A/N: I told you I'd cry like a small child, and guess what? I did. A lot.

Listen to You by Keaton Henson if you dare. It's heart wrenching. 'If you must die sweetheart, die knowing your life was my life's best part.'


In the morning when you finally go

And the nurse runs in with her head hung low

And the cardinal hits the window

The first Monday of March bloomed with grey skies and a dense fog that chilled everything it touched. Killua woke with a start, blue eyes wide as he jerked himself up right. It took a moment for his surroundings to register, for the colorless room and the steady beeping to make sense in his cloudy mind.

He must have fallen asleep he realized, glancing down at where his arms were still crossed on the hospital bed, one of Gon's hands held in his own.

Gon…

When Killua looked up and was greeted with Gon's bright smile he thought surely it must have been a dream. Morning light, pastel and weak as it filtered through the fog, shone in through the single window. Gon wasn't supposed to have made it through the night…and yet?

"Morning sleepy head," Gon rasped, and the pain in his voice derailed any fantasies Killua might have held about dreams or miraculous recoveries. Suddenly his smile didn't appear quite so bright, more ragged and brittle, a grimace more than anything.

"You," Killua started, but he was unable to finish. His gaze skirted over Gon, his tightly drawn face, his attempt at a smile, and then down to where his IV with its morphine drip should have been attached. The needle had been ripped out, set aside on the bed to pool whatever concoction of medication the doctors had prescribed onto the sheets. Distantly he was surprised no nurses had come to bitch him out yet.

Gon followed his gaze mutely, and then let out a strangled kind of laugh. "Oh," he sighed. "I didn't want to be drugged. You know, when I went. Figured I'd only get one chance to die so I better experience it to the fullest."

That's the most idiotic thing I've ever heard, Killua thought, but the words that came out of his mouth were, "You weren't supposed to wake up."

Gon's eyes fluttered closed, a sigh escaping his lips as he squeezed Killua's hand gently. It took him a moment to respond, as if the words he'd already spoken had drained him. "Well, it won't be long now I can tell you that," he murmured.

It was silent after that, Killua staring at the place where they were joined intently, Gon breathing shallowly. At some point he must have talked one of the nurses into propping his bed up because he was in a sitting position, a pillow at his lower back and another behind his head.

When Killua looked up again Gon's eyes were open, watching him. They were murky with pain but the fear and sadness he'd carried before had vanished.

"You brought the photo album," he said, a fact and not a question.

Killua nodded, not quite trusting himself to speak.

"I'm glad you found it." Gon's gaze shifted away, his head lolling slightly against the pillows, but he wasn't staring at anything anyone else could see. "I want you to keep the original. Make copies for everyone else, so that I can be with all of you."

Something massive was rising in Killua chest, up into his lungs, his throat, stopping his breath. He swallowed several times, to try and clear it, and eventually choked out, "It's really beautiful."

Gon physically seemed to pull his attention away from whatever he'd been staring at, eyes flickering down.

"Killua," he asked almost breathlessly, "Will you kiss me?"

It was enough of a non-sequitur that Killua's breath came rushing back to him, making him dizzy and light headed. The weight didn't clear, but it had moved enough that Killua was able to smile shakily, to lean across the bed and press his lips chastely to Gon's. He cupped Gon's face in his free hand, fingers trembling. A single tear fought its way free and slipped down his cheek, but when he pulled back, resting his forehead against Gon's, breathing unsteady, Gon had the tact not to mention it.

"Ready?" Gon whispered, lips brushing Killua's with the movement. His smile was gentle, the grip on Killua's hand equally so.

Killua's breath stuttered in his chest, the weight so heavy now he thought surely it'd drag him to the ground and suffocate him there.

"Never," he whispered in reply, despite the weight, despite the broken quality of his voice and the way his entire body was racked with tremor after tremor.

Gon's eyes closed, still smiling, peaceful even in his pain, relaxed, and Killua felt a soft breath against his lips and then the heart monitor was piercing through it all, a flat, steady wail that only made Killua tense, gripping Gon's hand tighter, holding his face closer, staring fixedly as if maybe those eyes might flutter open and maybe those lips might move and maybe his nose would crinkle when he smiled and he'd squeeze Killua's hand back and he'd laugh and he'd kiss Killua and call him a weirdo and his skin would be warm and soft and tan and he'd glow like he himself was the sun, born to bring light everywhere he went, to brighten every life he touched, and they'd go home together and he'd dance through the mist and the fog because he loved every kind of weather and Killua would be left to laugh and try to catch up with him and when they got home they'd fall onto the couch together and cuddle and wrap themselves in blankets and drink hot chocolate and they could do all of that and more, so much more maybe if he'd just open those eyes and move those lips and crinkle that nose when he smiled…

A hand fell on Killua's shoulder.

Everything was muffled, muddled, but he realized vaguely that someone was guiding him away from the bed, away from Gon, pushing him gently into a chair. Not his chair. Not the one he should be in, there next to his best friend and his lover and his everything. This one was by the window.

Killua stared out at the mist, the flat line ringing his ears. He was the only one to notice a bright red cardinal, confused and lost, fly headlong into the glass pane, its neck breaking, blood speckling its feathers, dead before it hit the ground.