We'll Tell The Saddest Story Of How We Made It Through This Past Year.

My body shook as the paramedics flew into the almost empty parking lot, their sirens blaring. I watched from no more than a meter away, but it felt like I was a thousand miles above, watching from the distance as the bright lights flashed all around us.

Danny and Matt had been the first ones to come running out of the bus. Danny had dropped to the ground beside Jack and Matt had whipped out his phone and starting barking out orders to 911.

Danny felt Jack's neck. "His pulse is steady. Jesus Christ, what the fuck happened?"

My eyes flew to Kyle and I was on my feet in a second. "WHAT DID YOU DO TO HIM?" I cried. "WHAT WERE YOU TRYING TO DO?"

Kyle trembled and couldn't meet my eyes. Tears streamed down his cheeks and he made no effort to hide it. "I'm sorry, Alex," he said, barely audible. "I didn't mean to hurt him. I just wanted him to l-love me."

"LOVE?" Danny cried. "This is how you expect him to love you? By poisoning him? Jesus Christ, what if he dies?! Did you think about that?" Danny's fists were balled and I put a hand on his arm to keep him from lunging forward.

"Danny, enough," I said firmly. My body still shook and my head was pounding, but my voice was clear. Danny looked at me, disbelieving, and pushed off, walking over to join the others.

One of the paramedics walked over to me. His dark eyes took in my haggard expression, my tear streaked face, and placed a comforting hand on my shoulder. He was gray haired and reminded me of my dad. I was overcome with a longing for my parents and I fought back the fresh wave of tears that threatened to surface.

"My name is Mike, I'm the first responder," he said by way of introduction. "Am I right in assuming you're Jack's boyfriend?"

The way he said Jack's name, instead of the stiff and formal 'Mr.Barakat', and the lack of judgement in his eyes instantly made me feel a bit better.

"I-is he going to be okay?" I stuttered, suddenly cold. It was gone 3am and it was freezing. Almost as if reading my mind, Flyzik appeared beside me and wrapped a sweater around my shoulders. I shrugged into it, but it did nothing to stop the wild shaking that seemed to be coming from inside my body. I leaned into Matt, my strength rapidly fading. Matt wrapped his arms around me and I could feel the worry in him just by the way he held me.

"Everything looks good," Mike responded. "He's been poisoned by roofies. But there doesn't seem to be any complications. He's going to need medication, but he should be just fine."

"ROOFIES?" I cried, horrified. I couldn't stop the tears this time and Matt pulled me into him.

What if I hadn't come outside? What else would Kyle have done? What if Jack hadn't passed out? Would Kyle have raped him? Jesus Christ. I choked on a sob, and started coughing. A water bottle was passed to me instantly, and I looked up to find that the rest of my friends had formed a semi circle around me.

"Someone needs to go with him to the hospital," Mike said. "The logical choice would be you, Alex, but you're going to need to talk to the police first. Can someone else go with him?"

We all looked at Danny. Danny was Jack's best friend.

"Yeah, I'll go," he said, the fear showing in his eyes. "Just let me get my phone and a sweater."

As Danny and Mike walked away, a uniformed officer walked up to us. He looked at me. "Mr.Gaskarth? Would you mind answering some questions?"

I shook my head, unable to answer. I felt numb. I was cold. Nothing made sense and everything hurt.

"Can I stay with him?" Matt asked protectively. "I'm scared he's going to go into shock or something."

We heard the ambulance doors close and with a squeal of sirens, it raced away. I watched it until I couldn't even see the glow of the lights.

"Of course," the officer said, not unkindly. He was young, maybe a few years older than us. "Maybe one of you should get him a strong drink. It'll calm his nerves and warm him up," he said like the veteran of vicious crimes that he was.

Matt and the officer led me to one of the picnic tables.

"Kyle Burns has turned himself in," he said without further ado. "He admitted to putting roofies in Mr.Barakat's drink. We believe that he put too much. He's being escorted down the station now. He's going to charged, and will probably serve some time in jail. He is also going to be put on the sex offender's list and will have a probabation officer. Is that all clear?"

We nodded, dumbfounded.

"Good. Now, I just have a few questions. I know the history between you two, band wise, but I need to know if you've noticed anything unusual about Kyle's behaviour during this specific tour."

I racked my brains, trying my hardest to think. "He kept trying to get Jack alone, and was always making comments about how lucky I was to have him. I just thought he'd had a bad break up ... he also admitted to me that he was gay. I knew he was looking for attention from us, but I didn't realize what kind of attention he wanted," I said, my throat clogging. If only I'd realized, maybe I would have been able to avoid this.

"Very well," he said. "Were there any other actual incidents, or was this this first one?"

Things were falling into place way too fast. "The Cokes," I said slowly. "Kyle had said they weren't his, that it was a mix up, but I bet he planned it!" I caught the officer's look and explained. "Jack got really drunk really fast one day when he was outside with Kyle. Kyle said that he hadn't realized that the drinks were spiked, that they were one of his band member's. But it almost cost me and Jack our relationship."

"And when Jack got locked in that room backstage," Matt added. "I bet Kyle was responsible."

Alarm bells were ringing. "And yesterday ... when he found the girls. Our daughters had gotten 'lost' at Disneyworld after getting off the wrong side of a ride and we found them within a few minutes with Kyle. But they were heading away from us, towards the exit. I didn't put two and two together until now. Oh my god," I said, dropping my head into my hands. It had hit me just then how close I'd come to losing everything that meant anything to me.

"Do you think he would have hurt them?" I asked.

The officer shook his head. "I don't know. I think he's obssesed with Jack. Obsession can be one of the most dangerous illnesses out there. Sadly, it's hard to catch and harder to prove, until something like this happens."

I shivered, remembering everything I'd gone through with Jack, Lisa, and her crazed obsessor last year. Why did this keep happening to me?

"We'll keep you updated, Mr.Gaskarth, and we'll be in touch. Both of you will have to testify in court, but since Mr.Burns turned himself in, it will just be formalities."

The officer slipped away, leaving me and Matt, and within seconds, the rest of my group joined us. None of us spoke, we were all in shock. From my point of view, I could see the members of Forever The Sickest Kids, none of which had dared to cross over and talk to us. I could specifically see Jonathan staring at us, and even though I couldn't see his eyes, I could imagine he was in just as much pain as I was.

"I'm going to talk to Jonathan," I said abruptly.

"Are you sure that's a good idea?" Rian asked.

"It's not their fault any more than it's ours," I said. "No one knew. It's a sickness. I've been through this, remember? There's no point in blaming them - they're probably hurting enough."

Rian, Matt, and Evan trailed behind me as I walked over to the others. Jonathan and Caleb's eyes were swollen and red and Austin looked like someone had poured a bucket of ice on him.

"Alex, I'm so sorry," Caleb spoke first, his voice thick with emotions. "He was acting weird, but we didn't know, I swear, we didn't know."

"It's not your fault," I said, even though I would have loved it to be. I wanted someone to blame. But there was no one to blame except Kyle, and even then, I couldn't blame him as much as I wanted to because he was sick.

"We didn't even know he liked guys," Jonathan said brokenly. "Why didn't he confide in us? We could have helped him find someone. The sad thing is, all he's ever wanted is to be loved."

Nobody spoke because no one knew what to say to that.

I broke the silence. "I want to see Jack."

"Let's go," Rian said, and led me away from everyone. I could feel their eyes watching me as I walked away, and I made a show of walking straight and pretending I was stronger than I was, when really all I wanted to do was cry and cry and cry.