Focal Enemy | ✔

Disgrace (the result of carrying out a dishonourable action)

"You're quiet tonight."

The ivory sofa was squished downwards slightly as Josephine's slim body accompanied Theodore. His eyes were trained forward at the flashing television screen, displaying advertisements of all sorts. Theodore wasn't really watching, but Josephine muttered something about how some singing competition was about to begin and stole the remote control from the coffee table. The screen changed, and she put down the device, picking up a bottle and a glass instead.

"Fee."

Gradually, Theodore let his eyes drift to her - or more correctly, her hands. They were curled around a bottle of beer and a glass of what - from the smell - Theodore assumed to be champagne.

"You need to relax," said Josephine, handing him the olive coloured bottle.

It was no surprise to Theodore that she had become calm. Josephine was not a resentful, distant person. She cared not for arguments, but she had put her foot down, although it had not worked. Calmness was in her very nature, and had been since her childhood - or so her mother had said. There was not a bone in her body that was able to hold a grudge, especially when she was so deeply in love with that said person that the ocean did simply not compare. Not the Atlantic or the Pacific Ocean could have touched the depth of her feelings.

And, that was the very thing that Theodore took for granted.

He took the bottle, wasting no time in letting it meet his lips.

"Better?" asked Josephine, glass on its way to meet her cherry red lips.

Theodore downed a mouthful and swallowed it.

"Yeah," he said. "It's just what I needed."

A smile sat on Josephine's face as she grabbed his arm, draped it over her shoulders and snuggled into his side. Theodore let his other arm drape of the arm of the sofa, still clutching the bottle. He didn't know what was more overpowering. The stench of alcohol, Josephine's favourite, sweet-as-candyfloss smelling perfume or the terrible rendition of an old ballad that one contestant was performing on the television. But even in light of the sharp overpoweringness of everything, Theodore allowed all tension in his body to fade, replaced by the unfamiliar, comfortable feeling of the weight of the world leaving his shoulders, allowing him to soothe.

The light from the television flashed colours of a neon rainbow and Josephine was suddenly sucked in, as though something had taken over her mind. It wasn't until the first break that she spoke again.

"Are you going to visit your parents tomorrow?"

The words left Josephine's mouth as though the had slid out alike butter. Theodore froze.

"No," he said, clenching his teeth. "Don't keep bringing it up."

Shivers ran through his body, his mind fuzzing over. Theodore could not tell if it was due to the alcohol or just the fact that he refused to relive or revisit the past. There was a certain box of memories in the back of his mind, locked and covered in dust as thick as a quilt. It was full of things that had happened and faces and places that he would never face again. Never.

Josephine shifted.

"Theodore," she pleaded, "they are your mother and father."