Work Text:
July 2024
Nothing could have prepared me for seeing you in the hospital today.
You’ve always been most in your element when you can be around machines, and the whole world has come to know it. To think of you is to think of complicated instruments, sprawling networks of synths and wires, intricate music software coded at your fingertips. For as long as I’ve known you, that has been your sanctuary. A flourishing world completely under your control.
So here you are, surrounded by machinery as usual, but something’s different. Plastic tubes are stuck deep into the veins of both your arms, dripping God knows what into your bloodstream. The ventilator which obscures half your face isn’t enough to hide how pale you are—paler than you’ve ever been, the skin on your arms mottled and strangely discolored. If you’re breathing, I can’t see or hear it.
Beep. Beep. Beep. The heart rate monitor beside your bed emits harsh noises, as constant and relentless as Chinese water torture. I can’t work out what all the squiggling lines and numbers on the screen mean, and I don’t want to.
For once, none of the tools in the room are suited to you. This isn’t where you belong.
Even during this period of relative stability, the room is restless. Technicians have been fussing over you nonstop, monitoring every aspect of your existence, strictly limiting visitation even for your own family. This may be my only chance to see you here. Maybe I should be grateful for it—you need the best care possible, and the last fucking thing I want is for some grubby Italian tabloid to get word of you being here—but it only makes me uneasy. Why are there so many doctors? Why do even they seem anxious and unsure? They’re supposed to be the ones who’ll fix you up, bring you out of this nightmare and return you to your thriving world of normalcy. Our world, the one we’ve created together.
I stare at you, powerless and numb. I can barely even recognize you like this, and I hate myself for it. Bedridden in this sickly-lit room, you are a husk of the man I have known and loved for decades.
“Mr. Yorke?” A thin voice tinged with an Italian accent tears me from my stupor. I look up to see a doctor who I hadn’t even noticed enter the room, eyeing me with clinical concern. “Are you alright?”
The irony of asking me if I’m alright while my dearest friend drains away before my eyes is not lost on me. I ignore the vapid question, offering one of my own instead. “He’s going to get better after all this… right? He’ll still be able to do everything he does now?”
No answer. The doctor looks over at you, then back at me, a look of exhaustion fleeting across her face as she shifts her weight between each foot.
I ball my hands into fists, nails digging painfully into my palms. “God damn it. Answer me!” I shout, my voice breaking. All the rage and terror I have been fighting back seems to boil over at once, and I feel tears in my eyes. The two technicians working in the corner of the room turn to stare at me.
The doctor inhales deeply. “We’re currently doing everything we can, Mr. Yorke. We can’t make any calls until his condition has stabilized.”
Some fucking answer that is. I’m about to respond, maybe just to yell at her for the sake of it, when the heart rate monitor’s incessant ringing starts to speed up. Beepbeepbeepbeepbeep. Something about the noise makes me stop cold, bile rising in my throat. Suddenly the doctor and the technicians are at your side, and she’s shouting something at them, and I’m being ushered out the door by a swath of nurses rushing in before I can really process what’s happening.
I can’t even think properly. All sensory input I receive is turned to meaningless shapes, colors, noise, and static by my failing mind. Total entropy. To protect myself, I refuse to put the pieces together.
I’m in the waiting room now. Did my own feet carry me here? I think I can hear your wife and children somewhere nearby. They’re exchanging hushed words in Hebrew, the meaning indecipherable to me but the fear in their voices clear as day. A long silence ensues, and then your wife recites a prayer I faintly recognize: a Mi Shebeirach. Her voice wavers.
I am not a religious man in any traditional sense, but for the first time in forever I almost find myself wanting to pray too.
My thoughts come together to produce a sequence of endless memories of you. Meeting you for the first time at your brother’s house when we were just kids. Countless rehearsals, tours, and performances we shared and celebrated together. Watching you growing older with me, starting your own family, reaching unique heights in your career that I could never envision for myself. I knew the sounds of your radiant laughs and sobs of despair by heart. Nearly all of my best memories seemed to be ones I shared with you.
I realize now that you are intrinsically a part of me. I need you, Jonny. I can’t go on without you.
——
I stand before the door of your idyllic farmhouse. The sun beats down on your property, blanketing the sprawling expanse of olive trees you and your entourage have worked so hard to cultivate over the years. I’ve been here more times than I can count, and each time I am blown away by its beauty.
Yet today there’s a strange knot in my stomach, a lingering feeling of uncertainty that gets worse when I ignore it. I don’t know why I’m so nervous. I’ve been completely over the moon ever since you came home, praising whatever miracle was responsible for your recovery no matter how tentative. But then I remember how you looked that day in the hospital—shrunken and dying, a shell of your usual self—and that uncertainty comes rushing back in. I absolutely cannot bear to see you like that again. I would rather not see you at all.
Pulling my phone out of my pocket to text you, I smile wanly at the sight of your contact photo, a stupid old picture you were always begging me to change. I type out a concise message: im here, coming in now. Taking a deep breath, I open the unlocked door and head inside.
Jerry Seinfeld’s voice sounds from the TV in the living room, followed by a raucous laugh track. I make my way toward the direction of the noise, noticing the numerous pill bottles on the kitchen counter and shelves, and I see you for the first time. You’re stretched out on the couch under a blanket, and you don’t even notice me come in at first; I exhale with relief when I see you, some of the tension inside me dissipating. You look pale and exhausted and ever so slightly high off whatever meds they’re making you take, but you look like yourself. Same mop of black hair, pearl necklace, oversized blue designer T-shirt. It’s you, and you’re going to be alright.
“Jonny.” I say your name to announce myself and you look over at me, your movements sluggish; the slow smile that spreads across your face transfers to my own. I want nothing more than to bound over and tackle you with an enormous bear hug, but I resist for your safety, fidgeting restlessly where I stand.
“Thom.” Your voice is barely above a whisper. You pause the TV and we stare at each other wordlessly, both grinning ear to ear. I want to say something—some witty comment typical of the banter we’ve shared since we were young, maybe—but words fail me.
You’re the first to speak, your smile faltering. “Hey, I’m, um… really sorry about the tour. It’s proper unfair to you and Skinner.”
I stare at you incredulously, now speechless for a different reason. You were one of the smartest people I had ever known, and yet you could be so terribly daft at times.
“Sod the fucking tour, Jon. I’m just glad you’re alright,” I say in all sincerity, sitting down beside you on the couch. “I was worried sick about you, you know? Like, seriously losing it. Take all the time you need to get better and we’ll worry about what comes next later.”
You seem unconvinced, a wistful look in your eyes obscured by your hair, but you know better than to argue with me. “Well. Thank you, I guess.”
I kick my feet up on the ottoman and look around your living room. “How’ve things been? You here alone?”
“Sharona just left with the kids to get a few things for dinner. Took ages to convince her it was alright to leave me here for a little while.” You pause. “Really, though, it’s been fine. Just a lot of sleeping and lying around.”
I have so many questions I’m desperate for answers to. Have you been in pain? Has it been lonely here? How long did they say the recovery would take? What can I do to help you? I don’t want to overwhelm you in your current state, so I reluctantly hold most of them back, choosing just the one I think you’d be keenest to answer. “When can you start playing again?”
As expected, that makes you perk up. “Well, I asked my physio about it and he said I’ll have to gain a lot of strength back first. I’ll have to take it easy when I do start, but he said I should be able to start messing about with some things as early as next week.”
I raise my eyebrows. “Sounds alright to me. Try not to forget everything you know from now ‘til then, yeah?” You chuckle dutifully, then abruptly break into a fit of coughing, covering your mouth with your arm; panic flares up inside me. When you finally pull your arm away, I notice a spot of blood staining the corner of your lip which you wipe away immediately.
You must notice the look on my face, because you shake your head dismissively. “I’m fine, I’m fine. The doctors said it’s normal.” I try to relax at your behest, but still eye you cautiously. The air between us has changed, now solemn and a bit awkward as you stare down at your lap, avoiding my gaze.
You clear your throat before you speak. “I hated being in that hospital. Hated every second of it.” There’s defeat in your eyes, and your voice gets quieter. “I… I really thought I was going to die.”
Dread works its way through my body, constricting my chest like a vice the moment that last word registers. My deepest fear, voiced aloud for the first time and therefore made all too real. Yes, you almost died in that hospital, almost ceased to exist forever, and I wouldn’t have had any time to say goodbye or thank you for all you’ve done for me. A lump forms in my throat and I try to wrangle it back. I hate crying in front of you. I can’t stand to have you worrying about me now.
The anxiety and helplessness in your eyes reminds me of when you were a kid. Back when ‘Colin’s little brother’ was your nominal role to me, your shyness and odd habits blinding me to the lively world within you. Your passion, your genius, all there from the very beginning yet so difficult to place. Had I really appreciated you properly over all these years? How could I ever?
“Christ, don’t waste your time thinking about that. You’re home now,” I say firmly, vehemently reassuring myself as much as you. “You’re alive, and you’re going to be alright.”
“I know,” you sigh, but the discontent doesn’t leave your face. It’s unbearable. You don’t deserve this.
In a last ditch effort to comfort you, I surrender completely, giving in to depths of sentimentality infrequent even between us. I reach out and place a hand on your shoulder, thumb gliding across the muscle; you flinch and stare at me, eyes wide.
“I love you, Jon. I mean it. I don’t know what the hell I’d do without you.”
Your lips part, and your breath catches in your throat. It isn’t very often I tell you I love you—it usually just goes unspoken, I think. No need to get all soppy over something so obvious. Yet it comes out so naturally now, as if the words have been lying in wait on the tip of my tongue the entire time I’ve known you, just waiting to spill from my mouth in moments like this.
You relax, finally, your new smile vulnerable and soft. “I love you, too. I’m glad you’re here.”
I withdraw my hand from your shoulder, my fingers coming away warm. “Now, then. Shall we watch Seinfeld?” Without a second thought, you unpause the TV. And that’s that.
Sitting beside you like this, laughing and spending our time on complete nonsense… it’s bliss, isn’t it? Something must have changed, because even this feels special now. I don’t think I’ve ever been good at gratitude; even when I have the world at my fingertips, I seem to always zero in on something I’m not satisfied with, something that could be better. You’ve seen it more than anyone else, so you know how bad it can get. Yet in this moment I am nothing but grateful—for all the time I have spent with you, and for the fact that there will be more to come.
You’re alive, and you’re going to be alright. My own words from earlier come back to me.
I don’t like lending myself to superstition, but this has been nothing short of a miracle.