A loud sound – something crashing to the floor in the distance causes his sleepy eyes to slam shut, his head to fall to his knees in surrender, and a wish to be anywhere but here to overcome him yet again. Two days. It had been two days and his hands still shook and where he had washed them time and time again until they were sore, he could still see the red dripping through his fingers and staining his hands, tainting his hair where he clasped his ears to drown at the sound of the clutter, the sound of the beeping, the sound of stunned silence as a family hears the news that a loved one has “passed” only to be followed by the sound of their cries as realization hits them. It was too much and Daniel couldn’t handle it. He had refused to leave, was continuing to refuse until the man in the other room awoke and spoke his name or something to let Daniel know he was alright, but maybe two days was enough.
He couldn’t though. Daniel couldn’t stand from his spot on the floor just outside the closed door. There were benches close by, some occupied a few feet down from him, and a nurse had even offered to get him a chair, but his legs refused to let him move until the door opened and he was allowed back inside the room where his best friend continued to sleep. ‘Wake up, just wake up, God damn it,’ He thought, but it had more so become a mantra spoken inside his head over and over when thoughts of that night finally dwindled down which wasn’t often. Not when the aftermath was still being dealt with, not when the person responsible was still running loose somewhere he didn’t know and the police were too incompetent to find, not when his best friend refused to open his eyes.
Something else is dropped to the ground and Daniel flinches, fingers tangling into his hair even when he realizes it was nothing more than a kid’s toy. Every noise, every little thing set him on an edge that felt like it was about to fall from under his feet. He was losing it, he knew, and the little fact that Easter had woken up, that she was okay and watching God knows what in another room didn’t help any longer. It had for the first few hours, but then the hours turned into more and then it turned into a day and now it had been two and Austin was still unconscious. And Daniel was losing hope. He had been here before, his neck sore from the uncomfortable sleeping position he had held for days while his mother was in one of these beds, and the next thing he knew he was dressed in black with the intention of attending her funeral, but he never showed.
This time it’s the door opening that causes Daniel’s head to shrink to his knees and his heart to pound against his chest and the girl who came through’s cheerful smile makes him want to punch something because he figures it’ll be the same news as the other days: ‘he’s stable. He just needs some rest, he’ll come out of this when he’s ready.’ Or some other bullshit they fed to the visitors of patients. But this time was different. Her smile wasn’t as faked, as practiced as it had been before.
“He’s awake. You can go in and see him, if you’d like,” She says in such a cheerful voice that Daniel is sure if Austin had had to deal with her for longer he would have run her off, possibly with her crying. But the small chuckle that wants to fall from his lips is suppressed, held back by a bite to the lip to stop the quivering. He almost wants to call her out, say this is some sick joke, but his hope is back and he somehow manages to pull himself off the floor, slipping past the nurse without a word and into the room. But he’s met with closed eyes and though the thing that had been helping Austin breathe was no longer there, he still thought for a moment she had lied to him.
“You fucking asshole.” The only words that he could manage. Daniel refused to cross the room, his feet stuck to the floor just inside the room. In a few days he might believe that he’s been selfish, that maybe he should have been more sensitive to someone that just woke up from a short coma, but in that moment he didn’t give a damn. And he wasn’t sure the boy was still awake. And the beeping, God, the beeping, supposed to signal that he was still alive, that he still had a heart where he claimed he didn’t, it was driving Daniel insane; his fists clenched and unclenched and he still wanted to hit something.
