"Oh SHIT!" Evan exclaimed as he skidded to a halt next to me. Time seemed to stand still, as I knelt, frozen, next to Andy's motionless form. The next thing I knew, Evan was ripping my cell phone out of my hand. He must've ended the call I'd made to Andy, as Andy's cell phone, which was laying next to him, stopped ringing and the screen on it went dark. Vaguely I heard Evan yelling that we needed an ambulance and the police. Then I felt him jab me in the shoulder. "They said to check for a pulse. Check for his pulse! Do you know how?" Evan was saying to me. With tears running down my cheeks, I just stared up at Evan blinking. "CHECK FOR A PULSE!" he yelled at me urgently. Jolted by Evan's yelling, I looked back down at Andy and felt for a pulse on the side of his neck. "I CAN FEEL ONE!" I yelled, feeling a ray of hope. I leaned close to Andy's mouth and nose and listened and felt for breathing. "I think he's breathing too, but barely," I shouted. I heard sirens in the distance. "The police and an ambulance are on their way!" Evan said, reaching in front of me and shoving my cell phone into my jacket pocket. He reached over and picked up Andy's and shoved that in my pocket too. "Andy! Stay with me Babe!" I said, leaning close to his face, and stroking his hair. "You can't die on me. Do you hear me?" "What's this?" Evan said, picking up something small and white off the ground next to Andy's head, "It looks like a tooth." I took it from Evan. It was a dental cap. Gently, I pushed Andy's upper lip up a little. Sure enough, his new cap was missing, and his gum was bleeding. "It's Andy's new cap," I said sadly, as I put it in my shirt pocket, "he just got it put in before he came here." Just then the sirens stopped in front of the alley. Seconds later, a couple of policemen ran up, shining large flashlights at us. In the light, Andy looked even worse. "Step aside," one of them said brusquely, as he shoved me aside and knelt next to Andy. He felt for a pulse, and listened for breathing. "He's alive yet," he said to his partner. The second policeman looked at us and asked what had happened. Evan told him the story, as his partner continued examing Andy. An ambulance pulled up outside the alley and the driver and paramedics ran toward us. Two of them began attending to Andy, while the third one questioned the police officers. * * * Evan motioned me aside. He said, "The cop says this alley has not outlet in the back of it. He says Devon and Terry might still be in here!" I spun around and started for the back of the alley. Evan followed. "Hey! Come Back!" one of the cops called after us. We kept on walking. The alley was completely empty. At the end of it there was a small alcove, with a dumpster sitting in it. The moon had just risen above the buildings' roofs. In its light I could see a little bit. I couldn't see around the edges of the dumpster though. We stopped and listened. Then I heard a slight scraping noise to the left of the dumpster. I stepped toward the sound. Suddenly, someone leaped out of the darkness at me and collided with me. It was Devon! Terry jumped out at Evan! I managed to grab Devon and throw him to the ground. He tried to knee me in the balls as I straddled him. He missed, but I landed in a sitting position on his gut, my knees pinning both his arms to the ground. Then I began pounding the shit out of his face. As I beat Devon senseless with my fists, I bellowed at him "I told I'd kill you if you ever fucked with me or any of my friends again! I meant it!" I could hear Evan and Terry scuffling next to me, but I was too busy breaking Devon's face to try and figure out who was winning. Suddenly, lights were shining on us, as the two cops ran up with their flashlights. I kept on pounding Devon's face, as they yelled at me to stop. Then, I felt myself being dragged off of Devon, but not before I got in one last good blow to Devon's nose, which caused him to shriek in pain, as with a loud snap, I apparently broke it again for him! The cops each had to hold onto one of my arms, because I was strugging and trying to get back to pounding on Devon some more. Evan and Terry were lying on the ground. Terry was writhing and moaning a little. Evan seemed OK. "What is this? Are you two gay bashers or something?" the cop holding me snarled at me. "NO!" Evan shouted, before I could speak, "They're the gay bashers! They're the ones who tried to kill our friend back there - because HE'S gay!" I'd finally stopped struggling, so the cops let go of me and stepped between me and Devon. One of them shined his light in my face. He said to me, "Is that true? They're the ones who did that to the blond kid? And they did it because he's gay?" "His name's Andy. He's my partner. And yes, these assholes tried to kill him because he's gay!" I said, still seething. The cop looked a little surprised. He said, "Then you're gay too? Where were you when all this happened?" "Actually, I'm bi," I said, testily. "Me and Evan were late getting here to meet Andy and this one," I said, motioning toward Terry. "He just got friendly with Andy earlier this week. Apparently it was a ruse. He meant to lure Andy away from me so they could do this to him!" "The world would have one less faggot in it if it weren't for you Wilder!" Devon sneered from the ground, as blood gushed from his nose. I lunged for Devon and kicked him in the ribs as hard as I could. Devon screamed, and grabbed his side. The cop stopped me, but I noticed he took his time about it, as I was able to get a second kick in before he pulled me away from Devon. Devon lay gasping and crying in pain. "Hey! Stop him!" Terry, hollered at the cops, "He just assaulted him!" The cop turned to Terry and said "I didn't see anything like that. And if I were you I'd shut up!" Evan flashed me an incredulous grin. "Can I go be with Andy now?" I asked. "Go ahead," the cop said, "but I'll need a full statement from both of you." "I want to go to the hospital with Andy," I said. "We'll come there to talk to you," the cop said, "but first we'll take these guys in and lock them up!" We thanked the cops, then ran back to Andy. They were just rolling the stretcher into the back of the ambulance. Andy was still unconscious. "Can I ride with him?" I asked one of the paramedics. "You wouldn't be John by any chance would you?" he asked. I said, "Yes, I am. How'd you know?" "Your friend here started to come around a couple minutes ago and he was mumbling your name. He's out again now though," he said. Evan asked where they were taking him. The ambulance driver told him. It was the A & E center at the hospital Elizabeth worked in. There are a few British terms I'll just never get used to. 'Accident & Emergency' or 'A & E' is one of them. To me it'll always be the Emergency Room, which in reality it really is. Anyway, Evan said he'd follow us there in his car. I hopped in the back of the ambulance, and we took off with the sirens wailing. I noticed the knife was still sticking out of Andy's belly. "So it's really best to leave a knife in like that until you get to the hospital?" I asked. "Definitely!" the paramedic answered, as he set about checking Andy over again. I pulled out my cell phone and quickly called home. Elizabeth answered. I told her what had happened. She said she'd meet us at the A & E. I asked her to call Harry's and have Jacob stay there overnight. By the time I hung up, we were pulling up to the A & E center doors. * * * The doctors and nurses wheeled Andy into a room. I was told I had to wait outside. Then another nurse shoved a clipboard in my hand with forms on it. She said I should fill them out as fast as possible. As I began filling out the forms, I kept glancing up at the door to Andy's room. Through the window in the door, I saw them immediately begin cutting his clothes off. A nurse got on the phone for a minute. The doctor looked Andy over, checked his ribs, and his arms and legs. They painstakingly carefully rolled him onto his side and looked at his back, then rolled him back onto his back. Then they covered him with a blanket, leaving the knife still sticking out of his belly. Evan arrived, and paced around, as I quickly finished filling out the forms. A nurse came out just as I finished the last one and asked for the clipboard back. I gave it to her. She took it in to the doctor, who quickly glanced over the papers I'd filled out. Then, suddenly they were wheeling Andy out of the room. They stopped for a moment and the doctor said, "We're taking for a quick CAT-SCAN of his head, then we're taking him right up to the operation theater. He needs surgery for his knife wound, otherwise he seems OK. Go to the hospital's main lobby and wait there. The surgeon will speak to you there, after the operation." Elizabeth came running in the door just then. "Elizabeth! What are you doing here?" the doctor asked. "This is my stepson," she said, indicating me. "What can you tell me about Andy? she asked, as she leaned over the gurney, looking down at Andy, brushing some of his hair out of his eyes. The doctor repeated what he'd just told her, then he said they needed to get moving. As I felt tears welling up in my eyes again, I quickly leaned over and gave Andy a kiss on the forehead, and said "I love you Andy! I'll be right here when you wake up." Then they wheeled him away. As I watched the gurney disappear around a corner, I started crying. Evan stepped around in front of me and took me in his arms and held me while I wept. As I got control of myself, Elizabeth squeezed my shoulder and said, "He'll be OK. I don't think it's as bad as it seems. Come along now, let's go to the lobby and wait," she said. When I looked at her I noticed that she had been crying though too. I grasped her hand and squeezed it, as we walked to the lobby. * * * When we got to the lobby, Elizabeth asked us for details about what had happened, so we went over the whole story of what had occurred. She was livid. After talking it over a while, we all just sat quietly waiting, lost in our own thoughts. About an hour later, the policemen who'd been at the alley with us showed up. They asked us a lot of questions, and took down all the information. When they were through, they told us that Devon had admitted to beating Andy. He denied knifing him though. Terry had denied everything. He said they were both being charged with assault, battery, and attempted murder. They said they would take our information and write up statements for us to sign. They asked if we'd stop by the next day and sign them. We said we would, and they left. Elizabeth gave Evan some money then and asked him to go to the cafeteria and get us some food. I wasn't hungry, but ate a sandwich out of habit when he returned 15 minutes later. Afterward I got up and paced around and around the lobby. Jacob and Harry called every half hour to find out if we'd heard anything. Finally, after almost 5 hours had gone by, the surgeon came down to the lobby. We all rushed over to him. * * * "Well, it was tricky for a while, but Andy's going to be fine!" he said. "Thank God!" I said, as tears welled up in my eyes, and I felt my knees begin shaking. Elizabeth turned and buried her face against my chest and hugged me. I wrapped my arms around her and hugged her back. Evan joined us, wrapping his arms around both of us, making it a group hug. The doctor told us that prior to his surgery, Andy had had a CAT-SCAN done on his head. They found no damage. The knife wound was clean, but it had perforated Andy's intestines. They'd made an incision and repaired the intestines. He said they had him on antibiotics, to clear up any infection that might have resulted. The doctor said Andy had lost a lot of blood though, so they'd had to give him 3 transfusions. He said if they hadn't gotten Andy into surgery when they did, we'd have lost him, due to the amount of bleeding there was. Luckily it had all worked out OK. He also said that when the surgery was finally over, they'd sewn up a couple cuts on Andy's face and hands. He was currently in the recovery room, and would be moved to a regular room after he'd woken up. The doctor suggested that we go home and come back in the morning. "I'm staying!" I said. "I need to be here when he wakes up!" The doctor looked at me, then said "Well, you'll have to wait here until he's moved into a room. I'll let the nurse know to send someone to get you once that's happened." We thanked the doctor, and he left. I suggested that Elizabeth go home and get some rest. She chuckled and said she was due back at the hospital for work in a half hour. She said she was going to have to go to her locker and get her spare scrubs and change though. So she excused herself and said she'd come find us later. I called Jacob and gave him the report, and suggested he and Harry go to bed, as it was getting late. He said they were already in bed, but had been staying awake until they heard from us. "Yeah! Don't tell me you're just laying there in bed doing nothing!" I said, snickering. Jacob snickered and said "How'd you guess? Good Night John! Tell Andy we love him!" Chuckling, I said I would, then said good night and hung up. I told Evan he didn't have to wait around, but he looked at me and said, "If you're staying, then I'm staying!" "You really don't have to," I said. But Evan insisted. I smiled and said, "I think we're in for a long night!" We sat down and looked at some magazines a few minutes. Then we watched the late news on BBC. Finally, we began doing a crossword puzzle together. Eventually, a nurse appeared and asked if one of us was John Wilder. I said I was. She said Andy had been moved to a room, and I could go see him. We followed her to the elevators and rode up to the 6th floor, then followed her down the hallway. She told us that only one of us could go in at a time, and since it was the middle of the night, we had to be quiet. Evan spied a small waiting room and said he'd wait for me there. * * * Andy was in a semi-private room. He had the bed by the door. A young man, who looked to be in his early 20's lay in the bed by the window, sleeping. Andy was asleep too. He had a couple of IV's in his arm. Quietly I pulled a chair up next to his bed and sat down. I took his hand in mine and held it, while I watched him sleeping. I must've fallen asleep, because the next thing I knew, I was waking up. I felt a hand laying on my head. I was sitting in the chair next to Andy's bed. My head was lying on the edge of the bed, and it was Andy's hand that resting on me. Gently I lifted his hand and sat up, then put his hand down next to him. Andy stirred then, and his eyes fluttered open. "Hi!" I whispered, "How are you feeling?" Andy stared at me, and I saw tears forming in his eyes. "I'm so sorry John!" "Shhh - you have nothing to feel sorry for! What're you talking about?" I asked, reaching up and brushing some hair out of his eyes. "For causing such a mess!" he said. I smiled and said, "You did NOTHING wrong! All you did was try to be friends with someone who turned out to be an asshole! So NO MORE apologies about it! OK?" Andy smiled a small smile then. We talked for a few minutes, and I filled him in on what had happened. He cried when I showed him his new cap that had been knocked out of his mouth already. I took his hand again and told him not to worry, that we'd get it fixed again. He calmed down, but I could see he was very tired. I looked at my watch - it was 5:00 in the morning. I told him to go back to sleep. He said he would, but he wanted me to go home and get some sleep and come back later. Hesitantly, I agreed. Just as I was getting up to go, Elizabeth came in. She smiled when she saw Andy was awake, and checked him over. Then she told him to go to sleep. I told her I was going to see if Evan was around yet, and see if he'd drive me home. She said he was sleeping on the couch in the lounge down the hall, and that she thought that sounded like a good idea. We said Good Night to Andy, and left. Elizabeth went back to her floor to continue her shift, and I went to find Evan. I found Evan sleeping on the couch in the lounge, snoring rather loudly. I hated to wake him up, but had no choice. He was pretty groggy when I woke him, but he got up and obediently followed me to the parking garage. "Here," he said, handing me his keys, after we found his car, "You drive. I'll fall asleep if I do." Smiling, I took his keys and went around to the driver's side, as he collapsed into the passenger seat, and curled up closing his eyes. I drove to our house. When we got there I woke Evan up and suggested he sleep over. Silently, he crawled out of the car and followed me into the house and up to my room. We both stripped down completely, and trudged to the bathroom to pee. As I was peeing Evan stepped up to the toilet next to me and started peeing along with me. I was too tired to snicker. When we'd both finished, we went back to my room, and crawled into bed. "Good night", I said. "Uhn," Evan replied. He was already drifting back to sleep. I was surprised, when a minute later he rolled over onto his side and snuggled up to me. I wrapped my arm around him and he snuggled into the crook of it and sighed contentedly. A moment later, he was snoring softly. Smiling, I drifted off to sleep myself. * * * The clock said it was almost noon when I woke up. Evan was still sleeping, lying snuggled up to me. In fact, he had his left leg draped over my left leg and was lying half-on, half-off of me. I thought it must be a position he liked to be in, as it was the second time he'd slept with me that he ended up in it. Just like the previous time, his dick, which was hard as a rock, was lying between his pelvis and my thigh. The side of my penis, which was also hard, was rubbing up against Evan's side. Having Evan's warm, silky smooth body pressed up against me, and feeling my chest hairs flicker as he gently exhaled warm air through his nostrils, was causing my dick to throb. Idly I ran my hand up and down, over the smooth skin of Evan's shoulderblade. I must have tickled him a little as he started to giggle in his sleep, then slowly started to wake up. "Mornin' Sleepyhead," I mumbled. "Oh man! I'm sorry!" Evan said, turning red in the face and rolling off of me, once he was awake enough to realize the position we were in. "Hey! Don't worry about it! I like snuggling with you. You're almost as much fun to snuggle with as Andy!" I said, snickering. "Fuck off John!" he said, smiling ryely. "Hmm, I thought you kind of liked snuggling with me yourself, considering how you rolled over and snuggled up to me last night before you fell asleep!" I said, grinning. Evan turned redder still, and began to look upset. "Hey! It's alright! Really!" I said. There was a pause for a moment, then staring up at the ceiling, Evan said very quietly, "I did enjoy it John. But not for sexual reasons. At least I don't think it was for sexual reasons, and no offense, but I really hope it wasn't for sexual reasons. I really don't want to end up gay! I don't really think I am, but ... sometimes I get very confused!" He hesitated, and I was about to say something, but before I could, he continued, "John, you're the closest I've ever come to having a brother, and other than my mother, nobody's ever cared about me. I can tell you do though, just like I care for you. And, I don't understand why I like it, but I just know I like being physically close to you. I don't mean that I want to have sex with you. I just like being physically close to you." Evan's voice cracked and he snuffled a little, then he continued, "I've never gotten a hardon because of a guy before, but I know you've seen it happen to me a couple times I've been with you though. And then there was that time in the loo at the Bell & Crown when we felt each other. And, yes, I'm hard now. But, like you said once before - I wake up hard every day. And I don't get hard all the time when I'm around you. It's not like when I'm near Betsey Buehler. It's just happened a couple times with you. I'm so fucking confused!" Evan sniffed and wiped his left eye with the back of his hand. I thought a minute, smiled, and said, "Evan, I love you. I love you a LOT! I think of you as a brother too! And, I really like snuggling with you! Sure for me, you might think I get a sexual thrill from it, and maybe I do. But, I've never thought you were doing it for sex, or that you were gay. I just thought you liked it because we are closer to each other than most guys, because we feel like brothers to each other! And, so what if you do get hard over me every so often. You're not gay. If you were, you wouldn't get hard over Betsey all the time, like you do. Hell, I'm half straight, and I get hard over her all the time! And Evan, I expect if I was completely hetero, and we were as close as we are, I'd get hard over you sometimes yet too. I think if two people are as close as we are - straight or gay - there's gotta be some sexual tension. A lot of brothers, or just good friends who are close to each other do have sex you know! Most of them turn out straight, although, I suppose they'd have to be classified as bi, really." "Do you think I might be bi, like you are?" Evan asked suddenly. I grinned and said, "I don't know Evan. But if you are, it's OK with me. I just want you to be happy!" "I-is there some way we could find out?" Evan asked, finally turning and looking at me. He was breathing heavily and his face was pink. He had a slightly fearful expression in his eyes. I also noticed the bulge his hardon was making under the covers twitch a couple times... ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ The next chapter in this series will be published shortly.
