Chapter 13
The third day Charlie was in the hospital, a Sunday, Megan and Colby met Larry and Amita at the Eppes house. Colby had already moved the desk, and all the papers and books he could find in Charlie's room, out into the hallway. The afternoon before, so that the professors wouldn't have to see it, he and David had borrowed a pick-up, and dragged the blood-stained mattress and box springs down the stairs, out to the landfill. Today, David and his wife would shop for replacements.
Larry and Amita sat in the hallway, poring over Charlie's papers, trying to devine or devise some sort of system. Megan was in the bedroom, taping off the baseboards, the closet, the door and window frames. Colby was in the backyard, near the koi pond, sandpapering blood off Charlie's bed frame, so that he could paint it. Later, he would help Megan paint the room. While it all dried, he would assemble the free-standing bookcases. Hopefully David would be here by then. Or maybe Larry understood in whatever language the assembly instructions had been written.
Megan popped the lid off the can of paint. Yesterday, while Colby and David were dealing with the bed, she had applied primer to the wall. She wanted to make sure the sunny yellow covered the blood. She was used to blood. She didn't want Larry and Amita to see it, today.
She was used to blood.
Just not Charlie's blood.
They were shell-shocked, all of them. The "hardened" FBI agents still understood family — they would feel for their team leader, even if it hadn't felt like Charlie was one of them, too. Larry had known Charlie for years — he was one of Charlie's professors when the young genius had come to college as a student, and now he was one of Charlie's colleagues as they both came to college as teachers. Amita had known him a shorter period of time, but her admiration for him as a mentor, as a man…her feelings for him ran deeper than even she acknowledged.
As the day progressed, they helped each other begin the process of healing. Colby recalled the story Don had told him about Charlie, who was afraid of needles, passing out at a flu shot clinic. Megan remembered the "vacation" he and Don had worked so hard for, just a few months ago, when Charlie had come back with everything from a broken foot to a black eye. Larry had the misfortune of being one of the people who had tried to teach 16-year-old Charlie to drive, and his recitation of the ensuing comedy of errors soon had Amita in tears. Her friend sat beside her on the floor, passed her another paper for her stack on cognitive emergence, and took the opportunity to smile, briefly rub her hand. The tone of the afternoon became protective. They created reasons to touch each other, silently exchange a smile.
After David and Colby took the new mattress and box springs out of the borrowed pick-up, he helped with the shelves, installed the blinds his wife had chosen for the window, hung the valance she had sewn last night. With all of them working together, it wasn't even dark yet as they began to re-load the room. When it was over, and they had cleaned up, they found they weren't ready to give up the comfort of each other. They sat in the Eppes back yard, and watched the sun set. For the most part, they were silent.
"It will come up again," Megan suddenly said in the dark. "The sun will shine again."
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Don looked at his brother. The brown eyes were finally really open, and Charlie had been able to speak some, but it was obviously painful. Still, he wanted to do this while their father was out of the room. Don had convinced him to take a break, at least go to the cafeteria for coffee. "Charlie…what's the last thing you remember?"
His brother closed his eyes. "Lunch. With Colby." He opened them again. "I don't even remember my afternoon classes."
Don nodded. "That's ok. The doctor said that would happen."
Charlie didn't look reassured. "Why won't anyone tell me what happened?" He shifted a little in the bed, involuntarily moaned and closed his eyes again as the wave of dizziness threatened to pull him back under. All too soon, he was looking at Don once more. "Dad said I hurt my head. I have a concussion." He tried to raise his hand toward his temple, but it fell back to the bed weakly even before Don could grab it. "How? When?"
Charlie's agitation was concerning Don. "Don't worry about that, now. You're in the hospital, we're with you, it's going to be all right. Let yourself get some more rest."
"Everyone seems so sad," Charlie murmured, "everything is so mixed up." He raised his eyes from the bed to look at Don again. "I don't know what I did wrong." His voice took on a plea. "Please tell me. I'll fix it. I'm sorry." He was thrashing by now, unable to stop the pain in the head, unable to distinguish it from the pain in his heart, and Don stood to touch Charlie's face.
"Shh. Relax. Listen to me, Charlie. Everything will be all right." His voice was quiet, his hand brushed away the tears. "Trust me, Charlie, you'll be fine." He kept talking until his brother fell asleep.
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That evening, after over 24 hours of bedside vigil and sleeping in hospital chairs, he finally convinced his father to let him take him home. "Remember what the doctor said, that first night," Don reminded Alan. "We need to take care of ourselves now, so that we can take care of Charlie later."
When he pulled the SUV into the driveway, Alan still seemed reluctant.
"I'll stay tonight, if you want."
Alan ran a hand over his face. "It's not that I'm afraid, you understand. I just need to take care of someone. Make someone breakfast. Preferably a son. "
"I know, Dad." Don swallowed, decided that if nothing else, he would learn some kind of openness and honesty from all this. "Maybe I need to be taken care of, too. By my father."
Exhausted, the two headed immediately up the stairs, hoping they could sleep. Charlie's door stood halfway open, and the smell of paint assailed them. Don approached it slowly, swung the door wide, saw the room cleaner and neater than he ever had. His eyes wandered to where the blood should be.
"I didn't even think," said his father, behind his shoulder. "I didn't even think that we should do this. That we couldn't bring him home to…that."
"This is amazing," Don said. "Who did all this?"
There was silence for a while.
"People who love us," Alan finally answered. "People who love Charlie."
They stood there, in the open door, and let the fragrance of love surround them.