To do right by him

When Thomas woke up, he didn’t know where he was. The very first seconds were spent in a dazzled bliss. He wasn’t in pain, he could hear the soft sounds of people taking and laughing close by, and when he opened his eyes it looked like he was laying in a wooden hut. So he must be on the Glade, right? He would have to get up soon, eat breakfast with Chuck, Newt, Alby, Theresa, Winston, Frypan and Minho, and then they’d leave for the maze. It’d be a sunny day, they’d pack sandwiches for lunch and maybe they’d come home a little earlier than normal to have dinner with the others. Maybe they’d make a bonfire and play some games. Thomas smiled.

But then, very slowly, other thoughts filled his mind. He wasn’t in the maze anymore. In fact, he hadn’t been there for a long time. He didn’t even know where he was now. Or how he was still alive after being shot. After…

Thomas opened his eyes. He wouldn’t have breakfast with his friends ever again, because most of them were dead. Alby had been dead for so long he wasn’t even sure he remembered the other boy’s face correctly. And Chuck… Chuck had been killed by WICKED. By Gally, only not really. Winston hadn’t survived much longer, and now…

He couldn’t even bring himself to think their names. Thomas sat up slowly, blinking against the sunlight that streamed in through an opening in the wall.

How could the sun be shining? How could people be laughing?

Thomas gently touched the part of his stomach where he’d been shot. The skin there was scarred and red, but it didn’t hurt as much as he thought it would. He must have been out for quite a while.

Before he could spiral down into even more morose thoughts, the creaky door opened, letting even more sunlight in.

“Oi, guys! Thomas is awake!” Minho was standing in front of him, alive and breathing and unharmed. “It’s so good to see you, man! We weren’t sure you’d make it for a while there.”

Minho seemed so happy to see him Thomas forced a smile onto his face.
“It’s good to see you too, Min. Where are we? Where are the others?”

Minho sat down next to him, his smile fading a little.

“I don’t know how much you remember…” He looked uncomfortable.

“I…” Thomas swallowed hard. “I know that they’re dead. Teresa and… Newt.” He closed his eyes, desperately trying not to think about them. “The others?”

“Everyone else is fine”, Minho replied, looking relieved. “Jorge got us to an island on this huge old rusty boat. Most of the Munies made it here, and there are even more of them out there, arriving almost daily.” He stopped, and when he continued speaking his voice sounded almost broken. “It’s just you, Gally, Frypan and I who made it… out of the Gladers I mean. Then there’s Aris, Harriet and Sonya, and Jorge and Brenda… and yeah. I don’t think you know any of the others. But you’ll meet them. Everyone is great here. They’re… they’ve all been through a lot of klunk, and they’ve all lost people.. so.. it’s good, you know? We’ll be fine, Thomas.” Minho touched his shoulder gently, and Thomas leaned into his touch. He knew that it wouldn’t be fine, but for now it was enough to be close to Minho.

He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. For the first time since he woke up in that elevator he let himself relax completely. He was safe, for now.

*

Thomas learned to appreciate his new lifestyle very quickly. It wasn’t easy, but he managed to help out as much as he could, even in his weakened state. Everyone on the island had a job, even the smallest kids or the oldest seniors did what they could.

It wasn’t that different than the Glade, and Thomas suspected that Minho had had a hand in planning their new world order. There were people responsible for different aspects of life – food, shelter, water, security, medicine. And a few people even dedicated their life to teaching. There were many skills to be learned and whatever was left of their human culture to preserve. Plus, they wanted the smaller kids to at least get some sort of basic education, however flawed it might be.

They all tried their hardest pretending this could be a normal society. They tried to cope with their losses, forge new friendships and relationships. Figure out how to navigate this new life they’d all build together.

Thomas mostly avoided other people. He sat with his friends for meals, but he didn’t talk much, and they had decided to let him be. They were mostly busy grieving themselves, Thomas had to remind himself sometimes. They had lost people too.

The same people he had lost.

It was easy to be so very centered around himself that he forgot that Aris had been quite close to Teresa too, and that Minho and Gally had known Newt for so much longer than he had.

But he couldn’t help it. He was so caught up in his own pain and loss that he barely noticed the passing of time, much less how most other people managed to move on with their lives.

*

Almost six months after they’d arrived on the island, Thomas was still barely functioning. He did his work, which consisted of gathering fruit in the island’s forest on most days, because he didn’t have to communicate with anyone there and it strangely reminded him of the calm in the maze. Sometimes he helped with the wood chopping or the building of their little huts too, but he tended to avoid anything that had to do with talking or, even worse, touching other people.

He could tolerate Minho patting his back sometimes, or Brenda squeezing his hand. But he couldn’t stand strangers touching him at all.

So when Gally grabbed him by the shoulders one night after Thomas had been sitting on the beach for hours without moving, he almost hit the other boy.

“Stop it! Let got of me, Gally!” He tried to get away from Gally, close to panicking.

“You stop it, Thomas. It’s been six months! We get it, you’re sad. You’ve lost people. Well, guess what? So have we! You need to snap out of this, and fast!” Gally didn’t yell, but he did seem genuinely angry and almost desperate.

“What do you care?” Thomas finally managed to get out of Gally’s grasp, taking a step back.

“I care… because you’re not going to survive this if you keep going like this. And that… I can’t stand for that. They’re my friends too, you know? Minho and Fry and Brenda and the others. And they can’t lose you too. So you have to stop this and come back to them.” He had started pacing in front of Thomas, who was at a loss for words.

“What do you mean? It’s not… I’m not going to kill myself, Gally”, Thomas said, but while he spoke he wasn’t one hundred percent sure he wouldn’t. He didn’t want to die, but sometimes it was so hard to get up in the morning. It hurt so much.

But then there were moments that made life bearable or even almost enjoyable. Like when Minho had made a Runner joke and had looked at him like he had in the old times, and they had laughed so hard it made his belly hurt. He couldn’t remember how long he hadn’t been able to laugh before that day.

Or when this little girl Kira had run up to him while he was sitting on the beach last week. He’d been crying right at this spot here, next to the big rock with all the names of the fallen. Kira was about one and a half, and she had just plopped down on his lap and grinned at him. He had been frozen for a few long moments, worrying Frypan who had been the one looking after her. Fry had tried to convince her to move away from Thomas, but she seemed to know what Thomas needed in that moment. So he had hugged her gently, and after a while she had started playing with his shirt, giggling occasionally. It had felt as if she had closed one of his many wounds, and given him some of the hope back that he hadn’t had before.

Swallowing hard, he looked up at Gally, who had sat down in front of him. He hadn’t even realized that he had sat down, lost in his thoughts about loss and hope.

“Newt tried, once…”, Gally said carefully, and for a moment Thomas didn’t know what he was talking about.

“What?”

“He tried to end it. He never told you about that?” Gally seemed surprised. “You two always seemed so… close.” Gally bit his lip and lowered his gaze. “You know?”

Pressing his lips together hard to stop himself from wincing, Thomas nodded. “No, I know. He did tell me about it…”, he whispered slightly embarrassed.

Then, he thought about how wonderful Newt had been and anger overcame him. “You know that it’s nothing to be ashamed of, being gay or bi or whatever, right? Newt and I… we weren’t a thing… not… not really… but we could have, and it would have been alright. Because he was a great person, and I… I wish…”

Thomas choked on a sob. He had so many things he regretted, but this was the biggest one. He would not let Gally taint his relationship with Newt.

Gally looked taken aback. “What? I’m not saying it’s a bad thing. I’m no homophobic douche, Thomas!” He looked furious.

“He was my friend too, you know? Back in the maze… before I went through the Change. We were close. I loved him like a brother. It was him and Minho and Alby and Nicky and George and I… we were a team. And then… I just couldn’t…” Tears glistened in his eyes. “I wish I could have been a better friend to them. To Newt.”

Thomas nodded hesitantly and looked at the stars that got reflected by the sea. “It hurts so much.”

“I know that it does. And it always will. But you need to go on, for him.”

Gally seemed so earnest and serene in that moment, Thomas realized that this was the first time he actually tried to listen to the other boy’s story. It hadn’t been him who had killed Chuck. It had been WICKED. Maybe Gally deserved being forgiven. Maybe he even deserved his friendship.

“He said that too. Before… before I.. before he died. That I needed to live my life.” Thomas’s hands played with the cool, dry sand in front of him. He didn’t meet Gally’s gaze.

“I know that you did it, Thomas.” Gally said softly. Thomas almost didn’t hear him with the waves crashing so close by.

“You – what?” His heart rate sped up and his eyes moved around frantically, looking for an exit to flee. He almost jumped up when Gally’s hand touched his knee gently.

“We all do. You were so distressed after he died.” Gally sighed sadly. “He asked you to, didn’t he?”

Thomas nodded, his throat not working correctly, tears streaming down his cheeks again.

“I didn’t want to do it. I begged him not to… Please, you have to believe me…”

“Hey, hey… I do… shhh…” Gally hesitated just for a second, then he hugged Thomas slowly, leaving room for him to retreat should he choose to. “You saved him so much pain, Thomas. I know it hurts a lot, and it’s not going to get easier for a long time… but you always have to remember that you did right by him. He didn’t deserve to suffer any more. And you did that for him. You took all his pain, and now he’s free and you have to carry it for him.”

Gally leaned back a little bit to look him in the eye. Thomas wiped his nose and took a shuddering breath, then he nodded slowly.

“But still, you have to start living again. It’s not fair for him to lose his life and for you to waste yours moping around.” Gally almost grinned at that. It was mean, but Thomas needed to understand this.

“You’ve got great friends. And they're- we’re all here for you. Okay?”

Thomas swallowed and nodded meekly. “Thanks, Gally. I appreciate it, I really do.”

This time, Gally did grin. “No problem, Greenie.”

*

When Gally was gone, Thomas stayed where he was, thinking about what had just happened. It had been freeing to talk about Newt. Of course it had hurt a lot, but he now realized that the others were hurting too. They were his friends, and he wouldn’t let any more of them down.

He looked at Newt’s name scratched in the surface of the memorial rock. His fingers found their way to the slightly sloping N, tracing it gently.

Thomas saw Newt's last moments in front of his inner eye. The dirty, blond hair. The torn clothes. His broken body, his desperate eyes. And still how happy he had seemed, just because he could be with Thomas in that moment. Thomas knew there was a lot he could have done better, he should have used those last minutes to tell Newt how he felt. He should have kissed him, held him.

But he hadn't, and that would probably haunt him for a very long time to come.

But at least Thomas knew that Newt had not been alone. At least he died with someone he loved close by.

When it was over and Newt's body went limp, Thomas had held him and wept for a long, long time. It had felt as if he himself had died. He had never hurt this much before in his life, and he hoped that he would never again. Losing Newt and then losing Teresa shortly after.... it had almost been too much for him.

But still. He was glad that it had been him. He would have wanted Newt to do the same for him, if roles had been reversed.

He would have wanted Newt's to be the last face he ever saw.

“I wish this would have ended differently, Newt. I wish… I wish there could have been more between us. I wish I could sit here with you right now… You would have liked it here, I think.” Thomas smiled, closing his eyes and taking in the smell of the salt water, the feeling of the cool breeze and the sound of the ocean.

“I miss you so much”, he whispered. “But I have to let you go. We’ll run together again, when the time’s right.”

He had never wished for anything but for this old Runner saying to be true. That he’d one day see Newt again, and that they’d be running again – together.

Thomas stood up, touching Newt’s name one more time.

“I’ll do right by you, I promise. Goodbye, Newt.”