What Do I Do Now?

Chapter 4: Down With A Sickness

Mark's POV.

"What time is it?" Magnolia asked. I took out my phone to check the time.

"Two in the morning," I responded.

"How long have we been sitting here?"

"Hours. A lot of hours."

"Aren't you tired?" Bailey asked me curiously. I shook my head no. "I don't understand how you simply aren't tired whatsoever."

"I don't know. I'm just not. I'm surprised you aren't asleep yet. Everyone else is." I pointed over by the few windows where my friends had set up 'camp' for the night. Bob had even made a fort out of couch cushions and blankets. Molly and Wade just slept on the window seat thingy. There's a word for it, but I'm too distracted to think about it.

"I still can't believe Bob made a fort," Magnolia joked. Bailey agreed with her.

"He's just one of those people. Running off to do what he wants and joining up with us later. In Drunk Minecraft, he runs off to build a treehouse and joins back up with Wade and I when he's done," I said.

"Oh crap. Mark, your channel. Did you post any videos?" Bailey asked.

"Yeah... It was early though. I'm gonna have to upload pre-recorded junk today."

"Excuse me? Junk?" Magnolia asked. "You can't possibly be calling your videos 'junk'. That's not you."

"I know, and it's not what I meant either. Calm down. I just prefer recording everyday instead of uploading old stuff."

"Are you going to be okay, Mark?" Bailey questioned in a hushed voice. "I don't want you to hurt so much. I understand why you could, Andrea is your best friend... But, I think I speak for everyone when I say that I don't want to see you lock yourself up in your head. That you have a right to talk about anything and everything you're going through while this is happening. Even if this wasn't real, you could still talk to us, including me, no matter what. Fair enough?"

"Yeah, of course, Bailey. I understand, thank you," I told her with a sad smile.

"Are you ever going to tell your fans about any of this? If you run out of pre-recorded things, we don't know what you'll be acting like. And you're a terrible liar when it comes to your Markiplites. You couldn't fib to them if you ever even made any honest attempt to."

"I know... I'll just tell them all that one of my friends is down with a sickness and it's pretty hard on everyone. That way I don't say anything to make this all obvious and I won't be lying. Andrea is my friend. And she's sick. It's tough, really tough. I don't see what could make her do this to herself..." I lifted my head up and faced Magnolia and Bailey. "Am I a bad person for not being able to have her trust me enough to tell me about this..? That I couldn't make her honestly smile and laugh when she needed me most? That she felt like she had to be fake around me..?"

"What? No, Mark, that doesn't make you a bad person at all! There's no telling what happened or why, but it did. If that was me, I wouldn't say anything either, no matter how much I trusted anybody. That's honest too."

"What if this was me..?" I asked, facing the tile beneath me again. "What if I was the reason she did this..? We aren't as good of friends as we used to be, we don't talk as much, hang out as much, what if this is all my fault because I was too caught up in everything else to be with her?"

"Mark! Bite your tongue!" Magnolia scolded, hitting my arm. "This is not your fault. Don't you dare say it is."

"I just-"

"No. Don't even. I will not hesitate to-"

"To what? Hurt me? Put me in the same place as her? If that's the case, please, do it. I beg you. Because if I'm in the same place Andrea is, I'm doing much better than I am now. I won't have to sit here and watch her hooked up to machines and oxygen pumps that are breathing for her, the only things that are keeping her technically alive. She's dying, Mokuren. And I'm never going to know why. I'm never going to know what drove her to kill herself. Never, will I know what went through her mind when this happened. She's going away. Forever. And I have no one to blame but myself. And that's not me feeling sorry for myself, that me being serious and truthful. This is my fault, and there isn't any other person who could have made her do this. It's my fault. All of it is my fault."