#be safe!

Masha knows, — she always does — so she walks to the glass with a stack of blue slips and sets them down like she brought nothing special.

“She’s counting,” she says, not whispering, not weighing it down either. “Don’t let it eat her alone.”

He doesn’t answer, he waits until lunch traffic thins and drivers go smoke where he can see them, then he opens the side door with his knuckles and speaks without raising his voice. 

“Booth down. Office.”

You look at him like the order might be punishment, he hates that look.

“You’re not in trouble,” he adds, and the words feel unfamiliar in his mouth, like a tool he stole from someone gentle and made his own. “Come.”

In the office he doesn’t sit nor he makes you sit. He stands where he can see the door and you stand where the old carpet doesn’t catch your shoes.

You won’t look at him. Your hands are in your sleeves.

“Say it.” he tells you.

Not a bark, not that hospital-cold tone he uses when a driver lies.

A door, opened.

You swallow.

“I’m late,” your voice is clean, small.“I don’t know how late… I stopped counting the day after—”

You pick the word, decide not to say it.

“I tried to count again. It… gets slippery.”

Your mouth twists.

“I thought it was stress. It’s still stress. I don’t know. I hear the clock too loud, I go to the bathroom and it’s never—”

You stop, because you don’t owe him the details and he knows it.

He breathes once, wrong, then he fixes it.

He was already ready for this, hearing it from you still hits something he keeps locked behind his ribs. He thought he was ready to know about the pain that was not visible.

“We’re not doing calendar math,” he says. “We’re doing steps. Tests today, blood if we need it. Then, a doctor who keeps his mouth shut. You do not go alone unless you want to. You can say no to me, to them, to your parents, to the fucking sky. Your body is yours. That’s the list.”

You blink like you heard a foreign language and it finally made sense. Your jaw trembles once. You shove it still.

“I can’t… do the waiting room by myself,” you say. “I know that’s pathetic.”

“It’s not,” he says, flat. “Pick your guard.”

“Nina and Masha,” you say almost immediately, and then, smaller “And you, if you can stand it.”

“I can,” he says.

He sends one text. Two words. Store run. Nina is a shadow at the office door ninety seconds later like she teleported.

“Two brands.” he says and she’s gone again.

When she returns, she hands you the bag and a ginger ale and a sleeve of crackers because someone taught her the small parts of care that keep hands occupied.

You go to the bathroom, he stays where he is.

He wants to tear the tile off the wall with his fingers.

Masha watches the clock with one eye and the door with the other. She doesn’t comment when you come back with your face doing that hard thing it does when you think you’re about to cry and would rather stop breathing.

She flips the stick face down and says,

“Second brand,” and takes the cup like this is any other task you delegated.

Ten minutes.

The second test gives you nothing to hold.

One line.

White space where the second would be.

Early.

Stress.

Bad timing.

It doesn’t soothe you. 

Your hands tremble on the counter.

“Blood,” Masha says. “We trust blood.”

She’s already calling.

He drives because you asked, Nina takes the back to be a wall, Masha sits next to you and talks to a woman on the phone who knows how not to moralize.

He picks the clinic that owes him two favors and a few quiet nights.

The desk nurse looks at your face and doesn’t ask for a story. You sign as little as possible. 

Blood draw. Vitals.

The doctor’s hands are warm, they ask the right questions, stop at the ones you mark no.

Results in the morning.

“Where do you want to sleep,” he asks when you’re back on the sidewalk, and you stare at the ground.

“Not home,” you say. “Not the safe flat.”

Your eyes climb to his face because you don’t want to say it to his shoes.

“Yours. If— if I can. I don’t want to hear anything from the walls tonight.”

He nods once.

“I’ve got you.” He says it like a statement, not like a promise he’ll have to then keep like a schoolboy.

He puts his hands on your face, not like he does when he wants you quiet. He does it like he’s checking your bones still line up under your skin the way they should.

Thumb at your jaw hinges, fingers light at your temples, his palms warm, you lean one degree into him, you breathe out.

You haven’t done that in hours.

“I’ve got you,” he repeats. “You will be fine because I said so. Not because the world is fair. Because I am.”

That pulls your mouth into something that almost looks like relief.

You nod hard, twice, to commit to this reality because he handed it to you.

At his place he does the useful things.

He hands you a clean T-shirt and looks at the wall while you change. He gives you a new toothbrush. He leaves the door open when you brush your teeth because you have earned the right to hear someone breathe in the next room and know they’ll come if you fall. He makes tea and sets it next to the couch. He turns down the bed. He doesn’t put his body between you and the door, he puts it where you tell him you want it, with a gesture — bedside, window side, wall side.

“Here,” you say, patting the mattress on the side that faces the door. “You don’t have to be on the floor.” you say and he hears the want hidden in the phrase. “can I…?”

You touch his arm with your fingertips when he lays on his back beside you.

“I don’t want to float.”

“Do it.” he says.

You roll onto his left side, head on his chest, ear over his heart. His arm goes under your neck without thinking about it. It’s a heavy limb, solid, the kind of weight that registers as safe because it can lift, carry, break.

He adjusts, careful not to pull you too tight — he wants to, but he won’t.

He rests his hand on your upper arm where the pressure means here not hold.

Your breath is a count he can live with. Slow. Then faster. Then slow again as sleep finally drags you in.

He stays awake a long time because he’s only good at sleep in good times and this is not one.

He looks at the ceiling and hears the small city sounds find their level. Every now and then your breath hitches and his hand moves, thumb smoothing the muscle, the way he learned to do with horses that needed to remember how to stand.

The morning drags itself into the room uninvited.

He gets up first. Coffee. Calls he hates. Nina runs the yard with Masha like the two of them were built for it.

He’s at the table when the clinic calls.

They’re quick, quiet, efficient.

Positive.

Early weeks, but clear.

He thanks the voice like it’s weather and hangs up.

He doesn’t stand there and rehearse lines, he’s not that man, he goes to the bedroom to find you awake already, staring at nothing, jaw braced like you’re about to take a punch.

He sits on the edge of the bed, body angled so you can say yes or no to proximity.

“Results came,” he says. “It’s positive.”

Your face empties. The muscles just let go of the pretense of calm.

Your eyes shine dry, your hands flex on the blanket like you’re deciding whether to climb under it or tear it.

He hates the fucking world and everyone in it who made this the outcome of that night.

“We go back,” he says. “We do this right. You choose, I handle the parts I’m good at, you don’t lift a single piece of the day that isn’t yours.”

You swallow and your throat clicks.

“I— can’t have this,” you say, voice even, like a judgment you issue on a file. “I can’t. I know what I want.” The words get faster. “I want it out. I want it gone. I want to stop thinking about timelines and math and him and—”

Your mouth shuts on the rest.

“Good,” he says. “Then that’s the plan.”

He texts Masha. He texts Nina.

The machine moves the way he likes it to move when he is the one fueling it.

Clinic slot pulled up from tomorrow to today, paperwork pared to what won’t get them audited, payment prepped in cash with the right amount of insult.

You stand up, your legs hold, you shower because you want your skin to smell like his soap and not the last month.

He opens the door once while the water runs to set a towel within reach and then gets out because you are the one with a body that has been owned before and he refuses to be that man.

In the car you sit straight-backed, hands on your knees, eyes forward. He drives without running the red lights because attracting police is for men who need audience. The clinic hallway is clean and without announcements, the nurse behind the glass knows him and knows to pretend she doesn’t.

They bring you back, the doctor explains — options, risks, aftercare, words like aspiration, intrauterine contraceptive device, cervical block and ultrasound placed gently in front of you like tools on a table.

You listen. You decide. No one tells you what to think.

“You stay,” you say to him when they ask about support persons.

You hold eye contact like you think he might explain his way out of this intimacy.

“Please.”

“I’m here.” he says.

They don’t allow him in the procedure room, he knew that going in, he doesn’t fight it, he walks you to the door and places his hand on your jaw, not to reposition you, not to claim anything, just to be heat and pressure.

“I’ll see you on the other side.” he says and it’s softer than he thought. “Look at the nurse. Listen to her. If you need me you say my name when they open the door.”

You nod once, mouth tucked in, body tight but not brittle.

You go because you decided, he sits in a chair that is too small for his back and too bright for his eyes and pretends to read a sign about hand washing.

Nina texts we’re fine and Masha fed the board and coffee boy survived. He doesn’t respond.

The second hand takes forever, he doesn’t count, he used to count during surgeries when he couldn’t hit anyone until the doors opened, he lets himself look at the clock and then refuses to personalize any number it offers.

They bring you back walking. Good. Your eyes focus on his face, not the floor. You’re pale and exhausted and you look angry at the world for requiring this.

He takes that as a good sign too.

He doesn’t talk until you’re in the car.

“Pain scale,” he says.

You shrug like the movement hurts.

“Four,” you say. “Five when I move wrong.”

“We’ll keep it under that,” he says. “Home, now. My place. Then soup. Then sleep.”

You don’t argue, he sees the exact moment you choose him over stubbornness and it hits him wrong and right at the same time. It’s getting hard for him to file and pocket so many moments like that one.

Back at his place he makes the little world as simple as possible for you.

He puts you in the bed, a bucket on the floor because sometimes bodies do small rebellions. 

He sets the meds out in order with stupid labels he writes on tape because the print is small and he doesn’t want you to squint. He heats the pad. He lifts your hips carefully and slides it under your lower back. He doesn’t look where your shirt lifts, he keeps his eyes on his hands.

When the cramping sharpens you press the heel of your palm into your belly and breathe wrong once.

He puts his hand over yours and presses in with you, steady, consistent warm pressure.

“Like that,” he says. “I’ve got it. Breathe.”

He talks you through the ugly minutes the way he talks a driver through reversing into a tight dock — calm, clear, no poetry, just angles and time.

“In. Out. Keep your jaw loose. Don’t climb your shoulders. You’re okay. I’m right here.”

You swear once, quiet. It cuts him in a clean way. He presses harder.

“Good,” he says. “Tell me when it peaks.”

“Now.” you hiss.

“Okay.”

He counts it out. Not numbers. Breaths.

He hears the shift when the pain changes from sharp to heavy.

He doesn’t move his hand until you move your own.

You take the pills when the clock says you can, you sip water, make a face, sip more.

He helps you to the bathroom once and waits outside with his forearm on the doorframe while you do what you went there to do.

He pretends the hallway is fascinating.

He pretends he isn’t listening for a fall.

When it’s over enough to be called over for today, you slide down under the covers and blink slow like a sleepy cat. The pads are stacked on the dresser, the heating pad hums, he sits on the floor with his back to the side of the bed and closes his eyes.

You push your hand out from under the blanket, it searches for something and stops when it finds his shoulder. You leave it there. He goes very still because one sharp move would be worse than any pain the day gave you.

“Don’t go.” you say, barely audible.

“I’m not moving.” he says.

“Good,” you say. Your voice is thin and stubborn. “You can be bossy.”

“I know.” He tilts his head back until it touches the mattress.

He could sleep like this, he won’t, he’ll watch, the way he does when drivers bring in a load that can’t shift.

You doze. Wake. Doze again. Once you jerk and whisper his name, not panicked, like you’re checking the room still holds the same people.

He touches your forearm.

“Here.”

You inhale. It’s deeper. Your mouth relaxes.

Masha texts call if fever and I left soup in your fridge; don’t ruin it.

Nina texts a photo of a cartoon she knows you like and the caption appropriate level of stupid achieved.

He doesn’t show you his phone, he reads the texts out loud because you don’t need to stare at a screen today.

In the evening he gets you to eat a little.

He rips the bread into the smallest pieces because you don’t have patience for anything that requires teeth. He talks only to tell you what time the next round is, what the plan tomorrow is, what later looks like.

He doesn’t touch you except where you reach.

He doesn’t kiss you.

He thinks about it twice and hates himself for thinking about it while you’re like this, so he goes to the sink and washes a clean dish.

Night again, you shift and wince and then fit yourself into his left side like you were born there. Your hand tucks under his T-shirt at his ribs, palm flat, heat on heat, human on human, not erotic, just proof he’s there, he’s warm and he’s not leaving.

He wraps his arm around you and sets his mouth near your hair because if he speaks into air it will feel like a speech, and if he speaks here it will feel like how you calm a skittish thing without pushing it.

“You did it, doe.” he says, almost a whisper. “It’s done. You’re safe. You don’t owe anybody a story. You don’t owe him a fucking heartbeat. Sleep.”

You obey because your body trusts him now.

He forces his eyes to stay open for an hour anyway because he doesn’t trust anything that can be lost if he enjoys it. Finally he drifts.

When he wakes at a mean hour you’re still there, breathing even, no heat under his arm that shouldn’t be there, no tremor in your hands, cheek pressed on his chest and the softest expression he has ever seen in his whole life.

Fuck.

Morning.

He calls the clinic, they say the words he needs, no complications, follow-up in a week, call if anything changes.

He tells them he’ll bring you when you’re ready, he doesn’t ask you to be ready today.

You wake up looking like you didn’t fight for twelve hours.

Tired, yes. Hurt, yes. But not hunted. He likes that better than any pretty thing he’s seen in years.

“How do you feel?” he asks, and the sentence is an honest question from a man who doesn’t give those away.

“Sore,” you say. “Empty. Relieved. Sad. All of it. But not…” You search. “Not stained.”

“Good.” he says. He slides out of the bed, tight back, stiff leg, whole body complaining because floors are hard and he slept wrong on purpose.

He makes you eggs you don’t want and you eat half of them because you decide you have to eat something.

He texts Masha that the board can live without you for two more days.

He doesn’t ask, he instructs.

She replies with a dot and an emoji of a knife.

Nina sends I’m taking your shift of rolling my eyes at drivers; don’t worry they’ll notice.

You sit on the couch with your legs under a blanket and a cup in both hands and you stare out the window like the street might be interesting again someday.

He stands at the counter and watches you breathe.

The urge to go commit crimes to pay for this quiet is strong.

He files names again. He files places. He files the surgeon who needs a thicker envelope. 

He files the man whose existence he plans to shorten.

But he doesn’t leave you. Not today.

He chooses being the wall the air can bounce off without hurting you.

You earned an uneventful day — he can give you that.

Before you nap again you catch his eye and hold it.

“Thank you,” you say, clean, low.

He takes it the way he takes payment that has no receipt.

“You’re mine to keep alive,” he says. “That’s the whole job.”

You nod like you understand the rules of that sentence and how far he’ll carry it.

You close your eyes, he sits down on the floor again.

He’s present, he will stay present until you are ready to go home, and then he’ll move his attention back to the parts of the city that need breaking.

He can be both.

He is both.

He will handle the blood and the soup with the same hands.

When you sleep, he adjusts the blanket so your feet don’t get cold.

He rests his hand against your ankle because touch is how he knows what he owns and what he protects and sometimes they’re the same thing.

He lets himself think, for exactly one breath, that the world did not take something from you he can’t give back.