AN: Been working on this one since I finished my last tag. Now that it's finally done, I'll be writing a couple more tags, and hopefully a multichapter fic (that will tick off some BTHB boxes). Enjoy!
Drake rested his head on his fist and stared out the window as he droned out whatever it was that Walter was talking about next to him. He would've preferred to ride in the car in silence, but just every now and then, Drake didn't actually get what he wanted. At least it was only a few more miles, then they would arrive at the DMV and Drake could finally apply for his driver's license. He'd finally passed his driver's test, after more attempts than he was proud of. Josh would've been his preferred driver down to the DMV, but tragically his brother was working and didn't feel like calling off just to drive Drake downtown. His mother would've been his second choice, but she was at a conference in LA - what sort of a conference someone who worked at a catering company had to go to, Drake had no idea, but then again, he hadn't asked, and he didn't really care. But that left only Walter to drive Drake, and as much as Drake had insisted that he could walk - which he couldn't, it was like ten miles from their house into downtown San Diego and it was blazing hot outside - Walter wouldn't hear of it. So, with Megan dropped off at Janie's for the night, and Josh at work, Drake was left to awkwardly endure his stepfather's cringeworthy attempts at bonding with him.
It wasn't that Drake didn't appreciate that Walter tried, he just knew it was pointless. They didn't have anything in common, and Drake just wasn't interested in another father, not after how awful his biological one was. But Walter didn't seem to get that memo, or he just didn't care. Like Josh, the man was incredibly stubborn when it came to forcing someone to be his friend. Unlike Josh, Walter was not succeeding in forcing the friendship. Drake didn't mind him, but they didn't need to have anything other than a cordial relationship.
"Are you even listening to me?" Walter asked, his tone making it very clear that this was not his first time trying to get Drake's attention in the past minute or so. Drake glanced at him, but didn't respond. It was obvious enough that he hadn't been listening without him needing to verbally confirm it. "Why do I even try with you?" Walter continued with a derisive shake of his head.
Ouch. It wasn't the worst thing that a father had ever said to Drake - far from it - but it still stung more than Drake wanted to admit.
"Yeah, why do you?" Drake snapped back as Walter pulled the car into the old parking garage.
"Maybe because I'm your father now! Ever think of that?" Walter spat out, thrusting the car into park much harder than was necessary. "Oh right, of course not, because you don't think! You never think about anything or anyone but yourself."
"Oh, come on," Drake groaned. "You're not even my father." He turned and tried to open the door right as it locked shut. Walter had engaged the child locks. Drake rolled his eyes and exaggeratedly pulled the door handle again and again.
"No, I'm not done talking to you, and for once in your life, you're gonna listen to me," Walter seethed. "And you're actually right for once! I'm not your real father! And you better be thankful for that, because I think you and I both know exactly what your real father would've done to you if you disrespected him even half as much as you disrespect me." Drake slowly turned to look at Walter with a sneer on his face and hurt in his eyes, but his stepfather wasn't finished. "Is that what it would take to make you listen to me? Is that the reason why you always disobey me? Because I don't beat you when you misbehave? What if I were to start? Would you actually listen to me then? Is fear the only thing that could ever make you act right?"
Drake sat staring at his stepfather for several moments, unsure of even what to say. He and Walter had had their fair share of arguments, but none quite like this.
"How can you even say that?" Drake asked, his voice still so loud in the silent car, despite being so quiet compared to his stepfather's shouts. He clenched his fists on reflex, not because he felt like hitting Walter, but to stop the shaking in his hands.
"Because how else am I supposed to get through to you!" Walter shouted. "I have tried, and tried, and tried to bond with you, for your mother's sake, for Josh's sake, but you just make it so impossible! No wonder your father-," Walter immediately cut himself off and shook his head, turning away from Drake. He remained silent, but the damage had already been done. Drake knew exactly what he had been about to say.
"I hate you," Drake replied as tears built in his eyes. "Josh's mom must've really been a saint, because you?" He shook his head. "I hate you so much. I wish my mom had never even met you." That wasn't true. Without Walter marrying his mom, he wouldn't have Josh as his brother, but Drake wasn't thinking about that. "Now let me out," he demanded, tugging on the door handle again and again. "Let me out!" he shouted. Drake couldn't be in the same car as Walter anymore.
"Fine! You can walk home for all I care," Walter said as he disengaged the child locks.
Drake didn't respond as he threw open the car door, barely missing dinging the car next to them. He slammed the door shut behind him and had taken four steps away from the car when he felt the familiar feeling of the ground beginning to shake beneath his feet. Drake fell to his hands and knees from the force of the shaking, and immediately saw the cracks forming in the ceiling above him. The garage was old, but it couldn't have been old enough to collapse on them, right?
"Drake! Get back in the car!" Walter shouted, all traces of anger gone from his voice as he shouted at his stepson from the car to get to safety.
Drake scrambled to his feet as parts of the ceiling began raining down around him. Car alarms started going off, and he could hear distant shouting from others both inside and outside the building. Drake only made it one step closer to the car before the earthquake intensified, and the ceiling started to collapse in full. Concrete fell right in front of him, with rusted rebar sticking out of it.
"Drake, come on!" Walter shouted. Drake could hear the fear in his stepfather's voice, and he was sure that the flicker of fear he saw in the man's eyes matched his own as the ceiling began to crumble on top of him.
Drake felt the ground shift sharply beneath his feet, tilting downward, the floor likely having begun to collapse on the other side of the garage, causing him to fall onto his back. Drake's head slammed into the concrete below, and pain erupted at the back of his skull. He moaned as his vision began to grow fuzzy, and Walter's frantic shouts started drifting away. Drake barely had the wherewithal to even lift his hands to protect his head as more of the ceiling fell. Searing pain like he'd been stabbed exploded in his chest near his shoulder, then-.
Nothing.
Walter could barely even hear himself screaming his stepson's name as the building collapsed around them. He was safer in the car, but Drake was out in the open, completely exposed, all because of Walter. He stayed where he was, watching as Drake fell, then didn't get back up, as a large chunk of the ceiling fell right next to his stepson. Walter clambered into the backseat of the vehicle, trying to get to the door closest to Drake's still form.
He jumped as a large piece of concrete smashed into the hood of the car, and he could hear smaller ones pelting the roof. Just as Walter reached the door Drake was closest too, another large chunk of ceiling fell right onto the car next to him, taking with it the car that had been parked on top of it. The entire building was starting to crumble.
Walter couldn't open the door. The sandwich of destroyed car, concrete, and destroyed car was preventing it from opening. Walter was lucky that the ceiling hadn't yet fallen on top of his own vehicle. But he still had to get to Drake. The shaking seemed to have finally stopped, but there was no telling how much more of the building could collapse, or when an aftershock could begin. He surveyed the damage around the car. From what he could see - the dust was quite thick, and enough of the building had collapsed that significantly less light from outside was being let in - he and Drake were trapped by debris of concrete and cars in an area about the size of their living room. He didn't see any other people, but could faintly hear shouting coming from somewhere else.
"Drake!" he shouted, but there was no answer. Walter could barely even see his stepson through the dust, and what he saw was not encouraging. Drake was laying on the ground, unmoving. Drake was never unmoving. The kid was hyperactive at best. Even when he was being lazy and laying around doing nothing but watching Celebrities Underwater, his hands were still always occupied with drumming on a nearby piece of furniture or shoveling chocolate or other junk food into his mouth - with how much junk food the kid consumed on a daily basis, it was insane how skinny he was.
"Drake!" he repeated, but still received no reply. But Drake was fine. Walter was sure that his stepson had just hit his head pretty hard on the fall, and was otherwise unscathed. He had to be.
Walter crawled to the other end of the car and sighed in relief as he managed to open up the other back door. He climbed out as quickly and carefully as he could, sidestepping piles of rubble and rushing over to the boy on the floor. Walter gasped the moment Drake came into view. That giant piece of concrete wasn't lying next to him. It hadn't missed him. Its broken edge was laying just barely on top of Drake, and exposed rebar was stabbed into the kid's shoulder, just under his left collarbone. Drake still wasn't moving.
Falling to his knees next to his stepson's head, Walter forced two fingers on his shaking hands together and checked under Drake's jaw for a pulse. He let out another sigh of relief when he felt the rapid but strong beat.
"Drake," he called out, much more gently this time. It took all he had not to touch him. "Come on, kiddo, you gotta wake up," he said. But why was he trying to wake him up? His stepson was going to be in a world of pain and fear the moment he regained consciousness, so wouldn't it be better to let him remain blissfully unaware as long as possible?
A soft whimper came from the boy. Walter sighed. It didn't matter anyway. Drake was waking up. Walter should've stayed quiet.
The whimpers continued, then turned into a moan of pain that drove a dagger straight into Walter's heart.
"Drake, it's okay," Walter lied. "I'm right here."
Drake's eyes slowly opened and his breathing picked up rapidly. He cried out in pain and tears immediately began falling out of the corners of his eyes. Walter had never seen his stepson cry before.
"Hey, hey, hey," Walter rushed out, leaning over Drake slightly to force himself into Drake's field of view. "You're gonna be okay, I'm right here." Walter forced himself to ignore Drake' unequal pupil size and the terror he saw in those brown eyes. They flicked over to his shoulder, and widened at the sight of the rebar impaled into it. Drake let out a cry that Walter wasn't sure was more from pain or fear, but it broke his heart either way. "I know it hurts, I know," Walter continued. "Just stay as still as you can, I'm sure the rescue crew will have us out of here in no time."
"I'm sorry," Drake rushed out. Walter looked at him quizzically, but didn't have time to reply before Drake continued. "I don't hate you, I was just hurt by what you said and angry. It's okay if you hate me or if you have to punish me like my dad did, but please just don't leave me right now. I don't wanna be alone." Drake squeezed his eyes shut and his breathing picked up again. He grit his teeth and moaned against the pain while Walter sat in shock next to him.
"I'm not gonna leave you," he finally replied. Walter refrained from mentioning that he quite literally couldn't leave him, since the building had collapsed around them, leaving them trapped exactly where they were. He wasn't sure if he should try to get Drake to talk about what else he'd said. Clearly the kid had a very severe concussion, and that mixed with what surely had to be agonizing pain was the only reason why he was saying what he was. "You're not gonna be alone," he settled on saying.
Drake didn't reply. He kept his eyes squeezed shut as a steady flow of tears continued to track down his temples and into his auburn hair. Walter reached down and took a gentle hold of Drake's hand, but the kid immediately squeezed it so tightly that Walter grimaced. He didn't take his hand away though. This was probably the only comfort he'd be able to provide his stepson for however long it was going to take until they were rescued.
He kept holding his stepson's hand with one one of his own, while his other snaked into his pocket to retrieve his cell phone. He was sure that the 911 call center had already been flooded with calls, but he had to try to get through. Drake needed him to get through, and while the kid was relatively calm - if steady silent crying with the occasional whimper counted as relatively calm - was the best time to try.
It took three tries, but eventually, Walter was finally able to get through.
"911, what is your emergency?"
"My son and I are trapped under a parking garage. It collapsed during the earthquake. My son is hurt, it's really bad. A piece of rebar is impaled into his shoulder, I need to get him out of here, he has a concussion and he needs a hospital," Walter rushed out. He looked back down at Drake, who remained unchanged. The kid was still clutching his hand, softly crying with his eyes squeezed shut.
"Do you know the address of the parking garage, or approximately where it is?"
"I don't know the address, but it's across the street from the DMV, downtown. We're on the first level, on the side closest to the DMV." Walter looked around them again. "There's no way for us to get out, and I can't move my son at all."
"What's his condition? How old is he?" the call taker continued.
"He's sixteen, and he's in really bad shape," Walter replied, his voice starting to shake. "The rebar is going right through his shoulder, maybe all the way out the other side, and his pupils are uneven. I've never seen him cry before but he is now and he's scared and he's in so much pain and he needs your help," he rambled, as Nichols men tended to do when stressed.
"Just try to keep him awake, and keep him warm. Fire rescue and EMS will be there as soon as possible."
Walter's stomach dropped at the feeling of the building shaking slightly around them again. He wasn't sure if it was an early aftershock or just the building continuing to collapse or settle or what, but clearly it caused the giant slab on Drake to shift ever so slightly.
Drake screamed, trying to jerk away from the source of the pain, which only made everything so much worse. Walter dropped the phone, let go of his son's hand, and quickly placed both hands on him, one on Drake's uninjured shoulder, and the other on the center of his thin chest, much too close to the rebar sticking out of him for Walter's liking.
"Drake, stop! Stop moving!" he yelled, this time out of fear rather than anger. He pushed down on Drake as hard as he dared, just trying to get him to be still. Moving was only going to continue to make the pain worse and make him bleed faster. Walter didn't even want to think about the possibility of Drake bleeding out before help arrived.
"It hurts! It hurts, Dad, please," Drake begged, his screams turning into loud sobs as he fell mostly limp under Walter's hands.
"I know, buddy, I know," Walter said. He tried to control his own tears at his son's visceral pain, and at the cruelty of Drake finally calling him 'dad' under such awful circumstances.
"Get it out, please get it out of me," he begged again. Drake opened his eyes and looked up at Walter, tears swimming in brown as he pleaded with Walter to fix it.
"Drake, I can't-." Walter broke off the moment Drake started crying harder at his words. "I can't lift a slab of concrete off you, especially not without risking the entire building coming down on top of you, and that rebar is the only thing keeping your blood inside your body where it belongs."
"It hurts," Drake repeated, squeezing his eyes shut again and letting his head fall closer to Walter, almost as if he were seeking out comfort from his stepfather.
"I know, kiddo." Walter didn't know what else to say. There wasn't anything he could do to get them out of there, and nothing he could do to help Drake. He could barely even comfort the kid. Concussion or no concussion, he just didn't know what Drake needed. Drake was so different from Josh, and try as he might, bonding with his stepson had proven to be impossible, as their earlier argument had shown.
Walter sighed as he gently took Drake's hand once again, and started carefully carding his fingers through Drake's bangs as he listened to his son continue to cry. He never should've said those things to him. He had let his frustration get the better of him and he spoke such awful words to a child he was trying to be a father to. Walter had known exactly what Drake's biological father had done to him - Audrey had sat him down and told him about all the ways that her ex-husband used to hurt Drake before she found out and he left them not even a year before Walter himself had met her, about all of Drake's struggles ever since and why he goes to therapy with Dr. Stein every week and all the things he should avoid doing if he wanted to get Drake to ever trust him - and he had thrown it all right back in the kid's face, using it as ammunition against him, even going so far as to start to say that Drake had deserved it. How could he have been so cruel to him? Yes, it was frustrating being turned away every single time when he tried to bond with him, but how was Drake ever supposed to trust him if he let his frustration get the better of him like that? His words had been completely unacceptable, and Walter vowed to himself that it would never happen again. His utter shame would make sure of that.
The sudden damp feeling at Walter's knees shot another arrow of fear through him. He didn't need to look down to know that it was blood, and that it confirmed his worst fear: the rebar had gone all the way through Drake's shoulder. The bleeding was minimal enough at the entry point, but gravity was working against him at the exit, pulling his blood out of his body and soaking both his shirt and the cement floor, and now Walter's jeans as well. Walter tried not to externally react at the realization. If he was going to have any shot at keeping Drake calm, then he had to be calm too - which would be quite a feat, since Nichols men were not exactly known for staying even keeled even at the best of times, much less when there was a perfectly good reason to panic.
The now intimately familiar feeling of shaking crushed Walter's heart. It couldn't be happening again, not so soon after the last one. He calmed down only marginally when he realized that it was only his hand that was shaking, and his hand was only shaking because Drake's was. Walter studied his son as best he could in the low light. All of Drake was shaking- no, shivering. He was cold, despite how hot it still was in there. But Drake was always cold, so that was okay, right? He was just too thin and cold natured, that's why he was shivering, not because of his serious concussion and the steady blood loss and shock.
Walter shook his head. It didn't matter why, so there was no use in lying to himself that it wasn't as bad as it seemed. The point was that Drake was cold and shivering, and his shivering was aggravating his impaled shoulder if his heartbreaking whimpers were anything to go by. But this was something that Walter could actually do something about. Besides, hadn't the 911 call taker told him to keep Drake warm?
He pulled his hand out of Drake's and started to stand.
"No, please don't leave!" Drake screamed. "I'm sorry, I'm s-sorry, I'll be g-good, just please d-don't leave me." His good arm was outstretched towards Walter, and his tear filled eyes pleaded with him. Walter immediately crouched down and took Drake's hand again, hoping that the stuttering was just because the kid was cold, and not from the concussion.
"Hey, no, it's okay, I'm not leaving you," Walter rushed out, choosing to ignore the rest of what Drake said for the time being. It wasn't the time to unpack all of that. He held Drake's gaze, the kid's pupils still uneven. "I'm just getting you a blanket from the car. I need to keep you warm. You're going into shock, and I'm not gonna let that happen, okay? I'm gonna take care of you." Walter gave Drake a thin lipped smile as he felt the tears in his own eyes threaten to fall. "But in order to go get that blanket, I have to stand up and walk away for a second. But I'm coming right back, I promise. Okay? I'm not leaving you."
After a moment, Drake nodded almost imperceptibly. It was so subtle that Walter wasn't even sure he really was nodding - it could've just been more of his shivering - but Walter couldn't spend any more time just sitting there and comforting Drake when he could be doing something actionable to actually help him, even if that meant that Drake was going to freak out for a minute.
"I'll be right back, I promise, Drake," Walter repeated. He squeezed his kid's hand for a moment before letting go and standing up before he could change his mind. Drake wasn't screaming, but Walter could hear a whine and the increase in the kid's breathing. He needed to be careful, but he also needed to move quickly.
Hoping and praying that his moving wouldn't cause further collapse and kill them both, Walter quickly made his way just a few feet over to the car, and carefully opened the trunk, where he kept a sherpa blanket for emergencies, thankful that the trunk was exposed to them and the vehicle wasn't so destroyed that he couldn't get it open. He pulled it out and didn't even bother closing the trunk before turning around and getting back to his son. The large blanket easily covered Drake's small frame, minus where he couldn't get it around the rebar, and it was soft, just like Walter knew Drake liked. According to Audrey, Drake had never really cared that much one way or the other on what type of blanket he used, until one day, Josh had complained to her that Drake kept stealing all of his soft blankets. She had gotten him one of his own, which Walter had seen him using too, but Josh still complained to both of them that Drake continued to steal Josh's sherpa blankets more often than not.
Walter carefully sat down next to Drake again. There wasn't any point in not getting comfortable, since there was nothing else in the car of use to them, no food or water or anything else. He once again grabbed Drake's hand and gently ran his thumb back and forth across the back of it.
"Where's Josh?" Drake asked, his eyes glassy from crying - but at least the tears had stopped for the moment.
"Josh is at work, remember?" Walter tried to give Drake a smile, but it was shaky at best.
"Is he coming back? I need him," Drake whimpered, eyes filling with tears again. Walter closed his own eyes so he wouldn't have to see Drake cry again, then forced himself to open them and see his son. He couldn't be a coward, not this time. At least Drake's stuttering had stopped and his shivers had significantly lessened. Maybe his earlier stuttering had just been from the shivering after all.
"You'll see him when we get home, okay?" Walter wasn't too concerned about Josh. The Premiere Galleria mall was a fairly new building, and thus wouldn't have suffered the same damage from the earthquake like the ancient parking garage had. Likewise, Megan was likely perfectly fine at Janie's, that house having been a brand new build, and of course Audrey was fine over one hundred miles away in Los Angeles. Drake was the only one he needed to worry about.
"I need him," Drake repeated, squeezing his eyes shut and turning his face towards his uninjured shoulder.
"I know, bud." Walter began carding his fingers through his stepson's bangs once again, trying to calm the kid while being mindful of the concussion - he just hoped Drake didn't have a skull fracture. "You'll see him as soon as we get home, I promise." In truth, Drake would probably see Josh as soon after getting to the hospital, since there was no way that Walter would be able to keep Josh away from Drake even if he wanted to, despite the fear of hospitals that Josh had had since his mother's death so many years earlier, but there was no use in reminding Drake that he would have to go there.
It was crazy for Walter to think about how things had changed between Josh and Drake. When he and Audrey had first started dating, Josh had thought that Drake was one of the coolest kids in school, but Drake had barely tolerated him, much less desired to be friends with him. Once the engagement and swift marriage had happened, Drake had seemed to open up to Josh and invite him into his life more out of obligation and necessity more than a desire to have him as a brother, but over that first year, things had changed, and Walter wasn't sure what had caused it, or when it had really happened. All he knew was that at first, Drake was begrudgingly calling Josh his brother, then one day, his stepson was shouting 'hug me, brother' and running full speed at Josh, only to have the biggest smile on his face when Josh wrapped his arms around him, lifted him into the air, and spun him around. Walter barely ever knew what their excitement was about, but he'd seen that exact scene play out between his sons more times than he could count. Most of the time, he didn't even see it, he just heard it from across the house.
At first, Drake had seemed aloof and stuck up, someone who thought that being friends with Josh was beneath him, but one day, when Josh started bringing his friend Drew around, Walter realized that that couldn't have been further from the truth. At that point, it had become clear to him that his stepson didn't actually have friends other than Josh. Walter couldn't be sure what it had been like for the kid before Josh became his brother, but by the time that Drake had started feeling neglected by his brother, it was clear to everyone that Josh was the only meaningful relationship that Drake actually had. There was his band, of course, and Trevor, but those relationships were superficial at best. The guys in his band, as much as Drake always praised them, were a revolving door, with none staying in the band - or in his son's life - for more than a few months at a time. Trevor was supposedly one of Drake's oldest friends, and yet Walter had only ever met him once, and he was the biggest idiot that Walter had ever met, seemingly incapable of having the deep friendship with Drake that his son craved, because the older boy was just that stupid.
Then there was Josh. Josh was really the only person that Drake ever seemed to want to spend time with, and was certainly the only person - aside from attractive girls, but Drake's relationship and commitment issues were a whole other discussion - that Drake ever truly welcomed touch from. Walter had never seen Drake and Megan touch in a loving manner, and despite loving his mother very much, and never shrugging her off or anything, Drake and Audrey didn't hug or cuddle as often as Walter knew Audrey wanted. Walter had been in Drake's life for several years now, and the two of them had only ever hugged twice, and they were quick affairs. Any time that Walter would try to initiate some sort of contact, just to show Drake that he cared, Drake would carefully step away or look pointedly at the hand Walter would rest on his shoulder until it was removed. Walter didn't take any offense to it, he knew it wasn't personal, but it did make it all the more special to him that Drake let Josh hug him all the time, and more often than not would actually be the one initiating the touch. Even if they were just sitting around watching a movie as a family or something like that, it wasn't unusual to see Drake putting his legs up on Josh's lap - ignoring the way that Josh would roll his eyes at his brother - or fall asleep against him.
When Walter had asked Audrey about it, she had confirmed that Josh was the closest friend that Drake had ever had, and that Drake had attached himself to Josh more than he had to anyone else since his father left. Sometimes, it seemed to concern her how close the two of them were, because she knew that the separation anxiety that Drake would begin to feel when Josh wasn't around was born of the trauma left behind by his father. She was worried about how Drake would cope when Josh inevitably left for college in a few years, but Walter didn't think there was anything to worry about, because he saw more than anyone else just how much Josh loved Drake too.
Of course, it was different with Josh. His son had always had friends, albeit weird ones, and despite never fitting in or ever being the cool kid, Josh was always uncompromisingly himself, and proud of who he was, and Walter was so proud of Josh for that. But Josh had always had a very kind and caring personality. It had broken Walter's heart when Josh had bent over backwards to try to take care of his mother when she got sick, only to have her pass away. She'd been sick for so long that Josh had gotten so used to having someone to take care of - even though as a young elementary schooler he wasn't actually doing anything to take care of her aside from trying to - and that had transferred to Walter once it was just the two of them. It wasn't needed, but it was sweet, and despite the everlasting pain of losing his first wife, Walter was thankful for the time it gave him to bond with his son more than he ever thought he could. But then Audrey came into their lives, and Walter spent a little less time with Josh, and Josh saw that he didn't need to take care of his father. Drake coming into his life had given him someone else to take care of.
It was as if Josh could see the scars left behind on Drake from his father, and saw that Drake needed someone to take care of him, someone to tell him when he was being an idiot, to try to keep him safe, to remind him to do his homework and help him study, to tell him that his music was good, that he was talented and that Josh was proud of him. Josh had stepped into the role of being a brother to Drake with an ease that Walter was proud of. Walter could clearly see that Josh loved Drake just as much as his brother loved him, and that would likely influence his decision as to where to go to college. Walter wasn't a betting man, but if he were, he would bet that Josh would either go to a college with an acceptance rate low enough that Drake would get in too - not the option that Walter was hoping for, for Josh's sake - or more likely, he'd go to the best college in LA, where he could live in an apartment off campus, so that he and Drake could still live together, but Josh could go to school and Drake could pursue his music. Josh was smart. He would find a way to keep them together - of that, Walter was sure.
Walter looked back down at his stepson. Drake remained where he was, with his eyes closed, one hand clenched around Walter's, and head turned towards his stepfather. If it weren't for the tears steadily leaking out of the corners of his eyes and the shaking in his hand - luckily just his hand, so likely from fear rather than shock - Walter would've thought that Drake was asleep. As much as Walter wished that that really were the case, since then the kid wouldn't be in such agonizing pain, he knew it was best that Drake was awake. He didn't know a lot about anything medical, but Walter did recall always hearing that when someone gets a concussion, you're supposed to keep them awake for a while.
To Walter's horror, the building started to truly shake in earnest yet again - definitely an early aftershock. Drake cried out aloud in pain over the sound of more bits of concrete breaking off and falling to the ground. He tried to move away from the source of the pain, but every move he made only made it worse.
"You have to stop moving," Walter tried to say, but his voice was drowned out by a loud crack in the ceiling above them. With a sharp intake of breath, Walter lunged over Drake as best he could, forcing himself to ignore Drake's shriek of pain as he pushed himself right against the rebar and concrete, wrapping one arm around Drake's head and using the rest of his body to create a canopy over his son, bodily protecting him from the larger chunks of ceiling raining down on them. He grunted as they hit his back before falling harmlessly to the ground. Walter was sure that he would be littered in black and blue, but none of the chunks were large enough to do much damage beyond that.
"You're okay, I've got you," Walter said, speaking almost directly into Drake's ear with how he was holding himself over the kid. He held himself exactly where he was even after the shaking had halted, just to make sure. Walter finally moved after the shaking had been over for what must have been a full minute. Drake was still crying beneath him. He needed to do something to distract him.
Walter took Drake's hand again, not surprised to feel his son accepting the hand and gripping it for all he had. With his other hand, he searched the ground around him for his cell phone. He sighed as he picked it up. It was smashed to pieces.
"Hey, buddy, do you have your cell phone on you?" he gently asked him.
"Front pocket," Drake whispered in response, eyes still squeezed shut.
Carefully, Walter reached into Drake's front pocket where he could just barely see the phone sticking out now that he was actually looking for it. He pulled it out and flipped it open one handed, and was greeted by a series of texts, and then some missed calls, all from Josh, and all from the time since the earthquake. Drake's phone must have been on vibrate only.
Not even bothering to read the texts, Walter called Josh back, and sighed in relief when his son picked up immediately.
"Drake, are you okay? Why weren't you or Dad answering?" he rushed out.
"Hey, Josh, it's Dad. I'm fine but my phone got destroyed. Are you okay?" Walter asked in response.
"Yeah I'm totally fine, but where's Drake? Is he okay?"
Walter sighed before answering. He hadn't wanted Josh to know that anything was wrong before Drake was safely at the hospital, but Drake needed his brother now.
"What's that sigh for? What happened to Drake? Is he hurt? Is he dead? Dad, just tell me what's going on and what's wrong with Drake, I need to know that he's okay," Josh rambled, his voice rising in pitch as he did so.
"He's hurt, but he's right here with me. We're trapped in the parking garage, waiting for fire rescue and EMS, and Drake-," he broke off for a moment, glancing down at his stepson. Drake's hands were still shaking, and he was still letting out small whimpers that broke Walter's heart more than the falling concrete had broken his phone. He clearly wasn't paying attention to anything but the agony in his shoulder, and Walter needed to change that - but he needed to prepare Josh first. "A piece of concrete with rebar in it from the ceiling fell on top of him, and the rebar went straight through his shoulder, pinning him to the ground," Walter explained as calmly as he could.
"What?!" Josh shrieked through the phone, taking it about as well as Walter figured he would. "I'm leaving work, I'm getting over there right now, I'll-."
"Josh, no, there's nothing you'd be able to do over here," Walter said, cutting Josh off before he could start rambling in earnest. "I know you're worried about him, I am too, but the best thing you can do for him right now is just talk to him. He has a pretty bad concussion and he's in a lot of pain and he's scared, and he really needs you right now."
"Okay," Josh responded after a beat, his voice just barely above a whisper.
"Drake," Walter said, ruffling his stepson's hair just enough to actually get his attention. Those uneven brown eyes clicked over to Walter's, showing Walter that Drake had at least some awareness of what was going on. "I've got Josh on the phone, and I'm sure he'd love to talk to you," he said. Walter didn't let his forced smile falter as he heard the telltale sound of the low battery signal. They wouldn't have as long as Walter wanted, but something was better than nothing. He reached down and held the phone next to Drake's ear.
"Josh?" Drake asked, his eyes going back to stare blankly above him.
"Hey, bro," Walter heard Josh reply. He could tell from his son's tone that he was forcing himself to stay calm.
"Where are you? What's going on?" Drake asked. His voice broke again, and Walter couldn't hold back his own tears at the look of confusion and fear and pain in his face.
"I'm at work right now, but I promise I'm gonna be there as soon as I can, okay? Helen said that's the only reason I'm ever allowed to leave early, if you need me." The low battery signal beeped again, its tone slightly different as the battery got lower. "You've been in an earthquake and you're hurt pretty bad, but you're gonna be okay. I'm gonna come find you, and Dad's there, and he loves you and he's gonna take care of you, okay?"
"He does?"
Walter barely concealed his sound of heartbreak at Drake's question. How did Drake not know that Walter loved him? Had Walter truly been that bad of a father to him? He gripped Drake's hand a little harder and began rubbing his thumb back and forth across the back of Drake's palm.
"Yeah," Josh responded. Walter could hear the pain in his son's voice at Drake's unconscious admission. "Yeah, he does. He loves you so much."
"Oh. I thought…" Drake trailed off, his eyes drifting away with his words. He was getting worse every minute. The fire rescue team needed to hurry up.
"I promise he loves you, Drake," Josh continued. Walter could hear that Josh was beginning to cry as well. The low battery signal chirped one more time, this time with the tone that signified that complete battery loss was imminent. There was less than a minute of battery left. "And I love you too. I'm gonna be with you as soon as I can, okay?"
"It hurts, Josh," Drake cried out. "Please make it stop."
Walter closed his eyes as his own tears kept falling. He could hear Josh's shaky breaths over the phone, and was so proud of his son for keeping together as well as he was, but he knew that the moment the phone died, Josh was going to break down at the Premiere.
"I know, I know, and I'm so sorry," Josh responded through his own tears. "But I'm gonna be there as soon as I can, I promise. I love you so-." The line went dead as the phone battery died. Walter gently took the phone away from Drake's ear and slipped the dead thing into his own pocket. Drake looked around the small space a bit, seeming confused again.
"Where'd Josh go?" he asked.
"We lost the phone signal," Walter lied. He didn't want to say that the phone had died in case Drake's concussion-addled mind got confused and thought that Walter meant that Josh had died. Walter didn't really know how concussions worked, but he wasn't going to risk anything that he didn't have to. "But he was telling the truth," Walter continued. "I love you so much. You are just as much my son as Josh is, I promise."
"It's okay, you don't have to lie," Drake said. His voice was getting weaker, but his uneven eyes were staring right at Walter's. He knew what he was saying, or at least, his concussion was allowing him to say something he truly believed. He continued before Walter could ask him what he thought he was lying about. "It's okay if you need to start hitting me, I'll understand, and I promise I won't tell, not like with my dad. I promise I'll be quiet, I swear I will, as long as you promise me you won't hurt Mom, or Josh, or Megan. You can do whatever you want to me, I know I deserve it, but please don't hurt them." Drake was crying again by the time he finally finished.
Walter was crying too. He couldn't contain the choked off sob he let out at his son's words. Concussion or no concussion, this was something that deep down, Drake genuinely believed. Not only did he believe that he was only one mistake away from Walter starting to hit him like his father had, but he truly believed that he deserved it, and that it was okay as long as he was the only one getting hurt.
"I'm sorry," Drake continued, looking up at Walter with a mixture of confusion and fear on his face, as if he felt he had done something wrong but he didn't know what, and that Walter was going to hit him for it.
"No, Drake, no," Walter finally said, forcing himself to calm down and shaking his head. He held Drake's hand in both of his larger ones and maintained eye contact. "You don't have to apologize for anything, okay? You didn't do anything wrong. I'm never gonna do that, I'm never gonna hurt you, I promise. I swear on my life, kiddo, I would never do anything to hurt you, especially not like your father did. What do I have to do to get you to believe me?"
Drake didn't have time to respond before the shaking began again, but this time, it was like a vibration throughout the building, rather than the shakes of a quake or aftershock. The kid still whimpered and shut his eyes tight, but the vibrations didn't get any stronger.
A faint beeping sound stole Walter's attention. He strained his ears and forced himself to ignore his son's whimpers. That was definitely a beeping sound coming from beyond the confines of their concrete tomb. It had to be fire rescue. Walter needed to move, he needed to let them know where he and Drake were. But that meant he had to get up, to release his hold on Drake's hand and leave him alone, if only for a few minutes. Walter hated it, but he had to do it.
"I need to let them know where we are," Walter said, squeezing Drake's hand. "I'm not going anywhere, I'm not leaving you, I promise, but I need to step over there and make enough noise that they hear us, okay?"
Drake still looked confused, but he seemed to nod slightly. That was probably as good as Walter was going to get. It was a herculean task, but Walter forced himself to let go of his son's hand and stand up. He ignored Drake's continuing whimpers and stuttered breathing, and moved as close to where the faint beeping was coming from as he could.
"Hey!" he shouted. "We're down here! We need help!" Walter looked around and spotted more rebar stuck in concrete on the ground, but this chunk of concrete was small enough that he could easily lift it. With the concrete in hand, he banged the exposed rebar against his car - it was totaled anyway. He took a second to make sure that the rest of the building wouldn't shift from his banging, then continued. Walter struck the rebar against the car again and again, shouting as he did so and making as much noise as he possibly could.
After what felt like an hour, but was likely only a few minutes, Walter finally heard something back.
"We can hear you, we're gonna get you out," Walter heard through what sounded like a megaphone. "Stand as far away as you can."
Walter let out a heavy sigh of relief and moved back to Drake with a disbelieving smile on his face. Help was there. Drake was gonna be okay.
"Hear that, kiddo? Help is here," he said, almost getting cut off by the sound of something against the concrete. Walter wasn't sure what it was, but if it got them out, then he didn't really care.
He looked back down at Drake to see his reaction, and found none. Walter got down on his knees next to his son. The pool of blood had expanded, and Drake's eyes were closed. His head had lolled to the side, and his hands weren't shaking anymore.
"Drake?" With his own hands shaking, Walter once again put two fingers to his kid's throat, and nearly cried with relief upon feeling the weak but steady pulse. It wasn't too late, Drake was just unconscious. "Hey!" Walter shouted again, despite knowing that the rescue crew probably couldn't hear him over the sound of their machine. "My son needs help! Please!" He looked back over his shoulder at where the sound was coming from, and was immediately greeted with a small beam of light. Whatever equipment they were using, they were breaking through the concrete and allowing the full light of the sun to stream in once again.
Once it started, the rest seemed to happen rather quickly, and soon enough, a man in a hard hat was standing in the opening that they had created, squatting down to look inside. Walter immediately greeted him.
"My son needs help," he rushed out. "There's a big slab of concrete on top of him and rebar stabbed all the way through his shoulder and he has a concussion and he just passed out and he's not doing well and he needs help, please, you need to help him!" Walter rambled, ending in a shout, his trademark Nichols panic coming back now that someone who could actually do something to help Drake had finally arrived.
"You need to let me see him," the rescue worker said. "We're gonna do everything we can, but we need to get you out first."
"No," Walter immediately refused with a shake of his head. "I'm not leaving him. If he wakes up and he's alone, he's gonna freak out and he's just gonna hurt more. No, I'm not leaving him." He looked back down at his unconscious son's pale face, grateful that, if nothing else, at least Drake wasn't in any pain while he was unconscious - at least, Walter hoped he wasn't.
"Sir, I'm sorry, but you have to. We can't get down there with our equipment to get your son out if you're down here too. There's just not enough room."
"I can't leave him."
"Isn't it better that you leave him for as long as it takes to get him out than if you stay and delay us getting him out and he dies, because of what you did?"
Walter was silent. He knew the man was right, and he hated it. If he wanted Drake to survive, then he needed to do whatever the rescue workers needed him to do, even if that meant leaving Drake alone.
"Fine," he finally said, just loud enough to be heard. "But I want to be able to see him the whole time."
"Okay, just climb out," the man said. He extended a hand down into the opening, waiting for Walter to grab it.
Walter looked back down at his son.
"I'm not going far, I promise," he said, despite knowing that Drake couldn't hear him. He squeezed Drake's hand one more time, and stood, moving back to the opening. Walter reached up and took the rescue worker's hand, allowing the man to help him to climb up and over the debris. Another man in a hardhat immediately grabbed Walter and tried to pull him away from the building and towards a paramedic. "No, he said I could stay by my son," Walter said, trying to pull away from the man.
"Sir, you need to move away from the building in case it collapses further," the man replied, with another worker coming over to help him try to get Walter away from the opening.
"No, I'm not leaving him!" Walter shouted. He watched as two men and one weird looking machine hopped down into the hole they'd created, obscuring Walter's view of Drake. If he had looked at anything else, Walter would've seen that the damage to the rest of downtown San Diego was not as bad as being trapped in that building would've had him believe, but all he could do was stare at where he last saw his son.
A loud cutting, grinding sound broke through Walter's concern. Paired with it was another scream that Walter had become all too intimately familiar with - Drake's scream.
"Drake!" he shouted, trying yet again to pull away from the men holding him back, and this time, he was successful. Walter wasn't exactly a very strong man, or even in the greatest of shape at all, but there was absolutely nothing that would stop him from getting to his son.
"Stay away from the building!" the men shouted, but Walter ignored them. One of the men grabbed his arm, and Walter did something he'd never done in his entire life - he spun around and slugged the man in the jaw, sending him careening back and groaning in pain. Part of Walter felt bad - after all, the man was only trying to keep him safe, which was a noble thing to do - but the only part of himself that he was listening to didn't care, and would fight anyone that tried to get between him and his injured son, good intentions or not.
Walter didn't go back inside the collapsed building, but he did get right next to the hole they'd created, and saw one of the rescue workers setting down the machine while the other was trying to keep Drake still as he openly sobbed in pain. They had just cut through the rebar right below the concrete, the vibrations of the machine no doubt causing agony to shoot through Drake just like the rebar had.
"Dad," Walter just barely made out through Drake's sobs.
"It's okay," the rescue worker holding him down said. Drake's struggles to get away from the pain had stopped, leaving him limp against the concrete floor once again. "You're gonna see him in a minute." The man turned his head back towards the opening, but stayed right next to Drake. "Send down the paramedics!" he shouted.
Two paramedics quickly dropped down into the space with a large bag, further obscuring Walter's view of his son. He heard them shouting out medical terms that he didn't understand, but the urgency with which they spoke them, he certainly did.
"What's your name, kid?" he heard one of the paramedics ask. For a moment, only silence followed. "Okay, Drake, we're gonna wrap this around the rebar, and then we're gonna lift you onto this blanket so we can get you out of here, alright?" she said. Walter sighed with relief. Drake hadn't passed out again, he just couldn't speak loudly enough for Walter to hear him too. "Now I'm not gonna lie to you," the paramedic continued. "It's gonna hurt, but we're gonna get you out of here, and your dad is right up there waiting for you."
"Everyone ready? We're gonna do this quick," the other paramedic said. Walter heard a series of agreements, a quick countdown, then the tragically familiar and heartbreaking sound of his son's scream of pain, devolving into long whines as he was moved.
Walter forced himself to step back, to give the paramedics and rescue workers room to get out, but stayed right there, ready to help in any way that he could. Soon enough, they were all out of the hole they'd been in and in the sun, and Drake was being held on the sherpa blanket like a makeshift stretcher, with both paramedics and rescue workers holding it up to keep Drake as stable as they could until finally, they were able to set him down on the actual stretcher.
"Thank you, thank you," Walter said, briefly looking between all of them. He quickly made eye contact with the worker that he'd punched. "I'm sorry," he said, and he did mean it, but he wasn't going to spend more time on the apology than that. Luckily, the man just waved a hand at him with a thin lipped smile, and walked away.
"Dad?" came Drake's weak voice as Walter once again took his hand and walked with the gurney to the waiting ambulance - when had that gotten there?
"I'm right here," he said. "We're gonna go to the hospital. You're gonna be okay." He forced a smile that he didn't feel.
"Where's Josh?" Drake asked again. "He said he was gonna find me. Is he okay?"
"He's fine, I promise," Walter said. He smoothed Drake's bangs back from his face. "He's gonna meet us at the hospital. I just have to tell him which one." He looked expectantly up at one of the paramedics.
"St. Schneider's," the woman said.
"Do you have a cell phone I can borrow?" Walter asked. He glanced over at her as he asked the question, but his attention was still on Drake more than anything else. "Mine got crushed by the building and Drake's battery is dead. I need to call my other son and tell him where we're going."
The woman sighed, but pulled out her cell phone and nodded.
"Make it quick," she said, then got back to checking the straps that secured Drake to the gurney.
Walter dialed Josh's number from memory as he hopped up into the back of the ambulance with Drake. No one even tried to stop him.
"Hello?"
"Josh, it's Dad," Walter rushed out. "Drake and I are in an ambulance headed over to St. Schneider's."
"Good," Josh answered with an audible sigh of relief. "I've been trying to get to where you guys were, but there's so many roadblocks to allow emergency vehicles through that it's been impossible."
"That's okay, just meet us at the hospital."
"I will. How's Drake? Is he okay? Can I talk to him?"
"I need that back," the paramedic interjected with an apologetic smile. Walter nodded.
"Josh, I gotta go, just meet us there," he said, then hung up. Walter felt bad for hanging up on his son so abruptly, but the paramedic needed it back, and his other son needed him anyway. "Josh is gonna meet us at the hospital, okay?" he reminded Drake.
"It hurts," Drake whimpered. As if to emphasize what they already knew, the ambulance rolled over a pothole, drawing another strangled cry out of Drake as he fought a losing battle to keep it together. "I'm so tired of crying," he mumbled. "But it hurts so much."
"It's okay," Walter said. He was sitting on the bench next to Drake and leaned over to make it easier for the kid to see him without having to move his head. "It's okay to cry. I've been doing a lot of it too." Drake nodded subtly and closed his eyes. Walter could see fresh tears tracking down his temples. "Isn't there anything you could give him for the pain? He's hurting so much," Walter begged, doing his best to keep his own tears in check. It hadn't been since Josh's mom was sick that Walter had been in so much agony over someone else's pain.
"We can't, I'm sorry," the paramedic replied. "With his concussion, we can't risk dropping his blood pressure any lower than it already is until he's in a hospital. But don't worry, we'll be there soon." She motioned up towards the ceiling, and that's when Walter took notice of the fact that he could hear the ambulance's sirens, which meant the lights were on too.
And she was right. It was literally only a minute later that they came to a stop at the hospital doors. Despite his internal hesitance at letting go of Drake's hand, Walter hopped out as quickly as he could and stepped to the side, giving the hospital staff that came rushing out of the hospital plenty of room to do whatever they needed to to help his son. He grabbed Drake's hand again once they had the kid out of the ambulance, and he practically ran with them as they rushed into the hospital itself and through double doors.
"You can't be here," one of the doctors or nurses or something - Walter didn't know and he didn't care, all he knew was that she was wearing scrubs - said. "You have to wait out there."
Walter was stopped from following them by a security guard, Drake's hand was forcibly pulled out of his as the gurney was rolled further down the hall, away from Walter.
"Dad? Dad!" Drake called out. Walter struggled against the security guard.
"Drake, it's okay!" he called out after him. "That's my son, I need to be with him, he's scared, he needs me to be there-."
"You can't be there, okay?" the security guard said, firmly, but gently at the same time. He purposely brought Walter back out through the double doors and into the waiting room. "Back there is for patients and medical staff only. They are going to do everything they can to help your son, but in order for them to do that, you have to be out here," he continued, ducking his gaze and forcing Walter to meet his eyes. "I got kids too, I can't even imagine how hard this must be for you, but that doesn't change the fact that you have to wait out here, understand? If you try to go back through there, you won't be allowed to wait in the hospital at all, and I know that would be so much worse. Understand?"
After a moment, Walter nodded, and collapsed onto the nearest chair. He ran his dirty hands over his face and through his hair. Walter stopped and looked back down at his hands. They were covered in blood. Drake's blood. The thought was so overwhelming that Walter retched. Collecting himself, he quickly made his way to the bathroom, where he proceeded to throw up the small amount of food in his stomach. Once he was sure that it was over, Walter stood back up and flushed the vomit away, and made his way over to the sink.
He stared at himself in the mirror. He looked rough. He was covered head to toe in a fine layer of dust and rubble, the knees of his jeans were soaked in Drake's blood, as were his hands, and his shirt was torn in multiple places. Walter sighed. There was nothing he could do in that moment to fix his clothes, but at least he could get some of the grime off, and wash away his son's blood.
The grime and rubble were easy enough to wash away well enough for the time being, but the literal blood on his hands was a different story. It wasn't coming off as easily as the rest of the grime had. Walter scrubbed and scrubbed and scrubbed until his hands felt raw, and yet he still saw Drake's blood on them. But maybe he only saw the blood on his hands because of the blood on his hands. It had been his fault.
True, he hadn't made the earthquake happen, but if Walter hadn't said such cruel things to his stepson, then Drake wouldn't have gotten out of the car like that and he wouldn't have gotten hit. If not for their argument, started by Walter, they either would've gotten out of the car at the same time and Walter would've been able to push Drake out of the way, or they both would've still been in the car, safe from almost all damage. If Walter had even just insisted on apologizing and fixing things right then and there instead of letting Drake get out of the car and walk away, then everything would've been different. Drake wouldn't have gotten so hurt.
Walter closed his eyes and took a deep breath. There was nothing he could do about it. It had already happened, and now, his fault or not, he had to deal with it.
Turning on his heel, Walter walked out of the bathroom and towards the front desk. There was surely a mountain of paperwork he needed to fill out.
"...for Drake Parker. I'm his brother, Josh Nichols," Walter heard from around the corner. As soon as he turned it, he saw his biological son standing in front of the front desk, still clad in his work clothes, including the red vest. "My dad came with him in the ambulance but I don't see him."
"Josh!" Walter called out. Josh's head - which Walter really didn't think was all that large in comparison to his body, but that was neither here nor there - snapped over to look at him, and Walter could see his eyes widen at the sight of the blood on his father's clothes. "Sorry, I was in the bathroom," he explained as he approached the desk. "My son was just wheeled back a few minutes ago, I'm sure I have a lot of paperwork to fill out."
The nurse nodded.
"I need his name and age, and a general idea of what's wrong," she said.
"His name is Drake Parker, he's sixteen years old, and we were in the parking garage that collapsed during the earthquake. Some concrete fell on him and the rebar went straight through his shoulder. He also has a really bad concussion," Walter said, finishing in almost a whisper. He stayed silent as the nurse typed for several seconds.
"Are you his legal guardian?" she asked him. "If so, I'll need your name as well."
"Yes, Walter Nichols, his father. Well, his stepfather, if it matters."
"Are you his legal guardian?" she asked again, looking at him pointedly and pausing in her typing. "Do you have legal custody, or does his biological father?"
"I have custody, along with his mother," Walter replied, cringing at the mention of Drake's father. "No one else has any custody."
The nurse nodded and continued typing, then handed Walter a stack of papers and a pen with a polite smile. He returned it as best he could and went to go take a seat, Josh right on his heels.
"How is he, Dad?" Josh asked, taking a seat right next to him. "Is Drake gonna be okay?"
Walter's heart broke for his son. Josh had exactly the same look on his face now that he'd had ten years earlier, when his mother went into the hospital for the last time - the time she never came out. Luckily, that wouldn't be the case this time. Drake wasn't exactly okay, but his condition wasn't life threatening anymore now that he was in a hospital.
"He will be," Walter promised, resting a hand on Josh's knee. "I'm not gonna lie, he's in pretty rough shape, but it's nothing that he can't come back from with time, and with help. It's not gonna be like last time. Drake is getting out of here."
Josh nodded, but he didn't look entirely convinced. Walter figured it would take actually seeing Drake to do that, and there was no telling how long that was going to be.
"Have you told Mom yet? Or Megan?" Josh asked. He leaned forward and rested his elbows on his knees with his hands clasped between them. He wasn't looking at Walter, but instead was staring straight at the doors that doctors and nurses were coming in and out of with news on other patients.
"Not yet," Walter admitted. "I want to wait until I have good news about Drake to share. Without hearing otherwise, they'll both assume that everything is fine and not worry. They're not like us when it comes to immediately assuming the worst." Walter forced a smile, but it didn't seem to have any impact.
Josh just nodded, without any verbal response at the slight jab. He leaned back in his chair and crossed his arms across his chest, eyes still focused on the door.
Walter turned his attention to all of the paperwork on his lap, hoping it would keep him occupied during the long wait, and that he would know the answers to all of the questions. He really didn't want to have to call Audrey until he could tell her for certain that Drake was going to be just fine.
Luckily, with Josh's help, Walter was able to fill out all of the paperwork. When Walter asked him how he knew so much about Drake's medical history, Josh simply stated that he'd asked both Drake and Audrey, because he "might need to know sometime, so just in case". Walter thought about delving into that, but decided against it. He could only handle diving headfirst into the deep seated emotional traumas and their lasting impacts with one son per day, and Drake was already filling that quota - but he did file away that information for later, and promised himself that he would make sure that he didn't need to be worried about Josh as well.
But with all the paperwork finished, all that was left to do was wait.
And wait.
And wait.
A familiar pain greeted him like an old friend. But it was different this time, no longer the stabbing agony that left him screaming and crying, but rather a gentle burning, like he was holding his hands just a little too close to a fire. It was too hot, and he wanted to move his hands away, but he couldn't.
But it wasn't a fire, and it wasn't Drake's hands that were burning. In the darkness, Drake tried to piece together his memories of what had happened. He clearly remembered a lot of pain, and he remembered Walter- no, his stepdad- no, his dad, being there the whole time, trying to make it okay. He remembered Josh's voice, but he didn't think that Josh had been there. Had he? Did Josh get hurt too?
Drake tried to speak, to call out for his brother, but all he could manage was a whining sound that barely left his lips. He didn't even know if anyone was around to hear him. All around him was nothing but darkness and silence.
Wait, not complete silence. There was a low hum off in the distance, like he was going to a party and was still a few blocks away but he could just barely make out the sound of the bass beat. Closer, there was a faint beeping noise. It was steady, and always the same volume. The more he focused, the more Drake could feel that it wasn't darkness surrounding him, his eyes were just closed. He tried to pry them open, but he was just so tired. It hurt to open them.
But Josh was still out there somewhere, maybe hurt. Drake needed to open his eyes, he needed to make sure that his brother was okay.
He let out a small moan as he forced his eyes to open just to small slivers. He expected to be greeted by blinding light, but he wasn't. Wherever he was, the lights were off. It wasn't too dark to see, with the light cutting through the curtain over the window, even though it was drawn across it, but it was a soft light that didn't hurt.
"Josh," he croaked out, just barely loud enough to even hear himself.
"Hey, hey, it's okay," a familiar voice quietly called out. "I'm right here." The voice was accompanied by a pressure on his hand, squeezing it and rubbing back and forth across the back of his palm. "Come on, open your eyes, you can do it," the voice - Josh's voice - encouraged. He needed to do this for Josh, he had to make sure his brother was okay.
Squeezing Josh's hand in his own as he did so, Drake painstakingly worked at opening his eyes, and, after what felt like an eternity, he succeeded. Drake's eyes quickly found those of his brother. Josh looked tired and worried - not the normal tired and worried he got when he was studying for a big test, this was different, this was something that Drake had never seen before, not directed at him at least - but otherwise fine. Now he was smiling, that big beaming smile that was usually accompanied by some loud proclamation and a "hug me brother".
"Yeah, that's it," Josh said instead, his voice low and quiet and calm and soothing and exactly what Drake needed to hear. "I knew you could do it." Josh's big beaming smile gradually turned into a soft smile that Drake had seen directed at him a few times before, like that time Josh had come home from work early and found Drake on the couch with their mom, watching a movie, almost asleep, cuddling up to her like he used to - Drake had been embarrassed at first, but Josh hadn't said anything, so neither did Drake.
"You're okay," Drake forced out, his voice slightly stronger, but raspy and sore.
"Of course I'm okay," Josh said, that smile Drake loved still on his face. "I'm not the one who got impaled by rebar during an earthquake, among other things." Josh's smile fell for a moment. He looked down, and rubbed his thumb across the back of Drake's palm once again. Neither one of them mentioned that they were still holding hands, and neither one made any move to stop. Josh took a breath, then looked back at him, that smile back on his face. "I'm just glad it wasn't worse."
Drake was silent as what Josh said sent a flood of memories of the day through his mind. He remembered the earthquake, the pain, Walter- his dad holding his hand and telling him it was gonna be okay. He remembered their fight. Drake looked away from Josh. Why was he such an idiot? Why did he have to make life so difficult for a man who was just trying to be a father to him?
"Where's Dad?" he finally asked, his voice still low. His head was only dully throbbing at the moment, but he remembered the pounding pain, so he was willing to do whatever he had to to delay it coming back. He was sure whatever meds the hospital had him on wouldn't last forever.
"He's outside on the phone with Mom," Josh answered. "He didn't want to call her or Megan until he knew that you were gonna be okay. Megan's gonna stay another night at Janie's, and I'm sure Mom will insist on coming back from LA early."
Before Drake could respond, a nurse came into the room. She was probably about ten years older than Drake, and very pretty.
"Hey," he said to her, turning his doe eyes away from Josh and towards the woman. He wracked his brain for some pick up line he could use, but nothing was coming to him, and he didn't have the energy to keep trying.
"Good to see you awake," she said with a smile, speaking just as softly as Josh was. "How are you feeling?"
"I'm okay," he said with a shrug, and gasped in pain as he immediately regretted it. The dull throbbing in his shoulder had shot up to a stabbing pain once again, leaving Drake breathing heavily through his nose as he fought to keep himself together. He didn't want to move ever again.
"Hey, you're okay, look at me," Josh said, stealing Drake's attention away from the pain for just a moment. "Just breathe." Josh looked away from Drake and up at the nurse. "Can you give him anything else for the pain?"
"I'd like to wait if he can," she sighed, turning her attention to Drake. "These aren't pain medications that we want you to be taking for very long, but if you need more, we can give you another dose."
"I'm okay," Drake insisted. "As long as I never move again." He tried to conjure up his signature grin that sent most girls swooning, but the attempt was half-hearted at best. She did, to her credit, smirk back at him, but it wasn't in the way that Drake liked. It was in more of a "oh honey" kind of way.
"When these meds wear off, it's probably gonna hurt a lot, both your shoulder and your head. That rebar went all the way through, in one side and out the other." She took a seat next to him and looked at him with sympathy. "I'll leave the details for you to discuss with your doctor, who should be in in about an hour, but it's going to be painful for a while. I see from your chart that you're no stranger to concussions, but that doesn't mean they get easier to deal with either."
Drake looked away at the mention of his previous concussions. Those were memories he'd rather let go off, with a father he didn't want to remember.
"But I'm gonna help you, okay?" Josh interjected. He ducked his head, forcing Drake to meet his eyes. "Like I said on the phone, Helen will let me take as much time off work as I need to if it's for you. I'm gonna help you get better, I promise." Josh squeezed his hand, reminding Drake that their hands were still joined. For a moment, Drake thought about taking his hand away in front of the pretty nurse, but decided against it. He didn't want Josh to leave, and it wasn't as if he had a chance with the nurse anyway - nor did he really want one, but he would pretend he did if that made everyone else believe that he was okay.
"I know," Drake softly replied. He offered Josh a weak smile before resting his head back against the pillow again. He was so exhausted.
"I know you're tired, but is it okay if I check a few things before you go back to sleep?"
Drake nodded, then barely suppressed a groan as the nurse pressed down on a button on the side of his bed to incline it. If Josh noticed that Drake started squeezing his hand as the pain built, he didn't say anything.
"Drake, just relax all of your muscles. Your brother is gonna help me," the nurse said. Out of the corner of his eye, Drake saw her look pointedly at Josh. "Could you keep him steady and upright while I check his bandages?"
"Yeah, of course," Josh quickly replied. He let go of Drake's hand - Drake hoped the little whimper he let out hadn't been audible - and stood next to him. "Just relax," Josh repeated. "I've got you."
"Drake, wrap that arm around your brother and let him support you, okay?" the nurse said.
Drake nodded, and allowed Josh to help him to get his right arm wrapped around the back of Josh's shoulders, while Josh kept his left hand on Drake's back to keep him steady. The nurse undid the shoulder ties of Drake's hospital gown, and began gently maneuvering the bandages just enough to check the wound. Drake began shaking as the pain grew exponentially with the movement and prodding. His breaths were coming faster and faster as he turned his head into Josh's shoulder in an effort to keep himself quiet - and for comfort, but Drake didn't want to admit that to even himself.
"You're okay, she's almost done," Josh gently insisted.
"Finished!" the nurse quickly said. She helped Josh to ease Drake back to resting on the bed and looked at him with a smile that in any other situation would've had Drake swooning, but he just couldn't get himself to notice how pretty she was anymore.
Even after he was resting against the bed again, Drake didn't let go of Josh's shoulder. It wasn't until he noticed that Josh was at quite an awkward angle that Drake released his grip and allowed Josh to help him bring his arm over Josh's head and back down to rest by his side. It wasn't lost on Drake that once they were both comfortable again, Josh's hand went to rest gently on top of Drake's arm.
"Just a few more checks, and then I'm done," the nurse said. She quickly ran Drake through a few concussion checks, checking his eyes and asking him questions and whatnot, then left after reminding him that he could press the nurse call button if he needed anything, and that his doctor would be in to speak with him within the hour.
Once she was gone, the brothers lapsed into a comfortable silence. Drake's pain was abating as long as he didn't move, and he had Josh with him, so he was okay. He was almost about to fall asleep again when he heard a shuddering breath to his side. Drake's eyes quickly flicked over to Josh.
"What's wrong?" Drake asked. Josh wasn't crying, but he looked like he was about to, and that wasn't okay with him.
"Nothing, I'm just-," Josh broke off for a second, wiping at his eyes. "I'm just so glad you're okay. You almost weren't, and what you said on the phone-." He broke off again, shaking his head and lifting his eyes up, as if fighting to keep himself calm. "I'm never gonna forget how scary it was to hear you talk like that."
Drake just looked at him, confused. He didn't remember talking on the phone, but clearly he'd said something wrong again - why did he always have to say the wrong thing? - and it hurt Josh. Why was he always hurting Josh?
"I'm sorry," he said. "Whatever I said, I didn't mean it, I swear-."
"Hey, no," Josh interrupted him. "You don't have to apologize for anything." He was looking at Drake with such sincerity that it confused Drake even more. If Drake didn't have to apologize, then what had he said?
"I thought you said that I-."
"You didn't say anything wrong," he interrupted again. "I promise. What do you remember?"
Drake was quiet for a moment, trying to remember everything, but he just couldn't. He remembered the events, but not the details of anything that happened once the earthquake had started. Nothing more came back to him that he didn't already remember.
"I remember the earthquake, and the pain. I remember hearing your voice somehow, and Dad trying to take care of me." He looked away from his brother. "We fought, right before the quake. I told him he wasn't my dad, that I hated him." Drake withdrew his arm from Josh's light grasp in order to wipe the tears away that had started to fall. He hated himself more than he ever thought he hated Walter. How could he have said such awful things? "I said that I wished he and Mom had never met." Drake's voice broke, but he kept on, looking right up at Josh through the tears in his eyes. "But that's not true, Josh, I promise. I'm so glad they got together and gave me you because without you I- I-," Drake broke off, not even sure where he was going or why. What was wrong with him? He wasn't like this, ever. Was it the pain meds? The concussion? Both? Or was he just a complete mess?
"Hey, it's okay," Josh quickly replied, once again taking Drake's hand in both of his own. "We all say things we don't mean sometimes. I'm sure Dad isn't mad at you either."
"He should be," Drake muttered, looking away again. "I deserve it. I deserve so much worse. I don't know why he even took care of me after what I said, the way I've been treating him. My dad was right, he was right the whole time, I deserve it, I'm just a-."
"No, stop, absolutely not," Josh firmly interrupted. He leaned down again, forcing eye contact. "You never deserved what your dad did to you, okay? It was always wrong, and you know that. It's just the concussion and the meds that are messing with you right now. The concussion was messing with you then, too. But you're gonna be okay, and I'm gonna be right here with you the whole time, I promise," Josh insisted. "Dad loves you, and he would never do what your father did." Josh was looking right at him, and Drake could feel himself pushing aside the little voice that told him Josh was lying. Josh had never lied to him, not once. He'd exaggerated, sure, but he'd never lied. He barely knew how to lie, especially to people he cared about - or to any authority figure for that matter, but that was neither here nor there.
Despite what that little voice was still telling him, Drake nodded. If Josh was saying it, then it was the truth. He could always trust Josh, no matter what.
The door creaked open once again.
"You're awake," Walter sighed in relief as he rushed into the room. "Josh, why didn't you call me? You know I've been-."
"I'm sorry," Drake interjected. "He was taking care of me." He didn't want Josh to get in trouble at all for not having notified the man of him waking up, especially since Drake hadn't asked to see Walter yet - but it was too late for that now, his dad was there and Drake had to face him.
"It's okay," Walter said, shaking his head. "I was just worried about you."
"Is Mom driving back down early?" Josh asked, pulling the attention off Drake for just a moment.
"Yes, she is," Walter said with a fond smile. "I tried to convince her it wasn't necessary, but you know how she gets." He shrugged, and the brothers nodded. Drake wasn't going to say so, but he was glad that she was leaving the conference to come home early. He was hurting and he wanted his mom, was that so wrong of him?
"Josh," Walter continued, turning his attention to his biological son. "Could you give us the room? I'd like to talk to Drake alone."
Before saying anything, Josh looked back over at Drake. Despite how much he didn't want to be parted from Josh, and how much he didn't want to be alone with Walter - he wasn't scared, Josh said Walter would never do what his father did, and Drake believed him, so he wasn't scared, he wasn't- - he forced himself to maintain a neutral expression as best he could. Drake could feel his heart swelling with love for his brother at the realization that if he needed it, even without words, then Josh would fight against his own father to stay. No one had ever loved Drake like that before except for his mother.
"Okay," Josh said, his voice just as calming as it had been since Drake had woken up. He looked back at his brother and squeezed his hand. "I'm gonna go get something to eat. I'll bring you back some pudding."
"Chocolate?"
"I know," Josh said with a smile. "I'm really glad you're okay. I love you, brother."
"Hug me?" Drake asked, forcing a smile onto his own face.
Josh grinned wide and leaned forward, carefully wrapping his arm around Drake's uninjured side while Drake held onto him with his right hand and buried his face in Josh's shoulder.
"I love you too," Drake said. He took a deep breath and held onto Josh as long as he could without feeling awkward about it while Walter was right there.
"I know," Josh whispered. It meant more to Drake than he ever thought it could. He messed up so much and sometimes it felt so much like he was just dragging Josh down, no matter how much he insisted to everyone at school that he was the cool one and he didn't need anyone and Josh was the one that needed him. It felt so good to know that despite how much Drake messed up, Josh still knew that Drake loved him, that Drake wasn't trying to be a screw up.
Slowly, almost hesitantly, Josh let go of Drake, and stepped back. He offered another smile and a nod, and went for the door.
"I'll be right back," Josh said.
"I know," Drake answered with a smile of his own as Josh stepped out and closed the door behind him.
Drake tried not to let his smile fall too quickly as Walter took the seat that Josh had vacated. Why was he so nervous? When he first woke up, one of the first things he remembered was Walter trying to protect him. He didn't have anything to be nervous about.
"I'm so glad you're okay," Walter said, unknowingly repeating the exact same thing that Josh had said. And, like Josh, Walter's eyes were filled with tears. "I was so scared I was gonna lose you, and after our fight, I just couldn't let what I said be the last thing that I said. I'm so glad that you're okay, so I can make it up to you, and maybe you can forgive me."
Drake just looked at him as he wracked his brain trying to remember what Walter could have possibly said that he'd be apologizing for.
"But you didn't say anything that wasn't true," Drake forced out, looking down at his empty hand. He brought it up to his lap and began fidgeting with the blanket. He didn't want to risk more pain in his shoulder by moving his left arm or anything attached to it, including that hand. After another moment of silence, Drake glanced up at Walter to find him staring Drake in disbelief. "I mean, I know I denied it and said really awful things to you, but I know you were right and you have every reason to do what my father did and even though Josh says otherwise, I know I deserve it," he rambled, quickly breaking off eye contact and shrinking in on himself. That little voice that had quieted down in Josh's presence was back, and louder than ever. Drake started to shake, and it was definitely only because he was cold in the thin hospital gown, but it sent tremors of pain out from his shoulder like roots on a tree, radiating down his arm, up his neck, down his ribs, and across his chest. He couldn't conceal a whimper of pain.
The moment the sound left his mouth, Walter sprang up and wrapped the blanket around Drake, instead of leaving it piled on his lap - Drake didn't flinch at his stepfather's sudden movement towards him, it was just a big shiver. He then took a hold of Drake's hand in his much larger ones, and gently rubbed it, stilling his shivers and bringing some warmth back into his body - maybe he really had been cold, and it wasn't just denial to think so, at least partly?
"Josh is right," Walter said, tears now falling freely from his eyes. "You didn't deserve it, and you wouldn't deserve it now." Drake opened his mouth to cut him off, but Walter just kept going. "What I said was wrong, it was so wrong and I'm so sorry. I will never, ever treat you like that again, and I will never do to you what your father did, I swear, Drake. You're my son and I love you so much and I will never do anything to hurt you intentionally. You have to believe that," Walter pleaded with him. Drake had never seen him cry like this before, or look at him with such desperation and love.
"I'm sorry, too," Drake started.
"No, you don't have anything to apologize for-."
"No, let me finish, Dad," Drake interrupted, forcing himself to call him Dad in hopes that it would show Walter that Drake was being just as serious as he was. "I'm sorry, because I don't mean to disrespect you and blow you off and treat you like crap. I don't mean to be a disappointment to you either. I'm just so used to protecting my mom and Megan and I- I still feel like I have to." Drake stopped, bringing his eyes up to meet his stepdad's confused gaze. "Not like I have to protect them from you, I know you wouldn't hurt them, I know that, I really do, but because-," he broke off again, dropping his gaze this time. "Because I still feel like I'm the only one who can protect them." Drake stopped, leaving what was unsaid to hang between them for a moment before continuing. "And I know that's not fair, because if you were any different you'd probably just remind me of him and then I'd still have to protect them and I'd probably be scared too and it's just not fair to you and- and I'm sorry," he finished, cutting off his rambling - maybe the other popular kids at school were right when they said that he was picking up some of Josh's bad habits.
"Drake, look at me," Walter gently said, the soft smile on his face matching the tone of his voice. Hesitantly, Drake complied, lifting his teary gaze up to his dad. "As much as I appreciate the heart behind the apology, it's still not needed. This all sounds like a very normal reaction to what you dealt with for years, and I could never be mad at you for wanting to protect your mom and sister." Walter was rubbing Drake's hand, practically massaging it, and Drake didn't know such a simple gesture from his stepfather could mean so much. "How about, once you're out of here and back home, when you go to see Dr. Stein again, I go with you, and we talk to him together. Does that sound okay?" he asked.
Drake hesitated. He knew as a concept it wasn't a bad idea, but he wasn't sure he'd be able to do it when the time came. Vulnerability wasn't exactly easy for him. The only reason he could do it right now was because of the concussion and heavy painkillers they had him on. Without both, Drake didn't know if he could bring himself to talk so candidly with his stepdad, especially not with Dr. Stein.
"Dr. Stein makes me talk through puppets," Drake said instead. And it was true. Dr. Stein did make him talk through puppets sometimes, and he hated it.
"Then how about we try finding you a therapist who's more age appropriate?" Walter asked behind a grin. "Dr. Stein is a child psychologist, right?" Drake nodded. "Well, you are a child, but I'm guessing his wheelhouse is children a bit younger than you." After a moment, Drake shrugged with just his right shoulder - he wasn't about to repeat his earlier mistake, especially not without Josh there. "How about we start with that, and go from there. Does that sound okay?"
"Yeah," Drake agreed. If nothing else, it would be nice to have a therapist that actually treated him like he was sixteen instead of six.
"One more thing," Walter said, the smile falling from his face. "It's something you said while we were trapped under there. You were surprised when Josh told you that I love you, like you didn't know that." Drake slowly let his head fall down, hiding his face. "Do you really not know that I love you?"
Drake took in a shuddering breath as tears came to his eyes once again - if he never cried again after today it would be too soon. He wanted to speak without his voice breaking, but he didn't know if he'd be able to manage it.
"I don't know," Drake finally forced out as sobs began to wrack his body, putting his shoulder into agony once again.
"Hey, hey, hey, it's okay, it's okay," Walter rushed out, leaning over to hug him just like Josh had done before leaving the room. And just like he'd done with Josh, Drake pushed his face into Walter's shoulder and held onto him as tightly as he could, gritting his teeth in pain and trying to force himself to calm down. "I've got you, you've gotta calm down, kiddo. Deep breaths, come on, do it with me." Drake tried as hard as he could to mimic his dad and breathe through the pain, and after a few tries, it began to work. He was able to calm his sobs enough that his shoulders weren't shaking, at which point he fell limp against his dad. "It's okay, I've got you."
Drake wasn't sure how long they stayed like that. It was certainly longer than any embrace they've ever shared, possibly longer than any conversation they'd ever even had. But it was nice. It wasn't the same as holding onto Josh, but it was nice all the same - not that Drake would tell either one of them that.
When they finally broke apart, Walter helped to ease Drake back against the bed, not so subtly wiping away his own tears.
"Whether or not you know, let me tell you once and for all," his dad said, looking Drake right in the eye in a way that made Drake unable to look away. He sat back in his seat, one hand resting on top of Drake's. "I love you. I love you so, so much. You're not just my son's stepbrother, or my wife's son. You're more than my stepson. You are my son, and I love you more than anything in the world. You and Megan mean just as much to me as Josh and your mother. You are everything to me, okay? I would do anything to protect you. I love you so much, Drake. I need you to believe that."
Barely trusting his own voice, Drake nodded a few times before answering, "I love you too, Dad." He offered a watery smile, and allowed himself to actually believe his dad's words. Drake pushed down that little voice that told him that it was a lie, and for once, decided to listen to Walter.
There were certainly a lot of things that Drake would never be listening to his dad on - the weather, for one - but being loved by him? Drake could get used to listening to him on that.