Spoiler! :
Blue Jeans
By AhmadBlues
By AhmadBlues
I still can’t get over it.
I wish I never asked you to go. Even though it was New Year’s Eve, even though we wouldn’t be seeing each other for God-knows-how-long because the next day I’d frantically pack because the next day I’d have to run and take the 7 o’clock train to get back to Uni, I’d rather know that I could sit next to you and just chat because you were there, and–and–
It’s hard, trying to remember that you can’t come back.
I remember it. It was a dark, rainy night. The puddles on the road shimmered in the light from the lampposts. You and I were in your ancient burgundy golf down the high street. You had this CD on of your favourite band that I happened to dislike – it was a dodgy rock band, I think – and you and I were talking and laughing and having a great time. I remember at the traffic lights, you grabbed the bottle of perfume Blue Jeans and sprayed it on yourself. You knew I used to adore it when you wore that perfume. I remember you leaning in to kiss me.
Citrus. Basil. Bermagot.
The lights turned green as you abruptly pulled away. You quickly pushed the accelerator pedal, but it took a few seconds for the car to move. Cars horned behind you, but you didn’t care. You raised the volume anyway, and carried on talking and laughing. You were halfway through this joke about a member in that band, but stopped when the rear of the car hit another while parallel parking. “Dodgy brakes. I need to get ‘em fixed soon.”
You and I stepped out into the cool, fresh summer air of the night. We walked along the cracked and bumpy pavement, looking at the stars. As we approached Dan’s house, we could already feel the bass vibrations on the pavement for the party.
We walked inside. It was incredibly warm and smelled sickly-sweet as if coke had been spilled everywhere. There were a few cans of it hidden somewhat discreetly under the table.
“Dance the night away...”
You started to dance. “’Part from the disco at school, it’s my first party.” I hung back near the walls, not far from you, making a great big fool of yourself. I stood there, expecting my head to fall off at any second from all that laughter.
Then you disappeared for a bit. Half an hour later, I started looking for you and found you in Dan’s kitchen with a bottle of Vodka, and some other stuff on the kitchen. “What on Earth are you doing, Tom?”
“Making cocktails,” you muttered, not bothering to turn around. A minute later–
“Voila. Vodka, cranberry, and lime!” You whisked around, the cocktail sloshing around and a bit sloshed onto the floor. “Shit.”
I snorted with laughter. Then, you started to go crazy with it. “Vodka and this!” “Vodka and that!” and then God knows what else. I decided to stay sober so we could drive hope. I was probably the only sober person out of everyone at the party, but yet, we were having a good time. Dancing the night away, like the music said. Well, you were, anyway.
At around 11, once I dragged you away from the kitchen, already very drunk (I wouldn’t have been surprised if – if it didn’t happen – you called me the next morning complaining with a bad first hangover). I leaned into your ear and whispered, “I’ll miss you.”
“I’ll miss you too,” you replied, slurring. You leaned in to kiss me, but tripped and fell into a tall muscular man, in complete opposite to your small, lean build.
He growled and shoved you onto the floor as you slammed into the wall. I could’ve sworn my heart skipped a beat.
“Get the –” I winced as he swore “–off me you drunk bastard!” He yelled. The house suddenly turned quiet. Even the music turned down.
“Wanfigh’?” you replied, still looking disorientated and dizzy. “You wanfigh’–”
The bloke walked towards you and slammed a fist into your cheek. I tried to wrap my hands around you to try and stop you retaliating and causing everything to escalate, but you broke free and aimed a punch at his stomach. He dodged the punch before grabbing you and throwing you as if he was in the Olympics doing the Hammer Throw. You slammed once again into the wall.
“No!” I squealed. “Get off him!” I charged at him, but someone grabbed me from behind.
Your body slumped onto the floor, blood covering the wall. He slashed at your unconscious body on the floor, while I stood there, unable to try and stop it all...
Geranium. Fir.
***
I put my arms around your unconscious body in the ambulance. You were unconscious so you wouldn’t have heard any of the crap I said about how your Grandad was dead and your mum was in Spain, unable to be reached. Your face was covered in scratches, smeared in blood. Your eyes were closed; your chest rose and fell ever so slightly with every breath you took.
I didn’t bother wiping away my tears. You’d have probably hated seeing me like that, but all I was concerned about was making sure you’d be OK.
“He doesn’t look good, I’m afraid,” said the paramedic, placing an oxygen mask over your mouth. Tears streamed down my cheek. I wiped it off, looking at the smudged mascara over my hands. “Airways... breathing...” the paramedic murmured to herself.
I prayed that you’d be fine. But that heart monitor–it was as if it kept screaming at me to give up and die myself. He’s not dead. He’s not dead. He’s not dead... Sometimes it would make a frightening beeping noise. The numbers in red – beats per minute – plummeted and soared, like a plane unable to keep a steady altitude. The numbers in green seemed to have something to do with Oxygen. I looked at those numbers. They didn’t look too good.
I couldn’t see if we had stopped, but I could tell because the things in the ambulance stopped moving around. The engine was still humming as the back doors opened. We were greeted by a team of doctors out in the rain wearing white, with a hospital stretcher next to them.
“Quick, quick, on here now–”
Bad thoughts in my head swirled around. I saw you dead. I saw your lifeless body in the morgue. In the grave...
More tears fell. Was it my fault that this happened? If I hadn’t thought of that idea, would you not have been in that stretcher with the blood and scratches all over you? Would you–
“Looks like we need to operate. Looks horrible without even the X-ray. Call the porters to take him to the X-ray theatre and we’ll discuss from there.”
I looked up from my gaze towards the floor. Already, as we were still moving swiftly through the corridors, one of the nurses was fumbling with something–a needle perhaps. Another was holding a tray of equipment.
We turned sharply to the right and entered a room. One doctor knelt down and drew in a few millilitres of crimson blood from your arm. Another tried to push you over to your back. “Clearly broken,” he muttered to himself. “Get the porters. We need an X-ray and it’s straight to the Op Theatre.”
He broke your back.
Two male porters wearing baby blue uniform walked into the room and were preparing to take you to be X-rayed. I grabbed your arm and kissed your hand. You still smelled strongly of alcohol, but that perfume was still faintly there.
Musk. Sandalwood. Vanilla.
They placed your body as carefully as they could onto a hospital bed. It jostled and then began to move. I stood up and watched you go. Go. Go...
***
I waited for hours in the ward. Hours. Days. Weeks. Months. Years. Eternity.
I was sitting on the bed, with the cheap, blue, disposable curtains you’d find at hospitals closed. The lights were dimmed, the only sounds being the occasional beep of a heart monitor if their heartbeat got too high or too low and the snoring of one lady in the far corner near the window.
I didn’t know how long the operation would be going. All I knew was that I’d be here, waiting for you. I finished watching London’s fireworks a few hours previously. They were good, but I’d have rather watched a set of fireworks go off in sync with Big Ben chiming or the fireworks swirling around the London Eye in the same way that a hamster runs forward in a hamster ball.
A tear fell, as I lay in the bed, glancing at the ceiling...
I woke up in the morning to someone’s heart monitor beeping. I didn’t even realise I had slept. Straight away, I leapt out of the bed to find a nurse waiting outside our ‘area’ where the sunlight streamed out of the windows.
“It’s bad news.”
I burst into tears. It was like being told you’d be going to hell for something good you did. As if the sky had fallen. As if 2012 really happened and apocalypse was looming. When you died, it was like I died a little bit too. My stomach felt empty. I felt... empty. Nothing.
When I got your ashes, I put them into the tin box that your cologne had come in. It still smelled faintly of you. Of that citrusy, woodsy scent. I spread them over the Thames, like you said once to.
I wear it sometimes. It’s as if that’s the wax that keeps the candle in me burning. As if that candle is the way to keep you there and my memories of you alive.
Nothing.
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