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Date/Timing: 22 July 2012
Setting: Reid family home; Glasgow, Scotland, United Kingdom
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Edan leaves Hermann to sleep in, sneaks downstairs, pokes his head into the front room, calls, "'ey, Kris. You're up early."
He doesn't look up from his mobile. "Couldn't sleep."
"Wanna go soak up some sunshine with me?"
Kris shrugs, hauls himself to his feet, leads the way out the back door into the garden, flops to the stoop.
Edan plunks beside him, leans back on his braced arms. "Pretty morning, ain't it?"
Kris grunts, wraps his arms around himself.
"Cold?"
"No."
Edan raises an eyebrow.
"Stop staring at me."
"I'm worried—"
"Don't be."
"You've lost some weight, yea? You feeling alright?"
"Been better."
"One of those crap summer flus?"
"'s not physical. Mostly."
Edan runs a hand through his hair. "It's gotta be hard adjusting to life 'round here. Dona and Fen-fen are really something."
Kris shrugs.
"You, uh, talked to your mum and dad since?"
"Nope." Snorts. "Last thing they had to do with me was canceling my mobile the day after."
Edan winces.
"They invited to the wedding?"
"Annie was, but she didn't RSVP, which's what we were counting on."
Kris smiles a little.
"So there's a least a /bit of sunshine in this for you."
"Yay."
"You are just the very /picture of enthusiasm."
"I'm fuckin' /tired."
"Been working too hard?"
"No job. No one's hiring, 'specially not someone without experience or Highers."
"You could take classes toward 'em?"
"Why bother? I don't have the wattage."
"But—"
"Y'got your brain from the Reids and I only got the Swans'. We barely know enough to get outta the rain 'fore we drown."
"You're smarter than /that."
"Not by much."
Edan looks, really /looks, at Kris. "You're not the bloke I've been talking with the last two years." Nudges his shoulder. "What happened?"
Kris scratches the inside of his elbow, sighs. "I went a little mental after ... ye know, and I got to messin' around with needles 'n such for somethin' to do."
Edan's heart stutters, drops. "Jesus, Kris ...."
"Gets better: gave myself hep C."
"/Fuckin' Hell ...."
"Taking meds that're supposed to fix it, like, ninety percent of the time, but I might get lucky and it'll kill me someday." Kris shrugs. "Upside is I haven't touched anything since."
"That's something, I guess," Edan croaks.
Awkward, heavy silence.
"So, you gonna write me off, too, now?"
"No way!" Squashes Kris's face against his shoulder. 
Kris squeaks.
"I love you and if I'd realized how bad it was, I would've—"
Kris forces his face around. "Sh'up. I'm not your problem t'solve."
"But you /are my little brother and I /want to be there for you when you need someone."
"Ye realize how mad that is, yea? We never talked face-to-face 'fore yesterday."
"So? We've been writing and texting and calling non-stop for /years and I've been wondering what you were like since you were a wee thing."
"I'm trash, is what I am.”
"That's this man's treasure, maybe."
"Don't 'handle' me, yea?"
"I'm not, ye muppet. I'm being honest."
Kris rolls his eyes in a spectacular fashion. "Come off it. You've never put a fuckin' foot wrong and you're all shiny an' smart an' perfect and gonna do Big Things. There's no place for me in that."
"No foot wrong, ye say?" Edan grimaces. "Don't suppose you've heard about how I punched a bloke was holding a cricket bat and wound up in hospital for a fortnight? The time I crashed Dad's car? How 'bout when I got nicked for drunk and disorderly? Or the HIV scare?"
Kris glowers. "Yer lyin'."
"Cross my heart. You can ask my Fen-fen or my dad."
Kris studies him, recognizes something, concedes.
"I was lucky. All I've got to show for all that's a coupla capped teeth, points on my license, a few pounds less in my savings, and the feeling I owe the universe big-style." Deep breath. "I've been super-fuckin'-lucky." Toes Kris' foot. "Maybe this'll get all your bad luck outta the way and everything'll be golden from now on."
Kris snorks, then sighs.
They rest a few moments.
"I wanna move to London," murmurs Kris. "Get outta this place 'fore it kills me."
Edan swallows. "I know you do and I wanna help, but Hermann and I ... we can't take you in. Maybe we can help you get a little place of your own? Or help you find flatmates?"
Kris raises his hackles again. "That your call or his?"
Quietly, "It's ours."
"Does knowing I'm about ready to top myself—accidentally on purpose—change that?"
"It—I ... I'll talk to Hermann about it again, alright?" 
"'Don't get my hopes up', yea?"
"Yea," sighs Edan.
A chime from Kris' pocket.
"My next dose calls. Later." He shoves to his feet, disappears inside, door /banging shut behind him.
Edan scrubs both hands over his face, breathes deeply through his nose.
Birds tweet.
A car grumbles along the lane.
Mrs Nairn sings tunelessly in the next garden.
Another car.
Kids—probably the Murray girls—shriek, delighted.
The back door opens, closes.
"You didn't go far," says Hermann, easing down beside him.
"Kris was too tired and I'm too wound up."
"Wound up? You look positively /exhausted."
"Rough conversation."
"With Kris? How surprising."
"Lay off the kid, alright?" Rubs his neck. "I know he's been a right—" Deep breath. "—been rude as hell, but he has a lot on his mind."
Hermann sighs. "Is he still asking to join us in Battersea?"
"Yea, but that's not the big thing."
"What is?"
"He's under treatment for hepatitis C."
A beat.
"There is only one common way to contract that."
"Yea."
"So he's an addict on top of all his other problems."
"He says he's been clean—I'll check with Dad—but it'll really help him to move to a new city and start—"
"We are /not taking him in," hisses Hermann.
"But—"
"He's infectious, mentally unstable, and his integrity—whatever it may have been—is /completely compromised. We /cannot take the chance."
"Hermann, if we leave him here, he's going to die."
"If we bring him to London, we /all might."
"How do you even /know that? /I'm still here!"
"I know because my father told me as much and—whatever his many flaws—he does not lie."
Edan makes a frustrated noise. "I can't just /sit by and watch."
"It's the good of the one versus the good of the many, Edan. We might save him now, but at the cost of more lives, /including his, later on."
"So we just leave him here to die."
"Or to find his way through, with the help of the rest of your family."
"I don't know if I can do this."
Hermann sits straighter, takes a deep—if shaky—breath. "You have to make a decision. Choose him or choose me."
"I choose you," Edan chokes out.
"I'm glad, /leannan." Hermann squeezes his hand.
Edan squeezes back. "Wh-what do I tell him? Reasons?"
"Say my immune system is compromised; it's near enough the truth."
Edan swallows, nods.
A chime from Hermann's pocket.
"Shit. I forgot my pills. I'll see you for breakfast?" 
"Y-yea."
Hermann shoves to his feet, cards his fingers through Edan's hair, hobbles inside.
Edan sighs, then stands, stretches, and slinks through the kitchen to the front room, where Dad works on yet another book of Sudoku puzzles. "Can't get enough of those, can ye?"
"Good morning, Boy. Nope." Grins. "Blame Dona."
"You blame her for everything."
"Everything's her fault."
Edan rolls his eyes, flops into a chair.
"You look like a man with something to say."
Quietly, "Why didn't anyone tell me about Kris?"
"We didn't want to worry you and we nipped it pretty quickly."
"Not quick enough."
"We did our best," sighs Dad. "We're damn lucky Fennie sussed it soon as she did."
"Thank God for Fen-fen."
Dad grunts.
"I still wish you'd told me."
"We thought it best not to distract you, what with everything going on. 'sides, the meds're supposed to clear it up."
Edan twists his hands, swallows. "If they don't, there's absolutely no way he can move in with us. Hermann's immune system isn't right so we can't risk anything infectious around him."
Dad grinds his teeth. "I'm turning Andrew into fish food."
"He's earned it, but Kris deserves some credit for making a huge, /stupid mistake."
"Fair enough." He picks up his pencil, spins it on his thumb. "What happens if he comes up clean in the end?"
"I'll talk it over with Hermann again and maybe we'll be able to work something out."
"Dona and I'll help money-wise, if that'll make it easier."
"Th-thanks. We'll keep that in mind."
"Good." Dad nods absently, spins his pencil again, sighs.
"What's bugging you?"
"I—" Another sigh. "I can't help feeling we've failed that boy."
"You've probably already saved his life."
Dad shrugs.
"And you ... you don't really owe him even this much. He's not your family."
"Yes, he is."
Edan queries.
"He's my boy's little brother—my son once-removed?—and that's family enough for me." Smiles. "'sides, I would've done it even if he wasn't Annie's son because there's no reason to chuck a kid out onto the street like Andrew did."
"R-right." Edan clears his throat. "I wanna help, too, but ...."
"You just worry about your wedding and getting settled into married life. We'll take care of Kris, yea?"
"Alright, yea." Smiles weakly. "Thanks, Dad."
"'welcome, Son."
Category:Celestial Mechanics
2012 07 22
Category:Ficlet
Category:Glasgow (setting)
Category:Edan
Category:Edan's POV
Category:Edan (ficlet)
Category:Hermann
Category:Hermann (ficlet)
Category:Kris
Category:Kris (ficlet)
Category:Torquil
Category:Torquil (ficlet)
Category:Dona (mention)
Category:Fenella (mention)
Category:Annie (mention)
Category:Andrew (mention)
Category:Lars (mention)
Category:Ficlets with images
Category:Images in need of Captions