(Mike’s POV)

Today was the day. Today was the worst day of the entire year. I rolled out of my bunk, sighing. I did not want to participate in today.


It was already late in the morning. Tony and Jaime were already awake, and I checked on Vic. He was still sleeping. Maybe he was just going to sleep the day away. I kissed his forehead before heading to the front with the other guys.


“’Morning,” Tony said solemnly.


“Hey,” I nodded to him. “Where’s Himes?” I asked.


“Outside,” Tony said.


“What’s he doing?”


“Sitting. Said he needed air,” Tony shrugged his shoulders.


“Oh. Well, I need a smoke. Want to join?” I offered.


Tony shook his head. “Nah, I’m going to make some coffee. Want some?”


“Sure, sure,” I said, throwing on a pair of basketball shorts and heading outside.


The morning was crisp, and the air itself was sharp through my lungs. We decided to camp out in Chicago, uninterested in traveling all the way back to San Diego for our two week break from touring just to come all the way back here. It was especially chilly here, despite it being only October. Ah, well, it fit the mood of the day perfectly.


Cold, like death.


“Hey, Jaime,” I greeted Jaime, who was sitting against the front of the bus. I patted him on the head, slumping down next to him.


“Where’s Jess-ey?” I asked, taking a nice, long drag of my cigarette.


“She went to get us breakfast,” he said.


“Oh.”


“Yeah,” was all he said.


“How, uh, how are you?” I asked. I hated this. I hated the quiet, I hated the sad, I hated the memory.


“Not too great, if you want me to be honest,” he said sadly. “It sucks, thinking about how things used to be, y’know?”


I nodded. “Yeah, I know.”


“How are you?”


I shrugged my shoulders, shaking my head. Bad, bad, bad. Everything was just absolute shit. I couldn’t get the sound of the gunshots out of my head. Bang, bang, bang. It was the third shot that haunted me the most—the one that should have never gone off. “Fucking terrible,” I said truthfully. “It’s all just so… messy,” I said, exhaling.


“I know what you mean,” Jaime said. He shivered. “Is Vic still sleeping?” he asked, concern in his eyes. I nodded sadly, sighing.


“He’ll probably just sleep all day,” I said sadly. “I don’t know what to do, Himes,” I said. “I’ve never seen Vic like this before, even when we were in high school. I feel shitty enough, but it’s him I worry about,” I admitted.


“I don’t know, man. He is fine when he’s playing his music, though. I just hate seeing him so depressed all of the time. He puts on fantastic shows, still, and he seems so happy and real for the fans on stage, but then he just turns into a zombie,” Jaime said.


I didn’t say anything, lighting another cigarette.


“I think seeing Spencer die is what makes it so much worse for Vic,” I commented.


“You saw it, too, though,” Jaime said.


I shook my head. “I heard it. I saw the aftermath of it. But I didn’t actually see it happen,” I explained. “If only I had shot the men quicker,” I hissed.


“Mike, no,” Jaime said seriously. I sighed, lighting my third cigarette of the morning. I went through packs quickly, these days. He was right; I couldn’t blame myself for that. It was hard not to, though. If I hadn’t of allowed myself to be threatened in the first place… I shook my head.


“The nightmares are so bad right now, Himes,” I said quietly.


“Do you want to talk about them?”


I nodded slowly. Tears stung in my eyes. “I hear those gunshots go off every night,” I began.


The room was sticky and suffocating. Everything was hot and sweat poured off of me, except there was one freezing contrast. Pressed up against my temple was the cold barrel of a gun. I froze—ironically, since I was really burning up.


“You have two choices, Michael,” a voice said. I didn’t recognize that voice as a specific person. It sounded awfully like the voice in my head.


“You die, or he dies,” the voice continued.


“N-no,” I stuttered. The gun clicked against my head, and I shuddered. But then I felt another feeling. Something cool and heavy was in my hand, now.


A gun.


“That’s right, Michael. Kill your brother, or I kill you,” the voice said. I slowly raised the gun, looking at it intently. Past it, though, was my brother. He looked so helpless and sad.


“Go on! Do it!” the voice yelled.


“I don’t want to kill Vic,” I said.


Vic smiled. He and the voice in my head said at the same time: “You already have!”


And then the gun in my hand went off. Vic’s blood painted a depressing scene on the dirty wall behind him.


“N-no!” I cried.


“Yes, Michael. You killed your brother, now die,” it said, and then another gunshot went off.


“That was where the dream always ended,” I explained.


“It’s okay, Mikey,” Jaime said, patting my shoulder. “None of it’s real,” he reassured. I nodded. Bang! I jolted at the sound of the gunshot. God damn nightmares. That sounded real, Jaime.


But Jaime’s face looked shocked, and he jumped up.


“What?”


“You didn’t hear that?” he half-yelled.


“T-that wasn’t in my head?” I asked quietly, my eyes growing wide in terror.


Jaime shook his head. All of a sudden, we heard a horrible scream from inside of the bus. “CALL 911 NOW!” I heard Tony scream. Jaime was already on it. I raced inside of the bus, immediately throwing up next to the bunk my brother laid in.


“Fuck!” I spat. “Vic!” I cried. Blood was splattered on the interior wall of the bus. His head was rolled to the left, exposing a terrible, bloody gash on the right side of his head.His right arm was limp and outstretched, and a gun was on the ground. “No!” I moaned. I got sick again on the floor of the bus. Tears streamed down my face. I should have known! I could have saved him!


Tony held on to me desperately, and I gripped his t-shirt as paramedics rushed in.


They pushed us aside, attending to Vic. He was dead, though. Why were they wasting their time?


“He still has a pulse! Send him now!” a paramedic ordered. My eyes widened. He wasn’t dead? He wasn’t dead, yet. The paramedics wrapped a neck brace around his neck to stabilize his head and tenderly wrapped gauze around his head, blood immediately seeping through. I got sick again.


“Come on, Mike,” Tony gasped, somehow managing to dig up enough strength to drag me outside.


My lungs were constricting, and I could hardly breathe. I felt panicky. I couldn’t lose Vic. No, no, no, no, we couldn’t lose Vic. I went into the ambulance with Vic; Tony and Jaime were going to follow us to the hospital.


I just sat there, staring at his body. He looked so dead. He looked very similar to Spencer…


“H-how is he not dead? He shot himself?” I asked in a tiny and broken voice, my eyes wide and not once leaving Vic’s body.


“The bullet grazed his head. We see this way too much,” the guy muttered.


“See what?”


“He must have flinched, which explains why the bullet didn’t go through his head,” he explained. I nodded.


The ambulance stopped abruptly, and the doors flew open as several doctors received Vic’s gurney. They carted him away quicker than I could follow, taking him, I assumed, to an operating room.


I fell to my knees in exasperation at the entrance of the hospital.


Everything was cold, just like death.

Notes

hehe it's four-twenty-three in the morning so i figured why not keep going

i gotchu