OUT

Chapter 49

Thursday, April 9th 2015

Jack's vision was blurry from the amount of alcohol coursing through his system. It couldn't have been later than five, but he had been drinking for hours at this stage. He had gone beyond the screaming and crying stages of panic and was now sitting on the end of his bed staring blankly across his room as his body numbed, and empty cough bottle in his hand.

Empty glass bottles from a collection of different spirits he had raided from the drinks cabinet now littered the floor. His mobile phone was in pieces among them, which had shattered on impact when he had flung it at the wall in rage, although the text he had received from the clinic was still etched into the screen - and burned into his mind.

YOUR BLOOD RESULTS HAVE COME BACK POSITIVE FOR PRESENCE OF HIV.

HIV. He had tested positive for HIV. He had only had sex with two men.

How could this be possible?

Paul was never going to want to be with him now. He'd leave him like his parents had. It wasn't right. He had been through so much and he was finally starting to feel like he was moving in the right direction, and now this? This was unfair, cruel even. The universe didn't want him to be happy. Was God punishing him for being gay? For having sex with men?

He unscrewed the cap of a second cough bottle and began glugging.

Fuck this. Fuck God. Fuck everyone and everything!

He cursed his mother too. She had been such a horrible presence in his life, making him hide who he was before he even realised what he was. She had made him hate who he was. What he was.

It isn't fair.

He struggled from the bed to his feet and placed the empty cough bottle on the desk, which was clear apart from a letter he had written a few hours previously - before the alcohol had properly set in - addressed to nobody in particular. He just felt like he owed it to whoever found him to explain himself - most likely one of his housemates.

I'm sorry.

Jack's legs turned to jelly under him and he fell to the ground, his face smashing into the desk as he fell. As his body slammed to the floor, a stray vodka bottle exploded under his body weight and gashed his forearm, sending shards flying everywhere.

'Jack?' The voice was barely audible as his eyesight blurred further and the darkness began to consume his vision. It could have been Millie. 'JACK!'

Then everything went dark.