Underworld

Brendon knew he should’ve just handed back the notes the following Monday and he knew that he shouldn’t have turned up at her house to give back the notes, but he did anyway. On the Friday which Brendon was going to give the notes back, Lara was away, so he took some extra notes so she could copy his and planned to give hers back on the Monday but then he thought of visiting her. Brendon hated the way Lara made him go against everything he should be doing. He hated the way she made him want to be a good person. With what Brendon had been born into it was impossible for him to be a good person.

“Hey Jenna” Brendon called, running to catch up with Lara’s good friend “Umm… I was wondering if you could give me Lara’s address?”

Jenna raised her sharp eyebrows at him “Why?”

“Oh…umm, I have some, some notes to give her” Brendon said realizing that he sounded like quite the stalker.

“I could give them to her.”

“Umm… I kinda wanted to give them to her in person.”

“Ohhhh” Jenna smiled “those kind of notes.”

“Wait, n-no, they’re just s-study notes” Brendon stuttered.

“Calm down, calm down” Jenna laughed upon seeing Brendon’s face “I’m just playing with you, just letting you know, she’s been pretty sick.”

Brendon wondered curiously around the east Melbourne florist, wondering what type of flowers to buy someone sick. Upon walking inside he scanned the walls hoping that there would be some sort of flower key on the wall telling him exactly what to get on what occasion but he had no such luck.

“Need any help son?” the middle aged florist wondered over to Brendon’s confused states as if she could instinctively tell that he was a flower virgin. It was true, Brendon had never been flower shopping.

“Umm yeah, I have a sick friend-” he started.

“Oh I’m so sorr-”
“No, not like that, I think it’s just the flu” Brendon said quickly.

“Oh, okay, well there are the ‘get well’ flowers” the woman led him to a group of multicoloured daises. Brendon made a face, he couldn’t imagine Lara quite liking those “Is your friend male or a-”

“She’s a girl.”

“Then how about some roses?”

“No” Brendon said quickly, “not roses, defiantly not roses” he didn’t want to give her the wrong idea.

The assistant sighed and Brendon’s indecisiveness “There’s always tulips.”

Brendon looked at the flowers before him while wondering why he was bothering about this so much. Why couldn’t he just pick up the damn sunflowers and giver her them? Why did he have to overcomplicate everything? “Umm…they’re a bit common.”

“There are other coloured ones, but they go up in price of course.”

“Price doesn’t matter” Brendon said quickly.

In the end Brendon mixed two bouquets, one set of purple and white tulips, the other of pale yellow and white. They reminded him of her and Brendon thought she’d like them.

Upon arriving at her house Brendon remained seated in the car for a number of minutes. Where she lived was so much different from the way Brendon had grown up. Brendon lived on a main road; there were constantly a number of sports cars racing down the streets forbidding the kids from playing on the road. Not that Brendon was deprived in any way, of course not, this was Brendon Urie we were talking about, and Brendon Urie was anything but deprived. His back yard was bigger than most streets, most children learnt to ride their bikes on the footpath, Brendon learnt on his tennis court. Most children played soccer at the local park, Brendon and his friends played on the makeshift pitch in a spare corner of his backyard.

In this street, there were at least fifteen children all on their push bikes riding around and around in the court. There were the mothers, all sitting on the footpaths talking over the feature article in New Idea this week. Brendon’s family had featured in those magazines a number of times, not so much recently, but when Brendon’s grandfather was murdered and his godfather locked away for race fixing down at Flemington. That was about ten years ago but Brendon still loathed those magazines with a passion. Half of the mothers at his high school worshiped the gossip magazines, the other half, like Brendon’s family, were featured on the cover.

Brendon got out of the car and began to walk to the back of the court where Lara’s house, number 16 was situated. The mothers all smiled widely and said hello as Brendon passed them on his way down to the house.

“Hello?” Lara opened the door, her voice all crackly.

“Hi La- are you wearing a snuggie?” Brendon raised his eyebrows.

“Why yes I am” she smiled sounding very congested.

Brendon laughed “Oh, umm these are for you” he said awkwardly handing her the flowers.

“Oh my God thank you” she cooed “They’re so cute, come in come in come in” she said quickly.

“umm, I’m just here to give you back your notes” Brendon said quickly.

“Come on” Lara whined “Don’t you want to see where I’ll put them?”

As it turns out, Lara was rather indecisive about...well, everything. First it was the vase, the clear crystal, the one with a hint of purple, the long skinny one or the small wider one? After that was decided, Lara had to find a place to put them, in the kitchen, in the living room or in her bedroom? Her house was half the size of Brendon’s yet she seemed to take forever to find a place to put it.

“How about here?” She smiled placing the vase on the coffee table of her living room.

“That’s where you put them first” Brendon said pointedly.

“But I needed to be sure before I make such an important decision” she said seriously.

“Placing flowers in a house?”

“It’s all about feng shui Brendon, feng shui.”

Brendon rolled his eyes “Sure it is, anyway” he said sitting down next to her on the couch “Here are you notes, and I took down some ones from the recent classes.”

The next hour was spent copying down notes, watching Ellen DeGeneres and of course, talking. Brendon knew he should’ve left by now, he knew he shouldn’t have been moving closer towards her, he hated the way she clung to every word that she spoke.

“So, what’s the story behind the snuggie?” Brendon smiled.

“Well, have you ever been sitting on the couch, and you’ve wanted to get the remote?” Lara smiled.

“You do know that you sound like an infomercial.”

“Well, just like those people in the infomercials, I was sick of my arms getting cold, so I said to myself, fuck blankets, I want a snuggie” she laughed.

Brendon smiled “You’re adorable.”

Lara bit down shyly on her lip and her pale cheeks began to redden. Right now, there was nothing running through Brendon’s head, if there was he would have stopped himself, he wouldn’t have made such a mistake, he wouldn’t have kissed her.