The Crash

Disclaimer: I'm not Shakespear, but I own everything else, so HAH!

Confusion is flying through my buzzing head. What just happened? All I've picked up from the last hour... well... wasn't much.

All I could remember... I was having a very in-depth conversation with my boyfriend. I was his counselor every Saturday, so at least that wasn't unusual. His father was an alcoholic, and his mother was never around.

I'd always known that. I was extremely aware of the stresses that would pop up when I said "yes" to his offer as a date to the spring dance.

He was the perfect type of boyfriend- the one every girl dreams of. Honest, a little overprotective, brave, strong, talented, beautiful.... I'm straying. Why am I thinking all of this at such a time?

I need to focus.

We were on our way back from seeing some new movie... I Am Legend or something like that. He was complaining about an argument his parents had maybe three nights ago. Then, as if somebody had pressed mute, then fast forward, we went silent. A pair of floodlights light up the rain like diamonds falling from the heavens. There was a loud, ear-bursting screech, and Gabe dove over to me, like he was shielding me.

I was too dazed to feel the impact of the car hitting us full on. All I knew was that suddenly, he was limp, and screaming in pain. And he fell silent again.

Then my mind skips to a set of red flashing lights- a woman crying on the side of the road, clearly in shock.... and blood.

Blood that stains the front of my flowery blue blouse. Not mine.

Worried voices, then a scream. None mine.

A pale, limp hand touching the soaking asphalt, with an emerald class ring. Mine.

A bloodied and broken young man, with once-tanned skin and sparkling blue eyes and carefully messy brown hair. Mine.

I stumble toward the car and don't hear anything. All I can see is him, lying there like a rag-doll.

"Gabriel?" I touch his cool shoulder. "Gabriel?!" I feel something warm run down my cheeks. Am I bleeding?

No... I'm... crying. Why am I crying?

A worried young woman in a police uniform strides up to me tentatively. Why is her forehead creased with worry-lines?

"Are you alright, honey?" What does she mean? "Do you hurt anywhere?" I shake my head.

I glance back at Gabe, my eyes getting hot as my body starts to force tears to well up. What's wrong with me?

Another skip, and I'm in the ambulance with Gabe... Why is he so pale? Did he hit his head and pass out? Why isn't that cut on his cheek bleeding more? It's not dried yet...

I gasp quietly as realization strikes me full-force. He's dying.

I'm so numb then, that while my mind is far away I do not even her the scream that builds up in my throat. I don't even notice the piercing pain that strikes my heart. All I can think...

Nothimnothimnothimnothimnothimnothimnothimnothimnothim Not. Him. No. Impossible. It can't be. Not him. No. No... No! It's not possible!

I see a few personnel gather around me, trying to find out what's wrong. Everything's wrong.

"Not him!" I hear myself sob. "Not him..." and then everything goes into a blur.

I'm not allowed to be with him. Not yet.

I'm sobbing alone, in silence. All the eyes in the room are on the floor as the year-old magazines lie untouched, the television entertaining only itself. He whole world is holding it's breath. One of the seven angels in the world is fading away, soon to be replaced.

Gabriel... My Gabriel. My own personal heroine. My silent sentinel. The silent guardian that protects my hollow bastion. My once full heart is falling.

The blown glass that forms my fragile heart is slowly falling down into a dungeon with stone floors and stone ceilings and stone walls. There are no windows in this blurry grey abyss- this empty void.

A nurse in sky blue scrubs steps into the waiting room, and I can see the people's heads raise in my peripheral vision. In the back of my mind, I notice her turn my way. But I am too busy remembering.

"Sarah?" I glance up. "He wants to see you."

I stand so quickly that the room spins once. "He'll be alright?" I inquire. She looks at me for a moment, then shakes her head.

"He wants you to be the last person he sees." I feel my heart fall even farther into this grey void. I follow her into the ICU, and let a sob escape as I see him, pale, frail. My silent sentinel, my guardian angel. My Gabriel. The only star in this night that I can see by is dying.

"Sarah... I.... I want to... ask you something." He can hardly hold in enough breath to speak the whole sentence. I sob again, and run to him, hugging him gingerly. As he slowly wraps his bandaged arms around me, he whispers for me not to cry. He has something for me.

"Gabriel, d-don't..." He puts a finger to my lips, his eyes losing their spark. He takes my hand from his shoulder and places his class ring into my hand... and something else.

"I don't want... you to miss me. Remember me, but.... but don't lose every...everything for me. I love you... Remember that always... I love you." He's leaving me. I can see it in his eyes.

"Gabriel? Don't leave me! Please! Please don't leave me..." He shushes me again.

"I know something... and that's all I need to know." His breaths are becoming weaker, his voice raspy. "Love is.... watching someone die." I sobbed again.

"I'm... I'm greedy! I can't leave you..." He gasped sharply, and my tears fell faster.

"One last kiss..." He can't even finish the sentence this time. I pres my lips to his passionately, internally begging for God to let him be with me, to let him stay.

As he relaxes, the LCD screen falls into a weak blipping. I know that every descending peak on that screen pulls him farther away, and collapse onto his shuddering chest, unable to stop the tears from falling. He puts a hand under my chin, tilting my face up so that he can see my face, and takes my hand in his.

He releases a shivering sigh, and falls limp. The monitor pulls a flatline.

Everything turns to silence, like again, somebody has pressed mute. I don't even hear myself screaming.

~"How fares my Juliet? That I ask again- For nothing can be ill if she be well!" "Then she is well and nothing can be ill. Her body sleeps in Capel's monument, and her immortal part with angels lives."