The Freshmen - 60. Chapter 60

November 12, 2004

New York, NY

Jeremy

I sat in the hospital room watching Travis sleep. I could not have been more bored. I’d promised Will that I would stay here with him, but I’d forgotten to bring anything to do and I’d even neglected to bring my iPod, so now I sat here, staring at the walls in silence. I was tempted to take a break and walk around for a bit, then I contemplated what would happen if one of my relatives breezed in and found him alone. I was already on thin ice with most of them. I sighed and looked at my watch, noticing that it was eleven in the morning. Lunch would arrive in an hour, and I’d asked them to bring something for me too. That would most likely end up being a stupid decision, as it removed an excellent excuse for me to get the fuck out of here.

“Will?” asked Travis, as his eyes blinked open.

I moved closer and held his hand. “No, it’s Jeremy,” I said. He smiled, which made me smile back. It was nice to be liked. “Will flew back up to Harvard to take a test.”

“Is he coming back?” Travis asked nervously. It was really sweet the way Will being here had so obviously brightened Travis’s world. He’d lain there, holding Will’s hand, gazing up at him as if Will being there was the only thing that mattered to him.

“He’s taking his test now,” I said. “As soon as it’s over, he’s flying back down here. I’m sure he’ll be here for the weekend.”

“That’s good,” Travis said, smiling. “Thank you.”

“For what?” I asked, because people usually didn’t appreciate the things I did for them.

“You know,” Travis said. He was on some pretty strong pain medicine, so he drifted back off to sleep. I was fine with that, but not a little annoyed that he hadn’t answered my question.

A nurse wheeled in another bed and put it next to him. She made a bunch of noise and bumped into him, waking him up. I saw him grimace in pain as his bed was jarred. “Be careful,” I barked, then felt bad.

“I’m sorry, sir,” the nurse said.

“No, I shouldn’t have snapped at you,” I said, wondering at how I managed to apologize without losing my mind. The smile I got back from her made me feel better and started a mental cavalcade in my mind about this whole thing where I hated admitting that I was wrong.

“What’s going on?” Travis asked drowsily.

“I asked them to put another bed in here so Will could stay with you,” I explained. “That way he can sleep or work on his homework, or whatever, and be close to you.” Will usually worked at his desk, and the table would suffice for that, but he also liked to kick back in his bed, especially when he was reading.

“That is what I thanked you for,” Travis said, and squeezed my hand. “You have been awesome, making sure things are taken care of for me.”

“I’m glad to do it,” I said. “You should practice looking like you’re sleeping even when you’re not.” I said that last sentence in a playful way.

“Why?” he asked.

“Because my father and Jake will be here soon,” I said. “I’m not sure if anyone else is planning to show up.”

“That may be a little overwhelming,” he said with dread.

“I’ll do my best to calm them down, but in a couple of hours Will should be back, and he can take over,” I said with a smile. “He’s better at crowd control.”

Travis laughed at that, then cringed in pain when he did. “Thanks, Jeremy. You don’t have to be here all the time.”

“I’m on guard duty while Will is gone,” I said, even though there was a guard posted outside his room. Jake had arranged for one to be there 24/7. I squeezed his hand and he smiled at me, then drifted back off to sleep. I scoured the room for something to read, but the only thing I came up with was a Jewish religious thing which must be their version of a bible, and an actual bible with “Gideons” imprinted on it. I decided I would rather have my eyes clawed out than dive into some ancient religious text. Lunch arrived and I ate the fruit plate they brought me and helped Travis eat from the tray they left for him. Nursing duty was definitely not for me, but for Travis, I would do it. As I shoveled food into his mouth, I could not help but think about what a nice guy he was. All this shit kept happening to him, and he didn’t deserve it. He was working hard to make it as an actor, only to find one obstacle after another thrown in his face.

“Mr. Schluter,” a nurse said, pulling me away from Travis’s feeding frenzy. “We have to take care of a few things for Mr. Buck. I’d appreciate it if you’d step outside for a few minutes.”

“Of course,” I said to her, then focused on Travis. “I’m going to go search for something to read other than a bible.”

He chuckled, then cringed. “That’s totally fine. Like I said, you don’t have to be here all the time.”

“I’ll be back shortly,” I said. I left the room and went down to the gift shop to buy some magazines and newspapers, then went back up to Travis’s room. I started browsing through the issue of Mode I’d bought, then slowly drifted off to sleep.

“Mr. Buck is in this room,” I heard a nurse say. That prompted me to open my eyes and sit up straight.

“Thanks,” my father said as he breezed into the room. He was followed by Jake, of course. It was like those two were always together, or at least it seemed that way to me. He came in like a large burst of wind, but I stood up and put my finger over my lips to tell him to shut the fuck up.

I walked over to them. “He’s sleeping.”

“I just want him to know that I’m here,” Jake said, and hurried over to Travis’s bed, annoyingly taking my chair.

“It’s good to see you,” my father said, shocking the shit out of me, because I didn’t think he’d ever be happy I was around. He was probably just saying that to be polite. He gave me a hug, but even that seemed a bit perfunctory.

“I’m glad you’re here,” I said. He went over and sat on the bed that was for Will, and having awakened Travis, they began pelting the poor guy with questions. I could see how uncomfortable he was, but I didn’t really see how I could stop them. Then a plan germinated in my mind.

“I’ll be right back,” I said, which wasn’t acknowledged by anyone, then headed out to find his nurse.

“Did you need something?” she asked.

“I think Travis is a bit overwhelmed by his new visitors,” I said. “Can you go in and give him a break, maybe tell him that you need to do something to him?”

She smiled. “I can do that.” She headed into his room, and I was smirking when Dad and Jake came out looking annoyed.

“The nurse needed to clean him up after lunch,” my father grumbled.

“That happens from time to time,” I said with a soft smile. We just stood there in the hallway, the tension thick because of their annoyance, their anguish over Travis, and their residual anger at me. I wished fervently that Will would show up and take over this whole shit show.

 

November 12, 2004

In the air over New York

Will

I was getting pretty used to these jet copters and had to admit they were pretty fucking cool. I’d finished up my test and, miraculously enough, I thought I’d done pretty well on it. I hadn’t taken the time to do more than breeze in, take it, then hurry to this aircraft to get back to see Travis.

I owed Marie a phone call, so I opted to do that in the air. The phone service in this thing was a bit spotty, but not as horrible as it could be. “Hey,” she said as she answered. “Where are you?”

“In the helicopter heading back to New York,” I said in a clipped way, as if by talking in quick short bursts that would somehow get me back there sooner.

“How’s Travis?” she asked.

“He was doing okay, but we’re supposed to get some more test results back this afternoon,” I said. “I’m trying to make it back before the doctors get there to talk about it.”

“Is he alright?” she asked with concern.

“So far it seems like he got pretty lucky,” I said. “He has a few bruised ribs, and that’s going to be painful for a while, and he has a hairline fracture in his left wrist, but other than that his body seems okay.”

“What are they testing for?” she asked.

“They want to make sure there are no internal injuries,” I said. “He got a really big gash in his abdomen, and they’re worried that may have caused some problems for him.”

“He’s due for a break,” she said. “Let’s hope he gets one.”

“No shit,” I agreed. “I’ll be here all weekend.”

“I expected that you would,” she said. “Keep me posted, okay?”

“Will do,” I said, then hesitated.

“What?” she asked.

“Remember how when we talked about Jeremy, and you asked me what he had to do for me to totally forgive him?” I asked her.

“I do,” she said. “You told me you weren’t sure, but you’d know it when it happened.”

“I think it happened,” I said.

“Okay, explain that,” she insisted.

“He really put himself out there after Travis’s accident,” I said. “He called me right away but I was in class so I didn’t get back to him for a bit. In the meantime, he’d set up a car to get me and had a jet copter on standby to take me to New York. He’d cleared it with the hospital so I could land on their helipad and get to Travis that much sooner. And he’d stuck with Travis, been there for him until I got there. Then this morning, he got up early and came over to the hospital so he could be with Travis while I was gone.”

“He did all of that?” she asked, shocked. “On his own, without an assistant?”

“He did,” I said. “He told me that he knew the most important thing to both Travis and me was that I was there with him.”

“So when this big crisis hit, he really put himself out there, not only for Travis, but for you,” she concluded.

“He did,” I repeated. “I don’t think the Jeremy of a few months ago would have done that.”

“I don’t think he would either, but I don’t know him as well as you do,” she said.

“I need to talk to Darius,” I said, more of a stream of consciousness.

“He’s probably the best person to give you insights on this,” she confirmed. There was silence for a bit, then I ended the call. I wasn’t sure that I was in the right frame of mind to talk to Darius yet, so I opted to follow up on the date I’d missed by calling Thor.

“Travis okay?” he asked, his way of answering the phone.

“Seems like he’ll be fine,” I said. “How was your date?”

“It was really nice, but I wish you would have told me he was HIV-positive,” he said in a bitchy way.

“It wasn’t my place to divulge that info, and it would have been wrong of me to do it,” I said firmly, not backing down on that point at all. “How did you find out he had it?”

“The date went pretty well,” he said, and from his tone I could feel him smiling. “We had a blast, then went back to his room, and right before I fucked him, he told me that he was positive.”

“So how did you handle that?” I asked. I was worried that he’d fucked Finn’s mind up by rejecting him.

“I put on a condom and fucked his brains out,” he said matter-of-factly, cracking me up.

“Then why were you annoyed that I didn’t tell you he was positive?” I asked.

“It just would have been nice to know so I could have prepared myself for that,” he said.

“Was it good?” I asked.

“Dude, he was amazing,” Thor said, and sounded wistful. “I had such a good time with him, and he’s a fucking rock star in bed.”

“So are you going out with him again?” I asked.

“Meeting him in an hour, so I have to get off the fucking phone and go get ready,” he said.

“Talk to you later,” I said and ended our call. I was pretty relieved that he’d handled things that well. I’d been pretty paranoid that he’d be a total dick about it, but I guess that wasn’t fair. Thor was a nice guy, and he was smart enough to know the risks. With Finn’s viral load being so low, they were pretty minimal.

As New York City came into view, I took some time to think about the last twenty-four hours, and how Jeremy had reacted. The jet copter landed on the hospital helipad, and I knew the drill, so as soon as the rotors stopped spinning, I jumped out, grabbed my backpack, and hurried off the pad. The rotors were winding back up before I even got to the door. I was surprised to find Jeremy waiting for me. “I am so glad you are back,” he said.

“Me too,” I said, then shocked the shit out of both of us by giving him a big hug.

“Dad and Jake got here about half an hour ago, and they were hitting Travis with a bunch of questions,” he said as we hurried towards Travis’s room. “I got the nurse to kick them out for a bit, but after that they went back in. I think it’s a bit overwhelming.”

“I’ll handle that,” I said firmly.

“I know,” he said, and smiled at me. “That’s why I’m glad you’re back.”

We strode confidently into Travis’s room and froze at the door, pausing to watch Jake and my father sitting on either side of Travis, apparently forcing him to have a conversation with them. “What’s with the other bed?” I asked Jeremy softly.

“I had them put that in here so you could stay with him and still get some sleep,” he said. That totally blew my mind. I had never imagined that Jeremy would do something so thoughtful for me.

“Thank you,” I said.

“No problem,” he said, blowing it off.

“No,” I said to him meaningfully. “I really appreciate all you’ve done.” He smiled back at me, and that was our cue to walk in.

“Hey,” my father said, and stood up to give me a big hug.

“It’s good to see you,” I said, then exchanged similarly warm greetings with Jake.

“The doctor is supposed to be here any minute to brief us on Travis’s condition,” Jake said.

“Good,” I said a little brusquely, and walked over to focus on the man I loved. “I’m back.”

“I missed you,” he said. I bent down and gave him a nice kiss, then giggled when his sheet started to tent up.

“Good to know that wasn’t hurt,” I teased. We looked at each other, connecting with just our eyes, and it was like there was no one else in the room.

“I don’t want you to think you have to be here with me all the time,” he said. This had obviously been on his mind a lot.

“I’ll be here with you as much as I want, and as much as you’re willing to tolerate me,” I said.

“Then it should be interesting to see just how much that actually is,” he replied playfully. I loved conversations like this, where we were both in the mood to just enjoy each other, but that was interrupted by the doctor, who came in with a nurse trailing after him.

“Good afternoon, I’m Dr. Simon, Travis’s physician,” he said. We all introduced ourselves to him. He then ignored us and spent a few minutes talking to Travis. When that was done, he turned so he was pretty much facing all of us.

“How is he?” Jake asked.

“Travis got lucky because his injuries were mostly on the surface,” the doctor said. “The reasons for that are because of the angle of impact with the motorbike, and because he is very fit and quite muscular.”

“You’re such a stud,” I said to Travis, getting a chuckle from him and frowns from the rest of them, which I ignored.

“He has a hairline fracture in his left wrist, and two of his ribs were bruised,” he continued. “Those will be painful and inconvenient injuries, but they should heal without too much problem. He also got some abrasions and will end up with bruises, some of them pretty large. Travis is lucky to have avoided head and neck injuries, which are common in accidents like this, and it is even more surprising that he seems to have dodged any soft tissue injuries as well.”

“Soft tissue?” I asked.

“Those would manifest themselves with strains in his back, shoulders, or neck,” he said. “We’ve finished testing for any internal bruising or injuries and have found nothing to worry about.”

“That’s very good news,” I said to Travis.

“When can I get out of here?” he asked.

“If things go well, on Sunday,” he said.

“It will be good to have you back home,” Jeremy said. “I’ll make sure we have everything set up for you.”

“Thank you,” Travis said to him meaningfully.

“In the meantime, he will need to rest, so visits should be limited,” the doctor said sternly, eyeballing us.

“All of us will adhere to your wishes except for my son, Will, who will be with Travis as much as he can,” my father said. He had warped into his power mode, and that had an impact.

The doctor looked at me skeptically. “I’ll rely on you to make sure that Travis gets enough rest and quiet healing time.”

“I can handle that,” I said. He didn’t look happy about that but caved to the inevitable.

“Excellent,” he said, then shook hands with us and finally left the room. I was surprised when my father walked out with him, then smiled when I heard his deep voice as he talked to the physician.

“That’s great news for you,” I said to Travis.

“Will you be here all weekend?” he asked me hopefully.

“I will,” I said, and held his hand.

“Thanks,” he said sincerely, so sincerely it was sappy.

My father strode back into the room, closing the door behind him. I looked at him and raised an eyebrow to question him, but he ignored me and moved us on to the next topic. “Jake, can you explain what happened to Travis’s stalker?”

“Chucky,” I said with a grimace, and felt my anger surging.

“Chucky, as you call him, died from his wounds this morning,” Jake said. It was not surprising that none of us were bothered by that at all. “His real name is Marko Vuković.”

“Where is he from?” I asked, trying to figure out his nationality.

“He is from Serbia and is linked to a Serbian crime family here in New York,” Jake said.

“Why would Serbian mobsters be after me?” Travis asked, a question that we all probably had.

“I don’t know yet, but I’m going to try and find out,” Jake promised. “My instincts tell me that someone hired them, not that the Serbian mafia has it in for Travis.”

“That is very good news,” I said. “What will be really interesting to know is who hired him.”

“That’s the big mystery I’m working on,” Jake said.

“Thanks for doing that,” Travis said. “I wonder if now that Chucky is gone, I can relax a bit.”

“Let’s give this some time to evolve, okay?” Jake said. He saw Travis get deflated, thinking that he was going to have to be on his guard forever. “I think we can work it out so you’re fine, but it’s going to take a little time.”

“How can you work it out?” I challenged. I wasn’t as willing to look blithely in the other direction when they started scheming. It was hilarious that Jake gave my father a frustrated look, and even funnier to see Travis and Jeremy try not to laugh.

“The best way is for us to contact the Serbian mafia to confirm that Travis is no longer a target,” Jake said in a smarmy way.

“Does that mean you just have to look up their phone number and call them?” I asked, being just as sarcastic.

“It means that we may have to tap into some of the people we dealt with last year and ask them to act as intermediaries,” Dad said firmly. He was referring to connections he and Jake had with the Mexican cartels.

“Makes sense,” I said. They looked annoyed, but I knew my father well enough to know that it was important to pin him down when shit like this came up.

“While you’re here, I’ve set up a guard outside your door,” Jake said, something we already knew but Travis did not. He saw Travis frown. “You probably won’t even know he’s there.”

“I can live with that,” Travis grumbled.

“I can take you back to my condo and let you get settled in whenever you’re ready,” Jeremy said. I was so grateful that he was all but shepherding them out of here.

“I don’t want to impose on you,” Dad said nervously.

“It really isn’t a problem,” Jeremy said. “Besides, that gives me a chance to bring Will a change of clothes.”

I just stared at him, stunned that he’d worry about me like that. “Thanks, Jeremy,” I said. “If I reek, Travis may kick me out of his room.”

“I like the way you smell,” Travis said in a sensual way.

“We’ll be back in a few hours,” Jake said.

“That sounds great,” Travis lied. They shuffled out the door and shut it behind them, and finally we were alone. “I’m sorry this happened, and that you have to make all these fucking trips to be with me.”

“I don’t have to make these trips; I want to make these trips,” I said. I leaned in to kiss him, a kiss that got passionate very fast. I pulled away from him and giggled at his erection that was making the sheet tent up like it was a pyramid. “Just a minute.”

“What are you doing?” he asked. I walked over to the door and locked it, then went back over to him and pulled the sheet down. I kissed him again, then kissed my way down his chest, around the bandage on his abdomen, then inhaled his cock. “Fuck that’s good.” We didn’t have much time, so I worked fast, and in what was less than a couple of minutes I felt my mouth fill up with his load.

“Yum,” I said, as I swallowed. I got up and unlocked the door, came back over and covered him up, then lay in my bed but scooted over so I was next to him on my side and looking at him.

“That was really good,” he said, cracking me up. “What about you?”

“I’m fine,” I said, even though I was so horny that just rubbing my erection against the wall would probably set off my fuse. “That’s probably the only reason you’re glad I’m here.”

He acted like he was thinking that over. “You’re probably right.” We chuckled about that, then he got more serious. “If this gets rid of the threat of having that asshole popping in and out of my life, it was probably worth it.”

“Bruised ribs are fucking painful, but I can see your point,” I said.

“Will you help me out with something?” he asked.

“Sure.”

“Can you grab my phone and call the director of Sunset Valley?”

“I can do that,” I said. I got his phone, he told me the dude’s name, so I hit “call” and handed him the phone. “I’ll give you some space.”

He nodded and I left his room, then called Darius. “S’up?” he asked in his curt way.

“Did you hear that Travis is in the hospital?” I asked.

“What the fuck?” he asked. I smiled thinking that those words showed that I had his full attention. I told him about the accident and Travis’s injuries. “Well thanks for the update.” He said that as a prelude to ending our call.

“I need to talk to you about Jeremy,” I said.

“What did he do now?” he asked with dread.

“He really put himself out there to help Travis and me through this,” I said.

“Seriously?” he asked.

“Seriously,” I responded, then repeated the same things I’d said to Marie a few hours ago. “He even had the hospital wheel an extra bed into the room so I could be with Travis, then when he left, he told me he was going to bring some clothes over for me to change into.”

“Wow,” Darius said.

“I was talking to Marie a while ago and I told her that I didn’t know what it would take for me to forgive him, for me to think that his nice guy attitude wasn’t just some game,” I said.

“And you think the way he’s handling this shows that he’s changed?” Darius asked skeptically.

“I don’t really think he’s changed, but I think he gets that he has to treat me, and everyone else, a lot better,” I said. “I’m thinking that with this, and with the shit he did before like coming up to Harvard, that it’s time to move on and put this behind me.”

“So you’re calling me to see what I think about this?” he asked.

“Duh,” I said. “I told Marie this morning that I needed someone who knows him really well to give me advice. That’s where you come in.”

“Part of me isn’t sure if he won’t turn into a bitch again, but I think that this has been a big enough pain in the ass to put a brake on his attitude,” Darius said. “I think you’ll do better to forgive him and move on and see how he acts when the pressure is off, than by keeping this feud going.”

“It wasn’t a feud,” I said in a very bitchy way.

“Whatever,” he said. “You know what I mean.”

“I get it,” I said. “I’ll do it.”

“Hey, Will,” he said to make sure he had my attention. “It’s pretty dope that you’ve shared this shit with me as you’ve dealt with him, and it’s even more awesome that you actually listened to me.”

“I always listen to you, even when you’re being a dick,” I teased.

“Good job,” he said, then ended the call. I went back into the room just as Travis was finishing up his conversation. I smiled because he was smiling.

“I figured that the director would be all pissed off at me for being hurt,” Travis said.

“He wasn’t?” I asked.

He shook his head. “He acted worried about me, but he was actually pretty excited. He says he’s going to rewrite my storyline so I’m in a car accident, and make it seem like Clyde was behind it.”

“Clyde is your uncle in the show, right? The dude whose wife you’re trying to fuck?”

“He’s the one,” Travis said. “He also told me that he was excited that I’d be around until March, although I don’t know what the fuck that’s all about.”

“My father bought Silver Star productions and met with the new CEO last week,” I explained. “He told that dude that Harry was fired and would never work there again.”

“Derek Greer put up with that?” Travis asked.

“Dude, he was dealing with my father,” I said, making us both laugh. “He said that it was important that the bullshit you put up with doesn’t exist at Silver Star, and Derek embraced it.”

“That’s pretty fucking cool,” he said, absolutely beaming at yet more good news. “So what does that have to do with me being in Sunset Valley until March?”

“They have to hire a new director for Palisades, and it will probably take until March to get things up and running with that person,” I explained. “Greer said that Sunset Valley would be happy as fuck, because you’re such a star.”

“Right,” he said skeptically.

“It’s true,” I confirmed. “Ask my father when he comes back later.”

“I’ll do that,” Travis said, then yawned.

“Dude, you need to get some rest, and I need to do some homework,” I said. So while he dozed off, I pulled out my books and my laptop and started plowing my way through my assignments. It was a happy scene of tranquility here in one of the fanciest hospitals in New York City.