When he woke again, he felt much more alert than he did before.
He was aware of the fingers laced through his own, the deep set pain in his bones and chest, and a very tired Mitch Grassi on his phone, slumped in the chair Scott was once sitting in however long ago.
"Hey," Avi croaked, smiling tiredly despite how awful he felt. It felt good to speak, though it still hurt his throat. The sound of his voice made his own chest rumble -- he hadn't felt that rumble in a very, very long time.
Mitch looked up from his phone and even though he had awful bags under his eyes, his eyes lit up as soon as he saw Avi. "Hey," he said with a smile, locking his phone and putting it in his pocket. "How are you feeling?"
"Like shit," he admitted. The simple words couldn't have been truer. Every single one of his muscles ached, his chest was heavier than it had been in months, and god damn was his throat dry.
"Yeah," Mitch frowned. "They took you off your morphine because they were afraid you'd get addicted."
Might be a little too late for that.
"Makes sense," he grumbled, but cringed when he tried to pull himself up.
"No no no," Mitch hushed, placing a hand on his chest and shoving him back down to the bed. "You're not gonna want to move for a while. You had, like, a mini seizure or something, and got your stomach pumped."
And then everything came rushing back to Avi -- about why he was here, and what he was probably putting everyone through. But for some reason, it didn't make him as guilty as it did before. It just made him sad, more than anything. "Sorry."
This time the guilt was here, but not because he was putting everyone through this. It was because he had to lie to Mitch.
The tenor just smiled and Avi knew that it was a little bit fake, albeit beautiful. "Just don't do it again, yeah? Promise?"
Avi didn't have the heart to make a promise that he couldn't keep, so he shifted his eyes away from Mitch and back down to the blood pressure tester that was clamped onto his index finger instead. If Scott had asked him that when he first woke up, then he'd agree instantaneously, without any doubt if he'd be able to keep it. But now that everything hurt and he was embarrassed and still fucking depressed... he'd much rather be dead.
He could only imagine the havoc he'd caused in their fanbase. No one told him how long he was out for, but he was sure it was long enough that people had started to worry. "Should I ask about the tour?"
Mitch shrugged and adjusted himself in his seat. "Canceled, indefinitely."
"Oh."
They were very awkwardly quiet, and it was too much for him, so he had to keep the conversation going (no matter how much he didn't want to). "What did you, ah, tell them?"
When Mitch shrugged again, Avi knew that the emotional turmoil in his head was probably worse than he was letting on. "We just tweeted that there were some personal emergencies happening. Everyone is more concerned than annoyed, really."
There was that guilt again. "Oh. I'm sorry."
Mitch nodded and let his eyelids droop. "Okay."
Mitch obviously didn't forgive him, but Avi didn't blame him. He wouldn't ever forgive himself, either. Especially for...
"Mitch," he said with a foggy voice. "About the letter..."
Mitch tensed his shoulders and his grip slackened in Avi's hand just the tiniest bit. "Don't," he whispered.
"I'm sorry I threw you under the spotlight like that," Avi continued, completely disregarding Mitch. "It was a dick move. And I'm sorry for not telling you what I really felt sooner."
He felt empty when Mitch slid his hand away from Avi's and rubbed his palms against his denim clothed knees. "Oh, man. The doctor told me to stay really far away from this subject."
Avi wrinkled his nose because what did doctors know, really? "What do doctors know?"
Mitch giggled a little bit and the sound was like wind chimes against his ears. "Absolutely nothing."
"Right," he agreed. "So can we just like... talk about it?"
Mitch sighed and squeezed his eyes shut tight, but nodded hastily. "You're not gonna like what I have to say."
Avi inhaled deeply and mentally prepared himself. "I can handle it." He'd been through hell within the last few weeks -- in a situation like this, there wasn't much Mitch could say that would harm him.
"I just..." He trailed off, twining his fingers together. "I never wanted to lead you on."
Avi quirked an eyebrow but didn't say anything, because he expected that Mitch was going to keep going anyway.
"I had this whole speech planned out, but it seems dumb now," he said with a tired smile. "I can't just force feelings, Avi. I-I don't feel the same way, and there's not much I can do about that."
He felt his heart crack, but let Mitch continue.
"And I'm not saying that I don't like you like that," he said with a blush. "I do. I really do. You're a fantastic guy with a great personality, and you're really good looking, you know how to make me blush, and boy can you fuck." Mitch bit his lip jokingly and despite everything, Avi laughed.
"But it's not the same," he went on. "It's not the same way you like me. You... You put me on this pedestal, like I'm some perfect human being or something. And I'm not, Avi. I'm really, really not."
Well. Avi would beg to differ, but he kept his mouth shut.
"I'm just... I'm a human too, Avi. I have emotions, and a lot of insecurities, and flaws and imperfections and I am by no means this perfect human being you created in your mind." He finally looked at Avi and the tear in his eye twinkled under the fluorescent light. "I have a lot of baggage you don't know about, and I'm nowhere near ready for another relationship."
"Well, you can't have more baggage than me," Avi said with a straight face as he gestured to the IV in his forearm, but couldn't hold back a grin when he heard Mitch's crystal giggle. It'd been so long since he'd joked around without faking it that he felt a bit of something alive inside.
"That is very true," Mitch agreed with a smile.
They smiled at each other for a little bit and it didn't feel weird at all when Mitch snaked his fingers through Avi's and squeezed gently, obviously serious again. "I want to be here for you, Avi, okay? I'm not going lead you on, but I'm not going to leave you, either. Is that okay?"
He nodded and squeezed Mitch's hand as his response, no matter how much it hurt him inside. He could heal, right?
"I'm not saying that we can't ever be a thing," Mitch mumbled with a blush. "Just... not until you realize that I'm not perfect."
Avi wanted to argue and tell him that he was perfect, but thought about it again and kept his mouth shut. Maybe he had a point -- maybe he'd just wait this one out. "Yeah. I'm more than okay with that."
They looked at each other with tiny smiles, and Avi had only started to feel peaceful when the door to the room was open and his sister was there and so was a mysterious man he'd never seen before and oh god there was his sister, with tired eyes and a messy bun and a neutral expression on her face.
He wanted to say something when their eyes locked, but he didn't need to because her arms were wrapped around him and he had to pull away from Mitch to hug her and he suddenly felt so safe and warm and perfect. "Esther," he whispered into her neck, because he didn't know what else he could say. "Holy shit."
"You're okay," she said back, and it felt so good to hear her voice again. It was like everything had just fallen into place -- his sister was here, and everything was okay, because his family would always have his back.
She pulled away and grabbed his face and kissed his forehead and then slapped his cheek playfully. "You fucking moron," she snapped. "Don't you ever do that to us again. Do you know how upset mom is that she couldn't come?"
Avi blushed a little bit and shook his head. "No, I-I-"
"My stupid idiotic little brother," she said lovingly, kissing his cheek where she just slapped it, then slapped it one more time. "I love you. I hate you and I'm so glad you're alive. I cannot fucking believe you tried to kill yourself. That's not you."
He'd forgotten how wonderful the comfort of family was, even when she was scolding him for being the moron he knew he was. Even when they'd just started their tour, he knew that he would start missing his family, but he never imagined he'd completely forget what it was like to have his family at his side.
The doctor coughed awkwardly and Avi was torn out of his thoughts to look at him. But the doctor was actually just smiling softly at Mitch, and Avi had the bad feeling he was about to get kicked out. "I'm sorry, Mitch. I know how much you must want to be in here for this."
He smiled in that beautiful way of his and rose from his seat, and it was suddenly a little bit too crowded in the room. "No, it's absolutely fine! Immediate family only, right?" He gave the man a friendly smile, and Avi wondered if he was flirting. Why wouldn't he be? The man was obviously attractive, with a broad frame and defined muscles under his lab coat, and sharp Roman features, and the faint stubble of a beard and a little bit of a buzz cut and holy shit Avi was attracted to his doctor -
The doctor nodded as Mitch shuffled out the door, leaving Avi with a comforting smile, and then Avi was alone with the two and he felt very nervous with a cute guy in front of his sister. She must've known, because she had to've read the letter, but still. It was awkward.
It came as such a surprise to him -- usually, he'd never been attracted to many guys other than Mitch. And when he thought about it, all the guys he were attracted to were so similar to Mitch that it wasn't even fair. This guy, though... He wasn't similar to Mitch. At all. Quite the opposite, actually.
"So, Avriel," the doctor said, flipping through the packet of paper on his clipboard. "Can I call you that?"
"Avi is fine," he said with a shy blush. He felt Esther's eyes still on him, so he shrunk his shoulders in on himself nervously.
"Avi," he corrected. "I'm Dr. Zeman. We're going to brief you on what went down in the past 72 hours. Is that alright?"
He nodded but realized that the doctor wasn't even looking at him. "Yeah. That's alright."
His smile was so sweet that it made Avi sick. "Well, first of all, we ran some blood work, and the glucose levels in your blood were so low that we could barely even detect any at all." His heart froze a little bit -- he hadn't eaten a few days prior to his suicide attempt, but he didn't think it was that bad. "On top of that, you ingested what we estimated to be around 13 thousand milligrams of ibuprofen. Now, it would've taken about 40,000 milligrams to kill you, but that combined with your low blood sugar... It's a miracle you're alive at all."
Miracle. More like...
"I would thank Mr. Olusola as soon as you get the opportunity," the doctor continued with a smile. "He saved your life."
Oh god. He owned Kevin everything.
"It seems like Mr. Kirk also caught you at the right time," he added thoughtfully. "Because of your low blood sugar and that amount of drugs in your veins, you had a partial seizure." He froze -- so the memories of his jaw getting locked up and his muscles cramping were real, and not just a figment of his nightmarish imagination. "You have very minor liver damage, so... You're definitely going to be okay. Physically."
Him and Esther both cringed at his word choice.
"Mentally, on the other hand..." He looked up from his clipboard and quirked an eyebrow at the siblings. "It's not my place to tell you what to do. Though I can recommend the best options if you're interested." It looked like he was really talking to Esther more than to him -- his opinion on this didn't matter.
Avi looked to his sister for support, but she just smiled at the doctor. "Yeah. I'd like to hear it."
"My best recommendation would be putting him under suicide watch," he said carefully. "There's many mental wards that would gladly take him in for a week to make sure he won't try it again."
Avi froze. "Any other recommendations?" Anything but that would be fine.
"Well, I always recommend psychiatry. I don't have the authorization to give you medication, but I have a list of medical professionals that do."
He looked to Esther hopefully, but she still had her eyes glued to the doctor. "We'll do that."
He felt like a child again -- having his big sister make decisions for him. He kind of threw away his privileges of making sane decisions for himself when he literally just proved that he was in no way sane.
"Great. I'll get that information for you," he said with a charming smile that would've made Avi's knees weak if he were standing. "We're going to keep him here for a few days while he recovers. In the meantime, Avi, I suggest that you take the time to invite your friends in. They're all very worried for you."
Avi inhaled sharply. "Yeah, um," he whispered. "I need to... Can you send Kevin in? I need to thank him."
Dr. Zeman nodded curtly and turned out of the door, shoving his pen into his pocket as he did so. Esther took the opportunity to turn to Avi with a mischievous look, and he knew that nothing good was about to come out of her smirking mouth.
"So... doctor's pretty hot, right?"
He groaned obnoxiously and let his head slump backwards into the pillow. "There's literally no rest with you, is there?"
They both laughed together like they did when they were just teenagers, and Avi felt a bit of the weight in his chest float into the air.
Maybe he could get better, with his family at his side.
***
So I lied... there's only one more chapter after this.
I can't decide if there needs to be an epilogue or not. Emphasis on needs to be -- it ends at a pretty good place. You'll see tomorrow, probably at 6:00 PM MST.
This has been such an emotional journey for me, and it's crazy to imagine that this story is about to be over. I love you all very much and thank you so much for reading <3