Lights (Scomiche)

Son

But this wasn’t a movie and this wasn’t a nightmare. There was no waking up from this.  This was reality and reality right now sucked. He was still wrapping his brain around the fact that Jeremy was gone. He had to stop thinking about it or he’d end up a sobbing mess and he’d be of no use to Scott and that boy needed all of the strength he could offer right now.

“I thought I’d accepted it, that he was going to... “ he couldn’t even say it anymore. It was too real now, now that he was actually staring the possibility right in the face.

“He’s strong and stubborn…”

Scott actually laughed at that, wiping tears away with the sleeve of his sweater.  “Yes he is.”

“And he loves you. He’ll find his way back to you, because he knows you need him.”

Scott nodded a bit, still wiping at his eyes.  “It should have been me. I should have gone with him to the makeup room…”

“Stop. You have to or you’re going to drive yourself crazy. You can’t change the past and there’s no point running yourself into the ground worrying about it, ok?”

He nodded, trying to get his thoughts back on a more positive turn, but it was impossible. They sat and talked, the food that had been ordered for them sat barely touched on a table. It was past 2 am when he heard a knock on his door and felt his heart drop to his feet.

He stared at the door like it was a monster and no matter how many times he told his limbs to move… he couldn’t bring himself to get up and open it. He didn’t want to hear those words…   he couldn’t…  he wasn’t ready...

Alex got the message and stood up and forced himself towards the door, fear holding him tight in its grip as he opened it.  It was Mike and he looked so tired, and yet wide awake at the same time.

“I thought Scott should know, we just got a call… he’s awake. He’s still pretty out of it and he’s still got a huge fight ahead of him, but he’s awake.”

The release of tension in his body was immediate and he took a deep breath as he nodded. “Thank you, I’ll let him know.”

Mike nodded and headed back for his room.

Scott was standing by the time he made it back to the bedroom of the suite. “Is he…   If he’s dead just say it.”

“He’s awake. He’s still nowhere near out of the woods yet, but he’s awake." 

Scott said a small thank you to God as he closed his eyes, relief making him a bit light headed. “Can we see him?”

Alex shook his head. “We’ll head over first thing.”

He nodded, brain on overload. He plopped back down on the bed, exhaustion beginning to catch up with him.

“You should sleep. I promise I’ll wake you up early.”

He nodded, knowing he’d never really be able to sleep, but Alex turned off the light and went out to lay on the couch in the sitting room.

Scott stared into the darkness, mentally replaying so many memories he’d had with Mitch. He grabbed his phone and found himself revisiting old tweets, videos and texts… He watched the divvie of him tickling Mitch so many times he could barely see it through the tears that were falling. He began to go through the gallery on his phone, but when he got to a selfie he’d taken of himself with Mitch cuddled up asleep on his chest he broke down and couldn’t look anymore. He eventually cried himself into a fitful sleep.

- 

The next morning was a bit of a blur. He was just pulling on his shoes when Alex opened the door to find Mike standing there again.