Just Like A Pill
Axl's POV
When I got back to the hospital I was quite surprised to see Izzy sitting up in the bed. My eyes meet with his and I watch all expression leave my face. Duff comes over to me and tries to get me to come out in the hallway with him. I watch Izzy turn my eyes away. I get it. Izzy doesn't want to see me. But how the hell can I blame him for that? Im the reason that he hurt enough to try to kill himself. I'm the reason for all the pain he's feeling. But I so needed to tell him how sorry I was.
As I struggle against Duff I hear my voice saying, "Duff, it's ok."
Duff turns Nikki's head to look at Izzy. He nods and let's me go. "I'm gonna go hit up the vending machines," he sighs and walks past me and out of the room. I hear the door gently shut behind me.
I stand there an eternity it seems just looking at him refusing to look at me. I've spent the last four days rehearsing over and over again what I would say to him when he woke up. But that perfectly worded and polished out speech fails to come to me. Not one single fucking word of it will come to me. Now is my chance to fix things but I can't fucking think. It's like one look at him had erased my brain completely. How do you talk after such a thing?
But Izzy's not taking either. He's just staring blankly out the window. I can see my eyes twinkling and brimming with tears. Goddamnit, why does he have to cry? Now I feel ten times worse. I know that I'm still hurting him. And that's really not what I wanted to do. I didn't like making him cry. I didn't like hurting him. And I sure as hell didn't like causing him to be suicidal. Goddamnit, I have to fix this.
I timidly walk closer to Izzys hospital bed. As I get closer I see the red hospital bracelet that said in bold black letters, 'Suicide Watch'. And it makes me cringe. I can't picture Izzy ever resorting to such a thing. I was the suicidal one, not Izzy. But that red bracelet on his arm reminds me that I don't know shit. I'm just a complete fucking idiot. A blind stupid fucking idiot. I don't even have the balls to utter the words, 'Im sorry'.
A tear rolls down my cheek as Izzy finally turns my head to look at me. "Looking to drive the final nail in my coffin?"
I just shake his head no and stare down at the floor because I can't stand to look at him. It hurts so much to look at him and know what I had done. "Izzy... I...I'm so fucking sorry," I whisper shaking his bowed head in disbelief.
"Are you?" He asks almost sarcastically, "I think you're sorry that I tried to kill myself, but that's it."
"No it's not," I softly say still looking down and shaking his head.
"It wasn't me I was trying to kill Axe, it was you. No matter what, I can't fucking escape you. You're there every time I look in the mirror. I can still taste you. Every fucking time I close my eyes I see the way you looked at me that night. There's nowhere I can go to escape you because I carry you inside me. I wish I could just cut you out like a faulty organ. Do you have any idea what it's like to think about someone every waking minute? Do you know how it feels to love someone so much that it just slowly kills you?"
Again, all I can do is shake his lowered head no.
"I can't be like this anymore Axe," he says in broken words and I hear my sobbing break loose with even more tears. I can't help but build up some tears of my own.
"Izzy...I'm so fucking sorry... I never wanted to hurt you...it's just... nobody has ever said to me the things you said. Nobody has ever looked at me like that...or touched me like that. I didn't know how to really take it. I can't even describe how it all made me feel. I'm scared and confused. I feel like I'm just falling. Izzy...these last four days have hurt me much more than you'll ever know. Do you have any idea how empty my world would be without you? I need you Izzy. I need you alive and here with me."
"Now you need me?" He huffs, "You spend weeks pushing me away from you and now you fucking need me? What exactly is it that you suddenly need from me?"
"You," I blink and a tear falls, "I just need you."
"Why? Because you get off on watching me hurt?"
"No...no I hate making you hurt," I say as I slowly extend his hand out to touch my hand.
Izzy just looks down at it as a couple of years splat down on our hands. "And yet you're so good at it," he slides my hand out from under his.
"Izzy... I felt everything you felt that night. No one has ever made me feel like you did and...and it scared me because I didn't know what was happening...I didn't know how to be around you after everything I felt that night. I know I pushed you away and I'm fucking sorry. I promise to never do that to you again." I gently reach his hand up to wipe the tears from my cheek. "Please give me another chance to show you that I can do this."
"That you can do what?" He asks me as my bottom lip quivers.
"That I can be with you."
And he just stares at me like I'm speaking German or something. "And it only took me almost dying for you to realize that?"
"What can I say? I'm a procrastinating fool."
He just shakes my head, "You think that just makes everything better? Well it doesn't Axl. It can't take back anything that's happened. How can I ever believe you? How do I know you aren't just filling my head with shit so I don't try to kill your body and my soul again?"
I grasp both sides of my face with his hands. "Look in my eyes and you'll see that I'm not lying Izzy. I know that noone will ever love me the way you do. I just want to rewind and try again. I can get it right this time. I know I can."
But Izzy just starts to cry again. I climb into the bed and pull my trembling body into his arms. I can feel him clenching to my shirt and sobbing so loudly. I stroke my hair and try to shush him. I slightly rock him, but for every soothing gesture I make he just breaks down a little more. He tries to speak but he can't get a single syllable past the sobs.
"It's ok Izzy. It's gonna be great. You're gonna wake up every morning with me in your arms. You're gonna fall asleep every night feeling my breath on your chest. Together you and me are going to have the biggest fucking band in the entire world. We're gonna buy a mansion in Malibu. We're gonna travel and see this world together. I promise I'll never push you away ever again. From now on I'll only pull you to me. I promise to never hurt you again. These are the last tears you're ever gonna need. I promise." And I truly meant that. I wanted to be with Izzy and feel what I felt that night every night. When I'm with him I feel whole. Everything makes sense around him. When he's in my arms I have no confusion. All wrongs get righted. Everything beyond the two of us just becomes trivial bullshit. And like the lightning bolt that traded our souls a revelation hits me again. This is love. Real love. Love of the highest degree.
