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TRIGGER WARNING: panic attack
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JONAH'S HEAD SNAPPED UP the second the door to his dorm slammed open, august spilling into the room, barely on his feet. jonah's up in a second, his hands are out by his side, his face open and comforting as he takes slow steps to meet august's form.
the boy had pressed himself against the door, his entire body shaking as his chest heaved unsteadily. the fragment could barely see jonah approaching through the pile of tears collected in his eyes. he couldn't breathe, his chest hurt really bad. he felt like he was dying. was he dying? this has to be what dying feels like? like nothing's ever going to get better? like no one's ever going to accept him? like he's never going to escape from this feeling in his chest that feels like he's being choked. august thinks he might be dying.
jonah stood in front of the alter now, his gentle words falling on deaf ears. the older bent his knees a bit, trying to catch august's eyes. but it didn't work. nothing was working, nothing was helping him, and honestly, jonah didn't know what to do.
this wasn't like august's previous panic attacks. normally the boy was coherent enough to allow jonah to approach him, and help him calm down. if not, leo would front and force the boy to take deep breathes, or accept help and comfort from one of the boys. the last time aug had a panic attack this bad was after brett. and even then, jonah had an idea of what was wrong, an idea of where to start.
jonah was completely lost right now. so the boy ran a very gentle, barely touching, hand through aug's hair, repeating the action until the alter finally looked up at him. the older didn't know if the boy in front of him was looking through him or at him, but then august let out a small whimper and collapsed into jonah's body.
the brunette caught him, lowering himself to the floor as he allowed aug to burry himself into his body, still gasping out poor attempts for air. jonah held him closer, rocking his body ever so gently before letting his hand find itself back in aug's hair.
"hey, auggie." jonah whispered in his ear, "can you look at me for a second?"
august still thought he might've been dying. blood was rushing through his ears. he felt like he could physically taste the bile rising up in the back of his throat. he heard the erratic beating of his heart in his chest and he only made the panic in his chest tower over his cowering frame. august was scared.
"listen to me, augs. you're okay. i don't know what happened, but it's okay. i promise, okay? you wanna show me your pinky so i can pinky promise?"
he was so scared, he was tired, he couldn't breathe. he wanted this to be over. he wanted everything to stop. he was used to this feeling but normally things got better. why wasn't anything getting better? august couldn't breathe.
