A/N : 1 : I've decided to title my part two of the amazing Forest Fic Is this real life and 2 : I hope that you're ready... -Carter
Tyler's eyes flutter open as he starts to see color again. He can't distinguish just quite what the shapes are, but he can tell that there are at least 3 people standing around him.
"He's coming to." He can barely understand what the people around him are saying, but, as the world starts to get less and less blurry, he can identify his mom, dad and a doctor all standing around him while the doctor appears to be checking his vitals. As soon as he's fully awake and sat upright in his hospital bed, he starts to remember what happened.
Flash back to the treehouse
Tyler lies on his back and watches as fire slowly engulfs the roof. The treehouse is starting to fill with smoke.
Something inside him is pulling, insisting that he has to get out, get out before he suffocates or burns. He ignores it. He doesn't care anymore.
Tyler falls asleep as everything around him burns.
He doesn't care.
As the world around him turns grey with smoke, he hears sound of agony from the ground and sees people entering the treehouse before everything fades to black.
Who saved him? Why did they save him?
He couldn't remember for the life of him why his life was worth saving.
Several months later, when Tyler is allowed to go out on his own again
As he was walking around the forest, the world was still just as blue-black as he remembered it to be before the incident. He tries to forget about Josh but he somehow always finds a way to start thinking about him.
He wonders if it was Josh who saved him. If Josh was actually listening to Tyler's apology for saying he wasn't real.
No. No. What was he thinking? Of course Josh wasn't real! Someone must have seen the fire or smelled the smoke and gotten him out of the burning tree.
But there was still a part of him that wanted to believe in Josh's existence. A part of him that wanted to believe that he was real.
But even if he were real back then, there's no way that he was still real now.
But that part of him that still believed in Josh made him feel guilty. It made him feel guilty that it was his fault that he wasn't still with Tyler, that he didn't have someone who truly understood him.
He was sad.
He was always sad.
But Tyler was quickly snapped out of his thoughts by the sound of footsteps behind him. They seemed to be going at the exact same speed has him, stepping in sink with his feet.
He decided to ignore it until the steps sped up a bit, until it sounded like they were running after him.
Out of pure instinct, Tyler began to run as well. From what, he didn't know. Or from who.
He was scared. He wanted Josh to hold him and tell him everything was alright. He needed Josh to hold him and tell him everything was alright.
Then he stopped. He doesn't know why. He just. Stopped.
Like his whole body froze and he couldn't move at all.
Then he noticed that the world was starting to look less and less blue-black and more and more pink-red-orange. He stops thinking for a second.
Pink-red-orange.
Josh.
Josh.
He could feel it, he could almost taste it he was so sure.
"Josh." He says in almost a whisper
"Yes." The figure behind him replies.
"But it can't be you, you aren't real."
"But I am real, Tyler. I know it, you know it. You just have to accept it."
"Did you save me?"
"When?"
"You know when and what I'm talking about."
"But I've saved you more than once, Tyler."
"But you know which time I'm talking about."
"The treehouse fire."
"Yes."
"Yeah, it was me who saved you, so what. I'm not real, right? So it doesn't matter if I saved you or not, because this isn't real. None of this is. And you know it. This is all happening in your head."
"But this is real! It's just you who isn't!"
"It's either I'm real, or nothings real. It's your call, whether this is real or not depends on whether or not you accept my existence."
"But-"
"No buts. Once you've made your choice, you'll know where to find me. And whether I take you to where I live, where nothing is real, or we both stay here all depends on you."
"I don't unders-"
"Until later, Tyler."
And then he was just left there, alone, standing in the middle of the forest. No Josh. And a world going back to being all blue-black.
All he wanted now was to find Josh, hug him, kiss him, and ask him what happened.
But he didn't know where Josh was.
"Once you've made your choice, you'll know where to find me."
His word rung through his head.
"You'll know where to find me."
What could that mean? Will he only be able to see Josh once he's made his choice? Will he be able to talk to him before he chooses?
What was he thinking. He just had a bad dream. He pinched himself. Nothing. He pinched himself harder. Still nothing.
Could this actually be true? Could Josh really exist?
With his voice that sounded like melted marshmallows, his C Major lips, his-
NO. No, Tyler. Stop. He isn't real. You don't even know his last name. Nobody else could see him. Only Tyler could see him. And if only one person could see him, then he was just Tyler's imagination. He was just a dream. A hallucination. A very detailed hallucination.
One that helped him get through a lot of tough times in his life. One who made his world turn blue-black when he wasn't around. One that saved his life. Multiple times.
"I'M SORRY! I SHOULD HAVE LISTENED WHEN YOU TOLD ME YOU WERE REAL! I BELIEVE YOU! JUST PLEASE, MAKE THE TEAR IN MY HEART GO AWAY! I'M LOST WITHOUT YOU! YOU HAVE TO COME BACK TO ME! YOU HAVE TO! YOU CAN'T JUST LEAVE ME LIKE THIS!"
By this point, he was in tears, pulling his hair, clawing his skin. His nails tearing through the soft skin of his cheeks, ripping, and he thinks that the pain is the most real thing he's ever felt. He claws desperately at his face, his neck, his arms. It hurts, it fucking hurts, and he's sobbing. Sobbing for Josh to take him home. Because this isn't home. Not anymore. It used to be. But the second that Josh left, that millisecond that Josh had truly left him, his home was no longer his home. It was HELL.
And then. Then it happened.
A pair of C Major lips kiss his shoulder, and the world is suddenly becoming pink-red-orange.
"JOSH!" He says whilst turning around.
But it didn't look like the same Josh that he fell in love with all those months ago.
His face was burnt in certain spots, he had cuts and dried blood all over his face, neck and arms.
He had all of the same scars as Tyler did when he was saved from the treehouse fire.
And then it hit him.
He did this to Josh. This was the real Josh and he did this to him.
Josh left him, but when Tyler was in danger of dying, he came back. He wasn't allowed to come back. Once you leave, you can't return, but he did it. He did it to save Tyler. So all of the scars that Tyler had, the scars that person he came back for had, were given to him, as a punishment for breaking the rules.
The rules of what?
Of a guardian angel.
Yes. Josh was Tyler's guardian angel and only the person whom the angel is protecting can see them.
And when you leave the one that you are protecting, it means that you don't want to help them anymore. That you don't care about them anymore.
But Josh has always cared about Tyler. Even when he said that he wasn't real, he still cared about him. And he always will, no matter what.
He told Tyler this and all he did was hug him. Not too tight, but not too loose. As if he was trying to make sure he didn't leave again but still didn't want to hurt him.
"I'm sorry, Josh."
"For what? You didn't do anything wrong."
"Yes I did. I said that you weren't real. And I hurt you. I hurt you really bad. And I gave you those scars. I gave you everything that you didn't want. And then once you were gone, I wanted you back again, even though I knew that you would never come back. And that if you did, that you would never want anything to do with me ever again."
"Don't say that. I came back. I'm here again. And I would never not care about you. I will always care about you. And you didn't give me these scars. If it weren't for me hurting you, you would never have told me to leave and therefore never would have given yourself those scars. And it was completely my choice to come back to save you. If it weren't for the fact that I love you, Tyler, I wouldn't have come back to save you. I wouldn't have inflicted these scars on myself."
"I love you too, Josh. And I always will."
Right when Josh was about to say something, he was interrupted by soft lips on his.
And as if by magic, both Tyler and Josh's scars started to fade, only to be replaced by fresh layers of skin. And as they separated from the kiss, they both looked around to see that the world was colorful again. It was no longer blue-black. The once dead looking trees had branches and branches of bright green leaves on them with colorful birds and squirrels on them as well. The previously blue-black grass was now bright green with colorful flowers and bunnies in it. And the sun. Oh, the sun was beautiful. The world looking like it had been drawn up as part of a cheeky Disney princess movie, like Snow White or Cinderella.
And that's when Tyler asked himself,
"Is this real life?"