Chapter Text
Michael sat on his bed and stared at the closet, watching the shirts that were dangling precariously from the shelves. It sort of represented the entire room. More clothes, books, and just random items were scattered all over the floor. The sheets on his bed were twisted and he hadn't made his bed in days. The only empty space was a little circle around his guitar stands, where his acoustic and electric guitars sat perfectly clean and in good shape.
He sighed and pushed himself up, hunting through the piles for his textbooks. He found his art class textbook and tossed it on the bed before hunting for his psychology textbook.
He froze as he pulled out a book. It wasn't his textbook- it was a small worn journal with dog-eared pages and random scraps of paper tucked between them. He stared at the blue cover.
There were sirens wailing. The lights were blinding him through the window but he couldn't move. His chest hurt, his legs hurt, everywhere hurt...
He shook his head to clear it. It's in the past, he thought.
"Shit!" Jake forgot about the two of them in his panic, turning and running out the door toward the back door of the house. Michael didn't know if he was crying from pain or self-hatred at the entire situation.
With a cry of frustration, Michael hurled the book across the room. It sailed perfectly out the open window and he heard a thud as it hit the ground a few seconds later. After a few moments of shock he sighed and turned back to digging through the mess.
_______
"Ashton, it's been so long," Luke whined. "Aren't you ready to move on?"
"No," Ashton pouted, kicking at a rock and watching it skitter down the sidewalk. "The dude tripped me!"
"Ashton," Luke said again in an exasperated tone, "it was two weeks ago and he was asleep! He had no idea you wouldn't see his legs sticking out."
"But my forehead is still bruised from the ground!"
"It is not. Seriously, you can't even remember what he looks like." Luke rolled his eyes.
"You only remember because you're creepy with people," Ashton said.
"I just remember what people look like," Luke said defensively. "What's that?"
His attention was suddenly diverted by an object laying in the leftover slush from winter. He crouched down to look at it and saw it was a book.
"I think it's a journal," Ashton said, looking over Luke's shoulder.
Luke picked it up and shook as much of the slush from it as possible.
"I'll dry it off at my dorm and see if I can find the owner," he decided, shoving it into his bag. Ashton rolled his eyes.
"You're just curious because you're a friggin' English major."
"Shut up." Luke stood and continued down the sidewalk, Ashton jogging to catch up.
Luke had to admit he was extremely curious, though.
_______
"Michael, please. Come do something with me. I haven't seen you in a while."
Michael sighed. Calum was in his dorm room practically begging him to go outside, but he really didn't want to.
"Come on. We can come back if you hate it. We don't even have to go to like, a party, or something. Let's just get coffee or dinner. The only place you ever go is class."
Michael felt a twinge of guilt. Calum had gone through a lot because of him- he at least owed him that much.
"Okay," he said.
"But Michael- what?"
"Let's go get coffee. I should do something."
"Okay." Calum looked around at the mess but he was smiling and Michael felt a bit better. "Um, here's your coat."
Michael took it and pulled it on, careful to keep his sleeves down. He followed Calum out of his room and then the building and breathed in the fresh air.
He felt a little more positive and realized that he hadn't been outside in months. Not really. He'd run out without a coat and hurried from building to building for his classes but he'd not gone out to enjoy it. Calum grinned knowingly at Michael but he seemed happy and Michael just rolled his eyes as they made their way down the sidewalk toward the campus coffee shop. It was a bookstore too, and Michael resolved to take a look at some books while he was there.
Business was pretty slow when they got there and they got their coffee pretty quickly before they sat down at a table.
"How are classes?" Calum asked.
"Difficult," Michael said. It was true. Everything felt difficult those days and he had so much trouble concentrating.
"How about the counseling?"
Michael tensed. "Not so great," he said in a clipped tone.
Calum sighed but seemed to recognize that he should drop the subject.
"My psychology class is a fucking drag. I wish we were in the same one."
"Yeah." Michael looked down at his coffee and swirled the cup a bit to mix it. He knew Calum looked worried without even glancing up at him.
"Look, Michael, if you don't want to say anything about it, that's fine. I'd just like to know how you're doing."
"I..." Michael blinked rapidly, trying not to cry. "I'm fine."
"Michael, you don't have to lie."
"I'm not-"
"You know," Calum interrupted, suddenly glancing down at his own coffee in his hands, "I haven't really seen you since the- the incident, and the last way I remember you is back there, back at- at home."
"Calum..." Michael felt guilty.
"No, Michael, it's not your fault. I'm just saying that I really want to see you more and reassure myself that you're not still on that floor all- broken."
Calum set down his coffee and buried his face in his hands for a moment. Michael had known Calum for years and he knew he was trying not to cry. He seemed to be failing, however, when he pulled his hands away and looked at Michael with glassy eyes.
"I'm sorry," Michael said, and he really was. Calum shouldn't have had to find him and get him out of his problematic relationship.
"Michael, it's not your fault. I know you still think it is, but it isn't. I'm glad I found you because if I hadn't that might have gone on much longer. But what I'm trying to say here is that I really want to see you more."
"I...I'll tell you what. I'll meet you here twice a week. Does that sound good?" Michael said. Calum's face lit up.
"That would be great, yeah," he said, and Michael felt a little less guilty.
"Okay. How about Tuesdays and Fridays?"
"I can do that if you're available at four-thirty," Calum said.
"Sounds good," Michael said, hoping he wouldn't come to regret the decision.
_______
Luke carefully picked up the now-dry journal and sat down on his bed with it, gently pulling the cover open. The cover and leaves were soft from use and he felt confident that they wouldn't crack and fall out.
Much to his dismay, however, there were no names or dates. Not even a beginning date. Each entry was begun with an extra line of space and ended with a goodbye or till next time.
Hoping he could glean information on who owned the book, he decided to read the first one or two entries.
Dear diary,
So that beginning is lame as hell. So are diaries, but I've got no one to talk to. Jake doesn't want to talk about much other than him which makes sense, I suppose. I'm not exactly interesting.
I forgot you don't know anything about me. Jake is my boyfriend...
Luke ended up reading the first few entries with sympathy. Whoever owned the diary was obviously dating a complete douchebag. The guy seemed to never want to listen and always want to talk about himself.
By the time he up the journal away and got his homework out, what he knew about the owner was this- that they were male, that they didn't care about themselves overly much, and that their boyfriend was a self-centered jerk. But he still had no names or even dates.
Resolving to read more the next day, he turned to his homework.