Rough Night, Rough Life

Her brother's screaming fit would have woken her had she been asleep.
Analisa's hazel eyes bulged as she stared up into the darkness.
For the first ten to twelve seconds, she just lay there, wondering which of them was caught in a nightmare. Maybe she was asleep and just imagining yet another of his outbursts. Maybe her exhausted mind was trapped in a dream of its own and he'd have to howl for a while, long enough to rattle her to wakefulness.
Finally, she flung her blanket aside, sat up, and thumped her bare feet to the floor.
"Alright, Geggie, I'm coming. Ah-eece-ah is coming."
She yawned and shuffled to the control panel, keying it more by memory than by sight to bring a dull, orange glow to the dark room.
WHAM! WHAM! WHAM! SCREEEEEEEEEEEEAAM! came from the adjoining room. She squeezed her bloodshot eyes tightly closed and pinched the bridge of her nose. Her brother's scream had a way of drilling into her skull, even through the steel door and walls.
Gregory, or "Geggie" as he called himself, actually quieted for a moment. The silence dared her to hope that his nightmare had subsided and she could crawl back into bed.
She drew two slow breaths, waiting for the screaming to start up again. As she began to inhale a third, a dull thud sounded from the next room.
"Of course," she grumbled. "Why should either of us get any sleep?"
There was a soft hiss as the sealed door opened, but on the wake of the whooshing air came a sickening smell. It was nearly as gut-wrenching as the sight of her paralyzed little brother dangling upside down in his restraint harness.
"Ah, Christ," she gagged. The seizure had toppled him from his bed, as well as caused him to both vomit and crap himself. At least, inverted as he was, he couldn't choke on his own puke. What a disgusting, broken puppet he looked like.
He reached a shaking hand out toward her and gurgled "Eeg-uh" around a mouthful of bile. If it had been the first time she'd seen it, her heart would have crumbled with pity. But this was nothing new. It was still plenty pitiful, though.
Here was her little brother, all grown up, but still just a helpless child.
She wanted to both hold him and hose him off. To both soothe him and slap him. Every time she looked at him, she had this paradoxical swirl of emotions to both love him and hate him. That wasn't fair to either of them. Of course she loved him. He couldn't help how he was. He didn't mean to be born this way, just to make her life difficult.
"You poor, adorable little !@#$%^&*," she muttered as she cautiously crossed to help him.
Perhaps someone unfamiliar with the occurrence would have instantly rushed to him and tried to pick him up. But this was a long way from her first rodeo. She had scars to remind her that she never knew what to expect after one of his episodes. Sometimes he'd cry and cling to her, other times he'd grin and want to have tickle fight. But there were also those times that he'd still be locked in a terrible delusion and fight back, thinking she was attacking him. Usually he'd just swat and slap at her, or claw and bite if he was especially scared. There was once, thankfully only once, that he'd really fought. But that once was enough to break her jaw and choke her unconscious. Her younger brother he might be, but now he was a grown man and had the strength to match.
If it weren't for the restraint harness around his waist, he might have killed her, but when she'd collapsed, she'd fallen away from him. She'd regained consciousness, unable to speak, only to find much the same situation that she was presented with now. Pathetic Geggie, hanging there and wanting his big sister to save him, yet again.
He coughed puke in her tangled hair and one of her arms got totally covered in crap when she heaved him upright and rolled him back onto his bunk. Then she stripped him naked and stepped back into her own room to get a towel and a bucket from the tiny bathroom.
He hooted and clapped when he heard the warm water splashing. He loved bath time, always had.
"I know, I know. Yay for bubbles," she called back through the door.
When she re-entered his room, he shot two well-toned arms triumphantly in the air.
"Ay bubbas!" he yelled with a wide grin.
She just shook her head with a sleepy smile and started to clean him up. Ten minutes later, she wrapped a shivering Geggie in a towel and tried not to look at the brown water dripping from his paralyzed feet.
"Thank God for bunks with drainage," she thought to herself as she sloshed the somewhat cleaner water from the bucket toward the grated hole in the metal floor.
"You gonna be okay while I take a quick shower?"
Geggie nodded and laid back down.
She pealed her sodden shirt up over her head and untied the drawstring at her waist, letting her loose pants fall around her ankles. Some sisters would squirm at the thought of being naked in front of their equally naked brother. It didn't phase her a bit. She was just happy she didn't get any of his mess in her mouth this time. She wanted to brush her teeth with bleach and peroxide when that happened.
"Ah-eece-ah?" he burbled behind her.
"Yeah buddy?"
"Geggie luzz you."
She felt the tears fill her eyes as she turned back to him. "Analisa loves Geggie too."
She hugged him tightly and relished the comforting way their bodies felt like one. Her warm flesh pressed against his goosebumps. He shivered again as she pulled away.
"I'll just be a minute, buddy."
Geggie just smiled.

She cheated herself into only letting the warm water run over her five foot frame for a minute or two. Then she stepped out of the open shower stall and quickly wrapped a towel under her arms. She peeked back into Geggie's room and found him fast asleep already.
She covered him with a blanket and glared at the heap of wet, messy clothes she'd left on the floor. She should have thought to pick those up before she showered.
Trying to touch them with as few, freshly cleaned toes as possible, she kicked the laundry into a bin in the corner. She'd have to remember to get that in the wash after she dressed or it was really going to stink.
Analisa was just pulling her shoes on when her alarm clocked emitted its sharply obnoxious eep eep eep, eep eep eep. She tried to slam it into silence before it could wake up her brother, and failed. She heard Geggie sit up as the clock clattered to the floor.
"Dammit!" she barked at herself.
"Ah-eece-ah?" he yawned "Why I nake-it?"
"You had a bad dream, pal. I had to change you and clean you up."
"Stinky dweam." He wrinkled up his nose and pointed at the laundry bin.
"I know, I'll take care of it."
"Geggie hun-gie," he told her as she picked up the basket.
"I bet you are, your tummy is all empty. I'll get you some breakfast in just a minute." Food was the furthest thing from her mind as she dumped the soiled contents into the washer.

"Ah-eece-ah eat bekk-fust too?" he asked around a half-chewed mouthful.
"Not right now. Maybe on my way to work." She scowled at her watch impatiently, then at the door just as Geggie's day nurse walked in.
"Ood-dan!" Geggie called, spitting out some of his breakfast. The nurse didn't miss a beat in gently wiping his chin and ruffling his hair.
"Hi, dude. How are we doing today?"
"Morning, Susie," Analisa said. "It started out pretty crappy." Then her jaw cracked loudly as she yawned.
"Uh-oh. Another rough night?"
"Yeah, you could say that. Rough night, rough life. I gotta get to work."
"What you gotta do is to get some sleep and take a day off. I've told you a hundred times that I'll gladly spell you out for a night."
"I know, thanks Susan. But I can't afford your service's graveyard hours and I certainly can't afford to take a day off work."
"Just promise me you'll think about it."
"Uh-huh. I think about it all the time. But thinking is free, action is expensive. I gotta go or I'm gonna be late."
Analisa tied the arms of her drab jumpsuit around her waste and shrugged the reflective safety vest over her black tank top. She stomped her feet into her heavy work boots and strapped them tight.
"Bye Geggie. I'll see you in 10-12 hours."
Geggie just flapped a loose bye-bye wave as he chomped his breakfast.
"They have you on overtime again?" Susan asked.
"'Again' would imply we were ever not on overtime. This is more like a 'still' on overtime. But you know how it is in this kind of work - someone is sure to get hurt and that means the rest of us get stuck towing the slack until they can come back."
"You just make sure that someone getting hurt isn't you. Deal?"
"I'll take that deal if you can convince this knucklehead to let me sleep through the night. Then I don't run the risk of nodding off while running a tug shuttle or plasma welder."
"Just be careful, ok?"
"I'll do my best."
"You always do."
"So do you. Thanks a million. Really." Susan was the greatest. She was so sweet. For months Analisa had been wanting to kiss those lips every time Susan smiled at her. She honestly envied her brother when Susan would kiss him on top of his head or the back of his hand. She had wrestled with the idea of asking her out, but even if Susan said yes, it would be really weird given the caretaker triangle they had going with Geggie.
Analisa let the door hiss closed behind her and sighed as it stood between her and the two things she loved most in her whole life. Then she turned and trudged toward the lift that would carry her down to the maintenance hangar.

The metal planking clanked as Tyson trotted to catch up to her.
"What's up, Buttercup? Penny for your thoughts?" he asked.
"Aw nothin." Analisa just shrugged. "I'm just tired."
"Geggie again, huh?"
"Yep. Same as usual."
"Poor kid. You doing okay besides the sleep deprivation?"
"I guess so."
"C'mon 'Lis, I know you well enough to know that 'guess so' means 'no.' So what's really up?"
"It's just...Susan." Analisa tossed her head back toward her quarters.
"What do you mean? I thought you liked Susan. Is it not working out with her and Geggie?"
"No, I mean...well, no. Not that it's not working out with her and Geggie. She's great with him. She's fantastic. It's just that it's...it's not...ya know."
"Oh." Tyson gave her an understanding smile. "You mean it's not working out with her and you. Sorry pal. But you know it's never gonna come close to anything with her if you never ask."
Analisa just shrugged again. "Yeah, I know."
"So ask her."
"I can't just ask her."
"How come?"
"Because it's complicated. Her and Geggie. Her and me. It would never work. How could it?"
"What do you mean 'it would never work.' You don't know that. You just tell yourself that because I think you're afraid to actually find out."
"Excuse you!" Analise stopped short and glared at Tyson. "What the hell is that supposed to mean? I'm not afraid!"
"Easy, killer. I'm just saying that you're coming at it with your hopes down and your defenses up. Don't try to use Geggie as your shield to keep you from trying for what you really want."
"How dare you?! I'm not using my brother as anything! I'm all he's got and vice versa. Who else is going to help me take care of him if things crash and burn with Susan? You?"
"Hey! I'd be there in two seconds if you ever asked me, you know that. But again, you never ask! You're so hell bent on carrying the weight of the world alone. It's not a crime to share the burden once in a while."
"My brother isn't a shield or a burden. He's my brother. He's my responsibility. You get that? Mine!"
"Oh cut the shit, 'Lis!" Tyson rolled his eyes. "I've known you for years. You always put him first, and there's nothing wrong with that, maybe that's even how it's supposed to be. Frankly I'd think less of you if you didn't. I'm just saying that you don't have to go it alone. I'm here. Susan's there too. You deserve more for you."
Analisa drew a long breath and blew it out through flared nostrils. "You don't know everything. You might think you do, but you don't."
"I know what you tell me and I know what I see. Ask her. Just scrape up the guts and do it."
Analisa opened her mouth to protest, then closed it again.
Tyson turned and started to walk away. "You know I'm right, that's why you can think of a damn thing to say."
"Shut up," she called after him, scampering to catch up.
They walked the rest of the way to the lift in silence. She was unhappy to see it unusually unoccupied when the doors opened. She was hoping the other commuters would give her reason enough not to talk to Tyson. She just wanted to fume. She wanted to convince herself that he wasn't right.
After a few floors, some other people got on. A few more floors and they exited, leaving her alone with Tyson again.
"So..." he said, letting the pause hang heavy. "Are you going to ask her or not?"
She glared at him again, then looked down at her boots. "Yeah, maybe. But that doesn't mean you're right."
"Fine. Whatever. I won't even say 'I told you so' later."
"You'd better not."
"I'll tell you what. When she says yes, you bring her and Geggie to my place, I'll entertain him while you gals talk. I'll even cook dinner."
"Christ, Ty. I couldn't let you do that."
"No really, it's my pleasure. I insist."
"Don't get all noble on me, Captain Chivalry. I mean I couldn't let you do the cooking. You suck at it. I really won't have a shot with Susan if you give her food poisoning."
Tyson scowled at her. "Wiseass. I eat my cooking all the time and I'm not dead yet."
"Maybe you've built up a tolerance."
"You're being kind of a shit to the guy who just offered you his place for your date."
"I don't think it qualifies as a date if you're there with my brother."
"Fair enough. After dinner I'll take Geggie back you your place and get him tucked in. Then you ladies can get on with your date. But please, don't let me interrupt your fun when I come back to watch."
"You're such a pervert. I never should have told you." Analisa smiled and raised a hand at him. When he flinched to cover his face she backhanded him in the crotch.
"Oof! It's a good thing we're not dating. You're not nice enough to my man bits to get any action from me."
"Your 'man bits?' God, it's a good thing we're not dating for entirely different reasons."