Don't Waste Your Time on Me.

Jack

Forgive me, I'm trying to find my calling. I'm calling at night. I don't mean to be a bother, but have you seen this boy?

I was running, running restlessly. Sprinting down the hallways of Manhattan's hospital without caring that the nurses around me were yelling at me to calm down, to stop scaring the other patients. I couldn't stop, I wouldn't stop. I didn't care about the other patients, I needed to find Alex. I reached the front desk and immediately halted to a stop.

"Gaskarth." I said, desperately trying to catch my breath "I need to know where Alex Gaskarth is."

Waking the neigbors, unfamiliar faces. He pleads, oh he tries, but he's only denied. Now he's dying to get inside.

"Are you related to the patient?" the receptionist asked, eyeing me suspiciously.

"N-no, he's my boyfriend. Please, I need to know if he's okay." I could feel my eyes starting to tear up, I tried my hardest to keep my composure. I told myself that now wasn't the time to break down, that I needed to be strong. I needed to see Alex before I could even think about falling apart at the seams.

"Oh." she simply said, shooting me a disgusted look "I'm afraid I can't give you any information on the condition Mr. Gaskarth is in, I'm terribly sorry." the petite brown-haired woman with huge blue eyes and an enormous unmissable pimple on her cheek spoke slowly, sounding rather bored than sorry which only set me off more and before I coud swallow the words I so badly wanted to shout in her face, they came out.

"Listen here, you little shit. The love of my life got hit by a huge fucking truck not even an hour ago and I had to witness every single second of it wihout being able to help him, without being able to fucking rescue him. So please forgive me for getting frustrated and paranoid, okay? All I want is to see my boyfriend, please." I was pathetically crying by the end of my little outburst, the events of the day slowly but steadily sinking in, images becoming more apparent and lucid. Vivid recollections haunting my every thought.

"Sir, I'm asking you to leave. We're not tolerating this kind of behavior nor do we in any way appreciate your inappropriate language. You can come back after we talked to one of the patient's parents, if you can behave yourself that is."

"I-I.. okay." defeated I turned around and started to walk away, not knowing what to do, not knowing how to get to Alex. I needed to see him, I needed to feel his skin on mine, I needed to know that he would make it.

I made my way out of the building, I couldn't help but let the tears fall freely, not caring about anyone who could see me. I didn't care about anything anymore, I wouldn't be informed about what would happen to Alex. I would never find out if he's still alive or not, his mother didn't know about the two of us, she wouldn't call me. If he was to pull through, he would think that I had abandoned him when he needed me the most, he would hate me without knowing what had happened. As I passed two buff black paramedics, I overheard something that caught my interest.

".. so this guy says something incomprehensible before blacking out and we almost lost him due to the amount of blood he lost, but we managed to get him back and I believe he's more or less stable now. He was covered in bruises and cuts and blood, I swear he looked extremely horrifying, dude. He got the last free room in the intensive care unit, he's one lucky bastard."

In that moment I wanted nothing more but to place one big, sloppy kiss on the forehead of this intimidating black herald of pure joy. Alex. He had been talking about Alex. It had to be him. It needed to be him.

The neighbors said she moved away, funny how it rained all day. Didn't think much of it then, but it started to all make sense.

I quickly walked towards the elevators, purposely not running in order to not catch anybody's attention. I stepped into the elevator and immediately hit the button to the fourth floor. I was the only one in the elevator which allowed me to take a moment and sort out the questions that were plopping up in my head so fast that I couldn't grasp all of them. In which condition would I find Alex? Would he remember me? Would he pull through? Was he even alive still? I was brought back to reality by the sound of the elevator coming to a stop, beeping to announce that we had reached the destined floor. I stepped out and headed to the second check-in desk of the day.

"Excuse me, sir, I came to see Alexander Gaskarth." I said rather timidly, biting my lip in anticipation.

"Oh, that's unfortunate. He was taken to the EOR because of his severe blood loss just a few minutes ago. You can wait here until one of the operating doctors gets back though."

Severe blood loss. Emergency surgery.

I slumped into the nearest seat, shamelessly letting the tears stream down my face. I tried to keep the noises of one sob following another down, but they were uncontrollably spilling out of my mouth. Images of Alex started flooding my head. Alex on his first day at the hospice, how sad and broken he looked, how he let me take him in my arms without protesting. I thought about the sparkle he had in his eyes whenever he sang, how perfectly content he looked. I could picture him squirming beneath me, softly moaning and panting as he tried to force the oxygen back in his lungs after feverishly making out with me on my bed. His hair a mess, his lips kiss-swollen. A sight I never wanted to forget, a sight I wasn't ready to give up. He had to pull through, I couldn't afford to lose him, not now. Not when I barely even had him to begin with.

I stood up from where I sat, nervously pacing the hallways. I caught sight of my reflection in the window pane, realizing just how awful I looked. I also noticed that the sky had gotten significantly darker, raindrops rapidly falling on the ground, clouding the atmosphere in a shadowy blanket of depression pain.

I'm not coming back, I did something so terrible. I'm terrified to speak, but you'd expect that from me. I'm mixed up, I'll be blunt. Now the rain is just washing you out of my hair and out of my mind. Keeping an eye on the world, so many thousands of feet off the ground. I'm over you now, I'm at home in the clouds. Towering over your head.

After about two hours a chubby, scruffy man came waddling out of the EOR and towards me. I all but ran to him, hopeful expression on my face which was destroyed the moment he shook his head.

"I-is he..?" I gulped. No, no he couldn't.

"If you're here for Mr. Gaskarth then unfortunately yes. We aimed for a blood transfusion but he was already too weak. There was nothing we could have done, I am verry sorry sir." and with that he disappeared.

He left me standing there, completely lost. I fell to my knees, curling into a fetal position, shaking back and forth. Back and forth. Back and forth. Tears were constantly escaping the corners of my eyes, falling to the ground and gathering in a puddle next to my cheek. I felt numb. Constant thoughts of 'Why?' were running through my head. Why him? Why not me? Why now? Why him? Why him? People were starting to stare at me, not that I cared. I couldn't bring myself to feel anything else than the pain of getting my heart ripped out. I couldn't focus on anything else than the feeling of someone kicking my ribs. Gone. He was gone. Forever. He wouldn't return. I would never see him again, ever. Gone.

I guess I'll go home now, I guess I'll go home.

I don't know how long I laid on the floor crying out every fiber of my being desperately trying to stop my heart from bleeding, but nobody seemed to care enough to ask me to get up. I didn't care either. I couldn't find it in me to stop being a pathetic mess, I couldn't find it in me to care about anything but my heart that's been twisted and torn until it eventually shattered. I didn't want to face anyone. That is until I felt a foot softly nudge my side. I looked up to see Dan standing above me, offering me a sympathetic smile. He took my hand without saying a word, helping me up and guiding me to the seating area.

"Wh-what are you doing here?" I asked, face confused and voice broken. "I never told you were I was."

"I know." he began, putting his arm around my shoulder and pulling me into him, allowing me to cry into the soft fabric of his jersey "The nurse thought you looked familiar, so she called me after you broke down on the floor. I came as fast as I could."

"I.. I-he, Dan he's-" I was cut off by another sob, more tears spilling from my eyes "dead." I choked, breaking down completely for the millionth time that day.

"I'm so sorry, Jack." he mumbled into my ear, pulling me closer. Before I could think of an answer I heard someone coughing to get our attention. I looked up to meet the calm brown eyes of an elderly looking doctor.

"Are you here for Alexander Gaskarth?" he asked, smoothing down his long white beard.

I shot up, furiously rubbing at my eyes. Did Albus Dumbledore just say Alex Gaskarth?

"Um yes.." I heard Dan answer awkwardly "I am Mr. Howell and this is Mr. Barakat, his boyfriend." I shot him a confused look at the use of the word 'boyfriend', not knowing who could've told him. He mouthed a "It was too damn obvious" before returning his attention to the man in front of us.

"Well, I am happy to tell you that Mr. Gaskarth is alive."

"He-he what?" I stammered, feeling my heart mending itself. Carefully closing every gap, stitching together every open cut, rhapsodically pumping the blood through my veins. Alex was alive.

"He was clinically dead for about twenty-three minutes, but we managed to bring him back and more importantly stabilize him. He should be okay now, the blood transfusion went according to plan, he should wake up tomorrow morning. Go home and get some rest, visiting hours are over anyway." a rather tall and friendly looking doctors said matter of factly before offering me a warm smile and a handshake.

"Thank you so much." Dan said, patting my shoulder and escorting me out of the building that had brought me so much pain over the course of the last few hours.

But all the pain I had endured didn't matter anymore, because Alex was going to live and he was going to be okay.