strangers // twenty one pilots

why do i care?

Tyler's POV

We all decided that considering it was already super late that we would go to the hotel for the night anyways, instead of trying to drive to Pittsburgh which is where our festival is tomorrow. We sleep in a tent at that festival though so we honestly deserve some sleep in a bed tonight. And a good shower. 

We just pulled into the hotel. Josh and Kylie have been talking the entire 15 minute drive here and it was honestly annoying. Like, it's late and we're all tired... so why are you conversing right now? I blocked out all that was said with my headphones and music. We all got out of the van and walked into the hotel. Josh held the door open for all of us and I followed closely behind Mark who followed behind Kylie. 

"We need a room that sleeps 4," Mark said to the lady behind the desk. 

"We only have rooms with 2 beds, so you'll all have to share." She said, matter-of-factly. 

"That works, I guess?" Josh said, sighing and looking at Kylie for approval. I mean, she could get her own room... 

Kylie nodded and reached in her bag for something. 

"That will be $64 for the night then." The worker said. Josh started to reach in his wallet for his credit card probably but Kylie cut him off. 

"I got it. Here," She handed the worker some cash. How does she have that much cash lying in her bag? 

"You didn't have to do that." Josh said.

"Yeah, seriously... that was too nice of you." Mark said also. I shrugged at them all. Who cares? Yeah, it was nice but... we were nice first. Well, Josh and Mark were. 

"You guys were nice enough to offer to drive me here, and now taking me to where I need to be. So, it's no problem at all. A small thank you for being so kind to a stranger." Kylie said, smiling at us. It looked like a genuine smile, the first one I'd seen on her since we met all of 45 minutes ago. 

"Here's your key. Room 17. Check out is at 10am." The worker said, handing Kylie a key. 

We all went to the van to get the last of our things, before finding our room. Kylie slid the key which allowed us to enter. 

"DIBS ON A BED!" Josh and Mark yelled, running to the same bed. I guess they will be sharing that bed tonight. Wait, that means... 

"Tyler, you can have the other bed. I'll sleep on the floor." Kylie said, gently touching my bicep and walking into the room. I nodded at her, thinking that was the end of the conversation. 

"Um, no. You paid for the room, you get the other bed. Tyler will sleep on the floor," Josh said, taking his shoes off. 

"No, it's okay-" Kylie started before getting cut off. 

"Nope. Tyler. Floor. Right?" Mark said to me, chuckling. 

I rolled my eyes, "Whatever. I'm taking a shower first then." 

We all set our things down and I headed for the shower. I turned on the hot water and stripped down. I got in and allowed the warm water to stream down my back. It felt good to take a shower. As I washed my body and hair, I got to thinking. Like I usually do. Who is this Kylie girl? Why is she here? Why has she gone through all of this traveling to get to where she needs to be? Why does she have so much cash? What's her story? Most importantly, why do I care? She's nothing to me at all and she'll be out of my life pretty quickly. 

Whenever I finished with my shower, I dried off and put on some sweat pants with no shirt. I hate wearing shirts. I left the bathroom and saw that Kylie and Josh were talking, again. 

The conversation stopped briefly when I entered the room but then picked back up. Mark took a shower next. Kylie and Josh talked while I sat on the edge of the bed, on my phone. I heard bits and pieces of the conversation. 

"Yeah, Cleveland is nice. You've never been?" Josh asked her. 

She chuckled, "No. I've seen a few pictures though. And my uncle, he talks very fondly of it." 

"Does your uncle know that you're coming to visit?"

"No, h-he has no clue. N-no one does, actually." She stuttered. My gaze moved from my phone to her as she bit her lip and looked down, not noticing me. I watched as she sighed. 

"Where are you from?" Josh asked. 

"Here and there." She said, finally looking back up. We made brief eye contact but I looked away quickly. 

"That's not a place." I interrupted and scoffed. 

"Could be, you don't know." She said back. 

Whenever I opened my mouth to reply, Mark came back out. Josh then got up for his shower. It was silent because Mark passed out immediately and I refused to start a conversation with Kylie. What's the point? 

She sat on her laptop anyways. Every once in awhile, I heard a small 'ding,' meaning she got a text message. She was smiling at her screen as I got up from the edge of the bed. I grabbed a pillow off of her bed, considering she doesn't need 4 pillows. I threw it on the ground between the bed and laid down. I closed my eyes to try to sleep. 

Josh leaving the bathroom made me snap my eyes open. 

"Kylie, there's no more hot water left. Can you shower in the morning?" Josh quietly asked, shutting the bathroom light off. 

"Yeah, that's fine. Thanks." Kylie whispered back. 

Josh shut off the room's light and laid down. "Night Ty, night Kylie." He mumbled. 

"Night." Kylie and I said in perfect unison. 

I laid awake for quite some time. I just couldn't get comfortable and I couldn't keep my eyes closed, no matter how hard I tried. It was too quiet. I left my headphones in the car, so that can't help me. 

About half an hour later, I heard some moving around in the darkness. I quickly realized that it was just Kylie in the bed above/next to me. I heard her sigh and then I saw some light in the room, from her laptop. I moved my position so that I couldn't see her laptop light anymore. 

"Tyler, are you awake too?" I heard her whisper. I thought about ignoring her, but my mouth wouldn't let me.

"Yeah." I said. 

"Are you uncomfortable?" 

"Kind of." 

"You can come up here. It's okay," She said, peeking her head over the bed and at the ground, where I was. I bit my lip and thought about it. I mean, there's no way I'll get any sleep tonight down here.

"M'kay." I said, standing up and picking up my pillow also. She slid over to one side and patted the spot next to her. "Thanks." 

"No problem, do you want one of my headphones to watch Netflix with me?" She held a headphone out. "It's too quiet in here, I can't sleep." 

"Sure." I grabbed the headphone and put it in. We laid in silence, watching the tv show on her screen. It was a funny cartoon. Our heads had to lay sort of close since we were sharing a pair of headphones, but our bodies were far away. The laptop laid between our hips actually. "What show is this?" I whispered to her, shifting my gaze from the screen to the side of her face. 

"It's called Brickleberry. A stupid show, but hilarious nonetheless." She paused to look over at me, immediately making eye contact with me. It felt like her piercing brown eyes were sucking my soul out of my body. "Do you want me to change it?" She asked. 

I fought hard to move my eyes away from her gaze before answering, "No. It's funny actually." 

A few episodes later, I heard her breathing get slower and I could tell she fell asleep. I watched an episode before I felt myself also drifting off.