Shut Up And Dance With Me//Klance//Complete

One Foot

Notes:

This ended up being one of the longest chapters of this fic so far. It's 24k words, so please take your time, don't stay up all night, take a break halfway through for a drink or a snack, and don't put off important things. This chapter will be around when you're ready, so no need to rush. Take care of yourselves, my dudes <3

Happy reading!

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He ends up needing surgery.

They tell him the details of the procedure, but he finds it hard to hear over the ringing in his ears. The high pitched static buzzing that fills up the room and crackles across his skin. He hears the words. Understands them. But he can't fully absorb them. They sink into his mind like pebbles dropped onto molasses, sinking slowly, unrushed and floating leisurely downward. And when they finally reach the bottom, it's a gentle landing, barely a pressure. Knowledge sitting there on the tip of understanding without truly sinking in.

A haze has settled around him. It's been there since the moment he fell from the stage and pain shot up his leg. It was there was people rushed around him, hectic movement swirling, chaotic. A storm in which he was the eye, immobile, calm, indifferent to the winds battering his edges.

It was there as he was helped to the car and driven to the hospital. It was there as his friends spoke around him, muting their words, dimming their touches, making them feel distant.

It was there as he sat in the waiting room, surrounded by people he knew and loved. Friends, all dressed in black. Their faces barely registered, even when they crouched in front of him. He could only tell them apart by flashes of color.

Orange and purple moving around, corralling all of them, pressing a clipboard and a pen into his hands, guiding him softly as he filled out the blank lines. He watched his hand move, distant and absently curious as they shifted, scribbling out words in a handwriting that was a messy version of his own, the shaking of his fingers visible in the pen strokes.

Pink in his vision, cupping his cheeks with hands that were small and warm, lips moving in words that he didn't quite hear, delicate features pinched in worry. Yellow at his side, arm draped heavy and thick around his shoulders. Green behind him, occasionally flashing in his vision when his head tilted automatically at sounds, small hands in his hair, running through his locks soothingly and methodically, blunt nails scratching at his scalp before dropping down to rub at his back.

Red. Red hovering around the group. Red staying at the sidelines. Red a shadow just beyond the others. Red and midnight eyes creased and glistening with far too many emotions for his rattled mind to understand. Red settling into the seat at his side. A hand in his, warm and calloused fingers, palms oddly soft against his own. An occasional squeeze, a pinching of his fingers, grounding, anchoring when he started to drift.

Time had slipped away. Time holding him suspended as it swirled around him, moving quickly and slowly in turns. Then he was ushered into another room. Another flurry of faces. Pokes and prods. More pain shooting up his leg. He thinks he might have shouted, but he doesn't quite remember.

He's in that room now.

He feels his lips moving to answer questions, hears his voice like he's listening from another room. It barely sounds like his own, just as muffled as the others.

He sees the activity in the room like he's watching from afar. Like he's trapped in his own body but not quite occupying it. It's all so distant. Movements are disconnected from his awareness of them, making them move sluggishly and far too quickly all at once. There's a delay to everything reaching his senses.