Sweetie You Had Me

For a long time the two of them sat there, completely still. Julie’s soft sobs being the only sound, but after a few minutes Ryan called from the door. “Brendon?”

Brendon sighed and lifted Julie’s body off of the ground. She continued to weep into his chest as he carried her out of the darkness. As the two of them emerged from the cellar, Ryan’s face was glazed over with indifference, to hide his pity. He watched Brendon hold Julie and walk up the stairs, straight past him. He felt a pang of sadness for the two of them, but only for a moment before he closed the cellar door and followed them. Brendon carried Julie up and out of the dark stairwell, bringing her into the hallway above them. He held her close and walked without saying anything. Ryan didn’t speak either; until he quietly told Brendon he was going to go on ahead to let everyone know what had happened. Brendon nodded and Ryan ran through the hallway to the rest of the men. Brendon and Julie were left alone in their silence. The only thing they were able to hear being Julie’s relentless sobs.

Meanwhile, Spencer was nervously standing by the door, waiting for the Fall Out Boys to finish their search. He tapped his thighs to try to calm himself but nothing worked. In fact, he thought that his restless hands were the reason he was freaking out so much, so he didn’t to put them into his pockets. But his eyes went wide with discovery. The blue cell phone was gone.

Ryan discovered Spencer by the front door only a moment after Spencer had realized this, his eyes still wide with surprise, worry, and realization. Ryan had the inclination to stop when he saw Spencer’s face. Something was wrong. Ryan came up to him briskly. “Spence, what’s wrong?” Spencer shook his head and rubbed his temples. He looked up at Ryan again.

“William knows,” he said. When Ryan gave him a questioning look he continued. “He knows you guys came tonight! He’s probably in here right now!” He said, shaking. Ryan’s own eyes went wide.

“Spence, you have to get out of here! William will kill you when he finds out what you did.” Ryan said. His genuine worry for his friend was taking over him. “You have to get out of Chicago!”

Spencer shook his head, ”I can’t just leave you guys!”

“But what if you end up just like Jon!” Ryan said. Spencer cocked an eyebrow.

“What happened to Jon?” Spencer didn’t know what happened to Jon, Ryan realized. How could he? No of them had told him, and neither would William. “Spencer, Jon is dead.”

Spencer was shocked. Jon was one of his good friends. How could he just be dead? He had just seen him, what two weeks ago? He couldn’t just be there and gone again. Spencer looked down and rubbed his face in remorse. He kicked at the ground angrily. “You’re right,” he finally answered. Ryan rose his eyebrows. “I’ll leave with you guys, but I’m not leaving Chicago, not as long as William is around to torture everyone we care about.” Ryan smiled and patted Spencer’s shoulder.

“We better round up the troops, It’s nearly midnight, and the Dandies will be back soon.”

By the time Brendon had made it out of the halls with Julie she had stopped crying, and was holding onto him with a tight grip, as if she wasn’t sure he was there or not. She seemed to think that if she were to let go of him for even a second he would disappear again, and she would be left alone in the darkness. As the two of them appeared out of the west wing hallway, the rest of their group stood there, quietly conversing among each other. Pete seemed to be quietly yelling at Spencer, while he stood calm listening to his rant. All their heads turned though, when they spotted Brendon and Julie coming towards them. All six of them looked as thought they wanted to speak, but Brendon shushed them. He walked past them to the door, where he made a “come on” gesture with his head. Ryan opened the door for Brendon and the group headed out of the house. Pete was the last to leave. He looked over his shoulder before he closed the door, glaring into the dim candlelight of the house. He appeared to see something looming in the darkness, but he didn’t make any advancement into the house. He only turned away and shut the door silently.

Brendon walked behind a shadowed tree and disappeared, reappearing into his bedroom at fall out boy’s warehouse. Despite her reluctance, Brendon set her down onto the dusty old mattress. He took off his jacket and covered her body with it. She accepted it, and tried take it the warmth of it. He then sat himself next to her and rubbed her head, running his fingers through her dirty, matted hair. He felt happy and sad at the same time. He was so happy she was alive and here with him, but he couldn’t help but wonder what the future would bring for them. William wouldn’t stop until he got what he wanted, so what did that mean for him and Julie? Could they continue to play his sick game of cat and mouse? Could their relationship survive if they were always on the run?

As Brendon studied the sighs of hardship on Julie’s face—her cracked lips, the hundred scratches on her pale face, the blue bruises on her cheeks— it made him wonder if William was ever a human being. He heard legends of the very first Vampires, the ones that were born and not bitten —the ones that were merciless and pure children of hell. Surely if he had ever been human he would have felt some sort of remorse, a smidge of contrition. He had heard of human beings that did worse to other humans. Perhaps William was one of those humans. It didn’t matter anyway. Brendon continued to rub Julie’s head, trying to not think about William, but only of the rare time he was able to spend with Julie.

Julie didn’t object to any of Brendon’s niceties. She was so broken. She didn’t have any strength left for fighting. William had broken her spirit in that dark dingy room. She was tired of being brave and strong. She was done pretending that she could protect both Brendon and herself. She was at a loss, and she was almost fine with it. She didn’t understand why she thought she could handle all this in the first place. She was weak, unintelligent, and didn’t really think ahead. She couldn’t win this game alone. She just wanted to know why she believed she could.

The mood was melancholy inside the warehouse. Everyone was upset for their own reason. Pete was mad because not only had he missed out on killing William again, he now had another person to take care of in Spencer. Spencer was mad because of Jon. He was having trouble comprehending how William killed him just a few days ago. He was ready to kill William himself. Ryan was feeling similar to Brendon. He was happy Julie was okay, but he was worried about her mental health. Humans can only take so much stress and living with William for five days could certainly affect a person physically and mentally. Patrick, Joe, and Andy weren’t really that pissed off, they were just acting like it because that’s what everyone else was doing. Andy had tried to lighten the mood a few times, but that didn’t go very well.

Most of them had gone to bed as soon as they returned home, but a few, namely Ryan, had been restless. He was watching TV in the living room, even though he wasn’t really paying attention.

Brendon stayed with Julie until he heard her breathing lessen to a steady pace and she was completely asleep. He kissed her forehead and left the bedroom. He walked outside to where Ryan was watching TV in the living room. Brendon sat next to him on the couch. They didn’t speak to each other for awhile, but Ryan broke the silence a few minutes into it. “William knows we were there.”

Brendon sighed. “Doesn’t surprise me.” Ryan turned his head to look at him in surprise.

“William tends to know everything one way or another,” he explained. “Which is why we have to go back.” Again Ryan’s eyes went wide. What the hell?

“Why?” Ryan asked, completely confused. “We just got Julie back, and now you’re going to leave her again!” Brendon sighed.

“Look, it won’t be right now but soon. William won’t stop trying to get to her if I keep near her.” he said, trying to be calm. “I’m the reason she’s in this mess. She wouldn’t have suffered like that if I never spoken to her!” his voice was becoming subtly louder as he continued. “If had just forgotten about the stupid hat, and went on with my life everything would be fine. I should have just let her be!” Ryan didn’t try to stop him. “I’m the reason she’s crying her eyes out! It’s because of me! I’m the fucking reason for it all!”

Brendon yelled loud enough for the whole warehouse to hear and probably the people in the neighboring buildings. Pete rolled his eyes and covered his head with his pillow, but Julie immediately sat up in her bed. She hugged Brendon’s Jacket to her chest as she looked around the room for him, but she realized he was the one who was yelling in the living room, for the walls were thin inside the building. Julie listened to their conversation intently now, hearing the grief in Brendon’s voice.

“Are you done?” Ryan asked, raising an amused eyebrow at him. Brendon glared lightly at him, but leaned back into the couch, relaxing.

“Yeah,” Brendon crossed his arms and Ryan laughed.

“Pete’s right,” Ryan said, smiling cheerfully.

“About what?”

“You really are PMSing!” Ryan said and started laughing. Brendon socked him in the shoulder.

“Shut up!”