3:30
'Hey, Alan, it's me. I know you just got off work, but could you give me a call back? I just want to know what you want for dinner.'
4:00
'Eric again. If you don't call in the next ten minutes, I'm ordering out and your food will get cold. It's a holiday weekend so you're probably just stuck in traffic. I get it. Call me.'
4:15
'Aaaaalan. Starting to get a little worried. I'm gonna call Will, maybe you just got stuck at work. I'm really hoping that you just got stuck at work.'
4:30
'Will says you left at lunch. Really starting to freak out now. Call me.'
5:03
'It went straight to voice mail, I really don't want to have a nervous breakdown.'
5:21
'It went straight to voice mail again, why am I even trying. I'm going to call some more people. Please be safe.'
5:30
'No one has seen you. Calling some hospitals. Please be safe please be safe. Please be safe for me, Alan.'
'Hey, it's Alan. Well, my voice mail at least. Anyway, I'll get back to you as soon as I can. If it's an emergency, you can reach Eric at...'
In a panic, Eric tossed his phone to the empty passenger seat. He couldn't bear to hear the voicemail message beep again for the fiftieth time.
At least he finally got a call back – albeit from a hospital but hey, better than nothing – giving Eric a sense of relief just knowing that Alan was safe. He had taken that route to the hospital so many times before that he could probably navigate to it with his eyes closed.
They got an apartment together a few months back, making sure that they were in good range of the hospital. With Alan's condition, they had to make several adjustments. Alan wouldn't have been able to do any of this, anything he had to do just to add a few extra years, without Eric's unyielding support.
'You are my rock,' Alan would say.
'And you're my light,' Eric would reply.
Eric trotted through the familiar sliding doors, right to the front desk – the staff knew him by name, anywhere else that would be amusing but no, not here – and was told where Alan was being kept.
The reason for the visit was the last thing Eric expected. There was guilt, for not checking in sooner, anger, for Alan to be so incredibly reckless, and fear, still coming down from the shock that he thought the only person that he gave a rat's ass about nearly died much sooner than planned.
Eric took a deep breath before he lightly pushed the cracked door open.
Alan looked terrible. At least to any other human being, but he would always look beautiful to Eric. He looked like a kicked dog, sinking into the dry sheets of the hospital bed while a monitor beeped beside him. Eric thought it was funny, in a morbid way, hearing the beep every time he left a message on Alan's phone and now...
"I'm so sorry," Alan swallowed. "I'm just... really sorry. Please don't be mad at me."
Eric shrugged his shoulders, slowly sauntering over to the side of Alan's bed. Maybe it was just the shock still not completely set in, but Eric refused to look Alan in the eyes.
"Overdose?" Eric questioned. He wasn't looking for a confirmation from Alan. He pulled up a stool beside the hospital bed. God, he hated the smell of hospitals. No matter how many times and how long he would be in that hospital, the smell was unbearable and would stick with him for days. But at that moment, he was more concerned as to why Alan just willingly put himself in the hospital. "They had to pump your stomach. I'm not mad. I need to know why." Eric reached over to grab Alan's hand when there wasn't an answer. "Why?"
"I don't care," Alan snapped. He choked on his own tears, raising a hand to cover his mouth and gasping breaths.
Eric didn't need to hear any more than that.
"So... that's it," Eric said as he leaned back. "They said you have one more year. Why are you trying to lessen that? Why do you want to speed that up-"
"Because I don't care," Alan cried out. "My body is already shutting down, so I just figured it wouldn't matter..."
"Really! Okay! For god's sake, don't... don't destroy yourself from the inside out. If you don't care about yourself, then care about me. Alan. Look at me." Eric's voice became more stern as Alan started to turn his eyes away. He leaned forward to cup Alan's face. "Did you know that I set up an alarm – quiet enough for only me to hear on my side of the bed – to wake me up in the middle of the night so I could check your pulse?" Alan's lip quivered. "Or that I always go grocery shopping when you're not around so you don't even think about lifting? I promised you, a long time ago, that I would stay with you, and nothing has changed."
Alan pulled away again and buried his face in his hands. "It was just a one time thing," he said with a muffled voice. "It was just..."
"Then why?"
"I don't want to die!" Alan looked up at Eric, face damp with tears. "I don't... want to die..."
The only sound in the room were a few sniffles here and there, and the beeping of the heart monitor. Eric was seconds away from breaking that stupid thing, each consecutive beep sounding more like shots from a rifle.
"I don't want you to die either," Eric said finally. He wouldn't admit it, but he was starting to choke up. But no, he had to be the rock, he had to be strong for Alan's sake. For Alan. "...If I could, I would trade places with you in a heartbeat."
In spite of himself, Alan smiled. "You're crazy."
Eric shrugged. "Probably, since I put up with you."
"Shut up," they laughed and Alan tossed a pillow at Eric's face. "You're my rock."
Eric smiled. "And you're my light."