Visiting Hours

"Excuse me, where's Blake?"

Jeremy leans over the reception counter, composed but panicked in thought and emotion.

"I'm sorry, sir, Blake who?"

"Blake Himbley, I rushed here as soon as I heard about his accident. Where is he?"

"I'm sorry, who are you?"

"I'm his brother, Jeremy. Could you mind just telling me where he is?"

The young woman takes out a clipboard from the side of her desk, flipping through it as quick as she can.

"Ah, okay, Mr. Himbley, we just took him out of the emergency room an hour ago, he's in 107."

The woman points towards the hall to the left of her.

"Is he okay or...?"

The woman looks up at Jeremy with patient eyes.

"He's alright. We've stabilized his condition, and we're going to do everything we can for him."

Jeremy's breath cleanses itself of terrified imbalance with a long exhale. Though, it only worked to highlight the tangled mess of emotions that was dancing a sloppy, sporadic tango in his brain.

"You can go on ahead to the room, there's someone else in there too. Just make sure to write your name down on the board before you enter. Visiting hours end at 8."

Jeremy speed walks to Room 107, keeping a tight grip on his chest all the while. He bumps arms with a doctor passing by him, not registering it at all as he continues to book it for his brother.

As Jeremy finally waltzes into the room, he sees an older man he doesn't recognize sitting beside his brother. The man grabs his cane, propped up on the bed, and takes a moment to study Jeremy, adjusting his glasses.

"Are you the brother?" A soft German accent decorates his words.

Jeremy gives an awkward nod and turns to the board on the wall beside him, quickly jotting his name down.

"You must be his neighbor. I appreciate you giving me the heads up. I would've come earlier, but I couldn't get the message till later."

The old man tries to lift himself up from the chair.

"No, no, don't. I'll come to you. Just sit."

The old man plops back down and gives a thankful nod.

"What do I...call you?"

"Paul is fine."

Jeremy extends a hand to Paul, and he takes it with a smile. Jeremy goes to the chair on the opposite side next to his brother. He gives a sigh, oozing with misplaced regret, as he looks upon his lifeless brother hooked to the hospital's nightmare of imposing machines. Despite not being the one in the bed, Jeremy felt vulnerable with it all around him.

"He's in a coma." Paul uttered.

"What happened to him?"

"Bond was lying on the floor in front of his staircase. That is all I saw before I called the hospital."

Jeremy looked to Paul like he was locked in a mental ward.

"Blake, you mean."

"No, Bond. He hasn't been Blake for over five years."

"Huh."

Jeremy looked back down toward his brother, giving a light chuckle.

"Bond?"

"Yes, Bond."

"As in James Bond. Hehe."

Paul looked at Jeremy with a curious smile.

"James...Bond?"

"You don't know? He was a fictional character, a...well, a famous spy."

"Now that you say it, I believe I may have heard him bring it up a few times."

"Sounds right. He obsessed over all those dumb, old films. His favorite was Goldfinger."

"Is that so? I think I remember one he talked of, it was, From Russia...Russia..."

"From Russia, With Love?"

"Ah, that is it. I heard him bring that one up quite a bit, happily so."

Paul gave an earnest laugh, and Jeremy followed suit with a forced one. Jeremy tapped his feet together without rhythm, and gripped hard on the side of the bed.

"Are you the oldest?"

"Uh, no. He is."

"How old are you?"

"What do you care?"

Paul turns away from Jeremy, gripping his cane. They both sit in uncomfortable silence for a while.

#

Jeremy takes his hand off the bed and rubs his sweaty palms together. He turns to Paul and feels his heart sink into his spinal column. His tongue starts to twitch violently inside his mouth and his feet start heating up. Jeremy gives a blunt, painful cough and clears his clogged throat.

"I...I'm 28."

Paul nods silently to himself before glancing over at Jeremy in all his emotional wreckage.

Jeremy looks to the side to see Paul gazing at him. He violently jerks his head down to the floor.

"It's...this is...a lot. I didn't mean nothing."

Paul shakes his head.

"I understand. I had the same experience hearing of my younger sister's passing two years ago. She lived in Poland."

Jeremy holds his hands close together, keeping a strong grip. He tries to loosen up with conversation.

"Your accent...are you...?"

Paul gives a warm, hearty chuckle, the kind you hear the best mall Santa giving that makes kids their whole Christmas.

"Yes, I am from abroad. German was my first language, but I have gotten better with English. Still practicing, of course."

"You...you're pretty good to me."

Paul smiles.

"Thank you, umm..."

"Oh! Jeremy. I'm sorry...I didn't give you my name earlier...I was just.."

"No, do not worry. I understand."

Jeremy gives a forced smile and another violent cough.

"Are you ill, Jeremy?"

Jeremy waves a hand in a hurry.

"Don't concern yourself with that."

"You are Bond's brother, it is hard not to."

Jeremy clears his throat and wipes the four beads of sweat resting atop his forehead.

"How do you...know Blake?"

"Bond, you mean."

"Y...yeah."

"I came to your brother's house one day shortly after I arrived here to California. He was in the neighborhood already when I came. I was looking for someone to talk to."

"Why him?"

"He was close by. Do I require reason beside that?"

"I...suppose not. Did he help you?"

"He certainly did. It was a quite hard adjustment time for me. He made it easy. Quite a kind man, your brother."

"Well...glad that didn't change about him."

"He did not care or mind my bad English like others seem to. We shared a lot together."

"What exactly?"

"Bond told me about his love for literature and his dream of being a great writer. He talked with such energy, it was hard not to love."

"Yeah, he was quite ambitious."

"That does not describe it."

Paul and Jeremy share a quick, good laugh.

"What struck me was how in love he was with stories. He talked of his childhood and college days with such detail and entrancing flow, it was like hearing a piece from Dostoevsky!"

Jeremy wrestled a smile on his lips as he listened.

"He seemed to enjoy my company. I remember him saying he had trouble with people."

In the struggle, a small smile wipes across Jeremy's face.

"Me and him both."

"He always fed me lunch. He would make these good grilled ham and cheeses with dill pickles."

"Huh...grilled ham and cheese, huh? Did he ever tell you how he lived and breathed those in UC Berkely?"

"Ah, he did. He said he added ham to it to give it some "pizzazz."

"I'll have to try it."

"It's quite good. I always enjoy it."

"How often uh...did you two talk?"

"It was every weekend. Fridays and Sundays. I would come over, we would talk the day away. Sometimes he even made me dinner."

"Did you get along with Chrissy?"

"Who is Chrissy?"

"A close girlfriend of his. I thought they were close, anyway."

"I never saw no woman in his place when I came over."

"Seems they broke up before you."

"I had him meet Janna a few times."

"And she is...?"

"My wife."

"Did they get along?"

"Enough."

"Did you ever invite my brother to your place?"

"A few times, but he did not want to intrude, said he did not feel comfortable barging into my house. I assured him it was no trouble."

Jeremy looked down at his brother, putting a hand to his shoulder. His throat felt full again. He tried to clear it, but it remained clogged. He coughed, ever harsher, for any kind of relief.

"He helped me a great deal, your brother."

Jeremy gave a nod and sighed to himself. Paul propped both hands up on the top of his cane. Silence shackled them both once more.

#

Jeremy bolts to life from a sudden slumber. Paul turns to him alarmed.

"Are you alright?"

Jeremy looks around the room, and is simultaneously relieved to be free of his dream state and depressed to be back in this dull, sobering hell.

"Yeah...a bad dream...well..."

Paul nods. Jeremy decides to drop his thought.

"Can I ask a question of you?"

Jeremy shrugs his shoulders and turns to Paul.

"Shoot."

"Where did you and your brother grow up?"

Jeremy pauses to think about the answer. He hates himself that he has to.

"We both uh...were born and raised in Washington."

"How long?"

"Until....I was 15, maybe."

"What happened?"

"My brother was going to graduate high school, and our mother found good work in Long Beach. So...we moved."

"Was that difficult for you all too?"

"For me it was. My mom and brother seemed to adjust well. He was excited about college."

"You weren't happy for him?"

"No...I guess I just....was worried with other things."

"What things?"

"I wanted to drop out of high school and find some steady work for one, find my own place."

"And you did?"

"With three separate part time gigs and about three years, yes. My mom gave me hell for it, but....I was never her favorite."

"Now you live here in California?"

"A bit farther north, but yeah."

"What do you do now?"

"I do customer service. It's not much, but with the hours I put in, it's enough."

"Does your brother know?"

Jeremy pauses and turns away slow from Paul.

"He never...asked. Not like he'd be impressed."

"Never know, Jeremy."

Jeremy clears his throat, compounding its violent aggression by beating his chest once with his fist.

"What did...uh...did my brother do?"

"Ah, an editing gig, at least that's what he told me the last time we properly met. Though, he was working on a novel too."

"Huh....what kind?"

"Kind of what?"

"Novel."

"Ah, he said it was an adventure story with a strong romance."

Jeremy nods.

"Said he would let me be among the first to read it when it was done."

Jeremy forces another smile.

"Didn't think he..."

Just then, Jeremy feels something inside banging against his chest, propelling it up into his windpipe. He can't speak, nor think, for this horrible thing inside was raging too much to allow anything to seep through its fury.

"Think he...?" Paul tries to ask.

"Forget it, it's fine."

Jeremy feels it settle down with that note, though a crushing emptiness takes it place that quiets him again all the same.

"Jeremy?"

Jeremy didn't turn his head toward Paul, for the sorrowful pit in him diluted his function.

"Hm?"

"When was the last time you met your brother?"

Jeremy took a deep inhale, and from the exhale that followed, he felt his life's content drift into the air.

"Don't ask that again."

Paul's voice dropped to a more subdued inflection as Jeremy started to burrow his chin into the bottom of his neck.

"I'm sorry I pried."

#

Sitting there with connections unspoken, Jeremy's pit only grew. It was consuming his body with a ravenous wrath. This wall he was attempting to forge with Paul had only made this demonic hole that had surfaced inside heavier.

Jeremy, desperate for relief, turned to the only person that could feasibly help and uttered a question.

"How...was my brother before...this? When you two...talked, how did he....how was he..."

Paul raised a hand to stop Jeremy, feeling his emotional resistance.

"He seemed constantly busy with something, though he wouldn't say what. He didn't tell as many stories as he used to. Sometimes, he wasn't even awake when I arrived, and he wasn't making many dinners anymore."

Jeremy, without intention, squirms in his seat.

"I told him I could stay over a bit and help him around with things, or that we could plan something together, to lift him up. He turned me down a lot, though he wasn't mean about it. He just said that he wouldn't want to burden Janna and me with something like that. I didn't want to pry into his business any more than he wished."

Jeremy's breath starts to come less easy to him.

"I didn't want to disrespect a good companion."

Out of some compulsion, Jeremy stands up out of his chair. He realizes what he's done as Paul looks up at him with confusion melting into mild concern.

"Jeremy?"

Jeremy tries to steady his breath, though its unevenness fights against any stable state. With enough of a grip on it, Jeremy looks down to Paul and swallows before he speaks.

"It was about six months after my brother, with his girlfriend at the time, got his house in your neighborhood."

"Was that the first time you..."

"No, no, I had come down before when he first bought and moved into it. When he threw his late college graduation party. Though it was just me, mom, and a few of his college friends. Anyway, um, he uh, was in a...he was in..."

Jeremy gave a quick, harsh cough to clear his throat, further throwing his breath into an emotional disarray.

"He was a bit...stand offish the whole time...and I felt...a bit...a bit lost being there, like I was...staring at a complete stranger. I was asking about his path in life and how he was...feeling about everything...and he was saying how..."

Jeremy rubbed a hand over his nose, as if that would magically restore any balance he had within.

"He...told me that...I wouldn't care to know about it...what he was doing...what he wanted...because.."

Jeremy feels his eyes start to sting with tears of regret waiting to flow. He viciously halts it with what meek resolve he could muster.

"I'm...I'm sorry...I'm..."

Paul shakes his head, permitting Jeremy's uneasy resumption.

"He said I wouldn't want to know...because I just seemed...I seemed so busy with what I was working toward...what I was trying to get for myself...and I....I told him that he was being an asshole to me....and that he didn't respect me...didn't care....because if..."

Jeremy can barely finish a thought, his mind plagued with years of hurt he didn't know was there.

"If he...if he did...then...he would've reached to me...or...tried to help...and I.......I pushed him..."

Jeremy's voice devolves to a barely perceptible series of sobbing spurts.

"I told...I said that...I didn't want to see him...but...I..I missed...so much...I missed so much...and I can't....I can't get...it back...I can't get it....I can't get it...I've lost him...I can't..."

Jeremy wants to let more out, but the pain of loss has locked his mind. Paul rises up from his chair, and walked over to Jeremy.

Paul holds Jeremy in a tight embrace and lets Jeremy release all the years of forgotten love into his chest.

"He's told me he missed you. He didn't forget."

Jeremy is reduced to a shivering, broken husk in Paul's arms.

#

Jeremy's eyes were still covered with fresh tears on his red face, glistening with the remnants of his self hatred, as he and Paul sat in their chairs.

The sound of steps approaching the room compels Jeremy to arise from his chair, wiping his face as clean as he can to retain any amount of presentability. Paul followed suit.

A young man entered the room and paused for a moment, witnessing the withered man standing at the far end of the room. He spoke up to the pair of men, gentle and polite.

"Gentlemen, visiting hours are over."