The Leather Jacket

Jack stumbled back through the hospital doors, he was bleary eyed and only just awake. He hadn’t been able to sleep, home felt too quiet and empty. He’d showered, changed and made himself feel a bit less gross but sleep had avoided him. He was just walking back toward his mum’s room with a cup of disgusting coffee in his hand when the front doors flew open and medics came rushing in. He looked up to see then pushing a trolley, he watched as they went right passed him. He caught a glimpse of the person lying unconscious on the bed, Alex.
The next moment seem to pass in slow motion. The coffee fell from Jack’s hand and splattered on the floor, he didn’t realise he’d screamed until he heard his own voice call out Alex’s name. He pushed past the people now crowding the hallway and chased after the medics. What had happened? Where were they taking him? Was he going to be okay? There were so many questions buzzing around Jack’s mind as he ran through the corridors he’d grown to know so well.
“ALEX” He screamed his name somehow hoping for an answer but all he gained in return were dirty looks from on looking nurses.
“Alex...”
He came to hold outside a pair of double doors, he wasn’t allowed to go through. They didn’t let people into theatre. He just stood outside the great white doors shaking with fear and utterly confused.
“Jack?”
He turned around to see the nurse Lily standing behind him, looking about as confused as Jack felt himself.
“What are you doing down here?”
“Alex... Something happened... They took...” he couldn’t get his words out he was trembling so much.
“Oh my goodness!”
Her hands covered her mouth and there was sadness in her eyes. Jack was terrified about what was going to say...
“The car accident, the boy in the car, it must have been.... Oh my goodness”
“Wh...What happened?” Jack asked.
“There was an accident on main street, a car going into another. The woman driving the first car seemed to get out okay but the boy... he was injured but they weren’t sure how much. Oh Alex...” her words trailed off as tears appeared in her eyes.
Jack didn’t know what to say, what to do. He just stood there, his body still shaking. Alex had been in a car accident, he was hurt but no one yet knew how badly. How could this have happened? Why did this have to happen? This wasn’t far. He couldn’t do this... He couldn’t do this on his own. Tears fell from his eyes then his whole body shook with a sob. This couldn’t be happening.
“Oh Jack...”
Nurse Lily wrapped her arm around the boy’s shoulders and held him as he sobbed.
“Come on, let’s get you back up to your mum”
Jack nodded weakly and let her lead him back away from Alex.

Jack sat curled up in the chair beside his mum, she was still sleep. Unaware at all that was happening around her. Nurse Lily had gone to find out about Alex so Jack was alone. The tears had finally stopped, he was pretty sure he’d run out. It wasn’t fair, it wasn’t fucking fair. Alex didn’t deserve it, to be hurt so much. He didn’t deserve that. But Jack realised, he was already hurt. He already held scars. First the ones his family had given him, the ones caused by being abandoned and then the ones Jack himself had made. He’d hurt Alex, he’d said the wrong things and tricked Alex into something that wasn’t true... Or was it?
“Jack...”
He looked up to see Nurse Lily back in the room, he hadn’t heard her enter.
“Jack, Alex is out of theatre now. It seems he was quite lucky, he has a couple of cracked rips, a collapsed lung which they’ve now fixed. He did have quite the hit of the head and he’s yet to wake; they don’t know when he will do or what he might remember”
“But... He’s going to be okay right?” Jack asked.
“Well there is always a chance with a head injury that the person won’t...”
“Stop, I can’t”
“It’s always a chance Jack but it is a rare one”
He nodded. Jack had been wrong, he wasn’t quite out of tears as a few more ran down his cheeks.
“Can I see him?”
“They don’t normally let in anyone who isn’t family but as Alex doesn’t seem to have any, they’ve made an expectation”
Jack took the nurses hand and with one look back to his sleeping mother he went to see his Alex.

Jack closed his eyes as he stepped into Alex’s private room. He wasn’t ready to see, he wasn’t ready to see him lying there hooked up to all those machines. He wasn’t ready to see him looking so un-alive.
“It’s okay Jack” Nurse Lily said from beside him.
Slowly he took a deep breath and opened his eyes. What he saw almost made him want to close them again. Alex lying on his back with his eyes closed, hair messy and stuck to his face. Tubes going in and out of him as the machines beside the bed beeped quietly.
“Alex” the word slipped from Jack’s mouth as he sunk into the chair beside the sleeping boy.
“Alex, it’s okay. I’m here” he reached beneath the covers for Alex’s hand, gripping tightly as to make sure he was real.
“Will you be okay?” Lily asked.
“I think so”
“If you need me, you need only push the button”
Jack nodded and she gave his shoulder one last squeeze of reassurance before leaving the two alone.
“Alex, can you hear me? They say that people are always aware of what’s going on around them. So I hope you can hear this. Alex I’m sorry okay? I’m really fucking sorry. You don’t deserve this, any of this. I’m sorry about the damage I’ve done but you need to come back to me. I need you here, I can’t... I can’t do this without you”
The last few tears fell as Jack held tightly to Alex’s hand and closed his eyes, the pressure of sleep finally claiming him.

Alex felt like he was drowning. Like something was pulling him away from the light and back into something deeper. He couldn’t breathe and he was fighting for oxygen as he struggled for life. Then suddenly it all stopped. Everything around him in the darkness just froze and instead of drowning it felt like he was... flying. Well maybe more like floating. He couldn’t feel any pain which surprised him, he’d hit the car. He could remember it happening but yet he still felt nothing. Alex was lost, somewhere between being alive and dead. Somewhere between letting go and living on. He couldn’t deny a part of him wanted to let it all go. He was Alex Gaskarth and yeah he got his dream, he’d made it but don’t you need more than that? The rockstar life, was that worth living for on it’s own? He had no one to share it with expect... No he didn’t have Jack. Jack had made his point quite clear, he wanted nothing of the sort from him. Alex could see it again, the light on the other side and for a moment he felt like running straight for it but life wasn’t quite ready to let him go just yet.
A voice, just one voice came through the darkness and whispered in his ear.
“I love you”
Jack’s voice sounding so unbearably sad and desperate but it was without a doubt Jack’s voice. He was telling Alex what he needed to hear, the three words that could him going forever.
Alex pushed away from the light until he was being dragged back again, fighting for his breath until...

Jack hadn’t moved, not once since he saw Alex. He didn’t know how much time had passed but he knew he couldn’t leave. Nurse Lily had come in a few times to check on him, bring him food and drinks, most of which he’d barely touched. Three words had been floating about in Jack’s mind, the same three words that had caused so much damage. He wanted to mean them, to know what he said was true and somehow cure the damage he’d done. As he sat there with the fear of losing Alex still shaking him to his core, he couldn’t have meant them more.
“I love you”
He whispered the words so softly into Alex’s ear, his voice sad and broken but the words have never been stronger.
The machines didn’t change, the beeps still ever going background music but Alex started to change. His chest raising and falling faster as he tried to breath, his eye lids flickering as he tried to force them to open. His fingers tugging ever so slightly on Jack’s, just to let him know he was there. Then with one big intake of breath Alex’s eyes opened. His beautiful dark eyes staring back at Jack.
“I love you too”
Alex’s voice unused and barely there but to Jack those words were everything.