Wing-Span

Wing-Span

Warnings: Near experience character death, RPS and incredibly angsty.

Pairings: Orlando Bloom/Johnny Depp

Notes: This is in every way dedicated to my best friend, whose life was put on the line earlier the same night I wrote this. I cried, writing this, thinking about how stupid it would have been if he had gotten killed by a freakin’ careless driver who probably had his head up his ass with his cell phone glued to his god damned ear. I just want Jason to know that I love him, and especially after my own accident when a car had hit me, to also make him realize the extent of trauma I would have been put through if I had been a witness to his death. Forgive me if this is a little too angsty, but I couldn’t stop thinking about how we as human beings think we’re invincible until something like a family member or best friend’s murder forces us inalinally come to terms with reality and every possible danger waiting around a very close corner.

Disclaimer: I do not claim rights to any Pirates of The Carribean references or character names. Don't sue me!

~*~

It was raining, a dark blanket of angry clouds storming the night sky as I stood in the middle of a busy street. Cars were stopped on either side of me, passengers watching, horrified at the scene I stood before. I cried. I couldn’t stop crying, and even as sirens sounded around me I couldn’t move or breathe.

His body laid at my feet, lifeless and cold, his gorgeous chocolate eyes still cracked open and staring at me with a departing affection that continued to rip at my fragile heart. I was exposed, and I was alone. I had no one to turn to and no one to comfort me, and I didn’t care. I shouldn’t be here, I should have followed him when he chose to walk off, I should have apologized. This was my fault, my guilt thrown back in my face and my soul shredded in agony. He was so beautiful, even in death, and he hadn’t deserved this, it was my fault, I should be where he lay, I should be searching for the gates of Hell with broken wings and a fake smile.

I reacted violently when the medics tried to push me out of their way to get to him, and I became hostile when the police officers tried to questie. Ie. I was put in the ambulance with him, and sat in the corner, afraid. The ss ofs of the street and the sounds of the life support machines were all a background noise as I stared at the pale face of my lover. He didn’t move, his hair had lost its fine shine and his lips had begun to turn blue at the corners. His clothes were soaking wet from the moody weather and his eyelids swollen from crying in my arms in the last minutes of his life. I loved him, I had bloody loved him damnit, and God had taken him from me and the pain I seemed to always cause him. I finally did it, I finally killed him, and I hadn’t meant to.

I was so blind, I always had been, and he’d always told me the same. I wished he hadn’t been right, I wished I had never met him. I wanted him to be happy, I wanted him to have his wings. I wished I had a bell in hand with me, so that my angel could have his wings.

He would have pearly feathers that could stretch into a wingspan as magnificent as he was, he would smile and laugh and enjoy his wings. He would fly gracey thy through the clouds, and watch me bitterly as I continued with my misery until my very last breath would be taken. I wanted my blood to run cold; I wanted to be lying besides him now with the same medics trying to revive me. But I wouldn’t fight for this, I wouldn’t want to be brought back, I deserved to stay asleep for eternity.

The hospital was a maze of white hallways, corridors crawling with people crying either in sadness or joy and I ignored them all. I ignored everything but the sway of my lover’s body on the cot as he was rolled hurriedly to the emergency room. They had to force me into a waiting chair to keep me from his side, but eventually I did stay, falling limply across the plastic chair and continued to cry. I couldn’t lift my head to a doctor telling me to wait, telling me to have hope and pray. But there was no God for me anymore. No God, no deity that was revered as the most merciful being in our history, would take my love away from me without giving me the chance to say good bye.

I watched the ceiling with blind eyes and listened to different, anxious voices with deaf ears, waiting as time inched away into blackness. I saw no more white tile and no more red blood, the blood of my lover spilled on my hands and clothes, forever marking me as the bad guy, the cruel uncaring man who’d let his love die. I was offered coffee, I was offered comfort, but no one stayed long as I sat in silence, wishing I could stop these tears from tracking down my broken face.

I shouldn’t have yelled at him, I shouldn’t have tried to claim he was a liar. He wasn’t the liar, I was, I lied when I said I had hated him, had lied when I said I didn’t care if he moved back into his own place. I did care, I did love him, and now he was gone. I couldn’t feel my body, it had grown numb to everything and I felt heavy. I was weighted down so much with self-hatred and depression that I was left with no strength. I was weakeryterything seemed so distant and insignificant, so inane and nonexistent. I realized then, that I had taken everything we’d had for granted.

We were not invincible; humans were just another animal living on earth like everything else. I felt like a squirrel, or a deer, and like one of them a car was something that imposed a great deal of fear on my life. He had been a deer, too, like me, but he had been one of those unfortunate deer, and had stepped in the path of a drunk. I remember my scream, a blood-curdling, ear-splitting scream that resounded against the busy street and even further down to the houses around the corner. I awakened the entire hotel, a crowd gathering the moment my voice cracked and my legs jolted into motion. More people had reached his side before I had, and I cursed them for being there, holding me back from holding my love one last time. But it wasn’t their fault.

I blinked another stream of rivers down my cheeks, the salty droplets running down my neck and soaking into my t-shirt. I was dressed to be in bed, my lover at my side contently. That was where we would be now, at this very moment, even if we had been making love we’d be sleeping right now with sated grins painting our faces. I choked on a sob, but otherwise kept silent and rigid. I remember his smiles, so mischievous and alert, lighting up his dark eyes like wild embers from a fire on a starry summer night. His tattoos, sketched inis tis tanned skin and living as portraits of memories along his lithe body. I remember his voice, so deep and wise, rustic and heavy when aroused and then the noises he’d make when we enthralled ourselves in the passions of our lust. It kept my tears from stopping, these horrible recollections. I never thought we would come to this, but now that we were here, I felt it was too soon.

A loud flat line caught my attention, and I finally closed my eyes. He was gone now, for sure. I sat up, limbs burdened heavily and I heaved upwards, forcing myself to stand and walk for the room I knew my lover to be in. People rushed in and out, weaving around me in blurs of color and motion, as I seemed to be in slow motion. This was no movie, this was no horribly played out scene where I could fuck up, start laughing and hear the director yell cut. Johnny was gone. No amount of money, no amount of begging could bring him back. I needed a miracle; there was no cheating to it this time, no talking my way out of it.

“Mr. Bloom!”

I felt my feet stop moving and my body tilt to the right to see a doctor in white. He rushed up to me, a look of regret on his face and sweat beading on his forehead. His gloved hands were filmed in Johnny’s blood, and I choked. This wasn’t happening, and in sort of a delayed reaction I gasped and started to shake. I was afraid that I was going into shock, it was the last thing this poor man needed, but it was the first thing I wanted.

“Mr. Bloom forgive me-…”The The world stopped spinning, and the doctor stopped talking, as my guardian angel revealed herself by sticking her head out from behind a swinging door. She had bright green eyes, and long black hair that was coiled down her back in a thigh length rope of a braid. She too wore the blood of my lover, but she also wore a frantic expression of hope.

“Doctor Shultz! We got his pulse back!”

My heart jumped with the Doctor’s reaction, and he left me quickly to join the other surgeon in the ER. I was frozen where I stood, just starring through the window of the door, watching the green line on the small black screen bounce with Johnny’s shallow heart beat and even shallower breathing rate. I felt my blood freeze, and all the commotion of time eddied around this one operating room; all movement was recorded in front of me, even though people still moved around my unmoving body.

I did not take into account how much time had passed before the same graying man returned to me, his expression lifted and completely different. He was smiling, brightly. I wanted to cry again, but was rooted to the ground and too scared, far too hopeful, to even breathe again.

“Mr. Bloom,” he repeated, with a touch of warmth to it this time. “I was afraid we’d lose him, but we were able to stabilize Mr. Depp’s condition and he will survive. Now, he’s been seriously injured and we’ll need-…”

The rest was nothing I could understand. I didn’t realize that I had started laughing, tears finally falling back into motion and the universe went back to normal. I had hugged the doctor tightly, and he’d smiled brighter before leaving me.

Johnny was going to be ok, he would survive. The words stabilize and survive, were words I could understand, could comprehend, could take, but the word afraid grounded me again. I sat in my chair, this time keeping my attention on the room where my lover lay, brought back to life, brought back to me. He would survive.

This was a story that had happened not two weeks ago, and Johnny had finally been brought home. Things were different, I no longer got into his personal business if I had no part of it, I no longer watched him wherever he went. I trusted my lover, I would protect him, and never again would I take anything for granted. He would see his pearly white wingspan some other day, but for now, with or without them, Johnny would always be my angel, and I would always treat him as such.

~*~

Again, forgive me, but even though I could barely see the screen and even though my hands were shaking really hard I had to write this. Writing lets me blow off my emotions, whether it’s anger, humor or sadness I have to write. It’s my release, and I warned you before you started reading that this was going to be horribly angsty, so I don’t want complaints, I really don’t need them right now.

But, pray for Jason for me, thank God if you believe in him that one more person wasn’t killed in a careless accident today. I did.