Forgotten

ROBBIE'S POV.

"What was that?" I asked, quickly looking out at the hallway. There was nothing there. A shiver ran down my spine as I thought of who it could have been and I turned back to Dad.

"Can we go, please, I think I've got everything." He folded up his letter and put it in his pocket, wiped a stray tear that was rolling down his cheek and nodded.

"Get your stuff," he said, picking up all the things that were found in Mom's cupboard. I nodded and left the room, walking back into my room for what I hoped would be the last time ever. I picked up the bag and took one last look around for anything I had missed, seeing nothing, I left the room and walked down the stairs slowly.

The drive back to Dad's house was silent except for the radio and my occasional sniffle. I pulled Mom's letter to me out of my pocket and re-read it, hoping to find comfort in her words but finding none. Whoever did this to her will pay, and I'm pretty sure who it was. I fell into a daydream for the rest of the trip...

"Robbie?"

"Yeah?" I asked, being jolted out of my thoughts of stabbing Darren to death with a screwdriver.

"You sorta zoned out. Come on," I nodded, realizing we were home and climbing out of the car.

"You gonna practice for tomorrow night with Josh?" he asked, unlocking the front door and kicking off his shoes once we were both inside.

"Yeah, probably," I said, heading off to the room where the drums were kept. I paused at the door, I could hear singing, harmonized singing coming from inside the room.

Here I stand, all alone,
Tonight.
And I wish I was strong enough to breathe,
Without you,
In my life,
and I wish I was anyone but me.

It stopped and I opened the door.

"We should get Cassie up on stage with us for that song, it sounds much better with the two of you," I said, looking at Josh and Cassie who had just been singing.

"You know she wouldn't do it," he said as she left the room.

"Yeah, I know, but it would sound great."

"You wanna run through all the songs now before my voice gives out completely on me?" said Josh, I could hear his voice was cracking every now and then as he spoke.

"Yeah, alright," I picked up the bass Matthew had lent me with great care and put it on. There was no amp here so I just had to play as loud as I could.

We ran through all the songs we had learned, acting as if we were on stage the whole time too, moving around, jumping off the drum set, anything we could think of.

Josh's voice was fading fast. By the last song he could hardly even speak, let alone sing.

"Shit dude, I hope your voice is OK for tomorrow," I said with a sigh. I had been singing along as much as I knew to try and help him out but I knew I wouldn't be able to sing that much tomorrow night on stage.

"So do I. Maybe it's finally breaking," he said hopefully.

"Don't get your hopes up, if yours is then mine should b-be too," my voice cracked and I coughed quickly to try and cover it up. He laughed loudly at my poor attempt of hiding it.

"We're growing up," said Josh, laughing and wiping away a fake tear.

"Took us long enough. Remember that dude who thought we were like twelve?"

"Oh yeah! That was pretty funny actually."

"Yeah until we told him we were fifteen and he told us to fuck off."

"Ha! I dunno though, being so small sucks. I mean, we're like fifteen and we're only about 5ft 4! We're midgets!"

"Your right. It does suck. Hopefully we'll get taller soon though I mean, Mom wasn't exactly short and Dad is like a pretty big guy," as soon as I had said the word 'Mom' I had wished I hadn't. I instantly thought back to the letters and started to wonder if Josh would still be in such a great mood once he read his.

"Guys!" called Dad's voice from outside the room. I sighed and opened the door before yelling back.

"WHAT?!"

"Come here," he called.

"NO!" I yelled, shutting the door.

"Please?"

"Fine." Josh and I walked into the lounge to find him sat there with Ben. I flung myself down onto the other couch and Josh imitated me, sitting beside me.

"Well what?" I asked impatiently, and trying to keep my voice steady at the same time.

"These belong to you," he said, holding out one hand. From his hand hung two gold chains, they were thin and fragile looking and I hadn't seen them before.

"No they don't."

"Yes, they do. Your mother left them for you."

I tentatively reached out my hand and took the chains from him, handing one to Josh and looking closer at my own one. Thanks Mom, I thought to myself as I pulled it on over my head and tucked it down the front of my shirt, forcing back tears as I thought of how I would never see her again.

ONE WEEK LATER

Everything was going great. The Madina Lake concert had gone without a hitch, nobody suspected a thing which I guess was mostly because the make-up artist, Janie, had turned us into perfect copies of Matthew and Nathan.

Dad had decided that Chicago, though it was our home, wasn't the best place for us to be right now. We had headed back to New Jersey to live in the band house, now that the rest of the band weren't there we could stay there as long as we liked. I had to admit I was relieved to be escaping, it felt like I was moving on, leaving the past behind.

Josh hasn't really been himself, he's been tense and tired looking but hopefully, Taylor's party tonight will take his mind off things.

"Dad, I can still go to that party right?" I asked as I threw a load of dirty laundry into the basket in the kitchen.

"Uh... well...."

"What?"

"I'm not sure. Who's going to be there?"

"Just the people who were at the gig and a few others. Don't worry, there's going to be adults there," I lied quickly.

"You sure?"

"Yes! I wouldn't lie to you, seriously, there will be adults there."

"I still don't know... I mean, I saw what you were getting up to with that girl at the concert..."

"Come on! We weren't getting up to anything!"

"That's not what I saw, maybe it would be better if you didn't go?"

"But... but..." I stammered.

"But...but..." Imitated Josh, walking into the room and sitting down moodily at the table.

"So what if you don't go, the only thing you'll miss out in having sex with that..."

"Josh that's enough," said Dad firmly as I felt my face turn red.

"I'm not going to sleep with her! I just want to go to the party and have a good time, I promise you that I won't have sex with her."

"Pfft, yeah right."

"Josh, enough, please," said Dad, sitting at the table opposite us. We were no longer identical. The black stripe that had been put in my hair had turned out to be permanent, I liked it though, and I had taken to messing up my hair every day with some hair wax I had found in the bathroom cupboard.

"Come on! Please let me go! I'll be good, I swear, I'll be back in the morning!"

"Hmmmm," he thought for a moment before looking at the two of us. I had my fingers crossed under the table.

"OK, you can both go, but I swear if I find out either of you have been up to anything, your grounded for life. No phone, no friends, no music, no nothing. You'll never see the light of day again, you understand me?"

"Perfectly," I said, sliding out of my seat and rushing upstairs to get changed.

I stripped down to my boxers and started looking through my clothes for something acceptable to wear.

"Please don't do anything you might regret," came Josh's voice from behind me.

"Knock much?"

"Nope. Dude seriously, don't, I know what your planning on doing tonight."

"I'm not planning on doing anything!"

"I overheard you talking to Taylor on the phone the other day! Something about her bedroom!"

I blushed.

"You shouldn't have been listening to my private conversations! Get out of my room!"

"It's our room, remember, we have to share here?"

"Shit. Well then, get dressed asshole, or we're gonna be late."

Josh sighed and pulled his shirt off. I noticed he still had pink marks from where Darren had scratched at his skin and it was still healing. I also noticed how skinny he was but very toned, like he had been doing hundreds of sit-ups.

I stopped staring at him and started looking for a shirt again, something decent. I went with plain black in the end, it smelled clean so I just shoved it on and sprayed on some deodorant in case it wasn't as clean as it originally appeared.

In the end I went with tight black jeans and a studded belt that Frank had left behind, I wore the jeans low and the belt even lower, showing off how skinny I was. I quickly re-messed my hair and glanced at my brother. He was dressed in identical tight black jeans but he was wearing a plain white shirt.

"OK, let's go, but first," I ruffled up his hair so it was like mine. "Much better."

He rolled his eyes and followed me from the room.

Five minutes later we stood on the doorstep of a house. Taylor had given me the address and it was only one block away from the band house, which was lucky for us, not far to walk.

"Hey!" cried Taylor excitedly, throwing open the front door. I blinked. She was wearing the tightest shirt I had ever seen, it was black with a red bleeding heart on the front and pretty low cut. She had on tight jeans which she wore low and about an inch of pale skin was visible from where her jeans ended and her shirt began.

"What happened to your hair?" she asked, pulling us both inside and hugging me tightly. I had missed her, even though it had only been just over a week, I had missed having her around.

"Uh... well, I was messing around with wash out dye and it turns out, it wasn't wash out after all," I said, grinning stupidly as we let go of each other.

"Awww. Well, it looks hot anyway, you look older."

"Thanks, I guess."

"Why are we stood out in the hallway, come on!" she pushed open the door to the lounge and it was full of people. Music was blasting out of the speakers and the alcohol was already flowing freely. Awesome.

Not awesome. Two hours later and I was already at my limit, I was starting to feel just a little drunk so I had decided to call it quits with the drinks. For now.

"Robbie, come here a second," mumbled Taylor in my ear, she pulled me by my arm out into the hallway. Josh was sat on the stairs with some random chick sat on his lap, making out sloppily with her. I smirked and kicked him in the back.

"Asshole!" he jumped up and went to start at me but the girl grabbed his hand and pulled him back.

"So, I was thinking. This is fun but I mean, maybe we could go and find something else to do?" whispered Taylor in my ear seductively, running one hand up and down my thigh as she had pressed me up against the wall.

"I... uh..." I stammered as she started to kiss my neck. I shivered slightly and my eyes slipped closed for a moment at the feeling of her lips on my neck.

"Sure, lets go," I said with a smirk, puling her into a kiss and pulling her body very close to mine.

Giggling, she led me upstairs by the hand and into one of the rooms, she pushed me onto the bed and shut and locked the door. It was pretty dark in the room but I could see something in her eyes as she climbed on top of me, pushing me so I was laying flat on my back with her on top of me. Something in her eyes that told me I was going to break a promise to Josh and Dad tonight.