Safe and Sound

At sixteen years old, Mike Fuentes could confidently say that he’d lived a comfortable life. Unlike the families of his friends, he couldn’t say that he’d had a troubled childhood; he got on well with his big brother, his parents didn’t argue, and while they weren’t exactly the richest family, they weren’t struggling either. Mike had lived a fairly cushioned life, where the darkness had been secluded only to the stories his friends told him about their own home lives.

Maybe that’s why Vic’s disappearance hit him so hard. Of course, having one’s brother disappear completely off of the face of the earth for three days was something anyone would find a little traumatic, but Mike was starting to think that maybe it was karma, or something like that. Maybe he’d been too happy with life, and had taken it for granted a bit, and that’s why Vic was suffering now. He blamed himself for something that was anything but his fault, but he thought that if maybe, he’d been more grateful for what he had, then maybe things would be different now.

Of course Vic’s disappearing wasn’t even the end of it. Mike practically ran home from the field with Vic in his arms, the pouring rain soaking both of them, and by the time he set his big brother down on the couch, his eyes had closed and his breathing slowed down considerably. He screamed for his mother to come help, and she cried over her eldest son as her husband phoned for an ambulance. That was when Mike believed that they were in the clear; Vic would be fine, if only the paramedics could stabilise him.

But Mike, in all his naivety, knew that things were never going to be that simple. Vic had disappeared for three days for no reason at all; things weren’t going to be that simple. This was just the beginning of something long and nasty, that Mike genuinely saw as the universe striking back at him for not appreciating his brother a little more. It wasn’t until they were at the hospital that Mike discovered just how right he was in thinking that things were going to get worse. They ran extensive tests on the elder Fuentes brother, and the rest of his family sat out in the waiting room as they anticipated the news they would receive.

It took hours for the doctors to emerge, and when they did they suggested to Mr and Mrs Fuentes that Mike should give them a moment to talk. Apparently the doctors didn’t think it necessary to worry him, but Mike refused to leave his parents side. Anything that was happening with his brother, he felt he deserved to know. The doctor, a man that Mike would never really like no matter what kind of news he was about to deliver, informed them that a mixture of sitting out in the cold all night without a jacket for three days, and getting caught in the pouring rain for God knows how many hours, had caused a nasty case of pneumonia, which in turn caused one of his lungs to collapse. His condition was serious, but they had every faith that he would recover. His disappearance, however, was still a mystery. They couldn’t explain it, and said it was up to Vic himself to reveal what had happened, if he even knew.

Mike followed his parents into the room his brother was stationed in, and the sight almost made his knees give out beneath him. His big brother, the boy who had been his guiding light for so many years, looked so broken and small; it was almost too hard for Mike to look at him like that. It was like seeing Superman without his cape, or Batman without his mask. It wasn’t right. Vic laid in the centre of the room, in a bed that looked entirely too big, and just made him look even smaller than he actually was. His eyes were closed, covered by dark lids, and an oxygen mask covered his nose and mouth, helping him breathe while he couldn’t do it for himself. His usually dark skin looked pasty and grey, a sickly colour that Mike would always remember. An IV was protruding from his left hand, and Mike knew that if Vic were awake, he would hate that more than anything else. Mike gulped as he saw a cast wrapped around Vic’s right arm and wrist, and he wondered what had happened. He didn’t even notice anything wrong with Vic’ arm when he found him, but then he supposed he had been so preoccupied with getting him home, that he hadn’t really been looking.

All Mike could do was sit down in the chair next to Vic’s bed, and wait for him to wake up. He didn’t know how long he’d be sat there, but he didn’t care. He was willing to wait forever just to talk to his brother again.

////

Vic’s P.O.V

Waking up was a difficult task, and Vic couldn’t figure out why. His head was throbbing slightly, and his lungs burning dully as if he’d been holding his breath for a long time. He didn’t feel comfortable, the way he usually did when he woke up in bed at home, and he wondered momentarily through the grogginess in his brain if he’d fallen asleep on the couch. He groaned, and gently fluttered his eyes open. He felt as if he’d been asleep for a week, considering the fact that the last thing he could remember was getting home and sitting on his bed, and that felt as if was a long time ago. He figured he must have just fallen asleep and slept right through to the morning, which would also explain why he felt a little hungry, considering he would have slept through dinner.

But as he opened his eyes, blinking rapidly for a moment to displace the sleep in his eyes, he realised that he wasn’t in his bedroom, or on the couch for that matter, and when he realised that he was in a hospital bed, hooked up to machines, he began to panic slightly. He whimpered, his eyes welling up with tears as he reached up to rip the oxygen mask off of his face.

“Woah, Vic, stop!” Vic looked to his side as a hand grabbed his wrist and set it back down by his side. Vic looked at his little brother, whose dark eyes were surrounded by purple bags and Vic wondered what he was doing in a hospital, with his brother by his side looking as if he hadn’t slept in a week. Mike sighed and slouched, smiling slightly, “Vic.”

“What’s going on,” The smaller Mexican croaked, his voice thick and rough due to underuse. “Why am I here?”

“You don’t… you don’t remember”? Mike frowned, his face swelling with concern, and Vic just shook his head; remember what? Mike looked around and bit his lip, and Vic wondered why his brother was here but his parents weren’t. Mike leaned forward in his chair, cupping his chin in his hands, “How can you not remember?”

“Remember what?” Vic groaned, getting a little irritated with his little brother. He didn’t know how he couldn’t remember, because he didn’t know what he’d forgotten.

Mike sucked in a sharp breath, “Me and mom got home pretty late Friday night, and when Dad realised you weren’t with us he started to freak out. He thought you’d been with us, and we thought that you’d been at you but you weren’t anywhere. No one had seen you or heard from you since you left school and you left your phone in your room so no one could even get in contact with you. Mom called the police but they told us to just stay home in case you called so we sat there all night, but you never called, and you never came home. We started looking for you in the morning, Tony and Jaime’s families helped us look by no one could find you. We looked everywhere but you weren’t there, you’d just disappeared. Mom thought you’d been kidnapped and pops thought you’d ran away but I knew there was something wrong. I could just tell.”

Mike stopped talking, and all Vic could do was look at him; he didn’t understand how he could have put his brother though that, and not even remember any of it. He felt sick, but still, he needed to know more. Why couldn’t he remember where he’d been? “Then what happened?”

“I found you in some random field,” He looked like he was going to cry, his dark eyes watering and focused on the ground. “It was raining so bad and you were just sat there under a tree, soaked to the bone. I was shouting out for you for ten minutes before I found you but you didn’t answer me, you didn’t even recognise me. When I found you, you were just there staring like I was a complete stranger. You were completely emotionless. I had to carry you home; by the time I got you inside you were passed out and barely breathing. I thought I was too late. “

Mike sniffled and wiped his eyes on his sleeve, “Then we got you here and they told us you had pneumonia for being out in the cold for three days, and your lung collapsed and they told us that there was a chance you wouldn’t make it. I didn’t think you were ever going to wake up; you’ve been asleep for four days. I was so scared, Vic.”

Vic reached out and grabbed his brother’s hand, trying to process how all of that could have happened, without him even remembering it. It seemed crazy, and he almost wanted to believe that Mike was making the whole thing up, but the look on his brother’s face screamed nothing but truth. “Mikey, don’t cry. I’m fine now, see?”

Mike wiped his eyes and nodded, taking a deep breath. Vic smiled at him, trying to convince him that everything would be fine, but in reality, he was twice as scared as Mike was. He’d almost died, and he couldn’t remember any of it. What scared him more was the possibility that, if he’d done it once and couldn’t remember it, then what was to say it wouldn’t happen again?