Queer as Muke

1.4.5 Sam's Not Dead

"Michael!" Luke shouts at the top of his lungs stepping back on the pavement to look at the very top floor, after failing to get a response on the intercom and the front door to Michael's apartment building being resolutely shut and locked despite him pulling hard at it, "Michael!!!"

"SHUT UP!!!" someone hollers back from another floor.

"Luke I have to go home!" Chloe honks her horn at him, leaning out of her car window. If she's not back in time for her parents returning she's going to be in even deeper shit than she was when they found out she'd been clubbing in the first place.

"But I have to find him!"

"What about the crazy lady?" Chloe suggests, hearing the desperation in Luke's voice.

"What crazy lady?"

"You know! The weird one. From the diner?"

"You mean Joy?!"

~~~

"So what do you think it means?" asks Calum. He and Corey have gone to the Sly Fox for a drink after clearing Sam's apartment of all incriminating evidence. Unfortunately the altar to Calum has seared itself into his brain and now he doesn't know what to think.

"I think it means he likes you," Corey sizes Calum up. He never realised how much or exactly what Sam felt for Calum but he feels sorry for Calum having to find out this way.

"I think it means he loves me."

Swigging from his bottle, Corey agrees, "Kind of flattering in a way. He collects you the way you collect comics."

"It's just, all this time I never knew."

"There's a lot of things we don't know about each other." Corey's never felt farther away from Sam than right now. He's his best friend and he never said a word about liking or loving Calum. What kind of best friend is he to Sam if he can't open up to him about something as important as that?

"Like..." he continues, deciding there and then that he should practice what he preaches, there's no time like the present. "...did you know I used to walk down the street in Townsville and the postman would spit at me?"

"I don't know where my father was born." Calum decides to share too. It's been a strange day, full of uncertainties, and he truly, finally, understands what Sam's Mum was talking about all those hours ago. "I don't know who he is."

"I sat with my dead grandma for an hour and held her hand before I told anyone she was dead," Corey says slowly, blinking away memories of the one person he felt loved by during his entire childhood. Calum looks at Corey's face, reaching for his hand over the table. "How come we never tell each other these things huh?"

~~~

"Don't tell me. Michael. Am I right?" Joy stands with her hand on her hip sizing Luke up as he transfers his weight from foot to foot, nervous to be knocking on her door at this time of night.

"Come on in, I'll make you a sandwich," she tells him, opening the door wider after he nods, hoping that she'll be able to help him.

"I actually just need to know where I can find him..." Luke stammers.

"And don't talk. I can figure it all out," she waves his words away. "Have a seat honey, right there."

"Calum? It's me. You've got male!" she jokes when he picks his phone up as Luke slumps in his seat. He only wanted to know where he could find Michael, not get grief off his best friend, again.

~~~

"I just want you to know Maddie feels terrible about what she said," Geordie tells Michael when he invites her in.

"Do you think I care?"

"Look, it's upsetting for all of us but it's at times like these we could all do with showing a little compassion. Especially for Sam. Is there any word?" She can barely stand asking, the wait for news is interminable, no wonder everyone's losing their patience with each other.

"The machines say he's still alive."

"Poor guy."

"What about us?" Michael asks. "We don't have any beeps or white dots or wires telling us we're alive so how do we know?"

Geordie knows this Michael. It's not one she sees often but he visits now and again, normally making an appearance after Michael sees his parents or his family, and she knows he needs a serious answer even though he may come across as being facetious.

"Maybe we know from what people expect from us. I mean, take Gus, he needs me to feed him, to change him. Knowing that tells me I'm alive. So for me, right now, it's him."

"What about me?"

"Sam needs you now." Geordie moves closer to Michael, he's looking all little-boy-lost and she just wants to give him a hug. "So that's maybe what tells you you're alive."

He bows his head under the pressure, it's too much, why did Sam do this? Geordie's warm palms bring him up again to look at her. "You'll do the right thing. Whatever it is," she says seriously.

"You don't know that."

~~~

It's true, the machines beeping around Sam are the only thing telling Michael that he's still alive. He grips the rails of Sam's bed tight in his hands.

"Fuck you," he whispers, "Fuck you. Fuck you for going home with some tweaked out little twinky and thinking you got lucky. Did he let you eat his ass? Did he let you suck his cock? Well I hope it was worth it."

Michael's face changes, angry again at everything that's happened today. "And fuck you for choosing me. I ought to let you lie here forever, how'd you like that? Can you hear me?"

"You know, you're not so bad looking. In fact, you look better like this. You should die more often. Or live, so that I don't have to say yes. Yes, I'll do it, I'll give you what you want. What you need."

"But don't think it's for you..." Michael's eyes are glassy, he never thought he would be in this position. "It's not. It's for me..."

He's about to say more to his captive audience when a hand comes on his shoulder. Expecting Calum, he's surprised when he sees it's the male nurse he was watching that morning, who must be finishing his shift. Standing up, Michael doesn't say anything, he just knows instantly what he needs and that the nurse wants to give it to him.

Pushing him up against a wall Michael starts on his neck, feeling his tension slip away.

Opening his eyes slowly, Sam moves his head to hear where the noise is coming from. Grunts and groans fill his room as he comes round sluggishly.

"Jesus," he rasps as he realises what it is he's hearing.