Hold Me Close

Chapter Twenty Seven: Black

-=Evan=-

Black. Like, not the color black, but if it was possible to make black a feeling, that would be what I was feeling. Completely void of all sense around me. But what felt to be soon after, like the dawn breaking night, the empty veil started to lift. I slowly regained consciousness of my senses, one by one. It started with hearing. I could hear the cliché, stereotypical beeping of something. Next was taste. My mouth was dry, and tasted heavily of iron. Smell. Clean linens, just like fabric softener. Touch. I could only feel from the bottom of my ribs up, and that felt fine. Only thing off was that it was a bit hard to breathe, but it didn't strike me as anything abnormal. I started thinking really hard, and after a few seconds I was able to move my left paw a bit. Then when I was about to attempt moving my right one, I noticed that someone was holding onto it. Clinging really. And in order to see who it was, I would have to pass the hardest test of movement, breaking the seal and lifting my eyelids. I was able to do it, finally, and started looking around. My vision was still a little bit blurry, so I had to rapidly blink to get it all cleared up.

I surveyed the room, seeing a window. No light flooded through whatsoever, leading me to believe that it was the middle of the night. Also to my left was a monitor, which beeped about every second, three numbers on it were changing constantly. Now I turned my head to my right. Summer was holding onto my paw, which had an IV sticking into it. She was asleep with her head resting on the bed that I was in. Behind her, propped up against the wall, was Jason, also asleep in a chair. I looked around, something was missing. No. Someone was missing, but who? Then his face appeared in my head. That time he kissed me at the bench. The trip to Italy. Hanging around the dorm. Christmas Eve and Day, the movies, and New Years. All of the nostalgic memories making me yearn for him, long for him to be right next to me, holding me as I lie here. But then another memory flashed across my mind. A memory of betrayal. A memory of abandonment. My yearning stopped, well, it didn't stop completely, but a lot of it left my being. Tears came to my eyes, sadness flowing through my veins, coursing through my whole body, cold, painful, empty. I started to cry, whimpering out his name to no one, knowing that he wasn't there. Knowing that he had left me. But soon my sadness was outmatched by exhaustion, and I slipped back into the pool of the black.

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-=Summer=-

I woke up to the sounds of people moving out in the hallway. I lifted my head up from its position on the bed in front of me, wincing in pain as my stiff neck adjusted to movement. I could see sunlight streaming into the room through the rather inefficient window curtains. Evan was still out of it, but I didn't really know what I should have expected at this point, it had been two days since he should have woken up, and the entire time Jason and I sat here, waiting patiently.

The others were probably worried sick about the three of us, because all we told them was a quick text sent from Jason that the three of us were alive and that we would contact them if we needed them. I picked up my phone and checked my notifications. I don't even know why I bothered, I wasn't answering any of them anyways. 27 missed calls and a plethera of unopened text messages clogged up my notifications panel, but I still didn't open any of them. I looked at the time, reading that it was just a little bit past six, so I decided to get up and go to take a shower. I got up as quietly as possible, making sure I wasn't able to wake Jason, and went over to the bathroom. The hospital was nice enough to give us some clothing while we stayed, which was nice because that meant we didn't have to leave. I started the showerband got in right away, feeling the water warm up slowly as it rained down onto my fur. I didn't even wash myself, just let the water flow over my body. It awakened me, mentally preparing me for another day of nothing but waiting. Again.

As I toweled off I heard my phone vibrating on the counter, I flipped it over to see the last person I would expect. Alex. Jason had told me a couple of days ago when we were here all about the situation and what had happened the night of the...incident. So it isn't too hard to see why nothing but pure hatred was all that I could feel. I denied his call and quickly blocked his number, because if I didn't, I wouldn't be able to contain myself from doing something regrettable. Jason must have been able to see the anger on my face, because when I walked out of the bathroom he was awake.

"What's wrong?" He asked me, yawning in the process.

"What isn't wrong?" I snapped back. Clearly sensing some hostility that he didn't want to dip into, he backed off.

"Fair point." He said. Almost as if on cue, a knock sounded at the door. I looked at the clock on the wall to see that it was just about time for the scheduled morning check from the doctor. "Come in." Jason called to the door.

"Jason!" I whisper-yelled to him, pointing to Evan.

"What? It's not like he can hear us." He said before looking up at Dr. Chatte, who was coming through the door.

"Hi you two, anything new or unusual to report?" She asked. Jason and I shook our heads no in unision. She sighed. "Well it has been three days since he was supposed to come out of the coma, and even though he seems able to breathe on his own, that's just about it so far. And according to hospital protocol, I am required to advise you to pull him off support, it just isn't happening." She said grimly. Jason and I turned and looked at each other silently, speechless. But then a cough broke the silence, coming from the wrong direction.

"I hope you two weren't actually considering doing that. Jeez guys." Evan said from behind us.

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I promised too many people that I wouldn't kill him so I didn't want them to doubt my word by ending it with them taking him off and he popped into reality. You're welcome. Lol.