Mindtouch (The Dreamhealers 1)

by M. C. A. Hogarth

  “I have been accepted to both my residencies,” Jahir said, lifting the data tablet he’d been holding.

  “The one off-world—”

  “And the one here, at General,” Jahir agreed. “And I must decide by the end of the semester which I am to attend, because if I choose Heliocentrus I have to be on my way by the first week of intersession.”

  Vasiht’h pressed his forepaws into the rug to keep from chafing them together. “And you don’t know which one you want? I would have thought you’d be mad for off-world. Especially since it’s on the capital. You’d learn a tremendous amount there.”

  “I would, and I won’t deny that I find the opportunity compelling,” Jahir said. He slowly rubbed his thumb along the edge of the data tablet, his gaze lowered, distracted. Was he really that uncertain? Vasiht’h bit his lip as the Eldritch looked up and continued. “But staying here has its advantages as well, chief among them that I wouldn’t be learning my way around a foreign city and culture at the same time I’d be engaged in a residency even my mentor deems arduous.”

  “I’ve heard some of the medical track residencies are hard,” Vasiht’h murmured.

  “Yes,” Jahir said. “It may be prudent to minimize my risks.”

  Vasiht’h studied his friend, who was again staring at the data tablet, this time with a slight frown. The mindtouch woke to give him the sensation of his heart skipping, the translated impression of a queasy hesitance.

  So his roommate really didn’t know what to do. And oh, how Vasiht’h wanted him to stay! Jahir could go to the hospital and come back to him for help staying grounded and sane. Vasiht’h could go back to school and wrap up the last of the clinical classes he needed to graduate. They could live together for another two years….

  But if Jahir stayed on Seersana, he’d never know whether he could survive the medical track on his own. He’d never have a chance to learn—as Vasiht’h had learned—that maybe he was in the wrong place. That maybe he needed the more normal ups and downs of a practice outside a hospital setting. If he went to Heliocentrus, Vasiht’h would lose him. But he might come out of the experience wiser about his own needs, and whether work in a hospital was the only way to fulfill them.

  But he would lose him.

  “I think you should go,” Vasiht’h said softly.

  “Arii?” Jahir said, looking up in surprise.

  “If you’re going to give yourself to medical,” Vasiht’h said, his chest growing tight and painful, “you should know if you can handle it at its roughest.”

  The mindline began to coalesce between them, whispering. Vasiht’h closed his eyes and pushed it away; it unraveled and took with it the hint of loss, bitter in his mouth like tannin. When he could open his eyes again, he said, “You need to know. Better to learn before you graduate and get your license.”

  “Yes,” Jahir said after a moment. “I can see where that would be the better part of wisdom.”

  When his roommate didn’t go on, Vasiht’h frowned. “Arii?”

  Jahir looked up, and there was what looked like beseechment in his eyes. Eyes like honey in sunlight. “I am not sure I wish to be wise,” he said.

  Vasiht’h cleared his throat. The pressure in his chest was so intense he thought he might cry. He carefully flexed his toes and fingers, crossed his arms. “We have to be brave enough to make the mistakes that teach us. Right?”

  The silence then was painfully empty without the mindtouch to tell him what his roommate was thinking.

  “We do,” Jahir said finally. Quieter, “Vasiht’h. Thank you for the advice.”

  “Anytime,” Vasiht’h said, and padded into his room before Jahir could ask if he wanted dinner. The last thing he wanted was to eat. That sense of loss he’d felt in the mindline before he had pushed it away… Jahir had already made his decision. They both knew it.

  CHAPTER 36

  The last two days of the semester were too, too full: his final few sessions with the patients he’d come to know during the practicum; the examinations with all the attendant studying; one last meal with the quadmates, all of whom were staying on at the university but him. Somehow he managed.

  At their table, KindlesFlame asked, “So, did you decide?”

  “I’m going to Selnor,” Jahir said.

  KindlesFlame smiled and said, “Tell me how it goes, ah?”

  “I shall,” Jahir promised, and then they were joined by Kandara, who’d been invited by KindlesFlame for this last lunch. The two of them regaled him with stories from their own residencies; though the healer residencies were treated very differently from the psychiatric ones, he still found the anecdotes delightful, and full of the wisdom of people looking back on their mistakes from years of perspective.

  And yet, even more than their stories, he felt their camaraderie, the ease they had in one another’s presence, the common context they shared in their backgrounds. How many years had KindlesFlame said he’d known Lasareissa Kandara? Long enough to have grown into a union he could sense at the edge of his mind.

  He was aware, distantly, of a yearning toward that, and gently put it away. Distance. He would respect the distance. Did not Berquist tell him that the people who cared for him would have to be willing to live with the inevitable hurt they would consign him to? And who was he to object, if they withdrew?

  Saying goodbye to the girls was difficult. That day he sat in their story corner with Persy in his lap and Amaranth and Kuriel leaning against him, and Vasiht’h had settled across from him, still observing their mind-silence. That hurt, but he thought—he hoped—he was growing accustomed to it. He would be doing without when he reached Selnor.

  “But where are you going?” Persy was asking.

  “To Heliocentrus,” Jahir told him. “To one of the hospitals there.”

  “Oh!” Amaranth said. “You’ll be on Selnor! Maybe you’ll see Meekie and Kayla. You could tell us how they are.”

  “I could,” Jahir agreed, and gathered them all close. Their sadness welled into him, and their uncertainty and resignation, and he paced his breathing, taking it in and letting it out. When he opened his eyes, he found his roommate concentrating, and his chest was rising and falling in synchronicity, and the children’s sadness was passing through him and out of them both. He thought, but did not allow out of his own mind, You’re still there.

  Shivering once, Jahir rested his head against Persy’s. “I will miss you all, ariisen.” They smelled of antiseptic and the slight sour scent of sickness, and his eyes watered. He waited until he had his composure before straightening and saying, “But let us not dwell on it. What shall we do?”

  “Read to us?” Amaranth asked.

  “Come closer, manylegs,” Kuriel added, reaching over to tug on Vasiht’h’s paw.

  So the Glaseah curled closer, and Jahir brought forth the book and read them poetry, about birds and trees that saw the passing of the years.

  When it was time to go, Persy said, “Jahir-alet? We made you something.”

  “You did?” he said, surprised.

  Amaranth went to the table and fetched back a folded paper card. Hearts had been pasted to it, and drawings of plump unicorns frisking, their tails decorated with flowers and butterflies and rainbows. On the inside, they had signed their names; not just theirs, but Meekie and Kayla’s too, in Kuriel’s writing.

  “For me,” Jahir asked, throat tight.

  “For you! To remember us,” Kuriel said.

  Jahir went to one knee and offered his arms, and they poured into them. He fell past their sadness and into their love, and could not believe that he had earned it… and that he was choosing to leave it.

  Outside, he found Berquist waiting. “So did they—ah, they did. They worked on that for two days, if you believe.”

  “I do,” Jahir said, and cleared his throat. “I am honored.”

  “Mmm. Well, there’s one thing missing from it, and the rascals gave their okay. If you mind?” She held out her hand, and he gave her the
card, mystified.

  She found a pen and wrote her own name alongside her charges’ and then gave it back. “I’ll never forget finding the two of you jumping rope for them in the parking lot. Thank you for being part of their lives. And mine.”

  Jahir bowed to her, and she seemed to find that an appropriate farewell. When he rose she had taken a step back and turned away. She was wise, he thought. She had learned how to hold a thing apart.

  “I guess you’re leaving soon,” Vasiht’h said as they walked to the apartment.

  “Tomorrow,” Jahir said. “I am almost done packing.” He glanced at his roommate. “I thought we could make dinner.”

  “I’d like that,” the Glaseah said. He frowned. “I’m not sure there’s food, though…”

  “I bought groceries.”

  Vasiht’h smiled. “I guess you had this planned.”

  “I had hoped you would be agreeable,” Jahir said. Quieter: “I will miss our meals together.”

  “So will I,” Vasiht’h said softly.

  It was good, working together in the kitchen; as they did, Jahir noticed how easily they moved around one another. He reached over Vasiht’h; Vasiht’h ducked under his arm. He dealt with the preparation, and Vasiht’h cooked. They did it without consulting one another, and the mindtouches lapped against his mind, trying to bring the mindline back. He knew that Vasiht’h was blocking it, and even wishing to feel that connection again he couldn’t bring himself to ask. Their parting would be difficult enough without adding that much more weight to it. Some things came and went; was that not the Alliance’s lesson? He would have to grow accustomed to the ephemeral joys, and make his peace with their passage from his life.

  “You have not told me how the research went this semester,” Jahir said over dinner.

  “Oh!” Vasiht’h said. And softer, “Oh. No, I didn’t, did I.” He looked up. “It went awfully.”

  Jahir set his fork down and gave his roommate his attention.

  “Contaminated, completely. Not a single result I can use,” Vasiht’h said, without the distress Jahir had been expecting. “And my thesis… I never did write a good draft. In fact, I never got past the first paragraph of my abstract.”

  “You gave it up,” Jahir said, understanding.

  “I did,” Vasiht’h said, meeting his eyes. “I was trying to do something I wasn’t suited for. Instead, I kept helping the people I was supposed to be studying. And I was doing that because… I enjoy it.”

  “You no longer fear you will be incapable of rising to the demands of practice,” Jahir said.

  “No.” The Glaseah breathed in, shook his head. “No. I’ve had enough experiences lately to prove otherwise. I’m steady on these feet, even when I feel like I’m dying inside.” That startled Jahir into looking at him sharply, but he was still speaking. “So I’m going clinical. I’ll take some practice management and business classes too. It should help. I’ve never run a business before.”

  “Sensible,” Jahir said, surprised at his own relief.

  “You’re glad,” Vasiht’h observed, brows lifting. “About this.”

  “I am. I did not think you suited to research,” Jahir said. “You have such a natural talent for helping others. You put them at ease.”

  “And you told me so when I decided to go research,” Vasiht’h said. “I would have saved a lot of time if I’d just listened to you, but… I guess some things we just have to figure out on our own before we actually believe them.”

  “Change must come from within,” Jahir murmured.

  “Yes.”

  “But it can be influenced by the opinions of someone we trust,” Jahir finished, and saw Vasiht’h’s surprised glance. He stood and said, “We should make more-almond cookies.”

  Shaking himself, Vasiht’h said, “Well, you certainly won’t get any argument out of me.”

  Over cookies and kerinne—and tea—Jahir said, “Vasiht’h… I will write. You know I will.”

  “I know,” Vasiht’h said, and swallowed. “And you know me. I’m always corresponding with family.”

  Jahir nodded. “I will look forward to that, then.”

  “When does your shuttle leave?” Vasiht’h asked, toying with the handle of his cup.

  “I must be at the orbital facility by dawn, I’m afraid,” Jahir said. “My trip to Selnor requires several transfers, and if I miss any one of them I might not arrive in time to report for the residency.”

  “Interplanetary travel’s messy that way,” Vasiht’h said. “You… you should get some rest, then. Go to bed early.”

  “I should,” Jahir said. “After I wash the cups—”

  “I’ll wash the cups,” Vasiht’h said. “Don’t worry about it.”

  Jahir studied him… this alien who’d taken him beneath a wing from his first day on Seersana. He no longer seemed so strange to the Eldritch’s eyes: the feathered ears and wings and the centauroid body. He had become Vasiht’h, known… friend. Perhaps better than a friend: one of those rare people one knows only once in a lifetime. The thought was impossibly painful to contemplate. To lose that? And yet, he would.

  But in the name of what they had shared, if only briefly, Jahir went around the table then and down to one knee. “If it would be no imposition?”

  “No imposi—you want to… hug me?” Vasiht’h asked, voice thin.

  “You have been my closest friend,” Jahir said. “And the embrace is custom here. I gave it to the children, and I would not withhold it from you. If… you wish it.”

  Vasiht’h stared at him, so still that Jahir remembered KindlesFlame’s comment: ‘you stop moving when you’re overwhelmed.’ But he remained where he was, willing the Glaseah to allow him to make the gesture.

  “You’re sure,” Vasiht’h said, hushed.

  “Completely.”

  His roommate took one step toward him, and another, until he was close enough that he could brush Jahir’s chest by breathing deeply. And there he froze. But that was well: it was for Jahir to show the Glaseah that he’d meant it, and so he drew Vasiht’h into his arms and with him, the complexity of his feelings. So dense! Loss and sorrow and other things, raw like wounds. And over them, shock and elation and wonder at the touch. Jahir sympathized. He found the revelation of the glossy fur astonishing, and liked the incense-musk scent of his roommate’s shoulder, and found it satisfying that the steadiness of the Glaseah’s personality was matched by the weight and stability of his short, solid body.

  Slowly, Vasiht’h set one of his hands on Jahir’s back and rested his cheek on Jahir’s shoulder. He was shaking, or Jahir was. Perhaps they both were.

  When they parted, Vasiht’h said, “If I don’t see you in the morning… Goddess keep you, Jahir Seni Galare.”

  “Vasiht’h,” Jahir answered, his hand on the Glaseah’s shoulder. He let it slide off as he stood, and took himself to his room.

  One final night, he thought. And then… what? To leave all this behind?

  To leave this behind, in particular?

  He thought of the mindline and closed his eyes, and gently put it away. He would have to learn to put all such things away.

  Vasiht’h went to bed in a roil of conflicting emotions so powerful he found himself pacing, as if he could release them in movement. Oh, Goddess, that hug. He threw himself on his pillows and buried his face in one of them. This was the last night. How could this be the last night? And he had brought it on himself, suggesting that Jahir leave!

  But he had made the suggestion, and his roommate had taken the advice, and now they’d both have to live with it. He’d spent the night suppressing the nascent mindline, and he knew Jahir had felt him doing it, and accepted it. They both understood what had to be done.

  So why did it hurt so much?

  He had planned to wake in time to see Jahir off. Had even set an alert, so he wouldn’t sleep through his roommate leaving. There was so much he hadn’t said, so much he wanted to tell him about the two years they’d spent toge
ther, and how much they’d meant; how grateful he’d been to experience the mindtouches, and how wonderful it had been to see the Alliance through fresh eyes. He wanted to tell Jahir that he’d never had a real friend until the Eldritch had arrived and taught him that friendship was sometimes more than just idle companionship. That it could be fierce and joyful, too, that it could be laughter and quiet. That it could be sharing a hearth as well as sharing, sometimes, thoughts.

  But he slept through the alert, and woke abruptly to the light of a bright summer morning in his eyes. He jerked upright, pillows gliding from his limbs and there was… a smell in the air, cinnamon and nutmeg and honey. Bewildered and in pain, he stepped out of his room.

  There was bread in his oven.

  He stared at it for a long time before he thought to check the counter. There was a note on it, of course.

  I know it is not a holiday, but I hope you enjoy it all the same.

  Be well, my friend.

  —J

  Vasiht’h sat because his back legs wouldn’t hold him up anymore. He pressed the note to his chest and dropped his head on the counter, in his arm. Was he crying? He was, but it was a stifled, hot thing, so small. He didn’t want to smell his own tears and acknowledge what he was mourning. He forced himself upright, forced himself to make dark, strong coffee and set out the jam and more-almond butter. When the bread came out of the oven, it was not lumpy, but a beautiful ring, braided in three parts and glistening with melted sugar.

  There was enough for two. Vasiht’h tore off a piece and had a bite, but it was too hard to swallow. He managed the one piece and sat staring at the table and the empty chair across from him. Forcing himself to rise, he put the bread in stasis, washed up the plates, returned the jam and butter to the refrigerator. Then, despondent, he went back to bed. He fought the first sniffle, but the second one won, and he cried himself to sleep.

  He dreamed of gardens, as he knew he would. The stool in the center, the one Jahir would have been using, was empty. All around him were flowers: beautiful flowers that he couldn’t touch no matter how he reached for them. He denied that dream and backed away from it, and for a while there was nothing in his mind. But it returned, and this time he saw flowers… flowers that were dying even as they broke free from the earth. He felt the desperation of it, dove for them and did everything in his power to make them live before they died… and he failed, over and over.