"I'm sorry," Francis tells Gilbert tiredly after the fifth, sixth. seventh phonecall in a row. His words do not ease the static living under Gilbert's skin and when Francis hangs up he opens all the windows and all the doors, he folds into himself on the bed and counts his breaths. The numbers start to touch upon the thousands when he finally falls asleep, copper in the back of his throat.
Gilbert cleans the kitchen rigorously and pretends not to notice the post-it notes littering the table. It makes him feel better when he sees the slanted e's and cramped f's, the shopping lists and goodbye notes are at least somewhat filling the empty spaces in the house where Gilbert feels like he can't breathe. It's unhealthy and he knows it but he keeps them anyway, and Ludwig doesn't comment on it when he passes by later that day with dinner. Feliciano touches Gilbert's shoulder with something akin to understanding and Gilbert thinks he might just shatter there and then, feeling brittle and sharp in the afternoon sun.
There is no more using the convenient bus stop down the hill; when Gilbert comes close all he sees in his mind's eye are the hospital bills and the blood, hospital bills and blood, Antonio coughing over the sink they bought together when they first moved in. He stops buying the sugar-free cereal because it tastes like morning kisses and he never actually liked them anyway he just had to disagree with Antonio on principle - his chest constricts and before he knows it he's screaming into the phone with Francis on the other end because life isn't fair to him and he wants Antonio back.
The hospital sends their official condolences on white crisp paper with black crisp letters and Gilbert feels like tearing his own throat out rather than ever saying thank you again. After the funeral he called Francis and cried because the flowers were the wrong sort of red and people kept apologising for Antonio being dead. Francis, bless his heart, does not say 'I told you so' or 'you knew this was happening'; he calls the funeral firm and curses them out about the flowers instead and Gilbert tells him that he's his best friend with two fingers on his pulse to check if he's still alive.
It's not fair, that's the point of it all. Falling in love with a chronically ill man in the waiting room after breaking a finger playing guitar hero should guarantee some sort of happy ending, Gilbert thinks. The smell of Antonio has started to fade from the bed and the chili they were saving for Friday has long since been thrown out from the fridge and nothing is like the movies.
He misses him.