Little Miss Babysitter

-- 33 --

"Um, who is this?" I coughed and looked at the caller ID. 'Unknown'.

"No one you know." The person spat. "No one you need to know."

And unfortunately, I recognized the voice through all of the slurring and strange gurgles.

"Jason, what's wrong?" I sighed and sat on my bed.

"Nothing!" He shouted into the receiver so that Taya glanced over and looked at the phone. "Ok, something. You're just... I don't like you."

"Okay?"

"No, I lied. I do. But I hate that I do, because you always walk all over me!" He whispered as if someone were listening to him. "It's like whaaaaat in the afternoon, and... I'm already drunk!"

He laughed. I groaned.

"I... I want to kill you. Yeah. That's what I want to do. Then there'd be no more problems, no more confusing, and you'd go bye-bye!"

"Confusing is not a noun."

"Who gives a camel, you fuckass?" He belched. "I hate you!"

My heart cracked, and a black aura filled in. The pang of unsure guilt, that I may have caused this breakdown of-sorts, stung like one-thousand angry bees. "Jason, you're drunk."

"No! I'm not. You're just not-drunk which is why you don't understand what I'm 'msaying." He said with a slight Irish accent. I wonder where that's from.

"Okay. Where are you? I'm picking you up."

"No you're not! You can go to hell!" He shouted, and I heard muted cheering in the background, along with a variety of cups clinking.

I was getting agitated. "Where are you?"

"O'Connor's Fork and Drink." He said with a regretful sigh. I was on my heels and panting my rage through my nostrils as soon as he had finished.

"O'Connor's?! You know that's in the bad neighbourhood! Why would you go there?"

"How do you know I'm at O'Connors?!"

"You, you just told me, Jason."

"Oh. Well then, I'm not! So don't come snooping for me. Especially at O'Connors." He said with a huff. "For no reason... Whatsoever. I'm not there. So... Don't look.. there. Bye."

The line crackled and cut off. And in that moment, I realized Jason, unlike my initial thoughts, had his problems as well. I was under the impression that nothing bothered him in the slightest. He was that easy go lucky guy, and everyone, virtually everyone, genuinely enjoyed his company because he was that much needed place holder, just to fill up space.

But he was deeper than that. And if it took me this long to figure that out, I really was as dense as I hoped I wasn't.

❀❀❀❀❀❀

O'Connors was the gateway to a dark descent. It was the first place that every city reject went to before they came out on the other side, completely transformed and sly. It was for this specific reason that I sped twenty miles over every speed limit so that I was able to get to him in twenty minutes instead of one hour. 

The outside was littered with people of all shapes. Some were blotches, pushed up against a wall. Others convulsed violently along the ground, appearing as if it were some sort of ancient inchworm ritutal. I shuddered unconsciously on my way in, and was blasted by the scent of caramel cookies, downtown liquor, and hard scotch.

"...know rocks are softer than she is."

My ears perked up at the familiar noise, and I lifted my head to find Jason seated among four others of his age in a wall-bolted booth. His face was pale and his eyes were red, yet a sloppy smile was thrown on his lips as if tossed there by a free and inaccurate hand.