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Yuuji’s throat was raw when he spoke. “I miss you.”
A sigh from the man in front of him. “I’m right here.”
Yuuji glanced up from his position crouched in front of Megumi’s sitting form, his neck craning to see his lover. They had been like this for hours, just sitting there, Yuuji’s head on Megumi’s lap. Hearing each other breathe, reminding each other they were still alive. That they were still both there together, holding onto each other as the world passed them by. Megumi’s hair had long since paled and silvered, and if Yuuji looked at it just right it seemed to glow in the sunlight splashed across their faces through the crack in the blinds. Megumi’s eyes were still that same piercing blue he had fallen in love with on the day they met, only more wrinkled and aged with the many, many years that had flown by without them noticing. They still studied him like he was something incomprehensible.
“You know what I mean, Megumi.”
And he did. Megumi’s reply was caught on his tongue as he saw tears well up in the doe eyes of the boy in front of him. That was all he was, a boy. His face still smooth and unchanged from all those years ago, not having fallen to age like Megumi had. His legs still worked, unlike Megumi who had been condemned to the wheelchair he sits in even now. It hurt watching your own body wither away over the years while the person he held closest stayed untouched by the calamities of age and the ailments that come with. He hadn’t been able to walk for months now, and even tilting his head downwards to gaze at the object of his affection was a struggle. He didn’t have much time, and they both knew it.
“I can’t lose you too, Megumi.” Yuuji’s words were distorted by his weak sobbing, and Megumi’s heart shattered hearing him cry.
“Yuuji-” Megumi’s words were interrupted again, not by Yuuji’s tears this time, but by his.
The shudders that wracked his body while he cried only irritated his aches, but he made no attempt to stop. This was the last time they would talk, both Yuuji and Megumi were well aware of this fact.
“Please, Megumi.” Yuuji sounded desperate, like someone who was ready to do anything to get what he wanted. He sounded nothing like the Yuuji that Megumi once knew. “Please, Megumi, don’t leave me.”
“Yuuji-” His tears were falling in earnest now. How cruel of Yuuji to beg him in such a devastating voice to do the one thing he couldn’t. He was human, after all. Nothing like whatever Yuuji was now. Eventually, he would move on and meet new people. He would forget all about Megumi and their strange life together. He would forget the times he made him laugh and cry and the time they went with Nobara to the beach for no reason other than the sun was shining. Megumi knew he had to accept this, but he couldn’t. He didn’t want to imagine Yuuji with anyone but him. Maybe he was selfish, but he was ready to die on the hill that Yuuji loved him, and only him.
“Please.”
“Yuuji I can’t-”
The nausea was back, rattling at his insides and making any thoughts excruciating. The sides of his mind were greying with fuzziness, but he willed his eyes to stay open. If anything, he knew there was no face worth looking half as much as Yuuji’s. Megumi wished so deeply that he could have aged with him, that he could have gained the lines and texture one does with age, the steadily growing beauty of the evidence of experience being imprinted onto one’s body. Yuuji would never have such a privilege.
It didn’t feel like a privilege now, though. Not with the straining of his ribs against his hardly even heaving chest. Their sobs had subdued into quiet sniffling now, Yuuji’s head once again pressed against Megumi’s lap, his arms around his waist. At one point, Megumi’s hand had found his pink hair and his clammy fingers had made themselves at home twisting and turning the soft locks. His eyes were drooping now, he was tired.
Yuuji held him tighter still when Megumi’s body began to relax further into his wheelchair, clutching desperately to his clothes as though it would keep him here longer, for one hour more.
“Yuuji...”
Yuuji’s whole body tensed at the mention of his name, not expecting Megumi to say anything else tonight. Slowly, he unravelled himself, and miraculously managed to actually pry himself off Megumi.
“Megumi.”
Megumi’s eyes were closed. If Yuuji didn’t know any better, he may have even thought he was just sleeping. But he did know better, because Megumi never looks this peaceful when he was sleeping, always seeming to have a permanent crease between his eyebrows, a stutter to his breath.
“Megumi.”
Yuuji’s voice was more frantic now. His heart stopped still for a second as he looked at Megumi, the man he had known for decades. Megumi, the only one he had ever been with. Megumi, whose head was angled awkwardly against the headrest of his wheelchair. Megumi, who was lying dead in front of him.
“Megumi.”
The tears were back now, back with a burning, searing pain that tore straight through his chest. He was a broken kite, grounded forever now. His only lifeline, his passion and affection, now nothing was left. Yuuji had nothing now.
“Megumi.”
Yuuji buried his face back into Megumi’s lap and squeezed his eyes shut. His body shook with the effort of holding back loud sobs. He clutched desperately around Megumi’s waist, no longer feeling a hand in his hair. No participation was given by his partner, nothing to fuel the delusion Yuuji was agonisingly attempting to hide himself in.
“Meg- Megumi.”
But Megumi was dead, all Yuuji was clutching now was a corpse. An empty husk of the flourishing life that was once lived. Nothing but a means of communication and connection. Never mind, that bond was severed now, and Yuuji was, once again, alone and cold in a hospital room without the only person he had ever loved.
Yuuji was alone, he had nothing left here.