"Coup de Foudre" 102
First time out.
By Gaedhal
Pittsburgh, July 2016
Morning was a clusterfuck.
Brian had been restless all night, constantly getting up and going to the bathroom, then wandering around the room, as if he were looking for something.
Justin sat up in bed. “Brian? What’s the matter?”
“Huh? Nothing.”
“Then why don’t you get back in bed and go to sleep?” Which he did, until he got up about an hour later and did the same thing again. Justin thought that perhaps he was looking for his cigarettes. Or a drink. Or maybe he wasn’t looking for anything. Dr. Peretti had warned Justin that he’d been the same way in the Rehab Unit - restless and unable to sit still, unless he was practically comatose, sitting and staring blankly at nothing.
Consequently, in the morning Justin was bleary-eyed - his ass was already dragging and he’d just gotten up. And there was so much to do - Gus was going to start at Michael’s store and Carmel wanted to go grocery shopping. Also, Brian’s new physical therapist was supposed to come over in the afternoon to meet his new client and check out the gym arrangement in the basement.
“Do you really need to go shopping this morning?” Justin asked Carmel. He was trying to get Brian to eat some breakfast - a slice of toast, a forkful of scrambled eggs, coffee, anything.
“I’m running out of everything!” Carmel insisted. “If you men want me to cook, then I need food to cook with! Or else you live on take-out pizza and greasy fried chicken!”
“Sounds good to me,” Gus mumbled, shoving cornflakes into his mouth.
Justin gave Gus a look, but the kid rolled his eyes, pushed his bowl away, and stomped off to the television room to play games. So asking him to take Carmel to the store was a no-go.
“I guess I’ll take you,” said Justin, knowing that Carmel still couldn’t find her way around ‘this crazy up and down city,’ as she called Pittsburgh. “But we have to be back in time for me to get Gus over to Michael’s store. Michael said he’d bring him home.”
“Will he be here for dinner?” Carmel frowned. She was perusing her shopping list and making little scribbles in the margins.
“I think so. I doubt Michael is planning to feed him every night,” said Justin. Then he added, “Although Debbie would be glad to do it.”
“I make dinner for Gus!” Carmel huffed. “Not that Debbie! I don’t want my chico coming home with a stomach ache every night! But I need food to make dinner.”
“I know,” said Justin. “Where do you want to go? Shop N Save or Giant Eagle?”
“Giant Eagle,” said Carmel. “I like their meat better. And they have that ice cream Gus likes.”
“Okay, Giant Eagle it is. Are you almost ready to go?”
“Five minutes,” said Carmel. “I want to get my bag.”
“I’ll back the car out of the garage.”
Justin headed for the garage and, to his surprise, Brian was on his heels. “Brian, where are you going?”
“You said we’re going out,” he replied. “To the store.”
Justin rubbed his face wearily. “You don’t have to go. You can stay here with Gus. Maybe watch one of the DVDs Michael brought over.”
“I want to go,” Brian said, his face inscrutable.
“But it’s to the grocery store. You hate the grocery store!”
But Brian only stared back at him. “I want to go.”
The only thing Justin could figure out was that Brian was eager to get the fuck out of the house, no matter where they were going. No wonder he was stir-crazy - all those days in the hospital, then rehab, and now stuck in the house. Brian had always treasured his ability to get out whenever he wanted to. His freedom was part of who he was. Now he couldn’t go anywhere without someone watching him. He couldn’t drive, he couldn’t go for a walk - it must feel like being in jail.
“Okay. Sure,” said Justin. There was no time for Brian to shave or take a shower, but he was passable… barely. “But you have to put on your shoes. And…” Justin fingered the skimpy nylon shorts Brian had thrown on after rolling out of bed. “You need to put on some pants. And underwear.”
Brian looked down. “Why?”
“Because I can see your dick through those shorts,” said Justin. “I enjoy the view and I’m sure Gus and Carmel are used to it by now, but I don’t think Giant Eagle is ready for Brian Kinney’s nine-and-a-half cut. Unless it’s on sale in the Deli Department.”
Brian grimaced. “Who the fuck cares?”
“I care. Go up and change and then we’ll go to the store.”
Ten minutes later they were ready to head out. Brian was wearing a thicker pair of khaki shorts Justin had never seen before. He assumed Brian had dragged them out of some bottom drawer, but he had briefs on under them. And a pair of ratty pink flip flops, but at least he wasn’t barefoot.
“I’ll drive,” said Brian, opening the door of the Jeep.
Justin put out his hand. “Wait. You said I could drive. Remember? Your shoulder is hurt.” Originally the doctors had said the left shoulder was fractured, but after taking more x-rays and talking to an orthopedic surgeon, they decided that Brian had badly bruised the clavicle he’d broken in the fall he’d taken on the Liberty Ride back in 2004. “It’s going to take a while before it’s strong enough for you to drive.”
Brian frowned. “My shoulder?” He jerked his left arm and winced. “Shit! That hurts.”
“Yes. Please be careful, Brian. You don’t want to make it worse.”
“Okay. You better drive.” And he walked around to the passenger side, while Carmel climbed into the back.
Justin sighed. The same thing had happened on the way home from the hospital. Brian wanted to drive and Justin had to convince him that he couldn’t, or shouldn’t, without getting into an argument. For now the aching shoulder was a good excuse, but Justin knew this would be an on-going issue and he worried that Brian would just go into the garage one day and drive off. Which meant hiding the keys to the Jeep, Brian’s Lexus, the Prius, and the infamous Harley, which was buried in the back of the garage, covered in a heavy tarp, where, hopefully, Brian wouldn’t find it for a long, long time.
Justin prayed that on a weekday morning the grocery store would be fairly empty, but that wasn’t the case. Shoppers, mainly women, were out in force at 10:00 a.m., pushing their carts, often surrounded by gaggles of giggling urchins, hanging off the carts like monkeys and grabbing things off the shelves.
Carmel shrugged and pulled a cart from the rack. This was business as usual. She had her carefully annotated shopping list and she knew her way around the store. As long as Mr. Brian and Justin didn’t get in her way, she was fine. She headed purposefully toward the produce section.
And Brian took off in the other direction.
For a moment Justin stood amid the chaos, but then he figured that Carmel could take care of herself. Brian, however, was a different story.
“Brian! Wait up!”
Justin caught up with him in the snack aisle, where he had two large bags in his hands - nacho-flavored tortilla chips and Ruffles. He shoved the bags at Justin and reached for some jars of salsa. “Here. I can’t carry all these.”
“Brian, Carmel is going to get the food. She’s got the list. You can put those back.”
“I want this, too.” Brian took a bag of pretzel rods and piled them on top of the bags already in Justin’s arms.
“Jesus! All this junk food? All these carbs? You never eat this stuff.”
“All we had when Mikey came over was pizza and microwave popcorn,” Brian said. “We need more of the major food groups - salt, fat… where’s the sugar?” And he bolted down the aisle.
Justin put the bags and jars back on the shelf and sprinted after him.
“Donuts? Where are the donuts?” Brian stalked the bakery section until he found racks of pastries behind glass doors. “Chocolate éclairs! Have you ever seen me eat one in a single bite? I can deep throat an éclair like Linda Lovelace!”
“No, I haven’t.” Justin couldn’t remember ever seeing Brian eat an éclair. Or a donut. Just the thought of one would have sent Brian to the treadmill for most of an evening. “I don’t think Carmel would want us to buy all these sweets.”
“Why the fuck not?”
“All this sugar. It’s not good for… for Gus,” said Justin. “He’ll be bouncing off the walls.”
“Oh.” Brian seemed really disappointed. But then he said, “Where’s the beer?” And he was off again.
On the way to the beer Justin saw Carmel pushing her cart. “Was that Mr. Brian who just went by?”
“Yes,” said Justin. “And he’s grabbing food off the shelves like a five-year-old.”
Carmel frowned. “What kind of food?”
“Junk food!” said Justin. “Chips and donuts and all kinds of crap. But I put everything back. Now he’d looking for beer.”
“Maybe if he wants that food, it will make him feel like eating?” Carmel suggested.
“I doubt it. Too much grease and shit always made him feel sick. It always amazed me that he could drink like a fish and take… whatever, but then he’d puke everything up if he ate too much of one of Deb’s lopsided cakes.”
“He’s like a supermodel, that man,” said Carmel. “He spits out more than he eats. But he has to eat something! I got salad, green beans, tomatoes, tomatillos, fresh cilantro, and some nice peppers. I need pork for my carnitas. And I thought maybe some steaks? Mr. Brian and Mr. Ron always loved a nice thick steak.”
“Whatever you think will tempt him,” said Justin. “But I better go get him before he grabs too much beer. He’s not supposed to drink any alcohol at all.”
“Good luck with that,” Carmel sniffed. “Mr. Brian doesn’t like nobody to tell him what to do.”
“Tell me about it.”
But Brian wasn’t in the section where they sold beer and wine. Justin wandered up and down the aisles, getting more agitated by the minute. Brian could be anywhere. He could have left the store and be meandering through the parking lot. Or getting on a bus. Or hitching to fuck knows where. Or…
“Brian! What are you doing?”
“Look at these cards.” He held up a greeting card with an illustration of a redneck bending over and showing his butt cleavage. Inside it read, ‘Say No To Crack.’ “These are hilarious!”
Justin gently took the card out of Brian’s hand. “Brian, you don’t need a card.”
“I don’t? Hey, this one has Snoopy!”
“Carmel is waiting for us. She wants you to help pick out some steaks.”
“Steak?” Brian immediately dropped Snoopy on the ground. “I love steak!”
“I know. Let’s go.”
At the meat department Brian picked out a number of expensive sirloins and three pounds of Tuscan sausage. “And hot dogs! Lots of hot dogs! And hamburgers. We cook out. Gus loves to cook out,” Brian told the man behind the counter. “And chicken. We want chicken, too.”
“I will pick out the chicken, Mr. Brian,” said Carmel firmly. “And the pork.”
“Here are the hot dogs, sir. All-beef natural-casing wieners. How many hamburgers?”
“A dozen,” said Brian. He turned to Carmel. “Is that enough?”
“Is enough, Mr. Brian. Are they lean?” Carmel asked the man.
“Fuck lean,” said Brian. “I want steakburgers! Big ones! Nice and juicy! You got those?”
“Certainly, sir.” The man pulled out the most expensive burgers in the case and wrapped them up.
“I think that’s enough meat,” said Justin. “Let’s move.”
The rest of the time at the grocery store was spent gathering up napkins, paper towels, toilet paper, eggs, bacon, bags of frozen French fries, corn and wheat tortillas, microwave popcorn, yogurt, ketchup, chocolate syrup, coffee, butter, milk, bottles of ice tea, multiple loaves of whole wheat bread, sugar, and gallons of that ice cream Gus liked. Brian seemed to have forgotten about the chips and donuts and éclairs, which was fine with Justin, who held Brian’s hand tightly to make certain he didn’t go off on another tangent. But Brian was finished with his wandering.
“Are we done?” Brian complained. The store was getting more crowded, and more people meant more noise, which meant more things to grate on Brian’s raw nerves.
“Carmel can check out the groceries while we bring the Jeep around.” Justin led Brian out to the parking lot, still clutching his hand. He was surprised to see some openly disapproving glares, which reminded him that they were far from Liberty Avenue, and that although same-sex marriage was a reality in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, gay men holding hands at a suburban supermarket was apparently still a rarity.
On the way home they passed the local Barnes & Noble. “Let’s stop,” said Justin, pulling into the parking lot. “We have plenty of time before we need to get back. I’d like to get a couple of things.”
Justin had looked up articles about Traumatic Brain Injury online, but he wanted to see if he could get a book that dealt with it. Something that would tell him what to expect. Something to reassure him - or warn him. His own experience of being bashed felt too far in the past, too foggy, to be of use. He was trying to look at things from Brian’s perspective, but it was harder than he’d imagined. Sometimes Brian was completely lucid, acting and talking like the old Brian Kinney. But other times Brian was like a strange automaton - a creature who looked like Brian and sounded like Brian… to a point. He would say things that came out of nowhere, do things that made no sense. Justin knew that was to be expected. That getting back to ‘normal’ would take time. It was still early in the process. Very early.
“Where are the magazines?” asked Carmel.
“Good idea,” said Justin. The store, thankfully, was calm. A few people were sitting in the café, quietly reading and sipping coffee. A grey-haired woman shelved books in the mystery section. Justin, Brian, and Carmel moved towards the side wall, where the magazines were displayed. Carmel immediately headed for the crafts section.
“Brian, why don’t you look at the magazines, while I go and try to find a book. Okay?”
“Sure, Sunshine,” said Brian. “I’ll look at the magazines.”
Justin browsed through the medical section. Books on pregnancy and cancer and fibromyalgia and picking a plastic surgeon. Memoirs of medical school and working in an E.R. Books on nurses and interns and heart surgeons. Finally, a book written by a neurologist. It wasn’t specifically about TBI, but there had to be something about it in there. Justin decided that he should have asked either Dr. Sun or Dr. Peretti for a recommendation of something to read. That was the problem with thinking you knew it all - you were always wrong.
Carmel was already at the register, buying a knitting magazine and ‘People’ in Spanish.
“Where’s Brian?”
“Still at the magazines.”
“You go out to the Jeep. I’ll get him,” said Justin as he paid for his book.
“Hurry up! I want to make my chico lunch before he goes to that comic strip store.”
“Don’t worry, we’ll be home in time,” Justin reassured her.
Justin walked back to the magazines and saw Brian standing there, in the exact spot where he’d left him more than 45 minutes before. He was about two feet from the racks, staring intently, straight ahead. Justin tried to figure out what he was staring at, but he couldn’t see anything unusual.
“Brian.” Justin touched his arm. “What are you doing?”
Brian turned to him. His green and gold eyes were beautiful, but there was something missing in them. He blinked at Justin. “I’m looking at the magazines,” he said. “Like you told me to.”
By Gaedhal
Pittsburgh, July 2016
Morning was a clusterfuck.
Brian had been restless all night, constantly getting up and going to the bathroom, then wandering around the room, as if he were looking for something.
Justin sat up in bed. “Brian? What’s the matter?”
“Huh? Nothing.”
“Then why don’t you get back in bed and go to sleep?” Which he did, until he got up about an hour later and did the same thing again. Justin thought that perhaps he was looking for his cigarettes. Or a drink. Or maybe he wasn’t looking for anything. Dr. Peretti had warned Justin that he’d been the same way in the Rehab Unit - restless and unable to sit still, unless he was practically comatose, sitting and staring blankly at nothing.
Consequently, in the morning Justin was bleary-eyed - his ass was already dragging and he’d just gotten up. And there was so much to do - Gus was going to start at Michael’s store and Carmel wanted to go grocery shopping. Also, Brian’s new physical therapist was supposed to come over in the afternoon to meet his new client and check out the gym arrangement in the basement.
“Do you really need to go shopping this morning?” Justin asked Carmel. He was trying to get Brian to eat some breakfast - a slice of toast, a forkful of scrambled eggs, coffee, anything.
“I’m running out of everything!” Carmel insisted. “If you men want me to cook, then I need food to cook with! Or else you live on take-out pizza and greasy fried chicken!”
“Sounds good to me,” Gus mumbled, shoving cornflakes into his mouth.
Justin gave Gus a look, but the kid rolled his eyes, pushed his bowl away, and stomped off to the television room to play games. So asking him to take Carmel to the store was a no-go.
“I guess I’ll take you,” said Justin, knowing that Carmel still couldn’t find her way around ‘this crazy up and down city,’ as she called Pittsburgh. “But we have to be back in time for me to get Gus over to Michael’s store. Michael said he’d bring him home.”
“Will he be here for dinner?” Carmel frowned. She was perusing her shopping list and making little scribbles in the margins.
“I think so. I doubt Michael is planning to feed him every night,” said Justin. Then he added, “Although Debbie would be glad to do it.”
“I make dinner for Gus!” Carmel huffed. “Not that Debbie! I don’t want my chico coming home with a stomach ache every night! But I need food to make dinner.”
“I know,” said Justin. “Where do you want to go? Shop N Save or Giant Eagle?”
“Giant Eagle,” said Carmel. “I like their meat better. And they have that ice cream Gus likes.”
“Okay, Giant Eagle it is. Are you almost ready to go?”
“Five minutes,” said Carmel. “I want to get my bag.”
“I’ll back the car out of the garage.”
Justin headed for the garage and, to his surprise, Brian was on his heels. “Brian, where are you going?”
“You said we’re going out,” he replied. “To the store.”
Justin rubbed his face wearily. “You don’t have to go. You can stay here with Gus. Maybe watch one of the DVDs Michael brought over.”
“I want to go,” Brian said, his face inscrutable.
“But it’s to the grocery store. You hate the grocery store!”
But Brian only stared back at him. “I want to go.”
The only thing Justin could figure out was that Brian was eager to get the fuck out of the house, no matter where they were going. No wonder he was stir-crazy - all those days in the hospital, then rehab, and now stuck in the house. Brian had always treasured his ability to get out whenever he wanted to. His freedom was part of who he was. Now he couldn’t go anywhere without someone watching him. He couldn’t drive, he couldn’t go for a walk - it must feel like being in jail.
“Okay. Sure,” said Justin. There was no time for Brian to shave or take a shower, but he was passable… barely. “But you have to put on your shoes. And…” Justin fingered the skimpy nylon shorts Brian had thrown on after rolling out of bed. “You need to put on some pants. And underwear.”
Brian looked down. “Why?”
“Because I can see your dick through those shorts,” said Justin. “I enjoy the view and I’m sure Gus and Carmel are used to it by now, but I don’t think Giant Eagle is ready for Brian Kinney’s nine-and-a-half cut. Unless it’s on sale in the Deli Department.”
Brian grimaced. “Who the fuck cares?”
“I care. Go up and change and then we’ll go to the store.”
Ten minutes later they were ready to head out. Brian was wearing a thicker pair of khaki shorts Justin had never seen before. He assumed Brian had dragged them out of some bottom drawer, but he had briefs on under them. And a pair of ratty pink flip flops, but at least he wasn’t barefoot.
“I’ll drive,” said Brian, opening the door of the Jeep.
Justin put out his hand. “Wait. You said I could drive. Remember? Your shoulder is hurt.” Originally the doctors had said the left shoulder was fractured, but after taking more x-rays and talking to an orthopedic surgeon, they decided that Brian had badly bruised the clavicle he’d broken in the fall he’d taken on the Liberty Ride back in 2004. “It’s going to take a while before it’s strong enough for you to drive.”
Brian frowned. “My shoulder?” He jerked his left arm and winced. “Shit! That hurts.”
“Yes. Please be careful, Brian. You don’t want to make it worse.”
“Okay. You better drive.” And he walked around to the passenger side, while Carmel climbed into the back.
Justin sighed. The same thing had happened on the way home from the hospital. Brian wanted to drive and Justin had to convince him that he couldn’t, or shouldn’t, without getting into an argument. For now the aching shoulder was a good excuse, but Justin knew this would be an on-going issue and he worried that Brian would just go into the garage one day and drive off. Which meant hiding the keys to the Jeep, Brian’s Lexus, the Prius, and the infamous Harley, which was buried in the back of the garage, covered in a heavy tarp, where, hopefully, Brian wouldn’t find it for a long, long time.
Justin prayed that on a weekday morning the grocery store would be fairly empty, but that wasn’t the case. Shoppers, mainly women, were out in force at 10:00 a.m., pushing their carts, often surrounded by gaggles of giggling urchins, hanging off the carts like monkeys and grabbing things off the shelves.
Carmel shrugged and pulled a cart from the rack. This was business as usual. She had her carefully annotated shopping list and she knew her way around the store. As long as Mr. Brian and Justin didn’t get in her way, she was fine. She headed purposefully toward the produce section.
And Brian took off in the other direction.
For a moment Justin stood amid the chaos, but then he figured that Carmel could take care of herself. Brian, however, was a different story.
“Brian! Wait up!”
Justin caught up with him in the snack aisle, where he had two large bags in his hands - nacho-flavored tortilla chips and Ruffles. He shoved the bags at Justin and reached for some jars of salsa. “Here. I can’t carry all these.”
“Brian, Carmel is going to get the food. She’s got the list. You can put those back.”
“I want this, too.” Brian took a bag of pretzel rods and piled them on top of the bags already in Justin’s arms.
“Jesus! All this junk food? All these carbs? You never eat this stuff.”
“All we had when Mikey came over was pizza and microwave popcorn,” Brian said. “We need more of the major food groups - salt, fat… where’s the sugar?” And he bolted down the aisle.
Justin put the bags and jars back on the shelf and sprinted after him.
“Donuts? Where are the donuts?” Brian stalked the bakery section until he found racks of pastries behind glass doors. “Chocolate éclairs! Have you ever seen me eat one in a single bite? I can deep throat an éclair like Linda Lovelace!”
“No, I haven’t.” Justin couldn’t remember ever seeing Brian eat an éclair. Or a donut. Just the thought of one would have sent Brian to the treadmill for most of an evening. “I don’t think Carmel would want us to buy all these sweets.”
“Why the fuck not?”
“All this sugar. It’s not good for… for Gus,” said Justin. “He’ll be bouncing off the walls.”
“Oh.” Brian seemed really disappointed. But then he said, “Where’s the beer?” And he was off again.
On the way to the beer Justin saw Carmel pushing her cart. “Was that Mr. Brian who just went by?”
“Yes,” said Justin. “And he’s grabbing food off the shelves like a five-year-old.”
Carmel frowned. “What kind of food?”
“Junk food!” said Justin. “Chips and donuts and all kinds of crap. But I put everything back. Now he’d looking for beer.”
“Maybe if he wants that food, it will make him feel like eating?” Carmel suggested.
“I doubt it. Too much grease and shit always made him feel sick. It always amazed me that he could drink like a fish and take… whatever, but then he’d puke everything up if he ate too much of one of Deb’s lopsided cakes.”
“He’s like a supermodel, that man,” said Carmel. “He spits out more than he eats. But he has to eat something! I got salad, green beans, tomatoes, tomatillos, fresh cilantro, and some nice peppers. I need pork for my carnitas. And I thought maybe some steaks? Mr. Brian and Mr. Ron always loved a nice thick steak.”
“Whatever you think will tempt him,” said Justin. “But I better go get him before he grabs too much beer. He’s not supposed to drink any alcohol at all.”
“Good luck with that,” Carmel sniffed. “Mr. Brian doesn’t like nobody to tell him what to do.”
“Tell me about it.”
But Brian wasn’t in the section where they sold beer and wine. Justin wandered up and down the aisles, getting more agitated by the minute. Brian could be anywhere. He could have left the store and be meandering through the parking lot. Or getting on a bus. Or hitching to fuck knows where. Or…
“Brian! What are you doing?”
“Look at these cards.” He held up a greeting card with an illustration of a redneck bending over and showing his butt cleavage. Inside it read, ‘Say No To Crack.’ “These are hilarious!”
Justin gently took the card out of Brian’s hand. “Brian, you don’t need a card.”
“I don’t? Hey, this one has Snoopy!”
“Carmel is waiting for us. She wants you to help pick out some steaks.”
“Steak?” Brian immediately dropped Snoopy on the ground. “I love steak!”
“I know. Let’s go.”
At the meat department Brian picked out a number of expensive sirloins and three pounds of Tuscan sausage. “And hot dogs! Lots of hot dogs! And hamburgers. We cook out. Gus loves to cook out,” Brian told the man behind the counter. “And chicken. We want chicken, too.”
“I will pick out the chicken, Mr. Brian,” said Carmel firmly. “And the pork.”
“Here are the hot dogs, sir. All-beef natural-casing wieners. How many hamburgers?”
“A dozen,” said Brian. He turned to Carmel. “Is that enough?”
“Is enough, Mr. Brian. Are they lean?” Carmel asked the man.
“Fuck lean,” said Brian. “I want steakburgers! Big ones! Nice and juicy! You got those?”
“Certainly, sir.” The man pulled out the most expensive burgers in the case and wrapped them up.
“I think that’s enough meat,” said Justin. “Let’s move.”
The rest of the time at the grocery store was spent gathering up napkins, paper towels, toilet paper, eggs, bacon, bags of frozen French fries, corn and wheat tortillas, microwave popcorn, yogurt, ketchup, chocolate syrup, coffee, butter, milk, bottles of ice tea, multiple loaves of whole wheat bread, sugar, and gallons of that ice cream Gus liked. Brian seemed to have forgotten about the chips and donuts and éclairs, which was fine with Justin, who held Brian’s hand tightly to make certain he didn’t go off on another tangent. But Brian was finished with his wandering.
“Are we done?” Brian complained. The store was getting more crowded, and more people meant more noise, which meant more things to grate on Brian’s raw nerves.
“Carmel can check out the groceries while we bring the Jeep around.” Justin led Brian out to the parking lot, still clutching his hand. He was surprised to see some openly disapproving glares, which reminded him that they were far from Liberty Avenue, and that although same-sex marriage was a reality in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, gay men holding hands at a suburban supermarket was apparently still a rarity.
On the way home they passed the local Barnes & Noble. “Let’s stop,” said Justin, pulling into the parking lot. “We have plenty of time before we need to get back. I’d like to get a couple of things.”
Justin had looked up articles about Traumatic Brain Injury online, but he wanted to see if he could get a book that dealt with it. Something that would tell him what to expect. Something to reassure him - or warn him. His own experience of being bashed felt too far in the past, too foggy, to be of use. He was trying to look at things from Brian’s perspective, but it was harder than he’d imagined. Sometimes Brian was completely lucid, acting and talking like the old Brian Kinney. But other times Brian was like a strange automaton - a creature who looked like Brian and sounded like Brian… to a point. He would say things that came out of nowhere, do things that made no sense. Justin knew that was to be expected. That getting back to ‘normal’ would take time. It was still early in the process. Very early.
“Where are the magazines?” asked Carmel.
“Good idea,” said Justin. The store, thankfully, was calm. A few people were sitting in the café, quietly reading and sipping coffee. A grey-haired woman shelved books in the mystery section. Justin, Brian, and Carmel moved towards the side wall, where the magazines were displayed. Carmel immediately headed for the crafts section.
“Brian, why don’t you look at the magazines, while I go and try to find a book. Okay?”
“Sure, Sunshine,” said Brian. “I’ll look at the magazines.”
Justin browsed through the medical section. Books on pregnancy and cancer and fibromyalgia and picking a plastic surgeon. Memoirs of medical school and working in an E.R. Books on nurses and interns and heart surgeons. Finally, a book written by a neurologist. It wasn’t specifically about TBI, but there had to be something about it in there. Justin decided that he should have asked either Dr. Sun or Dr. Peretti for a recommendation of something to read. That was the problem with thinking you knew it all - you were always wrong.
Carmel was already at the register, buying a knitting magazine and ‘People’ in Spanish.
“Where’s Brian?”
“Still at the magazines.”
“You go out to the Jeep. I’ll get him,” said Justin as he paid for his book.
“Hurry up! I want to make my chico lunch before he goes to that comic strip store.”
“Don’t worry, we’ll be home in time,” Justin reassured her.
Justin walked back to the magazines and saw Brian standing there, in the exact spot where he’d left him more than 45 minutes before. He was about two feet from the racks, staring intently, straight ahead. Justin tried to figure out what he was staring at, but he couldn’t see anything unusual.
“Brian.” Justin touched his arm. “What are you doing?”
Brian turned to him. His green and gold eyes were beautiful, but there was something missing in them. He blinked at Justin. “I’m looking at the magazines,” he said. “Like you told me to.”