By the time I’d clocked out, I ached like each muscle in my body had been contracted for hours on end. Every little passing gnce, every little comment too quiet to hear put me on edge, sickened further by knowing that my paranoia was actually justified.

  The only pce I was safe anymore was home, which was strange; growing up, I did everything I could to stay away - an instinct that had followed me well into adulthood - but now, I couldn’t wait to be there. The station had become hostile territory, and even Mercy’s house was pgued with its own kind of tension I had no idea how to navigate, so now home was where I longed to be. All it took was finally having someone worth coming home to.

  As I opened the door, the first thing that greeted me was the gentle melody of a guitar, and for the first time in over twenty-four hours, I could breathe. Nudging the front door shut with my boot, I listened closely for more sounds of life throughout the apartment. When I’d made enough noise coming home, the music stopped.

  “Hey!” Raja called out warmly. “Welcome back!”

  Following the sound of his voice, I found Raja reclining on the couch, his knee propped up by pillows with a pack of frozen corn on top of it. Across his body was the guitar, and as soon as I stepped through the doorway, he moved it off of himself to get up. Right when he sat forward, he hissed sharply, grasping at his knee.

  “Oh— you don’t need to get up, I’ll come to you,” I said, motioning for him to stay. To let him take up the couch, I shifted the coffee table just enough so that I could sit on the floor beside the couch. “How’s the knee today?”

  “Mmhm— just kind of having a fre up right now.” He let out a tense exhale. “I already took something for it, but it’s just gonna be one of those days, I think.”

  Noticing that the frozen corn had fallen off his knee, I reached up to put it back in pce. “You want me to get you anything?”

  “Nah, I’m okay. Don’t worry about it.” He waved his hand. “Honestly, I hate being waited on more than I hate having to hobble everywhere.”

  Pyfully, I smirked. “I could always carry you. Then you wouldn’t need to hobble.”

  “Man, why are you always trying to carry me around?” As he smiled, Raja’s nose wrinkled. “Is it a firefighter thing, or are you trying to show off?”

  “Ay, what’s the point of getting this jacked if I can’t throw people over my shoulder whenever I want?” I flexed my arm for effect. “Besides, it makes me feel cool.”

  With a graceless snort, he ughed. “Whatever you say. Hey, speaking of cool, I got paid yesterday. I left it on the counter, did you see it?”

  “No, not yet. Is it in one of those unmarked envelopes again? All cash?” I shook my head. “I still can’t get over how shady that is. You know you definitely work for some kind of front, right?”

  “Probably.” Lacing his fingers across his stomach, he looked away thoughtfully. “But at least it pays the bills— or it would, if you’d take the damn money already.”

  “I am not taking your money.” Though I was smiling, I wasn’t going to budge. “It’s yours. You earned it.”

  “Well, I feel bad staying here if I’m not giving you something in return,” he said, a little softer than I expected. “Feels like I’m just mooching off of you.”

  “You aren’t a mooch,” I insisted. “Just having you here is enough for me. You know that, right?”

  When he gnced down at his hands, Raja’s eyeshes fluttered, dark and delicate. Moving my hand down from his leg, I wiggled my fingers between his until his hands eclipsed mine, and the wrinkle that had formed between his eyebrows disappeared.

  Something about sitting there with Raja, the sun streaming in through the windows and bathing him in its morning light, felt so blissful, so humbling. Then, suddenly, my heart became a rock in my chest, sinking down into the pit of my stomach. My words tumbled out before I could even stop myself.

  “It could’ve been like this the whole time,” I said softly.

  Raja didn’t look up from our hands. “What do you mean?”

  “When you, um— when you got discharged, you didn’t have to go back to your parents, or… or wind up on the streets.” I paused, tightening my grip on him like if I let go, he'd float away. “You could’ve stayed with me.”

  I wish you’d stayed with me, I corrected, but it was too vulnerable to admit to. All those days of coming back to an empty apartment, all those nights of dragging strangers back so at least I’d have someone here… it didn’t have to be that way. It never did.

  At times, it was bittersweet. As grateful as I was for every moment we had together now, I still wrestled with knowing that Raja had purposefully cut me off. A part of me had come to resent him for it, but it was ultimately powerless against the part of me that yearned for the comfort of his touch, a comfort I was close to never knowing.

  Raja had fallen so quiet, I didn’t even hear him breathe. Written across his features was something conflicted, but whatever he was thinking, I couldn’t tell. When he reached for me, he cupped my jaw in his hand like he was holding something precious.

  “You look tired, Manny.” He was obviously changing the subject, but his concern was genuine, so I let it slide. “Did you get much sleep st night?”

  “No, but that’s nothing new,” I replied, closing my eyes as I leaned into his palm. “Honestly, I’ve never really slept good at the station.”

  He hummed, sympathetic. “‘Cause of all the emergencies?”

  “Yeah, it’s part of it, but…” With a frown, I sighed. “I don’t really sleep well anywhere.”

  “No?” Raja’s brows pinched together. “Not even with me?”

  “It’s not as bad with you, but even then, it’s just…” I cast my gaze to the floor. “When I sleep, I dream of him.”

  Gun shots.

  I squeezed my eyes shut.

  Raja’s hand became eerily still, then slipped off my face. Even behind my eyelids, I sensed his shame, and when I opened them, I saw that I was right: there was nothing sentimental in the way he looked at me now, only sadness, a shade of blue woven into every feature on his face.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “I didn’t mean to bring it up.”

  “It’s fine.” As he swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbed. “Actually, while we’re on the subject, there’s— there’s something I’ve been meaning to ask you about Feliz.”

  When Raja gnced down at his hands, I did too, but it was unnerving to watch him pinch and peel at the skin around his nail beds, so I looked away. His uneasiness was contagious, and the longer he went without speaking, the sicker it made me.

  For a moment, it was like he was bracing for impact. Then, he looked straight at me.

  “Did you love him?” He asked.

  Though I was a little puzzled, I nodded hesitantly. “Well, yeah?”

  Across Raja’s face, a subtle wince, like he’d been stung. His hands had stopped moving, but by now, his fingers were raw and red.

  “Did he…” He paused to swallow. “Did he know?”

  I rubbed the back of my neck. “We never really talked about it, but…”

  We didn’t have to, I finished internally. Growing up, we’d spent countless afternoons together, riding bikes, pying games and dreaming of a future beyond the barrio. When home wasn’t home but a house where doors smmed and people yelled, Feliz was there, ready with a sleeping bag on his bedroom floor even at three in the morning.

  After 9/11, he enlisted in the military as soon as he turned eighteen, and I followed him, because not even war zones could scare me as long as he was there. Some days I wanted to believe in an afterlife just so I could think Feliz was still out there. More than that, I wished that I’d told him how much he’d meant to me, my brother in all but blood.

  Despite the TV pying in the background, the room was uncomfortably quiet. Though Raja’s eyes pointed in my direction, it was like he was looking beyond me. Whatever he saw, it hurt him.

  The silence stretched on for what felt like forever. When I gnced down from Raja’s face to his hands, I nearly gasped: his fingers were bleeding now, like he was trying to tear himself down to the bone. Without thinking, I clutched his hands to stop him, and we both froze, staring at each other.

  “What’s this about?” I asked. “Something’s obviously bothering you— what is it?”

  “I— I don’t know,” he stammered weakly. “I mean, I already knew, but… actually hearing it is just…”

  The longer we looked at each other, the further Raja’s face crumpled. Suddenly, he yanked his hands away from me, hauling himself off of the couch even though it obviously caused him pain. He tried to put distance between us by shuffling towards the exit, but I was too quick on my feet to let him get away that easily.

  “Raj, what is going on?” I pleaded. “Tell me—”

  “Stop!” Raja snapped, whipping his head around to look at me. He looked devastated. “Just stop, okay?”

  Immediately, I cmmed up. Raja ran a hand through his hair so roughly, I was shocked he didn’t pull any of it out. As he spoke, his voice was shaky and weak. “Fuck… how can you stand to even look at me? Knowing what I did?”

  “It wasn’t your fault!” I said firmly. “Please, Raj— for the st time, I don’t bme you—”

  “How?! How can you let me stay here when I ruined everything? Feliz should be the one here with you, not me!” Raja shouted over me. “He should be the one waking up to you, and kissing you, and— and being with you, and if I wasn’t such a piece of shit… fuck, I got the man you love killed, Manny, how come you don’t fucking hate me?!”

  As heightened as the energy in the room had become, when Raja’s words left his mouth, I was completely caught off guard. Upon seeing the way I stared at him, despite his anguish, Raja seemed simirly confused.

  “What the fuck is that face for?” His tone was sharp and ashamed.

  “Nothing, it’s just that… you think I was in love with Feliz?” I asked, blinking at him. “Is that what you were getting at?”

  Now it was Raja’s turn to stare in disbelief. “Are you saying you weren’t?”

  “No! Jesus, man— I meant that I loved him like a brother!” I said. “He was like family!”

  Stunned into silence, the threat of tears in Raja’s eyes turned into a promise, and his cheeks became shiny and wet. He wiped himself with his sleeve, but even when he was dried off, he still looked tragic. When I gnced downward, I saw his knee shaking, though he insisted on standing like he couldn’t bear to show weakness.

  “Shit, it was never…” I spoke softly, afraid of upsetting him further. “What made you think…?”

  At first, Raja said nothing, but from the way he looked at me, this seemed to be a shocking - and almost terrifying - revetion. I tried to reach for him, but he pulled back from me purposefully. As he crossed his arms over his chest, he took a deep breath, looking agonized upon the exhale.

  “When I first started hanging out with you, you two were inseparable,” Raja said. “Like, you two were always together, and you knew everything about each other, and you were always hanging off of him or calling him nicknames— what was I supposed to think?”

  “What, so you thought we were, like, on the down-low?” I raised my eyebrows, letting out a breathy little ugh by accident. “Shit, did you think Mercy was a beard or something? With how obsessed he was with her?”

  The idea that we were secretly together was so completely out of the left field, it was hard not to find it a little funny. Honestly, if Feliz had ever known, he’d have punched me for making him look gay, especially around our fellow soldiers.

  But it was obvious that Raja didn’t find any humor in the situation. When he let out yet another stressed sigh, his eyes snapped up to mine, dark and pained. I hated myself for doing this to him, even if I hadn’t meant to.

  “Is that why you never said anything about…?” I made a gesture towards the both of us. “I mean, aside from, you know, all that Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell shit.”

  In response, Raja let out a sniff that sounded painfully unproductive. I gnced back to his hands, bloody and raw, and winced on his behalf. His lip trembling, he opened his mouth to speak, but it took a moment for something to actually come out.

  “When I saw you in the hospital, I… I wanted to say something, but…” His voice began to fragment. “I was so scared you’d hate me that it was better not to say anything at all.”

  All around me, nothing else seemed to matter - I didn’t even register the TV pying in the background. Like a rewound tape, I imagined Raja back in that hospital bed: young, skinny and broken. I didn’t care how ragged he looked, how dark the rings around his eyes were; the fact that he’d made it out at all was a miracle, and there wasn’t a miracle on Earth that wasn’t beautiful.

  When Raja began to speak again, I was brought forcefully right back to the present. He swallowed dryly, like his throat was as raw as the tips of his bloodied fingers.

  “It— it fucking killed me, ‘cause more than anything, all I wanted was for you to love me like you loved him. But I didn’t think you ever would.” He looked at me with such intensity, my knees nearly buckled. “Not after that.”

  “Raj,” I began, but I couldn’t make myself speak anymore.

  “No, Manny, listen, okay?” He interrupted. “I love you. I’ve loved you this whole, entire time. From the moment we met in basic— I just saw you and… that was it.”

  When Raja finally said it, it was like being struck by a bolt of lightning. We’d spent so long dancing around it, feeling it but never naming it, that to say it outright rendered me speechless. Pathetically, my own words struggled, as if my mouth was nothing more than a graveyard for everything I wasn’t brave enough to say.

  “I loved you even when I couldn’t have you.” Against his arms, Raja’s fists tightened, his lip curling. “Even when I thought you only loved Feliz.”

  I couldn’t bear another moment apart from him. Slowly, I approached him, until I could hold his face in my hands. Somehow, I was back in Afghanistan and still here in Dals all at once; in his eyes I saw the past, and the present it had led to, and - for the first time - everything felt right.

  “Raj, look, I’m a dumb asshole, and I’m also batshit crazy, so the idea that you want me to love you is fucked beyond belief. But I— I love you so much, it’s—” I paused to swallow, keeping my gaze steady on his face. “I can’t even talk sometimes, it’s so much. Fucking hell, I hadn’t seen you in ten years and I still dragged you off the streets to stay with me, no questions asked, and you still don’t know if I love you?”

  Despite his little smile, Raja’s eyes were so watery, I didn’t think he could see. “Manny…”

  “I love you,” I repeated firmly, like I might never have another chance to say it. “I… I don’t know if I’ve ever loved anyone the way I love you, Raj. There’s no one else like you. I dunno if there ever will be.”

  It was like a dam had broken. Suddenly, Raja grabbed me by the shoulders and yanked me into his arms. The force of pulling me into him was too much for his weakened knee, and we fell back against the wall, sliding down to the floor in a tangled mess of limbs. He buried his face into my shoulder, and the wetness of his tears bled into my shirt.

  “Fuck, I love you,” Raja said, low and strained. “So, so much.”

  Just to hear him say it again made my heart flutter. I pulled away, but not too far - only enough so that I could look him in the eyes.

  “That’s why you came back for me, isn’t it?” I asked. “Even when it could’ve killed you, you came back for me.”

  Swallowing thickly, Raja fell quiet, like he was too choked up to speak. He brought me back into his chest again as it shivered between sobs, and in his embrace, I melted, wax in the sunlight of his touch.

  The longer we sat there, the tighter Raja’s arms coiled around me, until it got to where I could hardly breathe. I let out a strained little sigh.

  “Raj, that’s— a little much,” I mumbled. “You’re gonna break my back, man, damn.”

  “Sorry,” Raja replied with a sniff. “I— I just don’t want to let you go. Not again.”

  My first instinct was to make a joke to lighten the mood, but I didn’t. I was sick and tired of running away all the time - from myself, from others. And on some level, between the investigation and the wasps creeping further into my head, I knew I was living on borrowed time. So instead, I wrapped my arms around Raja, which he took as a sign to bring me even closer.

  “Then don’t,” I whispered, my face tucked into his neck. “Don’t let me go.”