Times running out (a Bret Von Dehl love story)

Chapter 21

The day I was allowed to leave the hospital, it was grey and dreary outside.

I hadn't been allowed to check up on Bret and the boys for days due to their treatments, and it was eating at me.

But there was talk around the hospital.

Talk of a cheerful boy, who was almost entirely fine, and kept his head up even though his friends were hurt worse than he was, I knew it was JC.

There was talk of a quiet boy, and even though he could not use one of his legs as it stood, and may never be able to really use it again, you could always hear the beautiful sound of a guitar coming from his room. I knew it had to be Ray.

But most of all, there was talk of a miracle boy, who at a point was almost certainly going to die, but then somehow, during his operation, had healed to the point of highly likely full recovery. I hoped that it was my Bret.

It was also said that if you listened closely, whenever he got upset, afraid, or worried, he would mumble sweet and lovely things about a girl that he missed named Phoenix-Lynn. That one was everybody's favourite thing to talk about, and if that wasn't Bret, then I would be a little scared.

Although all of this was amazing, I never heard a single damned thing that I could assume was about Alex.

But that talk only mattered before now, the day I got out.

I packed all the things that the girls had brought me from the house and any other gifts I had been given, because yes, they did come to visit.

After I had just managed to shove my last T-shirt inside of my suitcase, I made the sudden realizations that:

A) the boys could leave as soon as they had recovered, so if any of them were doing well enough I could check them out.

B) I could now solve my little mystery revolving around Alex.

As selfish as it was, immediately after I was signed out I sped to Bret. According to popular belief he was doing very well.

I swung open the door and looked inside the room, I was greeted by the handsome smile of Bret. He held his arms out wide and I ran straight into them. He held me tight and pulled me into the hospital bed with him.

"Jesus fucking christ, I missed you." he grinned, he didn't wait for my response, he just kissed me.

I kissed back, and every repressed emotion I had felt for Bret bubbled up and went into that one kiss.

After a moment I pulled away and looked him up and down.

No tubes.

No wires.

No casts.

Just Bret.

"I'm so glad you're okay! I was so fucking scared!" I exclaimed, attacking his face with about a million kisses.

The both of us were fine, even if Bret had some scars on him from the glass that would never heal.

As we walked to Ray's room, I told Bret every story I had heard that I had figured was about our shy guitar playing friend.

Bret nodded and agreed that they were, in fact, very much like Ray.

We walked into his room, and when Ray saw us his face lit up. He grabbed a pair of crutches from beside his bed, and 'walked' over to us.

"Hey, how are you guys?" he asked with a concerned twinge in his voice.

"We're totally fine, you?" Bret answered.

He patted his fucked up leg.

"Well, there's some nerve damage in this one, so bottom line, worse case scenario is that I walk with a slight limp in this leg." he explained with a shrug.

"Thank god, it could've been so much worse." I exhaled deeply.

After we all chatted for a bit, and found the fully-recovered JC, we made the trip over to Alex's room, but we couldn't get in, there were doctors with clipboards and concerned looking nurses in front of the door.

"Hey," Said JC. "would you mind letting us into that room? A good friend of ours is in there."

We all stood behind JC and awaited a response.

A sad looking nurse turned to us.

"Oh..." she said. "I'm so sorry, you must've been the friends he had talked about... I hate to tell you this, but Mr. Foxx has just passed away."