☆ S̶e̶v̶e̶n̶ ̶D̶a̶y̶s̶ ☆

✿D̶a̶y̶ ̶6̶ ̶|̶ ̶I̶'̶m̶ ̶N̶o̶t̶ ̶H̶a̶p̶p̶y̶✿

✎T̴r̴i̴g̴g̴e̴r̴ ̴W̴a̴r̴n̴i̴n̴g̴✎

Disease, Death

♥♥♥

The door swung open as Hailey quickly stood up from the chair. 

"Mr. Haynes is finished his checkup. He is ready for visitors." The nurse said, as Hailey nods before walking into the hospital room.

The poor boy looked worse than he did on day 1. He was even paler, he had bags under his eyes, and his usual bright and energetic eyes were replaced with dull, lifeless ones. 

"Hey, Luke." Hailey said, walking up to him. Luke stopped looking at the night sky and turned back to the teal haired girl. 

"Oh, hi Hailey." Luke said, showing a weak smile.

"I wanna talk to you." She explains, kneeling down next to his hospital bed, so that they were directly across from each other.

"Okay." 

Hailey clears her throat. "First, you're really strong. If I was in your shoes, I would've lost my sanity at this point. But you're hanging on." She says, smiling as small tears formed in her eyes.

"Thanks, Hailey." Was all Luke managed to say through his raspy breathes. Speaking was becoming more difficult by the second.

"And, I'm really gonna miss you. We all are." She sniffles. Luke reached for her hand in an attempt to comfort her. She weakly smiled before taking it.

"Um... I think you should know, Zander's gonna come see you tomorrow." Hailey says, as the boy's face lit up, and just like that, his fresh golden eyes were back.

"Really?!" He exclaims, his voice quiet but excited. 

"Yeah. You have to understand he really wanted to, but he was too much of a mess." She explains.

He nods, before staring down at the foot of his bed.

"How's your mom holding up?" Hailey asks.

Luke lets out a small, fake laugh. "Not well. I'm her only family member, I hate to be putting her through this..." 

"Hey, this isn't your fault." Hailey reassures. She takes a shaky breath. "You know... I've always admired you, how you looked out for my brother. Without you, Zander would be so miserable all the time. No matter how cruel life was to you, he was always your priority. You took care of him." Hailey sighed, before glancing into Luke's golden eyes. "Thank you." She whispered.

Luke smiled. "My pleasure. And... Thank you." 

"For what?" Hailey asks, tilting her head.

"Well, you encouraged me to play the drums. If it weren't for you, I wouldn't have joined the club and met some of my best friends! I also wouldn't have started drumming, which is my favourite hobby! Or... Was..."

Silence fills the room.

Hailey is the first to break it. "I don't know if the others told you, but we talked about dropping out of the competition." 

"...And?" Luke asked, eagerly looking at her.

He was quite surprised when he didn't get the answer he was anticipating. "Well, we aren't going to."

"That's awesome! I wouldn't want you guys to drop out of it because of me. We've been practicing so much!" Luke exclaims. He was happy that they weren't worrying about him.

"Well, we agreed to change the song to a different one. Jake and I are gonna write it. It's gonna be tribute to you. Sean talked to the judges of the competition, and they agreed to let Zander say a speech about you after our performance, since you two are so close." Hailey explained.

"Oh, Hailey! You guys don't have to do that!" Luke says.

Hailey lightly shakes her head. "I know, but we want to. It's gonna be really difficult without a drummer, but we're gonna try." 

"That's really sweet." Luke says quietly, softly smiling at her.

"Visiting hours are over." The pair looked at the door to see a nurse popping her head through the doorway. 

"Right..." Hailey sharply sighed as she looked back at Luke. 

"I guess this is goodbye." Luke said as the two stared at each other.

"I don't like goodbyes." Hailey said, as a small tear rolled down her cheek.

"Then..." Luke thought for a moment. "See you soon." 

"Yeah." Hailey smiled, as more tears fell down her face. "See you soon..."

The two gazed into each others eyes. Without hesitation, Hailey leaned down and pulled Luke into a hug, knowing that this would be the last time she'd ever see her childhood friend. 

Luke returned the hug, as Hailey whispered something into his ear. "The fact that you're staying happy through all this amazes me."

She pulled away, before turning towards the door.

"Hailey." Luke said softly before she exited the door. She spun around to look at him.

"I'm not happy. I'm just good at pretending I am."