"But my dreams, they aren't as empty as my conscience seems to be."

[dontcomebackforme]

Who: Nathan Mitchell and Carmen Mitchell
What: The bearer of bad news
Where: Nate's apartment
When: Early hours of the morning following THIS

Nate had been saying for weeks on end that he was going to get completely blind drunk on the two year anniversary of his break-up with Tyler. It had been his sheer intention too. He wanted to just be numb to it, not thinking over and over about everything they had and lost, and how it all crashed and burned no matter how much he tried to hold it together. He and Tyler used to be amazing together. Nate knew they were soul mates, but when Tyler changed in the wake of his rape, not even their souls could be held together. Tyler was intent on destroying it, he was intent on not letting Nate help him, and Nate had been pulled under the bus in a bloody mess the more he tried to help. His heart had been completely shattered, and to this day, he had never been able to find all the pieces to put it back together. He hadn't come close to even contemplating dating again. He hadn't even slept with anyone else. It had still felt like he would be cheating on Tyler doing it, even if it was ironic consider that was exactly what Tyler had done to him. Ultimately, it wasn't the cheating that caused Nate to end it, it was knowing that had been the last final straw and he literally had no way of helping Tyler when Tyler had detached all feeling for him. He couldn't live his life in constant fear of what Tyler was doing every time he walked out that door.

He had one drink before it was already roiling in his stomach. He seemed to have a psychological block to substance these days, knowing how much it had destroyed Tyler. He wanted to be drunk, but he couldn't. Instead, he went out onto the front step of his apartment block and went through a whole packet of cigarettes. He wasn't hungry... he wasn't much of anything but numb. He wasn't a smoker, but he could have one or two socially now and again. At this rate, he probably gave himself lung cancer in one night. He was still out there, his brain on a constant replay of his life with Tyler, how happy they had been, and how it all went horribly wrong. Everything he wanted to switch off with booze but couldn't. Tears were dry on his cheeks from the three times he had broken down sitting out there, but now he was just back to being numb. He ashed the cigarette over the iron railing of the steps and then watched the glow of the end of it in front of him before he put it to his lips again. This night felt like it was going on for fucking ever.

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[paramedicfaghag]

The drive over to Nate's apartment had seemed to take forever, and not be long enough all at the same time. She'd spent the whole thing replaying the situation in her head, and trying like hell to figure out the best way to tell her brother the news she had to tell him. Nothing really felt right. Then again, was there ever a right way to say what it was she needed to say? This was her big brother. The person who loved her in a way only a big brother could. The person who'd saved her fucking life, for God's sake. And she couldn't spare him this pain. There was nothing she could do here but go in and tell Nate what had happened. And of all the fucking days, it had to be today. She could only really hope that Nate hadn't gotten himself so wasted that he wouldn't know what was going on when she talked to him. But after parking the car, she started to go to the door, but never got that far. Instead, she found her brother smoking like a chimney on the front step of his building. She didn't bother telling him to stop. It would be pointless, and besides that, the poor guy looked like he needed the smoke. And he really would after this conversation.

With a deep breath, she moved over to sit on the step next to Nate, and before she even said a word, she just wrapped both arms around his waist and gave him a gentle squeeze. There were tears on her own face, too, though she'd tried to clean them up before she got here. Nate was going to need her to have her shit together on this, because she had the feeling he wouldn't have. "Nate," she finally said, pulling out of the hug to meet her older brother's gaze. "There's... There's something that I need to talk to you about, and it might be... It's not going to be an easy thing. And I'm really sorry to be the one who has to tell you this, but I didn't want anyone else to do it, because you're my brother, and I love you." She paused there, trying to gather her thoughts. There was nothing to do now but just say what she'd come to say, one way or another. "Nate, Andy and I got a call last night, and... It was Tyler. He... He tried to kill himself. It wasn't an accidental OD. He was trying to die. We got him to the hospital, and he's... He's not doing very well, but you're still listed as next of kin." She stopped there. There was so much more, but this alone would be a huge thing to swallow.

[dontcomebackforme]

Hugs between them weren't really a foreign thing, lack of words were, however. Carmen had been saying how she wanted to try to get the night off to be with him, but Nate knew it wouldn't end up happening. In a way, he was glad because it left him alone with his thoughts, and on a day like this, he needed it. He needed time with all the good, the bad, and the very ugly memories. It wasn't like paying respect to the relationship or anything, mourning it like it was some sort of beloved dead relative. The thing was, Nathan had just never been able to find an adequate way to describe what it was and how it left him. Nothing was ever enough, no analogy really fit, and none of it ever made him feel better. When Carmen did finally come and, at first, didn't say a word, he knew something was off and it was more than just offering him comfort on this anniversary that would never not be hard. Well, technically the date was over now, but he couldn't switch his feelings off at midnight. This wasn't a fucking Disney movie where everyone lived happily ever after.

There was nothing that could have prepared him for what she revealed when she did speak, though. As soon as he heard the name, his blood ran cold, but by the time she finished and fell quiet again, he felt sick. In fact, all he could do was just stare at her, like he hadn't even heard what she was saying. The half-spent cigarette dropped from his fingers and tumbled down onto one of the steps beneath him, still lit. He tried to speak after a few moments, but no words came out. He went to swallow back the lump in his throat that had suddenly appeared, but it was more like a choked cough through a gasp for air. He really did feel like someone had just firmly booted him in the guts and took his breath away. There was one slight shake of his head before he managed to get some words formed. "What do you even want me to say?"

[paramedicfaghag]

There was a part of Carmen wishing tonight that she had gotten the night off after all, because then she wouldn't have seen what she'd seen, and she wouldn't have this godawful conversation to have with her brother. But on the reverse of that, maybe it was meant to be that she was there tonight... that she was the one who responded to the call with Andy, and had been there when Tyler was in and out of consciousness, hanging onto life, but just barely, to hear what he'd said. She was sure that some people thought she was nuts, but that didn't matter. She knew what she'd heard, and as much as it was going to hurt, Nate had a right to know. She just wished there were something on this fucking earth that would make any of this easier. Nate had always been her protector, the one who looked after her and made sure that she was safe when no one else would bother. And while he'd protected her from her own stupid choices, she couldn't protect him from pain that wasn't even his fault.

"There... There's more, Nate," she said, swallowing hard, and wishing she had answers for him right now. All she had was more information that would only raise more questions. "He was sort of... in and out of consciousness. And he was asking for you. Calling your name. He said he still loves you. Granted, he was out of it, but that part? I heard it, Nate. It's what he said, and I don't know what it means, but... either way, you... I think you need to go down there if you can. If for no other reason than you're the next of kin, and they can't release information to most anybody else. There were... a couple of people there. His roommate... People who know him. Shit, there's... There's really no good way to go about this, Nate. I wish there were. But... Tyler needs help. I don't know what else to do or say, but he's... He's at the end of his rope."

[dontcomebackforme]

There was a part of Nathan that just wanted to get up, walk away, crawl into bed and never come out. At least in there, nothing could hurt him. The other part of him was sort of rooted on the spot and he was worried if he even tried to move, his legs would give out from under him. His insides felt like they were being churned up by a lawn mower and that someone had a cold tight-fisted grip around his heart. It even felt like he had to remind himself to breathe or he just might literally had the breath knocked out of him. There was also a strange ringing in his ears, and a sensation that his mind was going to explode with too much information pulsing in there. He was glad now that he hadn't gotten drunk. There was no way he could have taken any of this drunk and for all he knew, he would just keep drinking to try to cockblock his heart getting once again thrown under a bus and railroaded over. He was trying to process the first part of her information before the next came. Fuck, he wanted to just be so angry. Angry was the easy emotion, the one he didn't have to explain. It would be so fucking easy to hate Tyler and never forgive him for anything. The only problem was, he had never hated Tyler, no matter the horrible things he had done and nearly tore Nathan down with him.

He pressed his lips together and swallowed, but his mouth and throat were dry. His composure was already lost and as much as he wished he could just tell Carmen to tell the hospital to go fuck himself because he wanted nothing to do with this, he just found tears welling up in his eyes instead and they were spilling over before he had any chance to try to stop them. He was angry at himself for not knowing how to react, but other than that, he just felt sick and numb. "What did he do?" he finally asked, with a crack his voice. May as well stick to the cold hard facts for now because he just couldn't face the other stuff she was saying. Not yet. Could he even go to the hospital and see Tyler? The jury was still well out on that.

[paramedicfaghag]

Carmen knew her brother, probably better than just about anybody... Anybody, that is, except for Tyler when things had been at their best. Back then, Tyler and Nate had known each other inside and out, and they'd just worked, almost without even trying. She could remember so many times when one of them had simply looked at the other and known how to react, what the other needed. And that thought alone was enough to make her swallow hard to choke back a threatening sob. At the end of the day, Tyler and Nate were soulmates. They just were, and regardless of all the horrible things that had torn them apart, Carmen knew deep down that Nate would never love anyone else the way he loved Tyler. A connection like that was a once in a lifetime kind of thing, and that just made it even harder to swallow. She couldn't imagine being in Nate's place, having Aaron be the one who threw everything away because something so horrible happened, and knowing that she had no choice but to walk away from him, or destroy herself in the process. Because that really had been Nathan's choice. Let go. Stop trying to save the man you love more than life itself. Let him destroy himself. Or be destroyed with him.

The question Nate asked her was very simple in itself, and it had a very simple, if difficult to face answer. She took a deep breath, trying to keep her own composure as the scene she'd walked into played out in her head again and again. Tyler lying there completely out of it and covered in his own blood. Ryder doing his dead-level best to tell them what had happened, despite quite obviously being freaked out. But Nate didn't need all of that. All he wanted to know was, in very clear and basic terms, what Tyler had done to himself. "He... He took Valium that wasn't his and slit his wrists. It's a miracle he's even still alive. His fever spiked... We got him to the hospital, and he's in good hands... Riley's looking after him."

[dontcomebackforme]

The confusion was almost suffocating. Nathan had tried for two years to get his heart to heal after being so hurt and betrayed by Tyler, but tried was the operative word. He had never succeeded, and instead just buried it away under things he could make more sense of like work and being a good brother. It took a good year to stop looking at other happy couples and being envious of what they had, or even worse, letting them remind of what he used to have with Tyler. It was like having it all ripped away from him had left these gaping wounds that were so deep, they were impossible to heal. The thing about that metaphor was that in comparison, Nathan had just had his heart ripped away, and the most important person it had every cherished. Tyler had his whole soul ripped away from him by that monster, and the wounds were so much more deep. But Nathan had just reached a point of no return. He had been so willing to help Tyler fight, and try to recover, but when he knew it was a lost cause, he had to walk away because he knew the person he loved with every fibre of him was gone.

Only, this shell of him was left that kept living in a constant storm of self-destruction, and here it was right before them... the volcano erupting. Tyler had tried to take his own life, and it wasn't an accident. He had gone on as long as he could, and not he couldn't anymore. And it wasn't at all lost on Nathan that it was the anniversary of their break-up that this was happening. Was it just a terrible coincidence...? Terrible wouldn't even cover it. "A miracle or a curse? How is it a miracle that he's still alive? By now, it's just dumb luck," he reminded her. There was no room for miracles in Tyler's life, not when all the times he actually needed one, he had been left to decay in his own misery. Nathan got up off the step and wrapped his arms up over his head, trying to figure out what the fuck he was supposed to do. "Maybe's it's better he doesn't survive it." The words nearly choked him, but he couldn't help voice the painful thoughts swirling through his head now. "An OD that bad, he could have damaged his organs. Any time without enough blood flow to his brain, he could be brain damaged."