Long Away

Chapter 70

"I still can't believe it had to end like this," Rami mumbled under his breath. Lucy beside him wrapped her arms around him, as they both looked down at Ben's unmoving body.
"Me neither," she whispered in a mournful voice.
"It's almost time for us to go," she added hesitantly.
Rami sighed.
"I know."
Lucy let go of him to take Ben's hand into hers.
"Farewell, dear friend. May you find peace."
Rami was too overwhelmed to find the words he wanted to say. He knew they would come later, once he was alone and had the space to process his feelings. Once it was too late.

"Farewell," he echoed weakly.
Seeking the comfort of Lucy's touch, he intertwined their hands again. She placed a soft kiss on his cheek before silently guiding him to the door. Closing it behind himself was one of the hardest things Rami ever had to do.

His body became tense when he saw Gwilym sitting out on the hallway. Judging by his stiff posture, he had noticed them as well, though his eyes remained glued onto his phone. Lucy tightened her grip on Rami's hand as they walked past him to the elevator. Rami wasn't one to resort to violence, but for a second he considered punching him in the face. The lies he had told Joe about him were downright disgusting- why his old friend believed them was still unfathomable to Rami. His throat tightened at the thought of Joe.
"Are you alright darling?" Lucy sounded concerned.
"I just hoped we weren't going to run into him today," Rami admitted. He pressed the elevator button.

The doors opened once they reached the lower floor. Rami blinked dumbfoundedly at Joe, who was about to enter the elevator. Sure. Today clearly wasn't a bad enough day already. This all was beginning to feel like some bad Wattpad fanfic written by a mentally ill teenager who was determined to make all his characters suffer as much as possible.

Joe didn't look good at all. His eyes were red with dark bags underneath them, and Rami could have sworn he had gotten thinner since he last saw him. For a moment their eyes met. Unspoken words weighed heavily on Rami, and he could tell by the look in Joe's eyes that he felt the same.
"Come on Lucy, we're leaving." Rami walked past Joe without looking back. It was better this way. For both of them.
"Are you sure you don't want to wait and talk to him later?", Lucy asked quietly as they walked towards the entrance of the building.

"It's not that I don't want to," Rami admitted.
"But Joe has enough to deal with without getting into another argument. And I doubt it'll go much better than that. Besides, why should I just forgive him for taking Gwil's side? He knew me for a decade. He should know I would never say things like that, especially not about a friend." Salty tears began to soak the brim of his face-mask. Lucy took a tissue package out of her coat pocket.
"That's true. Joe wasn't being fair to you. But we both know that all of this is even harder for him than for any other one of us. And we also know how much you miss him, even if you don't want to admit it."
Rami took a deep breath. She was right. He really didn't want to admit it, not even to himself. He tried every damn day to convince himself he didn't need Joe in his life. That he was fine without the guy who had cast him aside like their friendship never meant anything. Really, Joe should be the one to ask him for a second chance. But if that wasn't going to happen, was Rami really able to move on?

He held still while Lucy dabbed his tears away.
"I guess," he sighed.
"I'll go talk to him."
The corners of Lucy's mouth pushed up in the slightest hint of a triumphant smile she tried not to show.
"Okay. Do you want me to come with you?"
"Yes please."

They took a different elevator than Joe to get back up in time. He was almost at Ben's door when Rami and Lucy stepped out of it.
"Joe!"
His old friend froze before slowly turning around. His eyes, still red from crying, darted between the two. They picked up their pace to catch up.
"Please Joe, can we just talk? I don't want things to end like this."
Joe swallowed, and averted his gaze. Rami stopped in front of him, holding his breath in anticipation.
"I need to see Ben now. I can't promise I'll have the energy to talk after."
Rami opened his mouth to say something, but Joe turned away from him and pushed open the door to Ben's room.

Instantly, his eyes went wide in shock.
"Gwil?"
Rami and Lucy exchanged a confused look.
"What are you doing?" Joe stared in utter disbelief at something they couldn't see. Rami took a step forward, but Lucy pulled him back by his arm, silently signaling him to wait.
Gwilym's voice sounded from within the room, but Rami couldn't quite hear what he was saying.
"I...changed my mind...", Joe stammered in response. Then he shook his head.
"What are you doing to Ben?"
Joe motioned with his hand behind the door so that Gwilym wouldn't see it. He pointed towards the offices down the hallway, signaling Rami and Lucy to go and get a doctor.

Gwilym raised his voice.
"You're going to close the door right now and slowly come over here. I can explain everything, but I need you to do as I say." Joe, all color drained from his face, did as he was told. As soon as the door fell shut behind him, Rami and Lucy started running.
"What the hell was that?!", Lucy exclaimed.
"I have no idea." Rami vigurously banged against the next best door. When nobody answered within five seconds, he immideately rushed to the next.

"Come in," a melodic female voice answered to his knocking. Rami pushed the door open. Inside the office, a woman dressed in mint green was tending to her paperwork. Her dreadlocks were tied back into a neat bun and above her facemask sat an elegant pair of glasses, through which she skeptically eyed the two poeple barging in like they were being chased by a serial killer.
"You have to come quickly, a visitor is harming a patient!"

Finally able to make sense of the disturbed looks on their faces, the doctor jumped up from her seat.
"What patient? And what are they doing to them?"
"Ben Jones. The other guy is Gwilym Lee. We don't know exactly what he is doing to him, but there's no time to explain," Lucy hastily summed up the situation.
The doctor - Rami caught a glimpse of her name tag; Dr. Speyer - muttered sarcastically under her breath.
"God, I love my job..." She shoved the papers into a drawer rather carelessly.
"Lead the way then."

Rami couldn't have braced himself for the scene which awaited them in Ben's room. Right in its center stood Gwilym, staring at them with wild eyes, breathing heavily. In his hand he held an empty syringe. Joe was lying on the floor next to him, motionless, his mouth agape in a silent scream. Part of his left arm was swollen.
"What did you do to him?!", Rami thundered.
Shaking, Gwilym dropped the syringe on the floor and his eyes wandered from Lucy to Rami, then Dr. Speyer, who looked back in shock, and finally to Joe. The realization of what he had just done seemed to hit him.
"Fuck! You need to do something! You- you need to help him!"
The doctor dropped to her knees and felt for Joe's pulse.
"One of you, press the red button over there. I'm going to need assistance," she ordered, pointing at the emergency button by Ben's bed.

Lucy acted without hesitation. Rami was still struggeling to process the situation.
"Did you do this to Ben too?"
"I didn't mean for this to happen," Gwilym said blankly. "I just...I..."
Rami felt sick. He wasn't seriously trying to make excuses?
"I don't want to hear it. Ben is dying because of you!"
"What did you inject them with?", Dr. Speyer interrupted them.
Gwilym looked around with a confused look on his face, before finding and reaching for his bag which Rami assumed got shoved under Ben's bed while Gwil was fighting with Joe.

"Here," he pulled out the packaging of the drug.
"It was only supposed to sedate them. But Joe's arm..."
The doctor glanced at the text on the small box Gwilym was holding.
"His pulse shouldn't have dropped this drastically from that. Was the needle clean?"
"I...I think so?"
"You think?" Rami despised him more with each passing second.
"If it wasn't contaminated that means he's having an allergic reaction to the sedative. I can't say what would be worse though."

Rami almost got hit by the door flinging open when a nurse came in.
"Alright, I need the three of you to get out of here," the doctor ordered.
"Wait, what about him?" Lucy blocked the way when Gwilym tried to walk past her. He calmly raised his hand in her direction.
"Lucy, please-"
"Do not touch her!", Rami pushed him away from his fiancée.
"My colleague has his contacts, the police will be able to get a hold of him," Speyer said.
"Now get out of the way, we need more room!"

***

Hey guys!

I did not expect to take so long to write this chapter, but here it is at last.
You can expect one or maybe two more chapters for this story. I also started working on another Borhap fanfic, so stay tuned for that!

See y'all in 1-100000 business days

Tay