Big Bang Fic, Part 1
A Finer Command of Language
Band(s): Panic at the Disco
Pairing(s): Jon/Ryan
Word Count: 32,021
Rating/Warnings: NC-17/none that I know of
Author Notes: Thank you to Luc, for alphaing and betaing the fic, particularly when it meant dealing with me being a child. Untappedbeauty, for her thorough, awesome grammar beta. Finally, Rossetti, for making sure the sign language in this was actually informed by reality, and really helping me to rework the story in more interesting ways around that.
There was very little research that went into this, Aphasia doesn't work precisely like this and the type of injuries Ryan occurs are probably unlikely to happen in concert.
Title comes from a Sam Rayburn quote: "No one has a finer command of language than the person who keeps his mouth shut."
Summary: I called this the bus accident!fic while I was writing it. Largely because the premise is that Panic gets in a bus accident. I'm clever like that.
The morning of the accident, Ryan looked at Brendon as he stumbled out of the bunks and said, "Your slippers are on the wrong feet." As last words, he would have chosen others.
Brendon was sitting at the table, checking his email. He glanced down under the table and said, "Huh," but made no move to fix the situation. Ryan reached up to open the cabinet with the oatmeal bars in it, and the world lurched. Ryan didn't even feel himself go anywhere. He just thought, "Ouch, shit," and "Brendon," because he couldn't see him. Later, he would console himself with the fact that that had been a totally noble thing to think in the midst of almost dying.
*
Pete was not supposed to be on the bus. Pete was supposed to be... Somewhere. Ryan remembered, they had talked recently, but he couldn't quite figure out where Pete had said he was going to be. A charity cruise? Maybe. Wherever it was, Pete was not supposed to be on Ryan's bus, saying, "Guys. Guys. I think he--"
Ryan tried to say, "Finish your sentences, Wentz," but his throat was completely dry and his head hurt at even the thought of forming the words. Mentally, Ryan frowned.
Spencer was above him then--above? What the hell?--looking scared out of his mind. He had a gigantic bruise on the side of his face, and his arm was in a sling. Ryan was going to put a fucking hit out on whoever had touched Spencer. What the hell was Pete thinking, allowing that shit?
Spencer asked, "Hey, Ry. Hey, can you hear me?"
Last Ryan checked, he wasn't deaf. Of course he could fucking hear Spencer. He tried saying that, but his lips would barely open. Spencer said, "Bren, can I have that water?"
Spencer reached over Ryan, who turned to look at Brendon. Brendon was looking pretty fucked up, too. He had a gash above one eye and he was on crutches. Ryan closed his eyes for a second and considered the whiteness of their surroundings, the fact that he was clearly lying down and that Pete, who was supposed to be in Aruba or something, was right there. Internally, Ryan sighed. He fucking hated hospitals. Then he opened his eyes and searched desperately for Jon, because he hadn't seen him yet. Jon was at the foot of his bed, and he looked a lot like Spencer, except without the sling. He was holding himself carefully, though, so Ryan was pretty sure his injuries just weren't as obvious. Pete, at least, looked totally fine.
Spencer said, "Hey, c'mon."
Ryan felt the bed move under him, and yeah, he had to be on some pretty serious shit, because all he could feel was the shift in pressure. He was afraid to look at himself. Spencer held the cup with the straw to Ryan's mouth with his good hand and said, "Drink, Ry."
Ryan took a small sip, remembering every time his dad had vomited water on him after binging. It went down all right, so he took another, and when that proved a success, another after that. It took him a while to get his fill, but Spencer just stood there, letting him take his time.
When Spencer set the cup down, Ryan tried to ask, "What happened?" but what came out was a garbled mess of syllables and sounds that not even Ryan understood. He tried again, but the words just wouldn't form. He tried a third time, and when all that happened was that he sounded--even to himself--like a dying creature of bovine origin, he panicked. He tried saying, "Spencer," because he'd been able to say the word "Spencer" from the time he was six, and that was reaching the outer limits of where Ryan's memory could venture.
The syllables broke into incorrect, slippery sounds that Ryan couldn't catch before they slid right off his tongue. He could hear himself keening in sheer, utter terror, but he couldn't stop, not even with Spencer saying, "Ryan, Ryan, it's all right, it's all right."
Brendon looked scared out of his fucking mind, so Ryan was pretty sure that was a complete lie. Spencer was always trying to protect him. Spencer pressed his good hand against Ryan's chest and said, "Ryan, stop. Stop."
Ryan made himself listen to Spencer. Spencer said, "Can you understand me? If you can, nod your head yes."
Ryan tried, and sure enough, that worked. Ryan took a breath. It was something. Spencer said, "All right, you need to listen."
Ryan nodded again to let Spencer know he was. Spencer said, "A car jumped the railing on the highway and hit us nearly dead on. Jon and I were in the bunks and Brendon was at the table, but you were standing in the middle of the bus, okay? None of us are really sure what happened, but you--" Spencer took a deep breath and Ryan could tell he was trying to just hold it together. Ryan wanted to tell Spencer he was sorry for standing up, but that was stupid, they stood up on the bus all the time, they had to. Spencer said, "You were in surgery for over twenty-four hours, Ry. There was internal bleeding and all kinds of shit. They warned us that there might be other problems, if you even woke up. Which you did, so I say fuck the other problems, okay? Fuck that."
Spencer's voice was considerably less full of bravado than his words. Ryan found his hand, made it go up to Spencer's, made it squeeze. At least that was working. At least he would probably be able to play his guitar. The thought loosened Ryan's chest up the tiniest bit.
He had a million questions, like if their driver was okay, and what they had done about the tour and how they were going to fix him, but listening for that long had taken more effort than Ryan could really quantify, and for the moment, he really needed to just sleep some more.
*
The second time he woke up, Jon was sitting by his bed. Jon grinned at him and said, "Hey. Morning."
Ryan wanted to ask if it was really morning, but the minute he opened his mouth, he knew nothing was going to come out but random noises, so he shut it and did his best to smile back at Jon. Jon stood carefully and asked, "You want some water?"
Ryan reached out--moving was a huge deal--and touched Jon's chest lightly. What's wrong? He willed Jon to understand. Jon said, "No water?"
Ryan shook his head. Jon frowned. He said, "Take a sip for me, and then if you still don't want it, you don't have to have anymore."
Ryan went along with that. He was extremely thirsty. Like before, he finished off the whole cup. Jon looked relieved, but all he said was, "Okay, clearly I didn't understand you before. Let's see if we can do better."
Ryan tried to think up another way to ask, but nothing came to mind. He shook his head, Don't worry about it. Jon seemed to get that he'd given up, if nothing else, because he said, "No, hey, just let me go through it again, okay?"
Ryan tried shrugging, but that hurt too much. Clearly they were weaning him off the painkillers. Jon seemed to get the point. "I asked if you wanted water."
Ryan lifted his hand a little, palm up. You stood up. Jon mimicked the action twice before he tilted his head and said, "Oh, wait. I got up. I got up to give you the water."
Ryan nodded, feeling like he'd just run a marathon or something equally daunting. Jon said, "Okay, so I got up, and you put your hand to my chest. To tell me to sit down?"
Ryan shook his head. Jon said, "No, okay. Um. Does your chest hurt?"
Ryan would scream in frustration if he trusted the sound to actually come out right. It might, but it might not, and Ryan didn't want to hear some sort of muted, choked pretense at a scream. Jon seemed to understand, and he ran a soothing hand through Ryan's hair. "Sorry I'm bad at this, Ry."
Ryan bit his lip. Sorry I'm fucking retarded.
Jon petted at him for a little bit longer before he said, "You put your hand to my chest. Jesus, I'm an idiot, you were asking what was wrong." Ryan couldn't even help the grin that found its way to his face. It hurt--he was clearly banged up there, too--but it felt good, actually wanting it to be there.
Jon said, "See, you just had to give me a little bit. Not all of Panic can be baby geniuses. What would all the other bands do?" Ryan kept smiling at him. Jon said, "I'm okay, Ry. I broke a few ribs. Of all of us, I got off easiest."
Looking at Jon's face, that news did not make Ryan feel much better. He struggled to get his other hand above the covers. Jon figured out what he was doing a few seconds in and helped out. Ryan clenched both hands into fists and did his best to mime driving a car. He couldn't lift his arms very high. Jon watched for a little while and said, "Driving... Driving, driving-- Oh," he said softly. "You're asking about Gabby," he said, calling their driver by her first name.
Ryan nodded. Jon put his hands over both of Ryan's until they relaxed and said, "Ry."
Ryan already knew, he did, but he needed Jon to say it, because he had evidently been thrown pretty much the entirety of the bus and still made it, however many parts he was in. He looked straight at Jon and waited for him to go on. "Ry, it was an SUV that hit us. Some big Ford-type thing. It slammed right into where she was sitting."
Ryan could feel his eyes stinging, and it was stupid, because they hadn't been that close to Gabby. She was a new driver, but she had been easygoing and kind and more than willing to drag them right back onto the bus if needed. She had been the kind of older sister figure that Ryan loved to pretend really belonged to him, and she had been, if nothing else, alive. Jon said, "I know. I know. Spence and I are working on a college fund for her kid--"
Ryan retched at that. He didn't even know he was going to. He'd forgotten about the kid. He'd met him once. He was four or five, lived at home with his grandparents. The dad had fucked off pretty early on, if there had even been a father. Jon said, "I'm gonna get a nurse, Ry--" but Ryan held on for all he was worth. He needed Jon more than he needed a nurse. This would pass; he just had to keep breathing. Jon, thankfully, didn't fight too hard to get free. He just held on and, once he figured out what Ryan was doing, breathed in time with him. He was still there when Ryan gave in to his exhaustion.
*
Ryan had absolutely no way to measure the passage of time. Asking things was a complex and harrowing process filled with a lot of guesswork, and not to be wasted on simple questions like, "How long did I pass out for this time?" Especially not when all he could really keep his eyes open for was one or two, at best three, questions. All he knew was that there was a day when, instead of waking by himself, he was woken by a man in a lab coat who said, "Hi, Ryan."
Ryan opened his mouth to say hi but stopped before anything embarrassing came out. Instead he held his hand out to the man, who shook it.
"I'm your doctor, Dr. Beckerman. You fought pretty hard to stay with us."
Spencer was standing behind the doctor. Ryan didn't point, but it was all he could do to stop himself. He nodded. Dr. Beckerman said, "Spencer tells me you're having trouble speaking."
Ryan's nod was tight. The doctor said, "I'm sorry to have to ask, but can you try and say something? Hello would be fine."
There was a flash of intense pain in Ryan's jaw, and he realized he was clenching it. He loosened up and made himself say, "Hello." It came out low and twisted and unrecognizable, like he'd somehow gotten the letters confused. He looked away from the doctor, away from Spencer. Spencer made a noise in his throat, but even that couldn't make Ryan look back.
The doctor said, "All right, Ryan, thank you. I'm going to wait a few days, see if this clears up on its own. If not, we're going to do some tests, see what we can see. I'm going to be upfront with you: what we know about the human brain is minute compared to what we don't know, and you took a fair amount of blunt force trauma directly to your head. It really is a miracle you're alive and you can feel all your limbs. But we'll do the tests and do our best to fix you up, okay?"
Ryan nodded. There wasn't anything else to do, really. It wasn't like he could ask questions. If they were important, Spencer would figure them out and ask them. Ryan knew that much for sure.
The doctor smiled and said, "Okay, I'm going to let you have some time with Spencer. Rest up."
Ryan almost laughed. That was what Spencer's mom had always said when he came down with a cold or a flu. "Rest up, young man." Ryan missed Spencer's mom. Spencer moved closer to the bed and Ryan realized that it was unlikely she wasn't here, her and Spencer's dad. Spencer had been in a bus accident; they would be here. Ryan tried to figure out how to ask. There were a million things Spencer and he had identified with Spencer's mom over the years, but none that were useful to him at this moment. Finally it struck him that she had really curly hair. Ryan put a finger parallel to his face and made a corkscrew motion. Spencer tilted his head. He copied the motion and then said, "Oh, curls. My mom?"
Spencer was awesome at this. Ryan smiled for him. Spencer said, "She's been here every day, you're just always asleep. Her and my dad and both my sisters. My family's convinced you're avoiding them. Jon's parents are here, too. Brendon's were for a little bit, but they left when they saw we had the situation under control."
Ryan wanted to know where "here" was; he couldn't remember the last show they had played or where they had been heading, but he couldn't figure out any way to ask. Instead Ryan just made the corkscrew motion again. Spencer said, "Mom."
Ryan touched his fingers to his lips. Spencer tried, "Mouth?" Ryan shook his head. Spencer tried, "Sound," to another shake. Spencer stopped and thought for a moment. "Mouths eat and speak. Speak?" Ryan made a pushing motion with his hands, almost. Spencer moved his lips but didn't say anything, until he said, "Speak to? Speak to my mom?"
Ryan nodded, that was close enough. Spencer asked, "What do I tell her, Ry?"
Ryan put a hand to his chest. Spencer said, "You." Ryan pointed to his eyes. Spencer said, "Eyes. Eyes see. See?" Ryan made the corkscrew again in affirmation. Spencer said, "Mom. You see mom." It took a couple of seconds but he said, "Oh, tell her you want to see her."
Ryan wanted to cry, but he couldn't even tell if it was from the relief of having gotten across the message, or the frustration that it had taken so much effort. Spencer just said, "I will. She wants to see you too, Ry. She was so worried."
Sometimes Spencer told Ryan that other people felt a certain way when he wanted to tell Ryan how he was feeling. Ryan was pretty certain this was one of those times. Not that he didn't believe that Spencer's mom had been worried. But Spencer had been here nearly every time he'd woken up, and the few times when he hadn't, one of the others had been able to tell him exactly where Spencer was--usually getting food or sleep. Spencer's arm had broken in two places when he'd been thrown from his bunk. Neither were compound fractures, which was a blessing, but it was still going to be a while and a crap load of physical therapy before Spencer could play the drums again with any level of comfort, assuming he could at all. The thought made Ryan sick to his stomach, so mostly he avoided it. Ryan reached out and took Spencer's hand, the one attached to his uninjured arm, and tugged a little.
Spencer laughed. "Ry, we're not both going to fit." But Ryan just looked at him stubbornly. Ryan could out-stubborn anyone, even Spencer Smith. That might not have been true if Spencer had ever much wanted to hold out against Ryan, but so far they hadn't run into that problem. Spencer sighed and said, "Fine," before climbing up carefully, taking his time making sure that he wasn't pressing into any of the places where Ryan was still healing, and his arm was resting safely. Ryan fisted his hand in Spencer's sweatshirt and fell asleep.
*
It didn't clear up on its own. For the first few days, Ryan kept hoping, because, honestly, he'd been able to speak since he was eight months, this had to clear up on its own. After the first week, he simply refused to think about it, because to think about it was to give up hope, and Ryan was trying not to be too pessimistic, not when Brendon and Spencer and Jon were trying so fucking hard to keep things positive for him.
After ten days, the doctor said, "We're gonna do an MRI, Ryan, see if we can figure out what's going on in there," and Ryan just nodded, because once they knew what the problem was, of course they'd be able to fix it, of course they would. How could they not? People didn't just lose the ability to form words.
It was inside the MRI machine that Ryan discovered his newfound claustrophobia. He held it together for as long as he could before he started screaming for Spencer. Or, well, it should have been screams for Spencer, but fear didn't make Ryan any more verbal than otherwise, so instead it was just unconnected sounds of sheer terror. Luckily, they must have understood, because they got him out of the machine in time for him to vomit all over the floor. Spencer was at his side, talking him through it, saying, "Okay, okay, no more for right now, okay."
Things went a little vague after that, and when he came to, he was back in his hospital bed, all three guys waiting for him to wake up. Pete had left a couple of days earlier with a promise to be back soon. Spencer said he, Jon and Brendon were receiving texts about once every hour to check up on the situation. Spencer said, "Hey," when he noticed Ryan waking up.
Ryan saluted a little in the motion that they'd worked out for "hey." Then he spread his palms for "what." They didn't have a motion for "happened," and Ryan really had no idea of how to get that across. Spencer just said, "You freaked out a little."
Ryan remembered that part. He nodded. He tilted his head and tried to figure out a good way to ask why. Brendon said, "Here, here, let's try this." He gave Ryan a pad and a pen. Ryan smiled at him. Brendon smiled back, and it was sad, but it was also real. Brendon was pretty good about not lying to them with his smiles.
Ryan looked at the pad and willed himself to right "why?" He didn't even care about his handwriting, just so long as the message got itself across. He pressed the pen to the paper and started to write a "w", but even he could see that it wasn't. It was just a random assortment of lines, which didn't help Ryan at all. He transferred the pen to his other hand, shook his writing hand out, and tried again. This time the lines were curvier, but they were still just random, patternless entities. Ryan glanced up to the top of the pad. There was something, some sort of symbol at the top. He couldn't really parse it, and he hoped like hell that it wasn't a word, because if it was, there was a whole new problem they hadn't even considered. Ryan tried again, closed his eyes this time and just tried to let the pen go. He'd been able to do that before, would sometimes write before having woken entirely or right before he went to sleep, when his eyes were closing of their own accord.
When he opened his eyes, there was nothing that made sense, absolutely nothing. Ryan threw the pen across the room, chucking the pad in its wake. He wanted to yell at them to get out, but there was no way to say it, no way to say, "Leave me alone, leave me alone" again and again like he wanted to.
Spencer said, "Ryan--" and Ryan just started screaming with all the force he had in his lungs, just letting the sound do the work for him. And just like he had almost every time, Spencer got the message, said, "Okay, Ry, okay," and ushered the others out.
Ryan couldn't stop screaming for a bit, the inertia carrying him forward as if he were running or flying or playing his fucking guitar. Once he had started, it wasn't easy to stop. He wasn't sure he wanted to. He made himself, though, because if he didn't, Spencer wouldn't be able to keep the nurses out, and he didn't want them here, didn't want anybody here, didn't want himself here with this person who wasn't him, this person who couldn't talk or write or do anything that defined Ryan as Ryan.
He needed his guitar. He needed to touch it, to know he could still do that, to know the notes would still make sense, still come out all right. He needed to know there was some part of him that was still part of this band that had been the only thing that had ever meant something to Ryan. Ryan put his hands to his face and screamed quietly, as quietly as he could. He screamed into his hands until his throat hurt, his back ached, until he realized that it was painful to breathe that hard. He wanted to say, "Ow," to give into self-pity for just a little bit, just a while, but he knew he wasn't going to be able to form that syllable more readily than any other.
He could cry, though, that part of him still worked, so he let himself. He turned his face as much into the pillow as he could manage and cried until the emotion of it wore him down into sleep.
*
When he woke up, Brendon was sleeping with his head right next to Ryan's hand, and Jon and Spencer were sitting up, talking quietly. Ryan fluttered his fingers and thought, "Sorry."
Spencer said, "Hey. Hey, you want some water?"
Ryan nodded. He wanted to say "please," he wanted to say "sorry" again. He wanted to say anything. Instead he just took the water from Spencer and drank it. Spencer took it back when he was done and said, "I figured out what you were trying to ask."
Ryan looked at him. He'd been trying to ask something? Spencer said, "You wanted to know why. You wanted to know why you freaked out in the machine."
Oh, right, he had. It was a good thing he had Spencer around to remember these things for him. Ryan smiled vaguely by way of agreement and apology all at once. Spencer said, "They're not sure. Jon and I asked, but the best anyone could come up with is that you were evidently stuck in between where the kitchen kinda caved into the front for a while, until the rescue crews got to us. They think that might have something to do with it."
Ryan frowned and pillowed his head on his hands. Spencer said, "Sleep? You want to sleep? That's okay--"
Ryan shook his head. He made a crumpling motion with one fist. Spencer said, "Crumple."
Ryan made a driving motion. Spencer said, "Drive." Jon asked, "Bus? The bus crumpled, Spence."
Ryan nodded. He made the sleeping motion again. Jon and Spencer both looked at him, clearly concentrating. Finally Spencer said, "You were asleep when the bus crumpled?"
"Oh," Jon said.
"Oh?" Spencer asked.
"He passed out. He means he was passed out. He doesn't understand how he could have passed out and he can still be afraid in the MRI."
Ryan pointed at Jon. He was getting better at this. Spencer said, "Oh."
Brendon said softly, without raising his head, "He has a point. I mean, how does he remember?"
Jon and Spencer looked at each other. Then Jon shrugged. "Fuck if I know. We'll ask."
Ryan reached out his hand. Jon took it. Ryan squeezed by way of thanks. Jon smiled but didn't say, "you're welcome," so Ryan couldn't tell if he had missed the meaning or if he was just skipping on the social niceties. They did that all the time with each other.
Brendon brought his hand up to the bed and took Ryan's other hand with it. Ryan squeezed for him, too. Brendon said, "Sorry 'bout the writing." Ryan squeezed a second time for extra emphasis. He could hear the hitch in Brendon's breathing, but he let it be. It wasn't like Ryan could tell him it would be all right. It wasn't like Ryan believed that it would be.
Spencer walked around the bed and pulled a chair up next to Brendon, rubbing at his back with his good arm. He said, "We'll find an answer to Ryan's question, and then we'll find a way to fix Ryan."
Ryan rolled his eyes, but he also smiled, because Spencer did believe, and Ryan wasn't going to be the one to take that from him. Jon said, "Damn skippy," and Ryan laughed. It sounded like an actual laugh.
*
"Your unconscious mind knows things," the doctor told him when Jon asked about how Ryan could be scared of something he didn't even remember. Then he said, "We're going to need to sedate you, we really need to get a look inside your brain."
Ryan nodded. He hadn't tried to bring the subject up, but he was pretty sure that had been words in the corner of that pad. Before he hadn't been paying much attention, hadn't thought about it, but as far as he could tell, everything that was in a place where words might logically have been--the pocket of the doctor's coat, the top of the tissue box next to his bed, the fronts of the guys' shirts--were just odd-looking symbols. He needed them to get a look inside his brain as badly as they seemed to feel they needed it.
Brendon said, "We'll be right there, Ry. If you um--" He clearly didn't have an end to that sentence, so he just repeated, "We'll be right there."
Ryan really needed to come up with a signal for "thanks." Instead he gave Brendon his best working smile. Brendon took it.
It was easy after that, though. The sedative burned a little going in the IV, but then he just closed his eyes and let it take him. When he woke up, Brendon and Spencer were sleeping in chairs, and Jon was the first to notice. He said, "Water?"
Ryan nodded. Then he touched his wrist, which was their understood symbol for asking what time it was. Jon said, "Little after nine. But neither of them slept much last night."
Ryan took the water and sipped at it. His head was still pretty hazy. When he was done, he gave the water back to Jon and put his fingers gently to Jon's chest. Jon asked, "How're my ribs?"
Ryan put his finger to his nose. Well, he tried. He missed the first time, but then he got it. Jon was kind enough not to laugh at him. Ryan laughed. There wasn't anything else to do, not really. Jon grinned. He said, "They're better. I don't know how soon I'm gonna be strapping a bass on, but I can do things like breathe at this point, so there's that."
Breathing was good. Ryan looked at the shirt covering the ribs in question. He squinted at it, tried to make sense of the colors on it, but it was all just a jumble of shapes that had no meaning. Ryan touched Jon's chest again. Jon said, "Okay, you've already asked about the ribs, and you're kinda dopey, but I don't think it's that bad, so, um, me? Are you asking something about me?"
Ryan shook his head. He tugged on the hem of Jon's shirt. Jon said, "Something about my shirt?"
Ryan nodded, then pointed very specifically at the first symbol and dragged his finger across. Jon said, "Something about The Academy Is...? You wanna know if they know?"
Ryan blinked. He'd seen that shirt a million times. He'd read those words a million times. He narrowed his eyes, tried his hardest to focus, but there was nothing there, just random, meaningless lines and circles. Jon said, "Ryan. Ryan, stop. Ryan, breathe," and it was only then that Ryan realized he wasn't. He made himself close his eyes, made himself count until the repetitiveness of it calmed him, opened his chest.
Jon said, softly, "Ryan." Ryan opened his eyes. Jon asked, "You can't read it, can you?"
Ryan just closed his eyes again. He fisted his hands in the blankets to keep himself from doing something irrational, from throwing things or scratching at his skin until he fucking bled or pushing at Jon, who wasn't to blame, who was hurt, too. Jon said, "Okay, Ryan, okay." He maneuvered himself until he was on the bed, his arm carefully draped around Ryan, and in the back of his mind, Ryan knew that had to hurt, and the part of him that was still left, the part that could still at least understand words, wanted to say, "No," but everything else in him was just a little vindictively glad. Somebody else should fucking hurt. They all should.
Jon was saying, "Shh, shh," even though Ryan knew he wasn't making any noise. If Ryan could have made noises that made sense, he would have told Jon to shush himself, he wasn't the one who was fucking brain damaged. Instead he just bit his lip until it bled and ignored Jon and his stupid fucking promises that they would find a way to fix this.
*
Ryan's pelvis had been crushed underneath what had been the kitchen counter, and the doctors had had to piece it back together while staunching the internal bleeding throughout most of his torso, putting him in order one organ at a time. They'd had to remove one kidney and his appendix. That said, he was relatively whole and not paralyzed. It was going to take a fair amount of physical therapy to get him walking once more, and the doctors had told him that he was probably never going to want to walk long distances again. But then, neither was Brendon, so Ryan figured if they were holding Jon and Spencer back, at least they were doing it together.
The first time they put him in a wheelchair, sitting up straight was so painful that Ryan actually cried. He looked away, because as of yet, neither Spencer nor Brendon had cried over their broken bones in front of him. Brendon just put a light hand to his neck and said, "I accidentally hit my leg the first time I used the crutches then screamed and passed out."
Ryan laughed a little, through the pain, and slid his hand over Brendon's. He made himself lengthen his breathing until it didn't hurt as much anymore, or he was at least able to think through the pain. Then he took his hand back, reached down to the wheels with both, and tried an experimental push. It hurt like hell, but to his surprise, the majority of his upper body strength seemed to have survived. He made it down the hall before falling asleep from sheer exhaustion. When he woke back up, he was in bed again. Jon was playing cards with Brendon in one corner of the room. Spencer was sleeping, curled up on a chair.
Brendon said, "Hey, sleepyhead."
Jon gestured at Spencer. "We tried to get him to go back to the hotel. Even his mom insisted."
Ryan chucked the nearest empty plastic cup at Spencer. He woke up with a snarl. Then he rubbed his eyes and said, "Oh, hey, you're awake."
Ryan pointed at Spencer and then imperiously at the door. Spencer said, "I'm not going, Ryan." Ryan just kept his pointer finger trained on the door. It took two minutes for Spencer to say, "Fine," and walk out with a surprising amount of dignity. Brendon put his head down on the table between Jon and him and convulsed with laughter.
When he came up for air, Jon looked at him and said, "Hey, Bren."
Brendon said, "Yeah, sure," and maneuvered himself up--he was getting pretty good at the crutches--and out of the room. Jon moved to the bed and carefully seated himself to the side of Ryan's legs. Ryan waved, a little, "hello."
Jon smiled and waved back. Ryan tilted his head. Jon said, "I need to ask you something. And if you say no, it's fine, I can take care of myself and all, but just-- This is how I'd prefer it, okay?"
Ryan nodded slowly. Jon said, "Our plan is to get back to Vegas at the beginning of next week. Despite today's adventure, we talked to the doctor, and he thinks you'll be ready by then."
Ryan thought about how he felt about that. It took him a bit, but he decided it was good. He nodded for Jon to go on. Jon said, "Obviously I could rent an apartment for a while, but then I'd have to look, or I'd have to have Spence's mom look or something, and one way or another, someone's going to have to help you, whether it's one of us or someone we hire, so I thought, I mean, I'm not trying to invite myself or anything--"
Ryan put a hand on Jon's. Jon looked at him and Ryan nodded. He didn't want some stranger in his house, seeing him like this. If he couldn't have Spencer, then Jon or Brendon was the next best thing, and there really wasn't that much of a difference. Jon broke into a smile. "Yeah?" Ryan smiled back.
Jon said, "Good, I'm glad, because I kinda thought you were gonna be a stubborn ass about it and I was going to have to buy a condo in your building and just come over all the time until you gave in."
Ryan snorted. It was good to know Jon respected his decisions like that. Jon said, "It's Wednesday. You know what that means." Ryan curled his hand into a fist, held it vertically and swirled it a little bit. Jon bumped fists with him. "That is right, my man. Soft-serve sundae day at the caf!"
Jon held up ten fingers, told Ryan which toppings each one corresponded to, and waited for Ryan to tick off which toppings he wanted, before going off to get them their creamy concoctions.
*
Zack had been in the tech bus, traveling behind them. They hadn't seen much; they had been too busy swerving to avoid making the situation worse, driving off the highway and into a ditch. Most of the techs had some form of whiplash, and one had a broken wrist, but for the most part, they were fine. Zack, however, was acting like he somehow could have intervened with fate, protected them from this, too. Nobody was saying anything, because Ryan couldn't, and the others wouldn't. They just let him coddle them, and figured there were worse things.
On the day they had arranged for flying back, Zack put himself in charge of pushing Ryan's wheelchair, and then carried both Ryan and Brendon up onto the private jet Pete had insisted on. He did it separately, even though Brendon had tried taunting him into doing it all at once. Brendon acted the part of damsel-in-distress perfectly, and as everyone would expect of him, but Ryan could see underneath, to where there was the need to act normal, act Like Brendon. Ryan would never have admitted, ever, that he could tell Brendon was tired, that the strain of the crutches was getting to him.
Zack settled Ryan so that he was lying on the couch, and between him and Spencer, they set him up with water and juice and a soda, just in case. Ryan drank from each one, because they looked so concerned, but then he did what he really needed to do, and passed out from the sheer exhaustion of having been awake and not in bed for over an hour. Healing, as it turned out, was an interminably slow process. Ryan wished he had more patience for it.
He woke up somewhere between takeoff and landing. Spencer was sleeping on the couch across from him, and Zack and Brendon were clearly engaged in a winner-take-all game of something that seemed suspiciously like Old Maid to Ryan. Jon was sitting with a pad in his lap, but he didn't seem to actually be writing. He looked up and saw Ryan looking at him. "Hey."
Ryan waved, then pointed to the pad. Jon came over to sit on the floor, facing Ryan. "Just, there's been music in my head, and I thought maybe if I-- But I think I need my bass."
As far as Ryan could determine, their instruments, having been on the tech bus, were fine and had been shipped home by Pete early on. Ryan nodded. He was pretty anxious to get back to his guitar as well. Ryan glanced down at the pad, not really expecting anything, but found to his surprise that Jon's loose system of musical notation made a certain amount of sense to him. He tugged at the pad and Jon gave it up easily. Ryan looked and looked, and sure enough, a melody came to him. Ryan thought about how his brain could still interpret pictures and wondered if maybe that was how his brain read notes. He didn't care, not at all, that didn't matter. What mattered was that he knew what Jon was trying to say here.
Eagerly, he took the pen from Jon's fingers and added a couple of things. He could tell that his notations weren't right immediately and nearly threw the pen across the room in a repeat of his earlier frustration, but Jon said, "Wait, wait, do you understand? Do you understand the notations?"
Ryan nodded. Jon grinned. "Ryan. Ryan, that's awesome."
Ryan made a squiggly line on the paper. Jon looked. "Okay, well, yeah, that's a problem, but not really. Once we have our instruments you can show me what you want. Or, after you learn to sign, you can tell me and I can write it down. But you can still read music. That's--" This time Jon was the one to throw aside the pad and pen in his efforts to get to Ryan, to safely hug him.
Spencer, Brendon and Zack were all paying attention by this time, Brendon grinning wildly and Spencer moving over to look at the paper, see what Ryan had seen. Ryan hugged Jon back, because okay, at least he could still participate in the writing of music, at least he could still give them that much. That was something, even if it was something they could all do. Something was more than Ryan had had to go on recently.
Over Jon's shoulder, Ryan watched as Spencer smiled down at the pad, hopeful and terrified all at once. Ryan sympathized.
*
"You're a boy," Brendon said, when Spencer brought the ASL tutor he had found for them into the living room. Once the doctors had diagnosed Ryan's speech problems as an unusual-acting type of Aphasia, they had recommended speech therapy, but told him that sign language was probably going to be his best shot at having full conversations again.
"Astute," Jon said.
Brendon scowled at Jon and then Spencer, accusing, "You told me his name was Darcy."
"It is," Darcy said. He held out his hand. "Darcy Carrington. I'd like to say it's a family name, but my mom just has a really big hard-on for Jane Austen."
"Wow, okay," Brendon said. "I'm Brendon, but you can totally call me Brenda for being a presumptuous asshole." He turned quickly. "That only applies to him, dickfaces."
Ryan snickered silently. Brendon was screwed. Spencer said, "Yeah, okay. So, you met me at the door, and you've now been summarily introduced to our pet monkey. This is Jon--" he waited for Jon to hold out a hand and murmur a, "hey, nice to meet you," before continuing, "and this is Ryan."
Ryan held out his hand and smiled tightly for Darcy. Darcy's handshake was firm without being painful, and his eyes were an even, assessing sort of gray, set in a face of soft features--a rounded nose, cheeks that looked ready to smile, a forehead overshadowed by a mess of black curls. He was taller than Ryan, and he would have been even had Ryan been able to stand. He was taller than any of them, but he didn't use his body in a way that made that evident or important. Essentially, in Ryan's first-glance checklist, he came off as a decent guy. When he reclaimed his hand, Darcy said, "In the interest of full disclosure, I should say I'm a casual sort of fan. I have all your stuff on my iPod, and I went to your last tour."
"We'll break you of that," Jon reassured him.
Darcy laughed. "Okay, sounds good. Now that that's out of the way, let's talk about how we're going to do this. I've never worked with an aphasic student before, so I'm about as versed as any of you, and you have the benefit of knowing yourselves better. The suggestion I had was that we start the way I would start with any student, deaf or otherwise, which is with the alphabet. If that ends up not being useful, we'll just move on to other basic lessons, like directions, important questions, that kind of thing. Learning sign language is pretty much like learning any other language, you just get to look a lot cooler doing it."
"Cooler, huh?" Spencer asked, with a telling raise of his eyebrow.
Darcy grinned and moved his hands. Spencer said, "I don't actually know any sign-language yet."
Darcy translated. "I said, 'you tell me.'"
Brendon mimicked the actions. "Yup, yeah, Spencer's theory holds. We're not gonna look as good doing this."
"Speak for yourself," Spencer said, turning on Brendon as was tradition.
"How do I say 'I do' with my hands?" Brendon asked Darcy.
Darcy said, "Maybe a little later," with his mouth and his hands. Brendon watched, totally mesmerized. Ryan knew that look. He was going to have to make Spencer have a talk with Brendon about not molesting his sign language teacher until Ryan at least had a basic dictionary of words.
Darcy continued, "For now, let's start here." He held up his right hand, curling the fingers in a fist, his thumb flush against his fingers. "A." He looked at them expectantly. "Well, everyone repeat after me." His hands flew as he spoke. Ryan had to admit, it did look pretty awesome. Darcy uncurled his fingers, holding them straight up and tight against each other, his thumb turned in slightly to rest against his palm. "B." This time, Ryan held up his hand without having to be told to repeat. The others followed suit.
*
Ryan practiced the alphabet until long after his fingers were sore, until he could call up any letter he wanted to without even really having to think. And then, when he was ready, he tried to spell his name. He had all the tools he needed, the letters and the ability to "say" them. He couldn't remember what order they went in. Or even which letters he needed to create the name. He tried Spencer's, since it was almost as familiar as his own, and found the same thing. The world went a little dark at its edges, and it wasn't until Jon wandered in the room and said, "Holy shit, Ryan, breathe," that he realized he wasn't.
He tried to breathe, because Jon sounded really scared. It shouldn't have even been this big a deal. He couldn't speak, read or write. His ability to spell really wasn't of great consequence. Ryan couldn't breathe. The thought freaked him out less than the spelling thing; he couldn't be bothered to try too hard, not even with Jon sitting there, rubbing his back and saying, "It's all right, Ry, it's all right."
It wasn't. His temples pounded at the loss of oxygen, but his lungs didn't want to open up. Ryan nudged himself a little toward the dark and let it take him. When he woke up, he was lying down. He looked over to see Jon sitting on the floor, legs tucked into a pretzel, staring at Ryan with intense concentration. Ryan waved at him, just enough to let him know that other than being a brain-damaged defect, he was fine.
Jon said, "Hey. Okay, we should make a plan to have that not happen again, because it probably scared me more than the bus accident itself. Granted, I was pretty much unconscious for most of that, but you get my point. You scared the fucking crap out of me."
Sorry, Ryan thought, but didn't have the energy to come up with a way to convey his apology. Jon took a breath. "Sorry. I didn't mean to get all--" He shook his head. "What happened?"
Ryan didn't really want to try and explain that without words, either, but Jon still looked a little terrified, so he found energy in himself somewhere and started signing through the alphabet, just like they had learned. Jon nodded. "Alphabet, right."
Ryan made a dash with his hand. Jon frowned. "No alphabet?" Ryan sighed. Jon said, "Okay, okay, I can keep guessing. Um. You feel like you're bad at it and you're worried that you will be with the rest of the signs?" Ryan shook his head. Jon sat for a bit. "Oh. Oh. Wait. Ry. If you can't read..." He tilted his head. "Spell 'Jon' for me."
Ryan held out his hands uselessly. Jon nodded. "Okay. Well. We're just going to have to come up with customized signs for each of our names. I read online that people do that for the most part anyway, as a short cut. And the rest of the stuff, we'll figure out as we go along."
That was eminently logical, but all Ryan could do was blink at Jon, who was acting like this wasn't a big deal, like this wasn't one more thing that made Ryan completely fucking useless. Jon helped himself to his feet and said, "I'll be right back, don't go anywhere."
Since getting to as far as the bathroom was still a slow and agonizing process, Ryan didn't really see that happening. Jon came back after a while with two guitars in hand, one of them the one Ryan used when he just wanted to hole up in his house and write by himself. Despite his yearning, Ryan hadn't so much as attempted to touch his guitars since getting home, for fear of finding that was lost to him, too. He didn't particularly want that knowledge any more now than he had yesterday. Jon held out the guitar, but Ryan didn't reach up to take it. Jon just kept holding it until his arm shook with the effort and Ryan could tell it was hurting his still-healing ribs. Regretfully, Ryan took it from him, but he didn't put it in the position to play.
Jon, on the other hand, held his gingerly against his torso. It occurred to Ryan that he hadn't heard Jon playing at all, which was odd, since Jon had to know he could. Unless he just didn't want to hurt Ryan's feelings. Jon was like that. Then again, it probably wasn't the most comfortable thing in the world just yet to have the guitar rest against him. John plucked out a couple of notes. He asked, "Can you... Did you know which ones--"
Oh. Ryan held up his hand and signed out, "A, G, F."
Jon grinned so hard Ryan was a little surprised it could fit on his face. Ryan thought about what he had done for a couple of seconds and then slowly, hesitantly, arranged the guitar on his lap. It fit against him, in his fingers, just like it always had, and Ryan strummed at it a little, just to see if that was still familiar, too. It was. He picked out the melody for "7 Minutes in Heaven" because it had been stuck in his head for the better part of three days no matter what he did and because if he couldn't play one of Pete's songs, it wouldn't be as bad as finding out he couldn't play one of his own.
But he could play it. The notes came to him without even having to think of them, one after another, his fingers at the right places before he even considered where they needed to be. Jon was still grinning, filling out the sound as much as he could. "I should go grab my bass."
Ryan nodded in agreement, but he couldn't really be bothered by only having the guitars, not at this moment. For the first time since he'd woken up not knowing what the hell was going on, Ryan felt like he could actually catch his breath, actually have each inhalation bottom out. When he finished the song, Ryan went to the next that popped into his head and then the next and the next. His fingers were bleeding by the time Jon tugged the guitar from him, but he couldn't even feel it. Jon brought a washcloth and some bandages and cleaned him up. While he was sitting in front of Ryan, he said, "Honestly, what's a little spelling in the face of that?"
It was still everything, but at least everything had stopped seeming quite so large.
Part Two
Band(s): Panic at the Disco
Pairing(s): Jon/Ryan
Word Count: 32,021
Rating/Warnings: NC-17/none that I know of
Author Notes: Thank you to Luc, for alphaing and betaing the fic, particularly when it meant dealing with me being a child. Untappedbeauty, for her thorough, awesome grammar beta. Finally, Rossetti, for making sure the sign language in this was actually informed by reality, and really helping me to rework the story in more interesting ways around that.
There was very little research that went into this, Aphasia doesn't work precisely like this and the type of injuries Ryan occurs are probably unlikely to happen in concert.
Title comes from a Sam Rayburn quote: "No one has a finer command of language than the person who keeps his mouth shut."
Summary: I called this the bus accident!fic while I was writing it. Largely because the premise is that Panic gets in a bus accident. I'm clever like that.
The morning of the accident, Ryan looked at Brendon as he stumbled out of the bunks and said, "Your slippers are on the wrong feet." As last words, he would have chosen others.
Brendon was sitting at the table, checking his email. He glanced down under the table and said, "Huh," but made no move to fix the situation. Ryan reached up to open the cabinet with the oatmeal bars in it, and the world lurched. Ryan didn't even feel himself go anywhere. He just thought, "Ouch, shit," and "Brendon," because he couldn't see him. Later, he would console himself with the fact that that had been a totally noble thing to think in the midst of almost dying.
*
Pete was not supposed to be on the bus. Pete was supposed to be... Somewhere. Ryan remembered, they had talked recently, but he couldn't quite figure out where Pete had said he was going to be. A charity cruise? Maybe. Wherever it was, Pete was not supposed to be on Ryan's bus, saying, "Guys. Guys. I think he--"
Ryan tried to say, "Finish your sentences, Wentz," but his throat was completely dry and his head hurt at even the thought of forming the words. Mentally, Ryan frowned.
Spencer was above him then--above? What the hell?--looking scared out of his mind. He had a gigantic bruise on the side of his face, and his arm was in a sling. Ryan was going to put a fucking hit out on whoever had touched Spencer. What the hell was Pete thinking, allowing that shit?
Spencer asked, "Hey, Ry. Hey, can you hear me?"
Last Ryan checked, he wasn't deaf. Of course he could fucking hear Spencer. He tried saying that, but his lips would barely open. Spencer said, "Bren, can I have that water?"
Spencer reached over Ryan, who turned to look at Brendon. Brendon was looking pretty fucked up, too. He had a gash above one eye and he was on crutches. Ryan closed his eyes for a second and considered the whiteness of their surroundings, the fact that he was clearly lying down and that Pete, who was supposed to be in Aruba or something, was right there. Internally, Ryan sighed. He fucking hated hospitals. Then he opened his eyes and searched desperately for Jon, because he hadn't seen him yet. Jon was at the foot of his bed, and he looked a lot like Spencer, except without the sling. He was holding himself carefully, though, so Ryan was pretty sure his injuries just weren't as obvious. Pete, at least, looked totally fine.
Spencer said, "Hey, c'mon."
Ryan felt the bed move under him, and yeah, he had to be on some pretty serious shit, because all he could feel was the shift in pressure. He was afraid to look at himself. Spencer held the cup with the straw to Ryan's mouth with his good hand and said, "Drink, Ry."
Ryan took a small sip, remembering every time his dad had vomited water on him after binging. It went down all right, so he took another, and when that proved a success, another after that. It took him a while to get his fill, but Spencer just stood there, letting him take his time.
When Spencer set the cup down, Ryan tried to ask, "What happened?" but what came out was a garbled mess of syllables and sounds that not even Ryan understood. He tried again, but the words just wouldn't form. He tried a third time, and when all that happened was that he sounded--even to himself--like a dying creature of bovine origin, he panicked. He tried saying, "Spencer," because he'd been able to say the word "Spencer" from the time he was six, and that was reaching the outer limits of where Ryan's memory could venture.
The syllables broke into incorrect, slippery sounds that Ryan couldn't catch before they slid right off his tongue. He could hear himself keening in sheer, utter terror, but he couldn't stop, not even with Spencer saying, "Ryan, Ryan, it's all right, it's all right."
Brendon looked scared out of his fucking mind, so Ryan was pretty sure that was a complete lie. Spencer was always trying to protect him. Spencer pressed his good hand against Ryan's chest and said, "Ryan, stop. Stop."
Ryan made himself listen to Spencer. Spencer said, "Can you understand me? If you can, nod your head yes."
Ryan tried, and sure enough, that worked. Ryan took a breath. It was something. Spencer said, "All right, you need to listen."
Ryan nodded again to let Spencer know he was. Spencer said, "A car jumped the railing on the highway and hit us nearly dead on. Jon and I were in the bunks and Brendon was at the table, but you were standing in the middle of the bus, okay? None of us are really sure what happened, but you--" Spencer took a deep breath and Ryan could tell he was trying to just hold it together. Ryan wanted to tell Spencer he was sorry for standing up, but that was stupid, they stood up on the bus all the time, they had to. Spencer said, "You were in surgery for over twenty-four hours, Ry. There was internal bleeding and all kinds of shit. They warned us that there might be other problems, if you even woke up. Which you did, so I say fuck the other problems, okay? Fuck that."
Spencer's voice was considerably less full of bravado than his words. Ryan found his hand, made it go up to Spencer's, made it squeeze. At least that was working. At least he would probably be able to play his guitar. The thought loosened Ryan's chest up the tiniest bit.
He had a million questions, like if their driver was okay, and what they had done about the tour and how they were going to fix him, but listening for that long had taken more effort than Ryan could really quantify, and for the moment, he really needed to just sleep some more.
*
The second time he woke up, Jon was sitting by his bed. Jon grinned at him and said, "Hey. Morning."
Ryan wanted to ask if it was really morning, but the minute he opened his mouth, he knew nothing was going to come out but random noises, so he shut it and did his best to smile back at Jon. Jon stood carefully and asked, "You want some water?"
Ryan reached out--moving was a huge deal--and touched Jon's chest lightly. What's wrong? He willed Jon to understand. Jon said, "No water?"
Ryan shook his head. Jon frowned. He said, "Take a sip for me, and then if you still don't want it, you don't have to have anymore."
Ryan went along with that. He was extremely thirsty. Like before, he finished off the whole cup. Jon looked relieved, but all he said was, "Okay, clearly I didn't understand you before. Let's see if we can do better."
Ryan tried to think up another way to ask, but nothing came to mind. He shook his head, Don't worry about it. Jon seemed to get that he'd given up, if nothing else, because he said, "No, hey, just let me go through it again, okay?"
Ryan tried shrugging, but that hurt too much. Clearly they were weaning him off the painkillers. Jon seemed to get the point. "I asked if you wanted water."
Ryan lifted his hand a little, palm up. You stood up. Jon mimicked the action twice before he tilted his head and said, "Oh, wait. I got up. I got up to give you the water."
Ryan nodded, feeling like he'd just run a marathon or something equally daunting. Jon said, "Okay, so I got up, and you put your hand to my chest. To tell me to sit down?"
Ryan shook his head. Jon said, "No, okay. Um. Does your chest hurt?"
Ryan would scream in frustration if he trusted the sound to actually come out right. It might, but it might not, and Ryan didn't want to hear some sort of muted, choked pretense at a scream. Jon seemed to understand, and he ran a soothing hand through Ryan's hair. "Sorry I'm bad at this, Ry."
Ryan bit his lip. Sorry I'm fucking retarded.
Jon petted at him for a little bit longer before he said, "You put your hand to my chest. Jesus, I'm an idiot, you were asking what was wrong." Ryan couldn't even help the grin that found its way to his face. It hurt--he was clearly banged up there, too--but it felt good, actually wanting it to be there.
Jon said, "See, you just had to give me a little bit. Not all of Panic can be baby geniuses. What would all the other bands do?" Ryan kept smiling at him. Jon said, "I'm okay, Ry. I broke a few ribs. Of all of us, I got off easiest."
Looking at Jon's face, that news did not make Ryan feel much better. He struggled to get his other hand above the covers. Jon figured out what he was doing a few seconds in and helped out. Ryan clenched both hands into fists and did his best to mime driving a car. He couldn't lift his arms very high. Jon watched for a little while and said, "Driving... Driving, driving-- Oh," he said softly. "You're asking about Gabby," he said, calling their driver by her first name.
Ryan nodded. Jon put his hands over both of Ryan's until they relaxed and said, "Ry."
Ryan already knew, he did, but he needed Jon to say it, because he had evidently been thrown pretty much the entirety of the bus and still made it, however many parts he was in. He looked straight at Jon and waited for him to go on. "Ry, it was an SUV that hit us. Some big Ford-type thing. It slammed right into where she was sitting."
Ryan could feel his eyes stinging, and it was stupid, because they hadn't been that close to Gabby. She was a new driver, but she had been easygoing and kind and more than willing to drag them right back onto the bus if needed. She had been the kind of older sister figure that Ryan loved to pretend really belonged to him, and she had been, if nothing else, alive. Jon said, "I know. I know. Spence and I are working on a college fund for her kid--"
Ryan retched at that. He didn't even know he was going to. He'd forgotten about the kid. He'd met him once. He was four or five, lived at home with his grandparents. The dad had fucked off pretty early on, if there had even been a father. Jon said, "I'm gonna get a nurse, Ry--" but Ryan held on for all he was worth. He needed Jon more than he needed a nurse. This would pass; he just had to keep breathing. Jon, thankfully, didn't fight too hard to get free. He just held on and, once he figured out what Ryan was doing, breathed in time with him. He was still there when Ryan gave in to his exhaustion.
*
Ryan had absolutely no way to measure the passage of time. Asking things was a complex and harrowing process filled with a lot of guesswork, and not to be wasted on simple questions like, "How long did I pass out for this time?" Especially not when all he could really keep his eyes open for was one or two, at best three, questions. All he knew was that there was a day when, instead of waking by himself, he was woken by a man in a lab coat who said, "Hi, Ryan."
Ryan opened his mouth to say hi but stopped before anything embarrassing came out. Instead he held his hand out to the man, who shook it.
"I'm your doctor, Dr. Beckerman. You fought pretty hard to stay with us."
Spencer was standing behind the doctor. Ryan didn't point, but it was all he could do to stop himself. He nodded. Dr. Beckerman said, "Spencer tells me you're having trouble speaking."
Ryan's nod was tight. The doctor said, "I'm sorry to have to ask, but can you try and say something? Hello would be fine."
There was a flash of intense pain in Ryan's jaw, and he realized he was clenching it. He loosened up and made himself say, "Hello." It came out low and twisted and unrecognizable, like he'd somehow gotten the letters confused. He looked away from the doctor, away from Spencer. Spencer made a noise in his throat, but even that couldn't make Ryan look back.
The doctor said, "All right, Ryan, thank you. I'm going to wait a few days, see if this clears up on its own. If not, we're going to do some tests, see what we can see. I'm going to be upfront with you: what we know about the human brain is minute compared to what we don't know, and you took a fair amount of blunt force trauma directly to your head. It really is a miracle you're alive and you can feel all your limbs. But we'll do the tests and do our best to fix you up, okay?"
Ryan nodded. There wasn't anything else to do, really. It wasn't like he could ask questions. If they were important, Spencer would figure them out and ask them. Ryan knew that much for sure.
The doctor smiled and said, "Okay, I'm going to let you have some time with Spencer. Rest up."
Ryan almost laughed. That was what Spencer's mom had always said when he came down with a cold or a flu. "Rest up, young man." Ryan missed Spencer's mom. Spencer moved closer to the bed and Ryan realized that it was unlikely she wasn't here, her and Spencer's dad. Spencer had been in a bus accident; they would be here. Ryan tried to figure out how to ask. There were a million things Spencer and he had identified with Spencer's mom over the years, but none that were useful to him at this moment. Finally it struck him that she had really curly hair. Ryan put a finger parallel to his face and made a corkscrew motion. Spencer tilted his head. He copied the motion and then said, "Oh, curls. My mom?"
Spencer was awesome at this. Ryan smiled for him. Spencer said, "She's been here every day, you're just always asleep. Her and my dad and both my sisters. My family's convinced you're avoiding them. Jon's parents are here, too. Brendon's were for a little bit, but they left when they saw we had the situation under control."
Ryan wanted to know where "here" was; he couldn't remember the last show they had played or where they had been heading, but he couldn't figure out any way to ask. Instead Ryan just made the corkscrew motion again. Spencer said, "Mom."
Ryan touched his fingers to his lips. Spencer tried, "Mouth?" Ryan shook his head. Spencer tried, "Sound," to another shake. Spencer stopped and thought for a moment. "Mouths eat and speak. Speak?" Ryan made a pushing motion with his hands, almost. Spencer moved his lips but didn't say anything, until he said, "Speak to? Speak to my mom?"
Ryan nodded, that was close enough. Spencer asked, "What do I tell her, Ry?"
Ryan put a hand to his chest. Spencer said, "You." Ryan pointed to his eyes. Spencer said, "Eyes. Eyes see. See?" Ryan made the corkscrew again in affirmation. Spencer said, "Mom. You see mom." It took a couple of seconds but he said, "Oh, tell her you want to see her."
Ryan wanted to cry, but he couldn't even tell if it was from the relief of having gotten across the message, or the frustration that it had taken so much effort. Spencer just said, "I will. She wants to see you too, Ry. She was so worried."
Sometimes Spencer told Ryan that other people felt a certain way when he wanted to tell Ryan how he was feeling. Ryan was pretty certain this was one of those times. Not that he didn't believe that Spencer's mom had been worried. But Spencer had been here nearly every time he'd woken up, and the few times when he hadn't, one of the others had been able to tell him exactly where Spencer was--usually getting food or sleep. Spencer's arm had broken in two places when he'd been thrown from his bunk. Neither were compound fractures, which was a blessing, but it was still going to be a while and a crap load of physical therapy before Spencer could play the drums again with any level of comfort, assuming he could at all. The thought made Ryan sick to his stomach, so mostly he avoided it. Ryan reached out and took Spencer's hand, the one attached to his uninjured arm, and tugged a little.
Spencer laughed. "Ry, we're not both going to fit." But Ryan just looked at him stubbornly. Ryan could out-stubborn anyone, even Spencer Smith. That might not have been true if Spencer had ever much wanted to hold out against Ryan, but so far they hadn't run into that problem. Spencer sighed and said, "Fine," before climbing up carefully, taking his time making sure that he wasn't pressing into any of the places where Ryan was still healing, and his arm was resting safely. Ryan fisted his hand in Spencer's sweatshirt and fell asleep.
*
It didn't clear up on its own. For the first few days, Ryan kept hoping, because, honestly, he'd been able to speak since he was eight months, this had to clear up on its own. After the first week, he simply refused to think about it, because to think about it was to give up hope, and Ryan was trying not to be too pessimistic, not when Brendon and Spencer and Jon were trying so fucking hard to keep things positive for him.
After ten days, the doctor said, "We're gonna do an MRI, Ryan, see if we can figure out what's going on in there," and Ryan just nodded, because once they knew what the problem was, of course they'd be able to fix it, of course they would. How could they not? People didn't just lose the ability to form words.
It was inside the MRI machine that Ryan discovered his newfound claustrophobia. He held it together for as long as he could before he started screaming for Spencer. Or, well, it should have been screams for Spencer, but fear didn't make Ryan any more verbal than otherwise, so instead it was just unconnected sounds of sheer terror. Luckily, they must have understood, because they got him out of the machine in time for him to vomit all over the floor. Spencer was at his side, talking him through it, saying, "Okay, okay, no more for right now, okay."
Things went a little vague after that, and when he came to, he was back in his hospital bed, all three guys waiting for him to wake up. Pete had left a couple of days earlier with a promise to be back soon. Spencer said he, Jon and Brendon were receiving texts about once every hour to check up on the situation. Spencer said, "Hey," when he noticed Ryan waking up.
Ryan saluted a little in the motion that they'd worked out for "hey." Then he spread his palms for "what." They didn't have a motion for "happened," and Ryan really had no idea of how to get that across. Spencer just said, "You freaked out a little."
Ryan remembered that part. He nodded. He tilted his head and tried to figure out a good way to ask why. Brendon said, "Here, here, let's try this." He gave Ryan a pad and a pen. Ryan smiled at him. Brendon smiled back, and it was sad, but it was also real. Brendon was pretty good about not lying to them with his smiles.
Ryan looked at the pad and willed himself to right "why?" He didn't even care about his handwriting, just so long as the message got itself across. He pressed the pen to the paper and started to write a "w", but even he could see that it wasn't. It was just a random assortment of lines, which didn't help Ryan at all. He transferred the pen to his other hand, shook his writing hand out, and tried again. This time the lines were curvier, but they were still just random, patternless entities. Ryan glanced up to the top of the pad. There was something, some sort of symbol at the top. He couldn't really parse it, and he hoped like hell that it wasn't a word, because if it was, there was a whole new problem they hadn't even considered. Ryan tried again, closed his eyes this time and just tried to let the pen go. He'd been able to do that before, would sometimes write before having woken entirely or right before he went to sleep, when his eyes were closing of their own accord.
When he opened his eyes, there was nothing that made sense, absolutely nothing. Ryan threw the pen across the room, chucking the pad in its wake. He wanted to yell at them to get out, but there was no way to say it, no way to say, "Leave me alone, leave me alone" again and again like he wanted to.
Spencer said, "Ryan--" and Ryan just started screaming with all the force he had in his lungs, just letting the sound do the work for him. And just like he had almost every time, Spencer got the message, said, "Okay, Ry, okay," and ushered the others out.
Ryan couldn't stop screaming for a bit, the inertia carrying him forward as if he were running or flying or playing his fucking guitar. Once he had started, it wasn't easy to stop. He wasn't sure he wanted to. He made himself, though, because if he didn't, Spencer wouldn't be able to keep the nurses out, and he didn't want them here, didn't want anybody here, didn't want himself here with this person who wasn't him, this person who couldn't talk or write or do anything that defined Ryan as Ryan.
He needed his guitar. He needed to touch it, to know he could still do that, to know the notes would still make sense, still come out all right. He needed to know there was some part of him that was still part of this band that had been the only thing that had ever meant something to Ryan. Ryan put his hands to his face and screamed quietly, as quietly as he could. He screamed into his hands until his throat hurt, his back ached, until he realized that it was painful to breathe that hard. He wanted to say, "Ow," to give into self-pity for just a little bit, just a while, but he knew he wasn't going to be able to form that syllable more readily than any other.
He could cry, though, that part of him still worked, so he let himself. He turned his face as much into the pillow as he could manage and cried until the emotion of it wore him down into sleep.
*
When he woke up, Brendon was sleeping with his head right next to Ryan's hand, and Jon and Spencer were sitting up, talking quietly. Ryan fluttered his fingers and thought, "Sorry."
Spencer said, "Hey. Hey, you want some water?"
Ryan nodded. He wanted to say "please," he wanted to say "sorry" again. He wanted to say anything. Instead he just took the water from Spencer and drank it. Spencer took it back when he was done and said, "I figured out what you were trying to ask."
Ryan looked at him. He'd been trying to ask something? Spencer said, "You wanted to know why. You wanted to know why you freaked out in the machine."
Oh, right, he had. It was a good thing he had Spencer around to remember these things for him. Ryan smiled vaguely by way of agreement and apology all at once. Spencer said, "They're not sure. Jon and I asked, but the best anyone could come up with is that you were evidently stuck in between where the kitchen kinda caved into the front for a while, until the rescue crews got to us. They think that might have something to do with it."
Ryan frowned and pillowed his head on his hands. Spencer said, "Sleep? You want to sleep? That's okay--"
Ryan shook his head. He made a crumpling motion with one fist. Spencer said, "Crumple."
Ryan made a driving motion. Spencer said, "Drive." Jon asked, "Bus? The bus crumpled, Spence."
Ryan nodded. He made the sleeping motion again. Jon and Spencer both looked at him, clearly concentrating. Finally Spencer said, "You were asleep when the bus crumpled?"
"Oh," Jon said.
"Oh?" Spencer asked.
"He passed out. He means he was passed out. He doesn't understand how he could have passed out and he can still be afraid in the MRI."
Ryan pointed at Jon. He was getting better at this. Spencer said, "Oh."
Brendon said softly, without raising his head, "He has a point. I mean, how does he remember?"
Jon and Spencer looked at each other. Then Jon shrugged. "Fuck if I know. We'll ask."
Ryan reached out his hand. Jon took it. Ryan squeezed by way of thanks. Jon smiled but didn't say, "you're welcome," so Ryan couldn't tell if he had missed the meaning or if he was just skipping on the social niceties. They did that all the time with each other.
Brendon brought his hand up to the bed and took Ryan's other hand with it. Ryan squeezed for him, too. Brendon said, "Sorry 'bout the writing." Ryan squeezed a second time for extra emphasis. He could hear the hitch in Brendon's breathing, but he let it be. It wasn't like Ryan could tell him it would be all right. It wasn't like Ryan believed that it would be.
Spencer walked around the bed and pulled a chair up next to Brendon, rubbing at his back with his good arm. He said, "We'll find an answer to Ryan's question, and then we'll find a way to fix Ryan."
Ryan rolled his eyes, but he also smiled, because Spencer did believe, and Ryan wasn't going to be the one to take that from him. Jon said, "Damn skippy," and Ryan laughed. It sounded like an actual laugh.
*
"Your unconscious mind knows things," the doctor told him when Jon asked about how Ryan could be scared of something he didn't even remember. Then he said, "We're going to need to sedate you, we really need to get a look inside your brain."
Ryan nodded. He hadn't tried to bring the subject up, but he was pretty sure that had been words in the corner of that pad. Before he hadn't been paying much attention, hadn't thought about it, but as far as he could tell, everything that was in a place where words might logically have been--the pocket of the doctor's coat, the top of the tissue box next to his bed, the fronts of the guys' shirts--were just odd-looking symbols. He needed them to get a look inside his brain as badly as they seemed to feel they needed it.
Brendon said, "We'll be right there, Ry. If you um--" He clearly didn't have an end to that sentence, so he just repeated, "We'll be right there."
Ryan really needed to come up with a signal for "thanks." Instead he gave Brendon his best working smile. Brendon took it.
It was easy after that, though. The sedative burned a little going in the IV, but then he just closed his eyes and let it take him. When he woke up, Brendon and Spencer were sleeping in chairs, and Jon was the first to notice. He said, "Water?"
Ryan nodded. Then he touched his wrist, which was their understood symbol for asking what time it was. Jon said, "Little after nine. But neither of them slept much last night."
Ryan took the water and sipped at it. His head was still pretty hazy. When he was done, he gave the water back to Jon and put his fingers gently to Jon's chest. Jon asked, "How're my ribs?"
Ryan put his finger to his nose. Well, he tried. He missed the first time, but then he got it. Jon was kind enough not to laugh at him. Ryan laughed. There wasn't anything else to do, not really. Jon grinned. He said, "They're better. I don't know how soon I'm gonna be strapping a bass on, but I can do things like breathe at this point, so there's that."
Breathing was good. Ryan looked at the shirt covering the ribs in question. He squinted at it, tried to make sense of the colors on it, but it was all just a jumble of shapes that had no meaning. Ryan touched Jon's chest again. Jon said, "Okay, you've already asked about the ribs, and you're kinda dopey, but I don't think it's that bad, so, um, me? Are you asking something about me?"
Ryan shook his head. He tugged on the hem of Jon's shirt. Jon said, "Something about my shirt?"
Ryan nodded, then pointed very specifically at the first symbol and dragged his finger across. Jon said, "Something about The Academy Is...? You wanna know if they know?"
Ryan blinked. He'd seen that shirt a million times. He'd read those words a million times. He narrowed his eyes, tried his hardest to focus, but there was nothing there, just random, meaningless lines and circles. Jon said, "Ryan. Ryan, stop. Ryan, breathe," and it was only then that Ryan realized he wasn't. He made himself close his eyes, made himself count until the repetitiveness of it calmed him, opened his chest.
Jon said, softly, "Ryan." Ryan opened his eyes. Jon asked, "You can't read it, can you?"
Ryan just closed his eyes again. He fisted his hands in the blankets to keep himself from doing something irrational, from throwing things or scratching at his skin until he fucking bled or pushing at Jon, who wasn't to blame, who was hurt, too. Jon said, "Okay, Ryan, okay." He maneuvered himself until he was on the bed, his arm carefully draped around Ryan, and in the back of his mind, Ryan knew that had to hurt, and the part of him that was still left, the part that could still at least understand words, wanted to say, "No," but everything else in him was just a little vindictively glad. Somebody else should fucking hurt. They all should.
Jon was saying, "Shh, shh," even though Ryan knew he wasn't making any noise. If Ryan could have made noises that made sense, he would have told Jon to shush himself, he wasn't the one who was fucking brain damaged. Instead he just bit his lip until it bled and ignored Jon and his stupid fucking promises that they would find a way to fix this.
*
Ryan's pelvis had been crushed underneath what had been the kitchen counter, and the doctors had had to piece it back together while staunching the internal bleeding throughout most of his torso, putting him in order one organ at a time. They'd had to remove one kidney and his appendix. That said, he was relatively whole and not paralyzed. It was going to take a fair amount of physical therapy to get him walking once more, and the doctors had told him that he was probably never going to want to walk long distances again. But then, neither was Brendon, so Ryan figured if they were holding Jon and Spencer back, at least they were doing it together.
The first time they put him in a wheelchair, sitting up straight was so painful that Ryan actually cried. He looked away, because as of yet, neither Spencer nor Brendon had cried over their broken bones in front of him. Brendon just put a light hand to his neck and said, "I accidentally hit my leg the first time I used the crutches then screamed and passed out."
Ryan laughed a little, through the pain, and slid his hand over Brendon's. He made himself lengthen his breathing until it didn't hurt as much anymore, or he was at least able to think through the pain. Then he took his hand back, reached down to the wheels with both, and tried an experimental push. It hurt like hell, but to his surprise, the majority of his upper body strength seemed to have survived. He made it down the hall before falling asleep from sheer exhaustion. When he woke back up, he was in bed again. Jon was playing cards with Brendon in one corner of the room. Spencer was sleeping, curled up on a chair.
Brendon said, "Hey, sleepyhead."
Jon gestured at Spencer. "We tried to get him to go back to the hotel. Even his mom insisted."
Ryan chucked the nearest empty plastic cup at Spencer. He woke up with a snarl. Then he rubbed his eyes and said, "Oh, hey, you're awake."
Ryan pointed at Spencer and then imperiously at the door. Spencer said, "I'm not going, Ryan." Ryan just kept his pointer finger trained on the door. It took two minutes for Spencer to say, "Fine," and walk out with a surprising amount of dignity. Brendon put his head down on the table between Jon and him and convulsed with laughter.
When he came up for air, Jon looked at him and said, "Hey, Bren."
Brendon said, "Yeah, sure," and maneuvered himself up--he was getting pretty good at the crutches--and out of the room. Jon moved to the bed and carefully seated himself to the side of Ryan's legs. Ryan waved, a little, "hello."
Jon smiled and waved back. Ryan tilted his head. Jon said, "I need to ask you something. And if you say no, it's fine, I can take care of myself and all, but just-- This is how I'd prefer it, okay?"
Ryan nodded slowly. Jon said, "Our plan is to get back to Vegas at the beginning of next week. Despite today's adventure, we talked to the doctor, and he thinks you'll be ready by then."
Ryan thought about how he felt about that. It took him a bit, but he decided it was good. He nodded for Jon to go on. Jon said, "Obviously I could rent an apartment for a while, but then I'd have to look, or I'd have to have Spence's mom look or something, and one way or another, someone's going to have to help you, whether it's one of us or someone we hire, so I thought, I mean, I'm not trying to invite myself or anything--"
Ryan put a hand on Jon's. Jon looked at him and Ryan nodded. He didn't want some stranger in his house, seeing him like this. If he couldn't have Spencer, then Jon or Brendon was the next best thing, and there really wasn't that much of a difference. Jon broke into a smile. "Yeah?" Ryan smiled back.
Jon said, "Good, I'm glad, because I kinda thought you were gonna be a stubborn ass about it and I was going to have to buy a condo in your building and just come over all the time until you gave in."
Ryan snorted. It was good to know Jon respected his decisions like that. Jon said, "It's Wednesday. You know what that means." Ryan curled his hand into a fist, held it vertically and swirled it a little bit. Jon bumped fists with him. "That is right, my man. Soft-serve sundae day at the caf!"
Jon held up ten fingers, told Ryan which toppings each one corresponded to, and waited for Ryan to tick off which toppings he wanted, before going off to get them their creamy concoctions.
*
Zack had been in the tech bus, traveling behind them. They hadn't seen much; they had been too busy swerving to avoid making the situation worse, driving off the highway and into a ditch. Most of the techs had some form of whiplash, and one had a broken wrist, but for the most part, they were fine. Zack, however, was acting like he somehow could have intervened with fate, protected them from this, too. Nobody was saying anything, because Ryan couldn't, and the others wouldn't. They just let him coddle them, and figured there were worse things.
On the day they had arranged for flying back, Zack put himself in charge of pushing Ryan's wheelchair, and then carried both Ryan and Brendon up onto the private jet Pete had insisted on. He did it separately, even though Brendon had tried taunting him into doing it all at once. Brendon acted the part of damsel-in-distress perfectly, and as everyone would expect of him, but Ryan could see underneath, to where there was the need to act normal, act Like Brendon. Ryan would never have admitted, ever, that he could tell Brendon was tired, that the strain of the crutches was getting to him.
Zack settled Ryan so that he was lying on the couch, and between him and Spencer, they set him up with water and juice and a soda, just in case. Ryan drank from each one, because they looked so concerned, but then he did what he really needed to do, and passed out from the sheer exhaustion of having been awake and not in bed for over an hour. Healing, as it turned out, was an interminably slow process. Ryan wished he had more patience for it.
He woke up somewhere between takeoff and landing. Spencer was sleeping on the couch across from him, and Zack and Brendon were clearly engaged in a winner-take-all game of something that seemed suspiciously like Old Maid to Ryan. Jon was sitting with a pad in his lap, but he didn't seem to actually be writing. He looked up and saw Ryan looking at him. "Hey."
Ryan waved, then pointed to the pad. Jon came over to sit on the floor, facing Ryan. "Just, there's been music in my head, and I thought maybe if I-- But I think I need my bass."
As far as Ryan could determine, their instruments, having been on the tech bus, were fine and had been shipped home by Pete early on. Ryan nodded. He was pretty anxious to get back to his guitar as well. Ryan glanced down at the pad, not really expecting anything, but found to his surprise that Jon's loose system of musical notation made a certain amount of sense to him. He tugged at the pad and Jon gave it up easily. Ryan looked and looked, and sure enough, a melody came to him. Ryan thought about how his brain could still interpret pictures and wondered if maybe that was how his brain read notes. He didn't care, not at all, that didn't matter. What mattered was that he knew what Jon was trying to say here.
Eagerly, he took the pen from Jon's fingers and added a couple of things. He could tell that his notations weren't right immediately and nearly threw the pen across the room in a repeat of his earlier frustration, but Jon said, "Wait, wait, do you understand? Do you understand the notations?"
Ryan nodded. Jon grinned. "Ryan. Ryan, that's awesome."
Ryan made a squiggly line on the paper. Jon looked. "Okay, well, yeah, that's a problem, but not really. Once we have our instruments you can show me what you want. Or, after you learn to sign, you can tell me and I can write it down. But you can still read music. That's--" This time Jon was the one to throw aside the pad and pen in his efforts to get to Ryan, to safely hug him.
Spencer, Brendon and Zack were all paying attention by this time, Brendon grinning wildly and Spencer moving over to look at the paper, see what Ryan had seen. Ryan hugged Jon back, because okay, at least he could still participate in the writing of music, at least he could still give them that much. That was something, even if it was something they could all do. Something was more than Ryan had had to go on recently.
Over Jon's shoulder, Ryan watched as Spencer smiled down at the pad, hopeful and terrified all at once. Ryan sympathized.
*
"You're a boy," Brendon said, when Spencer brought the ASL tutor he had found for them into the living room. Once the doctors had diagnosed Ryan's speech problems as an unusual-acting type of Aphasia, they had recommended speech therapy, but told him that sign language was probably going to be his best shot at having full conversations again.
"Astute," Jon said.
Brendon scowled at Jon and then Spencer, accusing, "You told me his name was Darcy."
"It is," Darcy said. He held out his hand. "Darcy Carrington. I'd like to say it's a family name, but my mom just has a really big hard-on for Jane Austen."
"Wow, okay," Brendon said. "I'm Brendon, but you can totally call me Brenda for being a presumptuous asshole." He turned quickly. "That only applies to him, dickfaces."
Ryan snickered silently. Brendon was screwed. Spencer said, "Yeah, okay. So, you met me at the door, and you've now been summarily introduced to our pet monkey. This is Jon--" he waited for Jon to hold out a hand and murmur a, "hey, nice to meet you," before continuing, "and this is Ryan."
Ryan held out his hand and smiled tightly for Darcy. Darcy's handshake was firm without being painful, and his eyes were an even, assessing sort of gray, set in a face of soft features--a rounded nose, cheeks that looked ready to smile, a forehead overshadowed by a mess of black curls. He was taller than Ryan, and he would have been even had Ryan been able to stand. He was taller than any of them, but he didn't use his body in a way that made that evident or important. Essentially, in Ryan's first-glance checklist, he came off as a decent guy. When he reclaimed his hand, Darcy said, "In the interest of full disclosure, I should say I'm a casual sort of fan. I have all your stuff on my iPod, and I went to your last tour."
"We'll break you of that," Jon reassured him.
Darcy laughed. "Okay, sounds good. Now that that's out of the way, let's talk about how we're going to do this. I've never worked with an aphasic student before, so I'm about as versed as any of you, and you have the benefit of knowing yourselves better. The suggestion I had was that we start the way I would start with any student, deaf or otherwise, which is with the alphabet. If that ends up not being useful, we'll just move on to other basic lessons, like directions, important questions, that kind of thing. Learning sign language is pretty much like learning any other language, you just get to look a lot cooler doing it."
"Cooler, huh?" Spencer asked, with a telling raise of his eyebrow.
Darcy grinned and moved his hands. Spencer said, "I don't actually know any sign-language yet."
Darcy translated. "I said, 'you tell me.'"
Brendon mimicked the actions. "Yup, yeah, Spencer's theory holds. We're not gonna look as good doing this."
"Speak for yourself," Spencer said, turning on Brendon as was tradition.
"How do I say 'I do' with my hands?" Brendon asked Darcy.
Darcy said, "Maybe a little later," with his mouth and his hands. Brendon watched, totally mesmerized. Ryan knew that look. He was going to have to make Spencer have a talk with Brendon about not molesting his sign language teacher until Ryan at least had a basic dictionary of words.
Darcy continued, "For now, let's start here." He held up his right hand, curling the fingers in a fist, his thumb flush against his fingers. "A." He looked at them expectantly. "Well, everyone repeat after me." His hands flew as he spoke. Ryan had to admit, it did look pretty awesome. Darcy uncurled his fingers, holding them straight up and tight against each other, his thumb turned in slightly to rest against his palm. "B." This time, Ryan held up his hand without having to be told to repeat. The others followed suit.
*
Ryan practiced the alphabet until long after his fingers were sore, until he could call up any letter he wanted to without even really having to think. And then, when he was ready, he tried to spell his name. He had all the tools he needed, the letters and the ability to "say" them. He couldn't remember what order they went in. Or even which letters he needed to create the name. He tried Spencer's, since it was almost as familiar as his own, and found the same thing. The world went a little dark at its edges, and it wasn't until Jon wandered in the room and said, "Holy shit, Ryan, breathe," that he realized he wasn't.
He tried to breathe, because Jon sounded really scared. It shouldn't have even been this big a deal. He couldn't speak, read or write. His ability to spell really wasn't of great consequence. Ryan couldn't breathe. The thought freaked him out less than the spelling thing; he couldn't be bothered to try too hard, not even with Jon sitting there, rubbing his back and saying, "It's all right, Ry, it's all right."
It wasn't. His temples pounded at the loss of oxygen, but his lungs didn't want to open up. Ryan nudged himself a little toward the dark and let it take him. When he woke up, he was lying down. He looked over to see Jon sitting on the floor, legs tucked into a pretzel, staring at Ryan with intense concentration. Ryan waved at him, just enough to let him know that other than being a brain-damaged defect, he was fine.
Jon said, "Hey. Okay, we should make a plan to have that not happen again, because it probably scared me more than the bus accident itself. Granted, I was pretty much unconscious for most of that, but you get my point. You scared the fucking crap out of me."
Sorry, Ryan thought, but didn't have the energy to come up with a way to convey his apology. Jon took a breath. "Sorry. I didn't mean to get all--" He shook his head. "What happened?"
Ryan didn't really want to try and explain that without words, either, but Jon still looked a little terrified, so he found energy in himself somewhere and started signing through the alphabet, just like they had learned. Jon nodded. "Alphabet, right."
Ryan made a dash with his hand. Jon frowned. "No alphabet?" Ryan sighed. Jon said, "Okay, okay, I can keep guessing. Um. You feel like you're bad at it and you're worried that you will be with the rest of the signs?" Ryan shook his head. Jon sat for a bit. "Oh. Oh. Wait. Ry. If you can't read..." He tilted his head. "Spell 'Jon' for me."
Ryan held out his hands uselessly. Jon nodded. "Okay. Well. We're just going to have to come up with customized signs for each of our names. I read online that people do that for the most part anyway, as a short cut. And the rest of the stuff, we'll figure out as we go along."
That was eminently logical, but all Ryan could do was blink at Jon, who was acting like this wasn't a big deal, like this wasn't one more thing that made Ryan completely fucking useless. Jon helped himself to his feet and said, "I'll be right back, don't go anywhere."
Since getting to as far as the bathroom was still a slow and agonizing process, Ryan didn't really see that happening. Jon came back after a while with two guitars in hand, one of them the one Ryan used when he just wanted to hole up in his house and write by himself. Despite his yearning, Ryan hadn't so much as attempted to touch his guitars since getting home, for fear of finding that was lost to him, too. He didn't particularly want that knowledge any more now than he had yesterday. Jon held out the guitar, but Ryan didn't reach up to take it. Jon just kept holding it until his arm shook with the effort and Ryan could tell it was hurting his still-healing ribs. Regretfully, Ryan took it from him, but he didn't put it in the position to play.
Jon, on the other hand, held his gingerly against his torso. It occurred to Ryan that he hadn't heard Jon playing at all, which was odd, since Jon had to know he could. Unless he just didn't want to hurt Ryan's feelings. Jon was like that. Then again, it probably wasn't the most comfortable thing in the world just yet to have the guitar rest against him. John plucked out a couple of notes. He asked, "Can you... Did you know which ones--"
Oh. Ryan held up his hand and signed out, "A, G, F."
Jon grinned so hard Ryan was a little surprised it could fit on his face. Ryan thought about what he had done for a couple of seconds and then slowly, hesitantly, arranged the guitar on his lap. It fit against him, in his fingers, just like it always had, and Ryan strummed at it a little, just to see if that was still familiar, too. It was. He picked out the melody for "7 Minutes in Heaven" because it had been stuck in his head for the better part of three days no matter what he did and because if he couldn't play one of Pete's songs, it wouldn't be as bad as finding out he couldn't play one of his own.
But he could play it. The notes came to him without even having to think of them, one after another, his fingers at the right places before he even considered where they needed to be. Jon was still grinning, filling out the sound as much as he could. "I should go grab my bass."
Ryan nodded in agreement, but he couldn't really be bothered by only having the guitars, not at this moment. For the first time since he'd woken up not knowing what the hell was going on, Ryan felt like he could actually catch his breath, actually have each inhalation bottom out. When he finished the song, Ryan went to the next that popped into his head and then the next and the next. His fingers were bleeding by the time Jon tugged the guitar from him, but he couldn't even feel it. Jon brought a washcloth and some bandages and cleaned him up. While he was sitting in front of Ryan, he said, "Honestly, what's a little spelling in the face of that?"
It was still everything, but at least everything had stopped seeming quite so large.
Part Two