Mutatio

"Good morning Tom."

My eyes widened. Couldnt be. No, he hadnt left his room for weeks, he hadnt eaten hardly anything. I hadnt seen the whites of my brother's eyes since....well, just since. I didnt know how to responde.

"Do we have any waffles?" he asked, opening the freezer door without waiting for me to answer. I mad a noise -- somthing between a grunt and a 'yes' -- and my mouth gaped. "You can close your mouth Tom." Bill replied. he didnt even look at me. "Ah! Perfect!"

The toaster made a clinking sound as two ego-chocolate chip waffles were loaded into it. I turned to face him. My brother.

"W-we're out of milk." was all I could manage to say.

"Hm?" he replied. He looked to me and beamed. "Oh, its alright. I'll have orange juice or something. No, nevermind. Oranges and chocolate dont go together. Hm...." The fridge door opened again. "Nothing. Guess I'll deal with water."

I couldnt move. My brother. My twin. was this real? Or was I dreaming? Had I gone mad from worry? Bill always did tell me not to worry so much. And now here he was, as if telling me: "See Tom? No need to worry."

"Tom?"

I shook my head and loooked to Bill. "Yeah?"

"Arent you going to eat anything? You look extremely pale."

I looked down to my hands. I was paler than usual. Probably because I had to force myself to eat, even when Bill wasn't. I didnt always succeed.

"Oh. Yeah, I'll grab something. Um..." I turned to the refridgerator. I didnt know whether or not to open it. I didnt know why. I felt like I was in a horror movie and if I opened the fridge the light would expose to me that Bill really wasnt here, really hadn't just made himself waffles and gotten a glass of water after deciding against orange juice. Or worse, that he was too thin, too pale, even if I knew it was true. And I did, I did know that Bill was far too thin, far too pale. I rubbed my eyes and looked at the digital clock. It was really early. Way to goddamn early for me to be awake.

"Are you usually up at this ungodly hour?" Bill asked and yawned. I shrugged and managed a weak, pathetic smile that probably showed that I was more worried that he was awake than happy. But why should I be worried? He was awake, he'd come out of his room, he was eating! And yet my heart raced more than it ever had before. I tried to muster up a better smile, and it may have improved a bit, but I cannot clearly see my face on a regular basis, so I didnt know if it had changed at all.

He had dark circles under his eyes, and not from the eyeliner. No, that had rubbed off a long time ago. His cheeks look like they'd been carved out of his face, leaving a large pit between his jaw and his cheekbones. His skin may have been pale, but it was also flushed, as if moving was causing him so much exhersion that he was getting out of breath. But he wasnt, he was fine. He was eating slowly, not ravenous like I'd expected; quietly sipping on his glass of water.

"Tom?" he asked again.

"Yeah?"

"You can stop staring." He replied, smiled, and returned to his waffles. "Oh, and I think I'm going to....I dunno. nevermind. I have no idea where I was going."

I couldnt help but laugh a little. How like him to start a sentance and forget it? It reminded me of when we were kids in high school. He would always start telling a story about what had happened to us that day to our friends only to stop and say, "Actually that didnt happen. but its much more interesting than what did." and then not tell them what actually happened.

"So, brother of mine, whats our shchedual? Anything important?"

I shrugged. "Nope. we need to start writting again, well you need to start writting again, unless you want me to help, but dont try to rush it. Oh, and the G's have been badgering me for a while to come with them to *insert lake name here* before it gets cold again."

Bill nodded, mouth full of waffle, and mumbled something to the effect of "Sounds good to me." He chewed a moment, swallowed, took a drink of water, and laid his hands palm down on the table before adding, "I think I'm going to fly out to L.A."

I chocked on a bit of apple. "What? Why on earth would you do that?"

He shrugged. "I dunno. Ashley's got to be doing something, she always is, and if she is, then Lexi is, and Angie'll probably be hanging around there somewhere. Plus, if we're lucky, Lor wont be working on anything and ALL of us could hang out for a while. For old time's sake."

Make him hate me. she had said. But I couldn't. Never. Not her, not Bill. they could never truly hate eachother, and I wasn't about to change it. They could ruin their own lives, I refuse to help it along.

"And I think everyone should come along. Hey, there's even a recording studio in L.A.! We could work too, if we really needed to. Or wanted to. Or whatever."

I didn't know what to say. Something in my gut told me this was a bad idea, perhaps the worst idea. But there was something else too, something else that made me think this needed to happen. I dont't know. But what harm could there be in just a vacation? Melt away the stress by te pool. Yeah. This would be a good idea.

Good God, what was I thinking?