The Doorknob

The End

I don't get out of bed if I can help it - at first, I tried to sleep, but sleep never came, and I just wallowed in my thoughts.

I was dragged back to reality by a text from Dave asking if I would be coming into work the next day - I sent an affirmative before checking the time (and date, I really didn't know how much time had passed). Then set an alarm for the next day before returning to my depressing introspection.

I'd managed to arrive - showered and on time - to work the next day, and every day after. I'd even asked Dave if I could pick up a few extra shifts ("To make up for missing so much, plus I just really need the cash,") and ended up spending most of my time at the coffee shop. Any spare moment was spent on social media, Netflix, anything to distract me.

The nights were the worst, without a screen pulling my thoughts elsewhere, without a throng of people around demanding my attention. I spent every single one of those nights lost in my head, imagining the blue eyes and soft skin, the thousands of things I wanted to do to him, with him, the things that I couldn't do, could never do, because he'd left me. He was never real.

Even now, the voices in my head spend most evenings fighting each other, while I sit on the sidelines and watch with disinterest. What does it matter, anyway? He's still gone. I rub absently at my neck, the exact spot he'd left a mark. The mark that I had clung to when I'd almost convinced myself I'd made him up. It's almost gone - in the right lighting, I can't even see it anymore.

I unlock my phone again, desperate for anything to take me away from the fear of what might happen once that mark has faded completely. I check all my regular sites, irritated but not surprised when there's nothing new to capture my attention. I pull up old apps, older sites that I haven't bothered visiting in a while. I end up on Facebook, scrolling through a sea of updates from people I don't talk to and reposted articles I really can't care less about.

And choke out a sob when I see a familiar pair of bright blue eyes staring at me from the screen.

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I barely take a moment to read the article itself, titled "Miracles Do Happen - Coma Patient Awake after Three Years", before throwing on last night's clothes and racing out the door. I almost forget to lock it.

As I hit the street, I flag down a taxi and tell them to take me to the University College hospital - the one mentioned in the article - before taking out my phone and opening the article again.

"Phil Lester," I pause, reading his full name for the first time, before continuing, "Phil Lester woke up on Thursday after three years in a coma, which was induced by an unlucky fall and trauma to the head." I picture the bricked-up fireplace in my lounge - his lounge - and skip around, pulling out phrases as they catch my eye. "...woke up Thursday...been in recovery...parents by his side...University College London Hospital...in good spirits..." I look up from the article, willing the driver to go faster.

I can't believe...this whole time, my brain barely forms the thought before it's shot down by another, more painful one. What if he doesn't remember me? Suddenly, I feel very sick, and I'm about to ask the driver to turn around, to take me back, when he pulls up to the curb.

When he looks back at me expectantly, I pay him and step outside; the taxi takes off, leaving me to face the hospital on my own.

It takes every ounce of willpower I have not to turn tail and run, to avoid the possibility - the pain - that he might not remember me, but I force my feet toward the entrance, then the front desk. I have to know.

"Uhm, Phil Lester?" I ask, still unfamiliar with his last name. I expect her to just give me his room number, but she eyes me up instead.

"Who are you with?" She gives me an accusing glare, and I stand for a moment with my mouth open before I figure out what she means. She must think I'm with a newspaper or something - a miraculous story like his, surely plenty of papers want to interview him.

"I'm not-" I hesitate, realizing how much denial sounds like an admission, so I amend, "I'm actually an old, uh, friend. I saw the article and I wanted to drop by, say hello," I figure this is close enough to the truth, and after another moment of interrogation-by-eyeball, the woman directs me to room 33B, down the hall to the left. I thank her and walk as quickly as I can without actually running.

As I approach the room, I see a small window inset in the door and take a moment to peer through it. Phil's sitting up in the bed, smiling and looking, well, exactly how he looked before - blue eyes and black hair standing out against pale skin and white bedsheets, against the white of the whole room, and I don't even want to blink for fear he might disappear. My heart catches in my throat, and my hand covers my mouth to prevent a sob from coming out. I thought he was gone, I thought he'd left me.

I'm startled from my staring when the door flies open - inward, fortunately - and a woman almost walks into me.

"Oh! Oh, I'm so sorry, are you a friend of Phil's?" Her voice is sweet, and laced with a thick Northern accent. "Phil," she calls over her shoulder, still holding the door open, "looks like a friend's here to see you!" She bustles past me, out into the hall, and I have to remind myself to step into the room before the door shuts.

Phil doesn't move, doesn't say anything, just stares at me - he clearly doesn't remember me. I realize I haven't said a word, and I'm about to try to explain why I'm here, to say anything - or maybe just turn around and leave - but he beats me to it.

"Dan?"