Page 116 of Lovesick Titan

“Danny…” he called, this time getting the name out, blinking past the spots Lynn had left behind in his vision, hand reaching out in the direction he thought Danny had been.

A strong hand gripped his, and in the shadowed lighting, as the spots cleared, Mal saw a familiar silhouette and a big dopey smile.

While Lynn continued to protest, Mal reached up with his other hand and pulled Danny down until their foreheads touched. He was real. He was there. He wasalive.

“Sparky,” Mal choked on the emotions threatening to spill out with his words, “don’t ever scare me like that again.”

“Me?” Danny balked. “You’re the one who’s been in a coma for days.”

Days?

Their foreheads and hands were pried apart, as Lynn edged in and began to look Mal over without the awful penlight. Mal could hear Andre and Priestly arguing in the background over how to get the lights back on. He could hear Lucy half-laughing, half-crying as she talked hushed with Stella. He could hear Dom’s gentle murmurs. He could hear so many voices distantly, but it was Danny’s he focused on because he had been so certain he’d never see him again.

“I’m fine,” Mal insisted when Lynn kept on well after Mal could clearly see and hear everyone, even sat up halfway to look around. “Just getting my bearings. Nothing even hurts. Ow!”

She’d pinched him. “Just checking,” she shrugged.

“I’mfine,” Mal said again, feeling more and more exposed as he lay there with a throng of people watching him while he was bare-chested,which was a privilege to be earned, not something just anyone got to gawk at. “Can someone get me some clothes?”

“On it!” Andre offered.

Mal tried to sit up fully, much to Lynn’s horror, but as soon as he got to about a forty-five degree angle, he lay back down. The room spun. And he felt nauseous. And okay…maybe his back was a little sore now that his body had caught up with his mind.

“Take it slow,” Lynn said. “You’re not healing at Danny’s speed, just…close to it. You’ll need a few days before you can get out of bed.”

“Close to it?” Mal frowned. “What are you talking about?”

“For once, Mickey,” Lucy said as she sidled up next to him and took his hand, “it’s okay to listen to the voice of authority. Stay in bed. We’ll explain.”

Lynn crossed her arms with a look that said she was judge, jury, and executioner here.

“Wouldn’t dream of disobeying,” Mal said. “Now what’d I miss?”

He didn’t much care for the chaos that followed and the many faces—much as they were the faces of friends and…well, people he was still a little surprised he considered friends. Dom gave him an unsympathetic look and said to stop being a lazy ass and get better already, coz she’d been getting bored waiting on him to wake up. The subtle shift of softness at the end of the phrase was only something Mal would notice.

The lights came back on thanks to Priestly or Andre or some combination of the two, and Andre brought Mal a shirt he could pull over his head—slowly, with Lucy’s help. With the lights on though, he could finally see Danny’s scars, reminders of all the places he’d been skewered. The cuts were already so much lighter than seemed possible after days, but eventually they’d be gone entirely, just like Mal had hoped.

“How is it you can turn into a shish kabob, and I still end up with a longer recovery?”

“The universe must like me better,” Danny said.

“No arguing that,” Mal laughed.

Hearing the how and why of his recovery was a trip, though Mal wasn’t surprised to hear about Danny’s last light show since he’dfeltit.

“Basically, there’s a little bit of Danny in you now,” Andre said—only to darken to a deep red the second the words left him.

“Phrasing,” Priestly muttered.

Andre elbowed him while Dom stood back, grumbling to express her distaste for all the mushy affection going on, Lucy being the worst culprit. Eventually, Dom was able to pry her away to get something to eat, take a break, give Mal space. And more importantly, give Mal and Danny space.

Mal wished the hospital beds were larger so Danny could climb in beside him. For now, he sat in the chair at Mal’s left, looking tired and moving like an old man any time he got up, but at least he was healthy, healing,alive.

“I can’t believe Ludgate snuck up on you,” Danny said.

“He didn’t exactly sneak up on me.”

“Then how did he stab you? The feed cut out, so no one actually saw.”

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