Katie called it a mercy killing. Annie called it practicing good medicine (and loving her brother enough to let him go). Nick wasn’t sure what to call it, but the chilling revelation just moments before Joshua Donohue took his final breaths would be forever etched into his mind, playing over and over like a bad dream he couldn’t wake up from.
*********************
"You have great timing, AJ,” Nick murmured as he slipped out of Annie’s brother’s hospital room and pulled the door together quietly behind him.
"Why do I have the feeling that what you really mean is 'Your timing is terrible, AJ'?"
Nick let out a tortured sigh. "Because you've known me most of my life, and depending on who you ask, I guess you're right."
"What's up, Nick?" AJ asked, his voice immediately filled with concern. "How's Josh?"
Nick squeezed his eyes shut in an attempt to quell the tears that were rapidly forming. "Nick?"
"He's dying, AJ." Nick let out a shuddered breath and got back to pacing nervously atop the dull white linoleum tile outside the door of Josh's room in the intensive care unit, just as he'd been doing on the other side of it inside the room just moments ago while Annie and Josh's doctor explained to Katie what was about to happen. He knew it must be wrong to feel thankful for the phone call on his new phone, but he was anyway. “They’re taking him off life support right now.”
“Oh, God… I’m sorry, man. What can I do?”
“Distract me,” Nick answered quickly. For the sake of his own mental health, he'd tried desperately not to blame himself for this, but every time he closed his eyes, he could feel Josh's shoulder's slip out of his grasp as he jumped off the boat.
“Done,” AJ said in response. “I was actually calling to tell you we were just checking out the Christmas song you and Howie wrote a few weeks ago. It’s really good!”
“Oh yeah? What do Kevin and Brian think of it?”
“They love it, too.”
“They do?” The fact that the other guys really liked his songwriting was a revelation from the London trip that Nick was still getting used to.
“Of course they do!”
Nick turned at the sound of the door behind him opening to see Annie coming out, her steps unsteady, her eyes and the tip of her nose red, and her cheeks tear-stained. “AJ, I’ve gotta go.”
“Sure. Please let us know if you guys need anything.”
“I will,” Nick promised-- and this time, unlike so many other times he’d said it before, he meant it. He was glad to have finally realized the comforting power of the love of his Backstreet brothers, and with that fresh on his mind, he tucked the phone into his pocket and gave the broken woman standing before him his full attention. “Hey,” he breathed, taking several quick strides towards her.
“He’s awake,” Annie whispered.
Nick’s jaw dropped. “He is?”
“It happens sometimes,” she explained. “Occasionally there’s this surge of hormones that people get before they die that makes them more alert. I’ve always thought of it as God’s way of letting people say goodbye.”
Nick pulled her into his arms and wrapped them around her shoulders, resting his chin on top of her auburn head while she clutched handfuls of his t-shirt in her fists. “I’m so sorry, baby.”
“Don’t be,” she squeaked into his chest. “It’s better this way. For Josh, it’s better this way.” They stood there, Nick holding Annie in a tight bear hug as she leaned into him weakly, for several minutes, until Katie peeked her head out and motioned for Annie to come back in.
Nick loosened his grip on her and started to back away, not feeling particularly comfortable with going back in there. However, Annie reached for his hand, and he felt he had no choice but to put his hand in hers and follow her into the dimly lit hospital room.
The fluorescent bulb above the bed flickered against the pale green wall behind it, illuminating Josh’s broken body in an almost ethereal light, and the breathing machine that just minutes ago forced air through a tube into his lungs was now pushed into a corner. The clear hose that had been Josh’s lifeline dangled limply just inches above the floor, and the tape that secures it to his mouth still clung to it, now crumpled and stuck to itself. A heart monitor beeped loudly, and even Nick could tell that the pauses between beeps were too far apart.
His eyes met Josh’s, and beneath the burnt, swollen flesh and bandages, he thought he detected a smile. Then, Josh held up a piece of hospital stationery from the bedside table that was gripped loosely in his fingers. As Nick and Annie walked closer to the bed, they could see the words “I love u,” scrawled across it, except instead of the word “love,” there was a roughly sketched heart. “I love you, too,” Annie said warmly.
“He isn’t able to talk,” Katie explained. “Because of the damage from the burns in his throat and the breathing tube they just removed.” Nick nodded in understanding as Annie let go of his hand to sit down in the chair pulled alongside Josh’s bed. She gently took the sheet of paper out of Josh’s hand and placed it on the tray table, then took his hand into both of hers.
“Tell them hello for me,” she said to him. “We’ll be just fine down here, okay?” Josh nodded slightly. Nick shoved both of his hands in his jeans pockets and stood awkwardly as the siblings sat in silence, yet very obviously were having a conversation with only their matching green eyes. After a few moments, Josh raised his other hand and reached out towards Nick. Nick hesitantly took a step forward, and placed his shaking hand into Josh’s. Josh wriggled out of Annie’s grasp and used two fingers to point to his eyes, then at Nick, as if to say “I’ll be watching you.”
Nick let out a little chuckle. “Understood,” he replied. "I'll take good care of them," he promised, in reference to the man's little sister and nephew. Josh smiled, then gave Nick a weak handshake before letting him go. He pointed towards the pen and paper atop the faux wood tray table.
“You want to write again?” Josh nodded, and Katie rushed to the rolling table and pushed it closer to the bed, then placed the pen in his hand. He looked at Annie, then down at the paper as he began to write. They all leaned forwards as his shaking hand, barely holding the pen emblazoned with the hospital logo in its grip, began to write. Not surprisingly, the penmanship was akin to that of a preschooler, but the letter “A” was easily legible, as were the, “N, D, R, E, and W” that followed it. “Andrew,” Annie whispered. Then, she looked up at her older brother with wide eyes. Josh blinked, then took in a final gasp as alarms went off. Without another word, his sister stood to silence the alarms while Katie threw herself across her husband’s chest and sobbed. Nick bit his quivering bottom lip and placed his hand across the small of Annie’s back. She sighed and leaned into him, resting her head on his shoulder as they watched the blips on the heart monitor slow to a flat line.
Run by emily_michele
