We Knew That Time Would Kill Us

The front door opening could be heard from where I was in the living room, and I smiled inwardly when I could hear Dannii cussing under her breath as she hurriedly tried to unlace her Chuck Taylors. She was in a rush, obviously, and I figured that she wanted to talk to me about it so I got up to greet her.

A split second after I got up—I didn’t even have the chance to move away from the sofa—Danni appeared in the archway, gasping for breath as if she just ran all the way to the house. “Geez, Dannii, something on your mind?” Zacky laughed from his seat on the loveseat, we were still lounging around in there after I’d found out that Bert McCracken had let the cat out of the bag.

Crumpled up in one of her hands was a piece of paper, and as soon as she saw me she began hurriedly smoothing it out. She ignored Zacky’s remark, staring at the piece of paper before her gaze flickered to me. “Have you seen this?” She questioned, turning the paper toward me.

I recognized it right away. It was a print out of the exact news article Zacky had shown me earlier. My hands went to my eyes as if what I’d seen had scarred me for life, and I groaned as I turned away from her. “I’ll take that as a yes..." She trailed off and I could hear the re-crumpling of the paper as she stuffed it back into her pocket.

“Look, can we just... can we just forget about this at least for tonight?” I asked, my tone pleading. I still wanted to go through with the plan I had thought up earlier that day, the one where I could freak about everything tomorrow and just relax and somehow make it a fun night.

Sounds of happy agreement echoed throughout the room, which only made me sigh in relief. If no one talked about it, it made it much easier for me not to about, either.

It looked like Dannii wanted to say something, but nonetheless she nodded and smiled in agreement. “So... movies?” I asked, pointing toward where I thought the kitchen—and the stairs leading to the basement—were. The guys and girls usually always claimed the upstairs living room (I don’t know why though, because the lounge is obviously so much cooler), so Dannii and I had made a habit of favouring the lounge so there wouldn’t be any bickering over who gets to crash where.

Dannii looked a whole lot more chipper at hearing that, and she nodded enthusiastically and patted her overnight bag. “I’ve got the shit, P. It’s gonna be awesome.”

“What ‘shit’ is that?” Matt asked, raising an eyebrow as he stared at her almost suspiciously. I rolled my eyes, but said nothing as I stared back at Dannii. I didn’t even know what she was talking about, and I wanted to know, too.

“This shit’ll really mess you up, man. You’ll be tripping for days!” A smirk erupted across her features then, and she acted as if she hadn’t even heard Matt at all.

Quickly, I realized what she was doing and held back a laugh, choosing to go along with it when I saw that Matt looked like he was about to have a stroke. “Awesome, well let’s get started then!” I said, hooking arms with her, about to skip off down to the lounge.

Matt was up before we even made through the threshold, his hand shooting out to grasp my shoulder as he pulled as back into the living room. He was breathing heavily, like he was hyperventilating, and I held back another snicker. I mean, yeah, I didn’t like him worrying about me as much as he did, but sometimes he just took it over the top.

“What,” Dannii began innocently, reaching into her bag. “You want some too?” She asked after she slowly pulled out what she’d been hiding. Matt’s face fell into a look of relief when he saw what she was holding, an energy drink. One of many, by the looks of it.

Finally, I cracked and broke down laughing, hiding my face but still not being able to tear my gaze away from Matt’s face. It was priceless. But then, he began to realize what we’d done and he glared at the both of us, crossing his arms. I took that as our chance to get away, my shoulders still heaving with laughter as I hauled Dannii out of the living room as quickly as possible.

We collapsed onto one of the sofas in the lounge, still chuckling slightly, but we got straight into picking out a movie. We already had all of our movies laid out on a coffee table—waiting to be picked. They were all scary, obviously, but most of them were gory, which I could easily handle.

“Let’s start off with something easy, like uh... Eight Legged Freaks? Or—” Dannii stopped short when we heard footsteps, or it sounded more like multiple people tumbling down the stairs.

Soon, Zacky and Brian made their appearance, both of them grinning as they glanced at the selection of movies that were still on the table. “You sure you can handle these movies, girls?” Zacky asked, his eyes twinkling with mischief.

“They are pretty scary...” Brian agreed, looking pointedly at movies like The Exorcist and The Ring.

“Psh, yeah right,” Dannii snorted, pumping her fist in the air. I had a feeling that she had already consumed a few Monsters beforehand. “Bring it on!”

While she was doing that, I sat there meekly on the sofa beside her. Maybe I had a slight problem with the movies Brian had seemed to be so interested in. I could take movies with mindless gore, but it was the ones that messed with your head that really got to me. How Brian knew that, I had no idea.

Obviously, because they were just mean like that (or they could smell fear, which I didn’t doubt at all), both Brian and Zacky noticed my hesitance to agree with Dannii. “What about you, Patey?” Brian asked, his smirk intensifying.

I instantly put on a tough face, refusing to let any emotion (or how undeniably nervous I was at the thought of watching those particular movies) show on my features. "Fuck yeah," I said, sticking my tongue out at them.

"You sure? I mean, Matt probably wouldn't want you watching stuff like that if it bothers you..." Zacky prodded, knowing that would bother me even more. He got the reaction he was looking for out of me, but only because I wanted them to leave us alone so we could watch the movie in peace.

"Alright, get upstairs you freaks!" I said, standing up and shooing them away until we could once again hear the laughing and tumbling up the stairs.

My breaths came out in short, shallow gasps as I clutched the edge of the leather sofa in vice grip. Dannii was oblivious to my obvious discomfort, her eyes glued to the TV screen. I hadn't begun my freak-out until when Brian had predicted I would. We weren't even twenty minutes into The Exorcist and yet there I was, ready to clamp my hands over my eyes and never take them away again. God, why did I have to be such a pansy when it came to those movies?

A small, tiny movement in my peripheral vision immediately caught my attention; it was as if something had moved one of the end tables on the other side of the sofa. The air filled with a tense, terrified thickness. That night when Andy had attacked me kept flashing through my mind, and I couldn't help but close my eyes and focus on slowing down my breathing.
Hands unexpectedly gripped my shoulders then, and I couldn't hold back the scream that erupted from my throat. Images of that night were the only thing I could see for a moment, and then laughing snapped me out of my daze.

I took the chance to look around and actually try and figure out what was going on. Brian was holding my shoulders, now in a much more relaxed grip as he couldn't contain his laughing. Zacky was in the same position with Dannii across from me, except they were both laughing.

Of course, I did not find that funny. I knew they meant nothing by it, but I had just relived things I didn't even like thinking about. The only word that could describe my thoughts then was irrational.

"You're fucking dead, Haner!" I seethed, whipping around to glare at him.

Both he and Zacky slowly looked at each other then, and Dannii halted her laughing. In a flash, they had both taken off, lightning fast as they pushed and shoved each other to get out of there first. Yet I remained where I was, fists clenched at my sides as my eyes remained closed. I had to calm down before I did something I would regret.

Moments later, I opened my eyes and turned back to Dannii, plastering on a smirk similar to the ones Zacky and Brian had been wearing. Dannii had paused the movie a split second after Brian and Zacky had scared us, and I did not like the thought of going back to watch it. "Revenge?" I asked simply, eagerly shifting my weight from foot to foot.

We bounded from the room and up the stairs as soon as I had uttered such a word, but we tried to remain quiet. Like them, we were aiming for a surprise attack. I squeaked when someone caught me around the waist, we were up in the kitchen by then, and talking and laughing echoed in from around the poolside. We were so close.

“What are you doing?” Jimmy asked, excitement in his tone. I guess he figured from the way we were sprinting up the stairs, either the basement was engulfed in flames or we were doing something fun.

The smirk still gracing my face, I looked up at him hesitantly. “We’re getting Dumb and Dumber back for scaring us.” Dannii shifted nervously beside me, and I could tell she was wondering whether or not telling Jimmy what we were trying to do was a good idea or not. After all, he could (as he had done a few times before) take their side.

Jimmy looked as if I had just told him that we’d won a trip to The Chocolate Factory. He began bouncing up and down with pure excitement. “I have the perfect plan.”

Just a few minutes later, Jimmy sat on a lawn chair, straight across from where Zacky and Brian were sitting next to each other. He’d already helped us out there on the deck to the point where all we had to do was walk a few steps and we’d be right next to them. Jimmy had them engrossed into a conversation regarding their upcoming album and how excited he was for it, and while he talked about that he inconspicuously flicked his wrist.

Dannii and I rolled our eyes and chuckled at his ‘sign’, but nonetheless we put our plan into action. It was simple, probably even more so than theirs was with just scaring us. We stepped out of the shadows of the overhang, quickly walking out so we were pretty much standing directly in front of them.

Thankfully, their chairs were situated so their backs were to the edge of the pool, making this almost too easy for us. They had stopped their talking then, and stared up at us warily, yet they didn’t move from their seat. We had ditched our plans of a surprise attack. In a split second, I had my foot up and hooked under Brian’s chair, laughing at the ‘oh shit’ look on his face. My hands went to his shoulders to push him back, knowing that I wouldn’t be strong enough to get him to fall back with just my foot.

They both went tumbling into the water almost at the same time, and I realized that Dannii had promptly followed my actions and done the same as I had but with Zacky. We leaned against each other as we laughed at the two drenched men who were still in the water, their beloved chairs then floating a few meters away from them.

The rest of the guys and girls—including Jimmy—had joined in with our laughing by then, and it only intensified when Zacky and Brian lazily pulled themselves out of the pool, their clothing weighed down with all the water.

“What,” I began, looking toward Brian as he patted his face with a towel. “You really didn’t think we were gonna let you get away with that, did you?”

Yes, that had been a good distraction from what would surely have been a major freak out on my part.