Desolation Row [MxM]

Chapter 11

When I opened my eyes, it was almost dark out. The sun was setting, giving everything in the room an orange glow, and I could hear music and people downstairs. Rolling my head, I looked to see Joel laying beside me on his stomach, naked and clearly passed out. From my angle I could actually see the different tattoos he had. Two on his sides, one of his forearms, his wrist. I was pretty sure there was one on his shoulder, too, but it was hard to see.

His forearm had a series of birds going up from his wrist, which wasn't an unusual tattoo, I'd seen it a lot. Mostly on girls though. On his side though, there was a quote that I couldn't quite make out because of the bleariness, but I could see the raven that was just under it, with bright red eyes. Why would a quote need a raven?

Snorting quietly, I sat up and glanced down, noticing that I was naked as well. Then a wave of nausea hit me hard, and I leaned over to vomit on the side of the bed, emptying my stomach as I shuddered.

The noise made Joel stir, reaching over and wrapping his arms around my waist as he tried to pull me closer. I attempted to push him off, shivering and sweating and just not feeling good. “Joel, let go, I gotta go home,” I told him. He ignored me and just pulled me back further onto the bed with him, making me fall into a laying position again as he slowly moved over to kiss me again. His movements were uncoordinated and groggy, but his grip on me didn't loosen at all. I was forced to lay there with him as he fell back onto the bed beside me, breath evening out again and soft snoring coming from him. I tried to stay awake, but the pull to sleep was too strong, and before I knew it I'd blacked out again.

The next time I woke up, it was completely dark out, and I was wide awake. I felt anxious, and restless, and I was still nauseous, and I just knew I needed to get home.

I sat up quickly, swallowing down the urge to throw up again as I looked for my clothes, roughly shoving at Joel's shoulder to wake him up. Joel made a few sounds of protest as I got dressed, but after a few minutes, he got up and started getting dressed slowly, his movements still looking a little forced.

It took some time for Joel to finish getting dressed, before we headed downstairs and made our way through the crowd of drunken, high teenagers. I had to drive like this, I realized. While I was sober, at least I thought I was, I wasn't completely back to normal, and driving might be a little hard. I didn't have time to worry about that though. If I didn't get home, Charlie would freak out on me again, and I didn't feel like listening to him.

I fumbled for my keys in my pocket, unlocking my car and falling into the driver's seat. It took a few tries to get the right key into the ignition, but then I was able to back out and head down the road, to the apartment complex. Joel was driving behind me, as far as I could tell, but focusing on the road was hard. My eyes kept wanting to close, and I just didn't want to drive.

I shouldn't have been driving. It didn't take a rocket scientist to figure that one out. I could've hurt myself, or someone else. But I had no other way of getting home. I couldn't call anyone. Couldn't call Charlie, then he'd know where I was.

Somehow, I managed to make it to the apartment building without swerving too much, Joel pulling in behind me. We were able to get as far as the entrance hall before he pushed me up against the mailboxes, kissing me forcefully and rubbing his body against mine. I exhaled into his mouth, glad to focus on something other than feeling tired or sick.

Someone cleared their throat, making us pull away from each other and look over at the older man standing by, who glared a little. We snorted a little to each other before moving out of the man's way, and he went for the mailboxes as we headed to the stairs and stumbled up them.

Joel moved to bring me over to his place, but I shook my head at him. “Charlie's at work, we'd be better off in our apartment,” I told him. Joel nodded, following me into the apartment and back into my room, where we fell onto my bed.