Without You

“You know, he really is glad you’re here. He’s just wearing a whole lot of pride to cover up his happiness,” Ian tried to comfort me.

We were already in the guys’ hotel room where they were packing up so that they could leave tomorrow morning. Brian still hadn’t taken so much as a glance towards me. It hurt me to see him treat me this way. I guess he really has moved on in a span of a year and a half.

I stayed silent while absent-mindedly helping Ian fold his clothes. I shouldn’t have come back. I really should’ve just left things the way they were. I screwed things up. I screwed me up. I’m totally screwed.

Ian watched me sympathetically. He really shouldn’t be here trying to comfort me. Actually, no one should even be acknowledging me. That would totally make it easier for me to choose to leave and never come back but apparently, the whole world is against me.

Just then, Chachi entered the room. I really didn’t feel like being the third wheel so I told them I’d head out.

“You haven’t even talked to him yet,” Chachi mentioned, hugging Ian from behind. They were so cute together. I wonder why it took them so long to make it official.

“He doesn’t want to see me. There’s nothing more I can do here,” I told them and just like that, Ian whispered something in Chachi’s ear and they both ran out the door, slamming it as soon as both of them ran past.

I didn’t know what kind of motive they had in mind so I got up and gathered my belongings before heading out the door which magically opened by itself and revealed a sullen-looking Brian.

Shocked, I took a step back as he took a step forward. We were locked from the outside apparently.

“We’re not letting you guys out until you talk it out,” Chachi laughed.

I sighed and sat back down on Ian’s bed which looked like a storm had hit it. I didn’t want to look at him and I knew that he didn’t want to look at me either but as soon as I thought that, I felt his hot gaze pierce through my skull. It took all I had to turn and face him. I swallowed hard before meeting his eyes. They were welling up. A little more and I swear it would start flooding on his face.

“Why?” was the first thing that came out of his lips.

I just stared blankly at him, trying to process the fact that he actually spoke to me. I simply couldn’t speak. A ball was caught inside my throat. I wanted to try to explain through hand gestures but I was paralyzed. He was about to turn away, frustrated, but I got up and hugged him. It was a rushed idea in my head paired with a great amount of adrenaline. It could’ve been taken as a weak tackle if we were in a wrestling ring. But we weren’t wrestling. We weren’t fighting. I don’t exactly know what one can call this predicament of ours.

Slowly, his hands found their way around my waist and just like that we broke down together. All that sadness, grief and anger (solely on his part) were finally washed away through tears. But it was inevitable that we had to break apart so that we could have a proper conversation.

“Tell me,” he prodded with a hushed tone.

I took his hand and we both sat on the carpeted floor of Ian’s room. I breathed in and out trying to think of a way to blot out some crucial details as to why I had to leave but I couldn’t think of the perfect ingredients to try and sugarcoat what I was about to say.

“I had to leave, Brian,” I told him. So much more for trying to be detailed.

“I don’t believe that. We used to go through everything together. That was our thing,” he reminded me.

I smirked and looked at a splotch of something on Ian’s floor. “If I stayed and told you at that time, you would’ve dropped everything. I didn’t want you to do that.”

Brian raised an eyebrow, “What in the world could possibly make me do that?” he asked.

I bit my lip to try to stop myself from spilling the big secret but he grabbed my hands and squeezed them, catching my attention. He wanted to know, badly.

I straightened my back as I breathed out. “Remember that time I blacked out during that one workshop?”

“Yeah,” he said, “you were dehydrated and you had a bad cough. It happens.”

I tried to give him a small smile but I couldn’t bring myself to give him more than a lip twitch to the side. I was experiencing so much more than that actually. He just didn’t know. “I went to the hospital the next day to get a check-up and—”

“I thought you said you were going to that deli to get something to bite,” he told me.

“I white-lied,” I said, looking down at my lap. “I went to the hospital and the doctor took some blood samples. He made me take a full body X-ray, too. After a few hours, when I was in the deli, the doctor called and told me to come back to the hospital because something turned up in my results. They wanted me to take a few tests.”

“What was it?” he asked rather curiously.

I swallowed terribly hard. I was so nervous that I think my hands had started to shake after a few seconds. My breath hitched and more tears fell from my already puffy eyes.

“They found blood clots in my lungs,” I said quickly and bit my lips as I watched his reaction.

His grip loosened. He released one hand to cover his mouth to try to stop himself from moaning as he cried. He was hysterical in tears. I don’t know why I chose to just watch him. I made him take a few more heaves before taking both his hands back in mine.

“Brian, stop crying,” I semi-ordered him.

“How can you keep something like this from me?” he asked dramatically. “It’s been a freakin’ year or even more than that! How was I supposed to know if we were ever gonna see each other again?” he scolded.

“The point is, I’m here now—”

“No,” he said sternly. “You should’ve told me. We could’ve gotten through this together. We could’ve spent more time together and we could’ve—”

“BRIAN, STOP!” I yelled.

This got him quiet for a while before he started crying again.

“Look, I’m not dying, okay? I’m fine now. That’s why I’m back.” I tried to calm him down. It was hopeless though.

“How can you spring this on me now and think that I’d be fine with it?” he argued.

“Brian, I really don’t wanna argue with you. I just want everything to be okay,” I tried to say but he shook his head even before the last few words came out of my mouth.

“Ashley, your dad died because of those blood clots,” he rehashed.

I did have to take that into consideration. He was with me when my dad passed away and boy was I a mess. I guess the fact of the matter was that I didn’t want him to experience what I’d experienced at such a young age. He didn’t have to go through all that first-hand.

“I’m not him. I’m taking my pills regularly and I have appointments at the hospital. Besides, he used to smoke a lot,” I explained but he wasn’t listening.

“Is it exactly like your dad’s? What was it called? Pulmonary—”

“Yeah, I was diagnosed with Pulmonary Embolism.”

“Why would you hide something like that from me? I watched your dad get eaten up by that disease because you asked me to hold your hand while he slowly passed away. What happens if you had some kind of episode where you… you…” And just like that he snapped, remembering all the moments we had back when my father was killing himself by not taking any meds.

I held his shaking body as he cried. He enveloped my in his arms as well. We cried on each other’s shoulders like that night he finally laid to rest.

“I’ll never let anything happen to you. Starting today, I promise to never let you go,” he said whole-heartedly.

I smiled a small smile as I cried into his shoulder. I finally had my best friend back.