"A Sanctuary Safe and Strong"(Marianas Trench)

Chapter 55

The conversation was about to happen. Matt was dreading it before he opened his mouth, though if Josh was able to recall the events, but really truly had no idea what he had been ranting about on the phone, the guitarist needed to tell him. He had to try to stop this before it got any worse, before Josh went through with something he might not even be aware he was doing. Slowly, Matt sunk down to his knees in front of the singer, bracing his hands on his thighs while he tried to figure out how to word his thoughts.  

"Out with it," Josh demanded gently. "C'mon. Don't make me fuckin' wait." 

Huffing through his nose, Matt sarcastically scoffed. "That's really rich. You don't get to dictate this, Josh. Not after what you just said." 

"Don't "Josh" me," the singer said, raising his voice a bit more than he typically would. "Just fuckin' tell me, Matt." 

"No, now it's my turn. Give me a goddamn minute," Matt demanded, throwing the blond's words back at him, though he meant every word. "This is hard too, believe it or not." The brunet's own voice faded to nearly inaudible sounds. Without realizing how difficult it would really be, he was suddenly more upset about the whole thing than he ever realized he'd be. He now wanted to blame it on fatigue, anger, exhaustion, on confusion, on anything but the fact that the idea of losing Josh was too much. But he couldn't keep denying that if he wanted to be as honest as he was trying to get Josh to be. 

The blond sighed, sinking back against the couch again while he waited, and Matt felt the newest level of tension in the room wrap around him, nearly strangling him. "Ramsay...you..." He stopped and shook his head, unsure of whether he'd be able to go on with what he needed to say without having his own minor meltdown.  

"Yeah...? I...what?" the singer urged, making a hurry-up-and-say-what-you-need-to-say motion with his hand. 

Matt took a deep breath. Josh was right. It was bad enough that Josh couldn't remember what had gone on a handful of hours ago, but he had to be told, not only for his own sake, but for Matt's too. Matt flickered his eyes up to singer, then back down to a spot on the floor between his knees and the blond's feet. "You called me t-to say goodbye," he said bluntly with as little emotion as he could manage. The easiest way he'd come up with to explain was just to say it, to suck it up and spit out the words so at least Josh had some idea of the situation. 

The older man uncrossed his legs and set both feet on the floor, toes pointed inward. "I...what?" His hands were pressed tightly against the sides of his knees. "I fuckin' what?" he repeatedly asked several more times, a look of complete disbelief on his face. "I don't..." 

"You know that you told me...that you were dead. That you weren't here anymore. Then you said goodbye. Josh, it was fuckin' surreal. Man, I didn't know what the hell to do. I still don't. I can't get my head around this. You have no idea how terrifying those phone calls are." The brunet moved to sit cross-legged, folding his hands in his lap. "You have to tell the band, tell me when you're dealing with shit before it gets this bad. I can't... I don't wanna have to say goodbye to you." 

"I... I called you more than once?" 

The guitarist shook his head, tugging at the cuffs of his shirt. "Not this time." 

"Meaning what?" 

"Meaning, I've gotten those two a.m. calls before, man. It's been years, but you know what I'm talking about." He was referencing Josh's past and the singer had to realize that. He must have, because he immediately clamped his mouth shut and stared down at the floor. 

This time, it was Josh who stood again after a minute, stepping around Matt and moving over to a small chest of drawers that the brunet knew contained extra sets of keys for various things, a few important pieces of mail, a couple of photo albums and other extremely random objects that the singer didn't quite know what else to do with. Josh turned his back on the younger man, only to turn back seconds later and bump the drawer closed with his hip. He leaned back against the piece of furniture and lightly tossed an object in Matt's direction.