"A Sanctuary Safe and Strong"(Marianas Trench)

Chapter 28

By three in the afternoon, the singer had decided that he couldn't hang around his parents' house any longer without it seeming like there was something going on preventing him from leaving. He made some random excuse, saying something about having to get to the studio, which his mother thankfully bought without too many questions. If nothing else, she knew that her son was a workaholic and would live at the studio if he could. A few "thank yous" and "I love yous" later and Josh was back behind the wheel of his car, headed south toward the second place in his life that currently sucked out a healthy percentage of his monthly paychecks just to keep running. 

He'd survived another night. It might not have been at his own home, but he'd made it. No nightmares, either, which he was surprised about, but fuck it. Josh took what he could get. He was stupidly proud of himself, he realized as he let himself into the studio, tucking the keys into his pocket. No nightmares, no panic attacks, no imaginary men in masks trying to kill him. It was a good night. 

It wasn't until Josh was halfway through the building that he realized he had grabbed the bag of his clothing when he got out of the car. "Great job, asshole," he said aloud, dropping it onto his desk in the office. Why the hell would he have done that? It wouldn't have been his most idiotic moment in history, so he didn't bother to question it any further. Still, it seemed like a strange thing. 

First thing was first, now that he was safely at the studio and had brought the stupid bag in with him. Josh unzipped it and reached in to pull out the crinkled brown paper bag containing memories he wished weren't burned into his mind and etched onto his body forever. He hesitated before wrapping his hand around the folded top, but yanked it out quickly, practically running back through the building and sprinting down the block. There were industrial dumpsters for the businesses that lined the block to use right at his fingertips, and he took advantage of that today. The blond stopped at the first one he came across and flung open the lid.  

Just as Josh lifted his arm to throw the bag in, leaving it behind forever, he paused, pulling it back against him and squeezing his hand around the brown paper. He heard the crinkle and felt the roughness beneath his fingers, sighing heavily and wondering why he couldn't just do it and get it over with. Biting at the inside of his cheek, the singer slowly lowered himself down to the ground on one knee. Forcing himself to open the bag, he reached in and shoved the shredded shirt aside until his fingertips grazed the fabric of the jeans. Digging his hand into the pockets, he emptied them, finding a couple of dollars, a pen and something round and black. "What the fuck...?" he mumbled, turning it over in his palm and frowning at the thing. It looked like a screw cap that belonged to something familiar, but there wasn't much there to tell him what it was.  

There were brief flashes of the object in his thoughts, and what this could be felt like it was on the tip of his tongue, but he just couldn't retrieve it. Finally, he flipped it over once more, feeling the grooved edges between his fingers. "Fuck, no. Fuck, NO," Josh said, scrambling to his feet again and holding the plastic piece at arm's length. He knew what it was now. He knew exactly what it was.  

The singer could feel the cap in his hand as he squeezed his fist around it, the tiny pointed edges digging into his palm. He swallowed hard, trying to ignore the memory the soda bottle cap was bringing back. It was what he'd shoved into his pocket the day he'd been shot, just because he had nowhere else to put it. He'd never expected that it would come back to him. 

Pacing back and forth in front of the dumpster, Josh dropped his arm down to his side, squeezing his hand tightly every few seconds, just to feel the sharp biting sting the ring of plastic left against his skin. He wanted to throw it into the trash. He wanted to burn it. He wanted to get rid of it forever, but something in his gut was telling him to hold on to this meaningless little piece of crap. Each time he raised his hand to throw it, he hesitated. 

Sighing, Josh realized that there would always be time to throw it into a garbage can somewhere, anywhere. But if he did it now, he'd never get it back again. He couldn't say why he wanted to keep it. This kind of souvenir wasn't something normal people wanted to hold onto, was it? Hell, he rarely collected anything in his travels as it was, so why this? Why was this so goddamn important to him? He didn't know, but he couldn't make himself get rid of it either way.  

Instead, the blond tucked the money, pen and bottle cap into the pocket of the jeans he wore and bent over, rolling the top of the bag shut again. He righted himself and picked it up, throwing the everything into the dumpster and slamming the top shut with a loud metallic clang. It was satisfying, knowing that he was rid of that shit, at least, and he wouldn't accidentally come face to face with that later on down the road when he least expected it.