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Sixteen

I had been staring at Gerard for a long time now. I mean, I interacted when needed but if I didn't need to, I was focused solely on him. He could die at any given moment and I felt like if I hoped hard enough for him to wake up, he would - and not in days or weeks or months or years - now. His parents hadn't left the room yet since I'd been there, which had to be about 2 hours, and Mikey had fallen asleep in the chair next to Gerard.

My mom brought me up here to see him a few days after we got the call and I can't even remember if it was 2 or 3 days after because all I could think about was my boyfriend being in a fucking coma.

Unfortunately, we couldn't stay in hotels for weeks and weeks like I wanted, so we left 3 days later. The day I was supposed to leave, Gerard's parents, my mom, and Mikey left the room to give me privacy even though I hadn't asked - and I hadn't realized I needed a sliver of time alone with Gerard for it to finally hit me that he was really in a coma and he could actually die in his sleep. The doctor the chances of him waking up were slightly above average, but that would mean nothing to me until he actually woke up. I tried my best to not cry, simply because I've heard that even when someone is fighting for their life in a coma, they can hear you, and I didn't want Gerard to hear me crying at his side.

I moved a hand up to caress the side of his face that wasn't bandaged up because of glass from the windshield scraping it, and grabbed his limp, free hand. He had a broken leg and arm too, along with gauze on his arms from sliding against the road...or something of the like. I can't remember. There 3 cars involved though, because after Gerard and some women collided, another car crashed into the front of Gerard's as well. I couldn't form any words into coherent sentences, and the longer I sat there, the more choked up I became. My heart was beating too normally for me to be silently freaking out the way I was. Everytime I opened my mouth nothing came out and I was dangerously close to crying.

"Fight as hard as you can, Gee." I sniffed finally after maybe a minute of just standing at the side of his bed. "You can do it. Wake up soon, okay?" I whispered. I took off the weathered ring of mine and slid it onto his finger. Our initials were barely there anymore and it was close to finally breaking but it didn't matter. I didn't know when I'd be back up here to see him. I bent down to kiss the back of his hand and then took in a deep breath, swallowing hard to diminish the lump in my throat.

"I love you."

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2 weeks had passed before someone messaged me on instagram to ask why Gerard wasn't posting anything. He's on almost everyday and I know this is completely none of my business and understand if you don't want to say but ?? I didn't want to tell them. I didn't want to tell anyone. I didn't want to talk about it either. But I also didn't want to make myself feel like I was avoiding the situation because that would ultimately make me feel worse later on. I think I was still in shock. I mean, I functioned normally but... I didn't care about anything. I just kept thinking about Gerard. I thought about him dying and me not even being there before he did. I thought about him opening his eyes and me still not being there, and it hurt me a lot. I've never experienced something like this and the anxiety that came with it was something I was unfamiliar with.

Gerard is in a hospital and he's doing fine so far I said - when I had no idea how he was actually doing. Though, I would consider him not dead yet being 'fine'.

As the days passed, I was more inclined to write again. To write letters. Letters to Gerard that went into a folder every day I got a call from Mikey to keep me updated. One time I started crying as I was writing my 8th letter and had to restart it. How did people do this? How were they even able to function when their loved one was in a hospital for something so serious? Every night, I had to push my face against a pillow and scream at myself in my head not to cry. I felt like my life was losing purpose without Gerard next to me or talking to me. How long would it be until he woke up? How long would it be until he... Died? Even though I didn't want to think that way I couldn't help it. If Gerard died... fuck. Fuck, I don't know what I'd do. I don't know what I would do.