Thanatos | Geoffrey Thanatos (apeacefuldeath) wrote in forgotten_gods, @ 2009-12-30 13:14:00 |
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Entry tags: | thanatos |
And I have sins Lord, but not today.
Who: Thanatos and his friend in the wheelchair. [Narrative]
What: Bringing back some belief, Part I.
When: Spanning August through December, pre-Christmas.
Where: Beth Israel, Brooklyn.
Warnings: None.
"My friend in the wheelchair" Thanatos called him, progress from "the man in the wheelchair". It was never Mr. Tzanavaras, or Daniel, or Dan. He listened to the other therapists at first and wondered if Thanatos was purposely being patronizing.
Then Dan looked into his occupational therapist's far-off eyes and realized no, it wasn't that he meant to be demeaning. It was that Thanatos just didn't care. After dishonorable discharge from the Army, his family's pandering in response to the suicide attempts, after the doctors and nurses and physical therapists acting like well-meaning cheerleaders, Dan had to admit he found apathy kind of refreshing. So in turn Dan ignored the people who called the man Geoff, or prefaced Thanatos with Mister, and he fell back into the comfortable detachment which came with referring to a person by their last name.
The beak-nosed pain in the ass who re-taught him how to tie his shoelaces and knit goddamn scarves was Thanatos. No more, no less. Fair enough, because they weren't, despite what Thanatos called him, friends. Far from it.
Truth was, he liked that. It was simple: Dan was a cripple, Thanatos a crotchety sonuvabitch. Together they spent many hours trading a lack of expectations with one another. Dan told him about how it felt when he sucked down carbon monoxide fumes like a champ. Thanatos in turn regaled him with mythological wonders, Greek stories which the tall man told him in a cool, flat voice.
"Greek shit," Dan called it at first. "Is that why you're helping me out? 'Cause I've got a Greek last name? 'Cause of the Greek shit?"
Thanatos rolled his eyes and took a pull of the beer he snuck into the hospital and only shared with Dan when his charge 'shut up and listened'. "I'm helping you because they pay me to."
Dan laughed at that. Small talk didn't get far with Thanatos. He shocked them both when he started telling the Greek shit, because this was a man who said 'no' when Dan asked if he'd ever walk again, and 'if you're lucky' in answer to whether he'd be able to hold his own dick without dropping the damn thing.
For someone who spent his career in the sandbox, a little no-bullshit black humor made Dan's days brighter rather than darker. If listening to Thanatos talk about Nyx and Hypnos and Oneiroi and fuck-all meant getting real answers instead of doctors' patronizing, he'd suck it up and deal.
Or at least until his therapist got to stories about Thanatos -- about him.
At first it was funny: "You have the same name as a god?"
Then it was creepy: "No. I am Thanatos."
Eventually it wound up being more than a little frightening, late at night when it was just Dan, his therapist and a six-pack between the two of them: "Of course I still have the sword. It's part of me, like Zeus and his thunderbolts."
"Prove it," Dan shot back. Sitting in his wheelchair, friction gloves still on his hands, he felt like he could afford some defiance. He felt safe, confident in the fact that this man was obviously a fucking lunatic.
Silence fell between them then. Dan watched Thanatos open, drink, then finish a bottle of beer, all without bothering to look his way. It was only when he set the empty bottle down that he turned his head (like a hawk, Dan thought, like one of those crazy, cold hunter birds he'd seen snatch sparrows right out of the air) and really looked at him with a chilly hazel gaze.
"All right."
That was when Dan started to believe.