Take Me Out

12 - Choke

warnings: graphic depiction of murder, angst, deception, choking

***

Tom thought he had already experienced the worst pain in the world. When his body was crushed in the van eight years ago, when glass and metal shattered and scraped across his body, and he was screaming until he couldn't scream any longer. But this? Losing Harry all over again? Tom always thought it was bullshit in those TV shows when someone loses someone. How they would fall to their knees and scream as if they were in physical pain. But now, standing in Harry's hospital room and staring at an empty bed, he knows that there is absolutely no physical pain that could compare to this. Compare to the way his heart collapsed in on itself, draining the life out of each of his veins, his very soul, as it did. A cruel black hole that Tom has gotten too close to.

There is supposed to be a suspended state, he remembers in physics class in grade ten, his teacher called it spaghettification. It's a stupid name and he will never quite understand why it's called that, but he understands the concept well enough.

Right before your body gets sucked into a black hole it will approach an event horizon, where everything is suspended, it seems like millennia will pass between the time your feet reach the entrance to the black hole and the time you finally get sucked into it. This is where your body will stretch and stretch until you're paper-thin and miles long.

Everything is okay until you reach the event horizon.

"Mr. Holland-,"

Dr. Hartwell, Harry's doctor stands hesitant in the doorway.

"What happened?" Tom asks, turning back to him, crossing his arms over his chest.

"It seems to me that when getting a dose of medication, an air bubble got into his IV, it caused an embolism, resulting in respiratory failure-,"

"But that machine," Tom says, tears welling in his eyes as he points to the empty bed, "that machine was keeping him alive."

"Functionally."

"Excuse me?" Tom fights back anger as he clenches his hands into fists.

"The machine was keeping Harry functionally alive, but he was brain dead when he got to the hospital."

"But there was a chance-,"

"Mr. Holland, I'm sorry, but there really was no chance of Harry every making any sort of recovery, you knew this when you signed the papers saying he would be put on the ventilator."

"This is bullshit, you call me- make it seem like-," Tom can't continue, there's only one thought on his mind.

"Who caused the embolism? How could someone like a nurse who is trained to do this sort of thing mess up so badly?" Tom asks, already feeling sick as he thinks of the answer.

"We aren't sure, none of the nurses recall bringing Harry medicine, so we're trying to figure out who it could have been-,"

"You're telling me you don't keep track of things like this?" Tom feels red hot rage as anger blurs his vision.

"No, Mr. Holland, I'm saying we do, that's why this doesn't make sense. Your brother last got his medicine at 8 this morning, he was checked on again when the nurses did their rounds at 2, so he wasn't supposed to get any medicine until two hours from now. It looks like he died about an hour ago."

"I want to see him-,"

"It's probably best if-"

Tom isn't in a negotiating mood, "I want to see him."