cares too much, cares too little

one

"[...] the heart is an organ of fire."

Michael Ondaatje, The English Patient

July 6th

"Those bags of rotten dick-tips had it coming."

These are the first words I hear in over three hours after sitting in the hospital room. As you can probably tell, this is not what I expected.

"Excuse me?" I frown looking aside at the boy laying in the bed.

The stool is amazingly uncomfortable, so I'm just hoping that the guy doesn't mind me sitting next to his now conscious body.

"The fuckers who tried to beat up the poor kid?" He says still not opening his eyes, eybrows knitted in pain as he moves a bit under the quilt. "They deserved it."

"And how can you know?" I ask studying his features for like the twentieth time today.

He's probably smaller than me, his hair chocolate and quite curly with a lot of grey strands (I wonder if he dyed them), his pretty sharp jawline is really visible even though he's been sleeping here for over thee hours.

"Had seen them a few times before. They'd never done anything more than using several, uhm, not really nice words, at least I hadn't happened to witness that. But when I did, well, I had to react." He presses his lips together in a 'whatever' smile.

"You could've called the police." I roll my eyes on the boy's stupidity. It's not like I've been feeling a bit addicted to staring at the soft skin of his, bruises painted on the red-flushed cheeks, the cut under his lower lip.

Of course it's not like that.

"I don't really think they would've come quickly enough."

"And that's why you had to be the one to make the judgment and get into the fight?" I lift my legs up, bend them in knees and rest my feet on the metal stool glancing at the person lying in the second bed. It's a man, and he's been sleeping since I came here after the boy. Good for me (or for him) that he wasn't a witness of my fond.

Me, Connor Franta - fonding over an unconscious body. How unhealthy is this?

"Well, pretty much." He shrugs. Or at least he tries, because as soon as he does so, he whines under his breath, his fists curling under the thin quilt. "Hurts like hell. What happened?"

"Got beaten up, pal," I explain. "Good for you I was there, otherwise I don't know if you'd still be alive."

"Yeah, thanks. It's not really a life worth living, is it?" He finally opens his eyes and looks up at me. "Lying here like all bruised and pathetic."

"First of all, you're not that pathetic." I swallow slowly finally being able to see the color of his irises. They are illegally light blue. Pretty much unreal. "You probably saved the small boy's life. Secondly, I like you lying here. I'm a bit scared you'd kick me as well, so at least you're here motionless and not dangerous." I grin at him resting one of my elbows on knees to steady myself since I'm kinda sure I can swoon just from seeing the-summer-sky-like-eyes of his.

"Dickhead," he scoffs. "You did nothing that would make me feel like fighting you. As I said, these guys deserved it."

"What did they do, precisely?"

"Tried to attack the young boy just because he was, well, is gay."

"Oh, really?" I get interested.