A/N: warnings for revictimization by a family member and discussion of csa in later chapters. title of fic + chapters lifted from "bone" by mary oliver. please leave a review!


Self-perception, and lack thereof, and noise, and an overabundance thereof. Faces point towards the space his body occupies but he isn't there. He doesn't recognize the people moving around him, coaxing him, laying static-numb-tingling hands on his body. He wants to flinch but cannot. Everything felt real moments ago and now reality is gone, dissolved, whatever he's made of is reduced to splinters.

Someone shakes him by the shoulders and he wants to cry. He's scared, somewhere. Outside of his body, he's scared. The hands leave but he's still not—he doesn't understand, where is he, what is happening, is someone going to hurt him? Will he feel it? He hopes he feels it, he needs to feel it, if he doesn't feel it he can't run from it. He feels nothing. The forest is gray with light and red with blood.

His body is somewhere else, now. It's less noisy, and he's sitting down. Someone sits across from him and their mouth moves and their eyes fill with tears and they leave the room and he is alone. The person comes back dry-eyed. They ask him questions, and he answers them, and his body answers them, until his body decides it can't anymore and it's time to shut down.

Now again he moves. His body is lying down and he drifts somewhere above it. People come and go. Light shifts, gleams through the window, darkens and slants in moments' time. There are always people around. They talk to his body, with its open vacant eyes. They want to break through. He's always being told that he needs to let people in, learn how to ask for help. He will. This has happened before and it will pass. He'll talk then.

His body doesn't have much volition of its own. It can be guided, it is susceptible to suggestion, it has rudimentary autopilot. It will swallow the food that is put in its mouth. It will stand and move to the bathroom when it must. It will stay upright when it is moved that way. It will continue to breathe so long as these people continue to take care of the rest. He will not disappear. He feels on the brink of it.

Again, his body is somewhere else. He wasn't around to see it move. He is outside, he thinks, because he can feel—yes, on his face, he feels his face, and the sun, and the breeze, and he tilts his chin up—

His body is lying down again in the same place as before. He is not above it, perhaps just beside it, maybe half-in and half-out. Light cycles through the room from watery pink dawn to thick golden dusk into blue night. Again this happens. There are people around. He wants to go outside again. If he gets back to his body he can ask. Someone is holding his body's hand. His body listens, and he gives the hand a squeeze.

They let his body outside again. His body is in a wheelchair. It won't walk on its own without explicit purpose. Someone pushes the wheelchair through a sunny park and someone else walks along with them, talking. For a moment, he is there too. His name is Malcolm Bright, for a moment. His mother is the one walking beside him. He tries to open his mouth. Nothing happens. That's alright. This has happened before. Perhaps not this severely. Perhaps not for so long. But it will pass, all the same.

His body is back in the room to watch more light pass. He's mostly inside his body. It isn't working, though, isn't responding when he asks it to do things. He tries to replicate his orders from before to move his head, to clench his fist, to stand and move somewhere else. He is struck by frustration and he gasps with the force of feeling, coughs until whatever just got stuck in his chest is dislodged. Still he can't move, even with people crowding him, asking him, touching him.

He's missing something.

Another cycle of light spins by, and he can't place what it is. His name is Malcolm Bright, and he usually knows that, now. He's not well, and he's known that the whole time. He's going to get better, and he knows that too, though he's starting to get nervous about the prospect. Being nervous feels normal so he leans into it. Being nervous means he's feeling something.

What did he do the last time this happened? It was a long time ago. His mother was there then, too. What sped the process along? What made him come back into himself? He doesn't want to wait. He's bad at waiting.

While he watches the light again, and again, and again, and again, things he sees come to have more meaning. He's in a hospital, he must be. It's not as terrible as it usually is. He's being treated gently. No one raises their voice at him even though he should be able to feed himself now, at least. No one tells him he's a burden or overreacting or weak. He's not sure why anyone would tell him those things. He doesn't think anyone has told him those things before.

The people around him are often people he knows but he can't place them. They don't tell him he's stupid and broken for being unable to recognize them. He doesn't think they would say anything like that to him, anyway. Maybe these are things he tells himself. He doesn't know why he would feel that way about himself. He doesn't know himself.


He knows his mother. At least, he sees a woman, and he knows she's his mother.

It's in the clear sweet afternoon light that Malcolm sees her, and, quite abruptly, knows her. She is talking animatedly and Malcolm is propped up in the hospital bed and he tells his head to turn and it lulls to the side, lets him catch her directly in his sight, and she stops talking. She looks at him, eyes wide, her own head tilting, her breath stalled. He opens his mouth to say something and nothing comes out.

"Malcolm?" she whispers, hopeful.

He has to answer. If he doesn't answer he'll lose this moment and he doesn't want to lose this moment, he doesn't want to drift away again, he wants to stay. "Please stay," he rasps, and again, "please stay, please."

Her lips part, her brows crease, she scoots closer to him and she grasps his hand in hers. "I'm not going anywhere," she says fiercely, tears spilling over. Her other hand comes up to frame his face, to thumb through his own tears. "Darling, sweetheart, Malcolm, I'm right here. I am right here and I'm not leaving."

Malcolm drifts. He can't stay for long. That will get easier, he can feel it getting easier. He's getting better.

The next time he is present, the light is thin and gray, an overcast morning. Gil sits at his bedside. Malcolm recognizes Gil. Gil is steadfast, warm, the most reliable person Malcolm has ever known. Malcolm says nothing, just stares. Gil must sense something—some change in the air—and he glances up from his phone to catch Malcolm's eye. Slowly, like he might disturb the moment should he move too fast, Gil pockets his phone and leans forward in his chair. "Malcolm," he says. "Can you hear me?"

Malcolm wets his lips, nods. He's here. He's still here. Please stay.

Gil smiles so widely, so genuinely. Like he's proud. Malcolm always liked when Gil was proud of him. "That's great, kid," Gil says, rough and low. "Jessica told me you spoke yesterday, doctors said you've been more active. You're really pulling through, huh?" His big hands hold Malcolm's own. Gil is crying. Malcolm hasn't seen him cry since Jackie died. Malcolm wants to hug him. "I knew you would. You're the strongest man I know, Malcolm."

There's no way that's true, but Malcolm doesn't tell him that. Instead he tries to smile, and halfway succeeds, based on Gil's chuckle. "How long?" Malcolm asks, which makes Gil's smile drop away. Malcolm is good at doing that.

"You've been here a couple weeks," Gil answers. A beat of silence, in which Malcolm focuses everything in him on the feeling of Gil's callused thumb stroking over his knuckles. "Can you give me some idea of what's going on in your head, kid?"

Malcolm shrugs. There's not much going on at all.

"Doctors say you're dissociating. But that's… I mean, I've seen you like that before. This is different."

"Depersonalization," Malcolm says. "Derealization. Catatonia. Akinetic mutism, maybe."

Gil's hands squeeze. "Okay," he says, but he seems frightened. "Okay. Those are some big, scary words, right there. Can you help me understand?"

No, Malcolm wants to laugh. "Keep floating away," he says. "Like nothing's real."

Gil waits for him to continue, but Malcolm can think of nothing else to say. When the silence stretches for several moments, Gil sighs and shifts his weight closer. "Are you in pain?" he asks, quiet, impressing upon Malcolm the seriousness of the question.

Malcolm has to think about it. He's not physically injured. Most of his brain feels like empty white space, static and sucking like the foam in a sound-proof room. There's a yawning emptiness inside him. "I don't know," he says, apologetic, suddenly halfway to tearing up. "I'm sorry, I don't know."

The sad smile Gil gives him feels painfully familiar. "That's okay," he says. "You don't have to know, alright?" He squeezes Malcolm's hand, holds it tight. "What do you need, kid? How can I help?"

That's a much easier question. "Please stay," Malcolm begs. The world has begun to feel gauzy again, warped through cellophane. He wishes someone was holding his other hand, too, wishes someone would hold him down and press him back into his body.

Gil shushes him gently, because Malcolm can't stop repeating that same plaintive request. "I'm staying, Mal, I promise. I'm right here. I'm with you."

Malcolm drifts. Light changes. He has a nightmare when he apparently falls asleep. It isn't a particularly bad one, just enough to shake him awake with a startled gasp. He lies still and breathes, tetherless in the blue dark. No one is there with him. There are comfortably padded chairs at his bedside, and they're empty.

This is the most present he's felt this whole time. There's a tingle of sensation down his spine, an urge to move. Malcolm tries to sit up, and finds himself wholly incapable of doing so consciously. He feels weak, brittle inside, and the desire to be active disappears as quickly as it came. He collapses back and stares at the ceiling. He's in the hospital. His mother and Gil visit him. It's been a few weeks since s̢̀͘͜ò͜m̶̕͟͡è̶̸̛̛t̡͏h́҉ì̵̷͜ń̸҉g̶͘͠ ̀͢͞t̸́҉̢é̶͞r̡͟͏̡r̵̨i̧͘b̷̶͢͞l̶̡è̢͜ ̸̵̡̀̕h̵́̀͘͠a̶̸p̵͟ṕ͘é̛͠͞ņ̴͘͝e͢͟͞͞d̵͘̕͢.̀

Malcolm blinks. His ears ring. There are three windows along the wall to his right, and in the second one he can see the glow of the moon. Waxing crescent, full enough to spill silvery light over the city below. Malcolm hadn't noticed the view before. He hadn't noticed much of anything. There aren't any monitors or medical devices in the room. With his right hand he feels around the side of the bed, seeking out a lever. He finds it and pulls, slowly sitting himself up.

His head swims. He knows, logically, that he's been sitting up most of the day, even standing and walking without assistance. There's nothing wrong with his body. Waxy flexibility, his poor static-white brain supplies, the body is malleable in a catatonic state. Move the limbs, and they will stay where they are positioned. Some non-automatic processes may be conserved. It's been weeks since he's been in control and it feels foreign.

Malcolm lets himself adjust to the new position. The room doesn't have the stifling antiseptic atmosphere he's used to from hospitals, and though he can't make out the color scheme in the dark, he can see that there are flower arrangements populating any open surface. He wants to touch them, run his fingers over soft petals. Maybe he'll ask a nurse when they come around. It occurs to him that the request could be seen as strange and he decides against it.

For however long, Malcolm sits in bed, and he stares out in front of him. Perhaps he's not in full possession of all his faculties if this is how he's content to spend his time. A notion occurs to him and he raises one hand to his face—and finds it clean-shaven. He touches his hair then, sure enough finding it unstyled but clean and no longer than he remembers it. He's dressed in his own clothes, soft sweatpants and an old v-neck. His hand begins to shake, and he lowers it back to the sheets. Guilt and shame roll over him. Who's been taking care of him? His mother, Gil, the doctors? They shouldn't have had to do that.

At some point, a young nurse makes her rounds and does a double take when she sees Malcolm sitting up in his bed. She's quick to engage him, asking how he's feeling and if he wants her to call anybody. He can't manage much more than a polite smile and head shake for her. It's surely too late to bother anybody. For an absurd moment he wants to ask the nurse to stay, but holds back. She's reluctant to leave him; he waves her on her way.

The nurse checks on him a few more times throughout the night, brings him water and helps him drink it, asks if he wants the television on or something to read. If she can please call his family. Malcolm politely refuses. He doesn't want to be any trouble, and besides, he's no use to anyone like this. He should focus all his energy on getting back to normal. Not that normal was great, but normal wasn't—this. Normal wasn't blankness.

The light changes as Malcolm watches. Blue gives way to gray gives way to pink, parallel slats of sky pouring in through the windows. He hears voices down the hall before he sees anyone. He hears his mother, her frantically pitched worry that the poor nurse is trying her best to soothe. Then he hears Gil, too, his voice far too low to be intelligible, but whatever he says wrings a startled laugh out of Jessica.

The door to Malcolm's room opens, and his mother steps in. She sees him and the grin that lights her face makes Malcolm express what he hopes is a decent approximation. She approaches his bedside and takes his face in her hands—she stares into his eyes for a moment, then draws him close to kiss the top of his head, his temple, then she just holds him.

It takes a long time for Malcolm's limbs to do what he wants them to, but eventually his right hand comes up to hold her elbow, his left to clutch at the back of her blouse, and he buries his face in her shoulder. His entire body is trembling, from the activity, from the waiting, from the dizzying relief of getting a hug from his mom. He heaves a sigh that sounds wrecked to his own ears, and which very nearly morphs into a sob with his mother's comforting shushing in his ear.

Gil's warm hand rests on Malcolm's back, drifting upwards to rub at the nape of his neck, then down to glide over his shoulders. Jessica pulls back enough to look Malcolm in the eye again, a change that makes his throat tighten until she begins petting his hair. "Why didn't you have your nurse call someone, Malcolm?" she asks, fondly exasperated and earnest. "We would've been here in minutes, you didn't need to sit and wait alone."

Malcolm frowns. "It was the middle of the night."

"And you were catatonic for three weeks," his mother retorts, unimpressed. She's gazing at him, taking in how slow he's moving and speaking, the confused guilt on his face as he wracks his poor broken brain for something to say. "That's alright, baby," she soothes him, "it's alright, we're here now, yeah? And I'm so happy to see you."

Malcolm smiles, closing his eyes and leaning into the hand that now cradles his cheek. "Um," he says, scrunching his brows as he remembers the question he wanted to ask. "Where—where am I?"

Gil speaks up from behind Malcolm, "Oak River Psychiatric Hospital."

"Okay," Malcolm nods. He had inpatient treatment here as a teenager when things got really bad. It's a nice place, which he supposes is sort of the point. "I'm not strapped down," he says.

Jessica pulls a chair up close to his bedside and settles down, resuming her position leaned in closer with one hand stroking Malcolm's hair and the other holding his hand. It all feels so nice, especially when Gil takes a seat on his other side and clasps a hand on Malcolm's knee. "Yes, well," Jessica begins with a grimace, "you've been…"

"Catatonic," Malcolm finishes. "What happened?"

Neither his mother nor Gil say anything. They look at each other, then at Malcolm, then away, then at each other again. "It's a long story," Gil says eventually. He sounds tired, but he looks up at Malcolm with a kind smile. "Let's wait until you feel better, okay?"

Malcolm watches his mother. She hasn't looked back at him yet, instead staring out the window over Gil's shoulder with an unreadable look. Familiar anxiety takes its customary place at the forefront of Malcolm's perception. "Did I do something?" he asks, and his mother twitches. "Mother, what did I…?"

Jessica scoffs and rolls her eyes with typical theatricity, even though she looks seconds away from bursting into tears. "You and your guilt complex!" she exclaims, striving for normalcy. She falls painfully short. "Would it be so horrible to accept for once that something isn't your fault?" Her voice rises at the end, and Malcolm flinches.

"Jessica," Gil says in warning. Malcolm swallows hard, trying to wrestle the stress response back under control.

A heavy moment passes, and when Malcolm summons the courage to look up he finds his mother dabbing tears off her face. "I'm so sorry, my love," she says, and she pets his arm, and she seems thoroughly worn out. "You deserve better than this. You shouldn't have to worry about a thing. Yes, s̢̀͘͜ò͜m̶̕͟͡è̶̸̛̛t̡͏h́҉ì̵̷͜ń̸҉g̶͘͠ ̀͢͞t̸́҉̢é̶͞r̡͟͏̡r̵̨i̧͘b̷̶͢͞l̶̡è̢͜ ̸̵̡̀̕h̵́̀͘͠a̶̸p̵͟ṕ͘é̛͠͞ņ̴͘͝e͢͟͞͞d̵͘̕͢,—"

Malcolm drifts.


He's outside again, and the sun coasts high in the sky of a warm afternoon. Some ornamental tree decidedly not native to New York casts dappled shadows over the pathway with its purplish leaves. Malcolm remembers the park on the grounds of Oak River. It always smells like the tree—sweet, subtle plum. As a teenager it made him feel sick. Now it's comforting, in the way familiar things are. In the way Dani is, looking at Malcolm with such worry.

Malcolm blinks several times, tries to right himself against the tide that keeps sweeping him away. Yes, Dani is here—she kneels in front of his wheelchair and her mouth is moving, but it's not computing yet. JT stands behind her, leaning forward, like he wants to reach out but is holding himself back. A nurse stands off to the side, and he's saying something too. A robin pokes around in the grass, and another one swoops down to land close by, and a breeze rustles the leaves overhead.

Dani squeezes Malcolm's right hand where it trembles in his lap, and Malcolm forces his wandering eyes closed. He breathes in deeply, reels in his senses as best he can. The sweet plum smell is undercut by the scent of Dani's usual lotion, sharp eucalyptus and mint. Dani's thumb traces circles in the center of Malcolm's palm. "Take your time," Dani murmurs.

Eventually Malcolm opens his eyes. The disparate patches of reality have merged into a picture he can understand. Dani is in the center of the picture, and she smiles at him, small and sad. She's unbearably beautiful. Malcolm wants to make her laugh, but he's having trouble remembering how to do that. "Oh, hi," he says, and that works.

For once Malcolm remembers what happened while he drifted. He remembers the remainder of Jessica and Gil's visit, spent with his mother worried she managed to set back Malcolm's recovery irreversibly just by raising her voice. He remembers Gil talking her down before he eventually had to leave for work. She'd stayed with Malcolm for the rest of the morning, only leaving when Dani and JT came to visit and take him on a walk and—here they are now.

"It's good to hear your voice, man," JT says. "And yes, that's the only time I'm ever going to say that."

Malcolm grins. "It's good to see you," he says, still treacle-slow and uncertain-sounding. JT and Dani exchange a glance over Dani's shoulder, which means Malcolm either sounds very strange or has said something worrying. "Unless—have you visited before this? I'm sorry, I don't remember."

Dani gives his hand another squeeze. "It's okay," she soothes. "We visit as often as possible. A few times a week, at least. I come alone on the weekends, too."

Malcolm stares at her for a too-long moment, struggling to make sense of it. "You don't have to do that."

Dani rolls her eyes and exchanges another look with JT, this one much less worried and much more exasperated. "Sure we do," JT says. "You're our boy."

Malcolm can feel his face crumbling before he consciously recognizes that he's been driven to tears. He drops his head immediately, trying to hide what's already been seen. "Jesus—I'm sorry," he mutters, raising his free arm to shield his face. Dani's small hand takes hold of his arm and moves it back to his lap, where she holds both his hands as they shake. Malcolm tries to laugh, one more attempt to brush the whole thing off, but it escapes him as a defeated rush of air. "Sorry," he repeats.

"It's okay," Dani observes his tears unflinchingly, the same way she's always viewed him. She still seems so cold towards him sometimes, but she strapped him into bed days after they first met and she visits him in the hospital and her knees must be hurting her now, certainly, she's been crouching in front of him for the better part of ten minutes.

JT looks stricken, like he's said something wrong, and Malcolm wants to assure him that it's quite the opposite, but can't find a way to verbalize what he's feeling without sounding more devastatingly pathetic than he already does. "I'm okay," Malcolm croaks, catching JT's anxiously wandering eyes. "I just," Malcolm stops, swallows, has to look away, "Thank you." He almost starts crying again, which maxes out his quota for embarrassment.

Blessedly, no one responds. They let Malcolm pull himself together as much as he can. "What, um," Malcolm looks to the nurse, who has been watching closely, no doubt on Jessica's orders. "What medications am I on, exactly?"

"Your usual regimen," the nurse answers, with a careful glance at Malcolm's friends, obviously not certain what Malcolm is okay with them knowing. At Malcolm's encouraging nod, the nurse tacks on, "plus a new antipsychotic."

"You've been on antipsychotics?" JT asks disbelievingly.

"I literally am psychotic," Malcolm answers.

"He literally is psychotic," Dani answers at the same time, with more vitriol.

For a long moment JT stares at the ground with wide eyes. "I genuinely thought that was a slur," he says, then just shakes his head in heroic self-deprecation while his friends laugh at him.

Dani and JT stay for another half an hour, and they talk a lot about nothing. The fluffiest topics imaginable—new science stories they've read or heard about, gossip about Jessica and Gil, and of course JT's baby. Malcolm asks to see pictures, a chance that JT jumps at, and his little boy is predictably beautiful. "I'll have to bring him and Tally to visit next time," JT says, and Malcolm tries to hide the fact that this nearly makes him cry again, and his friends let him think he succeeded.

Even in his current bubble-wrapped reality, Malcolm knows something isn't right. Of course he wants to have normal-people conversations with his friends, but the three of them don't do those conversations. He'd like to, more often, if they'd like to, he would be thrilled—but. They don't. So something is wrong, s̢̀͘͜ò͜m̶̕͟͡è̶̸̛̛t̡͏h́҉ì̵̷͜ń̸҉g̶͘͠ ̀͢͞t̸́҉̢é̶͞r̡͟͏̡r̵̨i̧͘b̷̶͢͞l̶̡è̢͜ ̸̵̡̀̕h̵́̀͘͠a̶̸p̵͟ṕ͘é̛͠͞ņ̴͘͝e͢͟͞͞d̵͘̕͢, and everything is different now.

Dani kisses Malcolm's cheek before she and JT leave. It isn't perfunctory—she lingers, holds him while she does it. He says nothing, overcome, just closes his eyes and leans into her until she pulls away. Even then he can offer nothing more than a watery smile as she says goodbye, promising to visit again tomorrow. Malcolm watches his friends walk away and wishes he could promise to be present when they visit.

The nurse—his badge says his name is Mark—wheels Malcolm back down the path towards the hospital. Malcolm doesn't really want to go back inside. He's very tired now, though, and even the uneasiness taking root inside him can't stop him from drifting away.

The spin of light on days when Malcolm is not present are all he has to orient himself with. Days spent in a bleary half-daze are broken up periodically by ventures into wakefulness, usually brought upon by his own excitement over visitors. It's still difficult for him to speak, so he doesn't, most of the time. He's content to listen and emote and bask in having company.

His pool of visitors is surprisingly large, he thinks. His mother comes every day, of course, and Gil usually does as well. Dani is true to her word on her schedule, and Malcolm cherishes the weekend hours he can spend alone with her, listening to her speak. JT brings his little family along quite often now because Malcolm loves babies, and JT's baby loves Malcolm, so it's turned out to be mutually beneficial. Edrisa likes to stop by after work sometimes, and her presence is surprisingly calming, even when she obviously is being careful of what she says. She sneaks him candy, too.

He misses Ainsley. He asks where she is, once, and then never again, because it makes his mother look very sad. She says Ainsley is busy these days. That's okay. That's fine.


Five weeks into Malcolm's stay, he's working steadily towards greater independence. He's present much of the time he's awake, now, and his night terrors have made a return, as have cuffs locking him to his bed. Movement and speech while he's present are still frustratingly difficult. He pushes himself in physical therapy, lashes out at poor Nurse Mark who's just trying to convince him to take it easy. Mark isn't bothered, thankfully, but Malcolm still apologizes profusely.

Malcolm still doesn't know what happened, why he's here. He doesn't ask because no one wants him to know, obviously, and for once the not knowing isn't a physical presence clawing at his throat. Maybe this is something he really doesn't want to know. Not yet, when he's still so unsteady. He tells his therapist—he misses Gabrielle, but Laura is nice—how frustrated he is with his brain, with his body. She tells him to be patient, just as everyone else does. She says s̢̀͘͜ò͜m̶̕͟͡è̶̸̛̛t̡͏h́҉ì̵̷͜ń̸҉g̶͘͠ ̀͢͞t̸́҉̢é̶͞r̡͟͏̡r̵̨i̧͘b̷̶͢͞l̶̡è̢͜ ̸̵̡̀̕h̵́̀͘͠a̶̸p̵͟ṕ͘é̛͠͞ņ̴͘͝e͢͟͞͞d̵͘̕͢ and Malcolm's ears ring.

Six weeks into his stay, things are looking up. Malcolm can feed himself, make short walks around his floor and in the park, he's even been participating in group therapy. He's still talking too slowly, thinking too shallowly, like part of his brain is under lock and key. That's not how the brain works, Laura tell him. Malcolm knows that, obviously, so he glares at her good-naturedly until she laughs.

His mother has calmed down markedly ever since Malcolm's recovery became apparent. She doesn't fret quite so much, and even his silence doesn't bother her. He's gone quiet before, after all. Months, in fact, when he was a child, spent in a similar listless fugue. Malcolm doesn't remember it very well. Regardless, she handles the whole thing with her usual eccentric grace, bossing his nurses around and threatening him into eating.

Seven weeks, and Malcolm is getting restless. He spends all the time he can in his floor's rec room or outside, rebuilding whatever connection got severed between his mind and body. Again, that's not how the brain works. He's usually present, now, and only drifts for a few hours through the day.

Malcolm doesn't know what wakes him up that night, seven weeks and three days into his hospital stay. He blinks his eyes open from a dreamless sleep into the deep blue of night, illuminated by the full moon gleaming outside the second window to his right. It's all very familiar to him now, comfortable and safe, even the padded cuffs around his wrists are proof of the stability he's found here. For a moment, he feels perfectly content. Like he could just slip back into sleep.

There's movement to his left, and Malcolm looks over to see who's sitting in the chair at his bedside. It's far too late for visitors. Ainsley is there nevertheless, her legs crossed and her hands resting on her knees, staring at him with an unreadable expression. For a moment, Malcolm thinks his hallucinations must have returned—and then he grins, because that's his baby sister. "Ains!" he laughs, and tries to sit up—but he can't.

His restraints are tighter than they should be, and shorter too. His arms are locked in place on either side of him, he can't pull the lever to lift himself up, and he's not strong enough yet to sit up completely without assistance. For a moment he lies entirely still, not certain what's happening, until Ainsley reaches over and pulls the lever herself, leaving Malcolm sitting up but still immobile. "Ainsley?" he whispers, hating the uncertainty in his own voice.

His sister doesn't say anything for a long moment, just watches him impassively. Her dark eyes are cold, belying some emotion Malcolm can't pretend to understand. Eventually she speaks, and her voice rings clear. "Was it self-defense?"

Malcolm blinks, tilts his head. He doesn't understand the question, and Ainsley is scaring him.

"I need you to answer me," Ainsley says, conversationally, like this is an interview. "When y͝͞o҉̢̕͟ų̷̶̸̴ ̴͝͠k͟͢͜i͝͞l̢͠҉̴̀l͘͘è̸d̵̴̛͟ ̴̨͟o҉̀͢ų͝r̵̡̧̕͞ ̷̨͘f̴a̵̷̸͘t̵͞͞h̵͘e͟͏r̴͡, was it self-defense?"

Malcolm doesn't answer. His throat is dry and he feels cold all over, stinging frost over his skin, his heartbeat in his ears, a ragged breath ripping through his chest. "I didn't—" and he chokes, and he gags, and he remembers, and the fear that lives inside him breathes life of its own. He can say nothing.

"You did, though," Ainsley smiles, bright white teeth. "You did, Malcolm."

Malcolm's hand trembles and there are tears on his numb face, streaming down.

"You gave your statement after it happened. You said you killed him, and you said it was self-defense." Ainsley leans forward, casting her face in moonlight, and Malcolm half-expects to see her spattered in blood. "I'm asking you if that's true." She reaches out, touches his left hand, lightly scrapes one perfectly-manicured nail over the skin of his palm. "And I'm asking you not to lie to me again."

She's looking at him so coldly. She's already decided he's guilty, no matter what he says—the twist of certainty in her smile, like when she stood before Malcolm and accused him of doing to her what their father had done to him.

Their father.

She's doing this because Malcolm killed him. Because seven weeks ago Malcolm stabbed their father. And she doesn't understand, really, what a monster he was—Malcolm has tried to explain but it's not—he can't explain the horror of his childhood, and if he could he's not sure she would care, and can he blame her? It's not her fault that her father is gone. It's Malcolm's fault. She's killed a man for less.

Malcolm can't breathe. His dry throat works as he tries to swallow, tries to make his mouth move. He's more terrified than he would have thought possible, terrified of his little sister. She has him pinned, she's killed a man, she hurt Malcolm the last time he lied to her, Jesus Christ, he can't breathe. "Ains," he gasps, "Ainsley, please…"

She digs her nail into his palm, just enough for it to bite in, for a bead of blood to pool there. "It's a simple question. Just don't lie to me."

"Yes," Malcolm gasps, "yes, it was self-defense, he came at me with a knife—he was going to kill me, he said he was going to, I had no choice." His voice breaks and shudders on a sob, and his head throbs with his lack of breath, and the pressure on his hand doesn't ease. "I didn't want to do it."

She says nothing, like she's pondering the weight of his words, whether or not she believes him. He can't imagine doing this to her if their positions were switched. He doesn't understand why she's doing this, why he's so fucking scared, dizzy on terror. "You didn't want to do it," Ainsley echoes, her eyes not leaving Malcolm's own. "You didn't want to do it, and yet here you are, two months later, broken up because of it. Because you're guilty."

"Because I killed someone," he grits out, "because I killed my dad, regardless of whether or not it was self-defense—and it was."

"You hated him, though," Ainsley whispers. There are tears in her own eyes, impotent rage. "You wanted him dead."

"That doesn't mean I wanted to kill him," Malcolm half-sobs.

Another breathless moment, and Ainsley lifts her hand from Malcolm's own. It comes away bloody, and Malcolm can see that she's scored a line across his palm, but he barely feels it. "You're scared of me," Ainsley says. She sounds hurt.

Malcolm gives a sandpaper-textured laugh. He can't relax, can't take his eyes away from her, even if the danger seems to have passed. "Y-you can't do things like this, Ainsley," he implores, like he did last time, when she laughed it all off. "You can't hurt me to stay in control, you can't—"

"And why can't I?" Ainsley asks, haughty, and it would be funny if it wasn't so very not funny.

"Because that's abuse," he's begging her to understand, and she rolls her eyes at him. "You—you tightened my restraints so I can't get away, why would you—Ainsley, why would you do that?" He's seconds away from hyperventilating now, he's confused and scared, and his little sister watches him with blatant disgust.

Ainsley stands up, apparently disinterested in watching him struggle any longer. She touches his cheek—he flinches—and wipes his own blood on him. "I need some time to myself," she says, sounding so mature and steady, like Malcolm isn't shaking before her. "You'll probably be going home with Mom in the next couple weeks, and I won't be there. I do hope you feel better, though."

Malcolm swallows, his throat clicking. He wants to ask her to loosen his restraints so he can run to the bathroom and throw up.

"Also, uh," Ainsley stops in the doorway, looks at Malcolm over her shoulder. "Don't tell Mom about this, okay?"

"Why shouldn't I?" Malcolm croaks.

Ainsley smiles angelically. "I just think it would be embarrassing for you."


Malcolm doesn't go back to sleep that night. The night nurse comes around at some point. She's surprised that he's awake, she saw his sister leave a while ago after her surprise visit. They don't usually allow visitors so late but she hadn't come to see him at all yet and—the nurse notices Malcolm's vacant expression, the blood on his cheek, and Malcolm drifts.

He stays gone for a while.

A few hours, really, and then Gil is there to bother him.

Malcolm blinks into awareness. Instinctively he takes stock of the light—bright and clear, early afternoon. His eyes flicker down to his wrists, and they're unbound. He looks up, then, and Gil is sitting where Ainsley was last night, and he's in uniform, and he's saying something. "Bright? Bright, are you with me?"

A roll of nausea sets lights off behind Malcolm's eyelids, so he resolves to keep his eyes open, even if it means having a conversation he'd really rather not be having. He's half-reclining, not sitting up all the way, and he wants to run. He'd like to never stop running. There's so much to run from.

"Bright, I need you to look at me," Gil says, and Malcolm does. Slowly, broadcasting his movements, Gil takes Malcolm's left hand and raises it up, showing Malcolm the bright white gauze wrapping. "Did Ainsley do this to you?"

Malcolm swallows hard. He doesn't know why he wants to cry. His ears burning, he manages a tiny nod.

Gil lowers Malcolm's hand back down gently. "Why did she do it?"

Because Malcolm killed her father. Because Malcolm is a murderer, just like everyone thought he would be. "I killed Dad," Malcolm whispers.

Gil's jaw shifts, the way it does when he's furious but doesn't want to scare Malcolm. Gil runs a hand over his beard, gathering himself, then leans forward to whisper intensely. "Listen to me, Bright," he says. "Martin Whitly, the serial killer better known as The Surgeon, decided on a whim that he was going to kill you. You told me this. You told me the day it happened that you saw the moment he decided." Gil stops, inhales. "He came at you with a knife. You defended yourself, and Martin Whitly died."

Malcolm says nothing.

"Legally, that's clear-cut self-defense," Gil says. "And the only person in the world who would hold it against you is yourself. And, apparently, your sister."

Malcolm really doesn't want to talk. He turns his head away to look out the window. When he blinks he sees Ainsley covered in Endicott's blood, in pig's blood, in his own blood. He sees himself, covered in their father's blood.

Gil, of course, is still trying to get the full story. "So she came here to hurt you? For killing Martin Whitly?"

"She didn't believe it was self-defense," Malcolm answers wearily. "She was questioning me."

"She had to restrain you to do that? Had to cut open your hand?"

Malcolm feels ill. "Why didn't anybody tell me what happened? With my father?"

Gil sighs and shifts his weight, leans back in the chair. "Because you haven't been well, Malcolm," he says. "You've been very, very sick."

Sick because of what happened with his father. "I'm prone to dissociative amnesia," Malcolm says tightly. "The trauma doesn't go away because I don't remember it, it just—festers. Most of what's wrong with me is probably shit I don't remember, things I'll never be able to ask about now—" and that, suddenly, is crushing. He doesn't want to talk anymore.

Gil asks him a few more things after that. Malcolm doesn't look at him, let alone answer. He's not even drifting, and suddenly he wishes he could control it—could just choose to not be present when he doesn't want to be. He wishes he could rebuild the walls in his mind, go back to not knowing. Gil gets frustrated, eventually, and gets up to leave. "Ainsley's been taken off your visitors list. We're following your lead on this, okay?"

Predictably, Malcolm doesn't answer. Gil heaves one last sigh, less frustrated, more sad. "I'm sorry about what happened, Malcolm. I'm so sorry you had to go through that," there's a break in his voice there, an outpouring of compassion that Malcolm can't even meet with a glance. "But I'm not sorry you did it. I'm not sorry he's dead."

Malcolm denies all visitors for the rest of the week, and his mother doesn't bust the door down once. Laura tries to get him to talk about how he's feeling, if not what happened. Malcolm doesn't want to talk at all. He doesn't want to leave his room. He doesn't want to move. He doesn't want other people to have to look at him, knowing what he is.

He's not well. He's very, very sick. He's a stupid, malleable, broken man.

There's only one person Malcolm knows will let him not talk, so when Dani arrives that weekend, he lets her come in. His mother and Gil must have filled her in on everything, or else she takes one look at him—small, hunched, disheveled—and understands. She doesn't say a word when she sits at the right side of his bed, where his hand seemingly hasn't stopped trembling in days. She doesn't try to catch his eye or urge him to say something. Instead she takes his hand and she leans forward, presses her forehead to his temple.

She tells him about her day. They stay like that until the light fades.