Fire and Freedom - Book One of the Café Latte Trilogy

Chapter Thirty - Ross

"I'll do it," he whispered, and started unbuttoning my shirt. I closed my eyes and imagined that nothing else existed except for me and Jasper. I shivered as his fingers lightly traced my skin as they always did; he knew I couldn't resist it. He pulled my shirt off, and I felt his lips kiss my stomach softly. I opened my eyes and looked at him as he pulled at my belt buckle. He was so beautiful. He really did love me regardless of everything I did and said. I never wanted him to leave.

I blinked in astonishment as I thought that; I didn't want him to leave. I looked down, trying not to overreact to my own thoughts, and wondered why I so scared of that feeling. I wanted him to stay so badly, it hurt. I knew, when the time came, I'd make him go to London because he needed to experience other things. He was so new to a world that accepted and loved him, and he needed to find his feet in it, but for now, this was enough. It would be enough until he had to go, and when he left I would have to keep a tight hold on this feeling of happiness.

"Jasper," I murmured.

He looked up at me with dark blue eyes, framed with his beautiful blonde eyelashes. "Mm?"

"I..." I hesitated, gently pushing tufts of blonde hair out of his eyes. "I care for you. More than I have ever cared for anyone before."

He attempted a smile, and kissed my stomach again. "I love you, Ross, even if you are dysfunctional as a romantic human being."

****

The following morning, I took the first shift with Harper. Edward went home after some arguments, and I made sure to text Raven and say he was being difficult so she would go and check in on him later. I sat by Harper's bedside and waited.

It was so much harder than last time. He was covered in a sheen of sweat, and his body twitched unnaturally every so often. He murmured, groaning in pain despite the medications, shivering one moment and then boiling hot the next. I wiped his forehead with a cool cloth, trying to bring his temperature down myself, as though the multitudes of IV fluids weren't working hard to do that.

I held his hand. I hadn't held hands for longer than a couple of minutes with someone since I was a kid, but now I clung to his hand for hours. I felt like a kid. It felt like I was pretending to be an adult, and I hadn't quite figured out how to do it. Nurses came in every fifteen minutes to check his pulse, oxygen sats, temperature, and blood pressure. I asked every single time if he was okay. Some of them were impatient and busy, replying sharply and moving on. Some of them were kind, and told me he was hanging in there, working hard.

"How long until we know if he's going to be okay?" I asked one of them.

The nurse put his hand on my shoulder and said, "Harper's going strong, he's fighting it hard. We'll know by the end of the day if he's showing improvement, okay?"

I nodded, hanging onto that thought. We'd know by the end of the day if he was improving. His temperature was so high, I had no idea that a person could get that warm. Surely he was boiling alive inside, roasting from the inside out. I reapplied the cool cloth quickly, hearing him sigh slightly in relief.

He didn't get better. His temperature persisted. He started turning pale, the colour sucking straight out of him like he was being drained of blood. I was terrified. I called the others to keep them informed, and I must have sounded freaked out, because they were all in the waiting room next time I went to get a drink. Jasper gave me a hug, trying to keep me calm, but I needed to rush back to Harper's side.

"Hi," I greeted the doctor, who was checking Harper's IVs. "Sorry, I was just getting a drink - is there any change?"

The doctor looked solemn, and I felt my heart sink. "He... he's not doing well," the doctor said, her face full of empathy and concern. "I'm very sorry, but I'm not sure Harper's body is up to fighting this. We're doing everything we can right now, but we have to prepare for the possibility of him not making it through this."

My breath caught in my throat and I nodded, stumbling towards the door. I walked into the waiting room and blurted out, "He's getting worse."

Jenny managed to get the information out of me, and she replaced me by Harper's bedside. The others wanted to help me, I knew, but they were going through the exact same thing I was. Harper was going to die, in a hospital bed, without any way of saying goodbye to us, and we had no way of stopping it.

"He can't die," I whispered.

Jasper's hand tightened on mine. Cyri and Rory had shown up, too. They didn't have as strong a connection to Harper, so they were able to rush around making sure we weren't slipping into shock. They'd brought warm blankets and bottles of water and were handing them out like they were greeting us at the end of a race.

"Hey, Red," I managed to say, as Cyri tucked a blanket around me. "You ever get tired of looking after people?"

"No," she smiled, and then handed me a bottle of water. "Drink up, or I'll rip your balls off."

"Nice," I chuckled slightly, and was surprised to hear the noise. Cyri looked pleased at the sound, and patted me on the head as I wrenched the top off the bottle and drank some water. Suddenly, I heard a loud series of beeps from the ward, and we all looked over in horror as nurses and a doctor piled into the room. Jenny came rushing out, clearly not allowed to stay, and she ran into Lucie's arms, crying.

"He's s-seizing," she stammered, her face ashen. "I've n-never seen anything like it, oh God..." She dissolved into tears. I tried to stand, to run over to the ward's window, to see what was happening, but my legs had lost the ability to do what I wanted them to. I think everyone felt the same, because no one moved, rooted to the spot. It felt like if any of us moved, time would restart and he would die. If we didn't move, he would be okay. He had to be okay.

It was only three and a half minutes that we had to wait, but it felt like days. My heart thumped painfully against my chest. I was soaked in sweat and fear. Edward hadn't taken his head out of his hands since Jenny had left the ward, as though he wasn't there if he didn't look up.

The beeping stopped. My chest tightened. The door opened, and a tired-looking doctor emerged. We all looked at him, dreading his answer to our unasked question. He took a deep breath and said, "He's hanging in there. You've got a very stubborn friend."

It felt like oxygen rushed into my head all at once, and I leaned back in my chair, completely overtaken by the feeling of relief. Harper wasn't dead yet. He was going strong. We weren't allowed back in yet, as he was under observation constantly now. It felt like they weren't just waiting for him to die, they were trying to force him to live.

"Come on, Harper," I heard Edward murmur under his breath. "Please. Keep going."

And he did. His temperature came down after a few hours. His breathing evened out. His oxygen sats increased. His blood pressure lowered. His skin flooded with colour and lost the oily sheen. After another hour, the nurses left him to rest peacefully, going back to regular check-ins rather than constant observation. We were allowed back in. We were all allowed to stay.

Around seven in the morning, he opened his eyes. Eyeing the rest of us, he spoke with a hoarse, cracked voice, but it was unmistakably him. His lips pulled up into a smile, and he said, "You all look like shit."

Harper was alive.

Harper was so very, very alive.

****

So. I have something to say.

Ten years ago, I killed off Harper, and everyone was (understandably) devastated. Back then, it was right for the story, for how I had set the characters up, for how the story had progressed.

But the thing is, this is a rewrite. This is a different story, with better characters and better plotlines...and I've changed a lot as a writer. I've been put through the 'bury your gays' cliche (the trope where TV shows and books kill off gay characters rather than let them be happy) countless times.

So I decided that no, I will not be doing that again.

This time, Harper lives.

Love, Cam. x