Louder Than Love || Chris Cornell

Say Hello To Heaven

Seattle Washington, Harborview Medical Center
March 19, 1990

It was the next day and we made it back to Seattle early that afternoon. Chris and I grabbed a cab to head both to his place and mine. We stopped at his first to drop him off and I took the rest of the ride back to my place. Chris lived close to me so it wasn't far out of the way.

As I open the door to my apartment I drop my bag off at the door, freshen myself up a bit and grab a drink from my fridge. I was so scared of what we would be walking into, I needed a drink just to take the edge off a bit. It feels like it was only a few minutes, after I pour my next drink and there was a knock at my door.

"Coming!" I say and I take a quick swig of my drink and head to the door. I open it to see Chris standing outside in his black T-Shirt, black ripped jeans, his Doc Martens and his leather jacket. He turns to look at me and I see his expression worried and concerned and numb at the same time. His necklace that Andy gave him shone in the ironic sunlight of the day against his chest.

"Hi," Chris says slightly sadly.

"Hi," I say.

"You ready?" He asks.

"No..." I say worriedly.

"Me neither..." He says sadly, and with that, I grab my leather jacket and head out the door with him.

•••

We arrive at Harborview Medical Center and head through the main entry doors. Chris heads up to the front desk and is directed to the intensive care unit. Chris takes my hand and holds it so tight, it almost hurt, but I didn't care.

We find the ICU department and a nurse guides us to the room Andy was in.

"Now I should tell you, It looks like he can't respond to you but we are positive he can still hear you," The nurse tells Chris as she leads us to his room and the look on Chris's face was of pure sadness.

"Chris... I can stay out here if you want to be alone with him," I say to him.

"No... no I want you with me," He says shakily and grips my hand.

"Ok," I say and gently stroke his arm as we walk into his room.

At first it just looked like Andy was sleeping but you could see that he was hooked up to so many machines it looked unreal. Andy was pale and looked weak with a long breathing tube coming out of him that lead to a machine that breathed for him. Xana sat by his side holding his hand and looks up to see Chris and I walk into the room.

"Chrissy..." She exhales in a way I'd never heard before. It's like all the disagreements Xana and Chris shared melted away at that moment. She stands up and he lets go of my hand and they walk to each other and he gives her the biggest longest hug. The room was silent, but the machines keeping Andy alive continued to beep and make their noises as Chris and Xana just hold each other. Xana pulls away from him and wipes her eye where a stray tear had fallen.

"Hey Andi..." She says sadly but sweetly to me and moves to give me a hug.

"Hey," I say as I embrace her and then she breaks away from me.

"Has there been anyone else coming into see him?" I ask as she wipes her tears away.

"Uh yea.. Jeff and Stone came by earlier this morning and um... Susan was here just a little while ago," She says as she looks up at Chris. Chris nods and then looks back at Andy and moves closer to him.

"What happened?" I ask. Xana looks at Andy and tries not to cry.

"He uh... He had a a little slip up you know... he's been trying to get better for so long and... fuck..." She tries to explain and I take her hand.

"I uh came home from work and found him in the bathroom... he wasn't good... I don't know how long he was there but he wasn't breathing and I tried to do CPR you know... but he wasn't responding at all... so I called 911... and somehow, because he was deprived of oxygen for so long... he has some permanent brain damage and... he's..." Xana explains and starts to cry. Chris takes her in his arms again and holds her.

"His parents want to cut the life support but I begged them at least to keep him on it 'til you got here... I wanted you to have the chance to say goodbye..." She says through her tears.

"Are his mom and dad here?" I ask trying not to cry.

"Not yet, they were here earlier but needed a break obviously so... but they said they would be back later on tonight..." She says as she pulls away from Chris and wipes the tears from her flushed cheeks. Chris moves back over to Andy and sits down in the chair where Xana sat. Chris looks at him and I could see the pain and fear across his smooth face.

Xana and I stay silent and I watch Chris watch Andy, as the machine breathes for him.

"I'm gonna go and get a drink... I'll uh be back in a bit," Xana says and squeezes my hand again and walks out of the room. I look at Chris as he looks at Andy and I couldn't believe this was happening.

"Do you want to be alone with him?" I ask. Chris looks up at me with tears in his eyes and reaches for my hand.

"No... don't go... please stay," He says in almost a boyish demeanour, as if asking for his mom to stay when she drops him off at school for the very first time. I move closer to him as he pulls at my hand and wraps his arms around my waist to rest his head against my stomach. I look down at him and I begin to run my fingers through his hair, twirling each perfect dark curl of his between my fingers attempting to soothe the pain.

Chris begins to talk to Andy. Talking to him like he could still hear him. He reminisced about all the times they would party together, how they would hang out together, even how they wrote together. Chris let his love out for Andy like he never had before, all the while still leaning his head on me and holding me to him. Chris began to cry as he said his final goodbyes to Andy and held on to me as he cried. I began to cry a little as well but I remained silent. I wanted to let Chris have his moment with him one last time. Chris sobbed into me and I knelt down and took him in my arms and let him cry on my shoulder for I knew it was only a matter of time for him to do the same for me. Chris squeezed me so tight as he cried harder than I ever thought he could. After a little while, Chris re-gained his composure as Xana walked back into the room.

"Fuck... ok I need to get out of here," Chris days groggily as he wipes his eyes and we both stand up. Chris and I walk toward Xana as she looks up at Chris. They hug each other one last time and I then follow Chris out of the room and down the hallway out of the ICU.