FicWad

Two Days Later
Broadview Hospital, Broadview, Saskatchewan
7:11 A.M.
Emergency Room

Axl Rose sat in one of the hard plastic chairs in the emergency room at Broadview Hospital, his elbows on his knees, his head in his hands, back arched forward. His long red hair fell down the sides of his face like a curtain; people passing by thought he was asleep. But Axl hadn't slept in over forty-eight hours; hadn't left the emergency room since the moment he'd come out of his vodka-induced coma to learn from Slash that Laurie had been in a wreck...

"Axl. Axl. Hey, man, wake up..."

The lead singer heard his guitarist's voice as if from a long way off. He shifted a little, stirring against his unconscious state, and opened his eyes slowly. Slash was standing over him in his hotel bathroom, an anxious look on his face. Behind him stood Duff, who was crying a little bit, wringing his hands.

"Whoa," said Axl, struggling to stand up. "What's going on here?"

Slash put his hand on his friend's arm to steady him. "Dude," he said, as gently as he could, "there's been an accident..."

Five minutes later, Axl, Slash, and Duff were heading down to the lobby, where they'd join Matt and Dizzy and Gilby and head to the hospital. It turned out that Laurie had been in a wreck in a taxicab; the cab had crashed head-on into an eighteen-wheeler and been smashed like a Coke can when someone steps on it. Laurie had been rushed to the hospital; they'd sent her straight into a room where they'd induced her labor so that the baby could be saved; according to the latest reports, the baby was okay but Laurie was unconscious.

They got to the hospital and raced into the emergency room. A nurse asked what they wanted, and Axl said, his voice hysterical with panic:

"Laurie. She's here. I want to see Laurie."

Once the nurse managed to get the full story out of Axl (minus the beatings, of course; no one else knew about that yet), she smiled sadly and said:

"Of course, Mr. Rose. I'd let you go see her, but she's in intensive care right now. Would you like to wait here until she wakes up?"

"Yeah," said Axl, and he sat down without consulting his band mates. Slash and Duff looked at each other, shrugged, and sat down beside him. Gilby, Matt, and Dizzy sat down as well, and there the six men reclined to wait for Laurie's return to the conscious world...

Axl jerked a little; he'd been falling asleep without really meaning to. He lifted his head and searched the nearly empty emergency room with bloodshot eyes, his cheeks as tear stained as Laurie's had been in the hotel room. He swallowed hard; there wasn't a nurse in sight, no doctors to tell him that Laurie was going to be okay. The lead singer reached over and shook Slash's shoulder, waking him up.

"Huh...wha'? Did they--"

"No. I just--I just wanted someone to talk to." Axl reached up and scratched the stubble that was growing on his jaw. Slash, Duff, and the others had left the emergency room periodically to get food and drinks and other assorted items; Axl had only gotten up to use the nearest restroom, and even that he only did once or twice a day.

"Dude," said Slash as seriously as he could. "You're gonna wear yourself out before she even wakes up. You need to get some sleep."

"No," said Axl. "It's my fault she's here; I am not going to indulge myself until I know she's gonna be okay."

Slash raised one eyebrow; it was the first time since they'd arrived that Axl had even ventured to talk about that night, why Laurie had been in a taxi alone, why Axl had been passed out in his hotel bathroom, smelling strongly of whiskey. "What happened?" he asked, and Axl told him in a rush, the tears falling fast and hard again.

"I didn't mean to hit her!" he said when he was done. "I just--I dunno, I lost control. I know how fucked-up that sounds, but I was drunk, man; she was pissing me off, and I lost control and hit her." He locked eyes with Slash. "You think she'll ever forgive me?"

"Yes," said the guitarist, with no hesitation whatsoever. "She loves you, man; she'll know you didn't mean to hurt her. I just...I can't believe you hit her. You told me once that you two had--"

"I know what I said," muttered Axl, pressing his forehead into his palm. "I feel so sick, just thinking about it...the fear in her eyes when she looked at me, man; I can't describe it to you. I want to kill myself for doing something like that to her; that's the sort of thing Stephen would have done. Not me. Not to her. I was right when I said what I did to her once: we are the same person, trapped in different bodies. And it does hurt me as much as it hurt her." He slammed his fist into his palm. "That's why I can't sleep, Slash."

The guitarist was silent for a few seconds. Then he reached over and patted Axl's shoulder.

"You meant every word you just said. I could tell. And if you talk to her, she'll be able to tell also. I promise, man; Laurie is going to forgive you. And if she doesn't on her own...I'll talk to her."

Axl smiled faintly. "Thanks, man," he said, and then they were silent again.

Suddenly the doors to the emergency room burst open and in came Izzy Stradlin, looking wild-eyed and terrified.

"Where--" he started, then stopped, noticing Axl. Both men were silent for a few seconds, sizing each other up; then the rhythm guitarist (who had flown in from California immediately upon receiving a fax from Duff) said:

"Hey, Axl."

"Hey, Izzy," muttered Axl, not quite able to make eye-contact with his former friend.

Duff woke up and got up to hug Izzy. "Hey, man, glad you could make it. She's still in the ICU; they're supposed to be informing us when she comes out."

Izzy nodded and shifted his weight from one foot to the other, looking down at the floor. He swallowed hard; tensions rose until he couldn't stand it anymore.

"Is the baby okay?" he asked.

"Yeah, the kid's fine," said Slash. "It's Laurie we're worried about--"

Just then, the doors to the rest of the hospital opened and a nurse said:

"Mr. Rose?"

Axl's head shot up like he'd been struck from a cannon. "Yeah?"

The nurse smiled. "She's awake," she said, and Axl let out a relieved gasp and burst into fresh tears.

"Can I come see her?" he asked finally, his voice hoarse.

"Of course," said the nurse. Axl started for the door, then stopped, hesitated, turned back. He made a gesture to Izzy:

"You wanna come too, man?" and Izzy, his eyes wide with surprise and gratitude, followed the lead singer down the hall. On the elevator ride up to Laurie's floor, Axl said to the nurse:

"Can you show him to Laurie's kid, please? He's the father...and I think she'd want him to have it." He turned from Izzy before he could see his face break out into a smile of pleasure and thankfulness; as much as he hated to admit it, he still cared about his old friend, wanted the best for him.

They reached the fourth floor, and the nurse told Axl the correct room and then took Izzy down to the room where they kept newborns.

Axl took a deep breath and walked to Laurie's room.

~~~

Laurie was lying on her bed, one arm draped across her stomach, head tossed listlessly to one side, when there was a knock at the door. She hesitated, then called:

"Come in," and the door opened and in stepped Axl. He looked like he'd been through hell since the last time she'd seen him; his eyes were red, his face unshaven. He walked over and sat in one of the chairs at her bedside. She half expected to feel some sort of fear in her chest at that, but to her surprise all she felt was comfort, a calm contentment that she hadn't felt since she'd woken up.

"Hey, Axl," she said finally, softly.

"Hey, Laur," he whispered. He wanted to reach out and touch her, but somehow he got the feeling that it was too soon for that. "Y'know, Izzy's here."

"Really?" Laurie was surprised, but she was too tired to show much emotion at the moment.

"Yeah...I, uh, I kind of told the nurse to give your kid to him, since he wanted it..."

"Oh," murmured Laurie, and she remembered the conversation she and Izzy had had, all those months ago. A tear trickled down the side of her face, out of the corner of her eye, and tracked over a bump on her cheek. Axl realized with shock that he had given her that bruise.

"You--you don't mind, do you?"

"No, of course not...I'm not fit to be a mother right now anyway."

Unable to stand it anymore, Axl reached out and took Laurie's hand in his. She turned and looked at him, and in that moment he saw the raw pain in her eyes, all exposed like electric wires, the agony he'd caused her. He opened his mouth to say something, but she cut him off:

"You can't imagine what it feels like, Axl, to look up and see something that immense, that powerful, rushing towards you that fast. If I had been sitting in the passenger's seat, I would have been killed. The driver is in a coma right now, sixth floor; of course the truck driver got off Scott-free; drunks always do. I was awake for part of the time that I was being rushed to the hospital, and the whole time we were going there I only wanted two things: for my baby to be okay, and...and for you to be there, holding my hand. I heard them talking in that crazy medical tongue they have; I was so scared that one of us was going to die. When I finally went under, it was mostly induced by drugs. I'm lucky that I didn't break anything seriously; I'll be able to walk and do everything normally, but it could have been so much worse." She looked away.

"I never told them what caused the bruises, Axl, but when I was in the ambulance, before I passed out, there was a moment when I wanted to. Just to get you back...for putting me in that position."

His eyes flashed. "Don't blame me for the wreck you were in, Laurie. You didn't have to run out on me."

"You didn't have to provoke me into doing so," she shot back.

"I was drunk, Laur."

"That's no excuse."

"I know."

"You--wait, what?" Laurie stopped mid-sentence, stunned; the occurrence of Axl actually backing down, admitting he was in the wrong, was about one in a million.

"I know it's no excuse, honey. It's just that...I'd had a nightmare right before, and I didn't want to bother you by telling you about it, so I went down to get drunk and forget everything, and while I was down there Brynn came and--well, you saw what happened after that.

"But my point, Laurie, is that I was so wrong for what I did to you, for--" he reached out and touched the bruises on her cheeks-- "these. It's something Stephen would have done, and I always promised myself that I'd never sink down to his level, and then I did. It wasn't anything like what I do to Erin; I've never felt anything towards hitting her. But you..." He sighed.

"It's what I told you before, baby; you and I are the same person, trapped in different bodies. I always promised myself that I'd never hit you because you are way too like me to even consider hitting, and then I--I lost it, sugar, and I hit you, and now I know you're hurting, 'cause I'm in just as much pain as you. My heart's cracked, Laur, my world's been shattered because of what I did to you. I don't know what I'm more upset over: the fact that I hit you in the first place, or the fact that you'll never come back to me now because you'll never trust me again not to hit you anymore." He squeezed her hand, started to let go, but she stopped him by putting her hand on his cheek and turning his face back to meet hers.

"Who says," she whispered, "that I'd never trust you again, Axl?"

Then she leaned over and kissed him, very gently, very tenderly, tracing his jawbone with her fingertips. When they pulled away, he searched her face with his eyes and saw nothing there but pure love and respect.

"I'm yours, Axl," she said. "For better or for worse, I've always been yours and I always will be. I couldn't exist without you; our souls are attached and if we separated we'd rip them apart and die. You're my second soul, honey, and I'm your better half." They both laughed softly, then she continued:

"I know you didn't mean to hit me, Axl. Even in the hotel room, somewhere deep down inside of me, I knew you didn't mean it. I trust you completely, and I'm not going to stop now."

A smile, faint, broke out across Axl's face. "So you'll come back and stay with me?"

She nodded. "I will stay with you and love you until I die. You just have to promise me one thing: never hit me again, or I swear to God, I will leave you and never come back, and you will never find me again."

Axl swallowed hard. "I promise," he whispered, and then he gathered her up in his arms and pressed his face against the side of her neck, holding her as tightly as possible, without any intention of ever letting go.