Tristan reached over and grabbed the bottle of painkillers on his nightstand. He twisted open the cap and threw a few into his mouth - swallowing them down with water that he had from earlier. He cursed when some spilled out of his mouth and onto the bed. The pain in his legs was getting worse. This always happened during winter. The cold could cause them to become restless and in excruciating pain during the night. His back hurt as well, but that was a more manageable pain that went away with the help of prescription drugs.
"You okay?" He heard the soft voice beside him asked. He felt Miles' soft touch on his arm which he immediately shook off. Even the most gentle touch could be painful at times. He didn't even want the covers on top of him but knew cold would be worse without it, so he pushed them off his arms and down to cover his legs.
"I'm fine." He groaned. He knew Miles wouldn't believe him. He never did. It was obvious that Tristan was in some sort of pain. He hated feeling weak and hated especially hated people pitying him. He spent the year after Miles graduated getting his G.E.D. Tristan was proud of all that he had accomplished in the past two years. When Tristan was strong enough to travel he bought a ticket and flew to London to see Miles again. The feelings hadn't gone away for either of them and as expected the two started dating again.
They made the decision to live together in London for a few more years for Miles to finish off his schooling then move back to Toronto to be closer to their families. Tristan knew Miles didn't want to go back. He loved it in London and Tristan had loved it there too - but he missed home. They had talked about going back and visiting during the winter holiday. No official plan for that had been made, though.
He wished that sometimes he hadn't come to see Miles at all and stayed home. Life seemed so so much easier when he was living with his parents. 'That's just the homesickness talking.' He would tell himself. An internal was would rage on in his head daily. Miles was no help either. Tristan wasn't going to bother him while he was doing school work, but it felt to him life even in their downtime he couldn't talk to him about it.
Nothing felt like it was ever going to be the same after the accident. And when things were finally starting to look up for Tristan - it all seemed to be crashing down.