Nobody Ends Up Dead in a Bathtub, Everyone Keeps Their Organs

Chapter 37

Damián rolled over, stopping when he felt another body. He lifted his head and opened his eyes. Alex was sitting up next to him, scrolling through his phone with bedhead and alert eyes. When he saw Damián looking at him, he smiled.

"What time is it?" Damián asked.

There was a pound of gunk in his eyes, and his mouth was dry and fuzzy. He hadn't slept so soundly in days. His brain was running slow, and his body refused to move any more than it had to turn his head toward Alex.

"10," Alex said.

"Shouldn't you be at work?"

"I called in sick. They can cope without me for a day." Alex set his phone aside. "I thought maybe it'd be a good idea if I hung around today. Just in case we want to talk anymore. Or if you wanted a little company."

The tables had never been turned like that before. It was always Damián providing the company. Not that he was complaining. It was nice. It was wonderful. He was glad Alex finally understood.

"I'd like that," Damián said.

"Do you want breakfast?"

It was a loaded question. Damián pulled himself up, preparing to start his long explanation. Food was hard to stomach at the moment. He could eat some things but not others. Even if he felt like trying something, he might not eat all of it.

He had fasted so harshly the past few days. He didn't know what he'd be able to eat or if he'd fall into a binge in front of Alex.

"We can do something small," Alex said, not quite backtracking but offering a lifeline. "However much you want. Just maybe we should eat a little?"

"We can do a small home brunch," Damián said, trying to sound casual.

"I've never done brunch before!"

"This is like a queer initiation. We're doing at-home brunch."

"Please be here for my first brunch."

He liked the way Alex said "we." "We" could eat a little. There was no pushing. There was no anger. It was just understanding, patience, and solidarity. The promise of making food into something more than just eating—a bigger bonding moment—eased some of the uneasy turning in Damián's stomach.

Damián pulled himself up even though it was hours before he would have willingly gotten up on any other day. He pulled on a shirt, borrowed from Alex, that actually fit well. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he cataloged that information.

Eve was standing in the middle of the living room, dressed and with her school bag on her shoulders. She stared ahead. Leo sat in the kitchen with his phone pressed to his ear.

"What's going on?" Alex whispered.

"I would love to," Leo said. "My brother went out the other night, and what this student told me was he was at the bar, and then all of a sudden he wasn't—he was, you know. He was acting different. Like he was really drunk. But he hadn't been there all that long. The bartender said he had only served him a glass of wine. And then the man my brother was with was trying to get him out of the bar. He apparently left when some people confronted him and offered help."

Damián's heart sank. Alex's hand came to rest, lightly, on his back. Damián could have easily inched forward to break off the contact, but he leaned into it.

Leo took a quiet, deep breath. He laid his free hand on the countertop.

"And someone else managed to call me from his phone," he continued. "She was a nurse, apparently. And she told me where they were and what she thought had happened, and I met them down there. And he was—he wasn't okay."