DANTE

Sleep never came last night.

After the meeting at the record company, Turner had taken Sky to a cafe and tried to talk him down for an hour and a half. Eventually, he excused himself, saying he was headed home. However, Sky spent a good remainder of the day walking the streets, thinking. When he did finally go home, there was no energy to do anything, to eat or take a shower. Instead, he'd crawled into bed, closing his eyes and waiting for sleep to take him over. Halfway through the night, when he realized his efforts were useless, Sky had taken a sleeping pill from his medicine cabinet. The attempt fell short as Sky's mind fought the medication's effects.

Instead, Sky laid there the rest of the night, tossing, turning, staring at the walls.

He still is, now as the sun is rising, shining through his bedroom window. It's bright and dazzling, and Sky hates it because the giant orb in the sky—in its blazing glory—serves a purpose. Means something to the world.

And what is he?

An orphan. A druggie. A nobody.

Sky shuts his eyes to the sun's light, tries to shut out the voices inside his head that tell him he's worthless, that he has nothing left.

He needs to get up. Eat breakfast and start the day like it's any other. So he does. Sky struggles out of bed and makes his way down to the kitchen. But then he sees the calendar on the fridge. On it, a bright red circle outlines a certain date.

Today is Gracie's birthday.

Sky visits Gracie's grave on her birthday, but this year, he's forgotten. Wrapped up in his own petty, shitty problems, he's forgotten one of the most important days in his life. The saddest part is he doesn't even want to go this year. Doesn't have the strength, the heart left in him to make it out the front door—let alone to the cemetery downtown.

Here's that same trigger, on the verge of being pulled. The only question is:

What is Sky going to do when it goes off?

The answer becomes clear to him as he's standing there in his kitchen. Everything that's happened spins in and out of his head—but suddenly, it stops and the next step he has to take breaks through the fog in his mind as a brilliant epiphany.

Sky's ready.

He's ready to be done with life, done with the inner turmoil. For everything to be...gone. The nagging thoughts, the biting despair. Free of it. Nothing to it. Immune.

And in his heart, the very core of it, he wants it to end. He's tried to hope, tried to pray, but none of it works. All he wants is to be free of the confines of his own mind and body.

He always knew, with his torrid past, there was darkness in him—and that one day he would give into it. And no one can save him now. Not Turner. Not the angels. Not God himself.

Not now, when Sky's decided he's ready to go.

He thinks about the various ways he could end it all. He doesn't own a gun. Hanging himself would require a lot of effort that he's too tired to put in. He's never been one to self-mutilate, and bleeding out in the bathtub doesn't appeal to him.

Then again, there's one thing in his bathroom that he can use to his advantage.

Those damn sleeping pills that failed him last night might actually turn out to be his escape. It would be easy to take them—a real amount this time, not just one—and then...slip away. Resolved, Sky decides to follow through with his plan. It's sad how quickly everything falls into place. All he has to do is trudge his way back upstairs, go to the cabinet, and grab the pill bottle. He'll admit it: as he picks up the container, his hands shake. From nervousness, fear, adrenaline, he's not sure which. Probably all three. But whatever remaining reservations he has don't matter because this is his only way out.

He shakes the bottle and a copious amount of deadly tablets fall into his hand. Looking down at his impending end, Sky decides there's no reason to leave a note. There's no need to be any more melodramatic. Anyone who knows him can guess how and why he ended up here. He won't write anything, but there is one last thing he needs to do. One more thing he wants to say before he goes.

They think they're being discrete, but they're not. Turner can very clearly hear the giggles and whispers of the two women, who are standing barely a foot away from him in the grocery store.

"That's him, isn't it?"

"Yeah. He's the right height, and he's got the same pretty hair."

Turner tries to hide his face behind his aforementioned hair as he pretends to peruse the meat section. At first, when he left the house this morning, he thought he was being paranoid over people staring and talking about him. But nope. It's happening. Damn Ryan. The scandal he started is hot news.

Hell. The only reason Turner left the damn house today is that there was nothing in his fridge and he doesn't feel like starving to death. Bad move on his part. Unable to take the snickers anymore, he blindly grabs a package of chicken and hurries away from the girls, heading towards the snack aisle. As he starts down the aisle, brooding along the way, his ringing cell phone takes his mind off his current predicament. It's Sky calling, and Turner couldn't be more relieved.

"Hey. What's up?" Turner greets his friend as brightly as he can.

"Hi. Nothing much. What are you up to?" 

Turner notices Sky sounds less frantic than yesterday, more subdued. Hopefully, that's a good thing.

"Grocery shopping. Being stared at left and right now that everyone found out I'm a homo. The usual."

Sky's soft laugh comes over the phone, which puts Turner at ease. He listens as Sky goes on. "I wanted to say thanks for the other day. For sticking by me, talking me down."

"Of course. I'll be here for you, Sky."

"But that's the thing. I don't want you to worry about me anymore, Turn. I won't let you do it anymore. I want you to be happy. Not weighed down by my shit. After...after that night, I realized I don't want to weigh any of you guys down ever again."

"You're not. Look, you'll get better, and we'll find someone to replace Alex. It's going to work out."

"I hope things do work out for you, Turner."

"Why just me?"

"Because you deserve everything, the best. Don't forget that."

Touched, Turner makes a teasing, cooing sound.

"Aw. You're being rather sweet today. Is something wrong?"

"No. I agree with you. Everything's going to be okay."

"Good."

"Turner?"

"Yeah?"

"Thank you for loving me. I love you too, in my own way."

"Yeah. I understand." Turner starts, but that's when he hears it. This muffled, choked up sound like—

"Are—Sky, are you crying?" Turner says urgently, a feeling of dread sinking into his stomach.

"No. Don't worry about it. Can you tell the guys—"

"No." Turner's voice is hard. He's trying to hide how freaked out he's getting, but something isn't right. Something, a horrible sickening suspicion, creeps into his mind. A feeling that—dear God—he hopes he is wrong about.

"Sky, where are you? Tell me right now."

"Doesn't matter. I have to go. I need to take care of some things."

"Take care of what?"

"I'm sorry, Turn, but it'll be alright. You'll see."

"Sky, what the fuck are you talking about? What are you going to do?"

"Goodbye, Turn."

Sky hangs up before Turner can respond. He feels like vomiting. His head is screaming because he's increasingly sure, with every minute, his worst fears are about to become very real.

His sense of dread follows him as he drops everything, leaving the grocery store to rush to Sky's house. As he stands on Sky's front steps, Turner curses himself to hell and back as he's unable to remember which key on his ring will unlock the front door. It took too long to get to Sky's house with the L.A. traffic, and now it's taking too fucking long for Turner to open this goddamn door. The scariest part of the situation is he needs to use his key in the first place—seeing as Sky hadn't opened up when Turner had knocked. After a few more seconds of fumbling around like a jackass, he manages to find the one that belongs to Sky's house. 

He busts it open and rushes inside. It's obvious no one is downstairs after a quick survey through the rooms and calling Sky's name a few times. Some desperate, naive hope fills Turner that maybe his friend is upstairs, passed out from drinking too much. But deep down, he knows that's not it. It's something else. It's something worse. 

"Sky!" Turner yells frantically for what feels like the hundredth time.

He makes his way upstairs where Sky's bedroom door is cracked open. Relief washes through him as he sees Sky sprawled across the bed. Maybe it had just been a drunk Sky calling. Hurrying to his friend's side, he starts shaking his shoulder. When Turner spots the empty pill bottle on the nightstand, he realizes his attempts to wake him are futile. His heart drops as the gravity of the situation hits him. His first reaction is to start hyperventilating from shock. His second is to do anything he can to fix this. But even as he makes the frantic call to 911, Turner worries that he's too late. After hanging up, he cradles Sky in his arms, yearning for their rescue.

"Stay with me, Sky," Turner says.

Sky may be unconscious, but perhaps somewhere, deep down, he can hear Turner. And if he can't, maybe God will. So Turner prays like he never has before. When those shrieking sirens finally arrive, to him, they sound like a call from the angels.

Turner hopes it's come just in time.

*** Thanks for reading! I know this was an intense chapter but hang on with me! We'll find out more about Sky next week. ***

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