WHO: Ronan, Adam & Gansey WHAT: Post Greywaren bump, Ronan has a concern about Adam's well-being and brings it to Gansey. Adam sniffs them out and is stubborn about it. WHEN: Around November 15th?? WARNINGS: Greywaren spoilers STATUS: Complete
Ronan Lynch was like a cobweb, always hanging around his recently traumatized loved ones no matter how much they swatted at him. It had the side benefit of meaning he didn’t have to think about his own trauma as much. Or worry about how Nora would be affected by what he was. She hadn’t spilt the beans, which was impressive as shit really, but then he didn’t badger her with questions like Adam.
Adam Lynch needed to know all things. If you didn’t know everything, he couldn’t prepare for the worst. Not accurately anyway. But now they had one big question mark hanging over Adam’s head in particular, and Ronan for once was asking more questions. He had Gansey pulled to the side in the office the nerds shared and he was keeping his voice low.
“So did Hennessy…” No, that question wasn’t fair. He grimaced and fussed about with Gansey’s book stack like a pest. “Is Adam gonna be okay? I mean, in the future, he’s all there, right? No missing...pieces or whatever?”
Even though Adam was the one Gansey usually expected questioning from, it was very like Ronan to not want to sit on his hands and let things play out as the might otherwise. So it wasn’t really a surprise, though it did soften his look a little, as it was a fair question.
One he wished he had better answers to. Something more concrete. He did at least know Adam was better, after some time and rest, but there were always things at home he wasn’t privy to that he either had to guess at or someone else filled in the blank. None of them liked not having all of the answers, but it was particularly maddening when Gansey should know, otherwise what was the use of being so far ahead of them?
“Whispering about it is probably just going to pull his attention in even faster. But yes, he’s all there.” That much he was sure of, at least. “He just needs time, I think. And maybe it couldn’t hurt to talk to a healer, but I’m not going to be the one to suggest that to him.”
"Not going to suggest what to me?" Adam asked from the doorway. He was wrapped in a blanket, wearing the same sweats he had climbed into a day ago. Two days ago. Time was a blur in his brain, and the only way he managed to keep track of any of it passing was by someone waking him up for meals, reading his homework untill he fell asleep again, and aggressively hydrating. Sometimes he'd ask questions about who was taking care of errands, or the shop, or what did his professor say about missing another day of class, and start conversations with don't forget about the... but not much changed.
He felt better, at least he thought so, but he was biased, and unable to sit still and some part of his brain knew that he shouldn't push it. But admitting he was injured was admitting he had a weakness, and Adam didn't want to be weak. Not after everything that had happened.
His expression was disapproving and somber; Adam didn't seem thrilled to be walking in on Gansey and Ronan talking about him, but he also wasn't the best advocate for himself in this situation when exhaustion was still written all over his face.
This was why it was the three of them, always pairing off against the other when the one person in the situation was being unreasonable. Adam was being, absolutely, unreasonable. "You might as well say it, since I'm here now."
Ronan was so focused on Gansey’s reply that he didn’t hear Adam shuffle in. He knocked the stack of books over when he jerked in surprise. “Jesus Christ, Parrish.”
He belligerently righted the book stack, sneaking a glance at Gansey. It was an undeniable comfort to know Adam was alright – that he hadn’t picked the world over his husband and paid the ultimate price in a stealthier way than outright death. But he also knew Adam would be bullheaded about any kind of healing. That didn’t mean he shouldn’t get some.
“I asked if you were all here, okay? I wanted to know if there was some shit we needed to do to make sure you weren’t missing any parts of your fucking psyche or soul or whatever.” There was something petulant about the way he dropped down into a chair. Eldritch otherworldly beings were still childish shitheads sometimes. “Gansey says you need time but a healer wouldn’t hurt and I fucking agree with him.”
Gansey should have known Adam would pop up like a meerkat surveying it’s ground, it was standard fare for the exact moment he said anything like “don’t tell Adam” or “I’m not going to be the one to talk to him”. Like clockwork, Adam just somehow knew. So Gansey looked more resigned than surprised, but he gave Ronan a pointed look, but let it soften when Ronan supported his suggestion.
Two against one always worked better in this house, especially when every single person that lived here was unbelievably stubborn. He turned to Adam with only a moderately guilty-as-charged expression. “I just think that here we’re afforded a lot more magical healing options than home. So it doesn’t have to be as long of a process to feel better as it did back home.” Where most doctors couldn’t do shit for anything magically adjacent back home, it was different here.
“You could have asked me, you know," Adam said, finding all the energy that he had saved up for today pouring out of him to argue. It seemed apt for the conversation, considering. "Both of you could have asked, or maybe considered I might know if something was seriously, or dangerously, or psychically messed up with me." He didn't though, that was where his side of the debate fell short. The uncoupling of his soul for days, where he should have been dead, had left a mark. But Adam, observant and introspective, couldn't seem to figure out how or where.
"And who would we even ask? I don't want—" Adam started, and shook his head. That wasn't the truth, and he was trying to be honest in the way he had grown into while being in Vallo, and not the liar he had mostly been back in Harvard. "I can't deal with another person looking at me like I'm going to fall apart at any second."
Adam looked at Gansey, then to Ronan, being patently pointed about the people he was currently referring to. He adjusted the blanket around his shoulders, pulling it in tighter. "Maybe it's good to live with this reminder for a little while, anyway. You're both telling me not to do anything stupid, this is just all the bad scrying decisions catching up with me."
Ronan rolled his eyes, more frustrated than annoyed. He loved his stubborn husband and if he'd been anything but a pain in the ass about this, Ronan would've just worried more. But it still didn't make things easy. Having Gansey at his back was a comfort at least. He was older, wiser. There was something more settled there.
This Gansey probably wouldn't fold like an anxious house of cards if Adam dug his heels in and got mean about it.
"I wanted to know how you were doing in the future and last I checked, you didn't know any more than me on that front. And since scrying is out, I thought hey, why not ask my best friend? You know, the guy who also loves your stubborn ass." He wanted to touch Adam, to soothe him, but he understood why he hated feeling weak. Ronan sat on the edge of the desk and crossed his arms over his chest instead. "Anyway sorry for giving a shit, but if you think we're just going to sit around and let you suffer without putting up a fight, you're delusional.
Ronan was giving Gansey far too much credit, in his estimation, since he almost folded right then and there. But ultimately didn’t, he instead opted to stare Adam down. “It’s not like we were keeping some grand secret from you, Adam. If part of your soul was missing or you weren’t ever going to recover or something enormously bad was lurking there, I would have said something.”
If he’d had any immediate answers, he would have said more there, as well. Gansey didn’t do well with feeling useless about a situation, but none of them did. “You’d push for the same thing if it was either of us and you know it, don’t be a hypocrite about this, Adam.” Where Gansey would normally have felt the need to soften things a little, Adam’s health came first, and if that required forming a solid wall with Ronan? He’d do it without hesitation.
"I'm not a hypocrite, and I'm not suffering, I'm—" Adam snapped but almost as immediately all the fight drained right out of him. He put the heels of his hands to his eyes, and pressed in. Tired, he was so tired. But if he just focused on that he wouldn't think about what the exhaustion really was, what that bone-deep weariness was a sign of. He wished he knew how his future self had handled this, because Adam wasn't sure he was ready to put the time in for this now, again.
As he exhaled, his hands dropped away, and his body collapsed into the tiny sleeper sofa they had managed to wedge in between the desks of the office. He could let himself be swallowed up in the cushions and his blanket.
"I hate when the two of you do this, by the way," Adam said, gesturing between the two of them as if to indicate team up. "And if you were in my shoes, you'd have given in a while ago and it wouldn't have come to this." That was his last try to argue, an inadequate attempt.
"What do I have to do? What's going to make you stop worrying? Just a healer?"
Ronan's eyebrows shot upwards when Gansey called Adam a hypocrite, a proud smirk twitching at the corners of his mouth. This wasn't the time for clapping his best friend on the back and saying 'good job, look, you didn't melt into the floor or anything!' But he thought it anyway as he pushed away from the desk. He settled for squeezing Gansey's shoulder as he passed by on the way to the sofa.
"You just hate conceding a debate to a superior argument," Ronan said brattily, plopping down next to Adam. "Anyway, we'd probably have been just as fucking stubborn." He knew he would've been. Accepting what he was seemed to come with more stubbornness, rather than less. "It really depends on what they say, but I think a healer would go a long way. You're exhausted and you know it. If nothing else, maybe they can help speed up that part of recovery."
Gansey though about pulling over a chair to just sit and face them, but there was something about the idea of smushing Adam in on a couch sandwich that had him squeezing in on Adam’s other side without permission. “I can’t promise anything will ever make me stop worrying about the trouble that you two get into.”
Now he was the hypocrite, given Gansey and Blue were just as bad about getting into sticky situations. A little less bad about waiting on a healer, at least, but he still had no room to talk. “But I agree that seeing a healer would make a big dent in that worry. So would eating regularly, and getting plenty of rest and fluids.”
"I'm not conceding to a superior argument, you're both taking advantage of my inability to form coherent thoughts to best you in a verbal debate. Do not consider this the norm," Adam said, elbowing Ronan in his side. But the space became immediately more snug as Gansey squeezed into the couch beside him. Adam exhaled again, big and drawn out, sinking further into his seat.
He nodded to eating regularly and resting, all the usual requests, because Adam knew—usually—when to fight. Malnutrition and dehydration were not worth it. And then to finish the discussion Adam had walked in on, he glanced at Ronan. "I'll ask Syd. She won't bullshit me with bedside manner."
Exchanging a look with his husband, the one that seemed to say if you're not going to ask, I will, Adam slowly turned back to Gansey. Curious interest was written all over Adam's face. "Are you going to tell us what kind of trouble, Gansey, or do you like to worry when we inevitably do it again?"
He thought this had to have been the worst, but there were four years more to Gansey's memories than his and Ronan's, and they couldn't have possibly peaked at nineteen.
Ronan had already been harping on Adam to eat and drink so he didn't add onto that part. He just took Adam's hand and massaged it, particularly the top which looked dry. All the hydration Adam was getting was going elsewhere it seemed. He'd have to dream a new jar of lotion. Maybe one that could do more than just heal rough skin.
"I think Syd can at least make sure all the…" He didn't know how to word it so he linked his fingers with Adam's and spread their hands so it was like a cage. "All the pieces of you are wound together, right? Nothing's tangled fucking weird or whatever? From what I've understood about how her powers work, anyway."
He wasn't sure he could focus on any future reveals beyond Adam's health at this point, but he still eyed Gansey over Adam's shoulder. "Feel free not to answer that question unless it might fuck us up here. "
Gansey held up his hands in mock surrender at them both turning on him. They were both fair questions and that was what kept him from pointing out that this was an Adam intervention, not Gansey.
But then they’d got Adam to agree to a healer, and that was farther than Gansey expected them to get, so he wasn’t annoyed about it. His shrug was exaggerated and he looked a little closer at Adam, only to end up frowning at the dark bags under his friend’s eyes. Gansey reached up to squeeze Adam’s arm. “I can’t say exactly how it’ll work but I think it’s a good shot, because yes, we need you completely healed so that I can worry about the next time you run into trouble. Which is regularly, but that shouldn’t surprise either of you in the least.”
He looked over to Ronan and back to Adam, and let his smile return as the ghost of itself, faint and just barely hanging on. “We wouldn’t be us if we were just taking shit as it comes along and potentially making it worse, right? We’ll figure it out.”
"Some of us overthink problems until there's not a solution they can't tackle," Adam added on to Gansey's we'll figure it out. He knew asking wouldn't get an easy answer, and after he had asked it, his whole body felt immediately tired. He wouldn't have been able to parse out potential future problems like this.
He could, though, sag further into the couch. Between Ronan holding his hand, and Gansey squeezing his arm, and warmth between the two of them keeping him barely awake, Adam realized how quickly the conversation had burned through his energy. It was good that he was slowly nodding off, and he couldn't see that frown on Gansey's face.
"Before you start in with the..." He meant the eating and the drinking and the resting and the healing, but couldn't seem to finish the sentence. Adam made a half-dismissive gesture with his free hand, but moving felt too exhausting to think about, let alone actually do. His slow blinks were longer in between.
"Just give me a minute, okay. Don't leave me alone here."
Ronan switched hands so that one could still stay clasped with Adam's and the other could wrap around his shoulders and clamp around the back of Gansey's neck. It was as close as a hug as he could manage in this position, but it felt good enough. Grounding.
"We're not going anywhere," Ronan promised, knowing full well he could speak for Gansey on this one. "Take as many minutes as you need."