There's Nothing Like Suicide Avenue

I sat in the hospital for hours. Sometimes I was by myself, other times the guys were with me. Leana was here too, for a while, but her parents came and took her to their home. We hadn’t gotten any news on Kassandra yet, and Emma had to be escorted out of the waiting room more than once while demanding answers. At the same time, we couldn’t get a hold of Jimmy and Kassandra’s dad because of his trip in Tahiti. Donatello and Allegra Alfieri, Lucian’s parents, were on the next flight out. Cheyenne and Adam Charlton, Ben’s parents, did the same thing. Michael’s parents couldn’t get away form the restaurant at the moment, but promised to get here as soon as they could. Matt, Zacky, and Johnny took turns coming to check on me and talk with the nurses at the desk. Ben ended up going to Emma and Johnny’s place, to try and keep some kind of control over the masses of people, namely Emma. I continued to sit in the same seat, not moving, not eating, breathing only because I had to. Two things kept running through my head.

My best friend; my brother-in-law, is dead.

The love of my life; my wife, is in the hospital, almost dead.

And I couldn’t do a damn thing to save either of them. Tears welled up in my eyes, threatening to spill out again.

“Son?” A hand on my shoulder jerked me from my thoughts and actually caused a few tears to slip from my eyes. I let my eyes wander up to my dad’s face. “I didn’t bring Suzy with me. I figured you could use a bit of a break from all the hysterics.” I nodded. Honestly, I couldn’t care either way. Suzy crying didn’t change the facts. “Have you heard anything yet?” I shook my head, straightening up from how I’d been leaning over with my elbows resting on my legs, my head in my hands. My dad nodded and headed towards the nurse’s station. I could see him talking quietly to the head nurse, who smiled softly at him and nodded. He smiled a bit and nodded himself.

“Well?” My voice cracked and my throat hurt from lack of use in the last few hours.

“The doctor assigned to Kassandra is coming out now.”

“Haner family?” I shot out of my seat and made my way to the doctor, my dad right behind me. “Are you Mr. Haner?”

“Yeah, Brian. Kassandra’s my wife.” The doctor nodded and looked through some papers he had with him. “How is she?” He sighed.

“First off, she’s in a coma.” My heart sank. “We pumped her stomach and got everything out. Thanks to her high tolerance for the alcohol she drank and the drugs she took, they didn’t effect her as much as they should have. She’s in a coma because her body is trying to recuperate; repair itself from the damage that had been done.” He flipped a few more papers.

“When will she wake up?” My father asked for me.

“That, we don’t know. Since it wasn’t a drug induced coma, we have no control over any of it. She’ll wake up when her body has healed enough.” He stopped on a certain paper and read it over, before looking directly at me. “Mr. Haner, did you know your wife is pregnant?” I could feel myself paling.

“Pregnant?” The word was a whisper on my lips, but the doctor heard. He nodded.

“About a month and a week along, from what it looks like, with twins. We man-”

“That’s impossible.” I cut him off. “She cant have kids. She was in an accident when she was in her early teens. It damaged her reproductive system so she-”

“So it would be harder for her to have children, Mr. Haner, not impossible.” He smiled at me. “Both of the babies are perfectly safe, and haven’t been damaged in anyway, from what we could tell with an ultrasound. Right now, we have Mrs. Haner in the ICU, under constant supervision. She’s stable, but at this point, anything could happen.”

“Can I see her?” I asked hopeful. The doctor smiled and nodded, motioning for me to follow him. I looked back at my father.

“I’ll call everyone and tell them what’s going on. Go see her, son. She needs you.” I nodded and followed the doctor though a maze of hallways, going deeper into the hospital with every step we took. The lack of colors grew, the smell of sterile objects becoming intense and overpowering. He stopped in front of a closed door.

“She’s right in there. If anything happens, there’s a call button for the nurse’s station we just passed. Alright?”

“Yeah.” I paused and looked at the man., “Thanks, Doc.”

“No problem, Brian.” I entered into the room, and looked at my wife. I slowly closed the door behind me, eyeing all the machines and tubes hooked up to Kassandra. I pulled a chair to the side of her bed and carefully took her small hand in my own. She was still a bit colder than she normally would have been, but her skin was a normal color. My thumb ran over the back of her hand, and over the wedding set on her finger.

“I love you, babe. So much.” I whispered softly to her. “Jimmy’s gone,” my voice cracked, “but you probably already know that. But, I have good news,” tears flowed from my eyes, “you’re pregnant. With twins. We’re going to have little babies of our own, Kassi.” I wiped some tears off my cheeks. “You can’t leave me, sweetheart. I know you’ll survive so the babies have a chance to live, but you can’t leave me. You’re not allowed to. I can’t lose you and Jimmy. You’re a fighter. Fight for us, for the babies, for Jimmy’s memory, your family. For everything you know and love. Just-” my voice completely broke as did my self control, leaving me hysterical, “just don’t leave me.” I squeezed her hand a bit tighter and sat there for a bit.

“Mr. Haner?” A nurse came in after a while and got me. I looked over at her, my face blank. “We’re going to have to ask you to leave the room for a few minutes. We’re going to change the IV, check her vitals, and you have a group of people in the waiting room for you.” I nodded and stood up, kissing my wife on the forehead.

“I’ll be back, baby. I love you.” I told her and walked out of the room, to face everyone.

Days turned into weeks, which turned into months. Kassandra stayed asleep. Ben and Emma, along with the rest of Suicide Avenue, decided to drop the new CD in support of Kassandra. They did interviews and blogs, telling people about her and how she was doing, and the babies. They did a small tour to a few major cities and came home. Avenged Sevenfold followed in the same path. We finished the new album and did a big city tour, then came home. It was hard, without Jimmy, but we got it done.

Of course, the other reason we didn’t do a big tour, was the fast spreading epidemic that was taking over our group. It was early August, the twins due any day. Leana was due next month. Around the same time, Andy’s cousin was due with the child she was carrying for him and Mikey. She had been the perfect choice to carry their child, having looked like a female Andy and her extremely similar DNA. Shortly after, Benedikt and Darryk had decided to do the same thing, Darryk’s sister becoming the surrogate mother, and due late October. Gena was due with her and Zacky’s child in November. Arianna, Luke’s wife, was due in December. Pregnancy was everywhere. We often joked about something being in the water.

On August 8th, around seven at night, my hand was clenched in a most unpleasant way. My eyes fluttered open, looking to my wife. Her face was clenched in pain, a small sound of distress coming from her throat. Immediately, I hit the button to call a nurse to the room.

“Kassandra, baby?” I spoke, trying to get her to open her eyes.

“Brian.” She whimpered, squeezing my hand as pain racked her body again. “It hurts.” Her eyes fluttered open, looking to me.

“It’s okay, baby, I called the nurse.”

“What’s going on?” Her voice was a bit softer than normal, obviously disoriented.

“You’re having our babies, Kassi. We’re gonna have twins.” I told her softly. Her eyes widened, but clenched again as more pain hit her. A nurse walked into the room. “She’s going into labor and she’s awake.” I told Jessica, the nurse who I’d come to know over the months of being here. She yelled out of the room to the other nurses, then rushed over and started checking machines and Kassandra’s chart. She smiled at my wife.

“My name’s Jessica, I’m your head nurse here at the hospital.”

“What?” She was defiantly disoriented.

“Don’t worry about anything right now, hun, other than getting these beautiful babies into the world. You’re about a week overdue, since twins normally come in thirty-six weeks rather than forty, but we’re ready.” Nurses came into the room, rushing around. “Alright, we’re gonna bring you over to maternity.”

“Kassi.” I made my wife look at me. “Could you hear me while you were out?” She nodded. “Then you know what’s going on?” Her eyes went soft, nodding again. “Alright. Right now, concentrate on the kids. I’m gonna go call everyone.”

“Brian James Elwin and Briann James Isis. They‘re perfect.” She spoke just as they started moving her out of the bedroom. I smiled and kissed her forehead. She’d chosen the names of our twins, the ones I’d told her I liked best when she’d been in the coma.

“I love you, Kassandra Anastasia.”

“I love you too, Brian.” And they wheeled her to maternity while I went to make phone calls. My life, while having some of the worst moments ever, was ending up almost perfect in my eyes.