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When Matt thinks about near-death experiences, his first thought always goes to Justin. Justin and his golf club. Matt’s first accident.
The one where there had been a serious chance of him either dying or eating out of a tube for the rest of his life, that one.
And he’d think ‘yes, that’s the closest I’ve ever come to death’. At the hands of his own brother. Obviously he’d never held it against him. It was an accident and Justin already felt bad enough without Matt blaming him or something.
He still remembers the whole thing, but it didn’t feel like a near-death experience. In the moment he wasn’t like ‘oh yeah, I’m dying right now, for sure’, it was more of a ‘damn this is bleeding a lot’.
The only really unsettling part was the dream he had years later where he dreamed everything that happened in the hospital from an outside perspective in crazy accurate detail.
In hindsight, this is ironic.
.
.
.
Matt is so fucking tired, it’s not even funny. They’d just come back from a trip and he hadn’t been able to sleep on the plane because there was this loud ass kid playing fucking Call of Duty right behind him and he’d been this fucking close to kicking it across the plane, but he just bored himself through the flight instead.
Chris and Nick hadn’t been able to sleep either, so fortunately they all agree on just going to bed, separately because, oh wonder, Chris actually wants to sleep in his own bed.
Matt sleeps almost as soon as his head hits the pillow, he’s so done. It’s deep sleep too.
He almost doesn’t wake up when it happens.
Later, he will thank god that he did. Later, he’ll get how fucking lucky he is that he did.
Because he would be dead otherwise.
But that’s not the worst part about it.
The worst part is that it would’ve been Chris’ fault.
Chris, who wakes Matt up with his hands around his throat.
He’s already choking when he registers what’s going on, that there’s no air coming in. His airways are just… blocked, and even contracting his lungs consciously doesn’t work.
Chris is crushing his windpipe, both hands squeezing, bearing down on the length of Matt’s neck. He knows it’s Chris because the door is open and there’s a bit of light coming in from the kitchen, illuminating his face.
His eyes look so serene. Empty. He’s looking down at Matt, but he’s not really looking. Just seeing right through him. He’s smiling.
Matt’s head is starting to fill with static. His hands scrabble for Chris wrists, but his brother is pressing with all his weight and Matt’s half asleep, weakened by the obvious lack of oxygen and so fucking confused.
There are spots filling his vision, shit’s going fuzzy and with a startling clarity it hits him: he’s gonna die. He’s gonna die at the hands of Chris. His triplet brother. He’s gonna die and he doesn’t even know why.
Why is Chris choking him? Why does he look dead inside, like a fucking horror movie character? All smiles and empty eyes.
This has to be a dream. Any moment now he’ll wake up and be able to tell them over breakfast about that crazy dream he had where Chris tried to suffocate him. It’ll change to some other scene or he’ll fall into deep sleep again and when he dreams something else, everything will be sunshine and rainbows and everybody will be happy and smiling.
Smiling. Like Chris, no, dream-Chris.
He can’t die like this. Not today, not because of Chris. Not even in a dream. God, please let this be a dream.
The adrenaline in his blood is almost tangible when it finally comes and he bucks upwards, tries to dislodge the other’s grip to get even a little whiff of oxygen. But he’s weak and Chris is heavier than him, even if only by a little bit. Right now, that bit makes all the difference.
He tries ramming his knee into Chris ribs, but the other’s thighs are in the way and for all the time he has spent wrestling his brothers, he’d never really won when he’d gotten into this position.
The black spots start to get interspersed with bright stars and his hands are getting numb and weak and this is his last fucking chance, to either fight or wake up. Please let it be waking up. Please.
In a last ditch effort, he slings his legs around Chris waist from behind and pulls with every fucking muscle in his body.
It works. It works, Chris is ripped off and the fucking wall of oxygen hitting him is dizzying. He gasps, almost chokes on the air and he can fucking feel it rushing through his bloodstream, drowning out any hint of adrenaline still in his body.
His legs slacken and his last conscious (?) thought is a plea for (dream?) Chris to not try again.
.
.
.
When Matt wakes up, it’s… different to the usual. For starters, he’s lying on his back. He always shifts in his sleep, gets on his front and buries his head in the pillow.
Second, he has a raging headache and the inside of his throat feels like shit. Like he’d tried swallowing sandpaper.
It gets a hundred times worse when he tries to swallow.
Fucking dammit. He’s getting sick, isn’t he?
And even better, how the fuck is he gonna swallow Advil like this?
Ugh.
It doesn’t get better from there. Because he slept for what looks like fourteen hours. How the fuck.
It’s 12 o’clock in the morning and they all went to bed crazy early yesterday, at like, 10 pm. How the fuck did he sleep this long?
Especially because he can hear his brothers in the kitchen and they’re not even trying to be quiet. Assholes.
He gets up and changes because it’s fucking cold and he doesn’t want to get sicker than he already is. And then it hits him.
Fucking dammit, he’s gonna have to go to the store like this, isn’t he? They’ve just come back and there’s probably, like, negative food in their house. No wonder Chris and Nick are already screaming at each other again, they’re probably starving. Or suffering Pepsi withdrawal.
He pulls his hood over his head to muffle the sounds just a bit because his head feels like it’s gonna explode otherwise and trudges into the kitchen.
“Look who’s finally up. You do know that you’re the only one with a driver’s license, right? And we need food, ok, so hurry up and get in the car.”
Wow. Nick is already done and it’s only 12 o’clock.
“And who’s fault is that? Don’t blame me ‘cause you’re lazy.”
“What the fuck is up with your voice?”
“I think I’m getting sick. We gotta get Advil, too.”
And that’s that. Nick changes out of his sleep shirt and they go out like that, half pyjamas and also half asleep. No breakfast means no energy to even try to look presentable.
It’s dark outside, like it’s about to start storming like crazy, and it sets that special kind of depressed mood that has Matt completely zoning out of the conversation, which he can’t really take part in anyways because his throat feels like razor blades and rocks.
Nick and Chris are at each other’s throats again, so Matt takes the lead and grabs a cart, immediately regretting every choice that has lead to this because the bright, clinical lights of the grocery store send his headache rocketing to the moon.
His displeasure must show on his face because a random woman gives him a disturbed stare when he passes her. It’s a bit much, but Matt really couldn’t give less of a fuck right now.
The stares are getting more and more though as he walks through the aisles and grabs the shit he wants, with a dude outright gasping at him like he just stabbed a man. It’s fucking annoying. And incredibly anxiety-inducing, what the fuck did he do? What is he doing wrong, where is the large ass mistake that makes them all react like that?
It’s when he pulls up at the in-house pharmacy that he finally has enough.
Because the woman behind the counter takes one look at him and goes white like a fucking wall.
“Um, hi, a bottle of Advil, please.”
The white goes a bit green at his fucked up voice, which is kinda rude to be honest?
“Sir, you should go to the hospital for that. I don’t think Advil is the right choice in this case.”
What fucking case? What the fuck is going on?
“Ma’am, I don’t know what you think is going on, but I have a raging head ache and my throat feels like I swallowed a razor blade, so I’d really just like those pills, please.”
Fuck being polite, she stopped doing that when she stared at him like he’s a mass murderer. He’ll probably regret the attitude later, but everything hurts right now and the weird looks aren’t helping.
“Sir, are you safe at your home?”
What.
“I- what?”
“I’m sorry, but that doesn’t look like something normal, like, I dunno, a hickey. I just thought-“
“What? What do I look like?”
What the fuck is going one? So it is something about his looks. A hickey? Why the fuck would he have a hickey?
“Are you… not aware of what your neck looks like right now?”
What his neck-?
He pulls out his phone and clicks on selfie mode.
And it dawns on him. Why they all stared like that. Why she’s talking about a hospital and unsafe homes. Why his throat is so fucked.
His neck is… it’s wrong. It’s blue and red and purple and yellow and there are crescent shaped marks in his skin and everything is so obviously handprint shaped it’s sickening.
In many ways. Because one does not randomly get choking marks. And the only… the only instance he remembers…
But that was a dream. That had to be a dream. He wouldn’t. He just wouldn’t.
He still flinches at the loud “Matt! What’s taking you so long?”.
When he makes eye contact with the pharmacist there’s a horrible sort of realisation on her face, quickly replaced with determination.
“Hey, my shift is done in half an hour. What do you say we get coffee then, catch up a bit, you know?”
What? Catch up? Why is she suddenly acting like they know each other? And why is she talking this loud? God, what is going on?
“I-“
“Wait, Matt, do you know her? How? When? Why did you never introduce us?”
Oh fuck, he can’t let them see this. He can’t. Especially not Chris. Definitely not Chris. He’s never been so grateful for bad weather and hoods. Regardless of how this came to be, he can’t even look at Chris right now, because he might die. He might run and hide and never see them again.
The fucking memory of his smile is enough to make the decision for him.
“Can I wait in the back?”
Her hands are shaking when she opens the door for him.
“I’ll see you guys later, just finish this for me.”
“Matt, what the fuck? You can’t just-“
“The lights are hurting my eyes and she promised me Advil. You finish, I’ll talk to you later.”
It won’t hold them off for long, but maybe long enough for Matt to get his shit together and come up with a reasonable explanation for… all this.
The break room is thankfully darker and they even have a couch.
He turns around and almost walks backwards out of the at the look of absolute pity and simultaneous panic on her face.
“I- I presume he did that?”
Fuck. Fuck, no, he couldn’t have, they’re brothers for fuck’s sake, Chris would never do that, he couldn’t. He wouldn’t.
But how else? What other explanation is there?
No, it has to be a dream, there’s definitely something else, maybe he fell in his sleep. Maybe there’s a new kind of mosquito, maybe he did it himself in his sleep.
That must have been it, he strangled himself with his own shirt collar and just dreamt of Chris.
But she takes his silence as a yes.
“What’s your name? And his? I’m Madeline, by the way.”
She starts flitting around the room, collecting paper and pens and a phone and setting it all down on the coffee table. She also drops bottles of water and Advil in front of the couch and gestures for him to take it.
He does. Or at least tries to, because he chokes on the pill in a way he’s never done. He’s always been able to take pills without difficulty, but suddenly his throat closes up and the water splatters all over the couch, his lap and the table.
“I-, sorry”, he coughs, setting down the bottle and reaching for a box of tissues on the table.
“No, it’s fine, it’s normal. Now, have you ever told anyone before?”
Told anyone what? That his broth- no, that his shirt collar almost killed him last night? That the fingernail shaped marks are definitely from his own unconscious tries to get the collar off and not from Chris’ crooked nails?
“I just-, I’m guessing this isn’t a one time thing, you know. The manuals say choking is something abusers graduate to, not something they start with. God, they did not prepare me for this, why isn’t Aidan on shift right now, I’m only 26, I can’t do this.”
He tunes her anxious rambles out.
Abusers.
She’s thinking someone’s abusing him. No, she’s thinking Chris is abusing him. Chris.
Chris, one of the sweetest humans on earth, who is so free with his love and affection, so sure of himself, so supportive and kind and happy.
But he was smiling. He was smiling when he choked Matt. When he choked Matt in his dream. It was a dream, Matt, get out of your head.
“Um, sir? Are you with me? Please don’t have a panic attack, I’m not-. Fuck, please.”
“I’m fine, everything’s fine, don’t worry, this isn’t… he didn’t do this, he loves me, he would never do this. It’s my fault, he’s- he’s fine.”
Her face hardens in determination. “Things like this are never your fault. He hurt you, ok? And not because of something you did, but because he is a bad person. You don’t deserve this. You have to understand that.”
Chris, a bad person? No, Chris is the best, why is she still thinking of him like that? Matt just said everything’s fine, is she stupid?
“No, no, you don’t understand. He did nothing wrong, okay. I don’t know how this happened, but he-. He wouldn’t.”
But the determination doesn’t leave her face and she starts something scribbling on the paper with shaky hands and the typical handwriting of someone in the medical field, so Matt wouldn’t be able to read it if he tried to.
“Okay, anyways, what’s your name? We have to know each other at least a little bit to make this believable.”
“I’m Matt”, he replies reflexively. And then she jots it down in block letters and he starts overthinking that decision. She’s made her dislike for Chris pretty clear and if she thinks of him as an abuser, what is she going to do with that information?
Fuck, he has to clear this up.
“He’s my brother. I really don’t know how this happened, I was asleep, and I guess he was in my dream? I just don’t want them to see this, ok?”
Her sceptic eyes are hung up on his neck again.
“So someone choked you in your sleep and you were coincidentally dreaming of him during that and that person just… let go before you could suffocate?”
“No, no, not someone, maybe it was, like, my shirt or something? It just, it couldn’t have been Chris, ok? He’s too… he’s good.”
And then Chris’ name is added in block letters too and Matt wants to hit himself.
“Matt, I’m sorry. I get that he’s your brother, that you want to believe he’s a good person, that you want to protect him, but this is about your life now. That right there could have killed you-“
“I know! I know, ok, I was there. But he wasn’t-, he wasn’t right. Like, in the head? He looked… weird.” Wait, no, no no nononono. “He didn’t do it, though. He couldn’t, he was in his own room. He… “
Fuck. He’s not usually one for denial. More of an overthinker who goes over shit again and again and again, instead of repressing it.
The harsh reality of it is that Chris’ nails left crescent marks in Matt’s neck and his fingers painted it all the fucking colours of a fucked up rainbow.
What Matt can’t figure out is why? Why would he? He’d looked wrong, he’d been smiling, he hadn’t said a single word. And Matt can’t figure out what the fuck all of that means.
Matt hates things he can’t figure out, hates the unknown, hates things he can’t prepare for.
And never, not once in his life, had his brother been one of these things.
But Chris had also never tried to kill him before.
This is so fucked up.
Chris tried to kill him.
“He-. He tried to kill me.” He swallows. “Why?”
He glances at Madeline and finds her already looking at him. Not his neck, for once, but his eyes. And hers are drowning in sympathy.
“I can’t tell you that, Matt. I don’t know what your usual relationship is like. But you can get out. I can give you the number of an agency that helps people get away from situations like yours.”
She looks like she wants to say more, but Matt’s phone starts ringing in his pocket.
It’s Nick.
“Yeah?”
“God, tell your friend to give you something for your throat, you sound like a chain smoker. We’re done, come out and fucking explain yourself.”
Oh fuck. Explain. How can he explain this? He can’t explain this, he can’t face them like this, he can’t do this.
“Did you, um, did you pay and shit?”
“Yes, Chris is waiting outside with the cart because you have the car keys, motherfucker. Now move your ass.”
Chris is outside. Ok. Ok, Chris is outside, he can do this, just explain it to Nick and he’ll… he’ll do something. Anything.
“Just give me a sec.”
He hangs up.
Why? Why him? Why this?
The thing is, he’s not scared of Chris. Not in a physical way? He knows he can take him, can defend himself when he’s awake. But.
The mental side? The way he literally cannot explain why Chris would do this? The way his brother and the action of killing him are just so bizarrely far apart on the scale? The way there’s no feasible reason for what happened last night? That scares him shitless.
Because it rearranges everything. Hate like that doesn’t come from nowhere. Matt has to have done something for Chris to hate him like that. Or something is seriously wrong with Chris. How did he hide that for so long? He has to be a fucking amazing actor to fool Matt and Nick like that.
But merging that and the little brother outside with the large grin and the sparkling eyes?
He can’t.
“My brothers are waiting for me. I have to go.”
She frowns and gets up, pressing the water bottle and the Advil into his hands.
“Can you at least take the number of the agency with you?”
His eyes flicker over to the paper and he makes a decision.
“Only if you don’t, like, report this or some shit.”
Her jaw tightens, but she nods and slips a piece of paper with the number into his hand.
“I have to get back on shift. Please be safe.”
“I-. Yeah, okay. Thanks.”
He pulls his hood deep into his face and slips out of the back room.
“Fucking finally. I swear, the tiles here are gonna have imprints of my fucking soles at this point, good god.”
“Shut up, Nick.”
“See you soon, Matt.”
“Yeah. Bye, Madeline.”
Nick smiles at her and waves and then starts pulling Matt towards the exit.
“Ok, what the fuck was that? Who is she?”
“She’s a friend. Madeline.”
“Um, yes, I could tell that much. I’m not stupid. How do you know her?”
“We, um, we talked when I was here shopping sometimes and she was… nice.”
Nick levels him with an incredulous look. “She looks thirty. And you are literally afraid of people, why would yo-. What is that.”
Oh fuck.
Nick has finally noticed the bruises.
They’re literally ten feet away from the door, from freedom, from enough darkness to cover Matt, and now the fucking lights have blown it. Ten feet away from a chance of pretending this never happened.
But now Nick is pulling off the hood.
“Oh my god. Oh my god, what the fuck, Matt.”
He’s gone pale as fuck and his eyes are so wide Matt can see the red.
He raises a hand to poke at the bruises and swears at the way Matt hisses and bats his finger away.
He’s almost speechless. Almost.
“Matt, when did this happen? How did this happen? Who did this? Does it hurt? Oh my god, who the fuck did this?”
He’s holding onto Matt’s hoodie like it’ll answer if he just squeezes hard enough.
Matt kinda wishes it would. Just so he doesn’t have to do this, doesn’t have to somehow get Nick to believe it was Chris. Hell, he can’t even really believe it was Chris, and he was there for it.
“I’ll tell you at home. I really wanna take this Advil, but I think I have to crush the pill first.”
The pure rage on Nick’s face subsides just a little to make space for concern and worry.
Matt carefully loosens his brother‘s grip on the hoodie and walks out, pulling the hood back up. Nick follows and then passes him to lead him towards the car, like Matt can’t fucking remember where he parked the fucking car.
“Finally, my god, what took you so long?”
Chris. Oh god, Chris.
Matt’s steps falter without his permission and Nick turns around with an expression Matt can’t really interpret.
And then he jerks his head in Chris’ direction in a really unsubtle way before raising an eyebrow. Fuck, does he want him to tell Chris? Or, even worse, show him?
Matt shakes his head slowly with wide eyes, trying to communicate the empathetic ‘fuck no’ without alerting Chris. But they are triplets and have been reading each other for their whole lives, so Chris naturally notices their (kinda obvious) silent conversation.
“Umm, what’s going on?”
“Matt, are you for real right now.”
“Shut up. I want to go home, get packing.”
He opens the trunk and starts heaving grocery bags into it, intentionally ignoring the staring.
“Matt, show him.”
“Show me what? What happened while I was gone? Something with your ‘friend’? How do you even know her?”
Nick groans dramatically. And if Matt had been paying better attention, he’d have had a chance to dodge, but he doesn’t hear his brother’s steps and suddenly his hood is yanked from his head and Chris gasps.
“Matt, what the fuck. What is that? Is that real? Wait, did she do that? You didn’t have that this morning, right?”
What. What? Wha- how?
But Chris looks genuinely shocked, even more so by the full image when Matt turns towards him.
Did he- did he not do it? How does he not know? He has to remember. But he doesn’t. He’s not laughing. Not smiling.
What is going on? Is he going crazy? Was it really just a dream? But no, there are fucking fingernail marks, it couldn’t have been.
Is it? Are there?
He has to check, right fucking now.
He pulls out his phone and goes on selfie mode and there it is. And there are. Fingernail marks, in neat rows up the sides of his neck, only really visible if he turns his head. He can feel the grooves.
Someone has to have done this, a person, and it wasn’t Matt. And seemingly also not Chris?
“Matt, why the fuck aren’t you telling us who did this?”
Not right now. Not in the fucking parking lot, out in the open, in full sight of people who’d start staring.
“Can we just go home? I’ll tell you there, but people are staring, ok.”
Chris looks two seconds away from wrestling the answers out of him, but they get in the car, finally.
The drive is tense. Chris and Nick try to ask questions, but Matt can’t answer them. Mostly because he doesn’t know himself.
Not anymore.
First he’d not noticed, then he’d been sure it had to have been something innocuous and now that he’s finally come to terms with Chris being the only possible answer, all that is thrown out of the window again.
Because Chris is just as confused as Nick. As Matt, really.
How can he explain it now? It was already bad before, but now he doesn’t even have an answer at all.
As soon as they’re home he takes a few grocery bags and drops them on the kitchen table, ignoring his brothers’ expectant looks in favor of finally crushing an Advil and swallowing it with a sip of water.
“So? What happened?”
“I, um, woke up like this?”
“You- what?”
“I woke up like this. Didn’t notice it until Madeline asked me about it.”
“Dude, those are literal choking marks, how did you not notice them?”
“I thought I was sick, ok? Didn’t exactly expect you to try to suffocate me while I was sleeping.”
Wait. Fuck.
“Me? Matt, what the fuck? I would never do that.”
“I just-. I dunno. Yeah, I guess you wouldn’t.”
“You guess? Matt, we’re your brothers, what the fuck?”
“Sorry, ok? So you didn’t do it, but who else? You were the only other people in the house!”
“Matt, are you fucking with us? Just tell us who did it. Are those even real? Because if this is a prank, that’s really fucked up, man.”
A prank? A fucking prank?
Yeah, Matt fucking wishes it was a prank, because then he wouldn’t have very fucking vivid images of Chris smiling while choking him playing on repeat in his head.
“I don’t fucking know, ok?! They were just there and it fucking hurts and I have a headache, so shut up and either believe me or leave me alone.”
And that’s it with speaking for today. God, why does screaming have to hurt? Because he could do a hell of a lot more right now.
But his throat feels the way that rubber torso from that one TikTok Chris once showed them looked, so Matt just grabs his bottles and leaves them to unpack the grocery bags.
.
.
.
Matt has to admit, he’s just a little scared of going to sleep tonight. What if not-Chris is gonna come to finish the job? What if he wakes up and this was all just a really fucked up dream?
On second thought, that might be the best option. Because everything else is… no.
No, just sleep. It’ll be fine. You’re fine. Everything’s fine.
He manages a light doze. For hours, he’s on the edge of consciousness.
Now, he’s glad about that. Because this way he hears the loud banging of someone very obviously falling down the stairs.
In seconds, he’s out of the bed and in the hallway, turning on the light to find Chris’ body crumpled at the bottom of his stairs.
“Chris?! Chris!”
He takes the stairs as fast as he can, cursing his ankle, before dropping down next to his brother and turning him on his back.
His eyes are fluttering.
“Chris? Are you ok?”
“Ma’? Wha’?”
Oh thank god.
He cursorily cards through Chris’ hair and sighs in relief when he doesn’t find any blood.
“Chris, what happened? Why are you up, it’s like, 4am.”
The other tries to sit up and immediately winces.
“Aw, fuck, that hurts.”
“No shit, man. Want Advil?”
“Yeah. Um, how did I get here?”
Oh fuck.
“Do you have a concussion? Should we go to the hospital?”
“I… don’t think so? But-. I dunno, the last thing I remember is going to sleep and dreaming about the fucking Eiffel Tower.”
“Dude, not remembering what happened before a concussion is a symptom. You-“
“Yeah, but, like, my head doesn’t hurt and- I dunno.”
So Matt drags Chris up the stairs, deposits him on the couch with his Advil and wakes Nick. Who is first very pissed and then very worried when presented with the second brother hurt in the span of two days.
He also agrees with Matt about the concussion.
“You fell down the fucking stairs, you’re going to the hospital. You said everything hurts, maybe you have a broken bone or something.”
He tilts his head pointedly in Matt’s direction. “Maybe they can tell us what’s up with his neck, too.”
“If you want to stay the uninjured triplet, you better shut the fuck up.”
.
.
.
So Matt drives them to the hospital at five in the morning. It’s great.
It starts with entering the room and every person inside immediately zeroing in on his neck. He’s used to double takes, but usually only because of being triplets, not because he’s wearing a telltale sign of a violent near death experience.
The only reason he’s holding it together right now is Chris’ pained expression limping through the door next to him. Otherwise he’d be turning on his heel and sprinting back to the car right now. Anything to get away from the stares and the resulting assumptions.
He stalls. Lets his brothers pass him on the way to the reception. Tries to avoid eye contact with anyone and buries his chin in the collar of his hoodie.
“Excuse me, ma’am, my brother fell down the stairs this morning and we don’t know if he has a concussion or a broken bone or anything, but he says just about everything hurts.”
Nick handles it. Lets Matt hide behind him and gets the attention on Chris. Naturally, they follow him everywhere.
Turns out, Chris does not have a concussion, but his left wrist is sprained and he’ll need a brace for a few weeks.
And then the doctor turns to Matt.
“What about you, Sir?”
And Matt, like the idiot he is, asks: “What about me?”
“I’d like to take a look at your throat, make sure nothing’s too damaged. What happened?”
Oh fuck. Yeah, how does he explain this?
“Um, I think it’s fine, happened yesterday. I… don’t actually know how.”
“You don’t know? Sir, if something happened, we can help. This looks like attempted murder, we-“
“I know. But I don’t know. I was asleep.”
“Matt, come on.”
“Nick, I don’t know, ok? If it wasn’t one of you, then I don’t know because no one else was in the fucking house.”
“Matt, what is with you? Why would we do that? Why are you so sure it was one of us?”
“Because no one else was in the house, what’s so hard to understand about that! This didn’t just fucking appear, someone had to actually try to kill me!”
Matt immediately regrets those words. That word. “Kill”. Until now, they don’t seem to have realised. Until now, those were just bruises. Until now, they weren’t a reminder that Matt almost died. Was almost murdered.
Now? Now they paint a terrifying picture. A picture of a stranger entering their house at night and suffocating Matt in his sleep.
He can see the realisation dawn on their faces, all wide eyes and clenched jaws.
“Matt…”
“Are you saying you don’t know who did it?” The doctor has that incredulous kinda look, the one that says ‘yeah sure’ and ‘damn’ at the same time. Real helpful.
“I don’t know, I’m pretty sure I woke up during, but it-. Chris was there, but that could’ve been a dream and I fucking felt it, I fucking did, it hurt and I remember that, that wasn’t a dream, but I- just-, it couldn’t have been Chris and I don’t have any other idea.”
It’s all too much, too many people, too many questions, too many possibilities and at the same time not enough because the more he thinks about it the more sure he is about Chris and he couldn’t, he wouldn’t, that’s only on his mind because of Madeline, she was all convinced, but-. No. No, it wasn’t Chris.
But Chris is fidgeting in the corner.
“Did you say I was there in the dream?”
“Yeah, so?”
“No, I’m just pretty sure I dreamed about you that night too. It was all crazy, we were in a jungle and there was this dude who was trying to hurt you so I was pulling him away and tried to get you to move but you were, like, asleep or dead, I don’t know, and then this guy kicked me and pulled me away. I don’t remember the rest, I think there were stairs?”
“Didn’t you have sleep paralysis again? You said something like that, what-“
“No, no, I just thought so because I woke up in a weird position.”
So Matt’s not really sure what all that has to do with the bruises, but it’s taking attention off of his obviously unwelcome suspicions, so he won’t complain.
Suddenly the doctor’s assistant speaks up from the computer.
“Wait, you have a history of sleep paralysis?”
“Uh, yes? Sometimes? Why?”
“Have you ever sleepwalked?”
And Chris pales.
“Are you saying-“
“I’m saying sleep paralysis and sleepwalking are both parasomnias and if your sleeping pattern recently got disturbed and you’re under stress, you could very well be sleep walking. It would explain your brother’s injuries and yours.”
Oh.
“But it wasn’t on purpose. He didn’t know, right? He wasn’t conscious, so it couldn’t have been- he wouldn’t-“
“Matt, no, what-. No. I wouldn’t.”
He wouldn’t. Not on purpose. Not willingly.
“How do we stop him from sleep walking?”
Nick’s right. Of course he is. That should be the priority, not Matt’s trust issues.
But the assistant has concern written all over her face.
“There isn’t really any pill or anything. It’s mostly about reducing stress factors and adhering to a good sleep schedule. If you can’t, you could take melatonin, but only then. It’s not good for your body, but I can imagine that you’d rather take some gummies than potentially hurt your brothers.”
Chris stiffens at the words, nodding.
“Wait, are we sure? That it’s sleepwalking? I don’t-“
“Yes, Nick. He was smiling. I hoped it was a dream, but it’s too clear.”
Chris… Chris looks so fucking guilty, so heartbroken, so fucking sorry, Matt can’t- he can’t do this anymore.
He’s out of the room in two seconds and out of the building in ten, beelining for the car.
It was Chris. It was Chris, but it wasn’t.
He was unconscious, dreaming about saving Matt. It’s so ironic.
It’s so ironic that it’s sad.
He sits there in the car until Nick and Chris come out. He sits there until Nick bodily drags him out of the seat, pushes him and Chris into the backseat and closes the door with a hissed “talk!”.
Chris shakily grabs his wrist.
“Matt, I am so sorry. I didn’t mean to, I wasn’t awake, I would- I would never, ok? You have to know that, you know me, I would never try to- to kill you. I love you, you’re my fucking brother, I-“
“No, I know that, Chris. You’re fine, everything’s fine, I know you wouldn’t. And I love you too. It’s not your fault, I’m not blaming you. Just-“
God, this is gonna hurt. But he can’t.
“Don’t sleep in my bed for the next week? I’m not blaming you, I just don’t know if I can wake up with you there and not, like, freak out. I love you, but I need some time to, like, process, I guess? That you didn’t mean to and shit, you know?”
“I-, yeah, ok. But I wouldn’t. Ok?”
“Yeah, ok.”
But he looks so unsure. Like he doesn’t know where the line is anymore. And that’s scary. They’ve always known where the line is, what boundaries can’t be crossed, what they can do to each other and get over.
Attempted murder was never even on the playing field.
But it is now. And Chris is at square zero, no, at square negative. He looks awkward, like he’s with a stranger.
But Matt isn’t a stranger. Matt’s his brother. Even if Chris doesn’t seem so sure right now.
He slings his arms around his shoulders.
“If you go all weird on me, I’m gonna rock your shit, bitch. We’re fine, stop acting like I have Corona or some shit.”
“Fuck you too.”
But Matt can hear the grin in his voice.
They’re fine.