All he can hear, now that he's said the words he hadn't wanted to say, is the rushing of his blood in his ears, the pounding of the wave of guilt in his head.
He wonders if he's going to faint.
Doc is talking, but the words don't make any sense; Jack, Sean, and Henry come in the front door, and the boys are yelling but he can't understand the words.
The boys hug him but he can't say anything to them, and they go upstairs.
Henry goes upstairs with them after a quiet talk with Doc—probably waiting to see if he completely loses and they need to get the boys out of there.
Doc makes a phone call and keeps talking to him.
The door opens and Linda is kneeling on the floor next to the couch, and there are tears in her eyes.
The pounding in his head dies down a little, and her words make sense.
"What happened, babe? Please tell me."
He shakes his head. "Doc…"
"He didn't tell me. He just said there was something you needed to tell me. I'm here now. What is it?"
He tries to swallow but there's a lump in his throat.
He moves his mouth but no sound comes it—or maybe it does, but he can't hear it.
But Linda doesn't look shocked or disgusted or pissed, so maybe he hasn't said anything.
He clears his throat.
"The bullet I ducked…the day I broke my ankle…hit and killed an undercover cop," he whispers.
He closes his eyes, says quickly, before she can leave, "That's why I said I should have died, why I haven't been doing my exercises, why I don't care if my ankle never heals. A cop is dead because of me."
"Look at me, Danny."
He shakes his head, startled a little when she pulls his upper body off the couch and sits down with his head in her lap. "Danny, look at me—please."
He opens his eyes, startled by the love in her gaze. He'd expected…anger, disgust, hatred.
"It wasn't your fault."
He wants…no, needs…to explain that it was his fault, that he didn't see the other man's undercover armband, that he should have known the other guy was a cop, that if he hadn't ducked it would be him dead and not Officer Bradley; but she puts her hand on his lips. "It wasn't your fault, babe. I am so, so sorry, Danny. When…how long have you known?"
"Dad told me three weeks ago," he says, moving his ankle in circles and sideways as quickly as he can, and relishing the pain. "I… you had enough to deal with, with me being so…needy."
She puts her hand on his knee. "Stop trying to cause yourself pain."
He wants to kick himself in his bad ankle, but he's afraid he'll hurt her if he does, so he mutters a few words under his breath about how she's his wife not his shrink and could she please stop talking like his shrink?
She kisses him. "You need to talk to Doc about this, not me. I'm going to get started on dinner; we'll talk once the boys are in bed."
He nods, disappointed when she's gotten up from the couch and not holding him anymore, and listens to her moving around in the kitchen.
Linda is a lot easier to talk to than Doc, who's going on and on with the same words he'd used after Corporal Russell's suicide: It wasn't your fault and Did you know the bullet was going to hit Officer Bradley? and Did you deliberately duck out of the way so the bullet would hit Officer Bradley instead of you? and sometimes he wonders why he's paying Doc $150/session to ask impossible questions.
He's relieved when Doc leaves, and hopes he hasn't said too much.