"Somewhere out there
You lost yourself in your pain
You dream of the end
To start all over again"

CHAPTER FOUR: SPRING NICHT


Inside the bus, Gustav sat crouched next to the bed where he had just attacked his dearest friend. He was only vaguely aware of hearing the bus door slam as Bill departed, then all was silent. As the surreal feeling of the moment wore off, Gustav suddenly shook his head and came to his senses.

"No... no...no... Bill... shit... no..." he whispered to himself, squeezing his eyes shut, harder and harder, to try and make the memory disappear.

Bill was the only thing he really had to rely on, and he was sure he had ruined - devastated - their relationship in those few crazed moments. As he took a few deep breaths and slowly opened his eyes, he looked at his hands. He could vaguely remember, as if it had been some kind of terrible dream, those same hands, clawing at Bill’s clothes, at Bill’s skin, at Bill’s hair.

Tears slowly slipped down his cheek, one by one, until they because an uncontrolled stream rolling down his face. He had only one clear thought in his head:

I hurt Bill.

With that thought came flashes of the look of terror on his friend's face, the fear that shone in his eyes, and the reflection of himself he caught in those tear-filled orbs.

I'm fucking insane. What have I done?

Then, suddenly, another thought entered his mind.

Tom... shit... I'm a dead man.

As if he didn't feel horrible enough, he knew if Tom caught wind of this, he'd be at the mercy of the older Kaulitz's rage.

"And they'll all hate me."

The words slipped past his lips, ringing in the silence, making it all seem so much more real. Unbidden thoughts came in waves, crowding into Gustav’s head so tightly that it felt like his head would explode from them all. Bill and Tom - hell, even Georg – would hate him forever; the band was done for.

Worst of all, he'd have to live every day knowing that he messed up the best thing that might have ever happened to him – and it wasn’t exactly the band and his career he was thinking of at that moment.

"I... hurt Bill. Oh God."

His stomach lurched. The memory of Bill below him was making him feel sick. His head began to spin, and, without stopping to consider it, he reached into his bag, pulling out a bottle of pills. The rest of the band was still, thankfully, unaware that Gustav was on medication for severe depression (for reasons he’d been thinking about way too much, lately), and Gustav could not think of a deeper depression than the one he had just put himself into.

"You fuckup, Gustav," he grumbled to himself, popping the cap open and pouring a few of the blue-and-white capsules into his palm. The more he thought about things, the more he thought back to the worst parts of his life, the things that shaped this pathetic person he'd felt he'd become, the person who had done the unthinkable.

He'll never be able to look at me again. Hell, I don't want to look at me again...

He tried wrapping his mind around never being to Bill what he had always wanted, ruining the best relationship he had ever had, but his thoughts shut down. He couldn't imagine that life. He didn't want to. It was a dangerous train of thought. He just wanted the pain to go away.

Gustav picked up the small bottle and poured a few more pills into his hand. The dosage instructions called for only two of the pills, but at the moment, all he cared about was making the terrible thoughts in his head go away. Two weren’t going to cut it.

He stumbled to the bathroom, somehow, and swallowed every pill in his hand, gulping water from the sink as he did so. Then, spent, he slid down the wall next to the sink.

Minutes passed, feeling like mere seconds. Gustav frowned. He still felt upset, which meant the medicine must not have been working. He stood, with some effort, and reached a shaking hand out to grasp the small bottle of pills. Gustav frowned again. He hadn’t realized he had been shaking.

After a brief struggle with the bottle, Gustav managed to get the lid off, spilling a few of the pills in the process. He dropped to the ground to pick them up, swallowing them as he went. After about six pills, Gustav felt like his mouth was suddenly filled with massive amounts of cotton.

The sink was above him, provider of glorious water…if only he could reach it. He studied one of his hands, which he noticed was clenched into a fist. It was uncomfortably tense, but Gustav couldn’t seem to relax it. He slung an arm up into the sink and hoisted himself clumsily up, banging his head in the process.

With his unclenched hand, he swiped at the tap. Water rushed out, and Gustav almost cried out in relief. Maybe he did. He wasn’t sure. He drank and drank, inhaling some and choking. He drank until he felt sick. Then he drank some more. It was too much, especially on his empty stomach, and he vomited into the sink, losing most of the water he had just swallowed. It felt precious and irreplaceable, and Gustav began to cry again.

He was suddenly aware of a terrible cramping in his stomach. It felt so much like the cramping in his hand that at first he was confused. For a split second, it had felt like his hand and his stomach were the same. Then another wave of nausea passed through him and he threw up again, this time missing the sink.

Gustav’s mouth still felt dry, so he swallowed some more water. He realized that he was shaking even more, and felt a sudden, desperate need to move around. A walk sounded like a really good idea. But a walk meant he would have to leave the water, and that would never do. He cast his eyes around the room, searching for a container he could fill with water. His eyes landed on a shiny metallic toothbrush holder. It had dried bits of toothpaste stuck to it, but Gustav didn’t care. He seized it clumsily, threw the toothbrushes within it carelessly across the bathroom, filled the cup with water, then darted out of the bathroom.

He stumbled out of the bus, having difficulty walking. One of his feet felt as seized up as his hand did. His stomach, no longer cramped, felt like it was writhing violently within his body. Every muscle within him screamed in agony. He was in the most excruciating pain he could ever remember being in.

His need to walk was more important than the pain, however, and he began walking in circles around the bus. Gustav felt like he was speeding around the bus faster than any human should have been able to. He felt like he had circled it hundreds of times by the time he came to a stop just a few minutes later. A quick check of his watch, however, showed that over an hour had passed.

Gustav frowned. He was out of water. The drummer threw the bus door open roughly and went inside. The sound of the bus door hitting the side of the bus rang loudly in his ears. Suddenly, he heard Georg and Bill, sitting in Georg’s bunk, talking loudly. He realized with a start that they were talking about him.

The two boys had nothing nice to say – everything was about how much of a failure Gustav was. He could hear Bill crying, and everything he had done to his closest friend came rushing back. Gustav stormed to the bunk and wrenched the curtains aside, only to find that nobody was there.

“Hello?” he called out loudly. He could hear whispers of people that couldn’t possibly be there. His sister was laughing at him from his own bunk. Tom mocked and threatened him from somewhere toward the back of the bus. Bill was still crying. Gustav rushed around the bus, overturning furniture, throwing clothes around, tearing things apart wildly, attempting to locate the sources of the sounds.

There was nobody on the bus, but Gustav could hear them, he knew they were there. A ringing filled his ears. His mouth was impossibly dry, but he couldn’t find it within him to refill the toothbrush cup. He knew that without water he would die, but at that moment, he didn’t even care. He collapsed on the couch, then rolled off onto the floor, writhing around in agony. His entire body felt like it was on fire, and he wanted to die. He was in sensory overload.

There was a fog in his head. His mouth was full of foam, making it feel drier than ever. He couldn’t hear, couldn’t think, couldn’t move, couldn’t even breathe. Then, suddenly, he saw that perfect face in front of him. A face he knew better than his own.

“Bill?” he whispered. The face moved. He reached out to touch it, and the face did not disappear. It was real. “Bill?” he repeated. He began to cry again. “Bill, I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to, Bill…please don’t hate me.”

“Oh God, Gustav,” the person above him said. What Gustav had not realized was that it was Tom, back early from his night out, that he was seeing, not Bill. “Fuck, what do I do?” The guitarist looked around anxiously, beginning to panic. “Shit, shit, shit.” He pulled out his mobile phone.

“Bill, I’m sorry,” Gustav sobbed, thrashing around wildly. His foot kicked violently at Tom’s guitar case, sending it crashing toward Tom. The other boy yelped and attempted to dodge the case as it flew toward him. The mobile phone flew from his hands and landed next to one of the beds. Tom crawled toward it, but was stopped by strong hands latching onto his ankle. “I didn’t mean to, Bill, I’m sorry, don’t hate me. Please, Bill…”

Tom swore, trying to shake the other boy off to no avail. The drummer was stronger than he was, even in his pitiful state. He could not wrench his foot away.

“Goddammit, Gustav, let go of me!” he finally screamed back at the other boy. Gustav immediately let go, shrinking from the sound like a frightened puppy. His sobs increased in volume, and he continued to wail his apologies. Tom took advantage of the distraction to seize his mobile phone. He stood far out of the crazed boy’s reach as he dialed an emergency number.

Tom attempted to converse with the emergency operator, but it was extremely difficult with Gustav sobbing and convulsing nearby. Finally, against his better judgment, he left the bus entirely, leaving the spasming boy alone inside.

After getting an ambulance called, Tom went back inside to check on Gustav. To his horror, he found his friend in a sloppy pile on the floor, not moving. Tom rushed over to him.

“Shit! Gustav?” He patted the other boy’s cheek awkwardly, unsure what to do. Gustav did nothing. “Wake up, Gustav. Fuck. Wake up!” His efforts did no good; the other boy remained motionless.

Tom paced around the bus anxiously, at a loss. As his circuit took him near the bathroom, he caught a whiff of stale vomit. Holding his breath, he stuck his head into the bathroom, and was greeted with an appalling sight: puddles of water mingled lazily with puddles of vomit, and small capsules, half-dissolved in the liquids, littered the bathroom like sprinkles on a cupcake. Tom shut the bathroom door quickly.

“Fuck,” he said helplessly. He knew nothing about medicine, and had no idea what the pills in the bathroom were, but he had a feeling they were the cause of Gustav’s condition.

He decided to call the other two members of the band before the paramedics arrived. Then he went back to pacing, stopping occasionally to check that the other boy was breathing. On the third such check, Tom noticed that Gustav’s fingers were beginning to turn blue.

“Shit,” he muttered, feeling like his vocabulary had suddenly been reduced to a handful of words, none of them pleasant.

He was saved from further action, however, by both his brother and the paramedics, who arrived at almost exactly the same time. Bill burst onto the bus, his makeup smeared with tears and his hair in disarray. When he saw Gustav lying motionless on the floor, he froze, mouth hanging open.

Two paramedics bustled around, securing Gustav onto a stretcher and carrying him away. A third one waved Tom over and began interrogating him about the situation.

“What happened?” the paramedic asked, uncapping a pen and preparing to write on a complicated-looking chart. Tom filled him in as best he could, describing Gustav’s erratic behavior and recounting the things he had said.

When he described the bathroom, littered with pills, the paramedic looked up sharply. “I need you to show me these pills,” he said. Tom quickly led him toward the back of the bus and showed him the bathroom. The paramedic picked a pill up from the floor, then looked around and spotted the prescription container.

“Gustav Schäfer,” he read, examining the label. “Your friend?” Tom nodded mutely. The paramedic hesitated, then pocketed the pills and ordered Tom to follow him to the ambulance. As they passed, Bill’s shocked and teary eyes followed them. He appeared unable to move from his spot.

Tom and the paramedic climbed into the ambulance, which roared away, sirens blaring. Bill had still not recovered when Georg showed up, breathless.

“Where’s Gustav?” he asked, clutching his side. He had obviously run a great distance. Bill shook his head, unable to speak. “Bill.” Georg’s voice was loud and stern. “Bill.” When the singer still didn’t respond, Georg reached out and slapped Bill’s cheek lightly.

“Huh?” Bill snapped out of it, putting a hand dazedly up to his cheek where the bassist had slapped it. “Shit. Gustav - ”

Without finishing his sentence, Bill pulled his mobile phone from his pocket and began mashing buttons frantically. A moment later, his phone buzzed to announce an incoming text message, which he read immediately.

He knew where Gustav was.

“Let’s go,” he said.



By the by, in case you hadn't noticed, the chapter titles and lyric snippets clue you in as to what's going on in each chapter. ;)