wonderstruck// Tyler Joseph

twenty seven | and now i'm pacing back and forth

I wasn't sure how long it'd been. Everything was a blur since the moment my eyes parted from Tyler's. I couldn't remember much of anything since then.

Apparently I was back in New York now, and the one thing that confirmed that was the view of my sister looking down at me when I woke up. Normally, I would have been excited. I would've jumped up to give her the biggest hug and told her everything that she had missed since the last time I saw her. But I was exhausted, and I couldn't even find it in me to speak.

"December, you're awake!" She exclaimed when she noticed that my eyes were open. She knelt down, wrapping her arms around me. I finally felt myself smile. "Mom, Dad and August just went to get something to eat. They'll be right back," she explained, sitting on the edge of the bed.

I wanted to talk to her, to tell her how much I missed her, but it felt useless. In fact, everything had been feeling pretty pointless lately. Eating, sleeping, talking, what was the purpose of any of it if bad things like this still happened?

I was definitely down when Tyler came to visit me recently, but now, I was afraid that my attitude towards the situation had gotten even worse. A vague memory of being on the plane back to America kept replaying in my mind. There was a doctor and a nurse on board to assure that I would be safe. And I must've been half asleep, because I could hear them conversing with one another, and they didn't seem to notice I was listening.

"So, how do you think she's doing?" The nurse had asked.

"I'm not too sure," the doctor replied. "I wouldn't say she's doing good. Just like we told her, we aren't sure how the surgery will turn out. But I don't want to break her spirit by telling her that the damage that has been done will be extremely difficult to repair. We'll be lucky if we can even fix it at all."

After that, I tried to stop listening. I didn't think I'd ever been as scared in my life as I was in that moment. I wanted to scream and cry, yet at the same time, I was completely numb. Nothing at this point could hurt me more than what'd already been done.

I just couldn't help but think about what would happen to everyone I loved if they really couldn't help me. My parents, my siblings, my friends... Tyler. Poor Tyler, he truly didn't deserve to go through any amount of grief. I wasn't dumb enough to think that he could move on quickly. I knew him well enough, and I knew that he would tear himself apart over this, that his heart would be broken into a million pieces that would no doubt be hard to put back together. But he deserved happiness, so I only hoped that it could be done.

It would be possible for Tyler to find some sort of joy again, and that thought alone was enough to make me feel content. Maybe I was the only girl he had ever fallen in love with, but that didn't mean there couldn't be another. Tyler was sweet, creative, the most caring person I'd ever met. Of course somebody else would fall in love with him someday. And he would be happy.

Suddenly I had a thought, so I quickly sat up, frightening my sister. If I never got to see Tyler again, at least I could give him this. And he could hold onto it, read it whenever he needed it. I just needed to give him some sort of reassurance.

"June, can you see if there's a pen and a piece of paper around here somewhere?" I asked. She nodded, standing up and searching the room for a few seconds. Eventually she picked up the pen and paper from the desk on the other side of the room, and brought it over to me.

"What's it for?"

"Just something for Tyler," I stated, starting the note with Tyler's name at the top and doodling a little heart beside it. "Make sure this gets to him."