We're Losing Everything We Know

“You’re startin’ to fade, Gen. Want me to take over for a while?” he asked, putting a hand on my arm.

“Nah, Oli, I’m good. Go back to sleep,” I said, smiling and looking over at my long-time boyfriend sitting in the passenger seat beside me, Oliver Sykes. With a nod and a contented sigh, he grabbed my hand, gave it a quick kiss and then curled up to go back to sleep.

We were in his band, Bring Me the Horizon’s touring van on our way to the next city they’d be playing in. I was the sit-in merch girl on the tour; I normally wasn’t touring with them, but their originally slotted merch person had dropped out at the last minute and being Oliver’s girlfriend and Jona’s little sister, they’d asked me to do it and I’d accepted. I was on hour five of my six-hour driving shift, and Oliver was right, I was starting to fade a bit, and if I’d really thought about it, I probably would have accepted his offer to take the wheel for a while. But I didn’t.



The next thing I remember is the screaming, lots and lots of screaming. For a long time, I couldn’t figure what the source was; my head seemed to be filled with a thick black fog. Then it dawned on me. That’s Oliver’s voice. At that thought, my eyes snapped open and I shot straight up. I was on a gurney in the middle of the street. There were people everywhere and flashing lights all around me. I tried to call out his name, but my voice seemed to be frozen.

Then, before I could do anything else, my gurney was being pulled into the back of an ambulance. “No, I need to see Oliver. Where’s Oliver?” I yelled as they shut the doors.

“You’re going to need to calm down, sweetie,” a paramedic said from beside me, and it seemed like the most ludicrous thing I’d ever heard.

“I can’t. I need to see Oliver. Now! I need to see my Oliver,” I screamed, tears cascading steadily down my cheeks, and then it dawned on me that Oliver and I hadn’t been alone in the van. “The boys! My brother! The other boys, where are they? You need to tell me where they are! Are they hurt? I don’t even know what happened! Please, I just-” I said, but the paramedic put her hand up to silence me.

“You were in an accident, love. You seem to have fallen asleep at the wheel. You have no serious injuries, we’re just taking you in to be sure,” she said, and her words echoed in my head. Accident. Fallen asleep at the wheel. No.

“No! Please, just tell me if they’re okay. I need to know if they’re okay. He was screaming. I just need to know,” I screamed, my voice growing ragged and weak with sobs.

“You’ll see them the second we arrive at the hospital, I promise. Now you really need to calm down. You’re having a panic attack,” she said, handing me a cold bottle of water, which I promptly threw to the floor.

“I don’t fucking want any water. I want to know if they’re okay. I know you know,” I said, quickly growing angry at her. She didn’t respond, just picked up the bottle from the floor and placed it back into the cooler she’d gotten it from.

We rode the rest of the way to the hospital in silence aside from my rasping breaths and strangled sobs. When the ambulance finally stopped and the doors opened, I didn’t even wait to be wheeled out. I stood up and ran through the emergency room doors as quickly as I could, and I almost instantly ran right into three of the boys I was looking for, Lee, Matt, and Vegan. None of them looked too hurt, Vegan had a small bandage on his forehead, but other than that they looked fine. At that moment, I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to be relieved to see them or horrified that only three of them were there. Oliver and Jona were nowhere to be found.

Once they realized I was there, Vegan picked me up into a hug and squeezed me so hard I thought I’d burst, but I didn’t mind, I squeezed him back just as hard. When he put me down, I hugged both of the other guys, and when I took a closer look at them, I realized that all three of their faces were tear-streaked.

“Are you okay?” Matt asked, taking my hand in his and squeezing it.

“I’m fine, what about you guys?” I asked, even though I was more curious as to where Oli and Jona were.

“We’re fine,” Lee confirmed, and then all three of them went deathly silent, and I knew something was wrong.

“W-Where are Oliver and Jona?” I whispered, and all three of them paled and Matt pulled me closer to him so that he could wrap an arm around me.

“Jona’s alright, just a few broken bones,” Vegan said quietly, and I breathed a short sigh of relief, but my relief was almost instantly washed away.

“And Oli?” I asked, and Matt squeezed me tighter.

“He’s in surgery. He’s pretty bad. They don’t know if he’s going to make it, Gen,” Matt whispered, choking out a sob. I saw tears begin slipping silently down Lee’s face, and Vegan left us and walked across the room where I saw his shoulders shaking with sobs.

“No,” I whispered, and my own body started shaking violently with sobs. “No,” I repeated, pulling out of Matt’s grasp and sitting down in one of the waiting room chairs. “No!” I yelled, shaking my head and crying harder. I got up from the chair and walked straight out the door I’d just come in. Collapsing onto my knees on the sidewalk, I threw both of my fists in the air.

“This can’t happen! This can’t fucking happen!” I yelled toward the sky, crying harder than ever. And then I stopped to think about it for a second.

“Want me to take over for a while?”

“Nah, I’m good. Go back to sleep.”

“You were in an accident. You seem to have fallen asleep at the wheel.”

“He’s in surgery. He’s pretty bad. They don’t know if he’s going to make it.”

“No, no, no, no!” I screamed with more passion than before. “No! This was my fucking fault. No!” Suddenly, my throat seemed to be closing up and I couldn’t breathe.

Then there was a hand on my shoulder, startling me. Turning around, I realized it was my brother, Jona, clad in a paper-thin hospital gown, his right arm in a cast and a brace on his neck. “C’mere,” he whispered, holding out the arm that wasn’t in a cast. I stood up and he pulled me close to his chest and held me as tight as he could.

“I’m so sorry. This is my fucking fault,” I whispered, tears still streaming down my face.

“It isn’t your fault, Genevieve. Anyone could have fallen asleep, and anyone could have gotten hurt,” he whispered, but I wasn’t going for it.

“No, Jona. This is my fault. He asked me. He asked me if I wanted him to drive and I said no, and now he’s in there on an operating table. What if he dies, Jona? I couldn’t handle that,” I sobbed, and he backed away a bit so that he could look me in the eye.

“Genevieve, this is not your fault. People fall asleep at the wheel all the time. And you know Oliver, he’s a fighter. He’ll make it through this. He’s going to be okay,” he said, and he sounded as if he was trying to reassure himself just as much as me.

“But what if he’s not, Jona?” I asked quietly, and he raised his hand to stroke my cheek.

“He will be,” he stated firmly, pulling me back into a hug.

Right then, a nurse came flying out the doors and seized Jona by the shoulder. “You, young man, were told to stay in bed,” she said sternly, and Jona’s arms slowly left me.

“I needed to see my sister. Excuse the fuck out of me,” he said, and she got an angry look on her face.

“Go, Jona. Get some rest,” I said, standing on my tip toes so that I could kiss his cheek.

“Rest, yeah, sure like that’s gonna happen,” he said, turning around and slowly following the nurse inside.

A few moments later, I made my own way back in and sat down in the chair closest to me. Seconds later, I felt someone sit down beside me and I looked up to see that it was Lee.

“He’s going to be okay, Genny. He has to be,” the normally shy guitarist whispered, taking my hand in his and squeezing it tightly.

“He’s going to be okay,” I repeated, leaning on his shoulder.



It was two grueling hours before we heard anything about Oliver’s condition. A tired looking middle-aged doctor came toward us, and I could tell just by the look on his face that the news wasn’t good. He gestured for us to follow him into a less populated area of the room, and we did so.

“This is always hard, and I’m so sorry to have to be the one to tell you, but there’s nothing else we can do for him. There’s just too much damage. He’s conscious for the time being, but he’s not going to last long. I am so very sorry,” he said solemnly, and it took me almost a full minute to process his words, and when they finally sunk in, I was sure I’d imagined them. Then looking around at the looks on everyone else’s faces, I realized that they were real. I’d really heard what I thought I had, and I didn’t quite know how to react. Part of me wanted to run away and cry for the rest of my life. But a bigger part of me knew that I had to face the reality and go in and say goodbye to the love of my life, and it wasn’t a ‘see you later’ type of goodbye, it was an ‘You’re dying and I’m literally never going to see you again’ type of goodbye.

I decided to let the guys go in first. I don’t quite know why… it just seemed right. While they were in there, I decided to go in the bathroom and try to wash some of the smudged makeup off of my face. It didn’t really matter, though, because I was still crying and I just ended up smudging it more. When I walked out of the bathroom, Jona was sitting in one of the waiting room chairs.

“What’s happening?” he asked as I walked over to him. I couldn’t answer. I threw my arms around him and sobbed into his chest.

“He’s leaving,” I whispered finally, and Jona’s eyes instantly welled up with tears.

“No,” he whispered back, and I nodded once.

“He’s leaving,” I repeated, and Jona wrapped his arms around me again. “You need to go say goodbye,” I whispered into his chest, and I felt him nod.

“Yeah. Have you yet?” he asked, and I shook my head shortly.

“I wanted you guys to first,” I said, and with a final nod he walked off into the direction of Oli’s room.



Ten minutes later, all of the guys were back and I was on my way to Oli’s room by myself. I’d initially told myself that I needed to be strong for him, but that was quickly crumbling. I paused outside the door, and with a deep breath opened it gently. The second I saw him, I almost wished that I hadn’t come in at all. He looked so small and helpless, and quite honestly kind of lifeless, his entire torso was wrapped in bandages and so was the top of his head, and both of his arms were heavily bruised.

At hearing me walk in, he lifted his head lightly and as soon as he saw me, his eyes lit up and for a second none of it was happening. For a moment we were back in our house in our room. Then I blinked, and everything was terrible again.

“Genny,” he whispered, raising one of his battered arms and gesturing for me to come closer.

“Hi baby,” I whispered, obliging him. As soon as I was within arm’s reach, he grabbed my hand and squeezed it tightly.

“Genny, I’m gonna ask you something and you gotta tell me the truth. Promise me, yeah?” he asked, and I nodded, tears beginning to slip silently down my cheeks.

“Am I dying? I feel like I might be, and none of the guys would give me a straight answer,” he said, and I let out a choked sob.

“Oliver-” I began, but he cut me off.

“You promised. Don’t dance around it, just tell me,” he said, and I could see his eyes well up and begin to overflow with tears.

“Yeah, you are, Oli,” I whispered, sobbing loudly.

He gestured for me to come closer to him and then took my face firmly in between both of his hands. “You need to know that I love you. With all my fuckin’ heart, Genevieve. I wanted to spend the rest of my life with you. I’ll always be with you. No matter what, I’ll always be with you. Don’t you ever forget me,” he said sternly, smiling at me weakly.

“I love you too, Oliver, and I always will,” I said, and he smiled again

“Do me the honor of bein’ my last kiss, yeah?” he rasped, and I nodded quickly.

I leaned down slowly, and he pulled me to him with much more force than I would have thought he had at that point. He held my face inches away from his and just gazed into my eyes for a moment, and then our lips were moving quickly with each other. Then, as quickly as it had started, it was over and we were pulling apart.

“My heart will always be yours, Genny,” he whispered and a minute later, his arms went limp and his eyes fluttered shut.

“Oliver?” I whispered, but part of me knew that there wasn’t going to be a reply. “Oliver?” I asked a little louder and again there was no reply. “Goodbye, Oliver. I’ll always love you,” I said quietly, kissing his hand. I turned my back to walk out the door, and paused with my hand on the knob to look back at his lifeless body one more time. “This isn’t fair,” I said, my body starting to once again shake with sobs. “This isn’t fucking fair,” I repeated, turning the knob and making my way down the hallway and back to the waiting room.

Upon my entering, all four of the guys stood up and walked over to me. “He’s gone,” I whispered, and I could see that they were all crying.

“Are you sure?” Matt asked, and I nodded once.

“He’s gone, Matty,” I confirmed, and he quickly wrapped his arms around me and pulled me close to his chest.

“Why is this happening to us?” he sobbed, and I shook my head.

“I don’t know, sweetie. But I can tell you something. Oliver will always be with us, no matter what,” I said, squeezing him back.

“He’ll always be with us,” I whispered, looking up towards the ceiling.