☆Blaze☽
Chapter 6:
My Sunday went by typically and uneventfully. I hadn't even gotten a call from anyone. It was just a normal day for me- books and popcorn.
That was, of course, until my cell phone started ringing at ten o'clock.
I had nearly fallen asleep when the sounds of Fall Out Boy started filling up my room. I rubbed my eyes and stretched my hand out, trying to find my phone. I grasped the metal in my hand and held it to my ear.
"Hello?" I yawned, and when the person's voice was incoherent I realized I was holding the phone upside-down.
"Hey, Lake. We kind of need your help." It was Whiskey's worried voice coming through the phone and there was a lot of shuffling and scuffing in the background.
"What is it?" I was somewhat alarmed; the only person that ever called me other than Mom was Beatle. I didn't even know the rest of the guys had my number.
"Mi got into a fight; he's not looking so good." I heard him huff and shoes scraping across the asphalt. I reached over, looking for my glasses and figuring this wasn't going to be a short conversation.
"We're only a bit from your place, is it okay if I bring him there?"
"Um, yeah, I guess. Mom's not home." Hayden was more of an issue than my mother though. Usually, Mom would be out like a light at ten, but she was at the airport waiting for Dad's flight to come it. It had just been a constant stream of delays- he was supposed to be there at seven.
"Okay, okay. Good." The screen flashed 'call ended'. I sighed in defeat and pulled myself out of bed, exhausted. I hadn't had a decent sleep in days, but that was the price that this came with.
I looked in the mirror and ran my hand through my hair, trying to tame it. There was a shirt lying on my lampshade from God-knows-when, but it looked relatively clean, so I pulled it over my head. It clashed with my bottoms, but I had more important things to worry about at this moment.
I crept past Hayden's room, seeing the glow and hearing static noise from his television. He was still awake. I bounded down the stairs and to the front door, pulling it open with some struggle and looking out.
I could see Whiskey's ginger mop of hair in the distance, under a dim streetlight. He was stumbling and trying to support Mi, who was barely walking. I ran out onto the street, ignoring the feeling of the cold night air and the bright moon.
I slipped my arm around the other side of Mi, who he grunted in reply. His jaw was spotted with purple marks, but that wasn't what stuck out to me, it was the bright red hand print that he sported on his cheek. The finger marks were slender, and his cheeks weren't a rosy red, no, they were a deep red. It looked painful.
"What happened?" I whispered to Whiskey, I wasn't even sure if Mi was consciously aware of what was happening right now.
Whisky threw Mi's body more on top of him. I could tell he was having difficulties, hell, I was surprised he had gotten this far with him; Whiskey and I were the smallest of our group.
"Picked a fight with someone he knew he couldn't win against, got the shit beat out of him." His eyes seemed to narrow, almost in anger. We continued to drag him down the street and into the bright light of my front porch before pulling him into the house.
"Hello?" I heard Hayden's voice yell down the stairs, and I groaned inwardly.
"It's just me." There was no reply, because he didn't care enough to reply. We weren't exactly on speaking terms since yesterday. And, like I thought, he never did tell Mom about me leaving him on the side of the road to walk to and from soccer practice.
"Where should we put him?" I thought for a minute. The main floor was out of the question, because who knew when Mom could walk in, and she would freak. I looked towards the stairs and back at Whiskey, who growled. We proceeded to drag Mi up the stairs to my bedroom, while he moaned out incoherent words.
I pushed the door to my room open and we laid Mi down on my bed. I wanted to turn on the light and examine the marks more clearly, but I felt like that wouldn't go down well.
"Does he need a doctor?"
"Nah, he's been through worse." Whiskey blew it off, but I could tell he was concerned. He sat on my desk chair and stared at Mi's figure. He looked so weak and vulnerable with his face covered in bruises, fighting to remain conscious. It definitely wasn't the same Mi that had punched me.
"I'm just going to call Beatle." Whiskey excused himself from my room with his phone in hand, leaving me alone with Mi. His breathing was somewhat rhythmic, and his eyes were shut. I chose to believe he was asleep.
I sat in the chair where Whiskey had been and put my head on my hands. What an idiot. Leave it to Mi to go get himself beat up to the point of being nearly unconscious. And he didn't even tell any of us. I didn't understand Mi. I didn't understand why he did what he did, and I didn't understand why he hated me so much. It was easy to pin it on the fact that I was new to the group, or maybe even that he somehow found out I was gay. But I thought it was something much bigger than that. It was also easy to say that it didn't bother me that he didn't like me, that I just ignored it, but that would be a lie. I hated the fact he hated me, and knowing that there was nothing I could do to change it because I didn't know why just made it twenty times worse.
I decided he probably would need ice for his cheek and left the room. I went towards the stairs, and I could hear Whiskey's voice travelling out through the bathroom, and I was surprised Hayden wasn't all over me by now.
"Yeah, it was his Mom again." I wasn't trying to eavesdrop, but Whiskey wasn't exactly quiet. I stopped in the hall and thought for moment, connecting the dots. I should have found it strange that he had a bright hand print across his face, I'd never seen that when he'd gotten into fights with us before. That was because it wasn't from the fight, it was from his Mom.
It all began to make sense, all the school he missed, that fact he never wanted to be at home. I didn't want to jump to the conclusion that Mi's mother abused him, but it seemed like the only viable answer my mind could conjure at the moment.
I sucked in a breath and continued down to the kitchen like I hadn't heard anything. I walked over to the fridge and grabbed an icepack from the freezer. It stuck to my hands and I grabbed a blue cloth to cover it with so it wouldn't freeze Mi's skin.
I jogged back up the stairs and peered in through Hayden's room, seeing the lights all off and him passed out and snoring loudly. I hoped for my sake he stayed that way.
I opened up the door to my room and Whiskey was back, sitting in the chair and staring intently at Mi's figure.
"I got ice for his cheek." Whiskey nodded at me and outstretched his hand to grab it from me. He held it against Mi's cheek, and for a moment I envied their friendship. I didn't think I'd ever have anything close to that.
"How did you find him?" I leaned against my dresser and Mi shifted slightly in his sleep when the cold touched his face.
"The idiot called me after he went out and picked a fight with a BM student." That was the private Catholic school, Bishop McQuaid. All the people that went there lived in the posh neighbourhoods and their parents made six digits a year.
"Was he still okay when you got there?"
"No, he was barely conscious. Idiot," he muttered.
"Beatle's coming, by the way." Whiskey looked up at me and I suppressed a groan, I really didn't want to see Beatle, but at the same time I ached to see him. I didn't know which took precedence at this moment.
"What should we do with him?" I looked at the worried red head, deciding that he hadn't paid attention in any class that had anything to do with health or safety. Sharing my knowledge was something I had learned not to do, pretending to be stupid if you will, but I felt this was I time that required my inner nerd.
"Probably wake him up every two or three hours and ask him a simple question. Just to make sure he doesn't have a concussion, you know?" Whiskey nodded like it was the most obvious thing ever, though he clearly had no idea.
I heard tires screeching outside my house and rolled my eyes. Whiskey looked out the window and confirmed that it was Beatle. I trotted down the stairs to get the door before he knocked and woke up Hayden, but I found reality hit me when I grabbed the knob.
I didn't want to see Beatle; I wasn't ready to face him after what I did. I literally ran away from him. I took a deep breath and tried to keep my shuddering to a minimum as I turned the metal sphere and tugged the door open. Beatle didn't wait for me to invite him in. He walked straight in and turned around a few times.
"Where is he?" I nodded towards the stairs and Beatle began to climb them two at a time. Though there wasn't a lot of trust in the group there was a sense of family. A family that Mi probably needed more than I would ever understand.
I sighed and slowly went up the stairs, opening my bedroom door to see Whisky and Beatle having an argument at the volume of a whisper. When they saw me they stopped mid-sentence and looked over to Mi sleeping on my bed.
"You guys really don't need to stay here. I can take care of him." Whiskey rubbed his eyes with a yawn; he was clearly tuckered out from carrying Mi from where ever he had gotten his ass handed to him.
"Are you sure?" He asked as he stood up, and I nodded, hoping Beatle would leave too.
"Okay, well if it's cool I'm going to go then. I'm beat." He slapped his hands to his legs and I gave him a small wave before grabbing my hand and realizing how stupid I looked. Like a little child.
"You can take my car." Beatle offered and Whiskey raised a reddish-brown eyebrow at him, and that was when I knew I was screwed.
"How will you get home?" The dark haired boy shrugged and tossed Whiskey his keys. He caught them between his hands and bit his lip before saying a thank you and a goodnight, disappearing from the bedroom. A few minutes later I heard the front door shut.
It then became increasingly awkward. No words were exchanged between Beatle and I. I just held the ice pack while he watched. I'd never felt more judged in my life.
"How are you going to get home?"
"You're not seriously going to watch him on your own? You won't get any sleep. We can take turns." It was a bad idea. Scratch that, a horrible idea. Maybe it would have been good two days ago, or before I had made everything awkward, but right now I just wanted him out of my house so I wouldn't have to worry about him till another day.
"It's fine, I can take care of him."
"But you don't have to." Beatle grabbed my hand with the ice pack and snatched it from me, as if to prove a point. I ran a finger across the mark that painted the face of the light coloured boy's face. It looked painful.
"Beatle, does Mi's mother-"
"Yes." He cut me off before I could finish and pressed the cloth covered ice to the boy's rosy cheek. It probably didn't need to be iced anymore, but I wasn't going to mention that.
There was complete silence. Just Mi's patterned breaths and the silence brought on by tension that was so thick not even a chain saw could cut it. Beatle suddenly broke it, making me blink back to reality. His emerald orbs staring at me and making me want to melt- but only after I got to feel the small stubble that decorated his jaw.
"I'm not going to apologize."
"For what?"
"For what I said last night. I'm not going to take it back, so you can run away as many times as you want."
"I didn't run away, I had to go," I lied, and it wasn't even a good lie, it was a horrible one. But it wasn't completely a lie; I had to go because I didn't want to face the situation, because I'm a coward. Beatle rolled his eyes at me through the darkness of my room.
"Sure, whatever you say, Lake," he drawled out, and I felt myself becoming angry. I hate being patronized more than anything, even cigarettes and drugs. I clenched and unclenched my fists. I probably looked ridiculous, but I could care less at this point.
"I'm serious!"
"Sure," he continued in the very superior tone. I tried to shrug it off, sinking further into my desk chair and letting myself cool down.
"You're such an ass," I muttered and he laughed, turning towards me and abandoning icing Mi's cheek.
"You're cute when you try to be angry."
"I'm not cute." I blushed and he got a bit closer to me, not noticeably, he could have done it subconsciously. I didn't want to make things that weren't there, I would only get hurt. I wanted to think Beatle liked me, but I knew it would only end up crushing me.
"Okay, Lake."
"Stop doing that! I'm serious!" I huffed angrily and pushed his shoulders. I nearly gasped after I did, I couldn't believe I had done that. I was sure he was going to yell at me, but it never came. I winced when his mouth opened, but the words that came out were shockingly soft.
"So am I." His hot breath was right by my ear, and I tried to pull away, but he had his hands wrapped around my waist. I suddenly felt terrified, and my blood seemed to raise forty degrees. He removed one hand, only to put it under my chin, forcing me to look up to him.
He leaned and connected our lips before I could register what was happening. It wasn't desperate and rough like I had thought it would be- it was slow and gentle. His lips were soft and smooth against mine. I raised a hand to skim over the dark stubble I wanted so badly to feel.
And then his mouth was gone, the soft kiss ended. It didn't feel real, it was so... not Beatle.
"I-I-I" I didn't know why I was stammering and stuttering all over the place. I stepped away from him, putting a good distance between us, and allowed my fingers to trace over my lips where his had just been.
He was smirking at me, only adding to my confusion. Had that actually just happened?
"We should wake Mi now." He walked over and shook his shoulder. Mi made some incoherent noise, and when somewhat awake Beatle asked him what his name was. He answered correctly, Miles Lyndon, and then Beatle let him drift back to sleep.
"How many hours till we have to wake him again?" I stood still somewhat in shock, not noticing Beatle was talking to me until he waved a hand in front of my face.
"Um, three hours."
"Cool, I'm going to go smoke." He left the room and I followed him, not knowing what else to do. I felt like he had just fucked with my mind and then left me as a melted puddle on the road. I didn't know what was happening.
Beatle slid out of the back door and searched his jacket pocket for a lighter. He lit the stick and held it to his face, inhaling deeply before exhaling the smoke. I found it so intriguing, the way his lips met the stick, and how they were almost a perfect circle when he exhaled, how his wrist flicked it to dispose of the burned off end. It looked like an art.
"Want a drag?" He raised a dark eyebrow at me and smirked a bit, knowing that I wouldn't. But in truth, I did at that moment. I wanted to know how he could make something disgusting look so beautiful and natural; I wanted to understand why he did it.
I nodded and he handed it to me. I took it between my fingers like he had, and Beatle watched intently as I held it to my lips and took a long drag. I tried to hold it in, but I coughed and sputtered, nearly dropping the cigarette. My lungs burned for air. I felt Beatle's hand rubbing softly up and down my back as I felt like I couldn't get enough oxygen.
"It gets better." He tossed the butt into my mother's flowers and I opened the door back into the house, sliding in and pacing myself to stop from running for water. I covered my mouth as I yawned, my eyes becoming teary. I was so tired.
"You can sleep, I'll watch him." Beatle sat on the sofa and gestured for me to sit next to him. I shook my head rapidly and sat down leaving a considerable distance between us.
"Want to watch something?" I asked and he shrugged indifferently, so I turned it on to a Desperate Housewives rerun.
"This show is complete shit." He huffed and I ignored his comment. Mom and I always used to watch it together, at first she forced me to, but by the end I was forcing her. It had definitely taken a slight downturn, but to call it shit was something else.
I struggled to keep my eyes open while Eva Longoria eyed her hunky gardener. Tears were practically running down my face from the number of times I had yawned. I kept resting my eyes for a few seconds, but I would always be jolted awake by something on the screen.
I noticed that Beatle wasn't actually watching the show, he was watching me. I looked away and blushed, feeling extremely self-conscious.
"Sleep," he ordered me. I awkwardly snuggled into the back of the sofa, still sitting upright, and he snorted and rolled his eyes at me.
That was how I fell asleep. I don't know how it happened, but when I woke up I was no longer sleeping upright with the back of the couch as my pillow. I had somehow fallen so my head just barely against Beatle's leg. When I realized that I almost moved, but then I felt something else. His fingers intertwined in my hair. He had been playing with my hair while I was sleeping.
a/n omg you guys! So I get back from my three day vay-kay and Blaze is #750 in romance and #978 in teen fiction?!!?! Wow, that's so crazy! You are all amazing!!
How do we feel about Mi now? Still hate him? Not going to lie, he's one of my favourites.
Well, you guys are so freaking amazing and I love you all, you're super!!
Vote, comment, follow, inbox me, and whatever other creative things you could possibly come up with!