Summer Sons

Manifestations this physical were not supposed to happen while he was awake,

Knowing it was the right thing to do, to preserve the memory of Eddie as he’d really been, rather than what he’d become, didn’t fix how bad it hurt to be well and truly alone.

And worse than the pain was the gladness lurking underneath, Andrew monstrously pleased to know he hadn’t been cast off, hadn’t been left behind, that Eddie still wanted him in his final moment, even if he’d failed him in the grandest possible sense.

Troth was after him to fill Eddie’s shoes for her, to complete his research with her, to dredge the accident up for her—she forced her way into things no one else understood, probing secrets he’d rather leave buried. But he had questions to ask, and he needed her answers for some of them.

The disembodiment of the department gathering, his pretense at scholar-gentleman, dropped away at Sam’s slur on the -drew.

Raw vulnerability stung at his nerves, but he had to delegate.

This was, in a sense, research—

That was how it had happened, and also not how it had happened.

That secret lay between them, in all its ugliness, festering.