"...It's okay to let go, man." Repression leads to nothing but a lot of stress, he'd know. That was part of his problem. That and overexpression but he's worked on that pretty well too and- well none of that is worth shit when you've lost the other half of your mind now, is it? He'd hit his therapist with that hypothetical before, how would he have to cope without D, and made an example of how he'd failed to cope the first few months he'd been under the dome but now. Jesus.

He rubs his hands up and down North's back, tucking him as close as he can with the sheer mass of him wound tense with trying to hold in, hold back the bulk of his grief.

"I got you. It's okay."