when love dies [akkayan]

do you care?

Ray POV 

It's been two weeks since Top started rehab. Mew cried the entire night when I got back and told him. It broke my heart to see him like that, like he lost his floor. Of course he wanted his boyfriends to get help, but was not expecting to lose him in the process. He was mad, about Top not telling him anything, about Top not asking him for help. I tried to explain to him how hard the decision was for him, but he didn't want to listen, so I just let him cry, and I hugged him to sleep. My hope was over time he would understand why Top acted the way he did. 

But it's been two weeks, I'm getting ready to go visit Top for the first time and Mew still doesn't want to go. I can understand him but I also know it will break Top a little. I just hope he's on a good enough path that thinking Mew is angry at him doesn't change it. At least I can tell him he still has a boyfriend waiting for him, one that loves him. 

Apart from that, everything has been going fine. Uni is going great. I'm still talking to Thua and Kan. I actually told him I chose to change my name and they have been very supportive. I'm getting to a place where I could probably tell them where I am, maybe have coffee or something together. 

As far as I know Akk keeps texting me, I've seen the notifications but I'm not reading them so I have no idea what he's doing with his life. Kan told me they haven't seen him in a while, and he hasn't been talking to them. I wish someone knew how he is, wish he was still close with them, at least he would have someone taking care of him. No matter how much he hurts me, I still can't get myself to stop caring. 

To stop loving him. 

Maybe that's why I'm still drinking.

I should probably stop with that.

But I can't.

When I finally get to the clinic, Top is sitting on a bench in the garden. I called the nurses to tell them I was coming, so he's probably waiting for me, probably waiting to see Mew as well.

When I get closer to him, and he sees me, he does something I never even considered. He hugs me, and he keeps thanking me. Looking at him I can tell he looks a little better. His eyes don't have dark circles anymore, he's clean and there's actually a little smile on his lips, an aura of peace that wasn't there before. When he let go of me, I could feel his eyes searching around me, looking for something - or someone, that wasn't there.

I couldn't help but feel a wave of sadness crash onto me. The happiness I felt a second ago is threatening to fade and give place to the emptiness, again.

"He still loves you, you know? He just needs some time."

"You don't have to say that Ray. I knew this could happen, I'm fine really."

"I'm not just saying anything Top, I promise you. He was angry at first because you didn't even say goodbye but he loves you. And he's still your boyfriend, at least he still wants to be..."

"Really?" THere it was again, the sparkle in his eyes. It was subtle but real. The Mew effect. 

"Really, he just...he needs some time."

"Yeah okay, I can do that...I can give him time. And when I'm finally better I'll go back and I will show him how much I still love him"

That makes me smile. There's so much hope in his eyes, I know how much he wants to do this. And he deserves to be happy, they both do.

I decided to stay with Top the entire afternoon, we talked about how he spent the last couple weeks. I give him little updates about our lives outside. I was afraid it would hurt him knowing the world is still spinning out there without him, but he seemed genuinely happy while listening to everything about how we are dealing with school and our project. 

These weeks haven't been easy for him. The withdrawals, the fear of sleeping alone, the constant need to do drugs. I knew it was not going to be easy, but hearing talk about the shaking, the cold sweats, the feeling of losing your mind it actually causes me pain. When I ran away I never expected to find people that would mean so much to me. And here I am now, visiting a rehab center, in a city I don't even want to be, terrified I'll run into my ex boyfriend at any given point. And still there is no other place I'd rather be, than right here - helping my friend.

Sitting there, on a simple bench, surrounded by the trees and all those people in need of help and support, Ray realizes something. He hasn't stop caring about others, he still wants to help people. After running away, Ray thought he would have to change who he was to be able to be this new person - to abandon Ayan and become Ray. But maybe choosing a new life for yourself doesn't has to mean you need to become a new person, or a different one. 

It's perfectly fine to care about others, about their feelings, their well being. While at the same time putting your own happiness and mental health first. Top would never, in the circumstances he lived by, be someone who would cross his path, someone he would befriend, but life led him to a different course. Life led him here. Giving the opportunity to change everything he could want, his name, his city, his uni, his friends, his entire persona. And still Ray couldn't help but care about the people closest to him - UNcle Dika, his Mom, Top, Mew, Thua, Kan and Wat, even Akk. He cares, he still cares, and that's not a bad thing, it's not a sign of weakness. And it doesn't have to mean he doesn't choose himself first.

For the first time Ray isn't afraid he will see anyone from his old life again. He actually feels ready to. That's why, in the middle of that garden - one he will become very familiar with during the course of the next weeks. He makes a decision. He can still have parts of his old life, the ones he chooses at least. So he texts his old best friends, the ones he hasn't seen in months and proposes a dinner, a bridge into being in each other's lives again. 

He's not ready for Akk yet, doesn't think he will ever be. But for now this could just be enough.

There's something else he realizes. Looking at Top, at his progress in so little time. He, too, has a problem. He's drowning his sorrows in alcohol, and at any given moment that could destroy his life. 

Maybe it's time for him to be brave again, and ask for help.

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🖤V☆