Life Burns Faster | Eddie Munson

5

The night came and went, taking its time in doing so. Neither of the pair had gotten any shuteye and there was no sign of the others returning any time soon. There was a moment in the early hours where Eddie had suspected intruders of some kind and had raised the alarm, yelling at what turned out to be a duck and holding up the glass bottle he'd threatened Faith with the previous day.

They were both wide awake at 8:30am, having given up making any attempts at sleep. Faith had settled down at the rear of the boathouse again, looking out over the water while Eddie paced the floor. Eventually, he walked to the door.

"What are you doing?" Faith asked, snapping her head towards him in shock.

"I'm taking a leak – is that against the rules?" He mocked, holding his hands up.

Faith shook her head. "You're gonna go out the front? Where were you planning on pissing?"

"God, when I tell you I never thought I'd be in a situation where I would have to tell you when and where I was planning on taking a piss..."

"Well, you're in luck," Faith replied. "Are you not gonna go round the back and do it?"

"Piss on a tree? I don't think so, Foster," he gestured towards the house. "I'm not an animal."

"I don't know, I've seen you do some questionable things, including crawling around on the floor like a bear..."

"Hey! We were 16 and it was a dare, gimme a break!" Eddie defended and Faith giggled.

"It was the roar that got me, very realistic," she laughed and caught Eddie's annoyed expression. "Oh, come on, pissing outside not metal enough for you?"

"There's nothing metal about not using a bathroom when there's one mere metres away from us," Eddie said, raising an eyebrow. He turned to the door.

Faith stood up and ran to the door, taking a hold of the handle before he could reach it. "You can't be serious? You can't be seen!"

"I'm not doing another night in that hellish boat – I'm gonna have back issues 'til I'm 80. Come on, I've been holding it for hours. I've got this, Foster," he assured, though Faith wasn't convinced. He placed his hand on hers that gripped the handle tightly and moved it down, forcing him to step forwards towards her. Faith looked up at him, noticing the top of her head reached his nose, as it always had done. She supposed neither of them had done much growing since they last saw each other. She felt his hot breath plummet down onto her face as he opened the door quietly. Eddie stepped out of the boathouse, scanning the surrounding area for any sign of life. Everything remained still.

Eddie ran, crouching a little as he went, towards the building. Arriving at the side of the house, he looked around for a way in. He walked to the rear of the building and disappeared from sight. Faith watched on nervously and finally heard the sound of glass smashing loudly. Glass shards came crashing to the floor in an almighty smash. She rolled her eyes.

"Edward Munson, the master of subtlety," she muttered under her breath. Faith looked around before retracing Eddie's steps and running after him towards the house. She came around to the back of the building and almost stood straight on a large shard of glass. She squealed as she came to a halt.

He'd smashed the window next to the back door and had obviously reached around to the lock on the other side to open the door. It lay open, so Faith walked slowly inside. The hall was pretty bare, aside from a few frames on the walls leftover and a chest of drawers that looked largely ransacked.

Faith heard the toilet flush in the bathroom.

"I actually thought with your experience of hot-wiring, you'd be kinda skilled at a break-in – turns out I was wrong," she teased.