It's Gonna Be My Year

I blearily blinked my eyes, taking in my surroundings. So I was in the hospital and I don’t remember how I got here. That’s a great start. For some reason I do remember flowers being dropped, though I can’t remember who dropped them. I slowly turned my head to the left, ignoring the pain that felt like it was splitting my brain in two. I saw my mother sleeping in a chair and realised she was holding my hand. I started to wiggle it a little trying to wake her up. She did and sat up slowly, trying to blink the sleep from her eyes. Her eyes then widened when she saw me awake, and she started to tear up.
“Mum, please don’t cry,” I whispered hoarsely. I started to look around for water and Mum seemed to realise what I was looking for, so she dried her eyes and passed me a cup.
“Oh, Alex baby. You have to stop doing things like this. Do you know how worried I get?” She said in a rush. Oh shit. She was really upset. Just then the door to my room opened and I didn’t recognise the boy with black and bleached hair standing before me.
His hair was messed up and hung around his face. His brown eyes seemed dull and flat and had huge bags under them. He looked weary and tired when he shuffled in the door, his head lowered. His clothes were dark and baggy and looked wrinkled, like he had slept in them. I could see faded bruises on his face and arms.
This is not my Jack.
My Jack would have been bouncing around with energy as his eyes sparkled with life. Wearing band tees and skinny jeans that he would have hated to see wrinkled. His hair spiked up to perfection. I hate that it’s my fault that he’s like this.
He finally lifted his head and he seemed to notice that I was awake. I briefly wondered how long I’d been asleep for but that thought was soon taken over as I saw Jack bound towards me, the sparkle back in his eyes.

ONE HOUR LATER
I learnt I’ve been in a coma for a week and that I was going to be discharged tomorrow. I hadn’t been hurt too much and it was basically tissue damage. Apparently I had to take it easy and couldn’t go back to school for another week, but how was I supposed to protect Jack when I wasn’t there?
Jack had kissed me when he ran over and Mum was shocked. Whoops, I guess I must have forgotten to tell her about us dating. Well she took it all in stride and told me that now I was awake she was going to go home for a shower and get me something to occupy my mind while I was here for the night. She had extended the invitation to Jack, but he declined because he wanted to talk to me about something. Mum left with the promise she’d be back in a couple of hours with my things.
When she left Jack sat on the edge of my bed and just stared at me, his eyes roaming my face. We sat and stared at each other for another minute before Jack flung himself into my arms and started sobbing.
“God Alex, I was so worried. I-I can’t even, even, tell you h-how worried I w-was. When I-I saw you, you, getting hit… I-I just, I just. Why did you do that Alex?” He sobbed out. I was hugging him back tightly, rubbing his back in what I thought was a soothing way. Hopefully it was.
“To stop them from hurting you,” I whispered back. He was shocked and stopped crying for about two seconds but then what I’d said had registered and he just cried harder. About ten minutes later his sobs had turned into sniffles and he sat back up, facing me once again.
“Jack are you ok? Physically I mean. They didn’t hurt you too badly did they?” I asked, concerned. Those bruises were still pretty bad for being a week old. He looked at me like I was insane.
“How can you ask me that when you’re lying in a hospital bed!?” He exclaimed. I winced because of the loud noise and he seemed to notice. He mouthed ‘sorry’ and I just shook my head, silently telling him it was ok. That was a fucking mistake. I was about to answer when another thought struck me.
“Wait they haven’t been hurting you at school have they?” I asked, getting increasingly worried. What if they? It would be all my fault! I haven’t been there to help him because I couldn’t protect us well enough.
“No, I’m fine baby. They haven’t touched me. Not that I’ve really been there…” He said the last bit under his breath, obviously hoping I wouldn’t notice.
“What do you mean you haven’t been there?” I asked accusingly as I narrowed my eyes. He looked ashamed but then the shame turned to resolve.
“You’ve been in a coma for a week! How was I expected to go to school? I was too worried about you to concentrate anyway. The only reason I went is because the school said I had to go or my grades would drop exponentially.” Oh fucking hell. His dad would be pissed if his grade dropped below an A minus. He started to tear up again. Oh fuck I really had worried him. My poor Jack.
“Oh baby, it’s ok. I’m ok now. I’m gonna be out of hospital in no time,” I said soothingly as I pulled him down for a hug. I made him lay down beside me, after a little protesting from him because he didn’t want to hurt me further (as if his skinny ass could), and he soon fell asleep. I stayed up and stroked his hair, trying to show him I was here. I figured I had slept enough recently.
You could easily see he needed the sleep and I felt bad because it was my fault he was like this. If I was a better fighter I could have helped him more. I wouldn’t be in this mess and he wouldn’t have bruises staining his perfect face. He looked so innocent in sleep. Like there was nothing wrong in the world. And that’s all I wanted for Jack: for nothing to be wrong in his world. But unfortunately that’s not how life works, and I couldn’t protect him from everything, even if I really did want to.
I felt myself slowly drifting off, so I just tightened my arms around Jack and let my body take me into the land of sleep.

TWO HOURS LATER
When Isobel Gaskarth walked into the room she quietly cooed at the sight. She saw her son asleep, curled protectively around his boyfriend, as though he was trying to protect Jack from all harm. Jack, that poor boy, was getting well deserved rest. She was glad Alex had Jack in his life as he was more relaxed than she had ever seen him before. Unfortunately that was all about to change as soon as she woke him up. She walked over to Alex’s visitor and said:
“Look just wait out here. I will wait him up and get him ready to see you. Just be gentle ok? He was quite upset when you left him.”
And with that warning she was off to wake her son and his boyfriend, preparing for the havoc Alex was about to wreak on his visitor, Tom.