Chapter 3

"Midorima-kun, someone's asking for you."

The young doctor finished wrapping up bandages around his patient's wrist. Today he was assigned to the ER and it was completely exhausting. Just in the last three hours he'd had everything from a child accidentally drinking cleaning products to a massive car crash of which one of the patients had been beyond saving by the time he was brought in and the other two were in critical condition. He looked up and saw one of the resident doctors giving him a meaningful look.

"A high-schooler's in the reception saying he needs to talk to you, says it's important." And she wiggled her pinky finger adamantly.

He asked her to look after the patient and left the room, a light blush on his cheeks. Not many of his colleagues knew about his relationship with Takao, but Dr. Ienaga had figured it out since the first time his lover had come to visit him at the hospital and had been very understanding and supporting ever since, for which he was extremely grateful.

He made his way to the reception, wondering what would bring a high-schooler to meet him. How did they even know where to find him? Had something happened to Takao? An all too familiar pang of worry, bordering on panic took over him and he hurried down the hallway without noticing it.

The kid waiting for him was clearly one of the basketball club members from Shuutoku. He was alone, which gave him some peace of mind. Midorima was Takao's emergency contact, if something had happened the school would've contacted him directly instead of sending one of the kids to search for him.

"You were looking for me." He stated plainly, hoping to get this over with quickly.

The teenager flinched. He seemed to be struggling for words and couldn't even meet Midorima's eye. Good grief. "Did something happen with Takao?"

"Uhm… well it might be… I mean, it could be nothing and maybe I'm just wasting your time but… there was a fight about… M-Midorima-san's a-a-accident and Takao-sensei got really u-upset and… h-he sort of d-disappeared."

Shit.

His whole body shivered as yet another car ran by. He wanted to leave this place that caused him so much pain, but his legs wouldn't move, and he was left frozen there, curled into himself on the side of the road, on the verge of a panic attack every time he heard the noise of an engine, the sound of tires, or a car's honk. He usually had no problem with cars (heck, Shin-chan owned a small van because it made traveling in a wheelchair a lot easier), so it was clearly the location that was triggering all this terrible feelings of guilt, impotence and fear. Maybe he should've gone to counseling when his parents suggested it.

"What the hell am I even doing here?" he wondered out loud, hugging himself, hoping to repel all the nasty emotions that kept haunting him.

"How curious. I was wondering the exact same thing."

Takao flinched and his eyes got watery again. "Shin-chan!"

Midorima was looking down at him from the wheelchair, a mix of concern and frustration in his emerald eyes. He climbed down to sit next to Takao on the edge of the sidewalk and scooted closer until their shoulders were brushing against each other.

"Seriously, what are you doing here? One of your students came to see me in a panic because you disappeared in the middle of practice." He sighed and fixed his gaze to the ground. "I got scared, damn it… he said…" he hesitated. He wasn't sure if he wanted to open that can of worms, but he knew it was necessary. "…he said you had an argument with some other kid about the accident." He turned silent afterwards, letting his words sink in and allowing Takao some time to organize his thoughts.

Midorima knew that, although his physical injuries had healed in a few months, Takao still carried some emotional scars from that accident five years ago. He also knew his lover was still blaming himself for it, some times more than others, and whenever he noticed Takao being excessively complacent he knew that he'd been beating himself about it again. He had hoped the shorter man would sort through it on his own; that Midorima's small and indirect daily displays of affection would reassure his lover that he didn't blame him or resent him at all and had no reasons to do so. But Takao's gloom over the subject only seemed to grow with time and he'd decided he couldn't just dance around the issue any longer. He'd have to confront the problem headfirst, make Takao let out all of his fears and insecurities about the subject and share his own, and hopefully, they'd finally be able to get over that stupid accident that had been slowly and almost unnoticeably damaging their relationship for years.

He finally looked up to see if Takao was going to talk, but he seemed deep in thought and his shoulders were shaking. Midorima extended his arm to reach one of Takao's hands and hold it in his.

"Kazunari." He whispered softly. "Talk to me. Tell me what's going on. We need to find a way through this. We can't let something like this keep eating at us any longer. Please. We'll figure it out somehow… together. Like we did back then."

Takao ground his teeth hoping to will the tears away, but it clearly wasn't working.

"I just… I… I can't help it! Every time I think of that day, all I can think is that if I hadn't been so stubborn, none of this would have happened!" he sobbed, hiding his face from view. "I know you always tell me not to blame myself, but I can't help it! And now there's even this rumor that I… that I d-did it on p-p-purpose… I couldn't…" he was sniffling loudly now. "I loved how you played basketball… I loved watching you play… I loved playing with you, knowing you trusted me to get the ball back to you no matter what… How can they think that I wanted it to end like that?"

Midorima leaned his forehead on Takao's shoulder, letting the warmth of his breathing touch the other man's skin. "They don't know you like I do." He let out a soft sigh. "I have never, not even once, thought you were guilty for that day. Things happen. Please stop hurting yourself for this."

Takao snapped his head upwards to look at Midorima in the eye, his clear eyes already red and puffy from crying. "You're just saying it to make me feel better. It's because Shin-chan is too kind, it's a given you wouldn't put the blame on me. But no matter how I look at it, if I just… if I hadn't insisted on making you ride the bike… You lost so much, and it's all my fault and I…"

"How can you say I lost anything? You have no clue of what you're talking about whatsoever!" He was angry. Why couldn't Takao see it? Why couldn't he understand something so important? He pulled away from his lover and hid his face in his hands, trying to will the nightmarish images out of his head.

"You don't get it at all…I… I never told you before… about what happened that day."

Takao looked at him again, confusion written all over his face. "What is there to tell? I was there, I know what happened, I-"

Shin-chan shook his head violently to cut him off, still staring at the ground. He didn't want to remember; he'd tried so hard to get rid of those memories that served no other purpose than torturing his mind. But he had to come clean now. It was unfair that he demanded Takao to speak up while keeping his own fears a secret. Takao needed to know.

"That day, after the crash… I was awake the whole time." The memories started flooding his vision. The sound of sirens. The blinding pain. Takao in a pool of blood. Takao was hurt and he couldn't move. He couldn't reach him. Takao.

"I… when the ambulance arrived I…" his own voice rang in his ears 'take Takao! I'm alright, just please save him! He's bleeding! Please, please, please! Someone save him please!' and he was so desperate he didn't feel the pain anymore. "I don't remember much to be honest." He was panicking, struggling to get to where his boyfriend was, screaming, crying, flailing and just not letting them help him at all, so they'd had to sedate him. But how was he supposed to react after seeing that?

"But I remember… right before they got you inside the ambulance you… you… you…" the voices of the paramedics screaming "He's fibrillating! Get me the paddles!" the tears had begun trickling down his cheeks. "Don't you get it? Your heart almost stopped! I thought you were dying! Do you think… do you really think I care about my legs when I could've lost you?!" He choked as he remembered Takao's body convulsing with the electric shocks that tried to put his heart back in motion.

Takao gasped in shock. Had he really had such a close encounter with Death? No one ever told him any of it. He knew he'd been out cold for ten days, but he was released shortly after waking up because his injuries weren't really severe. As far as he'd been told, he'd gotten off with little more than a slight concussion. A near-death experience? No way.

"It's the truth. You recovered quickly so the doctors thought there was no need to tell you. They said although your injuries weren't that bad, your body had a very strong reaction to the trauma and it caused it to shut down for half a minute. But I was so scared. They wouldn't tell me what had happened to you. They didn't say anything or let me see you. I was terrified!"

He had few memories of their first night at the hospital, but they were as clear as if they had happened yesterday. How he woke up demanding to know about Takao and the doctors refused to reply. It wasn't until he tried to get up to look for him that he realized his legs weren't working and he fell into panic again, screaming, half in shock because his legs weren't moving at all, and half hysterical because he needed to see Takao right now. He had spent the next 30 hours going in and out of sedatives because the doctors found no other way to keep him from crawling out of the room in frenzy. And when he finally settled down, all they'd tell him was that Takao was unconscious and unstable, his vitals were weak and he may not wake up at all.

"I've had… I've had nightmares since that day. From time to time…" he really didn't want to bring this up. But he was tired of secrets, tired of watching Takao keep all his pain to himself, and if he hoped to persuade him to open up, the least he could do was to be completely honest himself, even if it didn't feel like such a good idea in the short-term. "They're… I wake up in the hospital and…" as the words kept coming out, a tighter and tighter knot started to form in his throat and the images from the nightmare blurred his vision. He choked and tears spilled uncontrollably out of his eyes again. "Sometimes I wonder which one is reality and which one is the dream. I'm scared! Every time I wake up, I'm scared my legs will move and you won't be by my side! What's the point of walking if I lose you? Why can't you understand this? If my two legs are the price for your life, I'll pay it a thousand times over!" he pulled Takao into a tight embrace and buried his face in his lover's shoulder, panting, trying to get his breath back, letting the warmth seep through his skin, reminding himself that this was the real world, that the man he loved was in his arms where he belonged and everything else was just a horrible nightmare.

Takao lost his breath. It felt stupid now, but it'd never occurred to him that Shin-chan had been carrying such a heavy burden up until now. Of course it made sense. Even when he was still in the hospital, Shin-chan had tried to act strong and cool about his paralysis so his family wouldn't get worried. His arms moved tentatively to surround the young doctor's shoulders, and Takao felt them shaking. He bit his lip in frustration. He'd gone back to do the exact same thing he'd promised not to: wallow in guilt and self-pity and make Shin-chan worry about him, when he'd vowed to become Shin-chan's support.

"I'm sorry, Shin-chan. I'm so sorry."

Midorima pulled back from the embrace and cupped Takao's face in his hands, locking their eyes in a deadly serious gaze.

"I want you to listen to me now. You are going to stop apologizing for this. And you are going to forgive yourself too. This has gone too far for both of us." He stroked Takao's cheeks with his thumbs and smiled meekly. "I know you love me, and that you don't want to see me hurt. But I wish you were more aware of just how much I love you, of how important you are to me. I don't want you to keep hurting yourself like this anymore. Just like you, I don't want to see the person I love being hurt. Please stop hurting the person I love."

Kazunari felt the familiar warmth of Midorima's lips on his, and his mind went blank. It was sweet and tender, the kind of romantic kiss that made him swoon. Takao could feel Shin-chan pouring all of his love into the kiss in the way he caressed his cheeks, and how he licked his lips, begging for entrance, how he deepened the kiss and how their tongues entwined, not in a juvenile struggle for dominance, but in a loving dance of mutual understanding. He could almost hear Shin-chan's thoughts echoing in his heart. I love you. I need you. I don't want to lose you. I love you. I love you. I love you.

"I love you."

Midorima had learned something that day. Before the accident, he had always taken Takao for granted. Since they became friends and even after they started dating, he'd always been mean and ungrateful in spite of everything Takao did for him. Everyone always complained about how he was arrogant and pedantic and they were right. He was also too proud to be completely open and honest about his feelings. Unlike Takao, who had no qualms in expressing his love in any imaginable way, Midorima rarely voiced his feelings or made any particular display of affection. Even though they had been dating for almost two years at the time, he was pretty sure he could count the times he'd said "I love you" before the accident with his taped fingers only.

That day he had seen Takao standing at Death's door and felt the world crash down on him. As the days went by without the shorter boy waking up, Midorima had started going over every minute they had spent together, every word they had said, every time they had kissed, every moment their eyes had locked. He'd started realizing just how often he would dismiss Takao's affection with proud rebuffs, how many times he'd pulled back from a kiss or a hug out of embarrassment, how he'd respond 'shut up, stupid' every time Takao said 'I love you'.

What was it that I told him right before the crash?

"Shut up Takao, you're annoying."

When was the last time I told him I love him?

Does he even know that I love him?

It was as if a switch had been flipped inside him. He realized he'd been doing it all wrong and now Takao may never know how important he was for him. It was commonly said that people don't change, but Midorima decided to do a full one-eighty where their relationship was concerned. Takao had given him so much, it was about time he started giving something back, and he'd promised himself he'd do anything to make sure Takao knew how much he loved him. And he'd kept to that promise until today.

Takao was having a hard time catching back his breathe. The last minutes seemed like a rush of emotions gone wild and he suddenly felt exhausted from all of it. The fact that Shin-chan's kisses always seemed quite effective in shutting his brain down wasn't helping at all. His face grew hot as he stared at his lover's determined eyes and saw the raw sincerity in them. Shin-chan loved him, and that realization made it hard to even remember why he'd been so afraid and insecure. If Shin-chan could forgive him, why did he feel entitled to keep blaming himself? How could he have doubted that Shin-chan loved him so sincerely? What others thought about him wasn't important. If Shin-chan loved him… If Shin-chan forgave him, that was all that mattered to him.

"That's just unfair, Shin-chan. You know when you kiss me like that all I have left is complete surrender." He smiled, his eyes still stinging from all the crying, and he leaned forward to press his forehead against Midorima's, rubbing their noses together and feeling the all too familiar tickling from his lover's beautiful, long eyelashes.

"Then do it. Surrender yourself to me."

"Kiss me again and we've got a deal."

Midorima didn't need to be told twice.

To be continued

There you go, three thousand words worth of melodrama. I think my biggest problem is that I adore this kind of over-the-top dramatic and emotionally intense climaxes, but then I don't know how to pull the characters down from the emotional high to find a solution to the conflict, so I always feel it ends up being rushed or not as satisfactory as it should be. But I'll let you guys judge that.

A small note for anyone who wondered about the doctor wiggling her pinky finger at Midorima. It's because in Japan, the pinky finger is associated with romantic relationships (the red string of fate is supposed to be tied to it) and men will usually lift their pinky finger when they're saying something about their girlfriends without explicitly using the term. Since in my headcanon, Shin-chan has an understanding boss who is aware and supportive of his relationship, I added it as a passing scene.

BTW, another idea that got scratched from the original concept was that at some point in the argument their emotions went to such an extreme that Takao suggested they broke up. One of the ideas I toyed with for a while was that Midorima had a lingering fear that Takao only sticks with him out of guilt, and so their relationship would be so plagued with self-loathing and insecurities it seemed beyond repair. I decided I was taking it way too far and that the Midorima in this story is completely aware of how important he is to Takao, so it didn't make any sense to follow that storyline. I also felt such a relationship would be genuinely unhealthy and I didn't want that.

I wonder if I overdid it instead with Shin-chan's nightmares and Takao almost dying. A funny thing is that I initially had Takao's heart stopping due to shock, but I read online that you don't use the electric pads when the heart stops, and I always find those scenes of doctors screaming "Clear!" while the patient convulses from the electric shock very impactful so I figured it would make for a much more traumatizing memory and changed the heart stopping to fibrillating. I happened to find this very useful website about the use of medical conditions in fiction. I always try to stick as close to both canon and reality as I can although I did take a lot of artistic liberties to make the scenario work (the details on which I am never disclosing, but I figure someone with more than basic knowledge in medicine would be able to point out).

As always I'm rambling so long I don't know myself anymore. There's only a short epilogue following and I'm already working on more side-stories within this same canon with which I'm so obsessed. I'm also working in some mindless porn for Takao's birthday (See "How to use a basketball jersey" which I just uploaded yesterday) so yay. The fandom's been kind of dead lately, but I'm so in love with this couple I can't stop writing for them (sorry to my MukuroTsuna three-shot that's been struggling to get out of my head and into the paper for half a year!) And of course I'm still battling with the AoKise continuation of "One crime", but I really want to wait for the anime S3 to come out so I can rewatch Kise's game against Haizaki. I'm kind of worried they're gonna cut it out for the sake of squishing all the Winter Cup in 24 episodes, but I'm really hoping they give us a decent adaptation. Basically there's a lot of stuff I'm working on, and my recent discovery that this month marks my tenth anniversary in this website (no kidding) has motivated me to work so much harder than usual!

ANYWAY. I hope you enjoyed this chapter and the story overall. Please do R&R, I have no other way of knowing if anyone's interested in this story and whether I should dedicate the time to put it on paper to share it with everyone or just keep it in my brain for my own amusement. Stay tuned for the epilogue!