous habits like this, see it immediately. But he doesn't question it. He knows better than that, even though he hasn't seen Adam for a year.

"I'm fine," Adam says and rakes his hand through his hair, because he does that every time he lies. "But I think you drugged me with something when I was there."

"Morphine," Lawrence says with a grin. "Your nurse had a crush on you, and since she'd never like you when you were conscious, I felt it was my obligation to knock you out."

"Because I'd never get laid if you didn't," Adam fills in with a sleepy smile. "Thanks, man."

Lawrence laughs.

Yes. Why wouldn't he laugh? It's a joke, this is how guys joke with each other. They come down on one another and then they laugh about it and hit each other on the shoulder. Because they're not serious.

Adam knows Lawrence doesn't mean anything by it. He's not mean. He would never nay something like that and actually mean it, not for no reason, especially not to anyone who looks as bad as Adam.

The doctor in Lawrence is raised to treat everyone like Adam, all the thin, fragile, skeleton-like people with dark circles under their eyes as gently as possible. And that doctor would never say something like that in a serious matter.

But Adam can't keep a faint sting of hurt from running through his heart when he hears Lawrence say that.

"But seriously," Lawrence says. "Are you okay? Because… I really found you as a wreck."

"Thanks a lot," Adam repeats and smiles bitterly. "Wasn't that what you just said I didn't look like?"

But in the same time, he knows he can't look like anything else. How could someone like him look like through someone like Lawrence's eyes, if not like a wreck? Lawrence is a rich doctor, he's one of those guys that save lives every day, one of those guys that have prizes on their walls. And Adam finally knows what he is, himself. He's seen himself the day before.

Now he knows that what he's done for so long to make himself stronger has only made him weaker. That the wonderfully burning hunger has turned him into a bird, a fragile, boney little bird that hasn't learned how to fly.

"No, no," Lawrence says and takes a quick, subconscious step against Adam. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean it like that. It's just that… You're so… Thin… I mean, the last time I saw you, you looked like you barely ate at all, and now, you seem to have dropped even more weight."

Adam's blood suddenly runs cold with terror.

Lawrence can't find out.

He doesn't usually tiptoes around his refusal to eat. Not that anyone is ever around to ask him about it, but he loves the idea of the world finding out how strong he is, how consequent he can be, but Lawrence can't find out. For some reason it's very, very important to him that Lawrence doesn't find out about how long it's been since he actually sat down and ate a whole meal. The last time probably was that time with Alexa…

He knows that Lawrence, both as a doctor and a thoughtful person, will try to help him, and no way he's going to a fucking therapist.

Plus, he knows that if he had to see Lawrence's face when he told him that he lives on a slice of bread a day, he would also have to face the fact that he has a problem. Because he does, he knows that. But he will deny it to the last, and not even Lawrence, that stands in front of him with a small smile and a poorly hidden concern in his eyes, can change that.

Adam shrugs in a way he hopes is casual.

"It's nothing big," he says. "Lately, I've been smoking more than I did before… I met you."

Shit. He almost said it.

Before the bathroom.

He can't say that. Can't, can't, can't say that. That, too, would be admitting that there was a problem. That the bathroom was a problem, and this fucking hell that settled in his apartment after that is a problem.

"Nicotine, you know," Adam says and tries to sound like he's joking. "Brings down your apatite like a living hell. Wonderful little drug."

Lawrence shakes his head, and he looks at Adam like he probably looks at Diana, and I would normally drive Adam crazy, but now it makes him, in a weird, warm, sedating way, feel loved.

Now. Stop. Stop it.

Not get depending. Not loved, not weak.

"So the only thing you lived on this past year is tobacco?" Lawrence says and sighs theatrically. "No wonder you look the way you do. Don't you have anyone to look after you here? No family, or a girlfriend, maybe?"

Adam feels how he involuntarily blushes.

He can't say he's been thinking of a man ever since… That. Of how a man, this man, would react to his way of living. Even if he really hasn't thought of Lawrence in a romantic way, he'd prefer not to admit that he's been thinking of him at all. For fucks sake, he can barely admit it to himself, how could he ever do it to Lawrence?

He mumbles something under his breath.

Not blush. Look him in the eye. Steady gaze.

"Girls have their profits, but… You know…" Adam says. "But they don't really think I'm the guy to give them an exciting life full of adventures and passion, so…"

His voice fades out, but it doesn't take him long to find it again.

"What about you? How's… Allison?"

Lawrence face, that's been relaxed and smiling, as if he's really talking to an old friend, suddenly drops a bit. But it seems like he, too, wants to keep his little mask up.

"We've got divorced, actually," he then says, still pretty casually, and Adam can't keep his eyes from widening.

"But…" He says and takes a step towards Lawrence without being aware of it. "How… How could that happen? You sawed your foot off for her!"

Adam doesn't even notice that he's brought it up. It that he hasn't been able to talk about to his inner voice, even. He's busy listening, busy talking to someone beside himself for the first time in forever, despite the fact that the talking contains a subject he wants to avoid more than anything.

Lawrence chuckles, and it actually seems to be honestly.

"Yeah, I know, but… That's in the past, I'm afraid. She didn't really think I changed after I got out of there, so she married… Someone. I don't remember his name, I was pretty pissed off when she said it."

Adam smiles back at him, uncertain of what else to do. After a few seconds, he put it all in one card and places a hand on Lawrence's shoulder.

"I'm sorry," he says, and he means it. "I really am. God, I didn't expect… You can still see Diana, though, right?"

"Yeah, of course," Lawrence says and his smile gets a little wider when he feels the hand on his shoulder. "She didn't really dare to say anything else. She was the one who had an affair, after all, so the unwritten laws on divorces says she has to agree to anything I say. And that's lucky, God knows what she'd do to me otherwise."

Adam cracks up. Even Lawrence manages to laugh with him, until he turns serious on a dime and fixes Adam with his eyes.

"But I've been worrying about you, Adam."

And Adam's whole world gets paralyzed.

The traffic stops outside.

The picture on the TV-screen freezes.

The sunlight stiffens into a pillar of glow.

Everything that exists, everything that's alive, is he and Lawrence, no, not even he, he's never existed and never meant anything, and he sure as hell better be careful of thinking otherwise, the voice in his head has so successfully convinced him about that.

Everything that exists is Lawrence, his eyes, his sincere face, his words that hang between them like the scent of a perfume.

I've been worrying about you, Adam.

Lawrence has been worrying about him.

Lawrence has been thinking of him. Lawrence has an important job and a daughter. But he actually has taken some time out of his life to think about Adam. To care about him.

Adam is important to another human being.

Adam is important to a person, and it's not any person, it's Lawrence, and it's the memory of Lawrence that has helped Adam to survive this past year. He would never admit it to himself, but it's the truth. It's Lawrence's voice in his head that's made him force himself to eat that slice of bread every day, and it's that slice of bread that has gotten him through the day.

Adam is important to Lawrence.

And that, just these words, can make all the walls, all the thick layers of amour that Adam hides behind and that has taken him half his life to build, crumble. They can show Lawrence the real Adam that huddles there, the Adam that Adam hides behind his sarcasms, his independent words.

And it scares Adam to death. It scares him to death and almost makes him cry with joy in the same time.

"You have?" He says sheepishly and quickly takes his hand off Lawrence's shoulder. "You… You don't have to be. I mean, I can take care of myself."

"I know you can," Lawrence says with a small smile. "But I'm a doctor, remember?"

Adam smiles back, insecurely, still terrified, and not sure about what else to do. Lawrence clears his throat.

"Well," he says hesitatingly. "I've got to go now, actually, but may I call you? Not as a doctor, just like a recently divorced forty year-old that needs some entertaining? So we can get together?"

No, the voice says. No way. You know what'll happen then, Adam. You know you're weak, so you start to depend on people. Relay on them. And you don't want what happened with Jerry to happen again, do you?

No, he doesn't. And Adam's going to say no, but his mouth doesn't agree, and suddenly, the door shuts behind Lawrence, and Adam stays behind, alone with the feeling of being opened up.

Fourteen years, he thinks angrily and swallows a sob. Fourteen years. Fourteen years, and it was so awfully close that they went to waste. For Lawrence.

The tears rise in his eyes, fresh and burning, and Adam does what he always does: He gets into the shower and lets the hot water burn away the memories of another person's closure.

Lets the tears mix with the shower water, so he can pretend they're not there.

I know I implied smut in the last chapter… But you can't rush art! Once again, I'm sorry for the long update! I'll try to be faster with the next one, but please review! That's what makes the writing worth it!