Long Away

Chapter 62

Tw: Death

"I'm going to get through this," he said. "I can do it for Ben," he said. Days went by, became weeks, then months. Now Joe didn't know if he should be laughing or crying about his past self's naivety. With his phone in his hands, he was laying on his bed. Joe genuinely thought things couldn't get any worse. How stupid of him. In a short amount of time, the whole world had gone to hell. He had sold his house to come live in the UK, thinking, foolish as he was, that he would be here when Ben woke up. That still hadn't happened, instead a global pandemic broke out, and he was once again unable to visit him at the hospital.

As if that wasn't enough, Ben's family had found a physician's directive among his belongings, stating that he did not wish to be kept alive for more than a year in case of a coma. One year. Twelve months exactly. Six of them had gone by. Nothing had changed about his condition. The same could not be said about Roger. Joe stared at the screen of his phone. Six missed calls. Thirteen unread messages. Gwil, Rami, Brian, all three had been trying to contact him since last night. He had been knocked out by the anti depressants he had been prescribed a few weeks ago. Before he got the chance to check what it was all about, a headline broke the news to him. Roger Taylor, drummer of Queen, found dead by his wife.

Joe dropped the phone onto the mattress. Strange. He had expected to freak out when it happened. Perhaps it was the medication, or maybe he was just emotionally burnt out. There was nothing. Not even a hint of a feeling. It wasn't that he didn't care. He had never experienced such numbness before. Exhausted, he closed his eyes again. No matter how much he slept, he was always fatigued. Now that he thought about it, this had gotten worse since he started his medication. He should talk to his psychiatrist. But that would require him to get out of bed. Not an option. Not today. Maybe he would try tomorrow. But probably not.

Time had lost all meaning when Joe finally remembered he should be answering his messages. He squinted, the light of his phone was irritating to his eyes that had gotten used to the darkness in his room for apparently the last twenty hours. He opened his chat with Rami first, skimmed over the texts, and realized he had no idea what to say. Hopefully he wouldn't mind being left on read for a while. Joe closed the chat, and went to check his social media. An overwhelming amount of posts and comments from mourning Queen fans. No, he did not have the nerve for this right now. It was even worse than having to think of a reply to Rami.

Rami: "Hey Joe. I don't know if you've heard it yet, but Roger is gone... Please don't hesitate to call if you need to talk. I'm always here for you." 1:22 am

"Are you okay?" 10:14 am

"Joe, we're all starting to get worried. Please just tell us you didn't do anything stupid?" 6:35 pm

Joe: "Hey. Sorry I didn't respond right away. How are you coping?" 6:49 pm

He pressed send, and went on to see what Brian had said.

Brian: "Hello Joe.
I am struggling to find the right words to express how shocked and hurt I am about the loss of my best remaining friend.
If that is any consolation, he seems to have gone peacefully in his sleep.
Sarina let me know that the funeral will be next week. The ceremony itself will sadly have to have a restricted guest list due to the current situation, but I will send you the location if you would like to visit it after.
We must all stay strong in these dark times.
- Bri" 9:58 am

Joe stared at the text for a solid five minutes trying to think of something, anything, he could say. "My condolences", he typed. Now what? Roger had been one of the most important people in Brian's life, especially since Freddie died and John left the band. There was nothing he could say to take any of that pain away, but the situation did call for a heartfelt message. If only he wasn't feeling so empty, this would be a lot easier. From the corner of his eyes, Joe could see the box that contained his medication standing on his cluttered bedside table. Maybe he should have actually read through the possibly side effects before he started taking it. But he assumed his doctor would know what she was doing. He reached for the box and took out the leaflet.

He skimmed over the physical symptoms, he didn't really want to know about the kind of death you could die overdosing these pills. Ah, there it was. Fatigue, lessened emotions, depression... He scoffed. Maybe it was best to just throw them away.
Joe turned his attention back to the message he needed to write. Chewing on his lip, he typed, deleted, repeated. After a few minutes, a new message came in. It was from Gwil.
"I can see you're online. Are you okay?"
Right. Gwil was the one who had been spamming and calling him all night. Joe opened their chat. Maybe Gwil could even help him with his message to Brian.