AN: I UPDATTED! Ok so I really owe y'all a HUGE apology. I know it's been forever but work, school, and my progressively worsening insomnia is to blame. I wanted to say a MASSIVE GIGANTIC thank you to everyone single one of you that reviewed, one of the main reasons why I'm continuing it. So enough blabbering from me...enjoy!
P.S.- This chapter has a lot of dialogue and its crap.
Monday 4 PM
"Brendan are you asleep?" Cheryl takes a seat on the side of his bed and roughly pushes him to wake him up.
Brendan rolls over to ignore her but gets hit with a pillow for it. He reluctantly opens his eyes half way and nods to her. "What do you want?"
She didn't expect their relationship to get back to normal overnight but she thought it would at least be a start. His tone comes out just as cold as before and she wonders if Brendan even remembers what he did for her yesterday. Maybe he was so high on drugs and that was the reason for him helping her. Cheryl holds onto his apology and hopes he meant every word he said last night.
"Umm...never mind." She has second thoughts when she makes eye contact with him.
"No what? You already woke me up might as well just tell me."
She sighs and takes a seat on the opposite side of the bed. "I was just wondering if we could talk about yesterday. I mean...you know, what you did."
"What about it?"
Cheryl watches to see if she can detect any guilt or remorse in his eyes, but there is none. His eyes once again look cold and dead.
"Brendan you took someone's life. You...you have blood on your hands."
Brendan gives out a small smile before laughing a bit manically. Cheryl stares at him dumbfounded.
"And you don't."
"That doesn't count."
"Doesn't it?" Brendan slowly sits up in bed. "Look I've had blood on my hands since I killed Seamus so this isn't as big as a deal as you're making it out to be."
She pushes herself off the bed and glares at her brother.
"Not a big fucking deal! YOU KILLED SOMEONE!"
"He deserved it! So...technically you could say I'm helping the world by getting rid of him."
"Forget it Brendan." Before she walks out of his room she stops to look at him again. "When did you lose yourself? When did you stop having any emotions at all?"
Cheryl walks out only to be followed by Brendan. They end up in the living room and stand in silence till Brendan speaks up.
"If you think I don't have any emotions or that I don't feel anything then you're fucking blind. Why do you think I use drugs Cheryl? Cause I think they taste great. No. I take them so I don't have to feel depressed throughout the day. I take them so that I can forget how pissed off I am. Are those not emotions? What about what I did for you? I didn't kill him because I was fucking bored. I did it for you. I love you Chez. I would do absolutely anything for you. My job is to keep you safe and as long as that guy was still around you, you weren't. So I had to."
Cheryl can see her brothers' pain spilling out of him. He looks so broken. So so broken. He carries everything on his shoulders. He's been carrying everything for years. Never asked for any of it, but just takes it for the both of them. She wants to take it all away from him. Wants to give him his smile back. But she can't.
"I'm supposed to take care of you Brendan. It's my job to watch over both of us." She sinks to the floor and waits till Brendan sits down in front of her. "But it's still you taking care of us. It's still you taking all the bullets for me. I shouldn't have let you take all the falls for me. I feel like you were forced to take care of me."
Brendan shakes his head at her and reaches for her hand. "We're not talking about the guy anymore right."
She doesn't make eye contact as she looks down at their hands. "You didn't have to do it."
"I did. You honestly think I was gonna let my sister go to jail. I was 16 I had a better chance of just going to young offenders if I took the blame for it. So I did. And I don't regret saying I killed him. I would do it again right now."
"That's exactly my point. You always take the fall for me. You went to jail for me. You served time for me. You killed someone for me. And what have I ever done for you? Nothing! I have done nothing for you and yet you're still here. You're still here saying you would do it again. For me. And I...I don't deserve it. I haven't done anything for you...I'm sorry."
"You have."
Cheryl looks up at and finally makes eye contact with him. He has a very faint glint in his eyes. They look alive for the first time in years. She sees her brother again. Actually sees him coming back to himself.
"You gave me a reason to keep living."
Cheryl and Mitzeee make their way down the long hallway until they reach the North Wing. They look inside and when they don't see Brendan around they walk in. Mitzeee goes to talk to one of Brendan's patient while Cheryl goes into the break room. She smiles to herself when she sees Brendan's phone charging. She practically dances when his phone isn't locked. She quickly goes through it to find exactly what she was looking for and sends it to her own phone before storming out of there. Mitzeee walks over to her with a piece of paper and they both rush back out. As they go back down the hallway they see Brendan heading in their direction.
"Oh fuck." Cheryl awkwardly waves at him and they both give the worst fake smiles in the history of fake smiles.
"Umm...alright." Brendan rolls his eyes but passes right by them not really questioning them. He looks back and sees them running away like two little kids. "How am I related to you?!"
"YOU LOVE BEING RELATED TO ME!"
He gives her the middle finger as a goodbye and heads into the North Wing. As soon as he turns the corner he bumps into a little girl. She wraps her arms around his legs and Brendan apologizes and tries getting her off of him.
"Umm...hi. Are you lost?" Brendan looks down at her and realizes he has seen similar eyes every day. "Leah right?"
She nods and smiles and all it does is remind him of her father. "Hi. Just saw my daddy."
"Did you? How's he doing?" He manages to free himself from her but crouches down to be eye level with her.
"He's happy. Said you helped him. Thank you."
"You're very welcome. I'm gonna go check up on him, did you want to come with me?"
Leah agrees and grabs Brendan's hand completely taking him aback. He freezes for a second before Leah starts dragging him towards Stes room.
"Daddy look who I found!" Leah practically makes them both deaf when they walk into the room.
Ste looks over at them and smiles widely at them when he sees his daughter so at ease with Brendan.
"Thank you sweetheart. I was missing him." Ste winks at Brendan and tries getting Leah to come over to him but she doesn't let go of Brendan's hand. In fact she motions for him to pick her up.
"Seriously?" Brendan rolls his eyes but picks her up. She starts messing with his hair and laughs when he gives her a death glare.
"She likes you Bren. She never acts like that to anyone new."
Leah starts giggling and gives him a kiss on the cheek before putting her head on his shoulder.
"She seems like a sweet girl. You did a good job as a father." Brendan walks over to the bed and hands her over to Ste who is already lying down.
"Thanks. She means everything to me. So does Lucas. They both do. I don't know what I would do without them in my life you know."
"Yeah...I know." Brendan gets into bed while Leah sits down in the middle of them watching tv. "Never take these moments with them for granted. They remember everything in their childhoods. Even the smallest things like this. It shapes them as they grow up. And I think this little one here-" he lightly taps her nose with his finger "-is going to grow up to be one amazing girl aren't you?"
Leah's eyes light up and she nods in agreement. She looks at both of them and points to the tv. "Can we watch a movie?"
"Yeah come on. I think I saw all the DVDs in the main room." Ste is about to get up but Brendan stops him.
"I'll take her; you just relax on your last day here. Come on darling." Brendan gets off the bed and Leah jumps onto his back. Ste watches as they both exit the room and he gets a few minutes by himself.
Leah jumps off his back when they reach the location where all the DVDs are at. She runs over to the kids section while Brendan watches her from the door. She ends up pushing a grown woman out of the way and Brendan can't help but laugh at that. The woman turns her attention to Brendan and gives him the evil eye before storming out of the room.
"Bitch." Brendan quietly mumbles to himself and walks over to Leah. "You know you can't be pushing people around right?"
"But you called her a bitch."
"Oh shit. I mean...wait no no. Forget that word ok. You know what let's just not mention any of this to your dad."
They both put a finger to their lips and go back to Stes room after they picked a movie.
"Nightmare before Christmas huh? Did you have any say in this Brendan?"
"Nope. I tried making her pick Godfather but she wasn't having any of it."
Ste puts in the movie and they all jump into bed again. Ste lays down while both Leah and Brendan end up sitting down on the bed. Towards the middle of the movie Leah falls asleep and has her head on Brendan's chest. Ste leans over to him noticing that Brendan's about to fall asleep.
"I love you Bren." When he looks back at him he sees that he already fell asleep. Normally he would be a little upset that he fell asleep on him, but not this time. He actually feels like he's more in love with him now. He smiles to himself as he sees Brendan being almost a father to Leah. His arm is around her in a protective manner and they both seem like they known each other for years. Ste leans back in bed and slowly goes to sleep with what he considers to be his new family.
Monday 9:14 PM
Brendan is back in the West Wing sitting by the lobby looking out the windows. He spent basically the whole day with Ste and Leah. Leah kept making up game after game for them to play. He would still be over there now but Amy came by and picked her up. Leah had to be practically dragged away as she kept a hold of Brendan's leg. He promised he would see her again and she made him pinky promise her.
Cheryl had called him back to the West Wing a few minutes later to discuss Laura's progress and about his upcoming board meeting. Once that was taken care of he decided he needed a few minutes to himself. He found the lobby was completely empty so it was a perfect place to take refuge in.
"You alright mate?"
Brendan doesn't need to look up to know who it is. "Yeah I'm fine. What you doing here?"
"Had to drop Mitzeee off for her graveyard shift. You sure you ok?"
Brendan waits for Warren to take a seat next to him before starting again. "I don't know. I feel...empty. I can't explain it but I feel like everything is closing in on me you know. Like I just want to escape from everything. I just want it all to go away."
Warren shakes his head before staring ahead out the windows. "I hate when you talk like this you know. It reminds me of those days when we would be at my place drugged out of our minds and you would start speaking all philosophical. It was funny to me back then but when I think back to it I don't think you were joking. You would talk about how death wasn't something to fear. How death was the easy way out. How easily death could rid you of all the pain and hurt. Remember that?"
Brendan doesn't say anything but he does remember it quite well. They don't mention the fact that a few months after one of their so called philosophical meetings Brendan almost died from an overdose. Warren doesn't ask if it was in an attempt to commit suicide or if he just messed up and took too much.
"Brendan I get it. I get that you're hurting right now. But do you ever think about the people around you and how much their hurting?"
Brendan looks over at him and watches as Warren puts his head in his hands.
"You think it's easy to watch you in so much pain. I wish every day that I could just take that away from you. It hurts, physically hurts to see you giving up. You're not fooling us by saying you're fine Brendan. Seriously you must think we are either stupid or blind. Whenever you say you're fine we all know you're not. I know for a fact you still think death is your only option. And it may in your eyes be the only way out but before you ever decide to give up. Before you decide to let him win, I want you to think of one thing. Think about us. Cheryl, Mitzeee, you, and me. We made our own little family. And this family isn't complete unless you're there with us."
Tuesday 12:46 AM
After basically agreeing that he would call him when he got home Warren let him leave. As soon as he gets back home he gives him a call and lets him know he's fine and that he's going to go straight to sleep. Brendan is exhausted and just heads to his room. He can already feel that he's going to have a nightmare. He's been starting to have one every night now and he can't figure out why. Sometimes they aren't so bad and he ends up falling back to sleep pretty easily. But then there are those nightmares that he can't get out of his mind. Those are the ones that keep him up at night. He takes one of his sleeping pills and climbs into bed. Before he knows it he drifts off to sleep.
*******Its pouring down rain with thunder echoing in the background. The old torn down house sits in the middle of the field. There's a white convertible parked outside. It seems out of place for the environment it's in. Brendan hears the screams coming from the house and when the thunder strikes he can see a person through the window. He can't quite make out the features but the man doesn't look normal. There's something terribly wrong with his face. He watches in curiosity as the man goes back and forth in the room. He clearly doesn't see him as he keeps going on with whatever it is he's doing. The screams become louder and louder. Then they stop. Brendan runs and hides behind a tree when he sees the man walk out of the house. It's too dark for him to get a good look at him. He watches him for minutes as the man digs out a hole in the ground and buries something. It looks like a branch. A rather odd looking branch. After he finishes he walks back into the house.
Brendan waits a few minutes before walking over to where the man was just at. He looks over his shoulder to make sure no one is coming before lowering himself down to the dirt below him. He digs a few inches into the muddy ground and feels something. It's slimy and gooey. And warm. Brendan thinks he should just get up and leave but he doesn't. He digs a little bit further and falls over when he sees what that branch actually was. It was a mutilated arm. He covers it up quickly and runs away from the house but again he stops. Something keeps telling him to turn back around. So he does. He walks back in the direction of the house. He carefully moves towards the front of the house and climbs up the porch steps. There's a pigs head on one of the steps with flies surrounding it. He glances through the doors window and it's what could only be described as a disaster. Dishes are piled up with grime all over them. There's some water or blood on the floor. He also notices some shears on the counter which he finds to be strange. He goes to open the door and as soon as he does a steel rod comes flying through it almost impaling him.
"Fucking great." Brendan realizes the house has traps all over it. He goes under the rod and slowly walks in. He sees bloody footprints on the floor so he follows them. The whole house only has one light shining the place. Brendan has to keep his eyes open making sure he doesn't set off any other traps.
He looks at the wall and sees family pictures. Some are much older than the others. They are worn and torn at the edges. He sees the different family members and they all seem to have deformed faces. Each and every one of them has something wrong with them. Whether it's that their skin is loose or their eyes show no color. A door shuts behind him causing him to jump.
"Just turn around and leave Brendan" he tells himself but he doesn't even listen to his own mind as he follows the sound of the door.
When he makes it there he opens it and looks around. It's just an ordinary bedroom. There's not much in it besides a bed in the corner. Brendan walks around but notices scratch marks on the floor as if someone was being forcefully dragged through it. He lowers himself to his knees and looks below the bed. His eyes widen as he sees a woman under it. She's looking away from his direction so he slowly crawls over to her. He reaches out a hand and slightly touches her.
"AHHHH AHHHH AHHHH AWAYYYYY!"
All she does is scream and scream and scream.
"It's ok it's ok. I'm not gonna hurt you."
She doesn't stop screaming, not even for a second. His ears start ringing and he feels what he thinks is blood coming out of them.
"I'm just trying to help. Let me help." Brendan reaches out again is able to touch her shoulder. She turns her head and Brendan is able to see her face. "Mum? Mum?!" He frantically tries pulling her from under the bed. She easily slides out and he's horrified by what he sees. She's strapped to a wooden board. Her face is covered with blood and again her face is deformed. But that's not what shocks him. She has no limbs.
She screams out more when he shines a light around her.
"Stop! I'm only trying to help you!"
He watches as her eyes look behind him. "Get away."
He thinks she means to get away from her. "I'm not leaving you like this. You need some sort of medical help. You're in pain."
"I don't. I'm fine. No pain. No pain. You need to leave."
"NO! NO! I'm not leaving you like this. I love you mum."
Brendan unstraps the belt that was restraining her on the board. He tries thinking of an easy way to get her out of the house as he's pretty sure he's not alone. As soon as he thinks this he hears a door close again.
"Who else is in the house mum?"
She doesn't respond but he knows who it is.
"I'm gonna go check and I'll be back to get you out of here ok?"
"Brendan just go! Get away!"
"SHUT UP! SHUT UP! I WANT MY MUM BACK SO IM GETTING YOU OUT OF HERE!"
He ignores her screams and walks out only to come face to face with his father.
"Brendan. Nice of you to join us." Seamus drops the shovel on the ground and locks the door behind him. He doesn't look normal. Hair is missing, fingers are missing, his eyes are black, his skin is falling off, everything is just wrong.
"Us? Us?! You been keeping mum in here like some prisoner and you actually think she wants to be here. With you!"
Brendan doesn't move when Seamus starts walking towards him.
"You're so naive and stupid Brendan. Of course she wants to be here. She would choose me over you in a heartbeat. She doesn't love you. She never has."
Brendan makes a run for the bedroom and locks the door as he hears Seamus slamming his fist on the other side of the door.
"OPEN THE DOOR BRENDAN!"
Brendan knows he doesn't have much time so he tries picking up his mum but she struggles again this grip.
"Stop moving I'm trying to get you out of here! That's what you want right."
He watches her as she avoids his eyes. Her lip quivers and she pulls herself away from him. Realization hits him right in the heart.
"You don't want to leave do you?" He backs away slowly. "You want to stay with him." He shakily gets to his feet. "He was telling the truth. You never loved me."
She quickly turns her head to look at him. "I always loved you. Don't you dare think that I didn't."
Brendan reaches over and opens the door letting Seamus in.
"No you didn't. You were always going to choose him. Even when you weren't together you wanted to be. You knew what kind of person he was but you would still choose him if you were alive today wouldn't you? You would still let him rape me. You would just sit there and watch as he did it wouldn't you?"
Brendan is so focused on his mum that he doesn't even realize Seamus advancing towards him. He doesn't feel his arms wrap around him. He doesn't feel lips on his neck. He doesn't feel Seamus breath ghosting over his ear. He doesn't feel the hands working on his pants.
He just stands there and watches as his mum looks back at him. When she smiles he snaps out of it.
Before he knows what he is doing he has his hands wrapped around Seamus neck. His grip tightens and tightens. They both fall to the floor without Brendan losing his grip. Seamus claws at him drawing blood but nothing releases his hold. A couple seconds later and Seamus body goes limp. His hands drop next to him and his eyes close. Brendan lets go and goes out the door to grab the shears he saw on the floor. He comes back and stabs away at his father's dead body over and over again. Blood gets all over him but he keeps going. He ignores his mums' pleas. He finally stops and walks over to her.
"You two deserved each other." He lifts the shears back up again. "Consider this my way of saying thank you for leaving me with him."
The shears in his hand go straight through his mother's heart.*******
He jolts awake dripping sweat all over his bed sheets. He lifts his hands up and their shaking uncontrollably. He feels something in his stomach so he jumps out of bed and runs to the bathroom. He barely makes it to the toilet before he is throwing up violently. When he finally stops he feels awful. His body feels drained and tired. He tries getting up but his legs don't want to cooperate. Instead Brendan ends up crawling back out to his room. He gives up on getting into bed and just leans against it. He's too exhausted to try getting to his phone or his pills so he looks through the nightstand next to him thinking he has a few pills in there. What he ends up finding his a blank notebook.
He stares at it and wonders why he would even buy it. It looks more like a diary. He flips through it and finds that he in fact didn't buy it. On the back cover it has a small note:
"You won't tell me anything but you need to let things out. So if you can't say those thoughts aloud then write them down. Please. Love Cheryl."
He smiles when he finally remembers her giving him this. They had just had a huge argument. Needless to say they both ended up saying things they regretted later. Brendan ended up walking g out of his house to get some air and when he came back he found the diary on the table.
He has completely forgotten he kept it. He runs his hands over it and then opens it up. There's a pen inside so he grabs it. He stares at the blank page for minutes not knowing what exactly he's supposed to get from this. He taps the pen over and over and then finally writes one line. Only one.
"I want help."
Tuesday 10:45 AM
Brendan is at work earlier than usual. He had some paperwork that needs to be complete and finished before noon. There's discharge and after care forms that need to be done and he's running out of time.
"Why are you doing those last minute genius?"
Brendan crumples up one of the blank forms and throws it at Mitzeee.
"I had forgot to do them ok. Get off my fucking case."
Mitzeee throws her hands up and gasps. "Ok mister grumpy pants. Wake up on the wrong side of the bed today or what?"
"No I didn't."
"Then why are you so pissy today?"
"I'm not pissy today! You're annoying the hell out of me when I'm trying to finish these damn forms so I can get rid of one of my patients who fucking irritated me at the beginning. Who kept prodding into my life. Who I can't get out of my messed up mind. Who I don't...who I don't want to leave...me."
Mitzeee stays silent and reaches over to grab his hand. "I'm sorry Bren."
"Just...forget it. I gotta go turn these in. I'll see you later." Brendan grabs all his paperwork and stands up to leave. Before he can even take a step Mitzeee is already up and hugging him tightly.
"I love you, you know that right. And I know he loves you. He won't leave you. I promise you." She pulls away and looks him in the eyes. "I promise you he won't."
"What makes you so sure?"
She smiles and looks away for a second before making eye contact again. "He was brought here to save you, and his job isn't done yet."
Tuesday 1:33 PM
They both walk down the hallways one last time. They move past other nurses and patients. They know where they are going but they both seem to be taking their time getting there. Brendan walks in front while Ste shuffles inches behind him. Every time Brendan slows down, Ste ends up slamming into the back of him. Brendan doesn't say anything just reaches back a little to give Ste a small tap. Sometimes when they have to wait for people to pass Ste leans in and gives Brendan's hand a quick squeeze. Brendan holds onto it before letting it drop and continuing their walk. After a few minutes they finally make it to their spot. It's the first place they ever kissed. To Ste it's when everything changed for him.
"I should have got on a wheelchair so we could have recreated the scene."
"No. You know how hard it was to push you all the way here."
"Did you just call me fat?!"
Brendan smiles at him before taking off knowing Ste can't physically run after him. Ste just gives him a glare and walks over to where Brendan is now at. He sits down and leans against the tree while Brendan lies down next to him on the grass. They both remain quiet just listening to the surroundings.
"So I finished all your paperwork so Amy should be here at 4 to pick you up." Brendan interrupts the quiet atmosphere around them.
Ste just nods and looks ahead. There's only a few hours left before he finally gets to leave this place. When he first arrived here he was counting down till this exact day. The day he would be able to leave and go home and get back to his life. His normal life. But then Brendan came along. And he changed everything in an instant. He showed him what actual love was and there was no way he would ever be happy going back to his old life without him. He doesn't want to go anywhere without him. So that's why at this moment he doesn't want to leave. Ste wants to be able to stay here a couple more days or weeks. He even thinks about "accidentally" tripping just to be able to stay. Ste almost went through with it on the way here but he thinks about Leah and Lucas and he just can't be selfish and think about himself. It's his time to leave and silently prays Brendan will still be there with him till the end.
"Why don't you stop and admit that you don't have a clue where you're at." Brendan looks out the passenger side window and doesn't recognize anything around them.
"I'm sure I just took one wrong turn. Not a big deal at all. I can easily get out of here."
"It's a small village Chez anyone can get out of here but then what? You still don't know where this place is at."
Cheryl hits the brakes and stops the car. "Fine fine I will ask for some bloody directions then." She steps out the car and slams the door causing Brendan to jump a little.
He looks around and watches people walking around the village. He can't help but laugh when he sees a guy wearing a hideous cardigan. It looks ridiculous. He follows him to a deli shop and squints to see inside it. He doesn't get a good look and he has no idea why all of the sudden he is out of the car and walking towards the small shop. Brendan avoids a group of what appears to be brothers and flicks them off when they pass him. He's just about to get to the door when Cheryl finally comes back.
"Bren where you going? I got the directions so let's move it." She looks up to where he is standing. "What you want a sandwich or something?"
Brendan shrugs and turns around for a second to look at Cheryl putting in a piece of paper in the car. He thinks it's most likely the directions. Cheryl walks up to him and goes directly into the deli. Brendan turns back around and follows her in.
They are quickly served by the ridiculous cardigan wearing man Brendan saw earlier.
"Nice shop you got here. Kinda busy for just one person though." Cheryl makes mind numbing conversation as she waits for her change.
"Oh no there's another owner. He just stepped out to take a call like a minute ago."
"Well that's good cause if it was me I would just walk out pissed at the world."
Brendan sighs and takes the change from the cardigan man. He pulls Cheryl out before she makes another conversation up in her mind.
"You're no fun Bren."
"Shut up and get in the car." Brendan and Cheryl walk out of the deli just as the other owner walks back in through the back.
"You know Doug I don't get why there's never any reception in here. I literally had to walk a distance outside to be able to hear."
"Maybe it's a sign Ste. That you shouldn't take calls while at work."
"Oh fuck off it's not like I missed anything important."
Tuesday 3:59 PM
Amy is already waiting at the lobby when Ste and Brendan arrive. Ste has a bag full of clothes and other small items that he accumulated while he was here. Brendan follows behind him with a few papers he has to give to Amy.
"Right so all this is for you to read over. There's aftercare papers in here that I would like you to read once you get home that will walk you through how to make sure he recovers completely. He has a prescription in there for pain medication and one for muscle spasms. He hasn't been on any of it for the past couple of days so I don't think he will need it. But it's just in case he does. Umm...I think that's about it. Just sign the discharge papers here and he's all yours."
Ste watches Brendan as he says those last words and sees his whole body lock up. Amy signs the papers quickly and hands them back to Brendan. She takes Stes bags and tells him she's right outside waiting for him.
They both watch her walk out and then make eye contact with each other.
"So..."
"Yeah..."
It's quite frankly awkward. Brendan gives him a small smile and runs his finger down Stes neck. He looks around to make sure no one is watching and then leans in and gives him a gentle kiss on the lips before pulling away.
"Promise me something." Ste makes sure he has Brendan's full attention and takes a hold of his hand. He waits for Brendan to nod before continuing. "I want you to promise that this isn't it. That this isn't the end of this."
"And what exactly is this Steven."
"Don't do that. You're trying to shut me out. I can already see you trying to distance yourself away from me and it's not gonna work ok. I told you I'm not giving up on you and I meant it. So suck it up and admit you know what I'm talking about."
Brendan doesn't give him any expression at all.
"You know what forget it." Ste turns to walk away but Brendan grabs him by the wrist and pulls him against his chest.
"I'm sorry." Brendan breathes into his ear. "I'm sorry I just don't want you to go." He lets Ste go and waits for him to turn around.
"Why?"
"Cause you're going back to your life and I'm not gonna be in it. You're...you're leaving me. Which I expected but it still hurts. I tried...I really really tried to get you out of my head this whole time because I knew this would end like this but I just can't. I can't forget you. You're always there. Every single thing reminds me of you. Just seeing you makes me...I don't know how to describe it but you make me whole again. And now I'm not gonna have that and I don't know if I can keep going-"
Ste doesn't even hesitate before he has his arms wrapped around Brendan waist. He's hugging him so tight he thinks that he is suffocating Brendan but he doesn't loosen his hold. He runs his hands up and down Brendan's back and places his head on his chest.
"Please don't. Don't make this a goodbye Brendan. I'm not leaving. I'm NOT leaving. This here...this is forever. For life. You're now my life Brendan. And I have to make you happy. I have to get you back to who you were. I have to fix what "he" broke. And you know what? Even if we don't make it, even if you don't want anything to do with me at the end, I'm still gonna make sure I save you. I promise you that."
They don't say anything more as Brendan leans down and gives Ste another kiss. It's just as gentle as the last one. Brendan's tongue sweeps across Stes bottom lip and he gives it a small tug with his teeth before pulling away again.
Brendan nods to the door and Ste turns around to see Amy waving her watch around and mouthing "the kids."
"Time to go then huh." Ste slowly breathes out.
"Guess so."
"Ok well...you'll call me during your break right? Or when you're shift is over?"
"Umm...yeah. Sure."
Ste gives him one last hug and starts walking away towards the door. "So umm...the ultimatum still stands you know."
"I know..."
"So Wednesday you'll be there right? Cause if you're not then...well that's it for us. I'll be waiting outside the office for you. Please...please be there."
All Brendan does is nod and Ste takes that as the only answer he is going to get. He walks out and gets in the car. As Amy starts the car he looks out the window and sees Brendan still standing in the lobby with his head down. His shoulders are slumped down and he seems to be breathing unsteadily.
Ste can't help but think that this is the last time he will ever see Brendan, but as he drives away he hopes that he's wrong.