Disclaimer: Not mine.
A/N: I've been thinking about what to write for "Death be not…" and since I didn't really want to write about Rocky and because I thought that Joan and Adam had talked enough, I had problems to come up with something. Finally I had an idea that's maybe a little far fetched, but I thought I'd write it anyway. Here we go.
Death Be Not Whatsoever
Overheard
(This happens after the last scene of the episode, when Joan comes home after her drive in the bus.)
Still thinking about what God had told her, Joan finally gave up her place in front of the house and went in. Nobody was to be seen so she climbed up the stairs. Kevin's wheelchair was standing at the base of the stairs, so she expected him to be upstairs, but she didn't expect to find what she did.
Kevin and Luke were both in the hallway, between the bathroom and Kevin's room, both paralyzed like dead in their tracks. Joan started to say something, but Kevin put his finger to his lips to tell her to stay quiet and Luke gestured to go to Kevin's room.
When Kevin nodded, Joan followed her brothers and sat down on Kevin's bed, next to Luke.
"What happened? You two okay?"
Kevin didn't react to her question, but Luke nodded. "Yeah, we're okay, but seems like Mom's not."
"Mom? What's wrong with Mom?" Joan was all of a dither.
"Nothing, really," Kevin said quietly. "We overheard her talking with Dad." He sighed and his features belied the words he'd just said. "I'd really hoped this was over."
"What? Kev, what was over?" Joan asked carefully.
Kevin shook his head, obviously not wanting to answer. Something had really touched him, touched him so deeply that he seemed to be struggling not to lose his poise.
Luke looked at Kevin, then at Joan and then at the floor, before he said, "Mom has been seeing a priest and reading books about death."
Joan inhaled deeply, her heart beating fast. "What? Is Mom…?"
"No, no! It… it…" Luke started, but didn't know how to finish.
"It was about me," Kevin said, trying to hold Joan's look. "Mom told Dad that to her it sometimes feels as if I died."
Joan, with all she'd heard and seen the last days, was too confused to interpret this correctly. "But… you're here. We're all fine, aren't we? Nobody is dying, right?"
Luke started to say something, but suddenly the phone rang and he took his chance to escape the conversation. "Must be Friedman. I'll get that," he said and disappeared to his room to take the call there.
Joan looked at Kevin, waiting for him to calm down and be able to explain why this was so emotionally exhausting for him.
"Nobody's dying, but isn't it pretty clear what Mom meant? Before the accident I used to be a pretty different person. That person died and all that's left is me. The son they loved and wanted died that night." Kevin was still struggling, but he seemed to be doing okay.
Hesitating for a moment and searching for words, Joan looked at her brother and carefully put a hand on his arm. "Do you really think that?"
"I don't know, Joan, I really don't know. Every time I think we all finally figured it out, that we finally understood how to handle things and that it would all turn out fine something like this happens. I'm really doing okay, why can't she just leave it with that?" He had started gesturing and made his sister pull her hand away.
Joan tried a smile to cheer him up, but he really wasn't in the mood to be cheered up. "But maybe this isn't about you and how you manage. I guess this is only about Mom and how she feels about it."
"But shouldn't this be about me? I know that my accident affected all of you, but shouldn't this come to an end? I'm not exactly living the life I planned, but it's not so bad." Kevin sighed. "The job at the paper is okay, really, I like it. Why can't she accept that?"
"I'm sure she does accept that and she's happy for you. Kevin, in all this learning to cope and trying to handle you just overtook her. You've come to terms but she hasn't. Allow her to take her time, too." Joan pleaded, asking for him to understand their mother.
"You think she hasn't come to terms? She's been pushing me all the time. She told me to get a job and a car… everything. And now you're telling me she hasn't come to terms?" Kevin was hiding his sadness behind a mask of anger.
"There's a difference between pushing you and accepting it for herself and you know that. Stop blaming her, please?" Joan asked.
Kevin grabbed the armrests of his chair and pushed himself up to relieve the pressure – Joan had seen him do that thousands of times, but right now she realized it again.
"It's not so easy for all of us," she said. "You're right, it should be about you, but… you know… seeing you in that chair every day… sometimes it's still hard for us too."
Seeing the look on his sister's face Kevin knew that she hadn't said this to blame him or to make him think that she had problems with him in the chair, but only to make him understand that his accident had really affected all of them and that they all dealt with it – everyone with his or her own speed. Maybe their mother hadn't had the time she needed, because she had been busy trying to get him back into life. And now that he was back at regaining life she finally had the time. Maybe that was why she'd told their father only today how she felt?
"I know," he told her slowly. "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have…"
"You shouldn't have overheard them in the first place." Joan finished his sentence and made him smile.
"Yeah. Just imagine they'd have been talking about something else."
"Or doing something else," Joan added and both of them shuddered disgusted
"That's gross."
"It is."
"Thanks," Kevin said still smiling. "I was already jumping into the 'I'm not the son they wanted' mood again."
"I know. But I've had enough drama the last days, so I couldn't let you." Joan said, forcing a half-grin.
"What happened?" Kevin asked, for once back in big-brother-mode.
Joan sighed and let herself fall back on her brother's bed. "You know this kid I babysat? Rocky?"
Kevin nodded. "Yeah, sure."
"He's dying. He's got this disease that kills him."
"What? He's dying? He's a kid, he…" Kevin was surprised and shocked.
"You should have seen him," Joan said. "He's such a good kid. A little weird because he's kind of obsessed with death, but he told me that it's okay to die. Isn't that strange? A kid tells me about death." Joan sat up again and looked at her brother. "And it becomes even stranger. Rocky took me to the cemetery and I found out why Adam doesn't like November. He told me that he doesn't like it, but he never told me why. Turns out his mother died in November. I… I didn't even know his mother was dead and now… "
Kevin reached out and put a hand on her knee. "A lot of death, huh?"
"Yeah," Joan nodded and a single tear began to fall from her eyes. "And then I come home and I hear that Mom's reading books about dying…and…"
"I'm sorry…," Kevin said. "You shouldn't have had to…"
Joan shook her head. "No, it's okay, it's just that…"
Kevin shook his head too and said, "It's not okay. Come here!"
He reached out for his sister and pulled her into a hug. She returned the hug and sighed. "Thanks, Kev."
"Always. Anything else you wanna talk about?"
Joan shook her head again. "No, I think I'll go to bed. Night."
"Night."
She slowly stood up and went to the bathroom. A lot of death. Really.
