Roderich awoke bright and early the next morning, and took a good ten minutes to realise why he was so happy – he was going to see Gilbert again. Many people had told Roderich that he seemed most antisocial, and he would have to agree with them – he was not one for idle chit chat – however he felt an inexplicable urge to actually be friendly and talk to Gilbert about, well; anything to be honest – Roderich would have willingly talked for hours about something as mundane as breakfast cereal! Gilbert had been one of the first people to hear Roderich play, and not instantly try to suck up to him because of his musical prowess, yet still be friendly towards him in a way that had been alien to him for many years.
Hurriedly throwing on a lilac dress shirt and beige chinos, Roderich grabbed his keys and bounced out of his apartment with a spring in his step.
He smiled charmingly at the nurses who let him into the ward, and his mood lifted even further when he saw that Gilbert was sitting up in bed, yet the faraway, staring look in his red rimmed eyes instantly shattered Roderich's joyful feeling. He ran the last few steps before slowing to settle into the chair next to Gilbert, not wanting to startle him.
"Morning." Said Roderich, careful to avoid saying 'Good' morning, as Gilbert's morning appeared to be anything but if his shell-shocked face was anything to go by.
Gilbert started violently, then looked around, and his eyes regained some of their light when he saw Roderich sitting next to him.
"Morning, how are you?" Gilbert asked, an emotionless tone to his voice.
"I could ask you the same question, but I don't think I'll like the answer."
Gilbert took a deep breath.
"I have some good news, and some bad news. The good news is they're letting me go home tomorrow."
Roderich's face lit up in delight, before it sank, and was clouded by confusion.
"I thought the doctors said you were incredibly sick and dying?"
"Yeah, but they said there's nothing to be gained by keeping me in hospital, as if my heart fails, it's too weak for them to restart it with a defibrillator or whatever."
"So what's the bad news?"
"You've guessed it already – they're letting me go because they can't do anything for me."
Roderich wasn't sure whether to try and console Gilbert, who now had tears running silently down his cheeks, or to keep quiet. He settled for resting his left arm on Gilbert's shoulder, rubbing it soothingly whilst his tears dripped onto his nightgown, and fiddling nervously with the cuff of his own sleeve.
"Y- You must th- think I'm a r- right wuss, crying l- like this!" stuttered Gilbert, his shoulders starting to shake. He turned his head towards Roderich, seeking a closer, more comforting embrace. Roderich stopped playing with his sleeve, and hugged Gilbert close, as the sobs racked his whole body, tears soaking into Roderich's shirt. Roderich buried his face in Gilbert's hair as he too began to weep.
""Y- you're braver than I w- would be, if I was in y- your situation! I d- don't think I would b- be able to cope – I w- would have found some way t- to overdose on pills or s- something."
"Don't speak like that." Gilbert said vehemently, suddenly sitting bolt upright, startling Roderich. "Being pessimistic won't get us anywhere."
"You're right, and deep down in my heart I know that suicide is a coward's way out, but it does seem like a preferable outcome to living, if there is nothing to live for."
"There will always be something to live for." Said Gilbert confidently, "We just can't always tell."
Roderich looked thoughtful for a minute, before Gilbert started speaking again:
"You keep that heart beating, you hear me?" He rested a hand on Roderich's chest, right over his heart. Roderich started at the spark of electricity that seemed to shoot through all his veins, before leading back to his heart, where Gilbert's hand was still firmly placed. "You keep that heart beating. If mine decides to die on me, the least I can do to the world is make sure someone else's stops due to them not being able to cope with life for whatever reason. If there were no hardships in life, we wouldn't be able to fully enjoy the better moments."
Roderich thought deeply over the meaning behind the words for a minute, before realising something.
"You've suffered terribly in your life haven't you." He stated, "More than you'd care to let on. And you haven't told anybody have you."
Gilbert looked taken aback for a moment, at Roderich's assumptions, and at how he had guessed such a large part of his past in the space of a few minutes.
"You're mostly right," he admitted, looking down at his lap, "About the suffering. But someone knows, other than you I mean. My brother."
"Roderich rested his hand on Gilbert's cheek and turned his face to look at him, "Do you want to talk about it?"
"Not partic–" Gilbert started, before changing his mind, "Yes." He took a deep breath before continuing. "What you have to understand, is I was from a deeply religious family, and I was their 'demon-child'. The blood red eyes, scarily pale skin; I was all their worst nightmares rolled into one. From a young age, I was blamed for everything that went wrong, even if I had no earthly way of committing the crime myself. I mostly just hid in some corner of the house to avoid everyone."
Roderich's eyes were already misting over with fresh tears.
"Look, if you can't handle that, there's no way you can face the whole story! Man up, Princess!" Gilbert smirked, before continuing, "Things got better when my parents had Ludwig, they stopped spending every waking minute shouting at me. However, all of their attention was now on the perfect little blonde haired, blue eyed boy with the charming smile who could do no wrong. You would have thought I would've hated him, but I was just pleased to be left alone. I wasn't ever supposed to be in the same room as him, in case my appearance scared him, but I took great delight in flaunting that rule, and Lud seemed enjoy my attention. One thing that my parents hated about him though was his first word; I used to sit by him when I had the chance and try to teach him to speak, by pointing at things. I would point at him, and say 'Lud' or myself, saying 'Gil'. When my Mother was rocking him one day, he suddenly piped up saying "Giwl~!" which made her furious. She, of course, blamed me, saying that her having to shout at me caused him to know my name, but I knew he was talking about me. I was the only person in our house who showed him real love, not just sibling preference." Gilbert looked lost in thought for a moment, before continuing,
"On my first day at primary school, I met Francis and Antonio, who were in my class, and attempting to place a water bomb on the teacher's chair. I joined in, and when the poor lady sat on it, we were unable to stop ourselves collapsing with laughter. I think we set a new record for the shortest time to get a detention – five minutes into the first day of the first year! And my family didn't even care!"
Roderich looked appalled at Gilbert's idea of a 'harmless prank', but the silverette just laughed and continued with his story, "The three of us were inseparable from that day on, earning the name of 'Bad Touch Trio' due to our love of pranking! The only time I was truly happy was at school, but that only made home seem worse. If anything, Francis and Antonio's houses were more like home than anywhere else."
Roderich could sense that the story was about to take a turn for the worse, as Gilbert appeared to be tensing up.
"When I went to middle school, I met Veta – but you already know that – who didn't get along with Francis and Toni, but still hung out we me all the same. However, my home life was getting worse and worse. Ludwig was old enough to realise what my parents were doing to me was wrong, and kept out of any arguments I had with my parents, even though they kept trying to drag him into them, and take their side. One day, when I was 12, I broke I plate, and Ludwig tried to cover for me by saying it was him, however my parents became even for furious at that, and accused me of bewitching him. For me that was the final straw. I ran out of the house, and even though Lud tried to chase me – he was surprisingly fast for his age – I was faster. I ran to the highest car park in town and jumped of the roof, trying to kill myself. However, I hadn't thought to check the ground beneath me, so I landed on a flat roof, meaning I fell only a few metres. It was still far enough that I broke both my legs and an arm though. When a lady heard me screaming for help, she called for an ambulance, whilst trying to console me, as I was howling to all four corners of the earth. I wasn't crying because of the pain though, even though it hurt worse than you could possibly imagine. I was crying because I was still alive. You can't possibly begin to imagine how desperately I wanted to die." He paused before continuing, "When the ambulance came, and I went to hospital, I refused to speak, or answer any of their questions, I just kept wailing that I wanted to die. They sedated me after the first few minutes, but eventually calmed me down enough to find out my name and address. My parents refused to come and visit me, and Ludwig told me that they were disappointed that I hadn't died."
Roderich now had tears dripping off his chin, distraught at how Gilbert had wanted to take his own life so badly, and how his parents would have preferred their first born son dead.
"Ludwig snuck in to see me after school, skipping one of his many sports clubs, and said that he'd managed to get in contact with my Grandfather, Fritz, who hadn't heard from my family in years. He knew I existed, but very little more. Ludwig told him how my parents were treating me, and how I had tried to kill myself, and he had instantly come to the hospital to see me. When I was allowed out, I didn't even bother going home. Ludwig brought me my school stuff and I went to live with Grandpa. The only people who knew any of this at school were Francis, Toni and Veta."
Roderich was now chewing oh so enticingly on his bottom lip, causing Gilbert to smile wanly.
"From then on, I lived a normal childhood. Lud went to a grammar school, so I didn't see him during the day, but Old Fritz's house was on his way home, so he would stop in to see me every day."
"But did your teachers not know that your address had changed?"
"My parents just binned any letters that came home anyway, so it made no difference." He suddenly became lost in thought, before faintly smiling at Roderich, "It seems like I'm finally getting my wish after all."
"What wish?" asked Roderich, confused.
"Dying. My heart's failing on me, ten years too late."
"D-don't speak like that!" Roderich cried, breaking into fresh floods of tears. "You said that your life got better, why would you want to die now?"
"I don't particularly want to die now, but if you'd asked me back then, I'd have willingly volunteered to be like this, even without the guaranteed companion!" at this, he smiled warmly at Roderich, who smiled back through misty eyes.
From the other end of the ward, they could hear a nurse talking to Arthur.
"Mr Kirkland, we will be able to let you out of here in a few days, is that all right?"
"About bloody time!" he grumbled in response.
"That sounds like good ol' Arthur all right!" laughed Gilbert. "Look, cheer up," he said, as Roderich was still sniffling and wiping his nose on a silk handkerchief, "It's all in the past though, so it's nothing to get upset about. I'm just glad someone cares."
"We wouldn't be human if we didn't."
The nurse then walked over to Gilbert's bed, and looked sympathetically at the pair of them.
"Mr Beilschmidt, you can leave this afternoon, as long as you have somewhere safe to go, where someone can keep constant watch over you."
"Yeah, I can go to my brother's. If he's working, his boyfriend Feli'll be home."
"Good." she walked briskly away.
"I'm going home." Gilbert whispered, mostly to himself.
"Wait!" Roderich cried, suddenly panicking, "Will I ever see you again? If you leave here, I mean."
"Course you will Specs! You think the awesome me would let you vanish off the face of the earth? 'Sides – you have my brother's address!"
"I suppose not! But yes, I do have your brother's address at home." Roderich decided not to mention that it had 'somehow and oh so mysteriously' become pinned to the very front of his fridge, with his favourite magnet (a resin block with a snippet of Mozart sheet music inside).
"I was just being silly really - I haven't had a friend I can be so open with in years!" he continued, beginning to talk too much and blush furiously.
"What about you fiancé?"
Roderich was suddenly stumped for a moment, struck with guilt for forgetting about Vash. "Oh... Ah... Well..." he stuttered, unable to class Vash as one of his closest friends.
He knew he should be able to, and that he should not put more trust in or be having feelings for the man he met less than a week ago, but Vash was mostly someone he was supposed to love, rather than someone he felt he would give up everything for.
In short, Vash wasn't Gilbert.
A/N
Hello! I am alive! I'm so sorry for the wait, but exam revision has got ridiculous lately. I've had half of this chapter written for a while, and only when I looked at the date on here and realized that it's been over a month did I start panicking and feeling très guilty!
I can't promise when the next update will be, and I apologize whole-heartedly for that, but please bear with me! I have the very end of the story written, and I'm quite proud of it, so I WILL publish on here at some point.
Review to tell me you're still here?
Or is that pushing my luck (probably...)
Hasta la pasta~!
Emily Prustrian
