This is an original poem that I wrote based on the prompt, "nothing you can do." You can read the speaker as any gender. It was an M/M prompt so thats how most read it but I wrote it specifically so that it could be read into in any way. Originally, I planned this to be a ficbit/short story but every time I sat down to write it, poetry came out instead of prose so I decided to go with it. Beware of sadness ahead.

I Know

My heart breaks alongside his.
We have lived through
skinned knees,
crushing defeat,
family falling apart, 
bruised hearts - 
all the things decades of 
friendship will 
survive.

My heart has belonged to him
since the beginning.
But his heart belonged to another.
And he was happy.
So I bandaged mine and 
smiled.

But now my heart breaks alongside his.
The tears on his cheeks,
the despair in his eyes,
the blood on his shirt
they all prove it -
His heart was left on that
pavement in tangle of burning metal.
As gently as I can, I wrap my arms
around him.
"I'm here for you."
"There's nothing you can do."
"I know."

My heart breaks alongside his.
The lost look in his eyes
tears me up inside.
The empty expression on his face
scares me.
A cascade of flowers drops haphazardly 
from his hands as if he can't
even find the energy to kneel down
and place them by the stone reminder that his
heart is no longer in his chest.
I reach for his hand and wrap my fingers 
around his ice cold ones.
"I'm here for you."
"There's nothing you can do."
"I know."

My heart breaks alongside his.
Weeks and months pass and it is like he has
been replaced by an automaton.
A machine that walks and works and eats
like he has but without 
the smile that shines from his face,
or the laugh that bubbles from his gut,
or even the tears that flow from his eyes.
I place a plate of food in front of him
and move my hand to squeeze his shoulder.
"I'm here for you."
Silence greets my words but in my heart I hear 
the truth: "There's nothing you can do."

My heart breaks alongside his.
The tears have finally come again
as they have not since that first night.
A year has passed and sobs wrack the 
fragile body of the one I love - 
the one I have always loved.
He buries his sorrow in my shoulder.
It is snotty and wet and ugly
but the fever has finally broken.
"I'm sorry," he whispers.
"I'm here for you," I whisper back.
He looks up at me and for the first time
in a year, he looks in my eyes.
"I know."