A/N: Hey there! I know the last chapter was damn confusing, so I decided to update this and set some records straight instead of updating my other fic… And it's all because I'm a sucker for readers!
1: Empty Words
Lawrence would always love Adam.
That's the promise he'd given him. Adam was half asleep when he got it, but he still remembers it. No matter how hard he's tried to forget it.
Still remembers how Lawrence's strong arm sneaked around his waist, pulled him out of his sleep and into a consciousness that wasn't really a consciousness, just a condition of a still dozing, a drowsy slumber, a condition where his head wasn't above the water but still close enough to the surface for the pale 4:00 AM-light to reach him, a condition where he wasn't awake but still able to hear Lawrence's soft whisper, feel his warm breath on his neck: I will always love you, Adam.
And Adam had mumbled that he loved Lawrence, too, mumbled with an almost girly shyness captured in his own dull, slurry voice.
And it had been true.
Right then, it had been true.
And it hadn't even been just then, it had been all the time. All the time, ever since Adam first saw Lawrence laying in his hospital bed, pale, unconscious and so cold that his teeth were chattering, but alive. He'd loved him all along.
Adam had nagged a hole into his nurse's head after they'd made it out of the bathroom. He'd swallowed the pride that had been both the end and the beginning of his and Lawrence's relationship, clutched to the nurse's disinfected hand and begged. And he'd gotten the permission to see Lawrence, he'd gotten to stand up on legs that shook with nervousness, because what if he doesn't want to see me, what if I'm a bad memory, what if he's upset over those pictures, what if…
And he'd walked into Lawrence's room. Seen him there, and been forced to swallow a big, annoyingly sentimental lump of tears in his throat.
Seen him, and sat on a chair next to his bed for almost two hours, until Lawrence's furrowed brows twitched and then loosened up, until his pale, cold hands were lifted to rub his temples.
Yes. Adam had sat on that damn chair for almost two hours, and when Lawrence woke up, he didn't even dare to give in to that warm wave that rose in his bitterly brewing soul and throw his arms around Lawrence's neck, didn't even dare to allow that lump that lingered in his throat to melt and pour out of his eyes.
He didn't dare. Because that wasn't his thing.
He didn't do it because he was a chicken.
It had been Lawrence that finally turned to the side and saw Adam sitting there, Lawrence who'd called out Adam's name in a joyful cry, grabbed his shoulders and pulled him into his chest.
And not even Adam was cowardly enough to disagree then.
He wasn't even cowardly enough to acknowledge the fact that it was obvious that Lawrence's embrace was given out of more than relief, the fact that Lawrence's cold hand had sneaked up, into his hair, the fact that Lawrence's head had tilted so much to the side that his lips had grazed over Adam's cheek. Right then, it'd just been a moment's impulse. A stupid, tickling, dangerous impulse, something they did because they wanted to, not needed to, something they did even though they knew they shouldn't.
Just like that last moment in the bathroom. And right then, it they left it at that. Right then
The love hadn't come until afterwards. When they got out of the hospital.
That was when those subtle signs happened too often to ignore, when the little things had gotten so many that they turned into one big thing.
Small, small things.
Like Lawrence's arm that lingered a few extra seconds when he put it around Adam's shoulders.
Like the way Adam, maybe not completely subconsciously, collapsed with his head in Lawrence's lap those nights when he'd drunken too much.
Like the way Lawrence's hand made a detour over Adam's cheek when they hugged each other goodbye after a day together.
The little things that soon turned into more, that turned into Adam's insecure fingers that sneaked in between the buttons in Lawrence's shirt, Lawrence's tongue deep inside of Adam's mouth, his hands that still traveled over Adam's cheek, but that didn't stop this time, they crept down, down, down.
They loved each other. And they would always love each other.
Until it ended.
Until Adam couldn't take it anymore.
His life had been okay up until the bathroom. He'd been okay with being a loser, he'd been okay with being alone, simply because the loneliness was unconditional. He didn't have to adjust to the loneliness, the loneliness didn't judge him, the loneliness didn't wake him up in the middle of the night and whispered in his ear: But Adam, you're twenty-eight years old now, you haven't paid the rent in three months, and you're a fair photographer, you don't have to live this way, you don't have to stay in an apartment where the walls close down around you…
But Lawrence did.
He didn't mean to. But he did.
It was like he, just with his expensive shoes and the doctor ID-badge that so subtly glimpsed in his wallet all those times, all those uncountable fucking times when they'd gone out and eaten and Lawrence had held out a rejecting hand when Adam picked up his own wallet, sort of pointed out how pathetic his life was.
How good Adam could have it. If he dared to take the chance.
Lawrence did everything that the loneliness didn't. And maybe that was the reason why Adam suddenly got so aware of how vulnerable he was, of what a big piece of his heart that was in Lawrence's open palm, of that Lawrence all the sudden could decide that he was sick of Adam, that he was good at fucking, sure, but still not worth his time.
And that was all so stupid. It wasn't Lawrence's fault, it was Adam's. It was Adam who was stupid and scared and childish. But that didn't really matter, because the gist is still there: The promise is broken.
There had been a time when everything was carefree, when Adam could listen to Lawrence when he said, with such pure and untainted love, whispered in his ear that he would always love him, that time could hurry on, that the sky could crumble and fall down outside their window, but Lawrence would still love Adam. For eternity.
But now, it's been a year since Adam packed all of Lawrence's stuff up in a big bag while he was at work, now, it's been a year since the fear overcame his suppressed, confused love and he broke all the bonds.
Now, when Lawrence hugs Adam in his hospital bed, when Adam's life, his drugs, his drinking, his malnourishment, his self-destruction have hollowed his body from inside out, it's been a year since their eternity ended.
ARGH! Can you believe I wrote that? I've broken my sweethearts up! Ah, well… As long as you review, I think I can at least get them to make out a little…