Words For Mikey: Day 19
Salubrious: favourable to, or promoting health.
You're doing so well baby. Your health is improving and Dr. Nicholson said she was going to talk to your doctor and explain the new situation so he can tell the others. She reckons they can try to bring you out of the coma in two or three days. As long as nothing goes wrong than you're most likely going to live. That wasn't exactly what happened though. She got caught leaving and had to spill the beans earlier than intended. I know now that I was wrong to say what I did earlier, but I was forgiven and when the others apologized I certainly accepted. Anyways, baby, we're all waiting on you know. You're the star of this tragic show after all. When you wake up we'll but a kitten, whatever one you want, and then we'll just get out of here. We'll drive until we don't know where we are and we won't have any destination. We'll drive until you're happy and until you're okay and Michael I swear we don't ever have to come back here ever again if you don't want. Whatever you want baby, whatever makes you happiest. I swear I'll do whatever it takes to make you happy. You know I mean that right? You know I won't ever give up on you, right? You have to know that.
I love you,
Luke
"Luke?" Lucy's voice was small and quiet after just waking up.
"Hey kiddo. What's up?" Luke asked her smiling softly.
Lucy shrugged and rubbed sleepily at her eyes. "Is Michael okay?" she asked. Luke nodded and she smiled a little, "Then everything's good,"
Luke smiled at the eight year old (and three quarters) and rolled his eyes. "I meant with you,"
"I'm good too," Lucy giggled. "What about you," she grew solemn. "Do you still want to die?" she asked.
Luke shrugged. "I mean. If Michael dies, then yes. But as long as his heart is still beating I couldn't be better," Lucy rose an eyebrow. "Okay so maybe right now isn't a great example of how wonderful I am. But once Michael's awake I'll be much better. You'll see,"
Lucy giggled again.
"What are you laughing at?" Luke asked in a jokingly angry voice. "Huh? What are you laughing at?"
Luke gave chase to the eight year old with two prosthetic legs and he followed slowly behind her, keeping her constantly just out of reach. Lucy was giggling non-stop as the tall lanky blonde chased her around. When Luke finally gave in and snatched her up he threw her fireman style over his shoulder. Her prosthetic legs kicked wildly in front of his face. And the soft punches she delivered almost tickled his back.
"Luke!" she cried shrilly laughing loudly.
"Yes?" Luke asked calmly.
"Put me down!" she cried through her laughter.
"Well, if you insist," Luke tossed her as carefully as possible into the chair by Michael's bedside where she continued laughing her face glowing with joy and amusement.
"That wasn't fun," she gasped.
"Really? I rather enjoyed myself actually," Luke mused.
Lucy giggled wildly again and Luke couldn't help but smile, his own amusement dancing lightly across his tired face.
"What's going on in there?" a voice called from outside the room. Luke easily recognised it to be Ashton and he rolled his eyes at Lucy making her giggle even more. "Are you laughing?"
"Yeah, do you have an issue with that?" Luke called back.
"Well I mean-"
"Or is it just you and Calum who can enjoy yourselves?"
"Luke-"
"I'm sorry. Was that rude?"
"Yeah, just a-"
"Well, you know what else is rude, Ashton? Not telling your best friend anything. Going behind his back only to stab it when he's most vulnerable. Leading him to believe that he wasn't suffering alone, only to make it clear he was. Deciding to murder your best friends only reason for living. Not realizing that he's slowly getting further and further away, falling into the footsteps of a possibly deceased suicidal boy. That's rude, Ashton. And I swear to God it hurts worse than almost anything else does. It hurts so damn bad,"
"Luke, that's enough," Ashton's voice is firm.
"Why? Does it make you feel bad, Ashton? Knowing that your best friend needed you and you were off sucking faces with your other best friend?"
Ashton didn't answer and Lucy slowly moved further away trying not to listen to their conversation.
"Dammit, Ashton answer me!"
"Yeah it hurts! Is that what you wanted to hear? That I feel guilty for not being there for you? I feel exactly how you did when you had to watch Michael slip away,"
"Are you trying to say you're in love with me?"
"Hell no. I'm saying that I know your-"
"Then you don't know how much it hurts. Maybe it hurts you, Ashton, but not in the same magnitude. Not nearly the same,"
"Luke come on. You're being unreasonable,"
"You want to murder my boyfriend and I'm the unreasonable one?" Luke questions. "I'm beginning to think that none of you even cared about Michael...did you?"
"What? Luke of course we care! The doctor said-"
"The doctor was wrong,"
"Luke, what-?"
"You'll see, Ashton. You'll damn well see who was right,"
"Luke, I don't understand what you're talking about..."
Ashton trailed off when Luke's steps could be heard heading away from the door.
"It's not their fault is it?" Lucy asked Luke quietly.
"Is what whose fault?"
"Is you wanting to the others fault?"
"You mean like Ash and Cal?" Luke asked for clarification. Lucy nodded. "No, it's not their fault. I just don't have any...motivation to live without Michael. I don't want to live somewhere that I'm unhappy you know? And without Michael all I am is unhappy,"
Lucy nodded. "So when Michael wakes up you'll be okay again?"
Luke nodded back. "And then all we have to do is make Michael okay as well,"
Lucy grinned at Luke. "We can do it. I know we can,"
"Yeah," Luke managed a smile for the eight year old. "We can do anything, kid,"
"Anything..." Lucy trailed off quickly lost in the bizarre thoughts of her eight year old mind.
Around noon the others must have gone to get food because Dr. Nicholson was knocking on the door and calling Luke's name. When the tall blonde let her in she passed him two Styrofoam containers and was quick to check on Michael.
"He's doing a little better than yesterday which is very good. I'm going to have to speak with Michael's doctor very soon about Michael's new condition so he can inform your friends. I'll be back after they leave tonight,"
"Are you gonna bring more food?" Lucy asked genuinely curious.
Both Luke and Dr. Nicholson cracked a smile. "Yeah I'll bring more food," the doctor replied. "Make sure none of them get in here until I let you know that it's alright," she warned glancing at comatose Michael. "We don't want anything to go wrong,"
Luke nodded his facial expression falling solemn. "Of course not," he agreed. "We don't want our Michael lost,"
The doctor gave Luke one last smile before she slipped out and Luke locked the door behind her. The noise outside told him that she had been caught.
"Hey!" Ashton's voice called. "What were you doing in there?"
"I was checking the patient's vitals, which you should know, have improved drastically. It seems Michael is going to live,"
There was a shocked silence until Michael's doctor's voice broke it. "What are you talking about? The last tests I ran showed that he should be dead in four days,"
"Well, you know what they say," Luke could almost feel her looking at him through the door. "Love really is the best medicine,"
"What? How? That's not possible!"
"Come look at his results yourself than,"
Luke could only guess that Michael's doctor did as Dr. Nicholson requested.
"This, this is incredible. This is a miracle in the truest form. Michael's made a full turn around,"
"That's what Luke meant when we were talking earlier then. About murdering Michael,"
Luke bit his lip slightly and knocked slightly on the door waiting for Dr. Nicholson to answer him.
"Luke?" came her voice.
"Yeah, can I unlock the door now?"
"Yes you can, Luke,"
Luke nodded even though he could not be seen and turned to face Lucy who was slightly preoccupied eating the peanut butter and jelly sandwich Dr. Nicholson had brought her.
"Come here kid, we get to go outside now," Luke called her.
"But Michael-"
"Is going to be fine. Dr. Nicholson told the others that he's going to live and they're not going to touch him," Luke told her, knowing she had missed out on the conversation while she ate. "Come on,"
"Luke-"
"Lucy. I swear it's going to be just fine,"
"Pinky promise?"
Luke can hear the silence outside the room and it's evident that the others are all listening into him and Lucy's conversation.
"Pinky promise," Luke confirms holding out his pinky for the younger girl to interlock her own with. "Now let's go out there yeah?"
"Wait!" Lucy cried. "Can we say bye to Michael?"
Luke smiled softly at the eight year old. "Yeah, we can say bye,"
Lucy hobbled over to Michael's bedside in the near silence and took hold of his hand in her much smaller ones. "See Michael? I told you, you could get unstuck. You just needed some help, but now it's all going to be okay. You'll see," Lucy smiled and locked her pinky with Michael's as well. "Pinky promise,"
She let Michael's hand fall back onto the bed as she backed away, gesturing for Luke to step forward and say his goodbyes. Luke didn't want his words to Michael overheard, but in the same sense he did. He wanted to shove it in everyone's faces that Michael was going to be okay.
"I thought I told you already that I wasn't going to lose you, Michael. I love you, baby. And I can't wait to see those beautiful eyes open again," Luke kissed Michael's forehead and brushed his thumb over the back of the boys hand. He slipped the heart Lucy had drawn and taped back together under Michael's hand and folded Michael's paper heart and tucked it in his pocket. "I'll keep your heart beating this time, baby. I promise,"
Luke squeezed Michael's hand one last time before placing it down and wiping at his eyes. He pressed his fists to his eyes to stop the tears that were coming seemingly from nowhere and let out a shaky breath.
"Luke?" Lucy asked gently.
Luke took in a shuddering breath and tried again to control himself.
"Luke?" Lucy asked again.
He heard her prosthetic legs hit the ground and couldn't keep in the strangled sob that forced its way out of his system.
"Should I open the door?"
There was indeed an incessant knocking on the door, but Luke couldn't answer Lucy. He could barely register her words, because in his head all he could think was that this was his fault. And sure Michael was going to wake up and he was going to be alive, but Michael would be so far from okay, and Luke knew, he knew he could lose him again. He lost him once and God knows he could lose him again just as easily. Luke couldn't bear to lose Michael again. Once had nearly done him in.
"I'm opening the door," Lucy concluded.
And she did. Footsteps got closer and closer to Luke until suddenly they stopped completely, because they were unsure. All Luke's words of anger and hatred. Ashton and Calum didn't know if Luke wanted them to comfort him, they didn't know if he ever wanted to see them again.
But this was Luke. The boy they watched go through puberty and grew up friends with. This was their best friend and maybe they were blind to his sadness before, but they sure as hell saw it now. So Calum took the last few steps and wrapped his arms around Luke and Ashton wrapped his arms around both of them.
"I'm sorry!" Luke sobbed. "I didn't mean any of it! I really am happy for you guys, you're really fucking cute. B-but it made me think of Michael, and that I had lost that with him. That I wasn't getting it back,"
"It's fine," Calum soothed. "It's okay, Luke,"
But either Luke couldn't hear them or didn't believe him.
"I'm so, sorry. So fucking sorry. I shouldn't have said any of that," Luke kept going.
"Luke, it's fine,"
"I'm sorry. For, for everything! For letting Michael going and for shutting you all out and being so damn angry and rude. I shouldn't have done that, should've let you in and let you help me out-"
"Luke!" Ashton shouted eventually. The blondes wide blue eyes zeroed in on Ashton. "It's okay. It's fine Luke. We don't care," The curly haired boy said repeating Calum's words.
Luke's eyes then shifted to Calum as if he needed him to confirm what Ashton had said even though Calum had already said it before.
"He's telling the truth Luke. It's alright," Calum hesitated slightly. "We're sorry too. We should have talked to you more about letting Michael go, and God Luke we should have known you needed us to just be there for you and I'm sorry that we weren't. We're sorry that we weren't. It really does hurt that we let it get this far again, but you have to understand we really did think it was what was best. Next time we can all decide together,"
"Next time?" Luke squeaked.
"When we have to figure out when and how to wake him up," Ashton explained quickly when Luke's eyes began swimming in tears again.
When Ashton and Calum finally let go of Luke he was in his mum's arms and she was apologizing as well. Though the apologies kept coming and Luke did truly forgive them, he couldn't help but remain sad and slightly hopeless.
Next he was passed to the much shorter Tatiana and he had to bend to hug her back. "Sorry, Tat. I've put you through a lot of shit too,"
Tatiana offered Luke a small half smile. "I'm sorry too, Luke," she said patting him on the arm softly.
And they all really were sorry. It seemed to be the core of their beings. Sorry-ness and sadness, but now there was a hope beyond measure. Hope because after all they'd been through Michael might actually wake up.
.