~Please, Say You Won't Let Go~ Clouis

Chapter Sixteen: More Problems (Clem's POV)

"I won't give up on you Louis. Not anymore." I promised as I cried against his chest.

My body shot up as I realized what had happened.

I ran out of the room and down the halls, out the doors and to the other building and to the nurse's station as I rummaged roughly through cabinets and drawers.

"You need help?" Ruby asked as she stepped into her sacred room.

"Louis... Louis had an accident. I need things to clean up cuts and blood and things to bandage them up." I stated quickly.

Ruby was quick to gather all the supplies and hand them to me.

"Is he okay?" She asked, shoving everything into my arms.

"I don't know." I rushed out of the door with supplies in hand and hastily made my way to the bathroom where Louis was.

I burst through the door and dropped all the things next to him as I quickly grabbed his right wrist and placed it flat on the ground gently.

I poured peroxide over the deep cuts which caused Louis to jolt awake and scream in guttural pain.

"Hey sweetheart, it's okay! I'm fixing you up! Stay still darling! It'll be over soon!" I stated loudly and clearly.

I grabbed a few of the many cotton squares and cleaned off the excess blood that ran all over his arms and wrapped clean ones around his wrist where his cuts were with stretchy gauze and did the same with his other wrist.

I sat there with him for a while until he regained consciousness.

"Hey Lou..." I spoke softly to him when he finally woke up. "Is it okay if I help you up to your bed?"

He nodded, still so out of everything, though he helped me help him up to his room.

I helped him to his bed and lay him down as I sat on the edge of it and held his hands tightly in mine.

I waited days, staying mostly in his room with him to make sure he would be okay. but all he seemed to do was stay stagnant. He breathed and drank water when I offered it to him. I brought him food and he ate with me, but his eyes felt like his life was gone.

Until one day, he woke me up in the middle of the night.

"I'm okay, I promise." he weakly signed to me

"I love you." I spoke and cried to him.

"I love you most. Do you think differently?" He questioned.

I looked down at my hands which started to fiddle around. Something I often caught when Louis was having trouble with something on his mind. I put them to my sides and looked up at him with weary eyes. I wanted to say yes so badly but my heart was already shattered by the prior years of heartbreak and loss of so many people I held in my heart. My brain longed for a truthful answer, but my heart wanted to lie.

"I..." I stuttered.

I couldn't make up my decision. Do I say yes and tell the truth? Or do I say no but lie? I had to be honest to him but at the same time, I didn't want him to panic again and get upset.

"It's okay. You can tell me. If I tell you the truth, you tell me the truth too. It's only fair." He signed sloppily.

I sighed, "You mean everything to me. All the heartbreak. All the loss of the people I was closest to. All the murders I had committed to innocent and guilty people. Everything I had ever done in this life is all worth it because I met you. I had so much guilt and so much pressure on me to take care of Aj and teach him what I had to learn. Some days, I felt like giving up. But I'm glad I didn't. Because I met you. You're the sunshine in my darkness. Tounge or not, you will always be mine for as long as I'm allowed to call you that. I didn't come all this way, fight for you, and drag myself through eight long, terrifying, and traumatic years just to see my only light grow into darkness and combine with all the other people I lost- just a distant memory. You have shown me things I forgot over the past years. You taught me to forget about all the bad things. Let them go. They didn't matter. You said that the past is the past. The only problem with that is that I can't just forget my past. Lee, Kenny, Rebecca, Omid, Christa, Alvin, Arvo, Bonnie, Javi, Gabe, Tripp, Ava, Ben, Luke, David, Duck, Carley, Carver, Kate, Katjaa, Lilly, Larry, Doug, Glenn, Nick, Sarah... everyone. I can't forget. I just can't. And if you try to make me forget that you existed by putting yourself six feet under just because of a lost tounge, that will hurt more than anything. So, whatever you do that's long term for any single person in this school, just know, that it'll stick and won't let go. Ever."

Louis stared at me blankly with glossed over eyes. His cheeks were pink, and his body stopped moving except for shallow breathing.

He sat there motionless in front of me, comprehending each and every word I had just thrown at him.

He stood up wobbly and emotionless as grabbed a piece of paper and a pencil and began to write at the desk in his room.

"I'm sorry Clem. I'm hurting. I'm hurting a lot. More than you could think. I try to tell you things, but I find hard to do because I want to seem strong. But I'm weak. I take people down with me, I drag others to my hellfire as I'm being pulled down farther. I don't want to do that but I need something. Something to take the pain away. Something to stop my mind from the terrible things. Something that distracts me from the real world." The note read that he handed it me after he finished writing.

"I wanted to make the point across to you and I couldn't find a way to do it. I still can't. This should not be how you handle your pain. You shouldn't have to distract yourself by cutting yourself open. The world can be just as beautiful as it is painful. If you open your eyes just a bit more, you might be able to see the color. There are other ways to do that if you need it. Not cutting. Not running away from your home. Try something enjoyable. Aj draws. I zone out to a totally made-up world as I'm falling asleep. We found our happiness. I want you to re-find yours. Find your color again. What about your piano?" I suggested, holding his hands in mine.

"That's gone Clem. Music was my color. My music is gone now. My voice was taken. It's not the piano that gave me the hope. It was singing. I'd go without sleep just so I could sing. Now it's gone. Theres no sense in the piano if I can't sing along." He wrote more.

"Then we need to find something else that will bring you back." I said as I gripped tightly onto his soft, chilly hands. "Even if it's just for the moment, until we can find you something that will actually give you life again."

"Give me examples." He lipped to me.

I thought back, thinking of anything I could that I knew would take him away from the moment at hand before I landed on a memory that I often focused on when things got to be too much for me to handle and I needed to escape from what the world was and lean into something that I knew could take anybody's attention away.

Without any words returning his request, I leaned in close to him and pushed my lips to his. He leaned into the gesture as I lightly bit his bottom lip before we finally broke apart.

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