As if I hadn't written enough of oneshots lately haha…

(I started this oneshot at the end of December, not long after I had just finished a bunch of Oneshots. Then I never got around to finish it. Writing this I still have a bit left but hopefully, some time…)

Sitting in the living room, knitting to make time pass by I suddenly heard someone come up the driveway.

Mitch was out grocery shopping. But he had told me he would be away for yet a while and it wouldn't be like him to be away for neither shorter nor longer than what he had planned.

Just while I stood up to meet whoever was coming, the door was ripped open in just the way that had always annoyed me and I was relieved beyond words when the one on the porch was my son.

"Luke…" I dropped what I was holding and it fell to the floor, not that I noticed because I only had eyes for the one on the other side of the room. "…Where have you…?"

When I tried to hug him, Luke took a step away from me. For just a second or two I thought I would actually be taking him in in my arms but then I saw the anger burning in his eyes.

"Luke…" I pleaded and reached out, but he only took another step away from me. "…Luke?"

Without making as much a single sound Luke only stared at me for a couple of seconds. Then he turned and walked away from me again.

"Luke? Luke? No wait. Don't go again. Just tell…"

In the middle of the sentence when I tried running after him my eyes flew open as I woke up with a gasp.

While I slept and dreamt the same dream like now so many times before had, before I'd even woken me up caused tears streaming down my cheeks.

While I just couldn't get myself to get up and leave the room, I sat up on the edge of the bed. each of these nights I had tried to stay quiet but still ended up waking Mitch up within seconds.

Just like all of the times before I had dreamt all since Luke had left that night right after Christmas, I just couldn't stop the crying.

I was the mum and had been meant to take care for my son. Now we were away from each other and I couldn't care for him like I was supposed to…

While I felt tears streaming down my cheeks I sensed it while Mitch sat up behind me. He didn't say anything at first but came crawling over my side of the bed, sat down next to me and laid his arm around my shoulders.

"It's okay." He stroke my arm while I leaned towards him. "He'll be back soon. You'll see."

Ever since my darling boy had pedaled away that dreadful night and I watched him go it hadn't felt like I ever would.

But I had said that so many times already. I had told Mitch about the dream I kept on having and about how I kept on seeing Luke was coming home.

Every time I heard someone outside, even just on the street I thought for just one second that it might be Luke.

But only talking about it hurt too much. Still I already had and with that this morning I quietly let the tears stream down my cheeks until there were none left to cry.

Just as I stopped I looked towards a framed photo that was on my bedside table. One of Luke and I the very first time I held him in my arms.

"My baby boy." I whispered under my breath. "Where are you now?"

"What?" Mitch had obviously heard me talking. "Did you say something?"

"Nothing."

"You should go back to sleep."

Somehow I had ran out of tears just like I did every night, wiped the last with my hands and raised to start of yet another day of worry.

"No…" I looked to the clock, it was almost six thirty anyway and not even an hour until. "… I'll stay up… If this dream would just stop… "

If I had known what it would take for that dream to never come again, I'd never had wished for it.

The whole following day it was like I knew something was badly wrong. I kept having a feeling that it was and no matter how much I tried I couldn't shake it off. I couldn't even explain it to myself that there was something been wrong. Something way more wrong than it had been ever since the evening I had been yelling at Luke until the moment he had taken his bike and went away.

It was nothing less of a miracle that I didn't end up setting the kitchen on fire making dinner.

"What's wrong with me today?" I asked myself when I dropped a plate dishing and it cracked towards the floor. "Can you pick it up Mitch? And then finish this I just can't get myself to concentrate and do anything right."

"I'll do it… Are you okay?"

"Yeah…"

If I only knew how far away from fine I really was.

To have something to do I went to sit down by the living room window, but still, I was restless and needed somewhere to keep my hands. Just as I saw Mitch in the corner of my eye and he sat down next to me with a book I grabbed something to knit. At least something simple so it wouldn't take so much concentration.

Only minutes after I sat down it was when everything- my whole life was changing.

The evening outside was dark, although all of a sudden the room was lit up by blue lights of a police car coming up our driveway.

I didn't need to wait. I just knew Luke wasn't there.

I barely even knew about it but tears started streaming down my cheeks while I started crying, crying worse than I had ever done before.

The two policemen in the car had gotten out but were standing in the driveway talking to each other with scowls on their faces. And while I maybe should have gone outside I could do nothing but to let Mitch wrap his arms around me and hold me up, while he must be as confused as I felt.

"They might be at the wrong house…They might be at the wrong…"

My whimpering was cut off when there was a ring on the doorbell. I wasn't sure if my legs could even carry me like this. But I just had to hold on, opening the door to what I already could feel was going on.

"It's Luke." I didn't greet them and I really didn't need for them to answer me. "It's Luke, right? Where is he? Have you got him? What did he do?"

The way they looked back on me for just half a second before we went on felt like an eternity. But somehow I knew exactly what they meant.

"What happened to him?"

"If we could just see some ID first ma'am." I nodded slightly, Mitch went to get the both of ours' and we held them up. The police looked over them, then nodded slightly. "We should probably be seated for this."

I gave a slight nod and stepped away from the doorway, not until then I noticed Mitch had stayed right by me and holding a hand on my back. That was until he let go and showed the two policemen into the kitchen and only looked towards me.

"This way…"

Mitch laid his hand back towards my back once we were in the kitchen.

"Can I get you anything?" I barely noticed how I was trying to last the moment last for as long as possible before I knew I'd get the worst news of my life. "Coffee?"

"No thank you." One of the police gestured for us to sit down, then silent for a moment and put his elbows on the table before "I'm afraid we have some bad news… Well there's no point with dragging on it since you've already confirmed you are the parents of Lucas Patterson." I nodded, but couldn't help to think back and remembered how much Luke had hated his full name. "Your son and two of his friends had some fast food. And as it turned out it was bad, they had food poisoning and unfortunately they came into hospital too late to save any of them."

The silence before the policeman had started talking was nothing compared to after. It was so silent it could have been cut through with a knife. If someone would have dropped a feather we'd be able to hear it fall to the floor.

"A-are you sure?" I asked everything I could have thought of. "H- h—o-o w d-do you know it's hi-Im."

"There were four boys… playing in their band. Only three of which ate the same from a fast-food stand. And when the fourth one came to the others he was the one who called for help and confirmed which ones they were."

I tried to ignore the feeling I had had all day and was just gripping for every single straw. Call it a mother's intuition but I had known it was him even though I wanted to hope.

"We need to see him…I need to see him."

The two policemen both nodded and one of them stood up.

"I need to make a phone call and sort it out."

Silence fell around the table, and the whole world seemed to have gone with it.

"I…" At last the policeman left by the table spoke up. "…I can't tell you how sorry I am for what's happened."

"It can't be him." I interrupted even though I had the truth in my heart. "It has to be someone else."

Mitch laid his arm around my shoulders and I felt his lips against my hair for just one seconds. We all jumped slightly when our front door opened and the second policeman came back inside and without sitting down faced us.

"Go straight to the ER. Father Atwood, the priest from the hospital church will be there and meet you. He will show you to the morgue and he, along with a nurse will let you know and show you the body."

It can be someone else. I tried telling myself. It has to be someone else.

I didn't want to admit that in my heart I could feel the truth.

"It could be someone else." I told myself as I and my husband were going towards the hospital and the morgue where we'd been told our son was. "Right? It could be someone else." I could only hope for a second Mitch would agree with me but he didn't say anything. "Luke is still out there somewhere. If he is we're going to have to find a way to go after him and find him. Right? To tell him that after all we love him and it doesn't matter what he does?"

Mitch didn't say anything, and he had to keep his eyes on the road.

"Right Mitch? The guy in the morgue could be someone completely different? It doesn't have to be Luke?"

"It could." Mitch said at last. "Let's just hope for now."

The way to the hospital took a few seconds, but at the same time several hours. Mitch didn't care to pay for the parking, we could take the parking fine and we both needed to get into the hospital.

We were on our way to the reception but before so a preacher, that we recognized from the collar around his neck stepped over in front of us.

"Mr. And Mrs. Patterson?" We nodded, he and Mitch shook hands but I couldn't move or talk and just forced myself to nod. "Come with me."

Father Atwood led us through the hallway and into an elevator. While the elevator sunk down two floors, I felt myself gripping for Mitch's hand. He took it, wrapped his big hand around mine that felt was cold as ice.

He leaned his head towards the side and onto my. But then the doors to the hallway opened and we came to a door with "morgue" written on it.

And this was just so real, more than ever before when the preacher led us through the hallway and into a room.

It looked just like that one saw on TV. With grey metal walls with squares as opening lids and a metal bunk in the middle of the room.

"Hello." The nurse started talking. "I'm…"

"I don't care." I interrupted. "Just let us see… him."

The young nurse nodded and grabbed the handle of one of the lids, then pulled it out.

Time was moving slowly yet way too fast…

"Is this your son?"

I could have told him no. I wanted with everything in me to.

When I at last had to tell her the truth I had to close my eyes and whisper as if anything would make it less true.

"Yes."

It didn't matter that I had known for hours, even though I didn't want to admit it. Seeing my son like this would be on the insides of my eyelid for the rest of my life. And despite everything it came as such a big chock I would have fallen backwards if Mitch hadn't caught me.

"Oh, Luke." I stroke him over his forehead and down his hairline. He looked like he was sleeping. "I…"

I ran out of words, maybe there were none from the beginning while I leaned over and kissed Luke's forehead. Maybe it was true that in fairytales, and with one true love's kiss he could wake up.

There was no truer love than the one in between a mother and a child.

And here I was with the feeling that I loved him just as much as ever…

It was with that feeling, while I felt my heart falling to pieces that I took a step back, turned around and somehow made every single step while moving away from the morgue and away from the spot that had been the one to put an end to my life as I knew it.

I wasn't sure how. But I did know I and Mitch watched as Luke disappeared again, then made our way back to the Emergency room and towards the doors.

Mitch was my rock. He had been ever since we were in high school and he'd tutored me in science.

But even the strongest of rocks could only take so much pressure, and it was when we passed the waiting room when we heard someone throwing up that Mitch suddenly, without saying anything stopped and then slumped down on one of the uncomfortable, plastic chairs by the wall.

I hadn't been through a moment quite like that one before. But in the middle of nurses and doctors rushing around me, the kind of strange hospital smell and alarms going off somewhere- it was like the whole world stood still.

Then I sat down next to him and laid my arm around his shoulders, he turned his head and we looked each other in the eyes for what felt like hours, but it couldn't have been more than a few seconds.

As from somewhere far away we heard Father Atwood ask if we'd need anything. I didn't even have any idea of what that could be and nonetheless I could figure an answer when all I could see an hear was… was…

It was Mitch. But there was…

"Is it real?" He suddenly whispered as nothing else reached through the pain. "Is it actually real? Isn't this happening to anyone else? Aren't we going to wake up in the morning and find that this was all a dream?"

"No…" I whimpered. "…this hurts too much."

Suddenly I could know nothing else but pain.

For what was left of that night I held onto Mitch harder than I remembered ever holding onto someone else before. Somehow I didn't feel that he must have been holding onto me in the same way, but still he- and everything else seemed too far away while I cried my heart out.

My heart that had, since the day I found out I was pregnant been for Luke and for Luke only. Now far beyond anything that could ever be mended…

How long did we sit there and just hold onto each other and cry I did not know.

One hour? Two? Twelve?

At last, just as the first morning sun rays were shining on us through the nearest window- far after all tears and sobs had started letting go of each other.

It was done slowly, as if we were afraid we'd fall to pieces even more if we did it too fast. I slightly turned towards the window- only by the beginning of this night it hadn't seemed as if it could ever come again.

This had always been Luke's favorite time of day…

Even though the dawn, like with everything else came with pain only…

Suddenly Mitch exhaustedly half mumbled half whispered the one question maybe I should know the answer to.

"Do you think it hurt? The food poisoning must have been terrible. But do you think it hurt to die?"

I laid a hand over my heart, as if feeling mine would help me know the answer to that question. And nothing was for sure- nothing could ever hurt as bad this.

"Yes…" I whispered at last. "…Yes. I think it did."

We hadn't even left the waiting room during the whole night. Now, from pure exhaustion and heartbreaking I and Mitch fell asleep.

For months I wouldn't have been able to fall asleep without that nightmare when Luke came back to me only to disappear again. And I had hoped with everything I had they would disappear…

The night the police showed up at our door, at the end of the day I felt something was wrong- the dream finally didn't come back anymore.

Maybe that was because I hadn't known before how much anything else could hurt. That there was something I didn't want to face….

"I know there's nothing that could hurt like this." I whispered under my breath while I drifted off. "Luke… my baby boy."

When the preacher's name was made I was watching the O. C.

Random fact

The end of the story was the last piece written (I don't write chapters right up and down but I write one bit here and one there depending on what I have ideas for) The worst thing that could ever happen to a human being is someone losing their child. It was hard to write and I re-wrote it a few times . I hope it worked in the end.