Like a Million Lights

After reading the note, I stormed out from the dressing room, leaving the guys in confusion. If the one who was behind this was the same one that I had in my mind, I didn’t know what to do. The outside wasn’t that rowdy anymore, just still a couple of fans that waited for the other bands, or just Alex, Sean and Ryan. I opened the crumpled paper in my hand to see where he wanted to meet me, and it was on the sidewalk, right in front of the venue.

I walked there and found no one. It was already quiet and only some crews that were packing everything so we could get out from here soon. I waited under the streetlight and controlled my breathing. “Are you looking for me?”

That voice came from my worst nightmare and I closed my eyes, taking a really deep breath. I turned my head to the direction of the voice and there he was. His dirty blonde hair looked paler under the moonlight and his green eyes looked really intimidating tonight.

“What did you do to Joel?”, I said through my teeth. Keane chuckled and shook his head before pinching his cigar that was hung between his lips and blew the smoke out.

“Mariza…”, he clucked his tongue. “You and your little boyfriend won’t ever give up, huh? I messed your relationship once and you two got back together.”

“What did you do?!”, I screamed, boiling in anger.

Keane looked amused and threw his cigar on the ground before stomping on it. “I just gave him some sleep, Rissy, he needed it, didn’t he?”

Tears started to build up on my eyes and Keane pouted before taking some steps closer to me. “Don’t touch me!”, I slapped his hand away when it was about to reach my cheek. It was a mistake.

He cupped my face with his thumb and index finger harshly, pushing those fingers onto my cheek deeply, hurting my jaw. “If you want to know, I put pills into his drink so you’d see that if you messed with me, the people around you would get hurt.”, he hissed.

“He’s probably dying right now in the hospital and the only thing that could save him was an antidote that I have because those pills were still unrecognizable to the medical world.”, he snickered evilly, “And the only way you could get that for him is to break up with him.”

The tears that were on my eyes now rolled down my cheeks. I nodded helplessly and he let go of my face with a sinister chuckle. My eyes stung because of the tears that were building on them. “Just please… give me the antidote… just let him live.”

Keane gave me a glance before taking something out from the pocket of his jacket. It was a small tube with a transparent liquid inside. “Just inject this into his veins and he’d be back to normal, but… how could I trust you that you would break up with him after giving this?”

“Please, Keane.”, I hiccupped. “I swear… I’ll…”, I bit my tongue before continuing the sentence, “I swear I’ll break up with him… just please give it to me. He’s dying…”

“Just get home after this and there’ll be a package waiting for you in your mailbox tomorrow morning.”, he flicked the bottle to me and walked away, not forgetting to kiss my cheek on his way.

I flinched but he ignored it. When he was out of sight, I broke down. How would I break up with Joel? The bottle in my hand felt hot and I had to get it to the hospital. I stood up then I saw someone’s shadow afar. “Who’s there?”

“Mars?”, John stepped into the light and he still had that worry in his face. “I-I wasn’t eavesdropping, but… I heard the whole thing.”

My heart sunk and I bit my bottom lip so hard, it drawn blood. “Erase all the things you heard!”

“No!”, he grabbed my shoulders and gripped them tightly. “You can’t follow his wants, Mariza! You can’t go back to your old self!”

“This is the only way Joel could live!”, I screeched and pushed John away harshly. His eyes widened in disbelief when I did that. “If you have another option, then please tell me, but you don’t!”

He just looked at me as I kept crying and wiping my tears with the back of my hands. “I don’t want to do this, John… I don’t… But I don’t know any other way…”

Then, he suddenly pulled me into his arms and soothed me. It was something I needed for the day because I couldn’t handle this on my own.
***********
I silently slipped into Joel’s room with an injection needle and the antidote in my hands. He was still lying lifelessly on the bed with IV tubes stuck into his arm. Tears started to building up again; I lost count how much I cried tonight. His skin was pale and his chest rose weakly according to his breathing.

With my trembling hands, I prepared the injection and filled the tube with the whole thing. I knew how to inject because back in rehab, I watched how the nurse injected medicines into my veins. When I touched Joel’s arm, it wasn’t cold, but wasn’t the normal warm either; like a tea that you left for half an hour.

I wrapped my headband tightly around his arm so his vein would show up and when it did, I carefully stuck the needle through his skin and into his vein. It was painful for me to do it because I never thought I would do this to anyone. I injected the antidote in and when it was finished, I pulled the needle out slowly. The change was drastically amazing. His heartbeat started to paced up according to the monitor.

“Mariza…”, he mumbled but his eyes were still closed. I closed mine and leaned down to kiss his cheek.

“I’m sorry, Joel.”, that was the only thing I say before I got out from his room. It was better that way for me, before he gained full consciousness and had the time to argue with me. John was waiting outside because he couldn’t trust me of going back safely to the bus.

When I was already outside the hospital, he was nowhere to be seen. I walked a bit away from the building and suddenly, someone from behind covered my mouth area with his hand and pulled me into a van that was parked in an alley. It was useless for me to scream.

John

I waited for Mariza outside the hospital, even though it was windy cold outside. Never in a million years I would thought that she had to get through this again, but harder this time. The way she sacrificed herself just for Joel hurt me because I was sure I could give her much more than he could. Suddenly, my phone buzzed inside my pocket and I pulled it out to see that Garrett was calling.

“Hello?” I answered and shoved my free hand into my pocket because I couldn’t bare the cold without rubbing my hands together.

“John, where are you? Do you know when bus call is and have you see Mars?! I couldn’t find her anywhere, and I asked the guys from This Century, they said she ran off.”, Garrett rambled on the other line.

I rolled my eyes and licked my chapped lips before answering. “Look, I’m outside the hospital where Joel is, Mariza’s inside because she wanted to meet him for a sec, we’ll go back soon, okay?”

“Fine. See you man.”, he ended the call. I exhaled while getting my phone back into my pocket and rubbed my hands together. It was almost fall so no wonder the weather was so windy.

It was almost 20 minutes but Mariza hadn’t walk out. I decided to just go inside and checked Joel’s room, in case something bad happened. When I was outside, I peeped from the small window on the door but found Danielle instead of Mariza beside Joel.

Joel was already awake with his hand in Danielle’s, but I could see that Joel was confused on what was going on. There was something in me that made me turned that doorknob and went in. Both of them snapped their heads to me.

“John? What are you doing here? Have you seen Mariza?”, Joel asked.
“Well… She was here 10 minutes ago actually, so I checked in to see if she was still here because our bus call is in 10 minutes.”

“No, I haven’t seen her and Joel just woke up.”, Danielle answered flatly and I could see that there was something in her.

“I felt like she was here…”, Joel muttered loud enough for Danielle and I to hear. “Please, John, if you see her, just tell her that I wanted to see her.”

“Sure thing.”, I nodded. “But, Danielle… can I talk to you outside?”

Her jaw tightened as she stood up from her seat and followed me out from the room. After she closed the door behind her, I turned around. “Look, Danielle, I know you’ve seen Mariza around, where is she?”

“Really, John?”, she scoffed. “I haven’t seen her for a while after I got kicked off from the tour and you expected me to see her 10 minutes ago?”

“She was here earlier! I was outside waiting for her to come out!”, I said through my gritted teeth. “I don’t know what kind of sick game you’re playing here, Danielle, but where is Mariza?!”

She snickered and flipped her hair a bit. “Who are you to her, anyway? Why do you care about her so much even though you knew she couldn’t leave Joel for you in a million years? Give up, John.”

My hands were itching to do something to her face but she was a girl and we were in a public place. “It wasn’t that… I care for her, even though she wouldn’t leave Joel for me.”
“If you must know, she’s now back to her old insane and drug addict self and leaving Joel to be with me.”, she grinned evilly. “To top things up, I knew what happened between you and Mariza earlier… I saw everything.”

My eyes widened and my heart paced up. She couldn’t be talking about how Mariza and I made out earlier. How on earth could she even saw us? We were secluded! “W-What are you talking about…”

“Oh come on, John.”, she giggled sinisterly. “Don’t play dumb with me. How you did some NC-17 things with Mariza on the parking lot earlier. I know everything and if you ever try to mess with me, I could easily slip it off to Joel. I know you wouldn’t care if you get some bruises, but you would be thinking of how Mariza and Joel.

“So, just to make it quick; don’t ever come near Joel and I and if you did find Mariza, just get her to break up with Joel.”