Chapter 19.
Mike was not having an easy time. He thought so himself. Not that he voiced it in any way. He couldn't. When he woke up he just laid there. He didn't feel like getting up at all, and he was pretty sure that it was Sunday today, so he didn't really have to get up anyway.
He remembered everything about yesterday and this night. He just felt super embarrassed right now. The worst part was that Harvey had walked in on one of his nightmares. Sure, right then and there he had been so thankful that Harvey had come, because he had been scared out of his mind. He remembered the fear and the uncertainty of waking up and not knowing what was real and not. Harvey had been real, and he had showed him what else that was, and he had really helped. That didn't mean that he felt good about it now, no it was the opposite. So embarrassing. He had been crying and telling Harvey that someone was outside the window. Harvey had even gone and looked out the window for him last night. It was just like his dad did when he was four and was afraid of monsters under the bed. Nothing is there Mike, no monsters, he had said. Just as he had believed his dad then, he believed Harvey yesterday.
He didn't want to leave this room at all today if it meant having to confront Harvey. He would most certainly bring it up as well. He couldn't stop himself from groaning and throwing a pillow over his face. Maybe he could just stay in here? But who was he kidding? No way would Harvey let him. He would come in and check on him for sure. At least it was worth a try.
Harvey came knocking two hours later.
"There is no way you are still sleeping." He said after stepping in to the room.
"I was trying to." Harvey ignored him.
"You want breakfast or not? If you don't get up now I will put it away."
"Fine…" Mike groaned and sat up. Harvey paused in the doorway and watched him. "You good?" He asked. Mike nodded and smiled a little. He felt himself blushing, but Harvey didn't say anything about it.
In fact they didn't talk about it at all, and if Harvey wouldn't bring it up, Mike sure as hell wouldn't either. He was just glad to avoid any awkward moments he could. The day passed pretty fast. Harvey was working, Mike helped him a bit, until he got tired and snuck away for a nap when Harvey wasn't paying attention.
Come Monday morning Mike went to the hospital. He didn't have treatment, but was scheduled for a consultation and some tests. The test went without problem. He felt kind of used to it by now, and knew what to do. Not that he had to do much, just what they told him. Hold his arm out, move to his side, lay still, take deep breaths, nothing new.
"Do you have anything you would like us to talk about Mike?" Dr Lundin asked him when they were seated in his office having discussed treatment for about forty minutes.
Mike shrugged his shoulders. He had a few things he wanted to discuss. On the way over there he had gone through it in his mind, but now when he was sitting there on the uncomfortable chair, he didn't know how to start.
"How is your appetite?" He was asked.
"I don't know. I eat."
"That's good. Appetite might easily get effected by the treatment you are receiving."
Mike just nodded. The doctor shifted on his seat, and got closer to him.
"You know you can ask me anything Mike." He said. Mike looked up at him, and nodded.
"Well…" He started. "I have been having trouble sleeping." He confessed.
"Okay, do you have trouble falling asleep, or do you wake up during the night?"
"Both." Mike took a deep breath. Here it comes. "The thing is that I don't really like to sleep at all. I get kind of worked up when it's time to sleep, and I start thinking about all of these things and I just can't calm down." He paused. He didn't really want to confess more, but he did. "I get so upset that I…Mostly I start to…eh…cry." There he had said it.
"I see. Look, Mike it's nothing to be ashamed about. It happens to a lot of people. Anxiety is perfectly normal for someone in your position."
"Yeah, but I don't want to do it. Or have it. It's exhausting. I freak out every night."
"Do you feel scared?"
"What?" Mike felt himself blushing even more. Dr Lundin just looked at him with a serious expression. "Yes." He admitted.
"But at the same time I know that there is nothing to be afraid of, but I still…" he paused, suddenly he felt like crying right then and there. He had to bit his lip. "I don't know why." he finished, not looking up.
"Do you feel like that on other occasions as well, Mike?"
He nodded.
"I understand. It can't be easy for you."
Mike didn't want to talk anymore. "What do I do?" He whispered pathetically.
"We will look into it, Mike. Probably there is some side effects, but also your situation matters of course."
Mike nodded again. They talked a bit more about the drugs he was receiving and went through possibly side effects for each of them. Mike had already done it himself, but he was able to get more information now from the doctor. In his mind he narrowed it down to which medications that was likely to cause him feeling bad. He also told him about the nightmares, and the despair he felt sometimes without any explanation. It felt a bit better to actually talk about it, even if he hadn't intended to do so at first. The other man wasn't judging him, or laughing, so it felt okay to do it. They decided to have another appointment in a few days to talk more about the whole thing.
Mike was pretty tired when he got to the office. He stopped and talked to Donna for a long time, and told her about the hospital visit. Not about his anxiety though. He couldn't believe he had that. He had never thought of himself as even capable of getting something like that. But he had known for some time now that his emotional state wasn't what it used to be. Donna was so nice to him, even gave him a hug before he went into Harvey's office. Maybe he looked like he needed one.
"It went okay?" Harvey asked.
"Yeah, it was alright. I have another appointment on Thursday." Mike answered.
"You look like crap." Harvey said to him, but he was smiling.
"So do you." Mike told him and dropped down on the couch with a few briefs.
– SUITS –
Harvey was working on an important case. He knew that it would take up a lot of his time in the near future, and to be honest it kind of worried him. The case would force him to work long hours and to be focused. Something that he really wasn't at the moment. A lot of his focus went to a certain person that was now sitting on his couch in his too big of a suit. The kid had lost weight in the last couple of weeks, and the suit he was wearing today didn't look good on him at all. It kind of bothered Harvey. Not that it was Mike's fault of course. It was probably like that with all of his suits now, and it didn't feel right to bring it up with Mike. Maybe he should surprise him some day and take him to Renee, his tailor.
"What?" Mike was looking at him now, and Harvey realized that he had been staring at the kid for some time now.
"Nothing. Get back to work."
"I was working. You were the one staring at me."
"It's your tie. It's so ugly I can't stop myself."
"Haha very funny." Mike rolled his eyes and went back to his papers.
The two of them went out for lunch together. Harvey claimed it was because he wanted to avoid Louis, since Jessica had stopped by earlier and told him that Louis would be joining his case.
"He is going to want to come and talk." Harvey said as he pushed Mike towards the elevator.
"So you are running away?"
"You are welcome to stay and talk to him in my place." Harvey offered.
"No thanks. I rather go and eat with you." He said sincerely, putting an end to Harvey's joke he had on the tip of his tongue about Mike replacing Donna.
"Good." He said instead.
Mike barely ate anything at lunch. He just sat and picked at his food, moved it around on the plate. At first Harvey decided not to say anything, but it did annoy him that Mike wasn't eating when he had taken him out for lunch. It wasn't something they did often, and it was Harvey's treat. The least thing Mike could do was to actually eat the food he had ordered. He couldn't stop himself.
"Is it something wrong with that?"
"What? No. It's good." Mike said.
"How do you know? You are not eating it!"
"Yes I am." Mike argued back, of course he did. "I just…" he paused. "I'm not really hungry." He finished lamely.
"Well, eat anyway." Harvey told him.
"Easy for you to say."
"Yes it is actually. We are not leaving until you finish that."
"What? You can't do that."
"Watch me!"
Mike was not interested in doing so however. He put his fork down harder than necessary and stood up and left.
"Mike!" Harvey called after him, causing the other people in the restaurant to look over towards him. Harvey quietly swore and went after the kid. He caught up with Mike by the door and grabbed his arm to stop him.
"Let me go Harvey!" Mike pulled his arm out of Harvey's grip and opened the door.
"What the hell are you doing?" Harvey told him as he started walking next to Mike.
"Nothing. Leaving."
"You are acting like a child."
"Unlike to you then, who's acting like a damn mum. I'm surprised you didn't start to count to three."
"Yeah, I bet you have a lot of experience from countdowns! You as a kid must have been insufferable if you act like this now."
"No, I wasn't!" Harvey stopped himself from his comeback at the tone of Mike's voice. Shit! He had taken it too far.
"I wasn't." Mike repeated and Harvey had to swallow his need of getting the last word. It had gotten too far for Mike and he sounded genuinely upset.
"Okay." He said and decided to drop the whole thing. If Mike didn't want to eat that was his problem. Yeah, he could tell himself that all he wanted. Mike was sick, he needed to eat.
They didn't talk any more during the way back to the office. Harvey glanced at Mike when the kid wasn't aware of it, and Mike looked tired and absent. Like he was lost in thought. Which he probably was, so Harvey let him be.
Mike wanted to go and work in his cubicle when they got back, and Harvey didn't object. Donna questioned him about what happened. She of course knew that something was up. He just told her that Mike didn't really eat, and she said she would take care of it. Harvey didn't really found out if she did or not.
Mike didn't talk much at all, and during dinner that night he ate everything he had on his plate, Harvey wasn't sure if he did it just to prove a point or not. In any case he wouldn't really meet Harvey's eyes, and only answered direct questions.
Hopefully the next day would be better. They were taking things one day at the time after all. However, Harvey had a feeling that things were about to get worse. It was just a feeling he had. He felt like something had to change. There was a kind of tension between him and Mike that he didn't want, and he was pretty sure neither did Mike. He would try and do something about it tomorrow. Try to talk to the kid probably.
– SUITS –
Mike was exhausted when he woke up the next morning. As usual he hadn't slept well at all. Last night he couldn't stop thinking about the comment Harvey had made about him being insufferable as a kid. He knew that Harvey had only been joking but he couldn't get it out of his mind. It had him think about his parents, what it would have been like if they were still alive. He thought about that often, but last night it kind of broke him. He felt so bad when he lay there pressed against the pillows, looking for some kind of comfort. The thoughts just spun out of his control. He thought about everything he had lost, and he thought about the things he most likely wouldn't be able to do. Because he was fucking dying! He just hated everything about the cancer, how it made him feel. He was so scared all the time, and it was so hard to control his emotions. They were all over the place all the time, though he thought he did a pretty nice job with keeping them under control. It was just hard. At night, alone in his room was the only time he let them flow out as they wanted. He was just so tired of feeling so bad every night. He really had to do something about it soon.
During the day he noticed that Harvey was acting kind of weird. He was really nice to him in the morning and at first Mike thought that maybe Harvey had heard him break down last night. But he couldn't understand why Harvey hadn't come in to him then. If he knew that Mike was upset, why the hell wouldn't he come and ask what was wrong. How hard was that? Mike couldn't stop himself for feeling angry at Harvey. The other man kept on preaching about how he was at his side in all of this, but when he had needed him he didn't show up.
He didn't want to be angry at Harvey, because after all Harvey was the only one who was helping him at all, except for Donna. But didn't he see that Mike was hurting? Why didn't he do anything, or say anything? He just asked him if he had slept well, and Mike didn't answer. Was he serious?
Harvey offered Mike to come with him on a meeting with a pretty important client. The new one, on the case that Harvey just had started.
"You trust me to not screw up then?" He had asked, and Harvey looked surprised.
"Yeah. Or what are you talking about? Do you not feel good?"
"Whatever. I'm not going."
"Why not?" Harvey looked mad. "What's wrong with you? Before you would have been thrilled about me taking you."
"Exactly, Harvey. Before. Now, I don't want to come."
Harvey puffed and shook his head at him. "I don't get you." He said. "Fine. Stay here then. Do as Donna says." And then he left without another glance at Mike. He regretted his attitude at once. He almost wanted to run after Harvey and apologize. Why was he acting like a dick? Donna stopped him though.
"Are you in pain Mike?" She worriedly asked.
"No, I'm fine Donna."
"You can tell me if you aren't, you know. I won't tell Harvey if that is what you are concerned about."
"No, I'm not in pain right now." He tried to reassure her. She looked like she didn't believe a word he was saying. He did what she said after that.
It was a bit awkward the moment when Harvey came back from his meeting two hours later. Mike was still in his office when Harvey walked in. Mike's plan had been to sneak away to his cubicle before his boss came back, but he didn't expect Harvey so soon.
"You good?" Harvey asked him, Mike who was expecting a yelling just nodded.
"How was the meeting?" he asked, and Harvey told him all about it.
Then worked in silence for a while after that. After lunch Mike had to leave for the hospital. They called him and told him that they had an opening for a test they had wanted to take and asked if he could come for a while. He didn't really feel like going there though. He wanted to ask Harvey to come with him, and he sat for a few minutes debating on how to fraise the question. But before he could, Harvey told him that he had a meeting and asked if Mike wanted to catch a ride with him and Ray. He agreed, and Harvey said to call or text him when he was done and they could also pick him up after. It was the best he could get apparently.
Mike didn't say a word to Harvey in the car. He didn't feel good. He felt upset and sad. It would have been so nice to have company at the hospital for once. He always went there alone. He noticed that Harvey threw him glances from the other side of the car, but he pretended not to see it, and Harvey didn't say anything. At least Harvey wished him good luck when he stepped out of the car.
He was having an MRI, which wasn't something he enjoyed. This time however he managed to actually fall asleep inside the machine after just a few minutes. They woke him when he was done and helped him to get dressed in his normal clothes again.
Mike called Harvey from the hospital lobby. He didn't pick up. He waited for five signals before it turned to voice mail.
"Hi Harvey. I'm finished now. Eh…call me."
He hang up. How long would he have to wait here now? Why didn't he pick up? What if Harvey had forgotten about him?
People were walking past him where he sat. There was a family with two kids on a couch next to him, a couple in two chairs across from him. No one seemed to be there alone, except him. He wanted to get out of there. He held his phone in his hand and looked at it, wishing that it would ring. It didn't, and he felt like crying. Tears actually rose in his eyes, but he wouldn't let them fall. Not in this room full of people. He guessed he could catch a cab back to the office, but Harvey had told him that they would pick him up. He wanted to go with Harvey.
"Are you on your way?"
He texted Harvey after fifteen minutes of waiting. He didn't get a reply.
"Harvey?"
He texted again after another fifteen minutes. He had to be careful when he blinked now, he didn't want the tears to flood over. Someone would probably come up to him and ask him what was wrong if he started crying in the middle of the room.
Harvey didn't call him back or anything, but then suddenly he was just standing there next to him.
"You ready to go?" He asked, causing Mike to jerk in the chair.
"Where were you?" He asked and stood up, blinking hard. Harvey studied him closely and looked concerned.
"You got some bad news?" He said, ignoring Mike's question.
"No! Let's just go." He brushed passed Harvey and headed for the door.
"The meeting dragged out." Harvey explained.
"You couldn't have called!?" Mike turned to face him. "I thought you had forgotten!" he was almost screaming. The tears were gone now and replaced with anger.
"I didn't forget Mike. It just took a bit longer than I thought that's all. Are you okay?" They stared at each other for a moment until Mike broke eye contact and went over to the waiting car.
They worked for the rest of the day and nothing special happened. They left pretty early on Harvey's suggestion.
Later that night Mike was in bed desperately trying to fall asleep. He felt so messed up. He didn't know why he felt like this. It was so confusing to not know. Somehow he just wished that he had a reason. He tried to rationalize with himself that he did have a reason. He was deadly sick after all. But there was nothing special that had happened today. It had been a pretty okay day after all, except for the hospital visit. He had gone to lunch with Donna to some new opened Vegie restaurant. He had tried to convince her that he needed meat in his diet, but she had talked for five minutes about the benefits of tofu, until he just agreed with her to get her to stop.
But now he felt like crap. Harvey and Mike had been watching a movie, one of the Iron man movies, and Harvey kept arguing that he was like Iron man. I have all that he has he said, nice condo, nice suits. It had been nice a nice evening. Now Mike felt like crying his eyes out. He was lying on his nice bed in the dark, and he felt himself starting to shake. His breathing started to hitch as well. He needed to calm down. Nothing was wrong.
But that thought was wrong! Everything was wrong! Noting was right. He just wanted to scream right then. Just scream until he felt better, until something changed, until this damn whole in his chest could be filled with something else other than fear, anxiety and despair.
He didn't scream. He laid as still as he could and tried to hold it in. Trying to force his body to stop shaking. Tears pooled down his cheeks and he didn't care. Something had to change. He didn't want to feel like this. He didn't want to! He started to cry in earnest then. He buried his face in the pillows to muffle the sound. He didn't want Harvey to hear.
What if Harvey did hear him? Would he come? Would he help? He hadn't yesterday. Mike wanted him to come so badly. But he didn't think Harvey would. Harvey couldn't give him what he wanted. He was longing for something he could never have. Mike was longing for comfort. Just some sort. He wanted help. Help from someone else. Anyone really. He didn't feel like he could fight through this by himself. Not anymore. But he was too afraid to ask the people around him for what he really wanted, needed. He was afraid to ask Harvey. He felt like he couldn't. And what if Harvey didn't want to? Mike didn't think that Harvey would say it straight out, but he was afraid that he would show it somehow in the way he acted. Mike didn't want to force Harvey to do something that he didn't wanted to do.
He was going to change something tomorrow. He refused to go through this tomorrow night as well. His doctor had told him that it probably was side effects all of this, his messed up emotional change. What if he just for one day didn't take the damn pills? He knew of course which ones he really needed, but he figured that one night without a few of them wouldn't be a big deal. He really thought it was worth a try. What if he actually could fall asleep in a reasonable way instead of crying himself to exhaustion and falling asleep of that? He would try tomorrow. Just to see what happened, and then he could tell his doctor about it on Thursday and maybe he could help him to change something. It was a plan. Not a great one, but it was something. At the moment anything was good enough for him, he couldn't feel like this anymore. He was going to crack. He had no idea what would happen then, but he didn't want to find out either.
– SUITS –
Hey there! I hope you like this chapter. Actually it was supposed to go together with the next chapter but it got way to long. I have started to explore Mike's emotions a bit more now. He is really not feeling that great. Sometime he is bound to fall a part a little bit. This chapter is leading up to that. Hope you enjoyed it!