Fucking jazz music on the bloody radio and he can barely hear it because the sound of his own lungs trying to crawl up his throat is too loud-- Charlie scrabbles at her wrist. His fingers are all slippery and his tongue feels thick even after the cut of his coughing starts to subside and then it's just blood in his mouth and under his tongue and on the inside of his lip. He digs his fingernails into her skin. It's soft, he thinks.

Christ, his side's warm.

"Think that shrapnel perforated something," he breathes out through the hand still mostly covering his mouth. The words are all garbled. Flexes and tightens his fingers against her arm. And then: "I can't stand this music." And then he's quiet, head pressing back against the seat and fingers going vice like as he locks up.