Howard was used to being woken up by Vince. His Gary Numan tapes, his loud, childish laughter, his fingers poking Howard until he woke up.
He was not, however, used to being woken up by the soft whimpers and cries of Vince in distress.
He sat up and looked over to Vince's bed, but the smaller man was nowhere to be seen.
"Howaaaard?" He was in the bathroom.
The tall man hurriedly made his way to the bathroom, shocked to see Vince half-lying on the floor by the toilet.
He looked awful. His usually pale skin was even paler, so that je looked almost ghostly grey. His raven hair was matted and the sweat on his face caused his messy fringe to stick to his forehead. He was clutching his side and crying. He never cried.
When his pained blue eyes looked up and met Howard's, he let out a small whimper. "Howard."
"Hey hey, what's wrong, little man?" Howard asked, kneeling down beside his best friend.
"Hurts," Vince moaned, squeezing his eyes shut as he let out a sob.
Howard tried to pull Vince in for a hug but the moment the small man moved, he let out a cry of pain. Instead he gently brushed back the goth's fringe and felt his forehead with the back of his hand. "Bloody hell, Vince, you're burning up."
"Howard, my side r-really hurts."
The tall man was panicking slightly as he removed his hand from his friend's forehead and placed it on his knee, as a sort of comfort. He didn't know what to do in a situation like this! He didn't know what was causing Vince this kind of pain, he'd never-
Oh.
"Vince, have you had your appendix out before?"
Vince winced. "My wha'?"
"Your appendix. It's a part of your insides."
"Uhhh... No, I don't think so- owww!" Vince shuffled and felt a sharp jolt of pain cause through his body. "Howard, do something. Please."
"Okay, okay," Howard assured, slowly standing up, his hand leaving Vince's knee.
"How'rd? Don't go," Vince pleaded in a childlike, helpless voice that broke Howard's heart.
"I'm going to call an ambulance, little man. Then the pain will be over soon, okay?"
"Vince didn't have the strength to argue. "'Kay."
When Howard returned several minutes later, he saw that Vince looked severely worse. He was throwing up into the toilet, with surprising dignity considering. Howard gave him a drink of water and mopped his forehead and mouth with a cold flannel.
Vince still looked in unbearable pain, but curled into Howard regardless and sobbed.
"Howard?"
"Yes, little man?"
"I don't want to die."
Howard smiled sadly, "You're not going to die, Vincey. The ambulance will be here soon and then everything will be okay."
Vince looked up at his friend with wide, sad eyes. "Promise?"
"Promise."
There was a pause.
"Howard?" Vince whimpered.
"Yes?"
"In case anything does, ah, happen... I want to you know that I'm sorry for laughing when you said you loved me in the Tundra."
"Hey, don't worry about it, little man." Howard reassured, given that talking for a prolonged amount of time seemed to be causing Vince pain.
"I don't know why I laughed. You caught me, ah, off guard." Pause. "I do love you, a bit, Howard."
The tall man smiled sadly, pressing a kiss to the top of Vince's sweet-smelling hair. "I love you too."
A/N: I honestly don't think I've ever been more stressed in my life as I am now. FUCK THEATRE STUDIES. FUCK SCHOOL. So this is my stress relief, writing fics. I hope you enjoyed this one - yay for slash! For the record, I've never had nor known anyone who has had apendicitis. I did proper research for this fic. Get me.