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“I know that. What are you talking about? Of course, I know that.”

Shit. Something’s wrong. He’s no doctor, but he’s had a lot of concussions and she’s got the telltale signs magnified by a hundred.

“Can you walk?”

She nods, letting him help her to her feet. Nothing’s broken, and he’s grateful for that as he half-drags her to the bike that, surprisingly, hasn’t been stolen. It’s a windfall he can’t explain, but maybe it’s as simple as none of their attackers knowing how to drive it.

They’re not in any shape to ride. Staying isn’t an option either when their enemy could come back. So, he nudges it upright and helps her on behind him, taking a slower pace around the dips and curves for the next ten miles while she leans heavily against his back.

An old, half-looted furniture store, four turns down a deserted street, is the first viable place to rest that isn’t on the main road. He slings an arm under her shoulders as they stumble through the door and into a back office where he deposits her on a worn leather sofa, swaying on his own feet.

“You’re hurt, too.” She reaches out toward the side of his head and pulls away blood-coated fingers.

He hadn’t noticed. Head wounds bleed worse than they are. He isn’t in danger of collapsing just yet. “I’m alright. Hang tight here, need to look for something to get us cleaned up with.”

He checks his reflection in a dirty mirror and exhales in relief when the injury on his head is only superficial. Half expected part of his skull to be showing. At this point, he’ll take any good news he can get.

The room looks untouched. No one’s been here in a long ass time and when he rifles through a desk, he’s rewarded with a roll of paper towels but nothing to flush their wounds.

“I can’t believe I did that. Wrecked the bike. I’m empty-headed, always have been. I’m sorry,” she says, as he drags the desk chair over to face her, curls a finger under her chin and tilts her head up to inspect that cut in her hairline.

He knows exactly who used to tell her that.

His heart breaks for how easily she’s conjured it up again, so many years later when that asshole who fostered them both is already dead and gone.

He can still hear that voice just as clearly sometimes, calling him a worthless piece of shit.

Good for nothing. Useless. He hates that she knows what it feels like to have someone so branded on her soul that it’s the first thing her mind latches onto when she’s injured, stressed, or hurting.

He applies pressure on her wound, guilt washing over him at her pained hiss. “You didn’t wreck it. We got attacked, remember? And the bike isn’t mine. It’s yours. You don’t need to apologize for anything. What else hurts?”

“Nothing. Not really?”

“What does not really mean?”

“My right ankle feels twisted, but I can walk, so it’s fine.”

“Alright, couldn’t find any pain pills in here. We’re roughing it for a while. Don’t think we should go out again today.”

“Are you okay?” she asks. “You’re taking care of me, but you’re still a mess.”

“Thanks.” He offers her a forced half smile. “I’m good. Still breathing, still walking. We’ll get through this.”

“Do you think they’ll follow us?”

“Nah, crime of opportunity. Just wanted our shit.”

He’s busy inspecting his road rash when she says something that slices right through his nerves and stabs him in the heart for the second time today.

“I see him sometimes in my nightmares. Not always, but sometimes,” she whispers, her voice small and childlike. “Hear him, too. It’s not the first time. Now it’s worse. More real.”

“Is he here now?”

Her face breaks and creases as she nods in confirmation, her willpower at holding in her tears failing fast as they brim in bloodshot eyes.

She’s hallucinating her abuser through the veil of a concussion and there’s not a damn thing he can do to fix this for her.

He doesn’t let himself think further about what it could mean if this doesn’t resolve on its own.

She’ll be okay, she has to be. The only acceptable outcome here is that she wakes up tomorrow and everything makes sense again.

“I’m not crazy, Wade.” She half sobs. “Right? Am I? Am I crazy?”

“No, no, no, you’re not. Just got hit real hard on the head during the crash, that’s all. It’s gonna be alright.”

“The crash. I crashed your bike, I’m sorry. Please don’t hate me now.”

They’re going around in circles, but one thing he has an abundance of is patience for her. “I’ll never hate you. And you didn’t crash it. That wasn’t your fault, come here.”

He joins her on the sofa, gathering her up in his arms as he leans back against the cushions. She goes easily, curling her legs up and pressing her face into his collarbone while he holds her snug.

“You’re the only one who can make him quiet. No one else. Only you,” she whispers.

“Don’t look.” He squeezes her a fraction tighter as she turns her face into his neck. “Don’t listen to him, you listen to me.”

Needing to stay awake during a concussion is a myth in most cases.

So instead of trying to keep her awake, he lets her doze while doing his best to quiet the monster she’s dug up from the grave.

He knows all too well what it feels like to be haunted.

In his case, he only saw her when he was manifesting ghosts in solitary. His hallucinations comforted him.

Her hallucinations are not so kind.

“Do you remember when I bought my first bike with my army bonus? I showed up one day with it in the back of my truck outside your apartment, asking for lessons.”

“I remember.”

* * *

“Why is there a Harley in the bed of a pickup blocking my parking space?” Kara raises a brow and crosses her arms, fixing him with a stare of annoyance that does nothing to faze him.

‘I just bought it! It’s cool, right? Wanna go for a ride?”

“Can you drive it?”

“Hell no. That’s why I’m here. I just so happen to know a great teacher.”

Her father had bikes. He taught her how to drive one of these beasts before she could ever drive a car, and now, if he’s lucky, she’ll teach Wade, too.

She tilts her head, her gaze traveling the curves of the bike. “Or you could just give it to me. Don’t worry, I’ll let you ride behind me.”

“So, so tempting.”

She won’t say no. He only has to wait for her to poke at him a few times before she gives in, and so he stuffed his hands in his pockets and rocks on the balls of his feet, trying to curb his smile.

Kara rolls her eyes with a shrug. Fine, but you owe me pizza, and a ride, and something else. I dunno what yet.”

His grin must be blinding and contagious for how quickly she looks away, a slight blush creeping up her cheeks. “Will my undying gratitude work?”

“I suppose that’s sufficient. Why did you get this, anyway? Chick magnet?”

“Busted.”

He doesn’t tell her that part of the reason he blew so much money on this thing is because he hoped it could be something the two of them would do together. Something to keep them close, even when life seemed to be tearing them in different directions.

* * *

“You picked it up so fast. Shoulda told you then that you nailed it instead of giving you such a hard time,” she smirks.

“I like it when you give me a hard time.”

“You still owe me that pizza for teaching you.”

“Noted.”

She lets out a soft hum, her eyes fluttering closed, and the fist she wrapped in his shirt loosening. “That was the same year you bailed me outta jail. I worried you wouldn’t come.”

Oh, that’s not a fun path to venture down. He should have known her mind would conjure up something faintly traumatic. If she wants to revisit it, then he’ll follow her. “Why did you think that?”

“Because everyone leaves eventually, Wade.”

“Not me.”

“You were so mad…”

* * *

Kara probably hears his footsteps, heavy and quick, before she sees him round the corner of her cell block for the night. She doesn’t even get off the shitty cot to greet him because she knows he’ll have a growl of disapproval in his throat.

“Are you okay?” Is the first thing Wade says, gesturing at the jail bars separating them, then to her split lip still dripping blood onto the concrete.

“You should see the other guy.”

“I heard he’s missing a front tooth and the bar says you owe them a cocktail glass.”

“He grabbed my ass,” Kara says to the ceiling. “Then he told me exactly what he planned to do to it in graphic detail whispered smugly in my ear. A cocktail glass to the face is getting off easy.”

“He hit you after you hit him?”

She nods.

“I shoulda gone with you,” he grumbles, already blaming himself for what happened as if she isn’t an adult making her own choices.

She sits up with a shrug. “You can’t protect me from everything. I can handle a jerk like that.”

“I know you can but now you’re in the pokey and that ain’t no place for a lady.”

“Since when am I a lady? Besides, maybe I like it fine in here. Maybe it’s cozy.”

“Oh okay, I’ll just tell ‘em to give me my bail money back and let you spend the night.”

Her eyes widen. She gets up to rush toward the bars, grabbing them with both hands. “You bailed me out?”

“Of course I did. They’re coming in a minute to release you. Can’t let my girl sleep on vomit-stained sheets. What would people think?” he teases with a fond grin.

Wade likes to call her his girl, but the truth is she never has been and she likely never will be. She’s never asked him why he does it or told him to stop. Sometimes he hopes she’ll question him so he can reply with ‘because I wish you were’.

“Well, your girl is ever so grateful. My hero.”

His fingers graze hers between the jail bars, his tone soft for the first time since he showed up.

“He did deserve it. Just be careful, okay? A couple inches higher and he could have taken glass to the eyeball. Then you’d have gotten a whole lot worse than a slap on the wrist. I just worry about you sometimes.

Don’t wanna lose you to another system.”

“You won’t lose me,” she says. “Couldn’t shake me if you tried.”

* * *

Wade doesn’t stop their journey into the past, plucking a few of their sparse good moments to offer up.

He may not remember anything from the time surrounding his abduction, but his mind works perfectly when it comes to her.

He’s more than ready to use the memories he does have to battle what haunts her.

“Do you remember when…”