"That slimy, sleazy, manipulative, two-faced scumbag!"

Almost immediately the exertion from his little outburst had Eli turning pale and sickly. If he hadn't already been in bed, he probably would have ended up on the floor. Ronnie quickly rushed in to support him, lying him back down gently.

I sighed heavily, pinching the bridge of my nose. "I knew I should have waited to visit you."

"You should have packed your shit and been here the second you saw that bullshit! Fuck chemo! I can't believe you stayed in that goddamn house!"

"Eli, will you please stop shouting," I practically begged.

"No! I'm pissed. Why the fuck aren't you?!" he snapped at me.

"I am pissed," I clarified. "But acting out isn't going to magically change what he did. Losing my cool and doing something stupid because I'm angry is only going to hurt me in the long run. Not him."

He made a disgusted noise, glaring down at his bedsheets. "What? So, you're just going to turn the other cheek and pretend that nothing happened?"

"Yes, because it's better if he doesn't know I'm onto him," I explained. "Look, you know Phil as well as I do. If he's really stooped this low to try to get what he wants, then there is no stopping him at this point. The best I can do is try to sabotage his plans. Which will be a hell of a lot easier if he thinks I don't know about them."

He shook his head angrily. "This-this is ridiculous. I mean, this has to be illegal, right? Informed consent, or violating bodily autonomy, or some shit, right?"

"Technically, it is," Ronnie chimed in, handing him a cup of water, "but the problem is that it would be nearly impossible to prove. That condom is the only 'evidence' that she has and it's not like she has any actual proof of who tampered with it. Only a suspicion. It's not a lot to go off of. If they even believed her enough to look into it at all.

"At best they'd pull him in for questioning, and even then, it's just another 'he said, she said' situation. He'd probably be out of there by lunch. Not to mention the fallout she'd still have to deal with after it was all said and done. It's fucked up, sure, but no matter what way you look at it, Maggie comes out the loser in the end."

Eli kept his mouth shut, but it was clear that he was still stewing. He glared down at his water with a near-murderous rage in his eyes.

However, that glare was all he had the strength for today. As always, the chemo had left him completely drained of energy. And his insistence on getting himself worked up over this whole situation had certainly not done him any favors. It only took a second before he resigned himself to his fate, letting out a sigh as he rested his head against the pillow.

"Ronnie, can you get me a straw? I don't think I have the energy to drink this right now..."

Ronnie's eyes went soft at that. As stern as he normally was with Eli, he had a hard time keeping up the front on the days Eli was actually sick. He smiled and took the cup from him gently, setting it on the table.

"Of course. I'll go grab one real quick. Try to take it easy on your sister while I'm gone though, okay?"

Somehow, Eli still mustered up the strength to roll his eyes. "Yes, Mom."

Ronnie patted his hand and stood up, heading out of the room. However, no sooner did the door close behind him than Eli immediately turned to glare at me. I sighed, resting my elbow against the arm of the chair.

"Don't look at me that way. You know Ronnie's right."

"Okay, great. That doesn't change the fact that your husband's finally snapped, Mags! And yet, for some ungodly reason, you still plan on going back to him," he explained, his voice filled more with concern than anger. "I mean, what even happened after all that? Did he come home last night? Did he say anything?"

"He did the same thing he always does after a fight," I said, shrugging. "Came home, made a big show of ignoring me, went to bed, left this morning without a word. Same as always."

"And that doesn't freak you out at all?" he asked. "Let's ignore for a second the fact that this whole situation is already beyond fucked up, but he really just continued on with his day afterward as if he did absolutely nothing wrong?

"The guy's a goddamn sociopath. How the hell am I not supposed to freak out knowing my sister is living with a guy like that?"

"Because you know I can handle it," I reassured him, squeezing his hand. "You know Phil. The last thing he would ever do is risk his reputation over something like this. The most he could ever do is trick me into sleeping with him and having an 'accident' happen. Basically, as long as I don't fuck him, I'm fine. And trust me, that won't be a problem."

I could still see the concern in his eyes as he looked down nervously at his bedsheets. His fingers picked absentmindedly at the loose fibers of his blanket.

I hated seeing him this way. Because I knew that look well. He was blaming himself.

His concern was sweet, but his logic was stupid. How could he possibly blame himself for things that he had absolutely no control over? Phil's shitty actions weren't his fault, my choice to stay wasn't his fault, and his illness certainly wasn't his fault. He had nothing to feel guilty about. I just wish I could make him understand that.

Luckily, Eli was nothing if not an opportunist. And a sarcastic one at that. Miserable or not, he just couldn't pass up the chance to say something snarky when the chance presented itself. Especially when it opened up the door to something I knew he'd been dying to hear about anyway.

"Why would it be? Did you break your new boy toy or something?"

A small snort of laughter made its way through my lips. He tried to hide it, but I saw the hint of a smile playing on his as well.

"No, don't worry. He's still perfectly intact," I said playfully.

"If that's true, then you clearly aren't using him right."

I shoved his head playfully. Not hard, of course. Just enough to convey what a little shit he was being. But that was all it took.

The laughter sputtered through his lips as he burst into hysterics. Well, as hysterical as he could be given his current situation at least. That said, I was glad to see the light return to his eyes, even if it was just a weak version of it.

"Oh God, he's laughing," Ronnie's voice echoed from the doorway. He appeared a second later, a drinking straw and a candy bar in hand. "What pitiful excuse of a joke did you subject your poor sister to this time?"

"Oh, nothing," he said innocently. "Maggie was just explaining to me that she didn't break her new boy toy."

"Then you're clearly not using him right," Ronnie teased.

"That's what I said," Eli chuckled.

I rolled my eyes and let out a small grunt of annoyance. But it was mostly for show. As annoying as their tag-team teasing could be at times, I couldn't deny that it made me a little happy seeing them so in sync with each other.

Ronnie unwrapped the straw and placed it into the cup, sliding his hand behind Eli's back to help him sit up. Relief filled his face as the water level in the cup gradually grew lower. He rubbed his hand along Eli's back softly as if to praise him before helping him to sit back again.

Without a word, he set a candy bar on the bedside table. Eli's eyes darted to it briefly before looking down at his bedsheets again.

It was a short exchange. The whole thing probably couldn't have lasted more than thirty seconds. But the warmth and tenderness I could feel radiating from it was almost enough to make me cry.

And, God, I wanted to.

They were so good for each other. They deserved each other. It killed me to see the invisible wall they kept between themselves that stopped them from being together.

For Eli, of course, that wall was his illness. The knowledge that his short time on this Earth was already shorter than most. And his reluctance to share the misery and grief attached to that knowledge with anybody else. His way of "minimizing the damage" when he was gone.

However, to say that Eli alone was the only thing standing between them would be unfair. Ronnie had his own wall separating them. And that wall was "ethics." The belief that he couldn't love Eli that way because he shouldn't. That being with him would be wrong because it came from a relationship built on dependency.

Eli needed him. He relied on him. He had to. He didn't have a choice. And to take advantage of that very real need to fulfill his own desires was a violation not only of the promise that he had made as a nurse to protect and care for his patients, but also a betrayal of the trust given to him by the person he loved most in this world.

So, they each kept their distance. To some degree at least. They were still very good friends. Talking, laughing, sharing their lives with each other. But that's where their relationship started and ended. They would never let it grow to anything more than that.

Instead, the words they refused to speak were passed in subtle gestures. A small touch, a soft look, a candy bar from the vending machine.

Eli tried to keep his eyes away from us, but I saw the way they turned misty at the sight of that candy bar. That little gesture that carried with it such a big meaning.

Ronnie hated how much junk Eli ate. It's not like he stopped him from eating it entirely, but the amount that Eli wanted was a constant point of bickering between the two of them. Eli was always trying to find some way or another to eat more of it, and Ronnie, in turn, did his best to limit how much he had access to.

Which is why that one little candy bar held so much meaning to him. A hidden message wrapped in chocolate: on your worst days, I will do anything to make you smile.

Ronnie couldn't have confessed his love better if he'd dropped down on one knee and proposed to him right then and there. And, as always, Eli wasn't sure how to handle it.

The wall he built around himself aside, Eli didn't exactly have a lot of experience when it came to romance. After all, it's kind of hard to date when you've spent most of your life living in and out of hospitals.

Even if all of their issues were magically fixed tomorrow, I still don't think Eli would have known what to do with Ronnie. What to say to him, how to act around him, or how to handle romantic gestures. He would be just as clueless as he was now.

So, in true "Eli" fashion, he did what he always did whenever faced with uncomfortable and confusing emotions: deflect.

He cleared his throat and turned towards me immediately. His eyes practically begged me not to tell Ronnie what I saw in them as he forced a smile to his face.

"Hey, speaking of your boy toy, what's going on with him? How did things go? Will you see him again?" he asked.

Was it a deflection? Of course. But it's not like that was his only purpose in asking either. There was no denying the genuine interest and curiosity that he had on his face right now. And he wasn't the only one.

"Yes, please, details," Ronnie begged. "The suspense has been killing me."

"Huh. Funny. I don't remember telling Ronnie about what's been going on," I said, looking at Eli pointedly.

He shrugged, completely unaffected. "Ronnie doesn't count as people and you know it. Now, stop avoiding the question and dish."

I let out a heavy sigh and rolled my eyes. But again, it was all for show.

The truth was, I was just excited to talk to them about all of this as they were to hear it. To finally have something good to tell them. To watch their eyes light up with intrigue instead of soften with sympathy. To finally have something worth telling them about.

"Alright. Fine," I grumbled with mock reluctance. "Here's what happened..."