Priorities

Danon fiddled with the ring box in his hand. He had something eating at the back of his mind. His priorities needed to be straightened. He made his decision then placed the ring box down. His phone rang. The ringtone gave away the caller. Danon bit his lip in anticipation of what he was going to hear.

“Hey Lulu.” Danon answers.

There was no immediate answer. Something was wrong.

“I don’t want to do this alone.” Lucielle finally answered.

“How many times do I need to remind you? You will always have me.” Danon reassured as he grabbed his packed luggage.

There were voices overheard in the background of the call. Danon could hear someone talking about vitals.

“Try to listen to the doctors and nurses until I get there please?” Danon pleaded as he rushed out his door.

“No promises.” He returned.

“Just don’t do anything Ru does.” Danon suggested.

“Already did.” He retorted.

Danon just shook his head when he got into the driver’s seat of his car. He could practically see the smirk he must have had on his face.

“Okay, well don’t do anything else.” Danon lightly demanded with a chuckle.

“Whatever you say Danonino.” Lucielle complies.

“While I am in the air, call Ru if you need anything else. Anything.” Danon said before starting his car.

“Okay. Be safe on the way.” Lucielle answered. “Love you, Danny.”

“Love you too, Lu. I will see you when I get there.” Danon said before the call ended.

When the call ended Lucielle let his head fall onto his pillow. The nurse was checking his vitals. He had his fourth breakdown this week. He didn’t want to rely on Danon, but he was always Lucielle’s last resort. It was always like that since they met. In elementary Lucielle was getting bullied for his name. His parents already had the name set for their first born. Danon was not a trouble maker, but that didn’t stop him from literally running into a bully. Since the incident they were inseparable. Danon trailed Lucielle until he was acknowledged.

They finished the rest of elementary with Danon stuck to Lucielle. In junior year, Lucielle started to mutually stick to Danon. Then high school came and they got a healthy distance between them. It didn’t stop them from having their physical interactions. When people saw them, they saw them as family. Brothers. To Danon and Lucielle they thought they were closer than those relationships. They never encountered any type of boundary to test the strength of their friendship.

Then Lucielle got into an accident during work. He worked in decorating venues for special events. This time he was helping with the decorations for a wedding. He was doing his normal job. He was suspended in a harness and pulley system to situate some pieces on the windows of a venue building. It was a two story building that needed the final pieces along the roof top. Something went wrong and the suspension gave out. Lucielle landed wrong and lost most of the feeling in his legs.

It was not confirmed that he would lose the rest of the function in his legs. It happened gradually, but he lost complete feeling in his legs and ultimate functionality. It was a hard blow to handle. He just started his independent life. Now he was sentenced to the rest of his life in a chair and was deemed unfit to live alone. His parents were too busy with his younger siblings to even answer any of his calls or emails. His friends were more of his family and they had lives that he didn’t want to burden. After hitting the same wall over and over again he had to face the facts. He needed the support of someone else and the first person who popped into his head was Danon.

Before he could get too lost in his thoughts, his phone goes off. According to the ringtone, he shook his head at the expectancy of the call.

“Hello Ru dear.” Lucielle greeted.

“Hey I don’t need another Kanga. Mimi is already annoying the energy out of me.” Mairu grunts into the phone.

“Well I am closer to understanding that feeling.” Lucielle sighed into the phone.

“So you called him? What did he say?”

“He actually is on his way to the airport. He was in his car by the time the call ended.” Lucielle ended.

“How long was the call?” Mairu inquired.

Lucielle scrolls through his phone and into his call history. He takes a screenshot and sends it to Mairu. As he returned the phone to his ear he heard a victorious cackle.

“He was packed and flying out wasn’t he?” Mairu teased.

“Yes he was you little psycho psychic.” Lucielle smiled into the phone.

“I will take credit for the little and psycho part, but he was packing when he supposed to be look out for Elli. When Elli got killed he called me to take over the job and of course he ran his mouth.” She recalled.

“The psychic one is still on the table since you called me.” Lucielle corrected.

“The sweet serving of Danonino told us he was going to be airplane unreachable so I put 1 and 1 together and made a cross.” She entailed with the usual humor in her voice.

“Full group chat?” He asked.

“Yup!” She chirped.

Lucielle was quiet. He was regretting his choice to call Danon.

“There is no room for one-sided regret. He is isn’t worrying about that.” Mairu chimes in.

Lucielle rolls his eyes at her comforting words. It wasn’t a simple thing to not hold regret. Mairu knew of all people. She still carried regret of her own.

“How do you do it?” He asked her.

“With help. No matter how hopeless or pathetic you feel. It might suck but we don’t have such choices is some matters.” She shares.

“How do you deal with that?” He adds.

“By lowly cursing Disney and everything that promotes anything is possible when you put your mind to it.” She scoffs.

He hummed at her thoughts.

“On the other days I just fight to make the best of it.”

The call was quiet once again. Lucielle knew that Mairu suffered from depression. Unlike their friend Michael who had bipolar she had a health condition that gave her chronic backs pains. It never stopped her from turning everything into a joke and being the light in their little group.

Whenever he broke down and fell deeper into his hole, he couldn’t believe that Mairu went through something worse.

“Ooopsies.” He overheard from Mairu’s end.

Mairu’s mom probably walked in. She always preferred to see Mairu asleep on her way out of their house to her graveyard shift. He could hear Mairu confirming that she took her medicine after dinner. Rattling off the multiple prescriptions that she needed to just close her eyes to sleep. When he heard kissing noises and the door closing he gave Mairu a minute to let out a long sigh.

“Not helping?” He asked.

“Yeah, but of course they think I just need to take them more often.” She replied.

“Don’t you already take them every 6-8 hours?” He asked her.

“I actually found a loop hole. I stopped reminding my dad. Who will probably start seeing reminders everywhere starting tomorrow.” Mairu huffed.

Their call continued for a few more hours. They talked about randomness in their group. When Lucielle started slurring they called it.

“Okay, don’t get weird when he has to poke your butt hole!” Mairu snickers into her end.

“At least I ain’t full of it.” He countered.

“It just adds onto all the reasons for me to have fun.” She added.

They said their goodbyes. Lucielle used this time to get some sleep as his eye lids fell closed.

By the time Danon arrived, Lucielle was sleeping. He immediately pulled up the closest chair. He brushed the side of the his face that wasn’t against his pillow. He looked the most disheveled that Danon had ever seen him. Lucielle’s face was scrunching up every now and then. Most of the week, Danon was not sure of his next move. Seeing Lucielle in his restless slumber, he only had one decision in his head. He took Lucielle’s cold hand into his warm pair.

He heard the door open and turned to see a startled nurse.

“I’m sorry, I didn’t expect him to have any visitors.” The nurse apologized.

“No worries. I was a last minute variable.” He assured with a smile.

He watched her collect his vitals.

“It’s okay if you don’t answer, but do you know when he fell asleep?” Danon asked.

The nurse looked at Danon who was not looking at her. He was still peering down at Lucielle.

“The nurse that has that shift will be in tonight. You can ask her if she remembers.” She offered.

Danon gives her a smile and nods.

“Thank you.” He said.

They exchanged their names as the nurse left. Danon introduced himself as Lucielle’s caregiver.

“I never asked you to sign up for that.” Lucielle mumbled with his eyes still closed.

“Well there is no sign up sheet so I came to claim the title in person.” Danon smiled at Lucielle’s drowsy expression.

Lucielle just looks at Danon. Danon knew he couldn’t rush their talk about them, but he didn’t like beating around the bush.

“I know me saying this is not going to make it better. It’s not going to fix your condition and it’s not going to erase your guilt. I will even repeat it whenever you need the reminder. You are stuck with me and I am not going to deliberately leave you. Don’t you dare be ashamed that you asked me for help either.” He promised and warned.

Lucielle wiped the sleep from his eyes.

“You aren’t supposed to say that to me. You were supposed to mention that in your proposal.” Lucielle complained.

“Well you technically win since you have heard those words twice in comparison.” He gave a half smile with teeth.

Lucielle rolled his eyes.

“I’m sorry.” Lucielle softly spoke.

Danon’s grip on Lucielle’s hand securely tightened.

“There is nothing to be sorry about and no fair quoting, Ru.” Danon called.

Lucielle huffed at his limitation, but shrugged it off.

“It’s going to be a while for me not to feel that.” Lucielle admitted. “I know I need to try.” He resolved.

Danon was proud of his determination. He was confident that he would conquer anything.

“What did you tell Rose?” Lucielle asked.

“I am going to talk to her when I go back to tie up everything.” Danon discloses.

“What do you mean tying everything up?” Lucielle asked.

“Well you have more things established here, compared to what I have over there.” Danon contrasted.

“What about your job and Rose?” Lucielle questioned, his sleep finally leaving.

“My boss said he would recommend me to some of his associates over here. If not I was looking into some jobs at the airport.” Danon shrugged.

“And Rose.” Lucielle pushed.

Danon bit his lip. He was anticipating the most probable reaction.

“I am not going to propose marriage, but a break up.” He said before going back to biting his lip.

“I wanna punch you.” Lucielle stated with furrowed eyebrows.

“You sound like Ru.” Danon chuckled.

Then Lucielle got an idea. Before Danon could realize the inspiration of his comment, Lucielle’s teeth were already in his hand. Danon yelped at the initial bite and tried to yank his hand away from his best friend.

“Bad boy!” Danon yelled out.

Lucielle just bit down harder and growled a bit.

“You sound like the shitzu we bought your sister!” Danon ground out through his teeth. “No wonder she named it Elle.” He chuckled.

As Lucielle’s bite got deeper, Danon had to scrape the bottom of the barrel. He took his opposite hand and put it down his pants. Lucielle glared at his hand when he removed it.

“I didn’t shower for nearly almost 2 days now.” He smirked.

Lucielle released Danon’s hand when it got close to his face. Danon stuck his tongue out in victory. Lucielle returned the gesture with his middle finger prominently sticking up.

“I’m sorry you have to end your relationship.” Lucielle apologized after he caught his breath after laughing.

“What did I tell you about apologies?” Danon asked with a raised eyebrow.

Danon sighed and leaned his head on Lucielle’s bed.

“I promise I thought it through. I had to get my priorities straight and you are always a priority I consider first. It has been a habit, but it sure made the decision easier.” He explained.

Lucielle groaned in defeat. Danon was always a thorough thinker. There was no point in fighting his decisions.

“Thanks for always being there for me.” Lucielle expressed.

“Without hesitation.” He promised.