I Hate Hospitals (written June 4th, 2011)

There is nothing scarier then watching one of my closest friends on this entire planet get injured. All the breath gets sucked out of you and your heart stops beating in that small fraction of a moment when you wait to see if they’re going to get back up and reassure everyone that everything is all right. When that moment doesn’t come, you are terrified. Even when you are the first person by his side and he tells you he is fine, you’re not convinced. It might then give way, a few minutes later, to him taking back his previous statement and saying that he is anything but all right. In that moment, suddenly, you are in command. You tell everyone that rehearsal is over and that he needs to get to a hospital as soon as fucking possible. You don’t let anyone else help him to the car; only you. You check in on him throughout the entire car ride, asserting any and all attention to anything he is doing because, quite frankly, you are scared out of your fucking mind. You get to the hospital waiting room, and you are the only person who sits by him because, fuck it, you have spent three years calling him your best friend. No one else deserves the one chair next to him. When the woman behind the front desk says only two people are allowed back in the examination room with him, you don’t even bother to ask if any of the other people would like to go. You stand, take him by the arm, and start to lead the way, not even caring if anyone is tagging behind. When the nurse comes in you sit on the edge of your chair, watching as he answers every question she has to ask. Sometimes you interject when you feel it necessary. When the doctor comes in and confirms that, yes, he will be all right and, no, he does not have a concussion, you are filled with such relief. You and the gang take him home, making sure he has a roommate there to watch out for him just in case anything should go awry.  You hug him. You hug him with all you got. You go to work. You sit. You stare off into space for a moment. Suddenly a vision of life without your best friend flashes before your eyes. Only then do you break. Only then do you cry. You are sitting inside a crummy motel front office that smells of old people and bad paint and you cry and you cannot stop and you do not care. You cry also because this term, as a whole, has been awful, and this is just the cherry on top of all the crap, but mostly you cry because the thought of your life without your dearest friend is an awful, terrible nightmare. So you just keep crying.