"This tastes so good!" Ray exclaimed after devouring half his plate of food.
"God, I know right, I need to start coming here more often," Frank agreed, whilst still chewing a mouthful of food.
"Dude..." Gerard grimaced, looking away, "not whilst you're still eating..."
Frank rolled his eyes and scooped more food into his mouth before speaking, "what are you, my mother?"
"No but you're being disgusting and I-"
"Boys..." Lindsay interrupted, giving them both a pointed look. They both looked between Lindsay and themselves before mumbling an apology and looking down at their plate.
She had them all wrapped around her fingers, which I found incredibly funny since she was basically acting as their mother most of the time. I must say, I wasn't expecting them all to be so childish, it was quite refreshing to see fully grown adults enjoying themselves for once.
I would have made some form of snide comment, if it were not for the fact that I was currently trying not to vomit. Something about their previous questioning set off a lot of stress, which made me want to drink or smoke some form of tobacco or drug.
It was an awful cycle I'd been dealing with for a while now, I could go a while without taking or drinking anything but the minute I get stressed or emotional, the need comes back. It's like an itch. If you don't think about it, it's easy to ignore but the minute you notice or think about it, it's almost impossible not to scratch
So now I was sitting here at a dinner table trying not to think about the vodka and weed I had in a suitcase upstairs. I was failing quite miserably at that.
"Taylor are you okay?" Lindsay asked, we were sitting at opposite ends of the table, so she must have seen me acting strangely. Everyone's eyes turned to me suddenly, adding to the stress.
"Hmm? Yes I'm fine, why do you ask?" I said quickly, trying to act as normal as possible.
I saw Gerard and Zoe look down to my hands, which were shaking, and swiftly hid them under the table.
"You look pale..." Mikey said, who was sitting closest to me.
"I'm just feeling a bit ill is all, nothing to worry about," I reassured everyone, the left side of my mouth pulling up abruptly into a forced smile.
Keep it together idiot, deep breaths, you know how to do this I thought to myself, whilst avoiding everyone's eyes.
"Would you like to go to you room and rest?" Lindsay asked, looking very concerned. Did I look that bad?
"Erm, actually yeah if that's okay?" I asked, thinking about what I have upstairs, that could help me calm down. It was just self-prescription after all...
"Of course dear," she smiled sympathetically.
I got up from the table and swayed to the kitchen door, before gripping to the frame.
"Do you need help getting to your room?" Gerard asked, eyebrows knitting together in concern. His eyes burned into mine, I couldn't look at him.
"No, no, I'm fine," I said, waving away his concern before mustering up my mental energy and escaping anymore questioning.
The second I closed my bedroom door I rushed to my suitcase and dug through to the bottom where I hid away my drugs and alcohol. I laid them both out in front of me, debating which one I needed more.
Shaking hands, bad gut feeling, racing heart... I made a mental note of my symptoms before deciding I needed some weed this time.
I hid the vodka back in the bottom of my case before rolling myself two joints out of the baccy I had in my leather jacket pocket.
Once I had them rolled I looked out of my window to see the roof that overhung above the front door directly below. Perfect. I opened my window and jumped onto it before reaching the ground and hiding around the side of the house.
I slid down the wall and sat down in the cold floor before pulling the joints and lighter out of my pocket with shaking hands.
Part of me was savouring my first drag, it had felt so long since I had some, but in truth it had only been about a month. Guess it just felt longer, these last few days have felt like years for some reason.
With that thought, I brought the joint to my lips and lit the end, whilst inhaling the slightly bitter smoke. I sighed as the familiar scent and flavour invaded my senses, taking me away from my worries and floating me up to the clouds, far away from everything. After a few minutes, I had finished my first joint and had begun my second. My hands had stopped shaking and the feeling in my gut had subsided. I was at bliss.
That was, until, the front door opened and a familiar voice called my name.
"Taylor?" Gerard said, as I heard his footsteps round the corner. I cursed quietly under my breathe and clumsily hid my now-lit-joint behind my back.
"There you are, are you-" He paused mid sentence as he took in my appearance and smelt the air I had been poisoning. "What the hell are you doing?" He asked, shock evident in his face and voice.
"Nothing," I mumbled, silently putting out the joint behind my back.
"Your eyes tell a different story..." He glared at me, looking angry, but his voice still remained calm.
"I'm not doing anything!" I raised my voice defensively, "I mean if you must know, I was doing something but I stopped now that you're here so thanks for that..."
"So that's why you were behaving weirdly early," he stated, I could practically see him joining dots together in his mind, "you're an addict and you needed a fix."
"I'm not an addict!" I yelled at him, stumbling up from my spot on the ground.
"Oh save it!" He yelled back, "I know the signs, I was one too when I was younger."
"I'm not an addict," I repeated, slower this time so he understood, "that was my first joint in over a month!"
"So you relapsed?"
"For fuck's sake, how many times?! I haven't relapsed, I'm not an addict, I just get stressed sometimes and need to calm down, it's no big deal!" I began to walk away but he caught my arm to stop me.
"Don't touch me!" I yelled, lurching away from him, whilst turning around to face him. Tears began to form in my eyes and his anger dissipated into sympathy.
"I'm sorry Taylor, I didn't mean to get angry and I have no right to either, I used to do exactly the same thing you're doing now."
"Exactly, so just leave me to get on with it," I said harshly, "I apologise for doing it near your home, and consequently your child, I won't do it around here again but I will do it again."
"I can help you if you let me, I understand why you're doing it," he replied gently, looking at me with desperate eyes. Why did he care so much? He's only known me two days...
"I don't need your help, or your sympathy so just leave me alone Gerard," I replied, devoid of emotion before leaving him and going back to my room.
I was burning. My heart felt as though it was encased in a sea of flames, caging it away from the rest of the world. The heat spread through my body, a wave of sadness pulling me under the sea, drowning me. Tears were starting to form in the corners of my eyes but I stubbornly blinked them away. I hadn't cried since I was a child and I wasn't about to start now.
I suddenly realised I was just standing in the middle of the room, staring dejectedly at the wall opposite me. I walked over to the bed and stood next to it, unsure of what to do with myself. After a moment or two of deliberation I decided to play the guitar standing next to my bed. I grabbed it and sat down before playing a sad melody, letting my mind go blank and my fingers play for me. I didn't feel like singing so instead I just let the guitar sing for me.
It's sweet tune filled the air and healed my wounds, temporarily sucking away the fire and soothing me. I didn't know how long I played for, I only stopped when my fingers started to hurt and cramp up. Standing up, I put the guitar back in it's place and stood by the window, looking out to the world in deep thought.
"That was beautiful," a voice said, making me jump. I turned around to see Mikey standing awkwardly in the doorway.
"How long have you been there?" I asked warily, not really wanting to speak with anyone at that moment in time.
"Only for a couple of minutes but you've been playing for a while, we could all hear it."
I grimaced and ran my hand through my hair. "Oh great.." I muttered under my breath.
"Don't be embarrassed about it, it truly was beautiful playing, you're an amazing guitarist," he said, still awkwardly lurking in the doorway.
"Thanks..." I replied out of politesse.
"Um... so, Gerard asked me to talk to you.." he started, getting to the real point he was here.
"Why, does he want us to do some bonding? Should I start calling you 'Uncle' Mikey?" I said with malice, rolling my eyes and starting too pace.
"He said you'd be like this," Mikey half-smiled.
"What do you want Mikey?" I asked, wanting him to just get to the point so he could leave me alone.
"Well... It's about the drugs."
"Oh brilliant, so he's told everyone has he?" I snarled as the speed of my pacing increased, "I should've known not to trust him with anything, maybe I should just save him the trouble and take myself back to that fucking orphanage."
"Wait!" Mikey raised his voice, seemingly starting to panic. "He hasn't told anyone else but me, he talked to me privately after he found you."
"Why should I believe you?" I stopped my pacing and looked at him.
"Because, my brother isn't a bad person, he just wants to help you and he was worried about you. He thought that maybe I could talk with you about it since... well I've only just gotten out of rehab so..." he trailed off, looking to the ground miserably.
I sighed, my anger leaving me just as quickly as it came. "I'm... sorry to hear that," I said awkwardly, I've never been any good at comforting anyone but Zoe.
"It's okay," he said, shaking off his misery, "besides I'm not here to talk about me, I'm here to see if there's anything I can do to help."
"But why do you care? Why would any of you care?" I asked desperately, I didn't understand and I needed to. "I've known you a matter of hours and Gerard a matter of days, you have no reason to care about me at all."
"Of course we do, you're part of the family now."
"No." I said quickly, "I'm not... I don't have a family, I've never had one and I never will."
"Well we all feel differently..." he argued, "look Gerard and Lindsey both knew that if they were going to adopt someone, that someone would have some problems but that didn't matter to them. They wanted to help the person they adopted, not just ignore their problems and delude themselves into a playing happy families."
"Yeah well maybe adopting two kids was biting off more than they could chew."
"Perhaps, but maybe things will turn out better than you expect, you never know until you try." Mikey searched my eyes for some form of understanding or acceptance.
"Trying means that I'm opening myself up to being let down, I'd rather not go through that again," I said, emotionless and staring off into the distance.
"My brother won't let you down, I know that for a fact," he vowed, he clearly highly respected and looked up to Gerard. I guess he would though, ultimately Gerard is a good person and Mikey is the younger brother, he's probably looked up to him his entire life.
"Fine, whatever, I'll give it a try," I said, trying to move the conversation along a little faster, "I'm still not promising anything to do with drugs though."
"Hmm... I can live with that," he smiled slightly, "good to take baby steps, you are incredibly stubborn after all."
I smirked a little at his comment, "is it really that obvious?"
"Unfortunately so. Anyway, would you like to join us all downstairs? I think we're watching Star Wars."
I rolled my eyes. From what I learnt about Gerard whilst listening to Zoe fangirl about him, he was a massive Star Wars fan, so I'd bet he was the one to make that terrible decision.
"Sure, why not?" I shrugged, "I've nothing better to do."
"That's the spirit," Mikey smiled, before leading the way back downstairs, where two men were arguing over the impact Star Wars had on sci-fi and pop culture over the last few decades...