Accidentally on Purpose

Chapter Fifty-Six

I was so deep in my own thoughts that I didn't realize that Tony was slowly waking up, until I felt his head stir in my lap. I stopped stroking his hair as he slowly blinked, confused and disoriented.

"Hi," I whispered to him, trying to give him a smile. Tony didn't say anything back, but he kept blinking and slightly moving his head to the left and right, but he didn't seem like he had enough energy to actually move parts of his own body. "How are you feeling?"

"Hey," he finally croaked out after a while. His eyes seemed focused now. "I'm sorry you had to see this," he said weakly, his words slowly slurring into one another.

I tried another smile. "Don't worry about it."

"Please stop crying," he almost pleaded, slowly trying to reach out to my face, but his arm fell to the side from exhaustion. It was only then that I realized that I was crying, and that my tears were slowly falling onto the front of his shirt. I grabbed his fallen hand and squeezed it.

But I shook my head anyway. "I'm not."

"You are." He tried to sit up and grunted. I laid my palm on his chest and lightly pushed him back down.

"Just lie down, Tony," I told him, "you gotta be exhausted."

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, before faintly nodding. "I'm so sorry, Hannah."

I moved to stroke his hair gently again. "It's okay," I whispered to him. I gently squeezed his hand again. "It's okay. But you should've told me."

He weakly squeezed back, and I looked up to see Leann peeking into the room from the door to check up on us. I nodded at her and she gave me a smile before continuing to speak on the phone.

It's okay. It's always gonna be okay.

[]

Epilepsy.

Apparently, it was a long-term side effect from the head injury he had after the accident. I didn't know or understand how the doctors could look past how bad it was that it had left Tony with epilepsy for the rest of his life, but they did. He only had his first seizure a few months after he moved out, successfully scaring the shit out of his friends.

I couldn't imagine how it must've felt for him, how terrified he was when he realized that he had to live with this thing that might not go away.

Even just thinking about what I saw still made me shudder in fear. It was one of the most terrifying things I had ever witnessed. I didn't want to see him like that ever again.

My parents arrived home shortly after Tony wake up, this time less confused and disoriented. He wouldn't look at my eyes when he woke up, immediately hiding away in his old bedroom. It took a while until he opened the door for our parents and allowed them to talk with him, but that was about that.

I tried to keep myself distracted by taking a shower and cleaning up my room, even after everything inside was spotless. Every time I tried to think, my mind always brought me back to the exact moment when he fell onto the ground, and it was the last thing I wanted to think about. Leann tried to talk to me about it, but I kept changing the topic and she eventually gave up and left my room.

I stood in front of his locked door, my fist up and ready to knock on it, but a hand on my shoulder stopped me and I turned around to see Mom.

"He's asleep," she said in a whisper. "He said it always leaves him very exhausted every time."

I took a deep breath and nodded. "I'm just really worried, Mom."

"I know, honey, me too." She was frowning at the closed door, before shaking her head. "Why don't you come downstairs? You haven't had breakfast yet, right?"