Take My Hand

We arrived at Rian’s after a few turns and we both parked along the driveway which had two other cars lined along the side. I guess Alex and Jack were here already.

I got out of the car and locked it as I placed my keys inside my pocket. Zack gave me a small smile before walking in without knocking. I guess the guys were all used to barging into each other’s houses since they all know each other pretty well to trust one another.

We both walked into the living room just to see Jack and Alex concentrated on a game of COD: Modern Warfare 2. They didn’t even notice Zack and I come in to the house. They were probably on the verge of killing each other or their enemies. I wouldn’t really know. I smiled at what I saw before greeting Rian who was in the kitchen looking for something to eat.

He perked up as soon as he heard our footsteps on the ground. “Hey Brittany!” he said with a happy smile on his face. I replied to him with the same kind of smile.

The house was suddenly silent and I turned to see that Jack had paused the game to look at me. He smiled sheepishly as I waved. He was in a better mood now and that was good.

“So this is what you call band practice?” I asked as I sat on the stool beside the island.

“Well usually when we say ‘band practice’, we just mean hang out and do shit like this,” Zack said taking the stool beside me as Rian laughed before turning back to continue his search.

“You guys want anything to eat?” Rian asked a pint of Ben & Jerry’s ice cream from his freezer.

“Nah, we just went to Starbucks,” I said checking my phone again. Stephen sent me another message. Could he really get anymore annoying?

“You two?” he asked startled. I looked up to him and saw that he had a look of disbelief plastered on his face.

“No, no, it’s nothing like that,” I laughed and he exhaled in relief. I looked at Zack who was now facing the other way, intrigued by the situation Alex and Jack were in the game.

Rian grabbed a spoon from a drawer and led us all out to the living room. I sat on the sofa chair that was right beside the long sofa in the middle of the room. I was too busy texting my brother who asked me if I needed anything to realize that the game was over and Zack took Jack’s place.

I sent the message that I composed and looked up to see that Jack was in the kitchen. I got up and walked up to him. We needed to talk.

“Hey,” I said leaning on the counter. He was just staring out the window probably wondering why I was here.

“Oh, hey,” he said turning around with a smile. I knew he was keeping things. I can see it clearly. He was just putting on a show for the guys in the next room.

“Um, I think we need to talk,” I whispered not really wanting the rest of the people to hear.

“Sure,” he said leading us both out to the backyard porch. We both sat on the swing and looked out into the distance before us.

“So what’d you want to talk about?” he asked breaking the silence with the same kind of synthetic tone.

“Jack, I’m really sorry that I asked you something really personal back at your house. I really shouldn’t have asked you something like that. That was so stupid of me,” I blurted out not able to keep it all in.

“Hey, don’t worry about it, okay?” he said turning his head to look at me. I looked back at him and saw that he actually meant it.

We were just silent for a while but the guilt inside me just wouldn’t simmer down. I had too much information on Jack and he needed to know what I knew. I really don’t know how he’ll take it but I guess I really don’t have any other choice.

“Look, I know about everything,” I said looking down at my plaid Chucks. I didn’t want to meet his eyes. I didn’t want to see exactly how he’d react to this. It might be too much for me to take.

“What do you mean?” he chuckled lightly. Maybe he thought I was talking nonsense.

I looked up to see the view that Rian had from the backyard before answering him. “I mean I asked someone about your ex,” I said biting my lips. That came out too abruptly.

“W-what?” he asked in shock. “Who did you ask?”

“Jack, it doesn’t matter who I asked-”

“Why would you do something like that?” he interrupted as he got up in frustration.

“What do you mean exactly?” I asked now confused.

“Well, I was bound to tell you about what happened but then you just go behind my back thinking that it’s okay to just ask people about what happened to me in the past? What would you do if I did the exact same thing to you?” he snapped. I should’ve seen this coming but I didn’t.

I didn’t really know how to answer this one so I just kept silent as I tried to keep the tears from falling. “I’m sorry, Jack,” I mumbled as he shook his head towards me.

“I can’t believe this,” he said turning his back to me and leaning against the porch railings.

“Look, Jack it wasn’t like I was looking for some kind of gossip. I care about you. That’s why I wanted to know. I know that I should’ve waited but you should really know that I’m not the kind of person who waits. I’m a very impatient person.” I tried to explain.

He spun around so that he was looking at me and just glared. “How is that my problem?” he asked crossing his arms over his chest.

“I wasn’t saying it was,” I said in a sigh. “I was just trying to explain why I wanted to know,”

“What exactly do you know?” he tested me as he placed his hands on the railings, leaning back.

“Oh, um,” I thought for a moment. Where was I supposed to start? “Well, I know that she was some girl who wasn’t satisfied with anything you did for her,” I said looking to the side as I spoke.

“Great, you talked to Zack,” he said in deep exasperation as I looked up at him.

“H-how did you know that?” I stuttered.

“Because he was the only one who really knew everything,” he said breathing out heavily.

“Don’t blame him, though,” I said getting up in caution. “I begged him to tell me. It’s not his fault,”

He groaned not really knowing what to say about that. “Then what the hell am I supposed to do now? Just let this all slip by me and pretend that nothing happened?” he asked aggressively.

“No,” I mumbled under my breath. “But tell me, Jack, why exactly do you feel this way towards the whole subject?” I asked and he looked at me as if I just said the craziest thing in the world. Shit, maybe I did.

“Why do I feel this way? I’ll tell you why I feel this way. I feel this way because what she did to me practically burned a whole in my chest. She ruined me and I couldn’t handle it and I just wanted to get away from everything that reminded me of her and I just didn’t want to remember everything she did to me. I moved next door to you to get away. I know that maybe one day she’ll find me and everything we’ve been through will flash right across my head repeating each and every scene that she made with me but right now, I didn’t want any of that to happen but guess what it just did thanks to you and your nosiness. So if you were trying to rip me apart to get me all fucking emotional like this then I guess you completed your mission.”

I was stunned. After I heard each and every word that came out of his mouth right now, I couldn’t help but release all the tears that I was barely keeping inside.

He rolled his eyes at me and mumbled something like “The waterworks won’t work on me, honey,” before walking back into the room. I just sat back down as I tried to keep myself conscious as I cried silently. I didn’t want to have to make another dramatic scene. I mean I think it was enough for today.

I breathed out heavily as I kept myself calm as I got up from the porch swing. But just as I got up, the back door opened and revealed Alex.

“Whoa, don’t worry, I’m not drunk,” he said trying to tell me that he was safe to talk to.

“Um, I kinda knew that,” I said through all the tears that just kept falling. I wiped some out of my face as Alex sat us both back down on the porch swing.

“Look, Jack is in a really emotional state right now and he’s really not himself. I’ve known him for so long but I’ve never seen him like this.” He said looking at me. I turned my head to look at him and I saw that he really wasn’t joking. “In time, he’ll heal. Don’t worry,” he said placing and arm around me trying to comfort me.

“I’m so stupid,” I said totally changing the topic.

“Hey, don’t say that,” he said as he rubbed his hand up and down my arm comfortingly.

“But, it’s true,” I said getting up from my comfortable stance as I turned to face him. “I should’ve just waited for him to tell me everything. Maybe if I did, he wouldn’t be furious at me.”

“But you wouldn’t know the real Jack if you didn’t know about the whole situation he’s in,” Alex said making a point. “Tell me, what do you guys do over at his place?”

“Well we haven’t really done much since we’ve only met two days ago but when he arrived in the house next door to mine, I helped him out with his stuff and he seemed a little out of it. I mean maybe he made fun of me for trying to help him out but his eyes seemed tired and it looked like he had been crying or something,” I said and Alex nodded as he waited for me to continue. “Then I left him since everything seemed kinda awkward. I went to the park for awhile and then went back to the house but when I arrived, my mother told me that he was looking for me so after dinner, I went over to his house and asked him why he wanted to see me,”

“What did he want?” Alex asked shifting his position so both his elbows were leaning on his thighs that were spread out widely. He clasped his hands together as he looked on the floor.

“Well, he wanted to watch movies with me because he said he felt sorta lonely,” I said and he smirked.

“You see, when Jack meets someone new, he usually jumps on them like a wild dog. With his odd behaviour, sometimes he scares the shit out of people but some people who seem fine with his behaviour maintain some kind of friendship. The way you described him just now was really not the kind of Jack that I expected.” I laughed at his description of the Jack that I was bound to get to know if this all turned out okay in the end.

“Well, with the way things seem right now, I might not be able to get to know the real him,” I said pessimistically.

“Oh come on, this is a mere bump in the road, Brit. You guys’ll get through it,” he said keeping my hopes up.

“It’s not like we’re in a relationship,” I said looking at him as he rolled his eyes.

“But you guys are friends,” Alex said as he got up and stretched his limbs. “Trust me, just give him some time and he’ll be the same odd kid again.” He said and I chuckled quietly as he made his way back inside.

Truthfully, I had no right to be here so once Alex was inside, I walked down the porch steps and made my way around the house without the guys noticing. I didn’t want to face Jack and make his day even worse so I just got into my car and turned on the ignition.

I turned on the radio and started to drive back home. Luckily I paid attention to the roads and everything or I’d be totally lost right now.

As I drove around, I thought about how long Jack might take until he’d get through this ‘mere bump in the road’ as Alex called it. Now I know that I shouldn’t really be rushing into anything here but as I said, I’m a very impatient person.

I really should try to learn to be more patient. I mean if I don’t, situations like this might pop up everywhere as I grow older. I wish there was some kind of class for this but deep inside, I kinda knew that even if I’d take the class, I’d probably still doze off and not learn anything from it.

Once I arrived back at my house, I parked the car in the garage and got inside the house. It seemed so lonely now so I decided to get my camera and walk to the park.

The weather and the lighting seemed kinda perfect for a little photo shoot. But the main problem was I didn’t know what to take pictures of. So I just kinda sat on the bench where I’ve grown familiar with since ever since I was a kid, I used to just sit here whenever I was sad or whenever I wanted to get away. But as I grew older, I became really interested in photography and so my dad kinda enrolled me in some summer classes over the past few summers and since then, I went to the park with a camera in my hand taking pictures of things that seemed really insignificant to some people. I didn’t know why I liked to take pictures of the simplest things but somehow, if you really stopped to think about it, maybe they weren’t all so worthless and maybe there was some underlying statement there just waiting to be found out.

“Hey, I knew I’d find you here,” a guy with a familiar voice said waking me up from the thoughts in my head. I looked up to see if it really was who I thought it’d be. Panic coursed through my veins as I saw his face. From that moment on I knew this day couldn’t get any better. So much for trying to get away from everything that I thought I’d never have to face again.