Chapter 29:

Stand By Me

Nick paced his room (slowly, which only added to his frustration), wringing his hands. Why hadn’t he said anything? He was dying to; the words had been right on the edge of his lips. He just couldn’t push them out. Some force was holding him back.

You never had to see him, did you? Well I did, Nick. I did and I have never been so scared in my whole fucking life.

He stopped for a moment in the middle of the room, completely oblivious to his surroundings.

Maybe the reason he couldn’t do what he so desperately wanted to was because he just didn’t understand. From the moment he had woken up he had been trapped in a bubble, one that confined him even more than the one he already lived in. For him, all that existed was his own hurt, his own pain. It was his, it belonged to him and it was a part if him. He couldn’t run from it, and no matter how he tried he couldn’t hide from it. Brian had tried to enter that bubble, and Nick had been so afraid that it would pop that he had struck him down in the worst possible way. He had seen the hope die in Brian’s eyes. Not only that, but he had been the one to kill it.

And instead of trying to make amends, what had he done? Nothing. Nothing! Howie was right. He didn’t deserve Brian’s friendship. He was so concerned about hiding from his own demons that he had refused to raise his head and see the nightmare that faced the rest of them.

What had happened to Brian? What had happened to all of them? That night had been stolen from him, and until now he had been too terrified to ask for it back. Now he needed it back. He had to know what it was that had put them all down this road. It terrified him, but he needed to understand it. It was the only way.

There was only one person who could answer his question, the one who had raised it in the first place. He left his room and went to find Howie, and discovered him lifting weights in the gym with his back turned. As he stretched up he noticed Nick’s reflection in the wall mirror in front of him. Instantly he paused, and averted his eyes uncomfortably, busying himself with adjusting the weight level he was using.

His face was unreadable, but there was something about him that was a little different from the others. It could only be seen by someone who knew him as well as Nick did. Hidden deep within those caring brown eyes of his was a man who had aged years in a matter of weeks. Some of the happiness, the carefree spirit that typically lived in those eyes was missing. None of them were the same as they had been before the accident, but some extra weight rested on Howie’s shoulders, one that was starting to become too much for him to carry. Perhaps his unrelenting devotion to his fitness, which had increased significantly, was his way of trying to make sure that he was still strong enough to carry that weight. Whatever it was, Nick had to know.

“D?” he asked hesitantly.

Howie watched him in the mirror for a few moments before putting down the weight and turning to face him. He said nothing, only waited for Nick to continue.

“I need you… I need you to tell me what happened.”

“You know what happened Nick,” Howie said softly, a heavy cloud descending upon his already tired features. Deep down he knew what Nick wanted to know but was unwilling to admit it.

“No.” Nick said, closing his eyes briefly, convincing himself that he couldn’t put it off anymore. “I need to know what happened to you. To him. To them.”

“You don’t want to know Nick. I don’t want to know. I wish I didn’t.” He busied himself putting away the equipment he had been using.

“You’re right. I don’t want to know, but I need to know.”

Howie said nothing.

“Damn it, Howie. You can’t hide it from us forever. You know what I don’t, and until I understand what the three of you went through I won’t be able to get Brian back. Look at yourself; it’s tearing you apart! I can see it in you, D. I know you need to tell. ”

Slowly Howie raised his head to meet Nick’s gaze, his eyes brimming.

“Come on,” Nick said softly. “I need you D. I know you may hate me right now. I hate me right now. I’m not asking you to forgive me, but here I am. Right in front of you. I’m right here.”

Howie sank down to the floor, the cold floor providing some relief to his sweaty body. He hung his head between his knees, resting his arms on his kneecaps while breathing heavily. Nick slowly sat down next to him, stunned at the sight of Howie looking so broken. Tentatively, he reached out and touched his friend’s arm. Howie jerked his head back up, his eyes flashing. Nick pulled his hand away, and brought it to rest with his palm on the floor, helping to support his weight.

“Please?” he whispered hoarsely, willing himself not to cry.

“Why me?” Howie demanded, his red-rimmed eyes burning a hole into Nick’s heart.

“Because you’re the only one who really knows. Physically, you wound up much better off, but mentally I think you took the worst of it.”

“No, Brian did,” Howie spat. “I was the one who got to sit there and watch him fall apart.” With a heart-wrenching gasp, Howie found himself spilling his guts to Nick right there on the floor, reliving every moment while he told it. A.J. flipping out and nearly killing him, his first visit to see Brian, in which the man had looked one step away from death. Uniting in the trip to visit Kevin and Nick, and how it ripped them apart. Brian’s anxiety attacks, and how each one took a little bit more of his strength away. Singing by their band mate’s bedside, using their broken voices for all they were worth, because it was all they had. Then he told about being present when the respirator was removed, and Brian’s horrible reaction to the possibility of Nick’s death changing from nightmare to reality.

At this Nick closed his eyes, fighting the urge to get up and run away from it all. Brian had nearly destroyed himself over him. And what had he done? He had gone and pinned all of the blame, all of the misery, all of the pain on his shoulders, when he already well beyond what he was capable of bearing on his own. Instead he should have been there to reassure him, and returned the friendship Brian had given to him.

“Don’t make him suffer anymore, Nick,” Howie begged. “It’s killing him. I know it is. If only you really knew what he went through. I’ve never been so scared in my life. I would have killed you where you stood when you yelled at him. But how could you know? Only A.J. and I saw him.”

Nick was speechless. Howie had sat back and watched one by one as each of his brothers came completely unraveled, forcing him to be the one to hold them together, a task that was far too much for one man to carry alone. Howie had stuck by all of them, unfailingly, no matter what the cost to himself. A.J. owed his life to him. Brian owed him his sanity. He’d been there for all of them, but none of them really saw what he’d gone through.

He was sitting now, his tearstained eyes on the floor, not quite sure what to do next. Nick exhaled harshly, hating what had happened to make him this way. He hated it. With a small sniffle, he crawled over to his friend and wrapped him up in a hug, much the way Kevin had done for him yesterday. Howie accepted it gratefully. Nick patted him on the back and pulled away.

“Thanks, man,” Howie said, attempting a smile.

“I’m sorry. For what I did and for everything else that happened.”

“The accident wasn’t your fault, Nick.”

“I know,” he said quietly. “But I’m still sorry. You’re too good of a person to have to go through this.” Howie laughed through the tears that were still trickling slowly down his cheeks. “I mean it,” Nick told him.

“Thank you, Nick.”

“Do something for me.”

“What?”

“Don’t worry anymore. We’re going to get through this. All of us. We are going to stick together and be better than ever before. I know it.”

Howie nodded his head. He believed him.

“Okay. Now I have to go. I kicked a very good friend of mine when he was down, and now I need to help him get back up, if he’ll let me.”

Nick got up off the floor and gave Howie a reassuring wink. Joyfully, he saw that some of the weight that had been threatening to crush his friend’s weak shoulders was gone.

* * *

Brian had gone into one of the rooms and lost himself in the one thing that could still bring him solace-music. It was like a protective cocoon that hid him safely away from the world around him. When he was singing, nothing mattered but the music. Each note resonated throughout his body and lifted him up out of the darkness that surrounded him, giving him wings that let him fly. It was the greatest natural high he had ever felt, and it allowed him to find a calm center in the middle of the hurricane that had become his life. He purposefully sat with his back to the door, not wanting to be disturbed by anything going on outside. One of their instrumental CDs was in the stereo, as he sang along to the music he forced himself to forget about everything else. Time passed without telling him, and he was completely unaware of the figure that eventually appeared in the doorway.

But my love is all I have to give,

Without you I don’t think that I can live

I wish I could give the world to you but love is all I have to give.

But my love is all I have to give,

Without you I don’t think that I can live

I wish I could give the world to you but love is all I have to give.”

He stopped singing as the music started to fade out, but a voice in the doorway made him stop cold.

“My love is all

I have to give,”

Brian whirled around at the new but familiar voice, and came face to face with Nick. He stared for a moment, and then found himself singing with him. The harmony their two voices created at that moment was one they rarely used when performing the song, but Brian had always thought that it was the best part of it.

“Think I can live

Without your love,

The world is for you

But love is all I have to give.”

When they had finished, Nick wiped his eyes with one fist and let his gaze falter to the floor.

“That was good, Nicky,” Brian said softly, with a sad smile.

“For someone as rusty as me, I guess it was ok.”

A few minutes of silence passed. Brian looked at him solemnly, not quite sure what to do next. Nick looked a way for a moment, and when he turned back, his eyes were bright again. Brian stood up from the couch and went over to him.

“I didn’t mean it Brian. I didn’t mean it.”

Brian said nothing.

“I’m so sorry. I don’t know if you can forgive me, but I am so sorry.”

“Talk to me,” Brian said, in a broken whisper. “How did I hurt you?”

“Brian…” Nick said, nearly choking on the lump in his throat. “No. You didn’t. You never did. I don’t know why I said those horrible things. Just… God.” He looked away as his voice failed him, leaning all of his weight on his crutches.

“Why?”

That small, wounded voice did him in. He gave up trying to hide the fact that he was crying, and did it openly. Wordlessly, Brian helped him over to the couch and laid his crutches down on the floor. Brian sat down at the opposite end, watching silently. Nick stared at him, wiping away the last of the tears, unable to believe that even now, Brian would help him without question. He ran his fingers through his hair nervously, and then held his hands out in front of him as if he wasn’t sure what to do with them. After a few false starts, he finally began to pour his heart out, just as Howie had done.

“I felt it Brian. I felt what you felt. I could hear you crying, and I knew how to get to you, but I was too afraid to go. I thought for sure that Howie and A.J. and Kevin would be there to take care of whatever was wrong, but they couldn’t could they? They couldn’t because what was wrong was me. It was me you were crying over, and once I realized that I had to find you. I had to let you know I was okay. Then after I woke up, the world seemed to have just been dumped upside-down, I had no idea what to do. I needed someone to blame for it all, even though there was no one to blame. I blamed it on you.” He drew in a shaky breath.

“Nick…”

Nick held up his hand. “If I don’t finish this now, I never will.”

Brian nodded slowly. He could see that what Nick was trying to tell him was almost impossible, since all he had to draw upon were his shattered nerves and broken confidence. Fight for it, he thought urgently. We can fight for this.

“When I was in the hospital,” he said haltingly, “I wanted to be able to talk to you so bad. I needed to talk to someone, and you were the only one I wanted it to be, but I was so mixed up, I’m still mixed up, that I couldn’t do it. I was in my own little bubble, and I was terrified to let someone else in. I didn’t think there was anything anyone could do to help me.”

“We were always there, Nick. I was always there.”

“I know,” he whispered. “But I was so scared. I have never been that scared.”

“Of what?” Brian asked, leaning forward. “Tell me now.”

“Of what would happen next. What the future would be. I was terrified my knee wouldn’t heal and I wouldn’t be able to be with you guys. You four have been my life. I can’t imagine growing up without y’all. Especially you. I was afraid I wasn’t going to be able to make the cut anymore. You’d go on without me and I’d be left alone. I was terrified that nothing would ever be the way it was. I was… scared. Just scared.”

“Oh God, Nick,” Brian said, his voice breaking. “We would never have let that happen. Ever. You can’t break us apart. Don’t you see that? A.J. said it too, no matter what gets thrown our way, we will deal with it together. Together. You weren’t the only one who was scared. I was petrified of what was going to happen. Waking up and wondering if you were dead or alive, wondering if the next time I had an anxiety attack that they wouldn’t be able to help me.”

Nick raised his eyes to look at him. All at once he saw the frail, weak Brian that Howie and A.J. had seen. He looked so fragile that Nick was scared that if he so much as touched him he would splinter and crack into a million pieces, and be gone forever. Brian looked right back at him, seeing Nick as someone who was utterly lost, and looking for someone to help him find his way home again.

“I want to show you something.”

Nick gave him a curious glance, but was afraid to nod. Brian turned his back to him and pulled his shirt off over his head. Nick gasped in shock. Brian’s back was covered with a mass of healing gashes and lacerations. Some of them seemed to have been healing on their own, while others had clearly been sewn back together with sutures. All of them were jagged and terrible, a permanent reminder of the night that had changed their lives. Against his will, Nick found him extending his hand to touch the marks that tattooed his friend’s skin. Brian jumped a little in surprise at the coolness of his touch.

“How…?”

“From the window. I went straight through it. Dr. Westin said it was really tricky to try and remove all of the glass from it. It was bad. I wound up lying on my back when everything finally stopped, driving it further into my skin. That and they said I got so violent when they brought me in, that Westin said it was almost a blessing that I flat lined, because I stopped thrashing.”

Nick gaped at him. Even Howie hadn’t told him that.

“Howie doesn’t know,” Brian added, reading his thoughts. “Howie knows they almost lost me, in fact he was the one who told me. But I asked the doctor to tell me everything, and since then you are the first one I’ve told.”

Nick exhaled sharply. “Oh my God.”

“I’d say that pretty much scared the shit out of me.”

Nick nodded. “That would do it.” They were both silent for a while.

“Brian?”

“Yeah?”

“You know I haven’t sung a note until just a minute ago when I came in here?”

“Really?” Brian was surprised. Nick looked so depressed by it.

“I really miss it.”

Brian smiled kindly, and opened his mouth to sing again.

“When the night has come, and the land is dark

And the moon is the only light we’ll see.”

Nick’s eyes began to fill up again. He didn’t know what he’d done to deserve a friend like this. But he vowed never to let him down again.

“No I won’t be afraid, no I won’t be afraid.

Just as long as you stand, stand by me.”

Nick jumped in at the chorus.

“So darlin, darlin stand by me, ohh stand by me

Oh stand, stand by me, stand by me.”

Their voices intertwined in the harmony that brought their young fans to their knees. Each embraced the sound, because deep down inside each had secretly wondered if it would ever be heard again.

“If the sky that we look upon, should tumble and fall

Or the mountains should tumble in the sea.

I won’t cry, I won’t cry, no I won’t shed a tear.

Just as long as you stand, stand by me.

So darlin, darlin stand by me ohhh stand by me.

Whoa stand now, stand by me, stand by me.”

Nick stopped to let Brian continue, and then rejoined him at the chorus.

“Whenever your in trouble won’t you stand by me,”

“Whoa stand by me. Oh stand now, stand by me, stand by me.”

Their eyes locked once again, and Nick saw the forgiveness he sought in Brian’s face. The two friends embraced. Brian had forgotten how tall he was.

“You know,” Brian said thoughtfully, after they had pulled away. “A.J. left his hat on that chair out there.”

Nick stared at his friend, baffled at the comment. Baffled that is, until he saw the mischievous light that glinted in his eyes. A slow grin spread across Nick’s face. How could he have ever thought that Brian wouldn’t understand?

“Did he now.”

“Yes. He did.”

“We should… get it for him.”

“Yes. We should.”

* * *

“Has anyone seen Nick or Brian?” Howie asked A.J. as he passed him in the hall.

“Nope. Right now I’m more worried about finding my hat.”

Howie snorted. “Some friend you are.”

“I’m serious. I’d better find the damn thing. Let’s see, the last time I saw Brian, he was singing. I haven’t seen Nick since earlier.” A.J. looked over to see his hat resting bottom side up between the arms of a hat stand by the main door.

“There it is,” he said cheerfully, wandering over to it. Howie turned to walk away.

“What the fuck!”

Howie spun around in alarm, and then began to laugh so hard he had to grab on to a counter top to stay on his feet. A.J. was standing by the hat stand, hat on his head, holding its brim with both hands, his head and shoulders covered in flour.

The sound of snickering off to his right made him turn. Brian and Nick cowered in a doorway, barely controlling their laughter. They stopped when A.J. saw them.

“Oh shit,” Nick said, trying to keep a straight face.

“Go, go! Get out of here!” Brian squealed. They scooted away as fast as Nick could manage.

A.J. continued to stand there, watching their retreat, absolutely dumbfounded.

“Well, I think this crisis has passed,” Howie said, getting control of himself again.

“Well that’s good, because I think I feel another one coming on,” A.J. muttered.

***

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