I'm fine. Don't freak out.

Once your brain processed the text message, the adrenaline shot through your veins.

You'd fallen asleep sometime around 10 o'clock on the couch, the TV on, and had just causally checked your phone upon waking up to see the time. It showed 2AM and you thought about how you should go to your actual bed. And then you had opened the waiting text message from your boyfriend.

You hadn't expected to read what you did.

I'm fine. Don't freak out.

It was practically taunting you, as you felt like the air was being squeezed out of your body. Sitting up quickly, you barely got your fingers to press on the screen, pulling up his contact, and hitting the small phone icon to call him. All but slapping yourself in the face in your haste, you pushed your cell phone to your ear, hearing it ring. Once. Twice. Three times. Four. Nothing. When his voicemail kicked in, you ended the call and tried again. Once. Twice.

"Hey." Seth's voice was rough, low in volume.

"What happened?" Your voice, on the contrary, was higher in pitch, and definitely in volume.

"Huh? It's just my knee," he answered, sleepily. "Having it looked at tomorrow."

"And you didn't think to just say that in your message? Jesus fucking Christ Seth! I'm just about having a panic attack here waking up to a text like that, with no explanation!"

"…what?"

"What do you mean 'what'?" you demanded.

"Didn't you get two messages?" Seth asked, his intonation giving away his confusion, though he at least seemed more alert now.

"What? No?" you responded. "All I got was 'I'm fine, don't freak out'."

"Shit…baby, I'm sorry," he sighed, sounding genuinely apologetic. "I didn't know if you were watching at all, but I told Xavier to text you anyways for me to tell you what had happened in case I couldn't talk to you until much later. I barely got a chance to send you what I did. And when I didn't hear back at all, I just assumed you were asleep, and I figured I would just talk to you tomorrow about it."

Your boyfriend, you decided, was a total fucking idiot.

"Well, I wasn't watching, and he didn't text," you made clear, still so amped up on emotion you couldn't help but be harsh in your words. "So all I got was that text from you telling me to not freak out, which of course, made me freak out."

"I'm sorry," he repeated.

"You should be," you snapped. "Don't you ever do that again! You scared the shit out of me!"

Taking in a deep breath, you put your elbow on your knee, leaning forward to rest your forehead against your hand. You were trying to settle your racing heart, but it wasn't easy. You had gone from dead asleep to wide awake in much too short of a time.

While it was good to know he wasn't in a dire predicament, you also knew any injury was bad. Seth remained quiet on the other side of the phone. You weren't sure if it was because he was worried about how angry you were with him, or he was just upset about his overall condition.

"So do you know anything?" you asked, your tone having lost most of its bite from before. As you calmed, you were able to realize this really shouldn't be about you right now.

"Not really," Seth said. "I mean, they put me on crutches, but I can put weight on it. Just…not a lot. We'll see tomorrow."

"How does it feel though?"

"Not good," he chuckled, though there wasn't any humor in it. "I mean, definitely not as bad as last time. But I knew the second I went down, something happened."

"Are you coming home? Or going somewhere else?"

"Alabama." You went to reply, but he spoke before you could. "No, you don't need to come down."

"…you sure?"

"I don't think this is gonna be a surgery situation. If that changes, I promise I'll make sure to include that detail in however I communicate with you." You cracked a smile at his wording, appreciating his attempt at lightening the mood.

"I'm sorry this is happening again."

"That's life, right?"

"Still sucks."

"I won't argue you on that," Seth replied. You didn't like the depressed tone he had used. It made your heart hurt.

There was a pause in the conversation. You knew he wouldn't be too talkative given the circumstances; he was one to draw into himself when bad things first happened, in order to process it alone, and then he would include others in his thoughts.

"I just wish you would have called me," you mumbled, chewing on your lip.

"It was a little chaotic backstage for a bit. And like I said, when I didn't hear back at all from you, I figured you were asleep. Didn't want to wake you up with this," he explained. "I'm sorry for the heart attack though. I really was trying to avoid that happening."

"How'd that work out for ya?"

"Not so great," he admitted, and you knew he was smirking.

"You're sure you don't want me to somehow magically find a plane to get to you?"

"Nah. Would rather come home to you when it's all done," he stated, causing you to grin to yourself.

"Well, I'll be here."

"That's all I need then."