headlights | joji

eight

DAY FIFTEEN

Music played delicately throughout the room. The soft sound of 'they don't understand' was creating a calm aura, making each of us slightly sleepy.

The three of us were sat on the floor at the end of Joji's bed, with our legs crossed and a random board game – that Ian unsurprisingly bought, was placed in the centre of us. Max was rolling two dice in his hand, preparing to throw them and begin his turn.

Though I was preoccupied, my head was lazily leant against the frame of the bed, my phone in hand. I opened twitter, unsuspecting what I was about to find. My twitter account was bombarded with thousands upon thousands of tweets, almost every single one asking about Joji.

"Oh, man." My eyes were wide, my lips slightly open as I took in what had happened.

Both Max and Ian look at me, confusion spread across their faces.

"They know, everybody knows." My voice was beginning to shake yet it was quiet, a tone of guilt clearly apparent.

"Fuck, how did they find out?" Max spoke first, followed by Ian.

"None of us have said anything, and I doubt Brenda would."

My eyes diverted from the phone screen to their own for a few seconds, before I put the puzzle together.

"Of course–"

"What?" Max interrupted.

"News reports. Coverage would've been all over this, it was only a matter of time before they found out Joji's name. Check your twitters."

Max dropped the dice as they both pulled out their phones, the three of us scraping our board game, no longer paying attention.

I watched them scroll for a few minutes, my eyes occasionally fluttering shut. I had been getting more sleep now that Ian and Max were here with me, it felt much more comforting; although it still wasn't enough, I was plagued with nightmares and strange apparitions. It was all undeniably in my head, but they still managed to greatly intrude my sleeping pattern.

"You're right, everybody is tweeting links to the news article." Ian spoke.

"I'm glad they care, but, I wish they'd respect our confidentiality, you know?"

"Yeah, it's pretty fucked." Max replied, whilst Ian looked at his phone with furrowed eyebrows and perplexity glazing his eyes. I turned my head to face him.

"What? What is it?" I questioned Ian, his focus not leaving the screen.

"Pictures, of you?"

"Well, yeah, I run a YouTube channel, and my boyfriend is being somewhat exploited as a trending topic, of course there's going to be photos of me." I replied obviously.

He didn't reply but instead pushed his phone into my hand. I stared down at the screen in horror. Photos of me, sat in the hospital chair, grasping Joji's hand with tears running down my face were being tweeted.

I inhaled heavily, my breath heavy due to the lump forming in my throat.

"How – how did they get these?" Bewilderment lacing my voice.

"Someone must've recognised you as they walked past, and thought they could make some publicity off it, maybe?"

"No, Max. I usually have the blinds closed, plus we're at the end of the corridor, nobody walks down here unless they're directly coming to this room."

The short silence was deafening, until Ian spoke.

"Do any of the hospital staff recognise you?"

My brows creased as I thought, I've only spoken to Dr Burnham and Liliana. I can hardly imagine Dr Burnham knowing of our channels, considering he seemed to be in his early fifties. So, that leaves Liliana.

"Liliana."

"Who's that?" Max asked hesitantly.

"She's the nurse assigned to Joji, I remember now. She knew my name before I managed to tell her, she was overly kind to me, but I don't know, she could just be a friendly person."

"Do you think it's her?"

"There isn't anybody else it could be. I mean I'm not going to accuse her of anything unless I have evidence it was her." I sighed. If it was her who took those photos, I'd feel so betrayed.

"I'll have a look through twitter, see if I can find the source of the photos." Ian kindly offered, with Max agreeing afterwards.

"Yeah, I'll help too." I smiled.

"Thank you so much guys, it really means al-"

Suddenly, a lurid beeping noise burst through the room, alerting us that something was wrong. I stood up faster than the other two and raced to Joji's side before looking at the heart monitor.

"Oh, my god." I whispered before I began shouting.

"Get a doctor! Max! Get a doctor! He isn't breathing!" I turned my head as Max sprinted out the room, his shouts and pleas loud in the corridor. Ian quickly packed the board game away, and threw it into the corner of the room as I turned to face Joji again; his body was now viscously convulsing so I moved one of my hands to his chest and the other to his face, trying to stop his thrashes.

I stroked his face slowly, leaning my forehead against his as I watched his face pale. My tears were soaking his cheeks, whilst they uncontrollably flooded down my face.

"Come on, baby. Stay with me, please, please – you can't do this to me, I promised Brenda I'd look after you. Come on, wake up. Wake up. I love you, please!"

Multiple thunderous footsteps were coming into the room now, each individual shouting at each other, but I couldn't listen to what they were saying. A piercing ringing in my ears was the only noise I could hear as I caressed Joji's face. Him being my only thought.

I could faintly hear the shrieks of Max and Ian directed at me, telling me I needed to move so they could perform resuscitation on him, but I couldn't move, my strenuous shaking and thoughts of Joji stopping me from thinking with any logic.

Doctors began to really fill the room now, several of them were crowded around his bed, pushing me aside and causing me to lose his touch. I tried to lurch forward to him again, wanting to hold him but a solid pair of arms wrapped around my waist from behind, pulling me further and further away from him.

I fought with all I had, but my fight was a losing battle as I was nearing the door. I had to be by his side, I can't leave him. My sobs were now inconsolable and distressing, my voice cracked and broken.

"Joji! Please! Let go of me – let go! Joji! I love you!"