Fervent

Chapter 9 { brother, brother }

{ I can say it's what you know, but you've known it the whole time, yeah, you've known it the whole time}

Chapter 9 { brother, brother }

"That's not your name!" They were already arguing and he'd only walked through the door ten minutes ago.

"I changed my name. Legally." My brother snapped now. He had changed his name to Ben Sheen. His name was William Larson.

"Why would you want to do that?!" My mom put her bag down on the table and looked more exhausted than angry, but still shouting.

"I didn't want anything to tie us together. Bad things could've happened to me, and that wasn't something I wanted you to deal with, too." Me and mom looked at each other. We knew why he had left, but only the story he had told us. The story didn't make much sense to why he changed his name, though. His girlfriend was pregnant, and she didn't want to be around drugs anymore. But I didn't see a girl with him, or a child, so I suppose they're gone. "I know dad left." He said, bluntly.

"How? You don't talk to any of us." My mom sat down and rubbed her head, like even the three letter word dad was painful.

"I bumped into him. He has a girlfriend." I wasn't sure if my brother was numb to all emotions or he was painfully unaware of the loss.

"I know he has a girlfriend, Will!"

"Ben."

"This is my house and I'm calling you William."

"You can't pretend I haven't changed! You can't pretend nothing has changed!"

"I'm not pretending anything. I named you William and that's final."

"It's not final. You may be my mom, but I'm old enough to know better."

"Know better than what!?"

"You!"

And then I couldn't stand it any longer. They sounded just like my parents arguing, and I'd had enough of that to last a life time. When I got to my room I slumped myself on the bed and closed my eyes.

The next time I opened my eyes it was morning and I was still wearing my clothes from yesterday. My stomach growled and I frowned, had I not been woken at dinner time? I jumped up immediately, going downstairs and preying I hadn't fallen asleep just for my brother and mom to murder each other.

Nope. My brother was crashed out on the coach. I walked into the kitchen to see unwashed plates in the kitchen and mom's keys on the table. Apart from that, everything was gleaming clean and fresh. The stupid flowers mom always brought looked a little wilted and off colour.

The house was silent apart from the ticking of clocks and the occasional bird tweet from outside. What time was it? 4am?

I went upstairs and logged onto my computer.

I had one message on chatspace the faultiest chat server ever, but apparently the most popular one, so I had downloaded it a month ago.

Jamie.Gint64: The documents are a dead end. Nothing interesting.

e.larson: you've read all of it already?

I checked the clock on my computer. Half three. I was close. I knew I had messed up my sleep schedule, but I also knew I had slept more last night than I had in forever.