Chapter 1 - I'm sorry

                                    

                                          
"Wake up...please wake up." I whispered, running my hand through his hair while I held his hand with the other. I sat on the chair right next to his bed, Mark standing by the door, completely silent.
                          
I was still struggling to process what had happened in the last hour or so. It all seemed to happen so fast. It was such a blur. I never thought on that day I would be in the hospital, with the love of my life lying in a bed, hooked up to wires and drips fighting for his life. 
                          
It all happened so fast. I wish I'd never looked away.
                          
"I've been trying to think of the best way to tell you. Sure, this isn't how I planned but...I just want you to understand that it's ok for you to love me like that. Because I love you like that too." 
                          
I said it. I finally told him. After a long two years of debating wether I liked him, questioning my sexuality and actually determining the fact that I had a crush on him. I told him. And the best part is that I knew he liked me. 
                          
He stared at me, eyes glossed over, jaw dropped. He seemed shocked. There was silence. Then something broke the silence. The sound of several car horns beeping all at once. I looked behind me. And when I looked back, that's when the car came.
                          
And Jack was hit.
                          
The car seemed to hesitate. The driver stopped the vehicle, staying completely still. He wasn't getting out of the car. He stayed in there, seemingly confused and scared. I was frozen in my place. I couldn't move. I could barely breathe. It felt like I was drowning. I choked and coughed, hoping this was all a horrible nightmare that I would wake up from in a few seconds.
                          
When I saw all the people coming over to stare, Mark shouting and running to me, the witnesses getting out their phones to call an ambulance and Jack lying motionless on the floor, his left arm slowly falling down to his side as his last breaths left his body, I realised that this wasn't a dream. It was a harsh reality that I couldn't escape from.
                          
That's when the shock and bewilderment went away and anger and rage clouded my brain. I curled my fists in a ball, my face going red. Mark was knelt down beside Jack, screaming his name only to get no response. It was horrendous. He was lying in a pool of his own blood. His legs had become a mess, bent in ways that they shouldn't have been, bones on display. His left arm seemed to be broken, while his right arm twitched every now and again.
                          
I couldn't believe the sight I had my eyes laid upon. I looked over at the car and felt an incredibly strong urge to hurt the driver. I ran over, screaming furiously.
                          
"Get out the fucking car! Get out, asshole!" The driver noticed and went to start uo the engine again. I grabbed the door handle and swung open the car door, unbuckling his seatbelt and dragging him out the car by his arm.
                          
"Let go of me man!" He yelled, trying to remove my grip. I was too angry to even consider letting go. He was going to see and understand what he had done. I dragged him over to where Jack lay. I pointed at his weak body, noticing how pale his face now was.
                          
"Look what you've done motherfucker! Look! Why are you on the fucking road driving like a crackhead?! You've hurt him! Look at him! He's near enough dead because of you, fucking dickhead!" I pushed him to the floor, prepared to get into a fight, when I heard sirens. An ambulance and a police car arrived, pulling up next to the car of the guy who hit Jack.
                          
Paramedics rushed out of the ambulance to Jack's lifeless body, picking him up carefully and placing him on a stretcher. Police came to detain the man who run Jack over, putting him in handcuffs and forcing him into the car. Two police men went around asking witness after witness what happened. It was happening so fast, it was like a blur. I saw Jack get put in the back of the ambulance and the doors were closed by two paramedics who proceeded to get in the front of the van.
                          
Mark touched me on the shoulder. I looked over at him, barely in touch with reality anymore.
                          
"It's ok Fe. It'll be fine. He's gonna be alright." 
                          
"Yeah." We both said that he'd be ok. But we both knew he most likely wouldn't. Even if he survived, he would sustain life changing injuries.
                          
We wrapped our arms around each other, crying into each others shoulders. We both knew the worst was yet to come.
                          
"Felix?" I looked over at Mark, who was still standing by the door to the hospital room.
                          
"Are you ok?" Him asking me that sent a similar rage through me that I had experienced earlier when I dragged that asshole out of his car.
                          
"Yeah, Mark. I'm perfectly fine. Why wouldn't I be? My best friend who I hoped would some day be my boyfriend, the person I wanted to soend the rest of my life with, just got run over. Now he's in hospital, most likely in a coma, barely alive. He's got broken legs, a broken arm, broken ribs and a broken collarbone. He's so close to death and if he dies, he probably won't be awake to hear me say I love him one last time. So yes Mark, I'm fine. What gets better than this?" 
                          
He looked down and sighed. I looked back at Jack, still running my fingers through his silky soft hair.
                          
"I'm sorry. That was a stupid question." He said.
                          
"You don't say?" The tears in my eyes were getting worse, falling down my face at a rapid pace. I opened my mouth to speak again in a calmer tone.
                          
"I never even saw the car. I heard the sound of horns. He was standing there, perfectly fine. Then I turned around and the next minute he was lying in a pool of his own blood. Again, I didn't see the car coming. But if I did you can sure as hell bet that it would be me in his place right now."