Julius

Julius Castle is dead? Shit, nobody told me.

Can I guess what it was? Drug overdose? Was I right? You don’t know?

Well, Julius destroyed me. When we were together, it was like living your worst nightmare, whatever it is. Drowning, or heights, or being a buried alive; that’s what it was like.

I knew him only six days. The first day, I had just gotten in this fight with some speed freak skank. Julius found me outside, bruised and pissed, and he just looked at me, smiling. I told him to fuck off.

The second day, it was after a show, and I was drunk when he found me but he was sober, crushing me against the side mirror of his car, and it wasn’t until the morning I recognized him from the first day. We watched the sun go up, and he let me braid his hair.

I wondered if he’d ever want to see me again.

The third day was when Julius began saying shit like “I’m trouble” and “Stay away.” I didn’t listen though; I figured he’d just heard those lines from a movie. But his face was dead serious, and I just laughed, calling him a “faggot.”

It was the fourth day when I woke up to the sound of him throwing up in his sleep beside me, needles on the bedside table. I turned him on his side, rubbing his back until he went quiet.

And Julius said, “It’s just a little bit.”

And I kept asking myself, “Would he be here tomorrow?”

“Will he even stay for just tonight?

The fifth day he promised he’d quit. You already know he lied; don’t make me say it.

On the sixth day, I woke up in the middle of the night and he was pissed. I didn’t want to know why; I just pretended to go back to sleep.

I didn’t even know him for a week.

I closed my eyes thinking, “Will he be here tomorrow?”

But he was gone the next morning.