Of Our Souls

I sat in the front lounge of our bus at night as we travelled towards Salt Lake City. It was the first city of Warped and I was stoked beyond explanation. It showed, because I couldn’t sleep and my stomach was full of butterflies. The guys, on the other hand, were sleeping like babies. I could even hear Harold and Gabriel snore from where I was sitting and it brought a smile to my face. It would be best for me to learn from them to calm down and shut off my nervous thoughts, but I couldn’t do that.

‘I thought I’d find you here.’ I raised my eyes in surprise to look at Henry’s smiling face, as he sat down in front of me. My lips turned upwards and my thoughts stilled. For a moment I was calm.

‘Doesn’t surprise me…’ I answered slowly and ran my hand through my hair. Henry chuckled lightly and my eyebrows immediately shot up in question.

‘Nothing, Greta. Still can’t believe we’re going to play to kids in a few hours.’ His smile was contagious and I found the butterflies returning in my stomach. The fluttering feeling of nervousness made my fingers twitch with anticipation and sweat a bit.

‘Yeah…’ My voice was light and barely heard, but it wasn’t a problem. Henry had seen my lips move, because we kept our eyes on each other. My grayish green eyes met with dark brown and kept their contact in a silent conversation. No words were exchanged for a long time as we let our eyes do the talking.

‘Do you ever think about what could’ve happened if that accident had never occurred?’ I felt numb and hollow the second those words left his lips and I was positive that he noticed that. His eyes told me he was sorry for asking that, but I knew why he had asked that. We hadn’t talked about that accident in a long time…

‘We wouldn’t be here…’ I whispered lightly, the hurt evident in my voice and my eyes full of tears. Henry ran his hand down his face and leant closer to me. He clasped my hand that was laying on my lap in his and looked up at me with sad eyes.

‘We’re all here for you, you know that…’ I closed my eyes and exhaled loudly. Henry clutched my hand and I nodded my head to show him I was alright. It was hard to not think about what had happened.

‘Hey, Henry, can you tell me what happened with Paul before?’ I opened my eyes suddenly, changing the subject. Henry watched me for a few seconds, his eyes showing chaos in his mind. He wasn’t moving, his eyes fixed on my face.

‘You’re clever, Greta. You analyze people and see a lot of things about them. I’m sure you can figure it out.’ I rolled my eyes, annoyed. His words were confusing as hell and didn’t answer my question at all.

‘Please tell me. I’m worried.’ My eyes were supposed to show my concern, but Henry didn’t even flinch. He held his ground and watched me with his unwavering gaze. His dark eyes were full of emotions and I could’ve gotten lost in them, but I didn’t.

‘It’s not my place to tell.’ And he was gone. Just like that.

I watched the place where he had disappeared into the bunk area with wide eyes. His words rang in my head and my spirit was crushed for not finding out what was wrong with Paul. Something inside me flared and I stood up harshly from the little couch. My knuckles clenched painfully and I wanted to scream, but I decided against it. My nervousness was turning into anger and it wasn’t good. The only thing that I could do to calm myself down was to go to Paul and ask him what’s wrong. Before I could even comprehend what I was doing, I was already beside his bunk and pulling back the curtain. My eyes met Paul’s in the dark and my breath got caught in my throat. Every thought about asking him what’s wrong went out of my head and disappeared into thin air. The only thing I could do was gape at him like a goldfish.

Paul didn’t seem like he was mad. On the contrary, he seemed surprised and happy that I was standing in front of him looking like a retard. The silence was barely bearable and I felt a strange unseen force settle on my shoulders. It made it hard for me to breathe and I looked down at the ground after I had closed my mouth. My brows furrowed and my eyes closed tightly. I had forgotten what I wanted to say and it made me feel frustrated.

‘Greta..? Are you okay..?’ His voice was raspy and I felt him grab my hand. He squeezed it in reassurance and I looked at him slowly. I barely made out his features in the dark, but it made me feel better. His blue eyes probably would’ve thrown me off and I wouldn’t have said anything what I wanted to say.

‘I just wanted to ask you about what happened earlier…’ My voice was weak and came out in a defeated whisper. It made me want to punch myself in the face and run towards the darkest corner of the bus, but I didn’t. I remained standing in front of Paul’s bunk and waiting for his answer. It seemed forever before I heard him take a deep breath and start talking.

‘It’s nothing, Greta. I just over-reacted for nothing.’ His answer didn’t calm me down and I was eager to annoy him with my questions until I knew he was okay.

‘Let’s just sleep, okay? It’s going to be a long day.’ I felt him tug me towards his bunk and I frowned in the dark. Something told me that it wasn’t the time for me to know the reason behind his behavior and as much as I wanted to press him for answers, I knew that I couldn’t. Nothing good would come out of it.

‘Okay…’ I sounded defeated and it was the truth. Also, I was tired. Both mentally and physically, so I just curled up beside Paul in his bunk and let him wrap his arms around me. It wasn’t unusual for us to sleep together, because I had nightmares most of the nights and having one of the guys share a bed with me, helped me get a few hours of rest. It also helped when I was nervous and couldn’t sleep because of my thoughts.

‘Goodnight, Midget.’ I heard Paul mutter before he pressed his lips to my forehead. My body relaxed and suddenly I felt drained. I couldn’t move and my mind completely went blank. The last few seconds of my consciousness reminded me of my meeting with Austin and I fell asleep with a smile on my face.