Grape Juice from Lemons

CHAPTER XXVII

I vividly remember the feeling of the wind whipping my hair in every direction possible, while the aroma of weed stuck to my clothes like glitter does to a carpet. My brother, Max, sat beside me, chugging the beer, Corona, like water. Noah, Jonathan's younger brother, was sitting in the back seat, laughing, showing Maxence a photo of a hot Sophomore he had scored a date with. Max was careless because he had eyes for Jasmine, who was spoken for. Tonight, he was going to propose with the most expensive-looking ring I have ever seen on the Eastside, but I caught him before he had the chance to be turned down. He almost threw the ring into the sink, therefore out of fear for his life, thinking he's going to drown the ring alongside himself, I took him on a ride with Noah and me.

It was going perfectly, as perfectly as it could. They were laughing while I solemnly forced my eyes to stick to the road. But I was growing tired, because of the Mary Jane, we smoked.

" Take the wheel, Max," I told him, sparing a look towards my brother, I shook him slightly, but he acted as if I wasn't there. My mind started racing, as it usually does when I have to be with my brother for longer than an hour. What if he hated me again? What if he brought me along, so I'd simply be his driver for the night?

" Max? " I said louder and looked at the backseat to see Noah looking at me with ... pity. The only thing ax did was turn the music higher, some ghastly rap song shook my eardrums so much, I lost the ability to think rationally for a second.

I forced my foot on the breaks as Max's Audi squealed on the road. Time moved by quickly, the only thing I saw was the flash of blonde hair fly by the corner of my vision, as Noah hit his nose against the armrest between me and Max. Because he hadn't placed his seatbelt on. Everything following the events of that got increasingly worse. Firstly, Max yelled at me with such anger, that I thought he was going to leave me here, stranded. In the middle of the westside of the city.

But I should have known this would happen, it always manages to. Because underneath the shallow waters of Maxence, lays an unkillable dragon of rage. And the sea monster he holds deep within him is always hungry around me, he always craves for the saltiness of my tears and the high pitches of my voice while I scream. He devours my spirit and lickes its claws clean of the sweet aftertaste of defeat lingering on my tanned skin. This dragon hates me as I do him.

I start the car again, his yelling louder than the music coming from the speakers, While Noah hides away in the shadows of the backseat. I barely had the chance to move, I barely raised my leg off the clutch before we started rolling towards the crossroads of the street. Max yelled louder, as if humanly possible, he yelled as his life depended on it and I feared that it was the dragon living inside of him that spoke those harsh words.

My biggest regrets, for when the cherry red challenger drove into us, weren't the last spoken words between myself and my brother, weren't the horrid screams coming from Noah or the fact we had smoked weed prior to the event. My biggest regrets were the open windows and open seat belts.

Noah flew through the windshield at speeds I couldn't describe, as if he was a feather as if he had no weight at all. And while he flew onto the pavement glistering of small pieces of ice, he slid a couple of feet, until his back hit a light post and his limb body laid on the side of the road. My head crashed into the steering wheel and in between the folding of metal and cracking of the glass and mirrors of the car, you could hear the bone of my nose slowly twisting before snapping like a twig, the blood oozed as if from a faucet. My head flew back and I just about caught a glimpse of my brother's body laying out of the side window. What I didn't realize then, but a few seconds later was the fact that we were spinning the car was hurling towards Noah. My eyes flew shut after I heard the sound of someone's back break.

You don't hear anything after a crash like that, you don't feel either. You assume the pain someone is in, you assume the pain you yourself are I, but there's no way of finding out. Your mind is filled with this euphoria of being alive, so you hear white static or nothing. You smell nothing, you feel like your whole body has done a restart. You have to breathe manually, blink manually and even that drains you. Sweet slumber seduces you, like a siren calling for a pirate.

I wasn't dead. Neither was Max. The last I'd seen him at least. But as I was carried away from the scene by the same cherry red challenger, I felt my insides long for the closeness of my brother. I yearned for the voice of Noah laughing, for the knowledge that he was alive. I didn't know. For a few days, I didn't know.

The newsletter came out, covering the story of a red Audi crashing into a fence on the westside of Detroit. One missing, one under arrest, one presumed dead. And when I got the call from the Michigan county jail, one of my desires was answered.

" Hey, Niki. I'm sorry, I'm so sorry about your brother. '' Those were the word's I first heard when I realized my brother had passed. I drove over to the hospital after that, threw the door open of the room he was supposed to stay in but it was vacant. It haunted me. It was lifeless, limb, as if a ghost had swept the floors clean before my arrival.

I hate to admit it. But I collapsed, right there. Right in front of the room, in front of everyone without a second thought to my actions. My knees hit the ground and my hands followed after, while my lungs collapsed.

People turned around ,stopped what they were doing to stare at me. To stare at a lamb on the ground. A few nurses rushed towards me. Held me and asked me if I was fine. I dully nodded before I felt the presence of Jonathan. Perhaps he had been there to see Max, perhaps to gather his little brother's things as he was admitted into jail, but for whatever reason, he was there.

I hugged him. I hugged him so tight, because I was scared. I would never admit it, but I was so scared of losing him. Of suddenly losing everyone around me. And that sort of fear slowly eats you up inside. It devours your every dream.