Summary:

Typical Drake & Josh storyline. Drake and Josh plan to go to a concert where a famous singer will be, but get sidetracked when a mysterious box addressed to Walter shows up and Meghan's pranks take over. Drake also must deal with an annoying girl (who says everything with a "w") from his class, that also shows signs she has a crush on him. When he & Josh go to the concert, something terrible happens.

Disclaimer:

Don't own Drake, Josh, Meghan, Walter, Audrey or anyone else in this story except "Kate McGin" and "Anita Prescott" (copyright, Morgan May 2005). I don't own the tv show "Drake & Josh" or any of the characters, and have no connection, affiliation or association with it. Don't own Oprah, either, LOL.

Note to Readers:

I can't believe I actually pulled that last chapter off! I expected it to seem flimsy and unbelievable but it wasn't! I'm so excited! I love to write angst, so this is fun. Thanks for the reviews! I thought for a minute that nobody was ever gonn'a read this story. –hugs this story-- It's really my little baby, this story is. Hehe. Well, this chapter has even more emotions in it. But it should warm your heart a little, apart from the Drake tragedy. R&R!

Story: "Party in a Box"

Chapter: "We're Brothers"; Four

Written By: Ginger

Extras:
Italics in "quotation marks" symbolize thoughts of Drake's.

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Josh's mind was cloudy when his eyes opened. Dust was settling around him, and as his eyes focused, he felt the seat belt gripping him to the seat in a vice-like hold. He figured out that he wasn't hurt badly, just a few bruises and a sore shoulder. The airbag was out, but deflated in front of him and when he realized, with alarm, what had happened, he looked over toward the passenger's side. With a deep gasp, Josh was horrified at what he saw.

He jumped out of the car as fast as he could muster and ran to the other side of it, stumbling a bit as he went along. "Oh, no…" he moaned to himself in a terror-filled tone, as he clutched the crumpled bumper of the car for support: "Oh, God, no…" As he turned the corner and came around to the right side of the vehicle, the sight spread before his unwilling eyes was vicious. Nearly unbearable for him.

The whole passenger side of the new convertible was almost lopped off. The seat belt inside the car, lay carelessly on the seat, snapped in two frayed pieces. Then came the dreaded moment, as Josh's eyes wandered over the scene of the motionless body of his step-brother. Drake lay silently on the soft ground, face down to the grassy ditch that the car had been slung into. Over him rested the crushed piece of metal that had once been used as a car door, and beside him lay the remains of the rear-view mirror. Josh had never felt such a rush of emotion in his life. It was terrible. He didn't want this. He didn't want to have such horrified feelings, building up inside him. He grabbed the car door and managed to drag it away from Drake's body before a hand on his shoulder startled him.

"Are you okay?" a voice of a middle-aged man behind him asked. Josh turned around and in a dazed tone, murmured a faint: "Yeah." After a moment, he asked the forty-ish man: "Who are you?" The man paused uncomfortably for a moment and then stuttered, in a suspicious voice: "I'm… I'm the one you hit. The ambulance will be here in a minute or two, I guess. Your friend looks kind of… bad." the shifty man spoke. "He's… he's my brother." Josh said, with a slightly uncontrollable emotional break in his voice. Believe me, if he could have managed to hide his feelings from this individual, he would have, because though the man seemed nice enough, he had a frightening air of dangerousness about him.

Josh looked back over at his brother's broken body and felt his stomach twist as he realized, for the first time, that Drake was seriously injured, if not dead. With this thought, he left the man and hurried back to his brother, dropping next to him, on his knees. "Oh, no…" he murmured, looking down at his beaten shoulders, as blood began to seep through the fibers, to the surface of the fabric of his sleeve.

"Don't pick him up." a different voice said, closer to him. Josh turned slightly to see another man. But this man had a kind, wise face, unlike the man he had hit in the car. "He may have critical injuries. And you're probably worse off than you think, yourself." "I—" Josh turned and watched the kind man sit down beside him: "No, I'm okay. Just a sore shoulder and a scrape or two. …Who are you?" Josh felt as if he would be forever asking that same question. "My name's James. I saw the wreck and thought you might need somebody here to help."

Turning back to his brother, Josh was barely able to turn Drake's beaten, bruised body face up, without shouting out with distain for himself. A tear dropped down his face as his mind screamed: "What have you done to him?"

"Is he alive?" the stranger asked quickly, dropping down beside Josh and the unconscious teenager. "I…don't—don't—" Josh broke into tears. The nice man bent to gently feel Drake's pulse. Josh looked up with such desperately hopeful eyes that the stranger felt as if his heart would break. "He's alive." he spoke the reassuring words to the devastated boy, for whom he had found compassion.

"Thank God…" Josh murmured, closing his eyes and hearing ambulance and police sirens becoming louder until he thought his ear drums would burst. He felt as if an eternity had passed before he opened his eyes again, to see paramedics quickly surrounding Drake with medical equipment. What happened next seemed to happen almost as quickly as the wreck had, except it was all in a deep white cloud for Josh, unlike the clear, torturous vision of metal crushing metal.

A paramedic quickly looked Josh over to make sure he was fine, and after bandaging a cut of his arm and telling him to be careful with his shoulder, the doctor handed his over to be watched and cared for by a policeman.

The policeman asked Josh's name and parent's names and Josh gave them readily, as he sat, wrapped in a blanket on the seat of the police car, leaning his head against the open car-door frame. Everything that happened seemed to be in slow motion, or in a dream that one begins to recall, but can't see clearly in his mind. The policeman got Walter on the phone and began to talk.

"Hello, Mr. Walter Nichols? This is Officer George O'Brian, San Diego police. Sir, I'm afraid your sons have been in a serious car accident. Josh is fine and unhurt, but Mr. Parker is in critical condition." The officer's brow bent in empathic sympathy to the shocked father of the two boys.

"We're on highway 44, north-bound. Please get here as soon as you can. We're rushing your other son, Drake, to the San Diego Hospital via ambulance, immediately." After a pause and a few understanding nods, the officer talked a bit more to Walter.

Josh was totally tuning everything out. How could this happen? Drake was so helpless all of the sudden. He had been so excited about seeing Kate McGin and now… now what? Josh just wanted to open his eyes and be able to wake up from this terrible nightmare. Drake. Why Drake? Why not him, instead? Why had he done this to his poor stepbrother? Drake had just been playing and joking around, but then Josh had to loose his sanity and cause his brother this tremendous pain. Josh buried his head in his hands and cried. "…Why?" he murmured aloud, unable to contain the whole extent of grief. The police officer patted his shoulder and said in a gruff Los Angeles voice, softened by kindness: "He'll be fine. It ain't you fault."

"Josh…?" a voice asked: "It is 'Josh', right?" The pleasant man who had witnessed the wreck stood there. "Yes, sir." the boy nodded. "Did you see the man that you ran into leave? He's gone!" "No, sir, I didn't. He scared me… there was something weird about him." answered Josh. "Well, if he was unkind, it might have been because his car was ruined." the man managed to chuckle. Josh nodded, but deep inside, he felt that there was something about the man that no one else saw but him.

After a while, James left him sitting alone on the edge of the police car seat. Josh could hardly believe all of this. He felt like he had screwed up his brother's life forever with just a push of the gas pedal. What had possessed him to do that?

The next thing Josh knew was the feeling of his father grabbing him in a tight hug and sniffling his tears away. Meghan hung around her stepfather's legs, being abnormally quiet, and she seemed to understand the emotions of this moment, with reverence. When Josh's dad stepped back after a long hug, he looked up into Josh's face and touched his shoulder carefully: "Be brave, Josh. It's going to be okay." For once in her life, Meghan looked at Josh and threw herself into Josh's arms. With tears in her young eyes, she whispered: "I'm sorry for pranking him yesterday. And you too. Don't worry, Josh. He'll be okay… won't he?"

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Drake woke, the whole atmosphere seeming laden with a thick, white mist. He felt an unexplainable pain course through his ribs and a moan issued from his dry lips. "Where am I?" A bright light clicked on above his face and it's clear rays fell down to his waist.

With some difficulty, he managed to focus his eyes to see that he was lying in a bed, dressed in a hospital gown. "…J—Josh…" he tried to speak, quietly. "Don't talk just yet, Mr. Parker." An unfamiliar voice spoke somewhere off in what seemed to be a dense, dim fog.

Drake obeyed the unseen speaker and didn't try to talk. Instead, he struggled with all his might to remember what had happened to him. Try as he might, he could find no explanation as to why or where he was, wherever that happened to be. All he could figure was he had broken ribs or something and that he was in a hospital. He could faintly hear someone walk out of the room and then he heard excited voices in the next room. He laid, in utter confusion, still trying to surmise what had become of him.

He was tired. He closed his eyes and tried to go to sleep. It came pretty easy but suddenly he had a thought strike him. "The box in the garage! Wherever I am, Josh better be guarding it, because if he's not, Dad might find it and then—" Then what? Drake didn't know. He didn't even really know why he and his brother had been hiding the box, after all, except that they both felt an over-whelming need to. If that box had some connection with the police, and Walter was innocent in the matter so far, the boys didn't want him to find it and be tempted to get involved.

"…Drake?" his brother's voice whispered from a few feet away. Drake opened his eyes, recognizing the voice. "Josh? Where are you?" he managed. Speaking hurt. Especially in his ribs. "I'm here, Drake." Josh said, grabbing his brother's hand. Drake focused and soon his eyes cleared completely, to the sight of Josh sitting in a chair beside the hospital bed. "…Josh, we were in a wreck, weren't we?" Drake said, suddenly recalling everything.

"Yeah, Drake." the stepbrother answered, able to crack a smile: "But you're gonn'a be okay. I swear." Drake tried to stir from his pillow: "Are you okay?" Josh quickly assured him that he was fine. "But… um, I really wanted to talk with you about something, Drake." Drake noticed the somberness in his brother's tone. "What is it, man?" he smiled. "I…I hurt you Drake…" Josh said, his voice starting to crack: "I made all this happen because I was being stupid. I wish I could just rewind back in time and stopped myself. …Why did I do that to you?" Josh leaned over and stopped as a stray tear wandered down his face.

"Josh, I don't blame you, man." Drake said, laying a compassionately forgiving hand on his brother's: "You didn't run into that truck on purpose. We're brothers." He paused for a moment as a stroke of pain battered his ribs. "I… I love you, Josh. A thing like this can't break us up. I'll get well soon and everything will be fine. I promise." The last two words were deep and meaningful. Josh was so surprised at his brother's attitude that a smile spread his face and as a happy-tear fell from his eye, he squeezed Drake's hand. "I know. And Drake… thanks for being you." Drake gave a reassuring squeeze back and Josh left the room, adding a kind: "I'll be back later. Thanks, brother."

As Josh walked down the hall to the waiting room where his parents were, he had for the first time in hours, a hopeful feeling in his heart. Drake apparently forgave him wholly for what he had done, and he was awake and stable. And with a happy smile, Josh repeated in a whisper, what his brother had said to him: "We're Brothers."