They hated it when doctors and nurses used euphemisms when updating the next of kin.
Not that they were technically next of kin or next of anything.
‘I am sorry to inform you that your friend had a bit of a fall event,’ the nurse had said as she phoned them.
What the fuck was a fall event?
A fall event was a harvest festival or a pumpkin carving festival, or a pie eating contest or a pitchfork throwing competition, anything but a massive tumble down the stairs that landed him in a coma. What had he even been doing on the stairs, he was supposed to be in a locked ward.
Your friend, the nurse had said, another one of those darn euphemisms.
They were so much more than friends, at least in their mind they were, even though they had never shown their true feelings to him.
You and I both know it can't work
It's all fun and games 'til someone gets hurt
And I don't, I won't let that be you
And now one of them had gotten hurt, not in the sense that they had feared over the past two decades, but seriously hurt as in stuck in a coma. Now there was an ironic twist of their favourite Bieber song. You could not get more Stuck in the Moment than in a coma.
They had met, or technically been reintroduced, when they were visiting some friends in the hospital after that foolish ‘rescue mission’ of theirs into the Ministry, back when they were still a member of Dumbledore’s Army.
Of course, he had not known who they were or that they had met before, but they had immediately recognised the man of their dreams. Literally the man they had been dreaming of ever since they first met at Hogwarts. They had even sent their mother copies of all his books, signed by the man himself, of course. In fact that was the second set they bought, they had a set themselves of course, and they could not get enough of turning the pages to stare at that beautiful face with the most perfect smile. Deserving recipient of the Witch Weekly's Most Charming Smile Award five years in a row.
How they loved that smile.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
As they entered the secure ward of St Mungo's Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries, the nurse greeted them with that sad sympathetic smile, generally used to convey that the news is bad, and led them straight to Gilderoy’s usual cubicle.
She pulled the curtains to give them some privacy.
They were struck by the fact that the figure stuck in the bed was unnaturally pale and there was only a ghost of his usual smile. The normally styled and coiffured mop of golden hair, lay limp beside his slack features.
Justin, grabbed his cold hands and whispered softly to the man they admired. I am here, they said.
With you, with you
I wish we had another time, I wish we had another place
Justin didn’t remember how often they had visited this very ward over the past few decades. The stacks of signed autographs in the bottom of their dresser would probably be a good indication, as Gilderoy insisted on presenting them with a signed photo each time they visited.
They hated seeing him this way. Bad enough that they had to do all the remembering for both of them. Merlin knew that they cherished each and every one of those moments.
Some of those moments were quite comical.
'How did I get here?', he would often ask and then wonder if he flew there hanging off the tail of a Phoenix of all things.
'Who am I again?' was another recurring question.
Justin lost count of the amount of times they had explained to him that he was the famous Gilderoy Lockheart, author of Gadding with Ghouls, Wanderings with Werewolves and the best selling autobiography Magical Me.
They often made fun together of Gilderoy’s surname. Lockheart, as in you are locked in my heart. They wished they were, but Gilderoy was definitely locked in their heart. Maybe if things had been different, if there had not been an accident with a backfiring memory charm, if they had been able to meet outside of the confines of the Hufflepuff Common Room and the Defence against the Dark Arts classroom.
Back in those days, they had hoped that the Dueling Club might have been their chance, a unique way to get closer to their idol, but then the incident happened.
They were painfully aware that they used a euphemism themselves when thinking back to that time, but they found it impossible to think about the exact details of that period in time, when the man they admired had been shown up by a pair of incompetent second years. A time when some of his less admirable secrets had been revealed to the rest of the wizarding world. None of this diminished their feelings for the broken man lying here in the hospital bed.
Now you don't wanna let go, and I don't wanna let you know
That there might be something real between us two (Who knew?)
They wished they could have taken him to their namesake’s PURPOSE WORLD TOUR a while back, but the nurses did not allow him to be taken out of the ward, especially as they were not family. Now THAT had been a Fall Event with a capital F, or Autumn event, as any self-respecting double-barrelled Brit would call it. They still remembered the sense of pride they felt as the crowd shouted Justin, Justin, Justin, as if they were shouting just a tiny bit for them also. If only they could have taken Gilderoy and have been stuck in that moment in time. All because they weren’t family.
Just because this cold cold world saying we can't be,
Baby, we both have the right to disagree
Fuck family. What had Gilderoy’s family ever done for him.
Justin was the only person who regularly visited him in his Gilded Cage, as they jokingly had started referring to Gilderoy’s confinement.
In one of his more lucid moments, he had confided in Justin that he felt that he was lost. Not in the 'Where am I?' sense of lost, which he also displayed more often than Justin cared to remember, but in the floundering, drowning sense of a person who is struggling to keep it together. Justin could sympathise with that feeling. Not only had they lost their heart to a man who could not even remember his own name, they had alienated themselves from their family and friends as a result. While Gilderoy could not remember any of the events that led up to the memory loss, he clearly knew that he had lost his way somehow. He certainly looked lost now, lying motionless on the white sheets.
The nurse had told them that he was stuck in that in between stage between living and dying. The outcome would depend on what the patient chose to do, the nurse had explained in that clinical manner they have. How long had she been nursing Gilderoy, yet she still referred to him as the patient.
Maybe this was Gilderoy’s chance to escape his Gilded Cage and fly to a different time and space, hanging off the tail of a Phoenix for all they cared. They really wished he could.
I wish we had another time, I wish we had another place
But everything we have is stuck in the moment
And there's nothing my heart can do
To fight with time and space
'Cause I'm still stuck in the moment with you
They pushed a golden lock of hair out of Gilderoy’s face and gave him a kiss goodbye. Their lips lingered on Gilderoy’s for a long time, willing that half-smiling mouth to take its last breath.
It’s ok to let go, they said softly, we’ll meet again in another time and place, 'Cause I know you can't love me here.