Days of the Old

Talking the in the kitchen woke me up the next morning, and as much as I didn’t want to, I forced myself out of bed and stumbled out to groggily greet Tyler and otherwise ignore Matt.

It was a little more than obvious they were talking to me, because as soon as they heard my bedroom door open their quiet chatter halted to a stop. As I said, I ignored Matt and muttered a “Morning.” to Tyler as I sat down at the island and rested my head on the cool countertop, wanting to wake up. This was probably going to be one of, or even my last day with Tyler, and I had to make it count.

A plate of pancakes and a glass of apple juice was set in front of me, and I remembered just how hungry I was. I smiled at Matt as a thanks, but didn’t say anything to him before digging in. Not that I normally would, but I was just way too hungry to be in the mood for small talk.

“Morning, Payton,” Matt said. I glanced up at him before going back to my pancakes. He was genuinely smiling, and I almost felt bad for not returning it. Tyler nudged me, but I ignored him. I couldn’t see why he would want me to be nice to Matt.

“We’re leaving tomorrow,” Matt said from across from me, confirming my earlier suspicions. “Pack whatever you can, and I’ll get the rest freighted out.”

Still, I refused to acknowledge him; instead I grabbed Tyler by his arm and hauled him off his stool with me. “C’mon, Ty,” I sighed heavily as we padded down the hall, “Come help me pack.”

My closed door seemed to feel like a barrier for me, it separated me from Matt and I felt like I could now talk freely with Tyler. I anxiously ran a hand down my face, recalling last night’s events. “Please tell me that it was you I was clinging to like an idiot last night.”

That was the first time I really let myself cry, I let it all out last night. Or as much as I could at once. I hated feeling vulnerable and weak and before then, I only shed a few miniscule tears. I felt like I was letting my mom down when I let it all loose like that, she couldn’t stand to see me cry.

When Tyler didn’t say anything, I glanced up and him smiling sadly as he shook his head. I groaned, completely mortified that I was acting like that around Matt. “Don’t worry about it, P. It’s what you’re supposed to do.”

I rolled my eyes as I began picking up my clothes and neatly folding them before laying them on my bed, promising myself that I wasn’t gonna break down anytime soon. I was going to keep my thoughts and feelings to myself. It wasn’t like Matt would understand, anyway. He was just a stranger to me, and vice versa.

I decided then that I wasn’t going to act sad, I would try to act as normal as possible. When I was around Tyler, at least. Once I leave, I would be so shy around Matt and his friends; I wouldn’t get a chance to be miserable around them. I pushed the thoughts of my mother and how I messed up to the back of my mind, focusing on cleaning my room up and packing all the crap that mattered to me.

Thinking about stuff that meant something to me, I glanced at the corner where my custom white Les Paul usually sat on its stand. “I left my guitar at your house.” I stated softly, wondering when I was going to be able to go over and pick it up.

“That’s nothing. You dad is coming over later to meet my parents, they won’t let you leave until they meet him,” He said with a touch of humour in his tone, but I shuttered at what he called Matt. Hardly a dad if he was never around. I knew who he was. In fact, I quite like his band, but it didn’t change the fact that he missed out on my childhood. Tyler began helping me fold my clothes. “You can get it then. Maybe we could even jam, one last time before you leave.”

Realization came over me as I attempted to grasp the concept of not being able to jam with Tyler anymore. It wasn’t anything elaborate; we didn’t have a band name or anything. We usually just covered our favourite songs. I was on guitar, and he played the drums.

Sometimes I even sang, but it was rare. I didn’t like my singing voice. I held my tears back as I looked up at him and nodded solemnly. “Okay.”

An anxious silence filled the room as we concentrated on cleaning and packing, and within an hour, almost all of my clothes were all neatly folded on my bed and half of my posters were taken down and in a neat pile on the floor. “Patey, can you promise me something?” Tyler asked, and when I glanced up to meet his eyes, seriousness filled them. I nodded without a second thought, he was my best friend. I would do anything for him, and keeping a simple promise was the least I could do before I left.

“Promise me you’ll give Matt a chance. He’s a good guy P, you know that.” I snorted and rolled my eyes in response. Of course he would want me to do something that was next to impossible to accomplish. “You’re just like him.” He added, grinning as he tried to lighten the mood.

“Whatever, Tina,” I huffed and ignored his last statement as I threw one of my old stuffed bears across my room. “I’ll try, I guess.” What was I getting myself into? I barely even acknowledged Matt yet, how could Tyler expect me to get along with him?

Tyler stopped what he was doing and gently took my chin, forcing me to look at him. His hazel eyes held a determined glint, and I knew he wouldn’t let up until I gave him a sincere promise, one that I meant and on I would keep. “P...” He started when I refused to look him straight in the eye.

I rolled my eyes yet again, before finally meeting his gaze. “Yes, Tyler. I promise I’ll try to give him a chance.” I quipped, hoping he wouldn’t notice how I snuck in the ‘try’ part. He looked at me pointedly, refusing to release my chin. “I’ll give him a chance,” I continued in an exasperated tone, pulling away from him to stare at my room.

He gave me a side hug and left an arm around my waist as he took what was left of my room in too. Thanks to some of the many band posters that had been taken down, you could see some of the black and red walls, and the many drawings and writing Tyler and I scrawled across the walls when we were younger. Conversations, insults, funny pictures, anything Tyler and I could think of was written on these walls.

I couldn’t believe I was leaving it all. Just like that. I never thought it was possible for so much change to happen in such a short span of time. A snap of the fingers and it was gone. “Thanks.” Tyler grinned down at me.

“Huh?” I asked, coming out of my daze. I didn’t know if I missed something said or not.

He smiled sympathetically, his arm tightening around my waist. “I said thanks, for promising.”

“Oh, hmm... yeah.” I mumbled, going back to looking around. Could I handle this? Could I handle the after affects of all the things that went wrong? I’d made myself numb. I refused to let myself feel, last night was just a small mishap, and I vowed it would never happen again, at least not when I’m around anyone.

“You wanna go to my house now? Get it over with?” He asked, retracting his arm from around my waist as he started for the door.

I sighed. “Yeah, I guess. If I have to.” I didn’t feel like talking, but I decided to answer him so he wouldn’t ask me how I was doing with everything. That was the most dreaded question, when asked that question I had a lot of trouble holding myself together. Even if it was just a ‘Hi, how are you?’ I would feel tears prick at the corners of my eyes. My mom was the only person I could ever really talk to; share my emotions and thoughts with.

Sarcastically, I mentally counted to three in my head as Tyler opened the door. I was expecting the worst. Matt would be standing outside my door, waiting for us to open so he could try and ‘get to know me’. That was even worse than The Dreaded Question.

If he wanted to get to know me, he could look at my health records. My report cards. That was enough; I didn’t want him to know me any further than that. He didn’t need to. I decided then that as soon as I turned eighteen, I was coming back home with Tyler.

Matt wasn’t there, at least not in the hallway. When we got the living room, it looked like he was doing something with the luggage he’d taken with him. I couldn’t care less and ignored him as he turned around and smiled at Tyler and I. “All packed?” He asked softly, practically staring me down.

Tyler noticed I wouldn’t even look at him, let alone answer, and quickly replied so Matt wouldn’t think too much of it. “Almost, just a few more things and everything will be ready.”

This is and always will be my home; I honestly don’t know if I could consider anything else even close to that. The east coast of Canada was where I wanted to be until the day I died, and I knew that was the case with Tyler too.

“That’s good...” Matt coughed after a few moments of awkward silence. Tyler quickly picked up on the conversation.

“My parents want to meet you before Payton leaves,” He started, and I could hear a sad smile in his tone. “You wanna head over there now?”

“Yeah?” Matt grinned and glanced at the front door that was just around the corner from the living room. “Alright, let’s go over now then.”

So many things can change, though. The past two weeks were proof of that. What if Tyler moves on, makes new friends? He already had tons, but they were ‘popular’ like he was, I was just his tag along that all the girls were jealous of. They thought we were a ‘thing’. They were one of the many reasons I always got in fights at school.

But what if Tyler let them get to him? We always went to parties on the weekends, and if I wasn’t there to stop him from taking the drugs that were almost always offered to him, I was sure he would be a junkie by now. He trusted people too easily. He thought no one ever meant any kind of harm. He and I were polar opposites in that case, it takes me months, even years to completely trust someone.

After we piled into Matt’s rental car, I didn’t utter a word as we started the ten minute drive to Tyler’s house. I noticed Matt would glance at me through the rear view mirror ever few moments or so, but I otherwise ignored it. Tyler nudged me with his elbow, wanting me to make small talk. Once again, I rolled my eyes and ignored him, willing to endure the awkward silence.

I practically nose-dived out of the car, ready to get as far from as Matt as I could. I wanted as little interaction as with him as possible.

Was I judging him too soon? Maybe... maybe Tyler was right. I could give him a chance. But what if everything turns out to be even worse than I was expecting? Hell, I didn’t even know what I was expecting myself.

I pushed all my thoughts the back of my head as I stared up at Tyler’s house, probably for the last time. I lived out in the middle of nowhere with heaps of land around my house, but Tyler lived in the suburbs. His house was the classic two-story, two car garage. The same as every other house on that particular block. But I had so many memories here. Pranking his snobby neighbours every Halloween, building the crappy tree house in his back yard, hiding out in his basements when we were in trouble with our parents.

The sleepovers, too. There were too many to count, we usually stayed at his house, then my house the next weekend, and then back to his house the weekend after that. The never-ending cycle that we never got bored of.

I jumped when the front door swung open, revealing Tyler’s parents. Melissa and Derek stood there, grinning widely at Matt. I didn’t understand why they were so happy to see him, but I went along with it and cracked a feeble smile myself for their sake.

After all, they were practically my parents, too. Whenever Tyler and I got in trouble, my mom would often conference call them and discuss our punishment. They were cool, though. They let us practically trash the house every weekend, and didn’t mind of blaring instruments whenever Tyler and I had a jam session.

Matt grinned back at them, looking relieved to finally find some friendly faces. “You must be Matt,” Melissa started excitedly. “It’s so great to finally meet Payton’s dad!” Once Matt was up the steps, Melissa had all but thrown herself at him for a hug. I snorted, sarcastically muttering something about how mature they were.

Derek on the other hand, while he was smiling, he only shook Matt’s hand tensely, his eyes boring into Matt’s. I smiled, if there was anyone would ever take my side, it would be Derek. If I had to name someone in my life who came even remotely close to being a father-figure for me, it would be him. He looked exactly like Tyler, same facial structure, dark hair, hazel eyes, the same burly build. Tyler was quickly catching up to his dad’s height too, standing at around 5’11, while Derek was around 6’3.

I was surrounded by giants. His mom was tall, too, I was guessing at least around 5’8, if not more. I always felt so meagre around them with my 4’10 height.

Melissa turned around, and her grin turned into a small, sympathetic smile. “Come on in, Payton. You have to be freezing.”

She was right. It was the end of December and at least minus 10 degrees Celsius, while I stood in the middle of the snow-coated lawn in nothing more than a fall jacket.

I didn’t mind, though. I would gladly take standing out in the cold than having to sit next to Matt as he talked to Derek and Melissa. Of course they would want to see that he and I were getting along, when in reality I haven’t even spoken a word to him yet. I had a feeling that this wasn’t going to go over well, at all.

“Come on P, after your dad leaves we can jam.” Tyler said, tugging on my arm. I gulped and begrudgingly followed him into the house, expecting the worst.