Chapter 130

In the middle of the night we dream of a million kites
Flying high above the sadness and the fear

As he walked along the waterfront, his hands jammed in his pockets, Patrick looked at the disappearing snow banks and thought it a good sign; no matter how frozen the earth became during winter, a thaw was inevitable. He hoped the same held true for him. If his mind was frozen and his speech was frozen then hopefully there was a thaw coming for him as well. Something, anything, that would let his memory and his speech flow freely once again. It had been three days since his impromptu proposal of marriage and he was left wondering how much his own health played into Robin's refusal. He had understood her reasons for why she wasn't ready but what was left unsaid, what remained just below the surface was the reality of who he was and how little he resembled the man she fell in love with.

As he continued to wind his way along the pier and up the steps he was struck by how much he missed working. It wasn't that he lacked things to do - his ongoing therapy took up most of his time - he was lacking his identity. For so long he simply told people he was a doctor and that established him in their eyes and told them who he was or at least who they thought he was. And while he was still a doctor, he was not practicing, his license was still suspended and his colleagues continued to move forward while he felt as though he was standing still.

He was in a rut.

Pulling open the door to the building, he rushed inside and took the stairs two at a time until he reached the fourth floor. He rapped impatiently at the door. It had barely opened when he brushed inside.

"N-n-need your h-help" he said swiping his hat from his head and unbuttoning his coat.

Eric dragged a hand through his bed head and looked at his friend in surprise. "My help?" he asked sleepily.

Patrick nodded as he slung his coat on the back of a chair. "Sp-speech. Need you to f-f-f-fix speech."

Sighing, he ran both his hands over his face. "Dude. It's early, I've not even had coffee yet."

Stopping in his tracks and seeing his friend for the first time since coming through the door, he noticed how run down he appeared. "Look l-l-like sh-shit."

Smirking, Eric padded to the kitchen and flipped the swtich on his coffee maker. "I love it when you sweet talk me."

Having followed his friend into the kitchen, Patrick leaned against the counter. "You okay?"

He nodded. "Alexis and the girls all caught chicken pox and so I was on duty for the last few days. Everyone's on the mend now though but I've learned what a Web Kinz is and have watched every possible Dora video."

The happiness on his friend's face did not escape Patrick's notice and while he was pleased for him at having found someone after all the years of taking himself of the market, a small knot formed in the pit of his stomach. He wanted so badly to have a family and he worried that he would become too attached to one that was not his. Patrick knew both Molly's and Kristina's fathers and while neither were men he had a lot of time for, they were still fathers and Eric needed to ensure he did not start assuming a role that was not his.

"B-be careful," he cautioned.

Screwing his face up, Eric shot him a questioning look. "Of what? I've already had the chicken pox."

Patrick shook his head, pulling his board from his bag. They aren't your kids.

"I know that" he answered tightly. "What's your point?"

Don't want you to get hurt

"I'm not" he answered breezily, grateful the coffee was ready. Turning his back to his friend, he pulled two mugs from the cupboard and filled them with coffee before carrying them over to the couch.

"So when you say you need me to fix your speech, what exactly do you have in mind?" Eric asked, changing the subject.

Patrick sank into the large double chair and twisted his lips to the side. Since asking Robin to marry him he had been on a mission to find a way to fast track his progress. It was beginning to feel like an insurmountable stumbling block to moving forward with his life - moving forward with Robin - and he was tired of being patient. He wanted to take action.

There's a procedure I read about that tries to re-establish the speech centre.

Eric narrowed his eyes. "No fucking way"

Doing a double take at his friend's almost violent reaction, the pen dropped from his hand. "Wh-why?"

"Are you out of your mind?" he asked before raising his hand. "On second thought, don't answer that. Pantsy I know exactly the procedure you are talking about and it is by any definition, high risk and experimental. You have had your skull open on the table twice already, you don't need a third time."

With his eyes fixed in steely determination, Patrick retreived his pen from the floor. Easy for you to say, you can speak.

"So can you," he reminded him.

"N-n-not enough"

Feeling that familiar sense of failure creeping up in him, Eric let out a long, slow breath. "Patrick, we knew this was a possiblity going in and I can't recommend you having another surgery especially one where the odds are against you. Not only could the procedure not improve your speech, it could make it worse."

I could find another doctor

Scoffing, Eric folded his arms across his chest and stared at his friend with incredulity. "You could," he snapped, "or you could tell me what the hell has you pushing to speak perfectly so soon? Your speech therapist told you it could take months"

Rolling his eyes in frustration, Patrick gripped the pen so tightly he nearly cracked it. I have NO MEMORY and can't fucking speak without relying on this goddamn board. I need another reason?

Staring at him, he waited. This was his friend and he knew better than anyone that things were rarely obvious with Patrick and regardless of what he claimed the reason or motivation for something was, there was always another reason. He knew he was frustrated and there was a part of him that felt responsible for that frustration but not so responsible that he was willing to undertake a risky procedure and lay his friend's life on the line again.

Patrick pinched the bridge of his nose and exhaled slowly. There were disadvantages to best friends, the chief one being the inability to hide things from them. One of the hallmarks of their friendship was that neither of them made it easy for the other one to get away with anything. They had always held each other accountable for choices and decisions. As difficult as that was at times it also ensure that they each had place to find the truth when they needed and even when they didn't.

Sighing quietly, he wrote: I asked Robin to marry me

Eric's blue eyes bluged in shock. "Holy shit."

With a small shrug of his shoulder Patrick nodded. She said no

"Oh." Eric reached for his mug and took a long sip of coffee. "Did she give a reason? Is it because of your speech?"

She says no. She says that she isn't ready - we have stuff to work through.

"What do you say?" he prodded.

Blowing out his cheeks, he gripped the board tightly in his hands. Such was his resentment at needing any kind of assistance to communicate that he wanted to break the board over his knee. But in the end it would do little to improve his situation and it was not as though his voice was actually locked inside the board, it just felt that way.

I think she still sees me as sick.

"And so you think if you got your speech back perfectly that she would see you as healthy? And then she would say yes?"

"Sounds d-d-dumb b-but yeah."

Scratching the scruff on his face Eric spoke, "You know, you guys have been through a lot of stuff lately and when things feel like they're out of your control, you immediately try to control the things you can."

With a disagreeable shake of his head, Patrick wrote: You think I asked her just to exercise some control? Nice to know you think so highly of me?

"It wasn't a diss," he objected. "I'm just saying that you have a lot on your plate and that you were looking for something to-" Eric stopped mid-sentence as Patrick banged the board on the table.

His brown eyes blazed furiously as he wiped the board clean and scribbled again.

Her protocol failed. Eric's gasp echoed around the room. And I always thought I would hit the door when that happened. I'm not good at this type of stuff, never have been. But when I found out about it I realized that I didn't want to leave. It only made me love her more because it drove home the point at how fragile all of this is and I don't want to waste another minute without her. I love her. I want to marry her and see just how long forever runs for.
xxxxx
Robin's legs bounced nervously up and down as she sat in the chair, watching the room fill up. She anxiously rubbed her fingers together and took a long, slow breath. As her heart continued to pound loudly in her chest she realized it was going to take more than deep breathing to steady her nerves. Her eyes darted around the room, from one familiar face to another but whatever feelings of calm she was hoping they would bring her were not to be found.

"Cookie?" Darren asked as he took his usual seat next to her.

Robin silently shook her head. Just the smell of the chocolate was enough to turn her stomach. Though her body had finally accepted her new protocol and the side effects were mostly disappearing, her current nervous state put food out of the question.

"You look like you're Anne Boleyn awaiting the axe" Darren observed as she continued to wring her hands.

Exhaling, she brought her hands to rest on her lap. "I'm going to speak today and it always puts me on edge" she admitted. "I don't know why - I mean I've given plenty of speeches in my life."

"Yeah but any time you talk about your feelings or your emotions you expose yourself in a different way and that's nerve wracking."

Smoothing down her ponytail, she took another breath. "You never get nervous. Or never seem to get nervous - how is that?"

Darren shrugged. "Practice. I've been coming here for years Robin. At some point it just gets easy."

"I don't think I'm at that point yet" she joked weakly.

"Can I help?"

She shook her head. "No. I just....I need to say this out loud and then I'll be better, I think."

She had been very much lost in thought in the days since Patrick had proposed to her. There were many reasons why she had said no - some of them she had understood and some of them she had not. It was a strange sensation to know that you were with the love of your life and but when they made the one gesture that was supposed to publically confirm that, you turned it down. Lying awake the night before in bed as Patrick slept restlessly beside her, she was hit by a sudden wave of clarity and having mulled it over further she was taken with the need to say it out loud - in a room full of people who would get it.

As the meeting rolled on she ripped apart the rim of her styrofoam cup, dropping the little squeaky white bits into the cup itself. Once the floor opened up for comments, she raised her hand and smiled nervously as she was invited to speak.

"My boyfriend proposed to me the other day-" As her friends clapped, she raised her hand. "I said no." Exhaling slowly, she tugged on the end of her ponytail. "I gave him a lot of reasons as to why we couldn't, not yet anyways. It's odd - it's not about us loving each other enough - that's not a problem for us. I told him that it was because we had both just been through so much and the timing wasn't right. As I talked myself into a hole, I finally admitted that I wasn't ready. I couldn't tell him why I wasn't ready to get married - or heck, even be engaged."

She continued to fidget with the styrofoam cup, breaking off tiny bits in a slow, deliberate fashion. Chewing on her bottom lip, she looked around the room and was once again grateful for the lack of judgment she found there.

"I've spent a lot of time trying to figure it out since then and I think I've found a reason, I just don't know how valid it is."

"Robin," the group leader Deborah, interjected, "it's valid because it's what you're feeling and you have to make sure you don't apply a rigor to your feelings and thoughts that you wouldn't apply to other people's."

She smiled sheepishly, knowing that it was in fact just what she had done. "I think I'm not ready to get married because by promising to love - by formally promising to love someone for the rest of my life, I'm forced to admit that my life will be short. That while no one is promised a tomorrow, I can guarantee that it is unlikely I would see a 25th, 30th or 40th wedding anniversary. There is a remote chance that I would see my children graduate college or start families of their own. And to be fair, that's a discussion that my boyfriend and I would need to have and I'm not convinced either of us are ready to deal with that reality. It's one thing to date a person who has HIV, it's another thing entirely to build a life around them knowing that each day means more sunsets behind them rather than in front of them. I guess I'm not ready yet because I don't want the reminder of all that I will miss."

"What about all you will experience?" Darren asked quietly.

Pulling on her bottom lip, Robin nodded. "I guess....I guess I need to find the balance between the two and then I'll be able to say yes."