The Black Tangled Heart

The End

The ride to the hospital was long and slow, the traffic packed tightly together on that busy Saturday night

Camila looked down to where her hand joined Ethan's and hated the way it shook and when she looked up into Ethan's face the tears were obvious and she suddenly hated that sight more than anything she had ever hated in her entire life

"FUCKIN MOVE!!!" Screamed Ethan as he pounded his fist down onto the horn over and over "MOVE IT!!!"

"They can't hear you" Camila said as she turned her head away from him but didn't release her grip on his hand

"They can hear my fuckin horn and if they don't move it they will feel my fuckin foot when it collides with their fuckin face"

"You sound like Shawn right now" she muttered as his name hung in the air between them

"And what the fuck is wrong with you? He's supposed to be your boyfriend, he's done way more for you than anyone else ever has and you're just sat there like some fuckin ice queen. Doesn't this bother you at all? Don't you care about him at all?!"

"Of course I care" she said in barely a whisper

"Then do something! Say something! Scream! Cry! Do something more than just sit there muttering bullshit at me"

"I'm trying to stay calm, I'm trying to do what's right"

"Well there's a fuckin first for you Cabello!"

"What do you want me to do Eth? Scream at cars that can't physically go any faster? Cry and punch inanimate objects?! Because I will do it if that's what you want, a hundred times louder than you have because that's exactly how I feel inside but what good would it do Shawn hu? To have both of us turn up there a mess"

"It would do me good. To know that I'm not going through this alone, that you feel it too"

"Of course I feel it" said Camila as she finally turned to face him "Don't you think I'm scared? I saw him too remember, don't you think that's engrained in my brain? Don't you think I'm doing all I can to hold myself together so that when we get to the hospital we can be of some use to him?"

"It's all my fault" confessed Ethan as his head dropped to his chest and he let out a wet sniff

"You know that's not true"

"His entire life I was there for him, looking out for him and then today... when he needed me where the fuck was I?"

"No one could have known"

"I should have known! I'm his big brother for fuck sake Camila... I should have heard something, suspected something but no, I thought it was over. Celebrated like it was over when in reality it was just beginning"

"He'll be okay"

"Will he?!"

"You know Shawn, he's way too protective to not hang around and make sure no other guy comes near"

"And why the fuck is he so protective eh? He doesn't deserve this Camila... none of it. He didn't deserve it when he was five years old and he doesn't fuckin deserve it now"

"What do you mean? What happened when he was five?"

"When he was five he watched our father beat our mother to death. You think he's an ass and he's over protective and he's overly aggressive? Well you try watching something like that and not panicking every time someone you care about looks to be in some kind of danger, imagine ever daring to let someone into your heart when you know how life destroying it is to lose them"

Camilas hand covered her mouth immediately as she thought about a five year old Shawn and the horrors he must have seen, the horrors he had kept locked inside of him for the last 13 years

"What about you?" Asked Camila tentatively "Those were your parents too"

"I was at school, I didn't see anything or hear anything until a police officer and councillor picked me up from school, after three days of crying for my brother they finally let me see him, one glance and I knew he wasn't the same Shawn I had hugged goodbye that morning and promised to play Lego with when I got home. He was never the same again"

"My God!" Camila couldn't stop the tears from flowing as she clutched Ethan's hand tighter

"That's why he doesn't deserve this... he deserves you, someone that cares for him and looks at him the way you do, likes he's magic"

"He is magic... to me he's everything"

"Yeah, me too"

A heavy silence fell over the car as the red lights of the hospital appeared on the horizon

"I can't do this" said Ethan quietly as he pulled the car into the hospital parking lot

"Sure you can, because I'm here with you. Shawn was always so strong for both of us and now we're going to be strong for him" Camila squeezed Ethan's fingers as she reached down and released her seatbelt "No tears, no regrets just Shawn... okay"

Ethan Mendes just nodded as he swiped the back of his hand over his nose "Just Shawn" he agreed as they released their grip on each other for the first time since they got into the car just an hour earlier

"You ready for this?" Asked Camila as she moved around the vehicle and once again took hold of Ethan's hand

"No"

"I'm here"

"I need you Camila, Shawn needs you"

"I'm here, I'm not going anywhere, not without Shawn" and with a small smile the two began the long, slow walk towards the E.R

*This is the last chapter just an epilogue left