Ronan: To the Moon and Back

Fear is something of an enemy to Raelyn. It surges up from nowhere, poisoning the pit of her stomach and plagues her heart. It has been doing that once in a while for the past three years, and today, today it comes back. The same powerful surge, if not a little differently because Ronan has never just fallen into her arms like that before.

"Rae, I'm sorry, you have to go now." Ronan's doctor, Dr. Ramsy, quickly and gently kicks Rae out of the room, the door closing and blinds pulling shut.

She had been playing a game of Minion Rush with Ronan on her phone, when he suddenly dropped the device and slumped over in his sister's arm.

"Ronan?" Rae questioned desperately, straightening his body against hers.

"Ra...m'chest...hurts...stop it." Ronan panted, his words slurred with each breath.

Immediately, Rae had called out for the closet nurse Greg, while the machine next to Ronan's bed, hooked with the clear tubes to Ronan's little wrist, beeped constantly. Greg quickly called for the doctor and now there Rae stands. Staring helplessly at the door, her little brother lying weak behind it. There's a serene moment as she stands there, quite in the hallway, save for the faint sounds of singing and guitar strumming, where Rae is frozen. The calm before the storm. Then it happens.

Fear that quickly turns into something worse. Sharp painful spams shoot through Raelyn's chest, curling its vice fingers and constricting her heart. She felt it coming, knew it would be coming the second Ronan fell limp, yet she could do nothing to stop the attack; never can. The halls of the Hospice suddenly surge in temperature, abruptly spinning around her in white and colorful blurs. Rae's hand springs to her chest, clutching at her skin, desperately trying to stop the pain.

Thoughts explode in Rae's mind, loud and urgent; What if this is it? Oh God, maybe it is it. Ronan is fading into the blackness that haunts her dreams. It's her fault; she overexerted him. If she hadn't made him laugh so hard, hadn't gave her phone so he could play the game and stress out when he lost. He'd be gone before their mother could get there. They wouldn't get to say goodbye and the blue of Ronan's eyes would turn into gray stones...

Rae is now gasping for air, leaning against the wall for support. It's nothing but sheer panic until she can squeeze her eyes shut and tries to force herself to breathe. She'd call him, she really would, if he wasn't already there, singing along with his band mates and knowing none the better. Rae spins around, wobbling a little on her feet, eyes wildly searching for them. A passing nurse reaches out to steady her, her expression alarmed.

With the strength pulled out from years of practice, putting on that mask she so carefully crafted, Rae sucks up her panic. If only for the briefest moment to reassure the nurse that she's fine, only to panic twice the times when the nurse walks away. Rae attempts to make her way across the hall, but she feels as if she's treading through water, opposite the current. Another painful spasm stops her in her tracks. She knows what room he's in, can hear the music, just adjacent from where she's stopped. But her attack is becoming too much, and she thinks she can't make it there in time. Just like Ronan isn't going to make it. Ronan isn't going too push through the way Rae is pushing through the water and if he can't, then neither can she. She'll just drown along with-

Bright blue catches Rae's attention, reflecting under the lights and interrupting her thoughts. She registers the eyes as Louis', who sees her and suddenly he's out of the room in the middle of a song. His own eyes laced with worry. Rae's skin is prickling with needles by the time she feels cool hands on her arms, and cooling her skin.

"Raelyn. Hey, hey, breathe. Raelyn, you have to breathe for me." Louis' voice cuts through the chaos in her brain.

Rae is shaking her head frantically, muttering small "I can't's" while hiccuping for air. "Ronan...Ro..." She starts frantically. "He...check. Louis please! Check!" Rae shot out her free hand as Louis was trying to decipher her words, and winces as her fingers accidentally catch his skin.

However, Louis understands. Understands and quickly tells Rae he'll be right back and makes her way over to Ronan's door. There's a bent blind that allows Louis to peek inside and sees nurse Greg hovering over Ronan, smiling up at the Doctor. He takes that in stride and goes back to Rae, all in five seconds.

"He'll be okay, it's okay. Ronan is fine, Rae. Breathe with me." Louis says calmly, and begins to inhale deeply. He carefully brings one hand to her cheek, thumb gently stroking beneath her eye.

Rae imitates his breathing; in slowly through her nose, holding for three seconds, then slowly exhales through her mouth. She continues breathing while Louis just mutters sweet words of comfort. Encourages her and praises her while she comes down. It takes several minutes for Rae to fully to calm down, her panic fading away with the pain in her chest.

Cerulean eyes frantically searches hers, double checking for any lingering signs of the attack. Louis drops his hand from her face and grabs hold of Rae's hand that's assaulting her chest; which he should have done in the first place. Now there's a sizable red mark on her chest just below her collarbones, welting lines evidence of her nails on her skin.

"Alright?" He questions, pushing his fingers through her hair, tucking strands behind her ear.

"Yeah. Yes, M'alrght." Rae takes a shuddering breath. She clutches at his gray shirt with her free hand, fingers clasping around the fabric. "Just...don't leave yet."

"I won't. I'm here for you." Louis promises softly, wrapping his arms around her shoulders. Tucks her head under his chin and holds her close. He thinks the way her fingers always seem to dig into something is her way of coping, of keeping something- someone- there for her. Like she's searching for anchor when a storm wildly rocks her ship. Something that Louis believes she hasn't had for a while. She digs her fingers into his back as they hug, and he knows it's probably going to bruise. But despite Rae's words, her breathing isn't completely normal yet, and tremors wrack throughout her body every twenty seconds. So he just tightens his hold around her, conveying his promise without words. If he holds tight enough, he thinks he can stop her ship and calm her storm.
*


As if this day couldn't already get worse; which scratch that, because she's standing in the middle of a Hospice and yeah, it could always get worse. Still, it's just another thing she's got to deal with atop her recent panic attack. A panic attack that had a small aftershock fifteen minutes later, when she still wasn't allowed in Ronan's room still and Louis was forced (with a reluctant apologetic look thrown at Rae) back into singing by his manager.

Several moments after that little scuffle -with Louis being an absolute little shit to Paul 'catch me if you can burly man!'  Then tried to dive over Paul, who was a good foot and a half taller than Louis, so it was a miserably failed attempt. (Causing Rae to burst out laughing for the moment.)- Jackie called Rae over to the front desk, handing her an envelope addressed to her and her mum.

"Bloody fuck it to hell." Rae curses quietly, reading over the paper held in her hands for the eighth time.

Someone tisks behind her, leaning close enough to her ear, their breathing making a shiver race down her spine . "This is a Children's Hospice, Raelyn darling. So disappointed in you."

"Don't pretend like you don't have your own sailor mouth sir, I've heard it." Rae shoots Louis a quick grin before returning back to the paper.

She folds the top half down to prevent Louis from reading over her shoulder, if he even was at all. However, it's in vain because Louis seems to notice the tension of the situation; in her shoulders and the tightness of her eyes when she looked back him, and steps back, opting to watch her face instead. Rae reads the letter once more, then abruptly moves, like a major spasm or something, shoving her hand in her bag and pulling out her cell phone. She startles Louis with the movement, concern in his eyes and his hands frozen in mid air, like he was about to reach out to her to steady her.

"Everything alright?" Louis asks cautiously.

"Have to call me mum." Rae mumbles in response, phone pressed to her ear awaiting an answer. She turns her back to Louis when her mother picks up and lowers her voice. "Hi mum," Rae greets in response, "we've got another letter. That makes eight."

She lowers her voice more and takes a step away from Louis, glancing over her shoulder to see that he's turned his attention to bulletin board on the opposite wall. "I've told them. They understand, but mum, they can only do so much to help."

"Maybe we should ask your-" Her mother begins.

"No! Mother, no! We don't need anything from- I am not asking him. You know what,on't worry about it. I've got this one. I'll figure it out, I promise. Don't worry, yeah? It'll be fine."

"Are you sure, dear?"

"Positive. No worries. Love you mum, sorry I called during work."

"You're never a bother, darling. Love you too." MaryAnn say before hanging up.

Rae sets her phone down on little table between the chairs in the ward's lobby, and pinches the bridge of her nose. Her thoughts whirl on how she can cover this latest overdue hospital bill. Probably having to dig once again into her savings to pay in full so her mother's hard earned money won't have to be spent a quid. Sighing with a mixture of exhausted frustration, she releases her nose and shoves her hand through her hair, knocking off the beanie she forgotten was there. It's presented to her before she can pick it up.

"Come on then." Louis smiles encouraging at her, pressing the lift button once Rae's taken back her beanie.

Confused, Rae asks "Where?"

"Tea. I think you could use a cuppa."
*


If Louis spends the next two hours skirting and sneaking around Paul, consisting of acting like a spy and pulling Rae behind him as they hide around corners and avoid him all together, just to hear and see Rae laugh behind her hand, it's exactly for that reason. They left with the reassurance from Dr. Ramsy that Ronan's vitals were steady and all he needed was a good rest, and headed towards a classic tea shop. Louis pulling Rae's hand behind him the whole way, swearing on his great, great Nan's grave they serve the best tea in the world. They stop in, Louis paying for Rae's cup of spiced chi, which Louis scoffs at as Rae explains how she like the way it bites on her tongue.

She confesses that the photos from their little photoshoot have been ready for a week, pulling out a brown folder from her bag, only handing them to Louis after she makes him promise not to look at them until he's with the other boys. He does, but hands the folder back to her for safe keeping, since he's forgotten his purse at home because it clashed horribly with his outfit. Rae rolls her eyes amused, flicking crumbs from her cheese danish at him.

Louis entertains Rae in a Vans store, placing shoes on his hands and attempting a hand stand. Ends up nearly knocking over a rack of shirts that rocks dangerously until Rae catches it in time, barking out a rather loud laugh. Louis blames it on his phone buzzing in his pocket, shoving said phone into Rae's hand because he doesn't want to hear anyone scolding him. While Rae talks to Niall, Louis' handstand, rack wobbling commotion caught the attention of two teenage girls. He takes pictures with them when they ask, and not 10 minutes later, a smaller group of girls, about eight of them, consequently show up.

Along with five more girls, and its quickly becoming a small mob, bound to grow even more because the girls have their phones out, and can text and tweet faster than Louis' eyes can adjust to the flash of their camera phones. Louis thinks it's a blessing from the heavens when the same shirt rack from before hits the ground with a loud metal pang. They all turn around, a few girls yelping in surprise, to stare at the shirts flooding around the rack, when Louis is suddenly yanked harshly, towards the back of the store and out the back employee door. Turns out his blessing is actually Rae, with an annoyed yet amused expression, still with his phone held to her ear.

"Paul says your arse is his when you get back," She relays. "And you deserve what you got for sneaking away."

"Thanks Rae." Louis breathes genuinely, ignoring Paul's words recited by her.

Rae smiles at him, wide and beautiful, the way it's lighting up her eyes beneath the sunlight streaming between the meek clouds. He can't be bothered with his current thoughts, not when Rae suddenly laughs at something that Niall says, cheeks turning the slightest shade of pink before biding him goodbye and hanging up. Louis is sure his smile matches hers, and widens when she takes his hand in her, and pulls him along, saying its her turn to help him escape his reality.

They end up in a quiet camera shop, Rae greeting the woman behind the counter with a hug. She's got blonde hair wrapped up with a colorful scarf, a shiny little stud pierced through her nose, and blue-green eyes that lit up when Rae entered. Rae pulls out two rolls of film and a memory card, handing them over to her friend she introduced as Angelique. The store is where she gets her pictures developed when she doesn't have time to do them herself.

Louis, his heart still beating a little abnormally from the Vans store incident, opts to lean back against the glass case counter, watching as Rae walks around the store. Eyes tracking her every move; from how her fingers gently trace over a ridiculously huge, expensive looking camera with four detachable lens, to the way her hands carefully handle a tripod as she tests the weight of it, to how her eyes lock on a canvas photo hanging on the shops wall. She slowly turns around, a smile spreading across his lips and a her hand pressing into her chest. For a wild moment, Louis thinks shes going to have another panic attack in the middle of the shop, when Rae shakes her head.

"You've hung it up." Rae says, sounding breathless. "That's my  photo."

"All yours, lovely." Angelique nods, speaking with an accent that Louis can't quite place. Then speaks quietly to Louis after Rae turns back around. "If she give an explanation, you're in. She doesn't let her walls down just for anyone, ya know."

Confused, Louis stares blankly at her, until Rae softly calls him over and only moves when her photography friend shoves him away from the counter. He takes in the photo, standing shoulder to shoulder with Re and can feel her eyes watching him carefully as he observes. The photo is quite beautiful in it's own meaning that is a little lost on Louis, yet a little haunting. The photo seems to be of a child, holding small daisies in its hands, shaded with gray, black and white. The white of the flowers petals stand out against the dark of the child's body, hidden away in the shadows so only it's the bottom half of its face and hands are shown. One of the daisies is falling out of the child's hand, falling upside down with its stem barely clinging onto the child's finger.

He lets it sink in, tries to open his mind and understand, or interpret his own meaning and what Rae's meaning actually is. He finally tears his eyes away from the photo, turning to Rae, watching her twirl a piece of her hair around her finger, upper teeth nervously gnawing at her bottom lip. She's suddenly so endearing, standing there with her gray beanie on her head with her nervous antics and wide blue eyes attempting to read his thoughts. He kind of wants to kiss her nose and whoa- what? No. He absolutely does not want to kiss anything, especially her nose because how fucking sappy is that, and yeah. Louis really needs to stop blatantly staring at her now, and she needs to stop chewing her lip and turns those incredible eyes on something, anything, that isn't him right at this moment.

Louis clears his throat, and hopefully those absurd thoughts he has no idea where they popped up from, (which is nothing but a lie because all he can think about lately is Raelyn, and her eyes, and her banter, and rambling, and her camera, and that stupid flirty late night diner and other stupid, prick blokes who could easily ask for her number as easily as she can give it.) But this moment isn't about any of that. In fact, wasn't he just going to speak. he realizes a moment too late that hes been fish mouthing, and clears his throat again. Before he has a chance to speak again, Rae beats him to it.

"It's alright if you don't like it." She says quickly, rushing through her words and twirling her hair faster. "I know not everyone does, it's alright. Honest. I just maybe thought that people would understand a little more how I felt when...well...it's inspired by um...inspired by Vinny's death. Like I just wanted to portray that I felt like a child at the time, with nothing to hold onto but those flowers.

"But I can't even hold onto that, onto anything that I can grasp as an understanding. Like maybe, just maybe the flowers would represent the hope of him coming back, of it being a dream rather than reality, yet that hope falls because it's the only pure white thing in the midst of the dark and the dark is swallowing it up slowly, so the only choice hope has is to fall..."

As Rae rambles on, Louis sees her hand start its odd subconscious rubbing, that slowly turns into her nails digging into her skin. Her eyes are bright, shiny but completely dry, maybe a little distant as she talks. Louis, for the umpteenth time today, takes her hand in his, offering a kind smile. He can feel his sudden fondness soften his eyes and he steps a little closer, until the toes of his shoes are nudging hers.

"Hey. I like it. It's amazing, Raelyn. Really." Louis earnestly tells her.

"It's not too dark or something?" Rae asks nervously.

Louis squeezes her hand. "It's exactly that. Hauntingly beautiful. It's like your heart in photography."

There's a heavy pause. Rae gazing so intently into his own blue eyes. Unexpectedly, Rae breaks out into a chuckle. "My heart in photography."

"Oh shove off." Louis snaps with no true intent behind it. "I was trying to be honest!"

"No, right. I'm sorry. I know you were. Thank you, really." Rae's chuckling fades out into her voice as it softens.

"It deserves to be on a wall."

Her responding smile leaves Louis a little breathless. "Thanks for today. You know, just being there when-"

"It's not ever a problem, Rae, you know that."

Rae nods, then turns her attention to the phone buzzing in her pocket. She slips out Louis' phone, handing it over sheepishly. "Oops. Forgot I had it, and it's Paul....you might want to answer that."

The conversation on the phone is mainly one sided and leaves Louis with an ear full out being chewed out, because he's in deep shit from the stunt he pulled and him ending up all over twitter and gossip sights already. He grimaced when he was told that a pap had showed up to the Vans store and he wasn't the only one photographed. He spares a glance over his shoulder at the two girls talking, a pang of guilt dropping in his stomach because Rae was undoubtedly pictured with him. Exactly what he had been trying to avoid this whole time. He figures its worth it though (and hopefully she thinks so too) just to see Rae's mood from the afternoon change into this animatedly chatting girl, with the excited eyes as she talks about her latest project with her friend.

Especially when he informed her that they have to head back to the Hospice, and her goodbye hug lingered a little longer than goodbye see ya later, hugs normally go, and the way her fingers brushes against her when she gave him the photos. It was worth it for the way she smiles back at him and Louis realizes, much too late, that the beating of his heart was not a lingering fear from the fans at the shop, but due to Raelyn instead.

************************************************************************************

Notes

Little fun fact, (does anyone read these, idk) This chapter was written Nov, 2013...because it was my bday and the Midnight Memories album dropped the day before. (I remember being up early getting ready to go to Disney with the TV on, no coffee in my system yet and saying "i seriously hate them so much" and my friend was like "uhhh..what?" I just said "it's a love, hate thing"-Nov. 26. 2013.)

So, in the timeline for this story, that same album doesn't drop until several months after November. It was around this time while I was writing that I actually came up with a timeline because I realized I was actually going to finish a story.