Long Term - Chapter 5

I held the door open while Adam steered the powerchair through. Then I set the room key and our backpacks on the small mirrored table and stepped beside him. "Well?" I asked, a little nervous despite everything.

I still relied mainly on Adam to judge how accessible a room really was.

"More than enough space," Adam noted with an amused glance up at me.

Satisfied, I stepped out of my shoes with a sigh of relief while Adam concentrated on navigating the wheelchair through the narrow gap between the foot of the bed and the wall, where the entrance to the bathroom was located.

"May I?" he asked, nodding toward the open bathroom.

"Of course." I replied, grinning. “No underwear lying around, or whatever you were expecting…”

I wasn't messy to begin with, and I'd quickly learned that clothes on the floor were a bad idea, at least if I wanted to avoid tire tracks on them.

"Too bad, actually," Adam murmured with a crooked grin as he navigated into the bathroom.

I shook my head as I watched him and could hardly believe any of this was real. How often I’d seen Adam in a hotel room I couldn’t say. I’d lost count. But during the last weeks a sight like this had only existed in my memory. Just a few hours ago, I’d seriously doubted my efforts to claim an accessible room. And now Adam was here, like he’d never been whisked away. As if the hospital had never happened.

But it had and I knew he’d have to return, eventually.

While Adam stripped off his gloves and washed his hands in the open bathroom, I stacked the two comforters on top of each other on the side of the bed facing the door. Then I laid one of the two additional blankets that were piled on the armchair over them, keeping the other one back for covering up. My hands on my hips, I regarded my work and hoped it would be enough. It would be up to Adam to judge.

After I'd also freshened up in the bathroom, we met again in front of the bed. Adam had navigated backward as close as possible to the long side, lowered the seat of the powerchair and folded one armrest out of the way. I pushed the heavy armchair in front of him.

"What do you think?" I asked, barely able to stand the tension. I took the transfer board from the back pocket of the wheelchair and laid it on the bed, pressing on it experimentally.

"Hmm," Adam said. "How many blankets is that?"

"Three," I announced, irrationally proud, and smirked. "But don't say anything, that's definitely the maximum I could squeeze out. If we need more, they'll probably have to close the hotel."

His mouth twitched. "We'll try it. Getting into bed is no problem, getting back out..." He raised his shoulders, his eyes twinkling with amusement.

Shit, right, I’d been so fixated on getting Adam to finally lie down to rest that I hadn’t thought about how he’d transfer out of the lower bed. I tried not to imagine what would happen if he couldn't manage to get back into the wheelchair. I could support him during the transfer; I'd done that countless times by now. But I also knew from that how incredibly heavy and unwieldy the immobile part of his body was. I had no idea how much taller than me he'd be if he could stand, but it was certainly a head's difference between us. No way I could carry him, not even for a split second.

"Ready?"

I nodded and our gazes met. His was determined and firm, and I resolved not to worry anymore. He knew what he was doing.

As always, I began by gripping under Adam's knees with both hands and pulling carefully so he slid forward a bit in the seat. When I’d done that the first time, following his instructions, I’d been enormously surprised by how easily I could move his butt forward. He was a large man and still… his body just followed when I tugged his knees out of equilibrium.

He gave me a brief nod as a sign when it was far enough and I lifted his feet from the footrests. One by one, making sure I placed the soles of his shoes flat on the ground. Adam needed a while to also push his upper body forward which was still slumped against the backrest. Eventually he sat freely, his fists propped behind him on the seat cushion, not swaying. His gaze was focused.

"The board," he said briefly and I stood up and pulled it closer to us. Now it became clear how big the height difference between the bed and the wheelchair seat actually was. Adam leaned slightly to the side, supported with one forearm braced on the armrest, and I carefully pushed one end of the transfer board under him.

The other end hovered about a hand's breadth above the bed. Damn. I sank into the armchair across from him and looked at him.

He nodded, intense concentration edged into his face. "It'll work. Come closer."

I scooted forward a bit more in the armchair until his knees were between my legs. This way I could stabilize them so they wouldn't tip sideways. I leaned forward and gripped his hips from the sides below. I couldn’t really lift him and I wasn’t going to attempt to. But I could give him little pushes, boost his own efforts.

"On three?"

I was very close to him, could hear his slightly accelerated breathing. This was new; normally he didn't get out of breath so quickly.

My throat was dry and I merely nodded, my forehead brushing his chest in the process, but I had no time to consider whether he could feel that. Then he moved, a choreography incomprehensible to me of remaining arm strength and leverage. Several times he counted to three in a flat voice and each time he slid a bit farther onto the board, which now lowered with one side onto the bed. My legs framed his. They leaned lightly against mine, motionless.

The triple blanket padding looked bulkier than it was. When Adam's weight landed on it, it compressed considerably. With a jerk of his head, he regained his balance against the inclined surface and gasped. His breathing was now rapid.

Our gazes met, his almost apologetic, before he let himself fall forward and pressed his forehead against my shoulder. Another anchor point for him, as I knew. He changed the position of his hands, pushed off again and slid in increments along the board until he'd finally made it completely over the gap between wheelchair and bed. He pushed off from me laboriously with his head and sat free again, this time swaying slightly.

"Okay?" Even my breath was faster, although I had just been assisting. I realized I’d held it the entire time his body was making its way over the hand’s breadth of space, teetering on the edge of the precipice, just a strip of plastic and air below him.

"Yes," he said briefly. I could see the transfer had cost him a lot. "The board can go."

I nodded, carefully pulled it out from under him. It had shifted anyway; he was only sitting half on it. I placed it on the empty seat of the wheelchair. The whole time I'd had one hand firmly on his upper arm, my knees still around his.

Adam cautiously turned his head to eye the two pillows I'd stacked behind him and sighed. "I think you'll have to help me."

He used to be able to lie down himself, in a mixture of controlled lowering of his arms and letting his upper body drop. Before. Now I suspected his back was still too fragile for that. Gingerly I got up, gripped his shoulders and together we managed to slowly bring him into a half-lying position. He smiled at me weakly, sweat beading on his forehead.

"Yeah, that was a piece of cake," he said dryly.

I laughed hoarsely. His legs still hung over the bed, his feet neatly next to each other on the floor. I knelt down to unlace the shoes and strip them from his feet. As always, his feet were unexpectedly heavy and I had to grip firmly not to let them fall back to the floor but to set them down gently. Then I pushed his legs onto the bed one after the other. It was like hauling up enormous logs.

While I moved the armchair back to its place, Adam slid somewhat farther toward the middle of the bed and completely onto the pillows, mainly using his shoulders. It was still a mystery to me how he could move himself like that.

"Are you comfortable?"

He nodded. "Divine," he joked and sighed. I gave him a kiss on the forehead and he closed his eyes briefly. His breathing was calming again, but his skin was pale and sweaty.

"Should I crack the window? You seem hot," I asked and he nodded. I straightened up, tilted the windows and drew the curtains at the window facing the balcony of the opposite room. The other window only offered a view of a windowless facade, so I left it open. From the bed we could at least see a corner of the darkening sky above the building.

“Thanks,” he murmured groggily. “Oh, and could you give me my medication?”

His voice was barely above a whisper.

“Sure.”

I tipped the handful of pills into his open mouth and carefully offered him a sip from my water bottle. A dribble ran down his chin despite my care and I dabbed at it with my sleeve, then sank down next to Adam and laid my cheek on his upper arm. I could still hear his breath, but it was sounding steadier now. "I'm so glad you're here," I murmured and meant everything. Here in my hotel room, in my bed, with me. And here, as in still here.

The first weeks Adam had spent in the hospital had made it clear to both of us that spinal fusion surgery was unavoidable. A second one—the first had been more than two decades ago, just after his accident, as he told me. Despite everything, it hadn’t been an easy decision for Adam the second time around. No one could tell if the surgery, with all its risks, would help relieve his pain—or make it worse. And no one could foresee that a couple of other surgeries would follow.

Now, Adam lay on his back, head turned slightly toward me, eyes half-lidded. The corner of his mouth twitched upward—tired, but genuine. Seeing him like this, I had to assume it had maybe all been the right decision.

"I'm sorry you had to worry," he murmured.

His voice was softer when he lay like this, his breathing shallow. But that wasn’t the only reason. He didn’t meet my eyes.

Oh Adam.

I buried my face in the hollow of his neck, before he could see what that sentence did to me. I wanted the familiar scent of him, the warmth of his skin — but mostly, I wanted to hide the tears springing to my eyes again. In the days before his surgeries, I'd made sure to load myself with so much work that I fell asleep from exhaustion in the evenings before my brain had the chance to drift off and imagine in endless loops what all could happen while Adam was under general anesthesia. But that never quite worked.

"I never…" Adam continued quietly. “I never wanted that.”

"I think if you’d had the choice,” I said after a moment, forcing a weak smile into my voice, “you probably would have done a lot of things differently. Less dramatically.” I rolled off him and looked with him at the ceiling of the hotel room.

He let out a breathless laugh.

"I can't really believe you're still here," he then murmured, so quietly I almost missed it.

I pulled back, propping myself on my elbow to make it easier for him to look at me. "What do you mean?"

His shoulders twitched. “That you didn’t run. I mean... two months!” He swallowed. “You traveled to a hospital for two months just to watch me lie in a bed. You could’ve been with anyone. Doing literally anything else."

Snorting, I shook my head. "I wanted to be with you."

"Still..." His tone remained serious. "That's... I can't believe you did that for me."

"Adam.” I sighed. His eyes met mine, his gaze obviously baffled. Was he really this clueless? "Adam… What is this to you?" I asked, sharper than intended.

Now it was his turn to frown. "What do you mean?"

I sat up, exhaling. "We've known each other for... what, eight months?" My hands lifted, then dropped back onto the bed. "This is... not just a fling anymore, is it? This is more than... a nice weekend now and then. A little cuddling, sex. And damn, yes, no one could have guessed you'd spend two months in this stupid hospital, but that's how it is. And of course I visited you there! If you really want to know, I plan to continue doing so, even if you spend the rest of your life on R1. You're not getting rid of me that easily, Mr. Nicholson!"

Adam made a strangled sound and turned his head away, blinking.

My heart hammered. I hadn’t planned any of that. Hadn’t even fully known it myself until it was out there, sitting between us. But now that it was, I couldn’t take it back. Somewhere along our long-distance thing — between dinners, slow city trips, waiting for ramps and taxis and taking breaks — this had stopped being casual. Everything with Adam took longer. And in that space, we’d talked. There hadn’t been much room to hide, especially not for him.

Some time back then, I had fallen for Adam. Hard. And I thought he had too, was almost certain of it. But during all that time we'd never talked about where we actually saw ourselves as a couple. The hospital got in the way of that, pretty solidly. And I suddenly realized, I didn’t know what he wanted from this, from us… If we even wanted the same thing.

I waited. Acutely, painfully aware again of the fact that he couldn’t just leave. Couldn’t even fully turn away.

Finally Adam turned his head back to me, his eyes moist.

"The sex was pretty important too though, wasn't it?" He smiled at me crookedly, something apologetic in his eyes.

I understood what he was telling me. Not now. We'd have to talk, more extensively, sometime later. But not during the last shared hours today, at the first meeting alone after two months.

Rolling my eyes, I sank back against the bed and gave him a kiss on the cheek, then on the temple. That was Adam, evasive as always. "The sex was pretty important, yes."

We were quiet. Then, following a sudden urge, I kissed Adam on the lips, gripping his jaw with my other hand. “Is this okay then?” I asked cheekily. Apparently we weren’t going to talk. So we could just as well use the time left.

He didn’t reply, instead lifted his head to draw me back into the kiss, opening his lips. I welcomed his tongue with a surprised gasp. When we paused briefly, he turned his head slightly away from me with a satisfied hum and I accepted the tempting invitation almost immediately, kissing the side of his face along the jawline to his ear. With the tip of my tongue, I slowly traced along his earlobe until I heard him breathing faster, then took it carefully between my teeth, biting gently.

"Rachel… Damn.” Adam’s voice was rough.

I laughed, my breath brushing over his cheek, and I enjoyed how he gasped for air in response. "I missed you," I murmured, continued nibbling on his earlobe and traced the shape of his throat with featherlight touch.

"Mmmh... Keep going," he whispered hoarsely, his vocal cords vibrating under my fingertips.

I paused briefly, trying to reconcile this request with the fact that Adam was, quite literally, still a patient of a hospital he had left today for the first time in two months. "Yeah?” A grin stole on my face. “Okay..."

I buried my nose in his neck, inhaling until I got dizzy, then kissed him some more, hungry.

This was it again. Not my place to judge. This was Adam’s call.

But truth be told, I really don't know if there was much that could have stopped me at this point.