Chapter Text
Wednesday September 21, 2011
Every morning is exactly the same. He wakes up. He hates himself for waking up. He stares up at the ceiling until he finds the energy to function. And he gets out of bed, solely to keep his mother from worrying. Waking up in the morning never used to be this hard. He hasn’t been alright in such a long time.
Imagine waking up from a nightmare. The chill in the air and the panic are erased by a blinding relief. Wide eyes can relax and lungs can finally accept a deep breath. Just pull the blanket up past the eyes and everything will be alright.
Now imagine waking up in a nightmare. For Michael, the nightmare is life. There is no relief. There is no deep breath or security blankets. There’s only this. Rust in his joints, hollow bones, a glitch in his head, and tired eyes.
That being said, Michael Jones wants to disappear completely. He wants to float off into space, he wants the silence to envelope him, and he wants to be completely numb. He wants the world to carry on without him while he stands still. He wants time to forget all about him while he stops. He wants everyone to tell him that they’ll be okay without him, just so he won’t feel too guilty about leaving. However, he hasn’t quite figured out how to achieve disappearing completely without offing himself. And so he exists. He exists even though his body and mind want him to give up on the mere idea of life
His alarm goes off at 6:45 every single morning. Sometimes he eats breakfast, but most of the time, he eats caffeine pills from a box that he keeps by his bed. Michael hasn’t slept well in six months. He yawns and rubs at his eyes, glances around his mostly empty room, and finds the energy to get out of bed. He plugs his iPod into the speakers he keeps in the bathroom and he turns on his Morning Playlist. Pop punk bands are his favorite. His routine is simple. Piss. Shower. Brush teeth. Dress. It doesn’t take him long to choose what to wear. He owns less than one hundred things. Six of those things are shirts. Five of them are pairs of boxers. Two of them are jeans. Three of them are jackets. One of them is a pair of shoes. It works out pretty well. He does laundry often enough. Afterwards, he feels more awake. Less like he’s going to fall over and die at any second. He fingers the dog tag hanging from a chain around his neck. The words "Michael and Babs Forever" were etched into the metal. The chain is getting old, Michael notices. He will have to buy a new one.
He grabs his maroon hoodie, slipping it on and telling his mother that he loves her before walking out the front door. David will ride with one of his friends and his mother will drive Jimmy to the junior high school. It isn’t that they haven’t offered to drive Michael to school, it’s that Michael enjoys walking. It helps him clear his head. They say that exercise helps improve depression, but Michael hasn’t noticed any changes yet.
The high school is only a fifteen minute walk away from his house.
The main road runs perpendicular to his block. There’s a gas station on the corner that he hits up every morning for coffee. Molly, the dark skinned and heavy-set cashier who always works the morning shift, greets him. “Hey, baby, how the heck are you?” she asks him.
“I’m good, Molly. How’s your morning?” Michael asks her as he fills a large cup with black coffee.
“Exhausting, as usual. How’d you do on your algebra test?”
“Aced it,” he smiles. “I got an A. Only missed one question.” He says, snapping the lid on.
“Just like I said you would.”
He laughs a little bit. “Yeah, yeah. You told me so. I know.” Walking the three steps up to the counter, he makes eye contact with her and she shakes her head at him.
“Don’t get short with me,” she says, but she’s smiling.
“I’m sorry,” he smiles back as he hands over the money with exact change. $2.07. “Wish I had time to talk today, but I’ve got to go.”
“Alright, honey. Be good.”
“Always am,” Michael calls over his shoulder at her as he walks out of the gas station and into the chilly September morning. Michael genuinely likes Molly.
After crossing the main road, things get quiet. Quaint little houses line the road and he knows that little old ladies live in them with there dogs and their gardens. Everything seems far too mundane. Another couple minutes pass and he can’t help but look down an intersecting road at the empty Dunkelman house that sits right in the middle of the block. A mere five minute walk away from Michael’s own house. He wonders for a moment if it still reeks of old laughter and Barbara’s incense, or if the walls are still saturated in her mother’s perfume and her father’s cigarette smoke. The “For Sale” sign still stands in the front of the yard. Michael doesn’t think anybody will ever want to live there.
There’s a hole in him, somewhere. The edges throb when he acknowledges old memories. He feels the emptiness at all times. It weighs him down in a strange way. Emptiness and Nothing shouldn’t make him feel heavy, but they do. They always do.
He meets Ray at his locker, like he does every day, where Lindsay and Kerry are already discussing weekend plans.
“Homecoming is this Friday,” Lindsay pipes up. “We’re all carpooling to the game. You in?”
Michael would cringe, but he doesn't want her to get upset with him. "I don't know, man."
"Oh, come on," she argues. "When was the last time you spent a Friday night with anyone besides your laptop?"
That struck something inside his head. He wanted to argue back, defend himself, but he realizes that he can't remember when he last spent any time with his friends outside of school. “Alright, fine," he surrenders. "Not like I’ve got anything better to do,”
She smiles.
“Do you think we’ll finally win this year?” Kerry pipes up.
“Fat fucking chance,” Ray says. “We haven’t won Homecoming since we were freshies.”
“Who the fuck even cares?” Lindsay rolls her eyes. “We never really pay attention to the game, anyway.”
Michael takes a sip from his coffee and decides that even if their team was any good, he wouldn’t give any fucks about what was going on in the game. Lindsay is right. They never go to watch the actual game. He supposes that the only reason anybody goes to the games is more to do with the atmosphere than the team’s actual skills.
“We’re all leaving around half past six,” Ray tells Michael. “So I was thinking that I’d just come home with you that day.”
Michael shrugs. “I mean, whatever works, I guess.”
The bell rings, signalling five minutes until first period. Lindsay and Kerry take off down the hall. They’ve got to be on the other side of the school building for first period. Ray and Michael make the short walk to the end of the hall. Their classrooms are parallel to each other.
“Kerry’s going to pick us up. We won’t all fit in Lindsay’s shitty truck.”
Michael laughs. “We doing anything after the game?”
“Not sure yet. We might grab a bite to eat, but Lindsay might put us up at her house for the night. We can have a game night. Like we used to.”
Game nights. Ray, Lindsay, and Michael. Mountains of junk food and a thousand bottles of soda. They used to see four in the morning every weekend. Lindsay’s dad used to make pizzas for them. He remembers why they stopped having game nights, but that isn’t important now. Don’t dwell on the past, that’s what Michael’s mother always tells him.
“Yeah,” Michael says. “Like we used to.”
First period. American history. Boring as fuck, in Michael’s opinion. Memorizing dates and names and forgetting them all once the tests are over with. The second he was in his seat, he set his coffee to the side and he pulled his journal out of his bag. Pen in hand and the teacher droning on in the background, he opened it to the next blank page and began to write.
September 21st, 2011
The Homecoming game is on Friday. Two days from now. We’re all going in Kerry’s car. It sounds like a good idea. I mean, I haven’t actually been out with my friends in a few months, so we’ll see. Hopefully I can enjoy myself.
The rest of the day passed slowly, like most Wednesdays usually do. Second period, he could feel the caffeine eating away at his stomach lining. That’s what he gets for taking the pills on an empty stomach. And by fourth period, they’d mostly worn off. He fixes it by chugging down a diet Pepsi that he bought from a vending machine between classes and he makes a mental note to get to bed earlier. At lunch, he eats a salad and a granola bar while Ray copies his history homework. The rest of the day is just rapid finger tapping and quick glances at the clocks.
Michael walks home with one earbud shoved in his ear, blaring Fall Out Boy’s “Infinity On High” album at full volume. He avoided glancing down the road at Barbara's old house (however, he did clutch at the dog tag that sits right under his shirt) and he did not go into the gas station. He crosses the main road and goes straight home, where his brothers are already settled on the couch, watching cartoons. His mother was sitting at the kitchen table, writing what looked like a grocery list.
"Hi Michael," she greets him.
"Hey, Mom," he says back, ruffling her hair in passing. "Ray's coming over on Friday. Is that okay?"
She shrugs. "Fine with me. It's been awhile since I've seen him. What are you guys going to do?"
He sits his backpack down in one of the chairs and goes to rummage around in the refrigerator. "Kerry's going to pick us up. We're going to the football game." He finds a yogurt and a bottle of water that might as well have his name written all over them. "Lindsay's going, too."
"Will you need any money?"
Michael thinks about it for a moment before replying. "Not sure yet. Maybe, though."
"I can spot you ten bucks. It's not a big deal," she tells him. "Also, dinner's at six. We're having grilled chicken."
"Awesome. I'll be in my room if you need me." He grabs a spoon from a drawer before heading down the hallway to his room at the back of the house. He boots up his laptop and is notified of two new emails. Both are notifications from clashjournal.com.
New comment from CJ user bluebirds!
That's a really good picture of you! You're hair's getting a bit long, huh? I think my hair's actually shorter than yours at this point. Haha.
He smiles, clicking the link and going straight to Michael's online journal. The comment was on his most recent entry, titled "Recent happenings." He talks about school in the entry. Nothing exciting. At the end, he posted a picture that he took with his webcam. He was wearing one of his hoodies that seems to be two sizes too big for him. His hair was a mess and he was sort of smiling. It definitely isn't a bad picture, Michael decides.
He types back a reply.
ltmkilla
Thanks Tora! Did you get your hair cut again? You haven't posted a picture of yourself in a while. I demand that you post one in your next entry! :P
Michael does the math in his head. It's about eight in the morning in New Zealand. She probably won't be online again until late afternoon. Her time, of course.
He checks the other comment.
bluebirds
by the way, honey, you don't update as often anymore. I think you should post more entries. Like, twice a week, at least. I miss you! xx
Michael smiled at that one, too.
ltmkilla
I'm sorry, it's just that my life isn't that interesting at the moment. I'll try to update more. But only because you didn't really ask, you demanded ;P
He logs into Facebook and sees that he has zero notifications. No surprise there. Seconds later, He gets a message from Ray.
Ray:
Just got word that Courtney's going to be at the game on Friday.
Michael rolls his eyes and sighs. Here we go again, he thinks.
Michael:
We'll just avoid her.
Ray:
You think she's petty enough to go out of her way to fuck with us?
Michael:
i don't know, man. She's left you alone since July. Why would she choose now to mess with you?
Ray:
I don't know. Maybe I'm just being paranoid.
Michael:
You definitely are just being paranoid.
Ray:
Thanks a lot man.
Michael:
Seriously, though. If anything happens, I'm sure we can just take care of it. But I'm 99% sure that she'll leave us alone.
Ray:
why not 100%?
Michael:
Because you've got me overthinking it, asshole. That 1% went down the drain when you brought it up.
Ray:
Right. Okay. We'll avoid her.
Michael sighs again. It's been three months since Ray broke up with Courtney. He remembers the nasty text messages and the voicemails and the shitty posts she made on Facebook about him. It definitely wasn't pretty. Michael sees why Ray is so nervous to even be in the same place as Courtney, but it's getting old.
Another few seconds pass and he had a notification. Lindsay wrote on his wall.
"Can't wait until Friday! :D"
And yeah, Michael can't really wait either.
Later, after dinner, after doing homework, after some late night internet browsing, and after finally falling asleep, Michael opens his eyes.and finds that he is entirely too warm under his covers. His body is covered in sweat and his hair is plastered to his forehead. He pulls his shirt over his head and throws it at the wall. His pillow is uncomfortably damp, so he flips it over. The bed beneath him is damp as well.
“Fuck,” he mutters. His phone tells him that it’s just after three in the morning and there’s a buzzing somewhere in his head that tells him he isn’t getting back to sleep right away.
His bedside lamp illuminates the room and he waits for his eyes to adjust.
Thursday September 22, 2011
it’s three in the goddamn morning and I hate night sweats. I haven’t had this issue for four whole months, so why now? Maybe it's because my friends are taking me out on Friday night. It's been awhile since I've gone anywhere besides school. I'll admit, I'm a little excited. Only a little though. Obviously, I'm anxious about it, too. I guess I should be thankful that this night sweating issue is chronic, though. I’d hate to have to deal with this all the fucking time. I think I need to shower now.
Thursday passes like any other day. He wakes up. Piss. Shower. Brush teeth. Dress. Coffee. School. First period is boring. Second period English literature is only slightly more interesting. They started another chapter of The Great Gatsby. Third period gym class sucks, but that's nothing new. Fourth period biology is easy and uninteresting. Fifth period study hall is quiet as he finishes the remaining pages of the chapter they'd started in English lit. Lunch came and went, and so did advanced algebra. Spanish was spent taking pages and pages of notes.
Intro to Art is his final and favorite class of the day. He had begged the counselors to put him in the class, and they had made it happen. Michael has been working on a simple pencil sketch since the beginning of September. Their teacher, Mr. Rick, let them pick what their first assignment would be and the class decided on sketches. Michael had never been too good with drawing real people. He could draw objects and buildings and animals, but those things were so boring. They were things that people could look at every single day.
His favorite things to draw were monsters. He could make them up as he went along, put their eyes wherever he wanted, give them six legs or no legs at all, make them colossal or minuscule, and do whatever he pleased with them. For this assignment, he is sketching a monster that stands on two legs and it has no arms. It's tall. It has massive eyes and a round mouth with a circle of sharp teeth on the inside. It has two horns protruding from the top of its head. In the background, Michael drew a mountain way off in the distance. There was a hole in the side of it; a cave. That's where the monster came from. It definitely isn’t a "pretty" picture, but it's intricate, with lines and shadows and depth and Mr. Rick says he's excited to see it when Michael is done.
When the door opens, Michael isn’t paying attention. No, it isn’t until somebody sits in the seat beside him that he jolts back into himself.
“Hi,” the boy sitting next to him says. Michael feels the nervousness swell up inside of him and pop like a balloon. The boy is familiar. Michael knows him. How could he forget him? They had homeroom together for three years, and they would’ve started high school together if he hadn’t moved all the way back to England once his exchange program was up.
“Michael,” Mr. Rick says from behind him. “This is Gavin Free.”
“I know who he is,” Michael interrupts. “We had homeroom together in junior high.”
Gavin smiles. He hasn’t looked away once. Michael wonders why Gavin doesn’t sit somewhere else.
“Okay. Good. I told him to sit where he wants. Help him out if he asks, alright?”
“Sure.” Michael looks back down at his drawing. There are only a few seconds of silence after Mr. Rick retreats back to his desk.
“I wasn’t sure if you’d remember me, to be honest,” Gavin says.
“Why would you think that?” Michael decides to make the legs thin with the skin stretched tight over bones. He thinks that it will add to the tone.
“Dunno,” Gavin shrugs. He sees it out of the corner of his eye. “It was years ago. You didn’t want to talk to anybody. Why would you remember?”
“You’ve got it all backwards. Nobody wanted to talk to me,” Michael explains. The monster’s toes are pointed with claws that dig into the ground like he’s hanging on for dear life. “So why would you remember?”
“Why would I forget?” Gavin shoots back. “What are you drawing?”
Gavin makes Michael’s chest feel tight. “A monster.”
A beat of silence passes before he answers. “Looks good. Really good.”
Michael looks up at him for a split second, just to make sure that he is being serious. “Thanks.”
“Where can I get some paper?”
“Right,” Michael sets his pencil down and points across the room wih a slightly shaking hand. Maybe Gavin won’t notice, he hopes. “See that countertop over there? Third drawer from the left is paper. Take the size you want. There are paints and markers and crap in all the other drawers. Pick what you need.” Michael picks his pencil up again and picks up where he left off.
“Thanks, Michael,” he says. And he leaves.
Michael takes a deep breath and decides to sketch the monster’s torso smaller as well, with ribs that lie parallel to one another and a concave basin of a stomach. Gavin sits down next to him again, but Michael doesn’t pay any attention to him. He keeps sketching. Veins protrude in places like its straining itself to even move. A thin neck leads up to an ugly head. Sunken eyes and cheeks and a mouth that's open wide. He wants to make it clear that the teeth are so shiny, that people could see their own reflections, but he isn’t sure that he has the time for that.
Maybe I should finish this, he thinks. Maybe I'm done with it. But maybe not, he thinks as he adds more shadows underneath the angry eyes. The thing is a walking skeleton at this point and Michael is almost satisfied with what he has.
"Better start cleaning up, guys," Mr. Rick tells the class. "The bell's about to ring."
Michael puts his pencil down.
Maybe it's a metaphor for something, he thinks.
“Where can I put my drawing?” Gavin asks him.
He glances over at the lines on the paper, so light that Michael can’t even tell what it’s supposed to be yet. “We’ve got folders. Two poster boards stapled together. Mr. Rick can help you with that.”
“Right. Thanks,” and he’s gone, off to talk with the teacher.
Michael puts his pencil behind his ear and stares down at his sketch, his metaphor. His face pinches into a scowl. With a sigh, he shoves it into his charcoal grey folder.
“Can I share with you today?” Gavin asks.
He seems sheepish, Michael observes. It makes him look small. “Uh, what?”
“Er, Mr. Rick says to just put my work in someone else’s portfolio for now. Can I keep mine in yours? Just for now?”
Small. Shy. Wide-eyed. Completely different from what he used to be. “Yeah,” Michael answers. “Yeah, of course.”
Gavin grins, wide and sincere. Michael shows him where the folders are kept. When the bell rings, he grabs his bag and leaves through the doors next to the art room. He is one of the first people out the door, so nobody flags him down or calls his name. It's just him. He’s alone to shake off the anxiety that Gavin left him with. The sky is overcast, like it might rain at some point. He shoots a quick text to his mom, telling her that he's going for a walk before heading home. That's all he says. She knows where he's going. He turns his iPod on and hits shuffle.
“Play Crack The Sky” by Brand New begins playing. Michael changes his mind and puts the song on repeat.
His destination is a few miles away. It’s a ten minute backtrack to the gas station and a short walk down the main road. Fourteen blocks later, he crosses the road into quiet suburbs where kids play with their dads and moms in front yards. Dogs bark and the occasional stray cat runs to hide out in a dripping storm drain. Cars remain parked along the sides of roads or in driveways. Everything is where it should be.
The cemetery gates hang overhead in no time at all, so he pulls his earbuds out and pockets his iPod. He walks along the winding path lined with tall trees and headstones. It’s mostly silent. The singing birds really ruin it for Michael, but he’s willing to ignore them.
Up ahead, Michael sees orange and yellow flowers next to an all too familiar headstone. He knows that they’re fake. They’re always fake. Someone must have changed them for autumn. He approaches the headstone and smiles as he sees her name, like the last remaining part of her.
He pulls his hoodie over his head and lays it on the ground before sitting. “Hey, Barb.” He pretends that the silence that greets him doesn’t hurt. His bookbag lands on the ground with a heavy thud and he pulls his journal out. “I miss you.” He wishes, as always, that he was speaking with her for real. Her name etched in stone is as good as it gets. “I’ve been okay. Ray and Lindsay and Kerry and I are going to the Homecoming game tomorrow. If you were here, I’d beg you to come along. I know you probably wouldn’t want to go, but you’d be there anyway.”
He flips through his journal, looking for something to talk about, but there’s nothing. Michael doesn’t ever do anything worth talking about. The cover of his journal is worn and soft from being thrown around in his bag every single day. “I haven’t cut myself since March. That’s good, right? That’s like, six months, since the last time. Since--”
Since I last heard your voice.
He sits in silence for a few minutes. Leaning back on his hands and staring up at the overcast sky. It just looks like one massive grey cloud hanging over the town. He doesn’t say anything about school, or home, or the picture he was drawing to represent her in art class. He just sits. And maybe he should feel more alone than he does, and maybe it’s because this is routine at this point, and maybe because he still has the mere idea of Barbara Dunkelman fresh in his head, but--
“Honestly, Babs, I’m okay when I’m here. With you,” he tells the name on the headstone. “When I’m elsewhere, I want to stop existing and disappear completely. And I always wish you were here.”
Friday September 23, 2011
Michael wakes up with a bad feeling in the pit of his stomach. It’s different from his hatred of waking up and his emptiness. He recognizes it as apprehension, but he decides to ignore it before he even gets out of bed. His walk to school isn't as pleasant as usual due to the rain that begins to leak from the sky. It isn't heavy enough for him to ask his mother for a ride to school, but he decides to skip the gas station to save himself some time in case the rain picks up. He just puts his hood up and keeps walking. It speckles his glasses and polka-dots his grey hoodie. Everybody in his first period class stares at Michael's wet bangs and they know that he walked to school.
Michael isn't sure why that makes him feel so intimidated, but it does.
This day is as boring as the last two. Classes suck up until art class, where he gets lost in his sketch once again and Gavin doesn’t say a single word to him, even though, at the end of the day, they’re still sharing Michael’s folder.
He finds Ray waiting for him at his locker. “Ready to go?” He asks.
Michael nods. They leave the building.
“I got my copy of Gears of War: 3,” Ray tells him. “Haven’t even opened it yet.”
“Awesome, man. We can play it when we get to my house.”
The apprehension is still present at the back of Michael’s being, but he choses to smile, anyway.
They get settled in Michael’s room, Ray with a controller in hand and Michael with his laptop open. Tora hasn’t been online since she left those comments, which is nothing new. He remembers what she said about Michael needing to update more. The “Post New Entry” icon stares at him from the top of the screen. Maybe she was right.
“They need a few more people in one act,” Ray says. “I was thinking about joining.”
Michael clicks the icon and a text box pops up. Waiting for words. “What the fuck is one act?” Michael asks, fingers resting on the keys.
“Like theater. Short half hour plays.”
“And you want to be an actor?”
“No. They need crew members.”
“And since when do you want to participate in anything like that?”
“Since I figured out it was going to get me out of school. They do competitions. Like, all day things. We go, we watch a shit load of plays, and we perform. Beats taking fucking notes all damn day.”
“Sounds exhausting.”
Ray’s character dies on screen. “Exhausting?”
“Yeah. Like, committing and doing something and working with people. Exhausting,” he explains.
“Right. Well,” Ray begins. He’s about to drop a bombshell. Michael would know that tone anywhere. “I may have already told the director that we’d be at practice next Tuesday.”
He whips his head around. Ray’s staring at the television, where he hasn’t even respawned yet. “What?”
“Are you mad?”
“What the fuck do you think, Ray?” He slams his laptop shut and throws it aside. “Are you fucking kidding me?”
“It won’t be that bad--”
“You couldn’t even ask me first?”
“I didn’t know it was such a big deal!”
“Goddammit, Ray.” Michael ends up in the bathroom down the hall. He doesn’t turn the light on and he doesn’t look at himself in the mirror. He takes a seat on the edge of the bathtub and breathes for a moment. He should talk to Lindsay.
Michael:
Ray’s going to drag me into this one act bullshit.
When he doesn’t get a reply five minutes later, he pockets his phone and decides to wash his hands to pass the time. He needs to not be angry when he goes back into his room. His phone buzzes in his pocket, so he dries his hands and checks it.
Lindsay:
Yeahhh, that may have been my idea. We’re really short on crew members and I can’t help because I’m an actress.
“Well, fuck,” he mutters to himself.
Michael:
Wow, thanks for talking to me about this beforehand, assholes.
David and Jimmy are sitting in the living room watching a James Bond movie. His mother is still at work. In the kitchen, he grabs a Coke from the fridge and pops it open. He begins to wonder what theater crew members even do. They build the set and they...keep everything in order maybe? Michael doesn’t know. He’s never really been interested in theater before.
His phone buzzed once again.
Lindsay:
We need someone to paint the set. I figured you’d want to do that.
Painting. Michael could work with painting. It wasn’t his favorite thing to do, but he could do it.
He assumes ten minutes have passed since he left Ray in his room, so he sighs and grabs another Coke to bring back to him.
“Still mad?” Ray asks him, not taking his eyes off of the screen.
“Shut up,” Michael tosses the Coke in Ray’s lap. “Lindsay says I’ll get to paint. This doesn’t mean I’m not angry, though.”
“Of course.”
“I said shut up.”
Post to: ltmkilla.clashjournal.com
Entry Title: My Friends are Assholes
Friday September 23, 2011
Ray came home with me after school today. We decided to play some video games before going to the Homecoming game tonight (well, he’s playing and I’m here on CJ). And then he started talking about the theater group that our high school has. They need crew members. And Ray may have told the director that we’d be there when the group meets next. “We” meaning Ray and Michael. Ray, who wants to be in theater to get out of class, and Michael, who wishes Ray had said something to him beforehand.
So I left the room (because I was so fucking angry) and I messaged Lindsay about it and she was in on it. SHE WAS FUCKING IN ON IT. She told Ray to tell the director that I’d be there. What did I do to deserve this? What did I ever do to either of them? Why do they feel the need to sign me up for things that involve SOCIAL INTERACTION and PHYSICAL WORK without my say-so?
Lindsay says that i get to paint, so I can’t be too angry about being volunteered for this, but I really do wish they’d said something about it to me instead of dropping the bombshell. I hate feeling like I have no control.
On the plus side, the Homecoming game is going to be fantastic. I’m hoping that this will take my mind off of everything. Maybe it’ll take the edge off of all of the things I’ve been feeling, lately. Finger crossed.
When Kerry picks them up, Lindsay and Miles are already in the car. “Hurry up, losers!” Miles calls out. “My girlfriend is saving us seats!”
Ray and Michael get in the back seat with Lindsay. “So here’s what’s up,” she says to them. “We can’t hang at my house tonight because my brother has a ton of his friends over. We should totally go out to eat after the game, though.”
“Sounds good,” Ray says.
Michael sits in between Ray and Lindsay as they sing along to whatever crappy song Kerry is playing from his iPod. He smiles because he’s missed them.
They find Arryn and Monty at the bottom of the first section of bleachers. They’ve saved a space for all of them.
“How are we doing?” Miles asks.
“We’re getting our asses beat,” Monty tells him. He seems bored.
Michael sits down beside Ray. Lindsay, instead of sitting beside Michael, sits on the ground in front of him and leans back until she’s settled between his legs. The contact is simple enough. Knees to shoulders. He places his hands on her head and ruffles her hair a little and she laughs. Michael laughs, too. He feels comfortable.
“Arryn’s sister is working at the cafe tonight,” Miles says. “If we go eat there, she’ll probably give us a discount.”
“The only thing better than food is cheap food,” Ray says. “I’m in.”
“Same,” Lindsay says. “And Michael’s in, too, because I’m not going anywhere without him.”
He smiles. “What, am I stapled to you now?”
“We’ve always been stapled to each other. Where have you been?”
The crowd buzzes around them as they talk. They are in their own world. Michael watches the field, a mass of bodies on the ground over and over and over again. The score is 21 to zero. The other guys are winning. Ray and Miles talk about Gears of War 3. Monty, Kerry, and Arryn talk about anime. Lindsay and MIchael talk about one act.
“I’m not mad about joining one act,” he explains. “I’m mad that you guys didn’t talk to me about it first.”
Lindsay tips her head back to look at him properly. “You would’ve said yes. It’s a chance to do art stuff.”
“That’s not the point, Lindsay.” Michael isn’t mad about it anymore, but he wants to talk to her about it anyway.
“We just want you to get out of your room. That’s all,” she says, and she’s suddenly serious. “You get up, you go to school, and you go home. We’re worried, is all.”
He blinks once. Twice. There’s something warm blooming in his chest, spreading outwards, radiating heat. He likes the way it feels. “You guys don’t have to worry about me,” he tells her.
“Shut up,” She says, but she’s smiling. “I just can’t wait to do one act with my two best friends.”
“So,” Ray cuts in. “Exactly how often do we get out of class for this?”
Michael rolls his eyes and laughs. “You’re in it for all the wrong reasons.”
“And?”
Half-time happens. The school band plays and the homecoming queen and king are announced. Nobody’s listening. Miles and Kerry are throwing popcorn at each other, and when a teacher approaches them and tells them to stop making a mess, Michael and Lindsay laugh themselves to tears.
It’s when Ray decides that he’s bored. When Miles and Kerry and Arryn and Monty agree. It’s when Ray sees Courtney standing in a group nearby. When Lindsay and Michael decide that they don’t care what they do, as long as they do something fun that they all decide to leave.
There’s a playground right outside of the football field. They commandeer the swing sets and see who can swing the highest. It’s when Lindsay and Michael are attempting to kick holes in the evening sky that Michael sees the chain of his dog tag fly up in his face. The dog tag itself isn’t there, though. It’s just two ends of a broken chain.
His heart leaps in his chest and he drags his feet in the dirt to stop the swing. His hands grip the front of his hoodie, looking for a place that Michael and Babs Forever might be hiding, but he finds nothing. He pulls the chain until it’s resting, coiled in his hand.
“What’s wrong?” Lindsay asks him, still swinging next to him.
“My dog tag broke.”
“Shit.” Her shoes dig into the ground so hard that Michael is surprised that she didn’t fall face first off the swing. Michael can’t do anything but stare at the ground, hoping to find it at his feet, but nothing can ever be that easy. Lindsay puts a hand on his arm. “Come on, I’ll help you look.”
The sun had set hours ago. One measly streetlight illuminated the area. Michael couldn’t see a damn thing. He backtracked through the park, through the parking lot, back towards the football field, and to the bleachers. Another group of kids has already taken their spot on the bleachers and the mere thought of asking them to move makes his skin crawl, so he stares at them until Lindsay tugs on the hood of his jacket. He checks his pockets again, just for good measures.
It’s as they’re walking back again, eyes on the ground, Lindsay’s voice filling the silence and Michael’s mind flinging dumb, irrational thoughts in every possible direction, that the world begins to fracture.
A car horn sounds from across the lot. “Lindsay! Michael!” Ray shouts. “Get in!”
No, he thinks.
“What the fuck?” Lindsay asks, mostly to herself, and they walk to the car. Miles and Kerry and Ray are already inside. “Where the fuck are you guys going?”
“Courtney and her friends left the game and they were hanging out in the park,” Ray explains.
“So basically, he’s running away,” Miles cuts in.
“Not running away. Avoiding. Right Michael?”
No.
“Maybe it fell off in the car,” Lindsay says. She grips his hand and squeezes once before getting into the car. He doesn’t let himself hope. And as they drive off, he stares out the back window at the swing set, at the stadium, and at the space in between. He doesn’t want to think about leaving Michael and Babs Forever behind. Some kid is going to find it someday soon, or maybe not so soon. They will admire the shiny surface and make their parents read the words to them. Maybe it’ll be the token they put in a chest for a lovely game of Pirates, or maybe it’ll be the valuable thing they use in a daily game of Cops and Robbers, and maybe they won’t understand how important it is, and so they’ll throw it away.
Michael feels sick to his stomach.
Miles drives them to the cafe, where Arryn and Monty are already sat at a table. Michael sits between Kerry and Lindsay. Arryn’s sister comes by to take everyone’s order. Michael decides that he isn’t very hungry. He’ll save his money for morning coffees, or maybe he’ll just give it back to his mom.
“You sure you don’t want anything?” she asks him.
Michael shrugs. “Yeah. I’m not really hungry. Thank you, though.”
Conversation starts back up after she walks away, but he can’t seem to keep his mind on track. Lindsay and Ray and Monty are talking about school while Miles and Arryn and Kerry are talking about video games. Michael feels caught in between, like he doesn’t belong. Like he’s just there. Existing in Limbo, but this is what he wanted all along, right? He wanted to be included.
Food arrives. Michael checks his phone for the first time all night and he isn’t surprised when he sees that he has no messages. He’s about to message his mother when a tall glass is slammed down in front of him. He looks up and meets her gaze.
“I know you said you didn’t want anything, but I’ve been experimenting with iced coffee lately,” she smiles. “On the house.”
“Y-you don’t have to--”
She cuts him off. “Don’t worry about it, kid.” And she walks away from them again.
Lindsay tries to share her french fries with him, but the smell alone is causing his stomach to churn. The coffee is sweet. Vanilla and bitter linger on his tongue in a tricky balancing act. Maybe it’s the familiar taste of the coffee, or maybe it’s the kindness of the gesture, but it makes Michael feel slightly better.
The next two hours pass quickly enough. Michael fills it with half-hearted conversation and tired words. The feeling taking over is familiar. Well worn. He would recognize it anywhere.
Miles drives them home, and thankfully, he drops Michael off first. As he is stepping onto the curb outside his house, Lindsay speaks up. “There’s another game next Friday. You want to do this all again?” She seems hopeful, so he pulls his face into something like a smile, if not for him, then for her.
“We’ll see, Lindsay.”
He tells them all goodbye and he watches them disappear down the road. The late night katydids sing their songs to the moon and the stars and the clouds dance slowly and quietly across the sky. A light breeze combs through the trees and Michael stands completely still. He sighs.
The lights are off in the house, and he attempts to be quiet as he slips his key into the lock. The door doesn’t squeak when it opens and he closes it slowly.
Flicking the light switch into an on position didn’t make everything seem any less empty. He feels exactly the same, except now the lights are on. It almost makes it worse. The clock ticking on the wall reminds him that time is still moving all around him. The Earth is turning, the moon is rising higher in the sky. And while his brothers and his mother and his neighbors are sleeping soundly in their beds, Michael is frozen, taking calculated breaths and clenching his fists in his kitchen, a place where all time seems to have stopped. Suspended until Michael can figure out how to move again.
And when he manages to break free, he goes straight to his bedroom, where his online journal waits.
Tonight is one of those nights where he wishes he could contact Tora. He can always shoot her a message or two on ClashJournal, but it’s something like early afternoon in Tora Land. Michael is positive that CJ user Bluebirds has better things to do on a Saturday afternoon.
So he writes it out instead.
Post to: ltmkilla.clashjournal.com
Entry Title: Sometimes I feel like I am permafrost.
I don't even know why. Nothing extremely terrible happened. I lost the dogtag Barbara gave me for my birthday. The one that said “Michael and Babs Forever.” The chain broke and I didn't know it. I just feel so detached right now.
We lost the game. 10-41 -.-' Hoo-fucking-Rah.
I should've fucking stayed home tonight. I should've stayed home, safe and sound. I would not have lost my dogtag. I would not have ended up feeling so alone. I'm a fucking mess..I feel like grabbing the nearest sharp object and going to fucking town on the first patch of skin i see...and I don't even have a Reason. I'm just stuck inside my own motherfucking mind.
I should not feel this alone. Not after I spent four hours with people I love. Not after tonight. I've been looking forward to tonight all week. And now I can't remember why I wanted to go in the first place. I'm just a third wheel. I don't belong there. I should've stayed home.... I'm going to fucking cry and I don't even have a real reason. I've just never felt more alone.
When it’s all out there, he feels as if the entry should be longer. There aren’t enough words on the page, but he doesn’t feel like writing anymore. The things happening inside his head feel much bigger than a few paragraphs. So he posts it and he throws his laptop aside.
The bathroom door closes behind him before he’s even realized that his legs have taken him somewhere. This room is frozen like the kitchen. And Michael wishes that he’d never looked in the mirror at his unruly hair and his pale face, blank expression, empty eyes…
So he sinks down to the floor and the air stops circulating in the spaces of his lungs. His knees against his chest only make him feel slightly better, but it doesn’t make his breath come any easier.
It never does.
This overwhelming sense of guilt and regret crush in on his thoughts until all he can think is, “I lost it,” and “I need her,” and “Oh, God. no.”
Oh God, why?
If he’d stayed at home, if he’d replaced that chain, if they’d stayed at the game, if his head wasn’t broken--
And as he shakes apart on his bathroom floor, he wishes that Barbara were here. But wishing doesn’t work.
It never does.