Disclaimer – I don’t own ‘em, I just like to play with ‘em my way.

Different Road

Chapter 1

Ennis Del Mar had never been so scared in his life. He’d experienced fear before, of course he had, and most of it had centred around the one thing, or one person, but this was different to everything he’d felt before.

He’d been sitting here for four hours now, slowly counting the minutes, and counting the people that seemed to endlessly walk past him without glancing his way, or offering a scrap of information that could stop him sitting here wringing his hands away to nothing, trying to swallow the terror that threatened to consume him and trying to hide it from everyone, including himself.

Ennis rubbed his eyes and ran his hands down his tired face. He was absolutely exhausted, but he knew he couldn’t go to sleep, not until he heard something – one way or another. Lureen was here somewhere, he’d seen her when he first charged into the hospital a few hours ago, but she hadn’t come near him since. He couldn’t decide if she had forgotten him, or she just didn’t think he was important enough to keep in the loop. He wanted to find her and scream at her that he needed to know, he needed to know what was happening to Jack, his Jack, but he knew he wouldn’t. He knew his anger was unjustified as well, why would a man’s wife be thinking of a crazy friend who had suddenly appeared when she should be worrying about her husband lying in a hospital bed, unconscious for more than 24 hours, his body broken and…

He shook is head roughly and got to his feet. He headed down the hall toward the coffee machine that seemed to be the most important piece of equipment in this entire building. He blindly put in some coins and pressed a couple of buttons, not caring what he ended up drinking, just as long as it gave him something to do while he waited. He couldn’t take much more of this; he was slowly going crazy from the tiredness and the fear. What was he supposed to do if something happened to Jack? It was hardly bearable just now, the way they were living without each other, hanging onto the memories of past times, and reaching blindly towards the next time they could spend a few amazing days together. Deep down Ennis knew what he felt about Jack, but even now he couldn’t even acknowledge the thought to himself, he just wasn’t that kind of guy, but he promised himself if, (no, when, never if) Jack pulled through this he would make sure he knew about it, one way or another.

It seemed more like a week ago than just yesterday that Ennis had made the phone call to Jack’s house in Childress, not knowing what he was going to say, but knowing he had to speak to Jack. It had been a month since their last meeting, and since then Ennis hadn’t been able to get their argument out of his mind. Everyday he heard the pain and despair in Jack’s voice, and the tears he had been trying to stem.

“I wish I knew how to quit you.”

He had horrible visions of Jack looking elsewhere for substitutes, despite Ennis’ demands for him to stop. He knew it was his fault Jack needed to go elsewhere, because Ennis had been fighting against Jack, and himself, for so long. But he couldn’t stand the thought of it, and now was wondering if he’d pushed Jack too far and had lost him for good. That was why he’d decided he needed to go into town and call Jack.

His world had crashed around him with that one call.

“Hello?”

“Hello? Is this Bobby Twist?” Ennis cleared his throat, angry at himself for feeling so nervous.

“Yes sir.”

“I’m a friend of your Daddy’s, is he home?” He could hear a male voice muffled in the background, but it didn’t sound like Jack.

“Um, no sir. He ain’t here. Hang on, you can ask my granddaddy.” The phone was passed over and a new voice came on the other side.

“Who is this?” Ennis felt his jaw lock in anger at the abruptness of the tone. He’d never met LD Newsome before, but from Jack’s account of him he new him to be an arrogant son of a bitch.

“This is Ennis Del Mar, I’m a buddy o’ Jack’s. Can you tell me where he is?”

“Well Mr Del Mar, he ain’t here and I don’t know if he will be, he’s had a little accident you see, and he’s in the city hospital, in a bad way by all accounts…”

If Ennis’ heart hadn’t dropped to his shoes at this point he would have tried his hardest to reach through the phone and strangle LD fuckin’ Newsome, ‘cause there was no mistaken the tone of glee as he passed on this information.

Ennis didn’t need to ask what happened, he knew inside himself somewhere that someone, or someones, had got a hold of Jack, and the anger that flared inside of him almost drowned out the fear at that moment. Almost.

“Where is he?” Was all he managed to ground out, but he must have made it seem like a demand, ‘cause it was enough to make Jack’s father-in-law pass over the name of the hospital. Ennis practically threw the receiver down and barrelled out of the call-box, heading straight for his truck and starting the 14 hour drive that would take him to Jack’s side.

The whole way there he’d tried to fight the anger, the fear, the tears that threatened to spill over constantly, but the hardest of all was to fight the visions that kept flooding him of several guys standing over Jack’s already bloody and broken body, wielding tire-irons. Ennis kept praising whatever it was that made him decide to call Jack that day.

Now nearly twenty hours had passed since he’d jumped into his truck, and all he knew was that Jack was still unconscious, and if he didn’t wake soon it was not good news. He paced the corridor a few times before admitting defeat and heading back to the blue plastic chair he’s abandoned in favour of the coffee machine just a few minutes before. On his way back he dumped the rest of his hot drink, whatever it was, into a half empty trash can.

He slumped into his seat and knocked his head back against the wall, letting out a sigh. Another doctor passed him, and ignored him. He could feel the tears welling up again so he slumped forward, leaning his elbows on his knees and buried his face in his hands. He forced himself to think of happier things to try and stem the flow. The only happy thing he could think of right then was Jack.

He remembered emerging from the tent one day up on Brokeback, catching sight of Jack out of the corner of his eye standing over in the distance, looking out over the sheep, apparently. Ennis had smiled and shook his head as he realised that for the fourth time now he had caught Jack sleeping on his feet. He could completely understand why Jack was so tired, he was feeling it himself when they’d been up here for so long, neither of them getting a whole lot of sleep.

They were nearing the end of their summer together, and both of them were all too aware of it as they tried to spend every moment together, neither of them wanting to voice what they were both fearing. Only last night they had spent most of the night just holding each other, looking at each other, and exchanging slow, languid kisses that seemed to last forever, and that held a lot more feeling in them than Ennis would ever admit to having. It had been amazing.

Ennis chuckled as he watched Jack swaying slightly as he slept, and couldn’t resist taking a few moments to admire him as he stood there, taking in the lean length of his legs, his slim hips. Ennis could practically feel Jack’s smooth muscles running beneath his hands as he stood there, could hear the pleasurable noised Jack would make when he pulled Jack’s hips flush against his and kissed the sensitive spot on his jawline. When he was alone like this and Jack was unaware of him he could allow himself these short periods of time to just gaze at his lover, to acknowledge the fact that there was more to their summer than just sex, to mourn the fact that soon they would separate and possibly never see each other again. Shaking his head against these thoughts he smiled as he made his way over to Jack, and couldn’t resist wrapping his arms around him, holding him tight against his chest.

He spoke quietly to Jack, trying to wake him gently from his sleep, and just enjoying the feel of having his arms around him. He felt Jack smile slightly as he began to sway gently, humming softly to Jack, allowing himself to feel a level of contentment that he hadn’t acknowledged before. He stayed that way until the comfort became too much and he began to fear it. For years afterwards Ennis couldn’t escape the feeling that this was easily one of the happiest moments he’d ever experienced.

“Ennis?” He felt a hand shaking his shoulder but didn’t move. “Mr Del Mar? Ennis?”

He lifted his head abruptly as he realised where he was, cursing himself for becoming so encumbered with his memories he’d allowed himself to doze and dream. He shook off the feeling of comfort he’d had from his dream and focused on the face in front of him. He felt a sob rise in his throat as he looked into Lureen’s face and saw the tears swimming in her eyes.

He’s dead, he’s dead, he’s dead, he’s dead…

“He’s awake.” Ennis’ inner ramblings stopped abruptly as he focused on what she’d said. He swallowed the sobs that had threatened to escape him, although he couldn’t stop a couple of tears that spilled onto his cheeks. He was confused by that sadness that was apparent on Lureen’s face, Jack was awake, awake! But he also saw, was it resignation?

“He’s asking for you.”

At once Ennis understood and he didn’t know what to say. Everything he was feeling was being swamped by the happiness that Jack was awake, and the desperate need he had to see him. He wanted to ask where he was, but he didn’t know if he could speak.

“He’s in room 314.” There was no hostility in Lureen’s voice, in her face, just the coldness that Jack had described to Ennis many times. Ennis just nodded his head to her and she turned away, heading in the opposite direction of the room, no doubt to phone her family.

As soon as she had left his line of vision Ennis stood, and ran.

End chapter 1

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