Getting Surreal

Not more than five days after Becks had had her public panic attack, and it came at her again, even harder.

This time, though, she was with Frank, Mikey, and Cove, the lead singer of Saosin. Nothing really special was going on; the group was just tossing around a football to pass time on their free day. Becks had been enjoying her dinner that night (burgers, and they were good stuff, if she had anything to say about them) with Mikey and Frank when Cove had come up to them, asking if they wanted to toss around the ball with him, Becks and Mikey laughing when Frank nearly tripped over himself in his excitement to go do something active before shrugging to each other in a ‘why not’ fashion and taking care of their trash.

It ended up being a ton of fun, and they’d been throwing around the ball for around a half hour when things took a sudden turn south.

Becks wasn’t quite sure what spurred it on, but when it hit, it hit hard, and all of a sudden, she couldn’t seem to breathe. Becks clutched at her chest, gasping, as all the sounds around her seemed to blur into one.

Mikey was turning, arm raised and held back, ready to throw the football at her, when he saw her looking a little worse for wear. “Becks, you okay?” He asked, lowering his arm. She didn’t answer. “Becks?” Mikey dropped the football completely, making his way quickly to his friend.

Through the blur of sounds, Becks could almost hear Mikey calling out for her, but her brain just couldn’t process it. She only just registered somebody grabbing onto her arm and was able (only just barely) to let out a tight-throated and terrified “Mikey?” before everything went black.

---

Becks shot up from the bed, clutching her chest and gasping for air.

Where am I? How’d I get here? What the fuck happened?
A million thoughts were whirling through her head, and her heart was threatening to beat out of her chest. Suddenly, she felt way too hot, and was about to throw the comforter off her legs when she felt the bed move a little, and then an arm was wrapping itself lightly around her waist.

“You okay?”

‘Mikey,’ she thought, relieved and feeling her body lose an ounce of its tension as he sat up and pulled her into him a tiny bit more.

“Becks?” His voice was very hoarse, and she realized that she must have just woken him up from a very deep sleep.

She desperately wanted to apologize for waking him, but all that she could manage to get out was a quiet, tight-voiced, “what happened?”

“Um,” he sniffed for a second and shook his head a little, clearly still waking up. “You, uh…you had another panic attack, I think. Blacked out.” He rubbed at his face with the hand that wasn’t resting on her hip. With a sinking feeling, the memory of what happened flooded back to Becks, and she gave an involuntary shiver. Mikey just pulled her closer. “You okay?”

Slowly, Becks nodded, even though it wasn’t the complete truth. She decided to try to mask and combat her unease by getting answers to her confusions, blurting out the first thing that came to mind.

“Why are we in a bed?”

It was a fair question. She’d been living out of a bunk for the last five months, and being in a bed was a little out of the ordinary for her. Especially waking up in bed with another person.

“Uh,” Mikey cleared his throat, “it’s a hotel night, remember?”

Becks’ brow furrowed as she thought about it, then she nodded again. “Okay, but…wasn’t I supposed to be with Frank?”

“Yeah, but…” he paused, both trying to think of the words to say and to try and wake up a little more, shaking his head lightly. “When you, uh, blacked out…um…I, w-we all kind of figured that I should be with you….”

Becks blinked for a second, processing Mikey’s softly-spoken words, then looked at him for the first time since she woke up, and she felt her racing heart skip a few beats. Just-waking-up Mikey was one of her favorite sights ever by this point; his hair all mussed up, that little daze in his eyes, the cute slowness with how he did everything. But in that moment, there was even more than a mild attraction. There was a very keen and distinct fondness that had her sucking in a sharp breath as she felt some kind of unknown warmth for him spreading out from her chest.

When she didn’t say anything, Mikey continued, staring down sleepily into his lap. “Um, yeah, so…Gerard switched so you could be in here.” Becks could feel his small shrug through his arm still around her waist.

“Remind me to thank him for that,” she managed to get out not even thinking to ask about why he decided to share a bed with her when there was another one four feet away, and finally easing into his embrace and resting her head on his shoulder.

Mikey must have taken her words and actions as the confirmation that they were, that it was the best thing – that Becks agreed that having him there with her made her feel better, because he smiled lightly to himself, and she could practically feel tension leave him.

“Yeah,” he said lightly, nodding his head a little. “I, uh. I will.”

They fell into a brief silence, then, as they sat there in the bed, Mikey just lightly holding Becks to him as she tried to calm her heart rate. She wasn’t feeling too anxious, really – Mikey seemed to have that effect on her, she’d learned long ago – just, she was…awake.

He seemed to sense this, asking, “Do you want me to stay up with you?”

Geez, the fucking guy was going to give her heart palpitations, caring for her so blatantly.

Blushing lightly, Becks nuzzled her cheek into his shoulder a little, nodding.

“Okay,” Mikey yawned, and gave her a quick squeeze before letting go of her completely. “Can we, um…” he shook his head again, his hair flopping around everywhere, “do you want to go for a walk or something?”

“Yeah,” Becks replied, stretching a little. “That would be nice.” Her words were quiet as she suddenly was feeling very bashful.

“Okay,” he whispered, then threw the covers off and got out of bed, running a hand through his hair as he looked around for his shoes. Becks followed his lead and stood up, suddenly shivering a little from leaving the warmth of the blanket, the tank-top and shorts she was wearing not doing much to heat her.

“Oh, uh…here,” Mikey said, digging through his suitcase for a second before walking over to her, one of his hoodies in hand. “I didn’t get a chance to grab your things from the bus,” he explained to her a little sheepishly, “sorry.”

She looked baffled by his words as she threw on the sweatshirt. “Mikey, don’t…” she looked up at him, studying him for a hard second before grabbing him in a sudden hug. Startled, he loosely returned the embrace, and she buried her head into his chest.

“Don’t apologize. You do too much for me for that,” her words were quiet and she refused to look him in the eye as she said them, but he heard them, loud and clear, his arms wrapping tighter around her for a second, pulling her even closer in a response to what she’d said.

They lost themselves for a second in the moment, just standing and holding each other in their dark hotel room before Mikey finally let go.

“If we don’t move, I’m gonna fall asleep on my feet,” he said quietly, as if afraid to break the stillness. Becks, didn’t seem to be as nervous about it, though, letting out a giggle and releasing Mikey.

“Okay, just gotta find my shoes….”

“I think, uh,” Mikey let out another small yawn, “I put them over by my suitcase,” he said.

Becks nodded quietly and looked where he said, finding them instantly, and all the while thinking about how he must have taken her shoes off for her when he’d….

“Did you carry me here?” She asked him suddenly, the thought having just occurred to her.

“What?”

Becks slipped on her shoes and followed Mikey to the door. “How did I get up here? Did you carry me?”

“Uh,” Mikey paused as he opened the door, holding out an arm in ‘ladies first’ fashion, following Becks into the hallway. “Yeah, I did.” For some reason, the thought of him carrying her up to the room had heat flooding to Becks’ cheeks.

“Oh,” she said, very quietly, looking down. Then, she realized that they were just standing in the hall outside of their room, and she squinted up at him. “Um, where are we going?”

Mikey let out a tiny chuckle then grabbed her hand, pulling her lightly along. “I think there’s a park across the street?”

As they made their way down and the through the lobby, Mikey never let go her hand, and Becks was more than conscious of this fact, though not complaining in the least. And when they made it out to the street, he intertwined their fingers, and her body felt like it was buzzing. She shot a quick look up at Mikey, but he seemed to be playing it cool, his face neutral (though sleepy), as if what he’d just done was the most natural thing ever. Becks let a small smile grace her lips, gripped his hand just a little tighter, and looked down at her feet as they walked.

---

Becks slowly came to, in one of those perfect and rare sort of mornings where you wake up without an alarm at just the right time for your body and everything just seems warm and golden. She’d been dreaming the best dream ever about taking a long walk with Mikey in the moonlight, hand in hand, fingers laced, walking through a park and just talking about anything and everything.

Smiling smally to herself, she nuzzled her cheek into her pillowww-wait.

That wasn’t a pillow. That was definitely a chest, and…yeah, that was definitely a hand stroking lazily up and down her back.

Becks slowly opened her eyes and lifted her head a tiny bit, to see that she was definitely laying on somebody’s chest and, looking up just a little more, she was met by Mikey’s eyes staring down at her and, suddenly, she realized with a dazed sort of happiness that her dream really hadn’t been a dream at all.

“Morning,” he said quietly, reaching up with the hand that wasn’t rubbing her back to tuck a stray lock of hair behind her ear, that small smile that Becks just adored on his lips. It was near enough to stop her heart.

“Hey,” she breathed back, caught in his beautiful and sleepy gaze and unable to process any other thought other than their proximity. When he just kept looking down at her and smiling at her like that, Becks flushed and laid her head back on his chest, nuzzling in a little and taking a deep breath, enjoying his scent, her sense of ease, his arms around her….

“How you feeling?” Mikey asked after a moment. And suddenly, Becks remembered why they were in the position they were in, and a sense of dread and embarrassment filled her. Becks breathed in a long breath through her nose and slowly sighed it out before lifting her head to look at Mikey again, partially expecting to see some form of judgement on his face - but he was just gazing at her with an expression of fondness mixed with concern, and Becks could hardly take it.

“I’m sorry,” she said quietly, trying to ignore the flush of her cheeks. Mikey’s brow furrowed in confusion.

“For what?”

Becks looked at him for a second, incredulous, then, “for…having to deal with…this, my anxiety,” she sighed and shut her eyes, almost as if she could hide with them closed. “With me….”

Mikey felt his heart wrench. “Becks,” he breathed out, both his hands coming up and ever so lightly cupping her face. When she still wouldn’t look at him, he said her name just a little stronger and watched as her eyes slowly fluttered open, some sort of fear hidden deep in her features.

He didn’t want her to be scared. He wanted her happy and smiling and he could almost feel a physical pain from the expression on her face as she just stared at him, waiting.

What was she waiting for? Him to get mad? To walk out on her?

No.

He wouldn’t stand for her feeling like that, and the steely expression on his face as he thought this had Becks fighting the urge to untangle herself from his grasp and run away. Before she could even put any real thought to leaving, though, Mikey finally spoke.

“I thought I told you never to apologize for that.”

He had only whispered it, but the serious, stone-cold honest tone to his voice would have stopped her dead in her tracks if she’d heard it a mile away. Not able to breathe, Becks just watched Mikey, her body completely still, as he continued to speak to her.

“I’m here for you,” he said, his voice breaking just the slightest. “Anxiety is nothing to be ashamed of, okay?” He paused and Becks slowly, slowly nodded. He frowned a little, then, trying to think of what he wanted to say next, and Becks was feeling a sudden swell in her chest.

“Mikey-“ she started to speak but he cut her off,

“Do you think I’m gonna ditch you because of it?” Becks eyes widened and even Mikey looked surprised at the question that had burst from his mouth. In a stunned silence, she shook her head just the tiniest bit, too ashamed to let him know that maybe, just maybe, deep down, she was a little afraid of that.

“Because…because I won’t, Becks…” Mikey continued, his face softened into an expression of absolute fondness and concern. “I’ll always be here for you, okay? No matter what. I-I wanna be the one you run to…” his voice was lowering and his eyes were searching hers as his thumbs starting caressing her cheeks softly and Becks was nothing but lost in it all as he continued, “…I’ll never mock, never judge. I just…just...I wanna….”

He broke off then, because Becks, seemingly beside herself, was so stirred by his words that she was leaning up closer to his face, laying a hand high on his chest to balance herself as she went, and it was Mikey’s turn to freeze, his breath getting caught up completely and his heart probably about to beat out of his chest as she edged even closer and the room suddenly felt like it was charged with some sort of electricity and then her hair was making a small curtain around them and her lips were right there…

And the door to their room slammed open, startling the pair and causing Becks to withdraw quickly to his side. Both of their heads whipped around and they saw Gerard standing there.