Problems

|| Chapter 14 ||

His door creaked open, and Martha and Mary barged in, once again jumping onto his bed and sprawling out. "Sure, make yourself at home," John sighed, and Mary giggled.

"So...who were you talking to?" Martha asked, raising her eyebrows.

"Just my roommate. He doesn't know how to take care of my turtle," John said casually, shrugging. Martha grinned, "And do you always tell your roommate that you love him?"

John blushed. She had him there.

"So who's the dude? And how long has this been going on?" Martha asked slyly, wiggling her eyebrows. John rolled his eyes and smiled. "His name's Alex. He actually is my roommate, so I wasn't lying about that. He's addicted to coffee, very short, and writes likes there's no tomorrow."

"And what's he majoring in?"

"English and Law."

"Ah, sophisticated," Martha said. "If he were a girl, he'd be everything Dad wanted for you."

John's smile fell. He knew that his dad would never support him. "Yeah, well, I'm not planning on telling Dad about him."

His sisters both nodded. They all had a collective agreement that no one talked about LGBTQ around their father.

"So is he gay or what?" Mary piped up, and John shook his head. "Nah, bi." Mary nodded.

"So how long have you guys been going out?" she asked. John shrugged, "Since September."

"Jeez, you jumped onto that wagon pretty quickly!" Martha teased, and John crumpled up a Post-It note and threw it at her.

She squealed and ducked out of the way, letting the Post-It fall between John's bed and the wall. He sighed, "Aw, look at that. I have to dig that up now." Martha started giggling.

John was happy he had made her smile.
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Alex woke up gasping. It was the same dream as always: walking through the wrecked ruins of Nevis, finding bodies and wreckage everywhere. Except this time, it was John's body that he found in place of Isabel's.

He sat up in bed, shivering, and pulled the blanket tighter around around him. It was freezing in his room, but he couldn't tell if he was shaking because of his dream or the cold.

"Damnnit, Elijah," he muttered, and got up to start a cup of coffee, dragging his blanket with him. Elijah was their dorm advisor, a nice guy in his twenties, but he was constantly forgetting to turn the heat up, and Alex was at the end of his rope over it.

The coffee pot hissed and crackled, and soon the smell of fresh, delishious goodness filled the room. Alex poured himself a mug and sat in his desk chair. He didn't want to go back to sleep, but at the same time he didn't want to stay awake. He would lose, either way.

He missed John so much. If John was here, he probably wouldn't be panicking. If John was here, he probably wouldn't be having nightmares like this.

Alex raised the mug to his lips and blinked when he realized that he had drunk the whole cup. He did that sometimes; spaced out and forgot what he was doing. His therapist had called it dissasociating.

Alex set the mug down and got up, wandering over to John's bed. He was planning on stealing some blankets, at least until fucking Elijah remembered that other people lived here too, and that they were freezing their asses off, but John's bed was so soft. And it smelled like him. And it had that turtle pillow-pet thing propped in the corner that John practically strangled in his sleep.

Alex curled up in the pile of blankets, wrapping himself up in a blanket-burrito. At the last minute, he reached out and grabbed the pillow-pet, tucking it close to his chest.