Chapter 2
The next time Sirius awakes, it’s to the sound of blaring machines and a shrill, screaming alarm outside of Remus’ door.
He’s wide awake in an instant, looking at the screen to see something bad. Something really, really bad. Where Remus’ ecg should be showing regular spikey peaks every few moments, instead the line is jagged and almost seems to be pointing downward instead of upward with every upside down u-shaped peak.
Pulseless ventricular tachycardia.
It's something Sirius has lived in fear of seeing on Remus’ monitor ever since he saw it for the very first time back in their Freshman year of college. Back then, Sirius knew nothing about medical equipment or heart conditions, he didn't even realize all the ways one's heart could fuck up.
Sometimes he misses his naïveté, the time before he knew all of the different things he needed to be scared of when it comes to Remus' health. But this is the life that Sirius chose and he will never get to live in blissful ignorance again, though Remus is 1,000,000% worth it and he'd make the same choice everytime.
The door to Remus’ room is slamming open and the entire code team is rushing to Remus’ bedside. Nurse Karl, one of Remus’ favorite nurses in the CICU, is there ushering Sirius out of the way.
It takes Sirius a couple moments to realize what's happening but, when he does, he begins moaning miserably, “No, no, no no no nonononono…”
The team goes to work quickly, a young resident is straddling Remus’ body and he can hear the sickening sound as Remus’ sternum is pushed forcefully down, the sound of a breaking rib echoes in his ears. He can’t understand any of the individual words. All he knows is that Karl is there, holding him tightly, keeping him from rushing into the fray.
Sirius is hyperventilating as the resident ceases compressions and everyone backs away as shocks are delivered to his lover’s chest. Remus is so tall, such a big guy, but right now he looks so small and fragile. He wants to rip into everybody who is touching his husband, breaking his ribs and shocking him. Hurting him.
Sirius knows, he knows they’re trying to save Remus’ life, but he can’t stand seeing Remus’ body brutalized and damaged, even in the aim of saving his life. He’s already suffering enough, he doesn’t deserve to have a broken rib or fractured sternum on top of it.
Sirius thinks distantly that the scene in front of him is why he’ll never be able to believe in God, even if he wanted to. What kind of God would make such a gentle soul like Remus suffer with pain and illness and cognitive difficulties, just to force more pain onto him while he’s already down?
Before Sirius can protest, Nurse Karl is leading him out into the hallway as the doctors and nurses continue to work on Remus. The nurse gently plucks Sirius’ phone from his hand where he’d been clutching it with a deathly grip.
“Let’s call James, Sirius,” Karl suggests, handing the phone over so that Sirius can input his code.
Sirius vaguely registers that the time is 2:17 am. The middle of the night. Calling James would mean waking him up but he can’t think about that now. He needs him, he needs James.
Sirius clicks the call button but when James’ groggy voice answers on the other side, Sirius finds that he can’t speak. All that comes out is a choked, moaning whine as he bursts into sobs.
“Sirius, what is it mate?” James says, his voice is suddenly much less groggy and he sounds alert.
Sirius tries to reply, he really, really tries but he can’t say it.
Karl gently takes the phone again from Sirius and speaks into the receiver.
“Hi James, it’s Karl, I’m here with Sirius,” Nurse Karl’s voice is steady and calm as he speaks. “Remus has coded. They’re working on him now. I think Sirius needs somebody to come be with him.”
Sirius doesn’t know when the phone call ends because he’s now just standing, face transfixed on the window to Remus’ room where the nurses have drawn the curtains so that he can’t see inside. He wants to go to Remus but he also finds that he can’t move. He begins losing time.
He doesn’t know how long it is before James arrives but when he does, the doctor’s have already come out to let Sirius know that they resuscitated Remus and that the cardiac arrest is over. Sirius, still can’t move though, knowing that the nurses are inside the room, caring for Remus’ new injuries and double checking all of his lines and tubes to make sure nothing was jostled or damaged in the panic to save his life.
That’s where James finds Sirius. Standing stolidly outside of Remus’ room, staring blankly ahead, hardly blinkling.
“Hey Pads, I’m here,” James says, folding Sirius into his arms immediately. “I just saw the doctor at the nurse’s station, they said he’s stable again. We can go in.”
Sirius nods blankly and James has to coax him to walk forward and when they get inside the room, the nurses have nearly managed to clean up from the chaos. Only Remus’ blankets crumpled in a heap on the ground and Remus’ naked body, where his gown was ripped off, give clues as to the events that just took place inside.
James steers Sirius toward the chair at the bedside and he points out Remus’ heart monitor, and his O2 sats. They’re back to normal which… which Sirius can’t believe. He feels like he’s been whiplashed. From calm to panic back to calm so quickly that he can hardly understand what has occurred.
“He’s stable again, Pads,” James tries to be reassuring, his hand rubbing Sirius’ shoulder gently. “He’s coded before and everything has been fine. He seems to be doing okay.”
Sirius is staring at Remus’s face, lax and tranquil, just as it had been when Sirius watched the sedatives take over earlier that night. Sirius watches as the kind nurse from earlier and Nurse Karl redress Remus in a gown and cover him back up with a fresh, warm blanket.
“He woke up earlier,” Sirius whispers, voice thick with guilt. “He was scared, James. He was so uncomfortable and scared… maybe he could feel it coming. He was fighting the breathing tube… maybe he was trying to talk, trying to tell me something.”
James squats down next to the chair, taking Sirius’ face in his large hands.
“Hey, but he’s okay now, we can see his monitor, yeah? He’s doing fine,” James says, forcing Sirius to look at him.
“But he was scared , James. He was scared and I just called the nurse to have her sedate him and then soothed him back to sleep,” Sirius moans miserably, the tears threatening to come back. “I could have listened, I could have tried to understand. I could have done something. ”
James looks Sirius in the eyes, his face serious and hands grounding, “All of us here, including Remus, know that calling the nurse was the right thing to do in that situation. You couldn’t have removed his breathing tube so he could talk and he was suffering from delirium. It would have been crueler to allow him to remain conscious.”
Sirius can’t speak anymore, the tears overtake him and he’s crying into James’ shoulder, taking huge shuddering breaths.
James holds him for a while but when it becomes clear that Sirius is struggling to self-regulate and ground himself, James goes over to Sirius’ backpack and pulls out Sirius’ prescription bottle of Xanax and takes out three pills.
James squats down at Sirius’ side again, handing him a pill and instructing him to bite a small piece and let it dissolve under his tongue. Once the bit under his tongue has dissolved, James hands him the rest and he swallows them down with a gulp of water. He becomes pleasantly calm soon after, his eyes drooping.
At some point he feels James pick him up and carry him over to the pull out bed and he wants to protest but he can’t manage. He knows James won’t leave now anyway and he knows James will sit with Remus while Sirius can’t.
James tucks him in, a plush pillow under his head and the warm duvet over the top, James is smoothing his hair and Sirius feels himself get dragged under into sleep almost immediately by the sedating effects of the Xanax.
When Sirius wakes, he struggles to awaken from his fog of anxiety medication but he feels a strong hand on his shoulder and looks up to see Regulus sitting next to his head, his hand protectively placed on Sirius’ shoulder. He lifts his own hand to grip Regulus’.
“Reggie…” it’s a whimper and the tears come quickly to Sirius’ eyes again.
“I know Siri, I know,” Regulus says softly, eyes sad and pitying, arm tightening protectively around Sirius. “He’s okay, he’s still stable. The doctor came by a little bit earlier.”
Sirius lays there a bit more trying to crawl out of the fog and when he finally manages to open his eyes and sit up, he realizes they’re all there. James and Regulus, Lily, Pandora, Marlene, Mary, Pete, Barty, Evan. All of them.
James must have rallied the troops over night. Explained the situation and pulled everybody to come be here for Remus and Sirius but, especially, for Sirius. He knows how it goes.
Throughout the day, individual people come and go but Sirius is never alone with Remus today and he is encouraged to sleep as much as possible. James never leaves his side and makes sure to keep him on a routine with his anxiety medication to keep the panic attacks at bay.
Eventually, he finds his way back over to Remus’ bedside where he lays again with his head on Remus’ thigh and hand in Remus’ hand. James covers him with the duvet again, a comforting hand on his shoulder.
God, Sirius feels so lucky. It’s incredible how lucky and unlucky one can feel all at one time. So lucky to have the most amazing support network imaginable. So unlucky to be finding himself at another hospital bedside, clinging to Remus, hoping to be the anchor that keeps him tethered to Earth.
Sirius allows himself to drift off. Maybe when the doctors come by in the evening, there will be good news. Sirius forces him to imagine that their news will be good news everytime because he just cannot entertain anything else.
James’ steady hand never leaves his back for hours and hours and hours.