Corrupt Me

I woke up on Saturday morning after the party with a killer headache and a churning stomach. It took me a few moments of stillness after I awoke to recall everything that had happened the night before, and when I did, I couldn't stop the smile that spread itself across my face. Well, that was until I attempted to sit up in bed, making my stomach lurch and everything that I had consumed the night before came rushing up into my mouth. I frantically covered my mouth with my hand and bolted to the bathroom, praying that there was nobody in there. Thankfully my prayers were answered and I found the bathroom empty. I quickly made my way to the toilet and spent probably fifteen or so minutes emptying my guts into it. I groaned quietly as I leaned back against the walls of the built-in bathtub, letting my cheek rest against the cool tiles, having finally finished evacuating my stomach contents. My mouth felt dry and tasted disgusting but I couldn’t will myself to get up and wash my mouth out with water. I’m not sure how long I stayed in my position on the floor between the bath and the toilet but it was long enough that I was about to drift off to sleep again, when someone knocked on the door.

“Yeah?” I called out with a scratchy voice.
“Micah? Is that you?” my mother’s voice replied. “What’s wrong?”

I scrambled to my feet and flushed the toilet. The loudness of the flush hurt my head but I tried to block it out as I looked around where I was sitting for any evidence of vomit. Being none, I moved over to the mirror to take a good look at myself for the first time that morning. My eyes were bloodshot, my hair was a mess and my skin was horribly clammy. I looked terrible, to be completely honest. I splashed some water on my face and that helped with the clamminess a little bit.

“Micah?” my mom called again. I’d forgotten to reply to her the first time.
“I’m…okay, Mom. I’ll be out in a sec.” I splashed my face again and then dried it off with my towel before I moved to unlock the door and face my mother. Her eyes widened when she saw my face and I hoped to God that she didn’t realise why I looked so sick.

“Micah! My goodness, what’s wrong with you?” she cried, placing a hand on my forehead to test my temperature.
“Mom, nothing, I’m fine. Just…ate something bad, I don’t know,” I mumbled as I dodged away from and avoided looking at her.

“Mi – ” she began again, but I blocked her out and went out into the kitchen. There, I saw Elise, Georgia and Sara sitting at the table, a bowl of cereal in front of Sara and toast in front of the other two. They all looked up from their food when I entered the kitchen. Immediately, Elise’s facial expression changed into a smirk and I sent her a glare, warning her not to say anything as I went to pull out two slices of white bread and busied myself by putting them in the toaster.

“Are you okay, Micah?” Elise asked in my ear with mock concern. She had stood up from the table and come over to me while I was preparing my breakfast.
“Fine, thanks,” I muttered. I turned away from her to get the butter out of the fridge, hoping that she would drop the subject, but no such luck.
“Really? Cause it looks like you’re pretty hung over to me,” she whispered, having followed me over to the fridge and then back over to the counter where the toaster was sitting.
“Leave me alone, Elle,” I snapped quietly as my toast popped up suddenly, startling me.

Elise just laughed, whether it was from me being scared or me being hung over, I don’t know. I shot her a dirty look again as I set about buttering my toast. Normally I would have added copious amounts of peanut butter, but I didn’t think I would be able to stomach it, so once I was done buttering, I took a big bite out of my toast and wandered over to the table to sit down. As I did so, Georgia poured me a glass of orange juice and pushed a package of painkillers over to me. I glanced up at my middle sister gratefully and put down my toast to break out two small pills from the pack. I swallowed them down quickly with my orange juice and began eating once again. It was silent for a few minutes while I ate. Elise and Georgia were occupying themselves by staring at me and Sara was falling asleep into her bowl of cereal.

Once I finished my toast and Sara had left the table mumbling about going back to bed, I looked up from my plate, hoping that my two eldest sisters had stopped treating me like I was an exhibit in a museum. However, I was met with the same four eyes I was trying to avoid. I rolled my own eyes as I got up from the breakfast table.

“Will you two quit it?” I whined at my sisters.
“We're concerned, MJ. This isn't like you,” Georgia said gently. “I feel like I don't really know my little brother anymore. You've changed since starting at – ”

“Just stop, okay!” I cut her off. I was so not in the mood for a lecture. “I'm fine. I don't need everyone treating me like I’m some anomaly that belongs under a microscope. I'm a teenager, for crying out loud! And besides, wasn't the point of me going to Hillcrest so that I could meet new people? Because I have, and they may not be the kind of people that the church would approve of, but I'm happy. I'm having fun trying new things and I'm actually enjoying my life for once. So, just…just leave me alone,” I finished lamely.

My sisters’ expressions were ones of slight shock. I'd never really spoken to them like that before. My relationship with them had always been fairly open and friendly so it must have been pretty strange for them for me to talk to them like I did. Georgia opened and closed her mouth a few times before working out what she wanted to say.

“Mics, I…okay, I'm sorry I jumped down your throat a bit last night, but you have to admit that it would have been a shock for me to see you like that. And now this morning, you look…you look…”
“Like shit,” Elise supplied. Georgia narrowed her eyes at Elise for swearing, but nodded once to agree with my oldest sister’s assessment.
“Yes, what she said. I'm worried about you, that's all. But I won't mention it again if you don't want me to. As long as you're happy and safe, I guess.”
I nodded quietly and put my dirty plate and glass in the sink.

“You really do look terrible though,” Elise piped up cheerfully.
“Thanks,” I replied sarcastically.
“Anytime.”

I rolled my eyes and left my sisters alone in the kitchen. I knew that they were right, though. I did look like shit. I felt like shit, too. How the hell does Angel get drunk so often? How does he survive the throbbing headaches the morning after? There's no way I would be able to handle that all the time. What I really wanted to do was just go back to bed and sleep the day away, but with the knowledge of how terrible I looked, I decided to take a nice, hot shower instead, and maybe that would make me feel better.

I ended up sitting on the floor of the shower while the hot water pelted down on me for over half an hour. I was feeling pretty sorry for myself, I'll be honest. And doubts about what had happened the night before were starting to creep in. I couldn't help but think that we had only been together for a little over a week, but we were already doing things together that couples who have been together for months might not have done yet. I mean, sure, I guess what we had going on had been building for a while but the nasty thought that maybe it was all a bit too soon kept making itself known in my mind. I'm not sure that if I had been sober, I would have been ready to move that quickly. I'm not saying I regret what happened and I definitely wanted it to happen, but I think that maybe the alcohol had a lot to do with it.

And as much as I didn’t want them to, worries about what my friends and family would think if they found out what had happened last night kept pushing themselves into the front of my mind. I kept picturing each person in my head and imagining what they would say or do if I told them “Hey, I’m in a relationship with a boy and last night we got drunk and fooled around.” Most of them didn’t take too kindly to that in my imagination, least of all my mother. I could picture her screaming at me that it was wrong and disgusting and to stop seeing Angel immediately. It made me pretty upset, to be honest. There is absolutely no way I will ever tell her that I’m with him. Although I was only imagining her reaction, I know that it would be pretty close to reality, her being as close-minded as she is. I thought back to one time her close-mindedness stood out the most to me. At my old school, word somehow got around to the parents that a boy in the grade above me was gay. I didn’t even really know the guy except by facial recognition and my mother didn’t know him either, but that didn’t stop her from ranting about how wrong he was and telling me not to go near him. I remember even back then thinking about how unfair she was being; not because I suddenly wanted to start being friends with him or anything, but because she was judging him without knowing a single thing about him, including whether or not he actually was gay or if it was just a nasty rumour.

I knew she would be ten times worse if she ever found out about me and Angel. So I’m going to do the best that I can to make sure she doesn’t find out about us.

Once the water in the shower started running cold, I decided that it was time to face the day. Slowly and carefully I stood myself up so I wouldn’t slip over, and turned the taps off. Stepping out of the shower recess, I grabbed my towel off the rack and dried myself. Looking to where I usually kept my change of clothes, I realised that I had forgotten to bring some in with me, so I wrapped my towel around my waist tightly, and left the bathroom. I’m not one of those people who are comfortable walking around in just a towel (or nothing) after a shower, so I immediately began looking for something to wear as soon as I entered my bedroom. Once I found a comfy outfit for the day, I slipped it on and sat down on my bed, letting my head drop onto my knees for a moment or two before I looked up again. I glanced towards my phone, which was sitting on my bedside table. The little LED light that tells me when I have a notification was blinking with a white light, telling me that I had an unread text message. Figuring it was probably from Angel, I immediately picked up my phone and unlocked it. It turned out that I actually had three messages; all from him.

I realised I must have missed the blinking of the notification when I first woke up, because there were two messages that were sent a while before I woke up.

Angel: (7:57am) Hey baby, how are you doing? Hope your head isn’t too sore. I had a really great time last night ;) call me when you wake up. Love you x

Angel: (9:23am) Babe, you okay? Call me, please x

The last text was sent while I was in the shower, about 15 minutes before I checked my messages. It sounded pretty worried.

Angel: (11:19am) Micah, please talk tome. Did I do something wrong? We can talk about this. Please call me

I replied to the third message immediately, knowing that Angel was probably going out of his mind by then.

Micah: hey im ok. Just woke up late n was pretty sick. Had a shower n feel bit better now tho. Sorry I worried u. I had fun last night too xo

His reply came less than two minutes later.

Angel: God you scared the shit out of me. Thought you’d freaked out or something. You were sick? :( I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have let you drink that much. Glad you had fun. We should do it again sometime ;)

I couldn’t stop the smirk from appearing on my face after reading the last line of his text. As much as I was worrying earlier, I really did enjoy what we had done the night before, and, as I replied to Angel, I would be willing for it to happen again. My curiosity about all of this stuff has definitely been piqued by now and I really want to see how it goes, because so far, it feels pretty special.

Angel and I spent the rest of the afternoon and evening texting back and forth, our messages getting flirtier and more sexual as the time went on. Most of the responsibility for that was on Angel, but I wasn’t complaining. I enjoyed myself, eagerly awaiting the next text that would either make me blush, laugh or screw my nose up when he went a little too far with his descriptions.

Either way, when I went to bed that night, I felt much better about everything that I was stressing about earlier. Angel is just so casual about everything that happened and it made me realise that I should adopt some of his carefree attitude about our relationship. I like him, he likes me. Simple as that, right? Well… I’d try and keep that mantra in mind, anyway.