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“Y'knowww.... I love youu, right Beeee?” Pico slurred out, his eyes getting droopy, the lazy smile etched on his face. The hand clutching his own stab wound got looser and looser by the second.
Keith hovered about him, kneeling, covered in Pico’s blood, but that was his own fault. His shaking hands held a metal pole in place of the knife he held just a minute ago.
“Y... Yeah.” Keith stuttered, his voice shaking with a sob that threatened to spill out. He was flooded with regret. This was an awful idea. He shouldn’t have done this to him, shouldn’t have hurt him. Fear and self defense wasn’t an excuse, was it?
“I’m-“ Keith’s breath hitched. “I’m gonna knock you out now, okay?”
Tears streamed down his face and he tried to breath. Knocking him out would relieve him of the pain of bleeding out, at the very least. Pain was the least of Pico’s worries though.
“... Yeahh, okay.” Pico responded, delirious from blood loss and the delusions he was having just before. He was still staring up at Keith, expression blank but lacking malice. It made him feel worse, sick to his stomach.
“I, uh,” Keith laughed shakily, slowly raising the pole above his head in preparation. “I don’t know if you're gonna wake up after this.”
Keith knew he wouldn’t. His grip on the pole faltered and he nearly dropped it.
“Okay...” Keith breathed out when Pico didn’t respond, choking back a sob. “Goodbye, Pico. I... I’ll see you soon.”
With a moment's hesitation, he swung the metal pole down on Pico’s skull. He didn’t hear a crack, thankfully, but he did hear Pico curse loudly and he swung again. And then a third time.
And then, it was silent. On Pico’s end, anyway.
He stared down at the almost corpse, hands shaking as he moved Pico’s hand from the stab wound it covered. It was bad, really bad. It made him sick to look at. Slowly, he reached into his pocket, pulling out his phone and dialing 911.
“H-Hello?” He stuttered once they picked up. “P-Please, please send an ambulance— my boyfriend is bleeding out, he got stabbed and I—“ he let out a sob and tried to cover his mouth. The other end frantically asked where he lived, and he managed to answer them. They told him help would be on the way, and then they hung up.
Keith finally let his body be wracked with sobs, He keeled over Pico’s barely breathing body and he cried, he cried and he kept crying. He knew that they would find him guilty, and that he’d be imprisoned, and couldn't bring himself to care. Pico was going to die because of him. Because of his stupid fucking decision.
He never said it back, he realized. Never told Pico that he loved him before he knocked him unconscious, and he wouldn’t ever get to say it again if Pico’s current state was anything to go by. Keith took a shaky, shallow breath in, resting his head gently on Pico’s chest. He barely had a heartbeat.
“P-Pico?” He mumbled, making an attempt to hold back whimpers and hiccups. “I love you— I love you so much, okay? Please- please don’t go, I didn’t mean to, please don’t—“ he interrupted himself with a sob. And then another.
It didn’t matter. Pico couldn’t hear him. The universe wouldn’t care no matter how much he begged or pleaded with it. So Keith sobbed harder, sobbed even as he heard the sirens outside his house, sobbed as the paramedics and police dragged him away from Pico’s body. He sobbed so hard he couldn’t breath, sobbed so hard he felt lightheaded. Keith’s sobbing grew louder when there was no concerned voice, cruel as it may sound, calling him a cry-baby. There was no awkward hug, no gentle attempt at comfort. He was covered in the blood of the person who he needed most right now.
And there was nothing that he could do as he cried, and cried, and cried some more. He was truly a useless cry-baby, wasn’t he?