“Gra…yson. No!” Haley snaps his fingers at the wandering toddler. “Don’t….even…think…about…it—Luce…can…you…”

He runs out of air mid sentence, pausing to catch his breath. He was nearing the end of a record run on the treadmill and couldn’t slow his pace without the machine restarting.

Luce throws down his weighted barbell and runs across the gym to grab the 3-year-old, who was toddling merrily towards the pyramid of brightly colored free weights the leasing office had just added to the gym.

Seconds later, the treadmill beeps out a happy tune as Haley reaches his 5 mile time goal. He shuts the machine off and runs a towel down his body before taking a squirming Grayson from Luce’s arms.

“When did you get so heavy ?,” Haley teases him. But then remembers his 34^th birthday the day before. “Or am I getting old ?”

“If you’re old, I’m fucking ancient,” Luce grumbles.

“Well, you are approaching mid life crisis territory--”

Luce smirks and then lunges, scooping them both up in his arms with no warning.

“Luce, no !,” Haley shrieks, clutching Grayson closer to his chest. Luce easily lifting their combined weight to his chest twice before setting Haley on his feet with a grin.

Grayson was delighted and demanded he do it again.

“Look, now you’ve got him all riled up,” Haley sighs, leading the toddler back to the blanket he was supposed to be lying on. “You’re sleepy, silly boy. Lay down and we’ll go back upstairs in two minutes.”

“Storytime now,” Grayson demands.

“We’ll do a story when we go upstairs. I’m almost done---”

“No. Now! Now! Now! I want it now, Daddy!--”

“Do you want to listen to music ?,” Haley asks, offering him his green iPod nano. He finds an album of calm music and puts the earbuds into his little ears, hoping it puts him to sleep.

11:30 p.m. was way past Grayson’s normal bedtime but Haley figured it would mean he’d be too tired to do his usual clinging tantrum routine at daycare drop off. He’d normally go to the gym when Grayson was in daycare but he’d been asked to do overtime at the nursing home everyday this week and he was past due for a good work out.

Working out was also time he and Luce could spend together. Luce liked that the gym in the apartment complex better than his bodybuilding gym. And if Haley had to watch Luce’s muscles while he lifted weights ? It was a burden he was happy to bear.

Once Grayson is settled back on his blanket, Haley stretches his warmed muscles in the mirror, sitting against it and pushing his legs on either side of his body to make sure he still could. He’d worn black compression shorts and a Virtue top he’d cut in half and then split down the middle. He still felt a compulsion to keep his body close to the same shape it had been since he was a teenager if not better. 

He tried to do it in a healthy way and had even gained some weight. The v-shape at his hip had lost some of it's definition but it was still there.

“I’m dropping him off at daycare at seven,” Haley says, arching his back as he stretched. “But I’m not scheduled into work. Do you want to stay the night ? It’s kind of late.”

Luce extends a hand to help him off the floor.

“You know the rules. Plus I  should go home,” Luce says. “Ma’s still stressed about Twyla.”

Luce’s 26-year-old sister had been working a dead end 9-5 office job  and decided out of the blue to go to law school in New York City. She'd moved into a duplex in Long Island last month with her girlfriend Colette. She was the only one of Luce’s siblings to move  far from Vegas and Sara was taking it harder than Haley would have thought.

Haley nods and gets a quick kiss on the cheek.

“Oh, did you see the hotel I sent your for D-I-S-N-E-Y ?,” Haley asks

Haley had spent the last year staring at the extra $200,000 in his account. He’d finally decided to put most of it in a college fund and use some to plan a trip to Disney World for Grayson and Skylar during Christmas break.

Lansing Prescott had been through rehab and AA since Haley  saw him at Maxwell’s funeral three years earlier. Lansing had found God in the process and asked Haley to be Skylar’s godfather last year. He’d gone to Lansing and Sky's baptism in San Bernardino followed by Lansing's wedding to the church’s  pastor.  

Inviting Skylar to Disney with them had less to do with Haley’s new  godfather duties and more with needing a babysitter so he and Luce could have time together.

And maybe he’d finally just propose to Luce ?

They’d talked about marriage after Lansing’s wedding. He even found a ring catalog in Luce's Ferrari. He’d just been waiting for Luce to take control and ask him.

But it hadn’t happened. Yet.

“I told you, I’ll do whatever you  want on this trip,” Luce says kissing him on the cheek again. “Call me when you two  get upstairs. Lock the door.”

“Yes, sir,” Haley smirks and it earns him another kiss.

“See ya later, buddy--,” Luce calls to Grayson.

“BYE!,” Grayson waves enthusiastically as Luce walks out. Grayson stretches out the iPod earbuds and puts them between his teeth like floss. “Daddy, I want story now.”

“Don’t put those in your mouth,” Haley says taking the earbuds. “I don’t want your teeth marks on them--”

“Noooooo, they’re mine!” Grayson says  yanking the earbuds from Haley’s hand.

“Grayson, I swear to god,” he says under his breath. He puts the headphones in his pocket. “Don’t take things from me. Let’s go back upstairs. Help Daddy clean this up. It’s time for bed.”

He folds up the blanket and has nearly everything packed when a series of car horns blare outside the apartment complex. Grayson’s hands clap over his ears and he runs in a circle. The sound is followed by a loud collision--then tire squeals and a series of harder thuds. Then screams.

Haley picks up his cellphone and  moves to the window but he can’t see much through the reflections in the glass.

He cracks open the door for a better look and his stomach drops when he sees the car on it’s back in the middle of the county parkway is a Ferrari. He rushes out the door, fear pulsing through his veins.

It has to be a different one he tells himself. Luce would have been going the opposite direction.

But the license plate matches.

 He dashes across the barrier. Police and emergency services were beginning to  pull up. Witnesses were dashing out of their  cars in the middle of the parkway, talking to each other in fascinated horror.

“Hoooly shiiiit, dude—”

“—tried to stop, I’m sorry—”

“Did you fucking see that SHIT—”

“—had to be drunk—”

“Motherfucker just kept going—”

“Excuse me,” Haley shouts walking through the crowd and towards the overturned sports car. “I’m a nurse, let me through, please. Why isn’t anyone helping him!”

He steels himself as he peers inside the driver’s seat. 

-2-

The car was empty.

Haley’s  heart stops for the second time that night when he notices the bloodied blown out windshield. Bile rises in his throat,  a  horrific understanding dawning on him, as he staggers toward the shoulder of the road where  Emergency Services  and police were gathered.

“—H-h-he had to be going over 100. I pulled over to call the cops and then the car went full speed into the lane separator.” a man in a basketball jersey was telling a police officer. “ I swear it flipped liked eight times. Like a movie. Craziest fucking shit I’ve ever seen…”

He finally sees Luce—covered in blood from going through the windshield. He's being lifted on to a stretcher by  three EMTs with the help of two police officers. His chest is split open but his face is almost relaxed despite the  horrendous pain he must be in.

“That’s my boyfriend--I’m a nurse,” Haley says loudly and the EMTs turn to him.  “Where are you taking him?”

“University Hospital. Um, you might need to talk to the police--,” the EMT adds.

“LUCE! Can you hear me ?,” he shouts as they load the stretcher into the ambulance. “You’re in shock right now. It’s  going to be okay, baby. Please hang in there.  Please--I love you.”

“Honey, were you in the--,” an approaching officer starts and then stops after looking at Haley more closely. “Were you in the car with him...Was he trying to pick you up ?”

Haley had forgotten his outfit. Nobody was supposed to see him except for Luce. He was barely wearing clothes and drenched in sweat from a five mile run.

“No. His name is Luce Grace. He’s 38-years-old. I live over there,” Haley says pointing to the apartment complex across the parkway. “We were at the gym. He was fine when he left. He doesn’t have a history of anything--”

“You seem a little shaken up… Were you two drinking or using narcotics ? You won’t be in trouble right now  I just need to get to the bottom--”

“Of course I’m shaken up!,” he screams. “My boyfriend just flew through a fucking windshield and you’re accusing me of doing drugs--”

 His voice had taken on a shrill panic he couldn’t seem to control.

“Okay, okay, we can do this later,” the officer says. “You want to ride in my car to the hospital ?”

“No. My son is--”

The realization of what he’d done floods over him.

Without waiting for the cop to dismiss him, he darts back across the parkway to the apartment gym where he’d left Grayson alone. The red-faced, sniffling toddler stood at glass door of the gym shouting for him.

“I’m sorry, sweetheart,” Haley whispers. “Fuck.”

His attempt to open the door  is impeded by the locking mechanism.  Building access after 10 PM was key fob only. He doesn’t have to look to know he’d  left the fob inside.

 “Turn the door handle, Grayson,” Haley cries, twisting on the door to demonstrate. The door handle was just tall enough for Grayson to turn it if he tried. “Open the door. Let Daddy in.”

Now that Haley was in his eye line Grayson had stopped crying and started laughing. He bangs against the glass, playfully enjoying the feeling of reverberations  of his knuckles against the glass.

“No! Turn the handle!,” Halley screams at the giggling toddler. “Turn  the door, love…just like this. Turn it…Grayson! Open the fucking door, Grayson! OPEN IT NOW!,”

He rarely yelled at Grayson and the giggles turn back into scared tears and he’s furious.

Haley was furious too.

***

“A stroke ?,” Zacharias Washington frowns at the assembled doctors and nurses sitting across the conference table from them. “How ?”

The brief silence is filled by two Mega Bloks banging together behind them. Haley quickly gets out of his seat at the conference table to take the noisy blocks away from Grayson--who was playing in the back of the conference room. Haley silently shows him how to play with the quieter bead maze toy that seemed to live in every medical office.

Grayson had slept for most of the time they’d been in the hospital but  got clingy just as Haley had been invited into the medical team’s conference with Rias.

“We don't know the cause just yet,”  the internist says. “A stroke this severe is rare for someone his age with no pre-existing conditions.”

The neurosurgeon speaks up next.

“Police said there were no skid marks on the road so we think his right side went numb, there may have been some confusion and the accident happened when he couldn’t get his foot off the gas.” he explains. “That said some of his injuries are the ones we see when drivers aren’t wearing seatbelts.”

Haley stays on the floor, playing with Grayson quietly to have something to do with his hands as he numbly  listens to them review Luce’s  extensive treatment plan with Rias.

He'd been grateful when  Rias invited him into the conference but when the meeting ends he isn’t sure if he feels better or worse.

In the waiting room Charlotte, Sara, Minnow and Alan are squeezed on a couch and  guilt rocks Haley.

Rias speaks first.

“He’s going to survive,” Rias says. “He’s coming out of surgery now. They said he had a stroke—”

“Sara, I just want to say I’m sorry,” Haley starts, the words spilling from his mouth. “If I hadn’t—hadn’t asked him to come work out with me he  wouldn’t have been in the car. I take full responsibility and I’ll do anything I can to—”

“I don’t need your apology. We have no use for that right now,” Sara says softly but her face is twisted in distress. “If this happened at home… I wouldn’t have even noticed. He would have suffered until morning.”

“They asked me about drugs or per-existing conditions,” Rias tells his mother. “I told them he smokes but that was all…unless I’m missing something.”

 Sara shakes her head.

 “Uh—erm,” Alan Gray speaks up. “The, um, the steroids right—”

“He doesn't take steroids,” Haley says.  

“Yeah…I think he put in an order last month is all,” Alan says quietly. “I’ve heard from a couple guys at the gym they’ve been causing heart problems.”       

“Are you fucking kidding me ?” Sara spits at Alan. “That steroid bullshit again?”

“Again ?,” Minnow repeats accusingly at Sara. It’s the first time Haley’s ever seen anyone besides Luce dare get cross with her. “What the fuck, Sara ? You let him do steroids?”

“I didn't let him,” Sara shoots back, “…Lachlan and his pals at that toxic fucking gym used to take human growth hormone. I told them to stop but they were convinced it was fine because it was natural--”

“These aren't HGH. They're anabolic steroids...guys like them because they work better but side effects can be gnarly. It could  explain the sudden brain bleed,” Alan supplies.

“What the hell, Alan ?,” Minnow shouts. “Why didn’t you tell me he was doing something that dangerous? I would have stopped him--”

“He just asked me for a hook up. All the guys at the gym have it. I didn’t think--”

“Of course you didn't,” Minnow interrupts with a hand to his face. “None of you ever think. How did you graduate medical school and still come out so fucking stupid!”

“Okay, everyone calm down,” Rias says. Raising his arms just slightly to get the room's attention on himself. “What are these steroids called, Alan ?,”  

“I don’t know the exact compounds…they’re  from a guy in Mexico but I think they’re made elsewhere.”

“For fuck’s sake,” Sara curses.

“Okay, Alan. You’re coming with me to talk to his  doctors about this,” Rias says with practiced authority.

“I can’t…,” Alan hedges. “I swear I didn’t actually give him the drugs, I just gave him the name of a guy. I don’t want to risk losing my medical license over this--”

“Seriously ? Fuck your license, Alan. This is serious.” Minnow snaps.

“My son just had a stroke,” Sara shouts at Alan. “Go with Rias and tell those doctors everything you fucking know. Everything.”

Zacharias  hands a folder to Charlotte with documentation from the meeting.

“Charlotte, can you go to billing and set up the payment through our accounts ?,” Rias sighs. “He doesn’t have any insurance.”

Charlotte nods looking through the billing paperwork.

“They said he’ll need to go to  rehab after he gets out of ICU,” Rias continues. “Minnow, can you see if you can get him into that place in Canada the CFO’s wife went to last year?,”

Minnow nods, confidently taking out her Blackberry and walking to a quiet corner.

“I can go pick up  Twyla from the airport,” Sara offers.

“Mom, you should rest--,” Rias starts.

“I’m can’t,” she says softly, stroking her youngest son’s cheek. “I  just need to do something…a drive would be good.”

“You don’t have a license,” Rias reminds her sternly.  “I’ll have my assistant send  a car to get them. You can come with Alan and I to talk to the doctor. Keep Alan honest. ”

“Fine.”

Rias turns to Haley next. He found himself eager to be given a job.

“Can you go to the condo and pack a bag ?,” Rias asks. “You probably know better than any of us what he’ll need while he’s in recovery.”

“His luggage is in the back of his closet,” Sara explains handing over her house key. “I don’t even think it’s ever been used…. And this is what he gets to fucking use it for.”

“Do you want me to take Grayson ?,” Charlotte asks holding out her arms. “He can stay with the nanny today…while we figure this all out.”

“Yes, I need that,” Haley says.  “Thank you so much.”

He pulls Grayson away from where he’d been messing up the magazines on the table, not at all phased by the adults conversation.

“Sweetheart,” Haley smiles. “Daddy has to go get some  clothes for Luce while he’s at the hospital. You’re going to go with Ms. Charlotte-”

“NO!,” Grayson screams pulling at Haley’s hands. “No, please, Daddy ?”

“You’re going to get to play with Eloise, Mai and Atsumi, okay ?”

“NO!”

Charlotte helps him unhook Grayson’s grip on him and the second he is free Haley makes a dash for the elevator. He barely makes it a few steps when he hears Grayson running full speed after him.  Charlotte follows after as best she can in her heels.

“GRAYSON DO NOT RUN--,” he warns and whips around just in time to watch the 3-year-old trip over his own feet and land face first on the floor. He takes in the blissful second of silence before Grayson explodes--open mouth screaming down the hall.

Haley rushes to him and reaches him the same time Charlotte does. Grayson screeches when Charlotte touches him, sliding on his stomach across the floor to cling to Haley with his arms and legs in a tight vice.

“It’s okay, dear--,” Charlotte says, rubbing his back and opening her arms. “Come on, Grayson. I’ll get you some ice.”

He clings tighter to Haley, digging his fingernails into his skin  as he climbs up his body until he’s wailing directly into his ear.

“Ow! Grayson stop it. You’re fine,” Haley hisses and turns to Charlotte. “I’ll just take him with me.”

“Are you sure ?”

He nods and  carries the screeching toddler through the lobby hospital and to the parking lot. For a brief moment, after he gets him secured in the car seat, he considers just locking him in the car and taking a cab so he could have a moment of peace to process what the hell was happening.

Instead he gets in the car and drives the 40 minutes to Luce and Sara’s condo in downtown Las Vegas. Right before he gets off the exit he makes a quick stop at a McDonald’s drive thru.

-3-

“Daddy, where are we ? Daddy, where are we ? Daddy ? Where are weeee ?,” Grayson asks as Haley pulls into the narrow parking space below the Grace's condo building.

“Get out the car, Grayson.” he says opening the backseat. “You shouldn’t have acted that way at the hospital and I’m very annoyed with you.”

Haley felt terrible for saying it out loud. He’d never heard other parents say their own children were annoying but he thought it atleast once a day.

“Daddy, who lives here ?,” Grayson asks, unfazed by being called annoying. “Daddy ? Daddy ? Who lives here ?”

He takes Grayson’s hand and leads him up the stairs to the building’s second floor. Haley’s heart sinks. The two-story building was built in the 1960's with no concern for accessibility. When Luce got out of rehab he’d struggle to get up these stairs.

In the nearly 5 years he’d been dating Luce, he’d never actually been inside the condo Luce grew up in and still shared with his mother. The condo building was a 4 unit, motel-style box that sat a few blocks from  Las Vegas’ Arts District in a mostly empty street. The exterior was painted a rusted turquoise and blue and it said Silver Hills in cursive lettering on the front.

Sara had lived in her unit since the mid-70s  and at one point Jean lived next door but had moved out when Virtue took off. Now Sara owned all four units in the condo building. They’d converted the bottom two units into server rooms for Fallwater.

The condo interior is smaller than Haley would have thought with three bedrooms off a family room and an enclosed kitchen in the back. The couch is a dated black and gold floral number with two matching chairs. If it weren’t for all the laptops and flat screen television it would have looked exactly like the 70s inside.

There were clusters of pictures of Rias with each of his daughters on the glass end tables but other than that there was no extra decoration.

Haley covers the matching glass coffee table with paper napkins, places the Happy Meal box on top and turns the giant flat screen TV to cartoons.

“Nooo, I want it,” Grayson whines when he sees Haley takes the toy out of the Happy Meal and puts it in his pocket.

“I need to pack a bag for Luce,” he explains to Grayson. “Can you be a big boy and sit here and eat while I go in Luce’s room ?  If you’re good I’ll give you the toy, okay ?”

The first thing he notices in Luce’s bedroom are the framed pictures on his nightstand.  One is of he and Grayson blowing out candles on Grayson’s first birthday cake.

The other photo more scandalous. It is of just him, on his knees behind a professional white background,  in a black jockstrap and a crop top that said CUMSLUT in big white letters—though the pose obscured the word. He’d been having a great hair day that day, his body was strained to show off every muscle and the cup in the jockstrap made him look bigger. He looked like a perfect wet dream.

He recognized the set from a promo shoot he’d done for Virtue. But the photo on Luce’s nightstand must have been an outtake because Haley's body was contorted in laughter at something off camera.

Luce’s closet is nothing but leather jackets and jeans so he starts opening drawers. He begins to wonder if Rias sent him to do this particular job for a reason beyond his nursing experience. The first two drawers he looks in he finds a stacks of  Playboys, BDSM magazines, a dozen different lubes and a healthy collection of sex toys. 

The next drawer has pajamas and underwear but also more pornographic photos of himself,  loose bullets, bundles of rope and nipple clamps. In the final drawer he just finds guns. He picks one up out of curiosity before putting it back and  shutting the drawer.

Haley pulls a set of stylish designer  luggage from the back of the closet and uses a Sharpie to carefully write Luce’s name in each piece of clothing as he folds and packs it.  The repetitive work is almost relaxing. He unzips the suit case's side flap to put in the rolled up socks when something inside the flap catches his eyes.

Haley reaches his hand into the compartment and pulls out a silver Cartier chronograph.

It was an item from another life that made no sense  being here. He digs his hand in again and pulls out a pack of matches from the The Saguaro Palm—the Palm Springs resort where Maxwell had taken his fatal fall.

Haley puzzles the two items for a moment and then puts them back in the compartment as quickly as he'd pulled them out.

He exchanges the suitcase for a different one and decides to put it out of his mind forever.

 

---

✨SHV-LILE Paradox Line ✨

- I feel like Haley is being peak Sofia Alexander in this chapter with the enjoyment he gets out of folding and  labeling clothes. I'm going to be stealing a lot from that verse. It's kind of a problem.

- This is the scene that originally had a mention of a Fleshlight in it but I changed it to 'healthy collection of sex toys'. But also, I manged to work in another reference to Fleshlights in a future chapter ?

- Luce gets his steroids from Mexico—much like Sera and Leon. Now, I do realize Luce doesn’t have any of the side effects of steroid use so that’s a little bit of a plothole.

- Also, I totally got an internet degree in in mid-century architecture of the American West trying to visualize the Grace's condo. Sara and Luce live in what it called a dingbat building. In reality they are mostly in California and a lot of them are gone but this is kind of what I have in mind:

Except the stairs are on the front and the instead of balconies a railing goes across each floor.