I apologize in advance for the clusterfuck that is this chapter.

Ross woke slowly,, blinking and groaning as the sunlight hit him directly in the face. He sat up, shoving the covers to the side as he stretched, incredibly surprised at how well-rested he felt, until he realized he hadn't dreamed. Looking around Max's room, he felt a pang in his heart as he noticed the thin layer of duct covering everything.

I'll clean this place later.

Stumbling out of the room, he jumped back in surprise to see Tim suddenly by his side. His mood darkened.

"Hey, Ross! Glad to see you're awake!"

"Go away, Tim."

Tim's forced-looking smile fell away. "Look, Ross, I'm just trying to help you."

"Fantastic fucking job you're doing, Tim. I just want to get this week over with so I can get back to the hospital."

"Well you've already slept straight through two o the days."

"Joy. Now what do you want me to do?"

"Well, as I said yesterday—"

"You said a lot of this yesterday."

His roommate glared at him. "As I said yesterday, you need to record something. Preferably a vlog explaining what's been going on. Go eat breakfast, I'll dig up a camera."

Tim abandoned him in the hallway, and Ross slowly moved to the kitchen, sitting down without grabbing anything. Five minutes later Tim appeared, camera in hand.

"Did you eat anything?"

"No."

"Come on, Ross, you have to eat something."

"Not hungry."

"Ross—"

"I'm a grown man, Tim. I can make my own decisions."

Tim pinched the bridge of his nose. "Starving yourself isn't gonna bring Max back sooner!"

"Yeah well, if they pull the plug on him then maybe I can join him this way."

Tim nearly dropped the camera, paling significantly as his eyes widened with shock. "Ross...please don't say things like that. I...I don't think—"

"Not everything's about you, Tim."

"Everything's not about you either, Ross!" Angry tears began to fall down Tim's face as the stared at each other, Ross' face completely void of emotion.

Suddenly, Tim shoved the camera into his arms. "Take the fucking camera. Record something. Might as well if you're so hellbent on slowly killing yourself. To hell with all those who care about you, right?" Tim chuckled darkly. "See you later, Ross." His roommate stalked off, stopping a few feet away. "Your girlfriend called. Again. You might want to get in touch." One door slam later and Tim was gone.

Ross stared at the camera in his lap before turning it on, making sure his face was centered in the frame, not caring how awful he looked, before pressing record.

"Hey guys, it's Ross here. I know it's been a while, but my life has been pretty uh...pretty rough lately. Max and I have been absent for a while, so I thought I'd clear some stuff up in this little vlog.

"First off, Max. He's...he's in the hospital. In a coma, specifically. For about a month now. I won't specify as to why, that's for him to say when he wakes up, but uh, I was there with him. At his bedside, I mean. Adam actually had to literally drag me out of the hospital." Ross chuckled, but his heart wasn't in it. "He forced me home for a week, I wasn't taking care of myself...at all, pretty much, so here I am, I guess. I won't be uploading much until Max wakes up, I'll try to keep you guys updated on his condition, but...well we'll see.

"Another thing you guys should know is that...well, the doctors put a time limit on him. He has six months to wake up before they end it. And a month of that's already gone by, so..." He rubbed his eyes. He was not going to cry on camera. "So yeah. I guess I'll see you guys in five months, or whenever. Bye."

He ended the recording, and, taking a deep breath, made his way over to his computer in his room and set to work on uploading, sighing in relief once it was done. A few minutes later is phone buzzed, signaling the arrival of a text. One glance and he saw that it was Adam.

"Hey Ross, saw you're video. Good job, man!"

He let a breathy laugh, more of another sigh than anything, then responded. "Thanks. That was...harder than I expected."

"I'd expect so. Rumors are already running wild in the comments, some of them a bit too close to home. Want me to take care of it?"

Ross ran a hand down his face before replying. "Please do. I gotta talk to my gf. Apparently she's been calling here. Multiple times."

"Oooooooh, have fun with that! If you need you can call me after. TTYL Ross."

"See ya."

Hesitating, he stared at Sophie's contact, thumb hovering over the call button for a long time before finally pressing it. It only rang twice before she picked up.

"Ross! I was just about to call you for the five hundredth time!"

"Hello to you too, Soph."

"Don't 'Soph' me! Where the fuck have you been for the past month?!"

"I uploaded a video."

"I don't care! I don't care about you're stupid Minecraft videos!"

"It's not—"

"You know what, Ross? You can't vanish off the face of the Earth and not expect me to get upset! And the fact that you don't even seem to care! I can't take it! We're through!"

Ross said nothing. He could hear Sophie crying softly through the phone.

"Watch the video, Sophie."

He hung up.

The brunette bent over and put his face in his hands, groaning and letting out a long sigh before picking up the pone again and dialing Adam.

"Hey Ross, how'd the chat go?"

"Oh you know. She broke up with me."

"What?! Why?!"

"Something about vanishing off the face of the Earth and my—and I quote here—'stupid Minecraft videos'."

"Damn. I guess she wasn't worth it in the end then, huh?"

"Yeah, I guess. What did you do about the rumors?"

"I uploaded a video telling them to back the fuck off or I'll start blocking people."

"Jesus, ruthless much, Adam?"

"Hey, it got the point across. Things have quieted down. What's that noise?"

Ross glanced at his phone. "It's Sophie, trying to call back. I guess she finally watched the video where I explained everything."

"What are you gonna do?"

"Nothing. Tell her off. I know how she feels now. Apologizing won't magically make things better for us."

"Good for you. I gotta go, Ross, but I'll see ya later. I'm sorry you have to go through all this shit."

"Yeah. See ya, Adam."

He hung up, and his phone exploded with texts, all from Sophie. Sighing once more, he texted a quick reply. "What do you want?"

The response was instantaneous. "Look, Rossy, I saw your video, I'm sorry, I didn't realize."

"And?"

"And so If you want to get back together..."

Ross snorted out loud. "Hell no. Your true colors have shown. I'm not diving back into that."

"I'm trying to apologize here!"

"And I don't care. Good-bye, Sophie."

He made quick work of blocking her number before flopping on his bed, arms outstretched and staring at the ceiling, turning his head at the soft knock on his door. "Ross?"

"You can come in, Tim." He switched his focus back to the ceiling, listening to the click as his door opened.

"Look, Ross, I...I saw your video. Good job."

"Thanks, Tim."

There was a long, awkward silence. Then, "Look man, I...I'm sorry for...for how I acted earlier."

Ross faced his roommate. "Yeah...me too." Suddenly, he sat up. "Hey. You wanna go to IHOP?"

A relieved grin spread across Tim's face. "I thought you'd never ask."

And there we go! A chapter! Sorry it took so long, that Fluttercord thing took longer than expected to write. Anyway, I apologize for the ABSURD amount of dialogue in the chapter, along with the ranges of emotions and shit that happened. I don't know what the FUCK I am doing. Still, I hope ye enjoy!