That Blue Gibson: Another Round

twenty-nine

"You sure smell pretty," Taylor grinned and tossed a towel over his friend's wet hair when he stepped out. "Liz was smart to pack towels. The ones here are shit."

Dave didn't say anything, couldn't say anything until he was dressed and they were back in the room, now cleaned of it's splattered floor. The long bench that folded out into a bed meant for brand new fathers felt overwhelming so he chose the vinyl and wood rocking chair to flop into instead. 

They sat in silence, listening to the metronome of the clock until Dave spoke.

"T?"

"Mmm?"

"Remember when...," he found the words difficult to muster forth. They'd never once spoken about this, but Dave needed to confirm that it wasn't just in his own head, that he wasn't slowly going insane. "Remember when you got sick in London and um... I mean, maybe you don't remember, but you would tell me that..."

"About the dreams?"

"... Yeah."

Taylor trained his eyes on his best friend and slowly sunk onto the bench, "... did you have another one?"

"Yeah," Dave scrubbed his hand down his face knowing the conversation was beyond reason and reality and knowing he wasn't the only one having the dreams made it somehow... worse. "We were in the old apartment in Olympia and Liz was there. She was young and... she said she felt tired so he told her he'd take her somewhere to rest until I got there. And..."

Taylor shuddered and surprised him with a laugh, "Did he say it was safe?"

They held each other's stares for a beat, answering the question with silence instead of words. 

"Well," Taylor reclined on the bench far too relaxed and in stark contrast to how Dave felt, "You always said that he visits you sometimes in dreams. Why wouldn't he visit other people, too?"

"But how is it possible for the two of us," Dave waved his hand between himself and Taylor and then towards the space Liz's bed had been in, "and the two of us to have the same dream at the same time?"

Taylor shrugged and contorted himself on the bench, never one to sit like a normal human being. "If we can finish each other's sentences and riffs, maybe it's not too far off to consider that we're synced in a much more profound way. We only understand a tiny fraction of the brain's capabilities and..."

Dave felt a smile pull at his lips and his shoulders relax against the stiff vinyl. If good ol' philosopher Taylor couldn't get him through the next couple hours, no one else could.

*

"Mr. Grohl?"

They both looked up to the nervous looking nurse in the doorway and Dave felt his nausea return in full force until he noticed her nervousness was due to recognition.

"Oh... it is you," she breathed and then blushed as she wrung her hands. "She's all done. If you want to follow me I can take you back to her."

There was a window in the recovery room and for some reason, Dave was more focused on the bright sunlight pouring in than his wife's body in the bed in front of him. He'd only had about half an hour's sleep and the effects were slowly creeping up on him. Before long, he'd be about as useful as one of those skeletons used in anatomy classes.

"She'll be in and out for a few hours. We've given her pretty heavy pain killers," the nurse said quietly as she shuffled around checking monitors and IVs, then paused when he didn't answer. "Would... do you want me to find you some coffee?"

A relieved sigh left his lungs as he pulled a chair next to Liz's bed, "That would be great, thank you."

Once they were alone, he brushed the hair off her forehead, trying to ignore that her skin felt like ice. He played with a lock of hair that had escaped its tie and was so attentive to that dark red curl wrapped around his finger that the nurse startled him when she scurried back into the room just as quickly as she had left.

She handed him a Starbucks cup with a peculiar grin and he muttered a thanks just before he noticed the 'Fresh Pots!' scrawled on the side of the cup. He tried to conceal his annoyance at the decade-old joke rearing its tired head again, but Liz's hand twitched and his eyes flew to her face. 

A tiny gasp escaped her lips as her eyes fluttered open and her head lolled to the side, her hugely dilated pupils jolting to a stop on him. "Hey, baby!" her cheerful rasp took him completely off guard and the nurse on the other side of the bed coughed back a laugh. "Did you know those turtles bite? I fucking hate turtles. Turtles are assholes."

"I'll send the doctor in," the nurse mumbled and bolted from the room once again, clearly trying to hold back her laughter. 

"Who the hell was that?" Liz looked around in surprise.

"Your nurse, Elizabeth," he wanted to smile at how high she was, but he too on edge. "You just had surgery. ... again."

"Oh, right. That thing we were doing," she nodded and lifted the thin blanket to look at herself. "Yikes."

"Bad?" 

"I dunno. There's a bunch of weird looking bandaids, though," she sighed and flopped her head back onto the pillow. "Hey, he didn't want to listen to The Melvins. He wanted to listen to your stuff," she added casually.

He felt his heart pick up speed and wanted to ask her to elaborate but worried it might upset her train of thought and make her forget.

"He had all your records, babe. Made me listen to In Your Honor like four times," she smiled and peeked over at him with one eye opened, "And Echoes at least twice. Don't tell him I told you, but he totally cried during 'Home'," she giggled and then gasped, "Oh my god, not you, too!"

"'m not crying," he smiled through the embarrassment as she clumsily wiped away his tears.

"He didn't like Vultures very much and I told him that I respected his very wrong and very bad opinion. Can we take this fucking thing off my face now?" she was all over the place, speaking quickly, pulling at the oxygen tube under her nose and trying to sit up just as the doctor wandered into the room.

"How ya feelin', Liz?" 

"Turtles are assholes," she grumbled.

"Okaaaay," he furrowed his brow and he turned to her IV tower. "Let's turn the happy juice down just a bit. Dave, can we talk out in the hall?"

*

He woke with her touch on his face, barely having slept at all on the horribly uncomfortable bed beside her. The dreams he had hoped for never came, the visits or conversations that he had been wishing would happen for almost twenty-five years were replaced with the echoes of her doctor's news; "Think of it as a tubal ligation. Everything is still there, regulating hormones and whatnot, she just can't use it. This way she won't need replacement therapy or..."

"'m sorry," she whispered. 

"Why?" he asked, disoriented by a fitful sleep and his own aching body.

"That I can't... that we can't..." the mist in her eyes threatened to spill over when he reached up to touch her face just as she was touching his. "You wanted a house full of kids and now..."

"Stop," he admonished gently. "It doesn't matter, none of that matters."

"Please don't tell Allison and Taylor. They'll be devastated."

He felt his stomach drop a little at not being able to talk to his best friend about it, but knew she was right. They would feel awful if they knew. "Promise."

She gave him that half smile, the one that told him she was done discussing it for the time being. "So we're okay?"

"As long as you don't scare the hell out of me like that again, we're okay."