Breathing Has Got Too Hard

I stood in front of the full length mirror in my room, straightening out my Skid Row vest, checking that I didn’t look like a complete prick…

I checked my watch - 11am. An hour before I was meeting Danny in Leeds town centre. And the earliest I’d been awake in about 2 years. Oh the things I will do for friendship shock me.

I grabbed my dark green messenger bag, covered in badges and writing from my old friends from the back of my door and trailed downstairs, putting my iPod and phone in my bag.

Walking into the kitchen, the cold from the tiled floor seeped through my socks to my feet, I grabbed a glass of water from the counter Mum had left before she went to work, and downing it in one, my lip ring chinking with the glass. While drinking, I read the note Mum had left on the fridge, kept up by the usual chipped Dubai magnet.

Ben

I hope you have fun meeting your friend today. Tell me all about it tonight. I’ve left you a £20 note on top of the fridge to get some dinner. I’ll be home by 6

Love you, Mum

I felt on top of the fridge for the £20 note, finding it and shoving it in my skinny jeans pocket. As I did, I felt another slip of paper brush on my fingers, and I pulled it out, curious.

Therapist, 07233449221

I stared at it a while, remembering the nurse, the overdose, the pizza. My Mum’s hurt. I sighed, smirked to myself and scrunched the number up. I didn’t think I’d be needing that anytime soon. Those fucking therapists never understood anyways.

*

I stood in the huge lobby of Leeds train station, surrounded by people rushing for their trains without a care in the world other than themselves. I stood and looked at the surrounding shops, Wh Smiths, Body Shop, Burger King…

“What’s up stranger?”

I turned around to see who I was seriously hoping was Danny, otherwise it’d be some random stranger. My eyes met a boy a few inches taller than me, wearing a purple Drop Dead t-shirt, skinny jeans and black pumps with no socks. His dark hair was straightened to perfection, framing his slightly chubby baby face. I smiled, taking his hand and giving him a man hug. You know, the hug where you pat his back quite forcefully rather than share a loving embrace.

“Alright?” I said, pulling him toward me, whilst clutching his hand and squashing them between us as we hugged.

“Yeah, I’m good you?” I heard him say behind my head, as he released my hand and pulled back,

I nodded, smiling, and he smiled back, assessing my features.

“I love your shirt!” He cried, taking a step toward me and pulling my vest out to see the design on it. “Was this a t-shirt before, or?”

“Yeah, I slashed the neck and cut the arms off. I’ll only wear t-shirts if they’re tight, I hate baggy ones. But I prefer baggy vests to tight vests,” I explained, looking down at my shirt.

“Well, you learn something new everyday,” He said, letting go of it and letting it fall again. “Where you wanna go? Yates for a drink?”

“Starting early with the drinking, are we not?” I laughed, adjusting my bag around my shoulders.

“Ben, I live by one life philosophy, and one life philosophy only.” He smiled, placing a hand on my shoulder. “It’s never too early to start drinking. That‘s lesson one in getting to know me better already completed,”

I laughed, starting to walk backward, intending Danny to follow and for us to start walking. “Alright, let’s not waste any time then, shall we?”

“You’re my new best friend, Ben Bruce,” Danny smiled, falling into step with me as we walked out into the busy city centre of Leeds.

*

Yates in Leeds was quite a nice bar, I thought. The huge chandelier hung just above the bar, overhanging green wallpapered walls and flat screen televisions on nearly every wall and in every corner. There was a big winding iron staircase to the right of the door, taking you up to another lounge. The bar lay directly facing the huge double doors, lined with black leather bar stools. The back of the bar was mirrored and covered in various bottles of liquor and wine, the light from the chandelier bouncing off every mirrored surface, and every corner of every bottle. It was brighter in here than it was outside to some extent.

“I wouldn’t think this would be the sort of place you’d pick to drink?” I enquired, as we approached the bar and I rooted in my bag for my ID.

“Yeah, everyone says that. It’s a nice place but truth is I only come here ‘cos it sells alcohol ‘round the clock. Oh and it does some fucking great food.” Danny flashed his off-white perfectly straight teeth at me turning his attention to the barman. “JD and coke please mate,”

“Anything else?” He asked, looking at me.

“Err yeah, bottle of Carlsberg please,” I mumbled, startled that he’d turned to me. I kicked myself internally for being so socially awkward.

"£3.50 please,” The barman put our drinks down and held out his hand, and we both put our money in it, taking a sip of our cold drinks.

It had been a while since I’d drank anything alcoholic, never mind Carlsberg. I smiled as the cool, fizzy drink slid down my throat, quenching my thirst immediately. I followed Danny to a table in the corner, with black leather seats, licking my lips in delight.

“Oh what would I do without JD? Danny sighed, looking lovingly at his glass he’d just set down on the table.

“You’d probably be in a better place you are now?” I suggested, as I watched him down the whole glass in a good few gulps. He slammed the glass down, sighing, and nodded.

“Yeah, that’s funny isn’t it?” He looked into my eyes, still clutching the glass, dotted in condensation. “I would still be living at home in York, and I would still have my bike. Oh, and all my friends. And I would never have broken my nose, and I would never have got a criminal record for indecent exposure. Yeah, I would probably be doing something constructive with my life,”

I sat, not really knowing what to say. I looked down at the table, not really knowing whether I should laugh or not.

“Well if we’re talking about ‘what if’s then if my Dad had never died, I would never have got clinical depression. And Brendon would probably never have hated me, and I would still have friends. I would have a social life and I’d probably be at a music college right now instead of being terrified to wake up everyday and step out of my own home,”

I shocked myself. I hadn’t revealed so much about myself to someone in the past 2 years more than I just had this second. I looked back up at Danny, who was looking deep into my eyes.

“We’ve both had it pretty shit haven’t we?” He said quietly. I just nodded, staring back into his icy blue eyes, shining at me in the chandelier’s light.

“I think it’s time for another drink,” Danny announced, getting up from the table and sliding out from the sofa. “You want another?”

“I haven’t drunk this yet!” I exclaimed, shaking my bottle at him and taking another, large swig. He just looked from me to the bottle, and said:

“Two JD and cokes it is then,”

*

Six JD and cokes, three Carlsbergs, and a shot of Jagermeister each later. I was red in the face from laughing.

“I’m being serious, man! I ended up in the middle of fucking Coventry, no idea how I got there, with nothing but a packet of M&Ms, an empty bottle of JD and this very pair of jeans to my name! Fucking crazy week that was, dude. Crazy.” Danny shook his head, smiling, with the memories swimming around in his eyes as he took the first drink of his Jagerbomb.

“I don’t think I wanna know how you got out of that one, mate.” I giggled, scratching my head. My face hurt from laughing, not just my cheeks, my whole face. I couldn’t remember the last time I laughed so hard.

It was now 5pm, and was pretty much dark outside. We’d shared a large bowl of messy nachos covered in cheese, salsa, and guacamole, but that’s all we’d had to eat all day, that’s all that lined our stomachs, protecting us from getting drunk. It wasn’t a very good barrier, I was seeing stars, and Danny was slurring his words. For an alcoholic, he couldn’t hold his drink all that well.

“No, you don’t. It involved various, shameful sexual activities though,” He made a face, wide eyed, yet he wasn’t serious. He stood up from the table, taking my empty glass from me.

“Jagerbomb?” He asked, shaking the glass in my face as I was still giggling to myself. I took a deep breath and nodded.

“Please,” I said, shoving my last £5 note into his hand.

Danny sauntered off to the bar, and I leant my head on my hand, looking up at the flat screen TV above me. Head spinning. Some random trance music video was on, but I couldn’t work out what it was. I was quite happily watching it, until I felt a tap on my shoulder.

I turned around to face the one person’s face I did not want to see for the rest of my life.

Brendon.

My jaw dropped, as I stared up at him. Oh no. Please no.

“Well if it isn’t Ben Bruce. In a bar on his own,” His deep voice boomed over the music. His words were slow and slurred, I figured he’d been drinking, too.

“I’m not on my fucking own, Brendon. Fuck off,” I frowned, surprising myself with my sudden courage. The drink talking.

He looked taken aback, I’d surprised him too. I don’t think I ever properly stood up to him.

“You trying to start a fight with me, Bruce?” he spat, pulling me up by my vest up from my seat. I sucked in a pocket of air, bracing myself, but not afraid.

“I should have started a fight with you a long fucking time ago, you manipulative cock sucking prick,” I managed to spit out, breath still sucked in. Brandon’s eyes widened, and released one of his hands from my vest, pulling it back ready to swing for me…

“OI!” I heard someone shout from across the room, and Brandon dropped me all of a sudden, the anger bubbling inside my stomach along side the massive amounts of alcohol. I looked over at the bar and saw Danny storm over, a deathly look on his face. He squared up to Brandon, his icy blue eyes burning into Brandon’s green ones. “What the fuck do you think you’re doing, starting on my mate?”

“Who the fuck’s this? Your boyfriend?” Brandon hissed, towering over Danny. I clenched my fists, feeling the heat of the anger bubbling inside me, coarsing through my veins.

“And give me one good reason why me, or Ben, should answer to you?” Danny growled, taking a step back to stand by me.

Brendon looked us both down, and sneered. “Both you skinny fuckers will be answering to my fists in a second,” he cracked his knuckles and charged toward me, and it all happened so fast. My head spun, the anger burned, and I just swung my fists. Hitting flesh. I felt teeth bite into one of my fists. But I carried on punching. I saw Danny charge in beside me, taking a swing with huge amounts of momentum to hit Brendon, and he was knocked to the floor. I stumbled back against the chair, focusing on Brendon who was now sat on the ground, staring up at us both.

“RIGHT, BREAK THIS UP, RIGHT NOW!”

A voice bellowed over the music, and the barman came running over, just as Brendon began to get up and go for Danny’s ankles. Danny skipped back, grabbing and pulling my shoulder back with him. The barman pushed Brendon back, preventing him from getting us.

“I want all of you out right now.” The barman looked us all up and down, still one hand holding Brendon down. "You stay here for now," He said to Brendon.

I breathed in, taking my bag from my chair and walking out, not taking my eyes off Brendon. Danny followed, glaring daggers at him also.

We got outside, the cold October air hitting our faces, hitting some sober right into me. I sighed, and started walking toward the train station at a reasonably fast pace. I felt so angry, my fists still burned and my head throbbed. Why did he have to come ruin a fantastic day?

“Ben, wait!” I heard Danny call a few meters behind me. I stopped, turning to see him running toward me. “What the fuck was that about? Did you know him?“ he asked, as he got to me. I sighed, covering my face with my hands, realising my cheek felt a little sore.

“Yeah. Remember I mentioned Brendon earlier?” Danny nodded. “That was him.”

“I see.” Danny simply said, and I stared into his eyes. Danny looked back at me a while, searching me. Tears began to well up in my pools of grey I called eyes, and I ran my fingers through my hair. Clenching a clump of the caramel coloured straw on my head, frustrated.

“He just always has to ruin everything!” I cried out, a lot louder than I intended.

“He’s the one who lost you all your friends right?” Danny slurred softly. I just nodded, as a tear accidentally escaped my pools of grey. Danny just placed his arms around me and squeezed. No man hugs. Just a caring embrace.

"That's lesson one in getting to know me," I sobbed into Danny's shoulder, burying my head.