Visiting Hours

Tom awoke by the obnoxious buzzing of his phone on his bed side table. He squinted at the blindingly bright glow. He wiped the sleep out of his eyes and clicked on the lamp on his dresser. The time on his phone read 5:43am… He really was not in the mood for this. He was just woken up from a dream that Chris Hemsworth had divorced his wife to be with him instead. He looked at his notifications and immediately the sleep washed away. 103 new Instagram followers, 124 new twitter followers; a bunch of Facebook friend requests and the list goes on. Most of the people followed him because they thought he was hot and he popped up in their “people you should follow” window. But there were a 2 or 3 who found him because of Jack and Finn. He had a few comments on the first photo he put up on his Instagram. It was a picture of him standing, arms spread out wide, and a goofy grin on his face, underneath the Eifel Tower. It was from last summer. A rich client of his gave him a week long, all-expense paid vacation after doing such a good job on a case Tom had won for his company. He thought it was a good first picture to get people curious. He was far away so you couldn’t see him perfectly and he was bundled up because it was pretty cold that day. The comments were varied.

@Finnsbabymomma : FAKE!!

@jAcKiSmYoNeLoVe : Is this the real Thomas Patrick?

@JINNISMYLIFE : I hope ur real cause ur HOTT!

It just went on like that. Most people were pretty skeptical but Tom expected nothing less. He prayed that this worked the way he had planned. So far nothing bad had happened until he googled his name. His heart broke as he saw hundreds of people pretending to be him just so they could get to Jack and Finn. “Why did I think this could work?” He thought to himself. Tears welled in his eyes. He knew people would never believe he was the real Thomas Patrick now. People were using random pictures and stole the picture he had posted on Instagram on their own accounts like @I_am_tom_patrick, @TheRealThomasPatrick, and @OfficialThomasPatrick. As his followers grew, the amount of people pretending to be him grew even faster. He really screwed this up. He didn’t know what to do now. #IAMTHOMAS was trending number one, worldwide, on twitter. He felt devastated and discouraged and out of options. All he could do now was hope that the boys would be able to tell who was the real me; me.

All of sudden Tom saw a new notification on his phone; Jack’s Gap had posted a new video. Tom immediately opened the video. On the screen was just Finn sitting with his head held low. The video quality wasn’t great so you could tell he probably recorded this just a few minutes ago on his phone or something. The video was 18 minutes long but for the first 3 1/2 minutes it was just him in the same position, trying to stop crying. After some time had passed, he wiped his eyes and looked up at the camera. His eyes were bloodshot and his faced was tear stained. You could tell by the dark circles under his eyes and the way his hair lay in every which way, that he hadn’t slept all night. His voice cracked as he started to speak. Tom wasn’t ready for whatever was about to come out of his mouth.

“I don’t think you guys know how much this thing means to me. I don’t think you know how serious this is. I loved this boy more than anything I have ever loved in my entire life and you guys are treating it like a joke. I’m sorry but I thought you guys were better than this. You keep sending me emails saying that you are Thomas just to get my attention. I was optimistic that one of you was Thomas at first but after the 100th person told me “I’m Thomas” it kind of felt like you guys were making fun of me.”

“I doubt many of you know what it’s like to really be in love, to be so obsessed with another person it physically hurts you inside. It is magical yet terrifying experience, and I pray to God every day that I can have that feeling back. I just want to be able to wake up in the morning and not feel empty anymore because the one thing that was able to fill my heart completely, is gone. I want to wake up knowing that I don’t have to be sad or anxious because I know as soon as I would see their face, all my worries would disappear.”

Tom was in tears. Not just tears, but ugly sobs; but he continued watching though it made his body ache. It made him want to throw up because all he wanted was to reach through the screen and kiss Finn’s tears away and hold him until he knew that he would never leave again. He un-paused the video to continue watching after he had recollected himself.

“I was expecting the hate, I really was, because not every person likes the idea that my one true love is another man, but what I did not expect was the utter lack of respect for my feelings that some of you have. I get that you want to meet us, but playing with my emotions by saying that you’re the one thing I miss the most in this life, is absolutely revolting. I-I –I just...can’t deal with these feelings anymore…” Finn broke down on camera for everyone to see. About 2 minutes passed before he stopped sobbing. He didn’t edit this video at all; he wanted everyone to know how he was feeling and why this whole thing is so important to him.

“The first time I saw Tom, I knew that he was going to mean something to me. I never told him this but I could never work up the nerve to talk to him all freshman year so I wrote down what I wanted to say in this journal. II never told him about it because I was always too embarrassed. But I am going to read that journal.”

“This is a list of things I wanted to tell him on the first day I saw him during the first day of freshman year. “Hi, my name is Finn, I really like your glasses. I like the name Thomas. You have really pretty eyes. Would you ever want to hang out?” and the list goes on. These are some towards the middle of the year. “Thomas Patrick, Tom Patrick, Tommy Pat, Tom Tom, Thomas Harries,” but that one I had tried to erase but I can still see it. Here are some more. “Thomas started hanging out with Jack but I’m still too nervous to ask him out. I really really like him but I’m scared he’ll reject me or fall for my brother or something. Everyone likes him better even though he isn’t gay. I think I could really love this guy If I ever built up the courage to talk to him.”

Finn flipped through the pages reading silly notes and some sad ones but nothing compared to what he had just found.

“Oh God…this page is from the day I left you. (Finn was now talking directly to Tom) Just touching the words brings back so many bad memories. But I need to share everything.” Finn opened the journal back up, took a deep breath, and began reading the horrible memories aloud.

“I’m sorry Tom. I am so sorry. I hope you know how much I love you. I hope you know why I had to go. He threatened me with the one thing that I would never let him touch ever again, and that’s you. He threatened to kill you Tommy if I didn’t leave. I’m sorry. I almost killed myself the second he left but I know we will meet again someday. I am praying every day that we can be together again. I haven’t stopped crying and I don’t think I ever will. You are the love of my life and forever will be. I love you with everything I am and everything I want to be. The thought of you is the only thing that keeps me going. I miss your touch and the smell of your shampoo on my sheets. I miss your smile and the freckles on your elbow. I miss the way you say Massachusetts and the way you say my name and I’m terrified that I’ll forget those. I’m scared that I’ll forget what you smell like or the sound of your voice and the taste of your lips on mine. I don’t want to forget a single part of you. I love you Tommy. I love you with all of my being. I will love you forever and always to the moon and back.”

Finn finished reading the pages with tears aggressively spilling from his eyes. He clutched the journal so tight to his chest; you would have thought he could push right into his heart. He cried and cried for about a minute until Jack came in the room. Jack came up to him and just hugged him for another minute and a half. A single tear fell from his eye for his brother.

“Hey Finney… Do you still want to post this?” Finn just nodded his head.

“Do you want me to edit it at all?” Finn shook his head no.

“Ok.” Then the video went black, it was over.

Through all of Thomas’s tears he whispered a small sentence out into the universe.
“I’m here Finn. I’m here.” Tom quietly cried himself back to sleep.

-3 Hours Later-

“Hey Tom! I’m about to leave for the hospital. I thought I’d walk today.” Harry called through the door to Tom’s room. There was no reply.

“Tom? Are you awake? Tom?” With still no reply, Harry cracked open the door. He stepped into the room and his eyes grew wide. A silent gasp fell from his mouth. Tom was in the middle of his bed, wrapped up in blankets and crying his eyes out. His hair was all over the place and the room smelled of vomit.

“T-Tom? Hey buddy, what’s wrong?” He got nothing.

“Tom please you can talk to me.” Still he got nothing out of the broken man sitting in front of him. He walked over to the bed and sat behind Tom. He wrapped his arms around Tom’s torso and placed his head on Tom’s back. Harry remembered Tom telling him that his mom used to do it to him as a kid to calm him down. Tom just started crying even harder. He started chocking and coughing between sobs. Harry couldn’t help but start crying too.

After a few minutes Harry wiped his face and stood up.

“Tom I’m sorry but I have to go to the hospital now. Just get some rest. Everything will be ok, we can talk when I get back. Please, whatever you do, don’t hurt yourself.” Harry walked out of the room and closed the door behind him.

Tom just sat there…for hours as his phone beeped and buzzed. Finn’s words just kept replaying in his head over and over again. He didn’t know what to think of everything. All he wanted to do more than anything in this world was to run forever and at the end of the road, see Finn waiting for him there. He just wanted the searching to be over.

Tom never left his spot; only once to use the bathroom, then he got right back into his bed. His head was pounding, his eyes ran out of tears hours ago and his body ached. He just sat there staring at the door, praying the Finn would walk through it.
This was going to be a long process but he wasn’t willing to give up, not just yet, and neither was Finn. They would find each other again, no matter what it takes.

Notes

First off I want to say i'm sorry. I am so sorry for not updating like I should be. I have had a rough summer. My depression started coming back and I forgot about the one thing that calms me down, and that's writing, writing for you guys. I promise to start updating more often and with longer chapters like this one. I usually stop at 1000 words per chapter but this one is 2,049.

I am grateful for your support, and I won't let you down anymore.
Please comment and subscribe and vote and tell your friends about this story. :

~~Lauryn~~