Emery's eyes were never completely pain-free when they gazed at him these days; Josh wished he could help soothe that somehow. "I have an infectious disease," Emery underlined, as if Josh hadn't heard him the first time. "You're correct that there's a good chance you're not infected. I won't risk your health like that."

"Do you really think you can stick to a TB regimen without slipping while you're living out on the streets? Are you okay with infecting other people," he challenged, "just because you're too proud to accept help from me?"

Emery looked affronted. "Proud? You think this is a matter of pride? I'm under no illusions that I could— you've already seen me stripped of every ounce of it entirely."

"Then why didn't you come to me in the first place?" He hadn't planned on asking that, but suddenly it was as if his ability to breathe depended on having it answered. "If it wasn't a matter of pride?"

"To you?" Emery looked confused enough for Josh to take it personally.

"After the trial, when you had nowhere else to go, why didn't you come find me?" Josh's voice betrayed him, cracking on the last word; he ploughed ahead. "Did you really think I wouldn't lend you a hand? That I'd be that petty?"

"It would never have crossed my mind to impose such a burden on you—"

"Did you think I'd be happier with you living on the streets and out of the way than if you gave me the chance to help out?" Did Emery really think nothing but the worst of him?

"Josh, I—"

"Would you have shut the door in my face if it'd been the other way around?"

Emery's eyes widened. When had they come so close? Josh had no recollection of having gotten up from his chair and in the other man's face but there they were, inches apart, their masks keeping the distance that Josh, on his own, had failed to maintain.

"I would never have refused you assistance," Emery replied, a fraction of Josh's heart unclenching at the fire in his words, "but you weren't the one in the wrong. I wouldn't have put you in the position of knowing about my situation if I'd had a choice." Troubled brown eyes slid away from his. "I'd hoped, for your sake, you'd have forgotten I ever existed by now."

Fuck. What could he reply that wasn't 'I could never forget you no matter how hard I tried'? He sat back down in his chair, safely away once more. "Well, I'm looking at you now, and I can see you exist. I'm saying you have a house to exist in, when you're released."

"You're a remarkably generous man, Josh. I won't—"

"Stop doing that. It's a damn pattern with you. You compliment me and then you usually throw whatever I'm offering away and stomp on it for good measure the minute after that."

"Go get your friend, then," Emery said, anguish bleeding into his rising voice, "and have him explain the side effects of the drugs you'll need to take for months on end, then tell me if you believe that to be an acceptable risk."

Josh still held his gaze. "I don't have to — whatever they are, compared to the alternative, it's an acceptable risk. And it certainly beats following you in and out of shelters like a deranged stalker for months."

"Josh—"

"Please. I promise I won't be this hard to live with if you let me have this one. You're not homeless, Emery. And you're not alone."

Emery closed his eyes sharply, but not so fast that Josh couldn't see the flash of bone-deep yearning in them. No matter his arguments, a part of him clearly wanted to live more than he believed. When he opened them again they were watery, his voice hoarse. "I can't begin to tell you how much you make me want to take you up on your offer."

He seemed poised to continue, leading Josh to cut across him before he could begin to utter the word 'but'. "That's settled then. I have your word you'll get Mark or whoever is on call to call me to come pick you up when you're discharged?"

"Josh..."

Emery was wavering. He only had to close it. "Or do I have to get comfortable in a waiting room chair for the next few days so I won't miss it happening?"

Emery fidgeted with the hem of the bedsheet again. "You'll have months to regret that decision if I infect you. How could that ever truly be what you want?"

Josh's voice was soft but forceful. "I'll have the rest of my life to regret any other decision if I let this thing kill you because you were on the streets ruining the rest of your immune system."

"I have no way of paying you," Emery countered, and this time Josh was sure he'd done it deliberately, a way to make him angry so he'd rescind his offer, but knowing that and managing to not be affected by it were two different things.

Well.

Emery had gotten half his wish — Josh was powerless to prevent the hard sharp anger that lodged somewhere in his chest — but there was no amount of anger that would cause him to want to abandon Emery to his fate. His voice was cold, and he was just as powerless to prevent that as the rest.

"Not everything is a transaction. Hardly anything is, with me — that's more up your alley," he added pointedly. "But I think you know that already. Are you going to make me beg? Will that give you back some of that pride of yours?"

And there it was again, just as the night before the last: at the disdain in his words Emery shrunk in on himself, looking like he'd taken a beating; every remotely good emotion fled his eyes, leaving only weary resignation in its stead.

"No, I... No. You have my word. I'll have them call you when I'm released."

"Thank you." He got up from his chair, exhaustion catching up with him. "Try to get some rest now, and I'll do the same."

Predictably, Mark was hovering outside. Less predictably, he had no pre-prepared rant over the idiocy of taking Emery home. At times like these, the doctor in him outweighed the friend, and that was a relief to Josh; the last thing he needed was to defend his life's choices while running on no sleep.