A Promise Fulfilled [WattyAwards#2012]

Chapter XV: The Ending -¢єиѕσяє∂-

Dex didn't even notice he was crying-crying with relief, with disappointment that nothing felt different, with unknown emotions that somehow needed to be expressed through tears-until Timmy sat down beside him and pulled him into his arms, stroking his hair and murmuring 'Shhh...' as Dex turned his face into Timmy's chest and clung to him.

It should be the other way around.

"I need to see it for myself," Timmy told him when Dex expressed this out loud. "I just...need to see the scans myself, and then I'll believe it."

Dex could respect that, and thought, partially, that was what his problem was as well. How could you just accept something that changed your life for so long was just gone, without seeing it for yourself? He kissed Timmy's temple and leaned against his shoulder, and watched as Timmy ordered Haley to his feet and braided her hair into careful, tiny braids.

Dex slept alone again that night, and he could hear Timmy and Haley whispering to each other, giggling softly as they exchanged stories and catch-up. He wondered what Haley was feeling now. She knew Timmy was going to live, seemed to have accepted it without the reassurance that Dex and Timmy both needed, that she would have that one person who loved her and adored her, even if her own personal fairytale had gone horribly wrong. She would always have one prince to carry her away into the sunset, even if she only really wanted someone else.

And, in this way, she hadn't failed to protect him. Even if Haley didn't notice in school until it was too late, now she was aware, and she could hold Timmy in her arms and tried to keep him safe.

He wondered if that would be enough this time.

........................................................

The next day, Dex brought Timmy in for his final appointment with the doctor. Haley told Timmy she could come too, but he just pushed her back to the couch and said he was fine. She was still exhausted and moody, and would probably do no good at the hospital besides perhaps annoy the nurses. So Dex called the two of them a taxi, and they sat silent all the way to the hospital, hands clenched tight between them. Somehow, Timmy ended up with his head leaning on Dex's shoulder, and Dex kissed his hair and threaded an arm around behind his back.

He must be so tired. He'd been fighting for years-against abusive social workers, bullies, against his loneliness, against hunger and poverty and then against something in his own head-and now there was a chance for him to stop, to actually rest and recover and remember what it meant to have a chance.

Dex wouldn't be surprised if Timmy went back to the apartment and wanted to sleep for months.

The cabbie dropped them off at the front of the hospital and they walked hand in hand through the front, doors, to the elevator, down the hallway to the oncologist's office. Timmy went to sit in one of the plushy waiting room chairs with the other silent patients as Dex headed to the counter and checked in. He signed the forms for the payment plans, and once again, thought about the people out there without the money to do such a thing, the people who would die because of a stupid thing like numbers printed on green slips of paper.

Timmy had closed his eyes and tilted his head back against the wall, hands working uselessly in the hem of his shirt, when Dex got back to him. He didn't react when Dex sat down next to him. Dex considered picking up a magazine, but one glance at the cover told him that reading about some reality star's boob job gone wrong wouldn't help at all-maybe triviality could keep people from seeing the problems in the first place, but it did a really awful job of covering it over. Dex wondered if it worked for some people. It must. Otherwise, how could the world be such a messed up place, if distractions like movie stars and cat videos didn't capture so much more attention than people starving in the streets?