Rise [Bruno Mars]

Chapter sixty-one

Chapter sixty-one

Bruno fought to recall the last time he'd seen his rib cage.

Sun rays streaked the horizon, similar in color to the sticky substance Bruno vomited over himself. He was assigned a bed bath. A nurse undressed him but kept a towel around his waist. Gentle from her profession, she smoothed a cloth damp with unscented soap up and down Bruno's shrunken arms, across his emaciated chest. After she patted that area dry, Bruno touched it, felt the hard bones ridging his torso and—had he ever once seen them? He settled with this being his first time. If it hadn't been, he would have never been dubbed the name Bruno.

When the nurse adjusted his towel, Bruno glanced down quickly to capture the sight of his penis. It was, maybe, an act made to make sure every part of him was there.

That didn't make him feel more intact.

Bruno felt hollow presses of silence all around him in the places his sense should be. No matter how hard he reached he grappled at nothing. His sense was just. . . not there anymore.

Which made sense.

It was because of the animus—the second stage fluid—that he had had such a gift. And he was no longer sick.

He should be happy. He should be. Man, this moment graced his dreams for hundreds of nights: to be free of the cage the animus put him in, whatever the cost. He remembered how low-spirited he became before that shit with Ryan went down. He'd lie in bed and the world would grow dull. He didn't have liquor to drown himself in. He didn't have music or money to make himself feel good. His chump nephews weren't around and he'd lost his girl. Worse, he'd lost her to a man that wasn't better than him. On top of that, he had been dying. Just lying there in the dark, the strength would leave Bruno, rendering him a person he so often concealed, his sense running slow and blurry.

Then Ryan stabbed him in the back, and he broke.

And woke up into this nightmare.

Counting the amount of visible bones on his chest was not enough distraction. The nurses did not linger over him long, even the one washing him, gentle as she was, left in a frenzied hurry. There were too many wounded that needed their attention, and usually quite the chatter-bugs, they were silent. This was a solemn time.

Too many funerals were being coordinated.

Bruno swore often. He swore at the mush he was only allowed to eat, not that he was hungry, and at the hard mattress beneath him, the springs digging into his back with every toss and turn, and at the day that refused to end no matter how lengthy his prayer. "Shit," he whispered when he turned on his side and saw Douglas standing beside him, no longer in soldier-gray but worker-white. He hadn't heard him come in. The blond owned a spy's feet.

Douglas crossed his arms, his face, as always, emotionless, which rivaled with the way he spoke. "Due to unfortunate circumstances, you have survived."

Bruno flinched. Douglas saw and realized how much his joke was not a joke.

"Oops," he said.

Bruno threw an arm over his eyes, his breathing turning ragged. He had set up Adrian for her own ending.

"I could have sworn my face would've made you feel better."

"Douglas," Bruno whispered, a soft, raspy plea that Douglas decided to be immune to.