A Long Trip Home

[chimeramimicry]

The door is two yards away but I can't move from the top of the stairs.  It's been months, four or so, since I've been here, in this spot.  Gone were the days of trudging up the stairs with my satchel on the way home from work because my building's landlords refused to fix the elevators properly.  Gone too was the pleasure I had of returning to this apartment I paid for with my own money and not from my trust fund.  I donated all of that to charity the moment I turned twenty-five and finished paying off my loans to school.  It was two years ago.  It feels like forever.

I'm not the same man I had been.  I'm not a child anymore.  At least, I want to think that.

I'm still clutching the photograph of my brother and I in our tuxedos.  There's a smudge on it from my thumb and full of creases.  I've not let it go since I opened that box containing everything that I am.  Everything I was.  I left Ireland without looking back.  There was, there is only one thing on my mind.  Nathan.

Nathan.

Nathan.

I know he's here.  I've always felt a connection to him.  Mohinder Suresh called it part of my empathy, to feel things like that.  Funny to be so empathically linked to someone I spent my whole life pining for, who has always had a life to live without me.  He's never had time for me.  Never.

"Just walk, Peter," I whisper to myself as I move to a door I have not touched in a long time.  I swallow.  And knock.  I know he's in here without knowing it.  I almost lose the nerve to knock.  Please answer, Nathan.  Please.

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[chimeramimic.livejournal.com]

Stumbling backwards, towards two girls ready to claw out the eyes of anyone that hurts me, I stop time. I'm alone in the silence after that, and it lets me drop to my knees to sit out the fit of hyperventilation I'm experiencing. It's been awhile since I've had a panic attack, and I accept it as it is and just let it go, exhaling through my nose until everything stops spinning.

I don't know how to handle this. Situation control is not my forte and I pick myself up slowly to move to Nathan's side. He's still got our mother's wrist, and that's good enough.

I touch them both and for them at least, the world resumes it's course. Everyone else is struck with looks of confusion on their faces. Immediately, Mom pulls herself away from us and gives me a push as she looks around, makeup smeared on her face.

"You have no idea," she says, choking on her own tongue as she tries to stop her quaking, "what you two are doing!"