Serendipitous (Gawsten)

30. Slow

Geoff really did need Awsten.

And Awsten had blocked his phone number.

He was driving fast, Gracie kept telling him to slow down, he didn't listen. "I need to see- I need to get you to Sarah," he quickly stuttered out as he applied more pressure to the acceleration pedal, he needed to see Geoff. "She needs you."

And Geoff needed me.

It wasn't even in question at this point, if Awsten had just gone to see him when he had asked, then he wouldn't be driving to see a half-alive Geoff in a hospital bed.

There wasn't a lot of traffic out, it wasn't even that late, but as he approached an empty set of lights, he had no way of telling whether it was green or red, he could have asked Gracie, although it didn't really matter; he probably wouldn't have stopped even if he knew that he had a red light.

A drive to the hospital had never gone for so long. It wasn't like going there was a common occurrence, although it wasn't as if he and Gracie hadn't hurt themselves in the past. "Aws... why are you crying?"

She didn't know about their kiss yet. He was going to tell her, he just never got around to doing that, he was pretty sure that now wasn't the best time. "He just... seemed so nice. He doesn't fucking deserve this shit." Awsten usually swore a lot when he was mad or stressed or upset. Right now he was all three.

"Please don't swear," she winced, it wasn't even the swearing that was bothering her, Awsten was just driving so fast and it was obvious that he was angry, that he was being destroyed by all of this. "I know there's something wrong."

"Of course there's something wrong!" He hadn't meant to get so aggressive, he saw her quickly sink back into her chair as he tightened his grip on the steering wheel. "I'm sorry... I didn't mean to- I mean," he laughed sarcastically, "he fucking tried to kill himself!"

He was shaking, you couldn't tell because of how tightly he was gripping the steering wheel. Gracie was also shaking, although he was pretty sure it was because he was scaring her. "I know, I do... this is b-bothering me a lot more than I'm leading on."

She glanced back to Awsten who had a steady focus on the road in front of him, it was obvious that he was upset, if the glossiness of the tears creating a film over his eyes and the patchiness of his cheeks didn't give it away, the pure brokenness in his eyes was enough to.

"I liked him... a lot, you know."

"What?"

"I-" she was already starting to blush and stutter before she could say anything else, Awsten already knew what she was going to say, anyway. "I guess I had-have..."

"You have a crush on Geoff?" He sounded like he was in disbelief, it probably made Gracie feel bad, although it was more out of jealousy than anything else; Geoff was his, only his.

She looked out the window to avoid Awsten's line of vision as the blush started to bleed through her skin, "yeah... for a while." Even though Awsten couldn't see her, he could tell that she was still shaking hard, he could hear it in her voice. Maybe this was why Sarah was so mad, maybe Geoff knew? "You can't... tell Sarah that... she'd hate me."

So it wasn't. He sighed, "it's okay, G-Gracie." His voice broke a little as the tears threatened to spill from his eyes, it didn't take long before they finally did. He didn't bother to wipe them away, though, he just let them fall down his face and drip down his neck, into the soft material of his pale-blue hoodie.

He indicated to turn into the parking lot by the Emergency Department, it seemed fairly empty. He tried to get a car space that was close to the door, he didn't feel like walking very far; luckily, he found one.

He had tried to get to the hospital so quickly, he desperately wanted to make sure Geoff was going to be okay. Now, he couldn't even bring himself to open his car door, he just sat in silence with Gracie as they both stalled from having to go inside.

"Apparently he overdosed," Awsten slowly turned to look at Gracie as she spoke, she sounded exhausted, they both were; the last hour had been a long one. "On his old anxiety medication... that's what Sarah told me."

"O-oh," Awsten could feel the tears start coming back, he wasn't even sure when they had stopped in the first place, but his eyes began to sting as the warm tears fell. "Why would be do something like this to himself? Fuck."

"I'm not sure, Awsie... he's been acting, kind of... angry, lately." She sounded confused, running her nails through her hair in an attempt to untangle some of the blonde strands that had knotted together. "I don't think he was in a very good place."

Awsten laughed softly, bitterly to himself, shaking his head in disbelief. "How long? How long has he been acting like that?"

"Maybe... I don't know, Aws, a month?" Thirty-two days. Thirty-two days.

"Oh- fuck." Awsten immediately began to break down, it was his fucking fault, he was sure of it, Geoff probably hated him now.

"What's wrong, Awsie?"

"I-" he shoved the back of his hand to his mouth in an attempt to muffle the loud sobs that were falling shakily from his mouth, his hand was shaking, too, his whole body was. "I kissed him. Fuck- no, he kissed me." He buried his face into his hands as the tears began to spill faster. "I liked it, a lot, I t-think he did, too. We kissed again a-and then we... I-"

He quickly cut off his words and began to cry, he couldn't bring himself to look at Gracie, although he could feel her staring at him.

"Sarah saw us... she got mad and then- he just... stopped talking to me-" he paused to quickly sob into his hand before breathing in heavily. "He t-texted me a few hours ago... when I was outside... he said- he said he needed me! He said he fucking needed me but I didn't go and- fuck, it's all my fault."

He sobbed into her shoulder as Gracie pulled him into a hug over the centre console of his car, his tears were soaking rapidly into the material of her white T-shirt. "Oh, Awsten, It's not your fault." She whispered so quietly that he could barely hear her, he knew it was his fault though, she probably did too. "Awsten?"

He shakily pulled himself away from her shoulder to meet her eyes, quickly using the heel of his hand the wipe the tears that were coating eyelashes. "What?" He could hear the worry in her voice as he tried to figure out what she was about to say, he knew something was off. "Gracie, what is it?"

"Aws... you know that Geoff has a girlfriend, right?"