Somebody else's arms

Chapter 2

Ryan

The next day was quite similar to our normal days. I woke up besides Brendon, just as I had for the past two years. But still, everything felt so different. I couldn’t quite put my finger on the differences, but I knew that they were there. Somehow the way Brendon acted was just so strange. He avoided making eye contact, and hurried off to work as soon as he could. All I could do was stare at the closed door, wishing that it would open again and Brendon would come back to give me the good bye kiss that he hadn’t ever missed before. Not until today.

Finally it was time for me to go to work too. At least now I would have something to do for the next six hours. Hopefully the café would be busy today, busy enough to keep my mind off things that made me miserable. The worst thing about this whole Brendon situation was the fact that he didn’t tell me what was wrong. “Maybe he wanted to break up with me“, had flashed in my mind last night, just before I had fallen asleep. A thought too scary to even think about. Life without Brendon wouldn’t be anything. Simply, it wouldn’t really be worth living. As long as I would just get my Brendon back, I would be happy. This guy that I lived with nowadays wasn’t Brendon at all.

To my extreme annoyance, the café was surprisingly quiet all day. I served a few customers and that was it. With not much to do, my mind was free to wander. I tried to figure Brendon out, but it was hard, since thinking about him in this state was so painful. “Maybe he doesn’t love me anymore“, was all I could think of, as a reason for his actions. Though the problem was that he actually hadn’t really done anything wrong, because he hadn’t done anything at all, or so it seemed anyway. He went to work, came home, and went to sleep. That wasn’t normal. And I promised myself that I would figure out what was going on in his mind. Sooner or later… Of course, when I eventually did find out, I wished that I wouldn’t have.

“Ryan you do know that I’m going to fire you if you don’t put a smile on your face, right?” Katie asked, with a smirk on her face. Fire me, yeah right. We were too close for her to do that. Sometimes it was pretty handy that your boss was also your best friend.
“Being sad is healthy”, I muttered.
“I’m sure. So, what has Brendon done?” Katie asked, straightforward like always. That was one of the reasons why I liked her so much. She always said exactly what was on her mind. I leaned against the wall and closed my eyes, thinking of Katie’s question. What had Brendon done, that was a very good question. Something that I would also like to know.
“I don’t know”, I finally said.
“Well there must be something. And I bet that it has to do with him, otherwise you wouldn’t look like your mother died last night or something”, she said matter-of-factly, as she sat on the floor, leaning against the big refrigerator.
“Yeah it’s because of Brendon”, I agreed. It almost scared me how weak and sad my voice sounded. Surely things couldn’t be that bad?
“So what’s going on? You’re not going to dump him are you? Tell me you’re not. You can’t. You guys are the cutest couple I’ve ever seen. I love watching you two kiss. It’s so hot”, Katie finished her rant with a giggle. I couldn’t help but smile, too.
“No, I’m definitely not breaking up with him”, I said firmly, “though he might be breaking up with me.” The smile had vanished as fast as it had appeared on my face. The words sounded worse said out loud, than when I had thought about them. Saying them out loud made the whole situation seem more real, like I had accepted it already, which I certainly had not.

Katie looked really surprised by my news.
“No way”, she exclaimed right away.
“Well I hope not”, I said, not managing to sound too convincing, even to myself.
“He can’t. He loves you so much. How could he ever break up with you?” Katie whispered, her voice full of concern for me. She got up from the floor and moved to stand next to me, so she could wrap her arm around my slumped shoulders.
“Don’t worry about it. Everything will be okay. It is obvious that you two were meant for each other”, she assured me.
“That’s what I used to think as well…” I muttered quietly.

On my way home from work that day, a ragged poster on a lamppost caught my attention. “My Chemical Romance”, was written on the top corner of it, in big letters. Brendon’s favorite band, I realized, and walked closer to read what was said on it.

Under the black and white picture of the bands members, was a short announcement.
“MCR will be playing in San Francisco on the 3rd of May, in Club 7. The concert starts at 6 pm. For tickets, call 102500 on the 21st of April.” I got a brilliant idea as I stared at the familiar faces of the five band members. There was a similar poster of them hanging on our bedroom closet door. Brendon loved their music, and I also liked it. It wasn’t exactly my favorite band, but it was definitely listenable. One of the band members, Frank Iero, had actually worked in the same mortician as Brendon, only a few years ago, before their band became famous in the USA. Next summer they would start their first international tour. This was all information that I had heard from Brendon, before he decided that talking to me wasn’t on his list of things that he wanted to do.

“I need to get those tickets for Brendon. And for me too, of course”, I decided. I was quite sure that that would be something that could possibly wake Brendon up from this weird trance that he was in right now. Brendon loved surprises. Almost just as much as I did. Sadly, or maybe luckily, I didn’t yet know what sort of a surprise was waiting for me…