He heard Logan’s sigh; it was long, slow, patient, as if he were searching for the right words in a minefield.
“Ad,” he whispered, reaching out again, fingers brushing toward his hand. But Adrian didn’t move. He couldn’t. Because if Logan touched him now, Adrian knew he’d come undone. Everything he’d been holding inside—the bitterness, the shame, the guilt, the grief—it would all spill out in a flood he wouldn’t be able to stop. He would say too much. He would confess that he hated the way Logan still looked at him like he was beautiful, like he was still whole, when all Adrian could see in the mirror was a stranger. A gaunt, fading version of the man he used to be, skin pale, bones sharp beneath it, eyes hollowed out by pain. He would admit how much he despised the need, the desperation, the craving for Logan’s voice, his touch, his warmth, how, without it, the silence seemed to scrape his insides raw, like it was hollowing him out from within, like his body was giving up piece by piece.
He would admit that he was afraid. Not just of dying, that fear had settled into him long ago, quiet and constant, but of being left behindbeforedeath ever came. He was afraid that Logan would wake up one day and realize he was already grieving. That he would look at Adrian and see not the man he loved, but the fading outline of someone he used to know. That he would grow tired of pretending. Tired of carrying this weight. Tired of watching someone disappear in slow motion. And if that day came, if Logan reached the edge of what he could bear, Adrian wouldn’t blame him. He would only blame himself. For holding on too tightly. For being the one who begged him to stay. For making him stay.
Logan had been warned. Dr. Tierney had said it early on, calmly, gently, as though clinical language could soften the truth. This will happen. The mood swings. The withdrawal. The hopelessness. The guilt. The anger. The treatments take their toll not just on the body, but on the mind as well.Be patient. Be prepared. Logan had nodded, said he understood. But nothing—nothing—could have prepared him for the way Adrian looked at him now. Not with love. Not even with pain. But with something colder. Like Logan was the villain in the story. Like he was the reason Adrian was here.
Adrian sat stiffly, arms crossed over his too-thin chest, the lines of his body drawn tight with tension. He looked like he could snap with the slightest touch. Logan thought the storm might pass. That if he just waited long enough, the silence would settle. That maybe Adrian would let it go. But then—
“Why did you even do it?” Adrian suddenly said. “Why did you bring me here? Why did you force me into those treatments? I didn’t want this. I don’t want to be here.”
Logan’s breath caught. His whole body tensed, instinctively straightening like a soldier under fire.
“Ad, you don’t mean that.”
“I do.” Adrian’s voice cracked as it rose, hoarse and trembling but full of something that had been building for weeks. “I’m so fucking tired, Logan. Tired of this hospital. Tired of the fucking machines. Tired of being—”
He stopped. The rest of the sentence clung to the silence between them, unspoken but deafening.
Logan felt it. Knew what he didn’t say.Tired of being without you.
But he was here. Hehadbeen here. Every day, every hour he could spare. He had held Adrian through fevered nights, whispered to him through vomiting fits, carried his weight when his legs couldn’t. He had slept in stiff hospital chairs, answered every nurse’s question, and memorized every medication schedule. He had stayed, and stayed, and stayed.
And still, this.
Still, this chasm between them—wide and aching, emerging unexpectedly, tearing through the beautiful connection they had been nurturing like a crater.
Adrian didn’t see that. Couldn’t. Because there was a voice inside him louder than Logan’s presence, louder than reason, louder than love. A voice that said:You’re not worth staying for. You’re not enough. You’re not lovable like this.
And that voice, that cruel, inner gravity, was dragging everything down.
“I’m tired of being this,” Adrian said, and his voice trembled under the weight of everything it carried. “Of being so goddamn lame. Of being stuck in this fucking bed, in this body that doesn’t even feel like mine anymore. Of the pain. God, Logan, I’m in constant pain. Everything hurts. Everything.”
Logan’s stomach twisted, his fists tightening in his lap, helplessness clawing its way up his throat like a scream he couldn’t release.
“I can’t do anything,” Adrian continued, and now his voice cracked—raw, exposed, bleeding. “I get exhausted just walking to the damn bathroom. I can’t run. I can’t surf. I can’t even eat without throwing up. I feel like I’m not even here, like I’m some fucking ghost of myself. And I can’t even be your equal like this.” His chest was heaving now, every wordtearing itself out of him like it had been buried too long. “I hate that I can’t work. That I depend on you for everything. That I’m not… enough.”
The silence that ensued was an inertia, a stifling inert air that refused to budge. Adrian’s breath shuddered as he exhaled, his shoulders sagging, the words draining the last flicker of strength from his being.
“I refused treatment because I knew how it would be,” he said, voice quieter now, shaking his head. “And I was right.”
Logan looked down, his throat tight, his eyes stinging.
“You’re sick, Adrian,” he uttered, gently, trying to steady the crack in his voice. “Sick. Don’t you get it? This is temporary. Just until you get better.”
Adrian let out a sharp, humorless laugh. “But what if I don’t get better?” The bitterness in his voice nearly tore Logan open. “What if this is all for nothing?”
Logan’s head snapped up, panic rising in his chest.
“What if I end up exactly where I would’ve been anyway,” Adrian pushed on, eyes glassy, burning, “just dragged through months of this—this humiliation, this fucking hell—for nothing?”
“It won’t be for nothing,” Logan insisted, desperate now, but Adrian wasn’t listening. He was spiraling, unraveling, the small drops swelling into a flood as the dam gave way—every fear, every resentment, every unspoken thought crashing through the breach, tearing him apart from the inside out.
“Why did you do this to me, Logan?” The words carry the same impact as a punch, strong enough to shatter something between them. “Because you felt guilty? Because you felt sorry for the sick guy? Because you needed to fix something in your own fucking head—”
“Ad—” Logan tried, but the name barely passed his lips.
“I told you I forgave you!” Adrian’s voice broke completely now, tears spilling down his cheeks, his chest rising and falling too fast. “So why did you have to do this to me?! Why couldn’t you just let me go? Why couldn’t you have just left me alone?!”
