‹ Prequel: Rooftop Musings
Sequel: Set Sail
Status: finished | 5th sept, 2015

Where the Wind Takes Us

love ***ing sucks

Love sucks.

I pause, chewing the lid of my pen in my mouth as I struggle to form a sentence. Many words are coming to mind but nothing stands out to me, and with a sigh I stare at the page in my diary, the words Love sucks written in a squiggly font across the top.

There’s not really much else to say to that fact. The whole falling in love and finding your other half is bullshit, complete crap that some idiot ‘in love’ probably said at one point and thought it was true. I thought I’d found my other half, but it turns out he isn’t interested in me like I am in him. But it’s not just a mere interest, though. It’s love, and I know I love him because I just know. I can’t describe it, but I know that every bone in my body aches for his, wishes for his arms to be around me and holding me and telling me he loves me ever so deeply. I want him to take me out for coffee and we sit in the park, his hands interlaced through mine as we talk for hours, about nothing and everything. I want to go on long walks with him, singing along to stupid songs and ending up at deserted places where our hands run over each other’s bodies and explore every inch of it with our lips. I want this, I yearn for this but the reality is that the guy I want is my best friend, and no matter how I much I want to have him, I can’t have him.

Love really sucks.

There. I feel a bit better now.

♡♡♡

The fridge is empty. How can the fridge be empty? It’s been twenty minutes since I last checked and last time I checked there was a container of fresh blueberries with my name on it. I’m not one for eating unhealthily, except for our once a month Friday pizza nights at Colton’s. We order about four pizzas between the five of us – me, Mick, Colton, James and Georgia – and Mick buys the beers because his sister works at a liquor store and can get it for a cheaper price. I think it’s illegal or something to give out free beers, or maybe it isn’t, but Colton and I are the only ones who are underage and not supposed to be drinking. But we do it anyways, because no one really cares.

With a sigh, I slowly trudge my way back upstairs, but not before I see the container – my container – in the living room, sitting on the stool next to the couch. Dad’s fast asleep on the couch, no surprise there considering he and my mum don’t sleep in the same room anymore. I think they’re on the verge of getting a divorce, at least, I hope they are. All they do is argue and bitch about each other behind their backs and whenever I mention what the other parent has said, another argument erupts. I know the only reason why they’re not getting a divorce is because I’m underage and they don’t want to deal with the whole custody thing, but I’ll be eighteen in less than a month anyways and I plan to leave after exams, though they don’t know that yet. But when they do, they can do whatever the fuck they want because it won’t concern me.

It’s no surprise that Dad is out like a log, so there’s no sneaking around to be done to take the blueberries away from him. But I decide to be stealth anyways, creeping around on my tippy-toes and swiftly taking the container, holding it to my chest as I make a mad dash for the stairs and close the door to my room quietly, so quietly that I’m not even sure if I heard it myself. I smile at my ninja antics, and settle myself onto my bed, pulling my laptop onto my lap as I scroll through tumblr and snack on my blueberries. It’s enough to distract me for a little while, until the depressing photos and quotes come up onto my dash, of course. Then I think about my love for Mick and it gets me sad again, so I unfollow those people and try to reblog happy things, like that video of Will and his son, Jaden Smith, dancing and rapping on The Graham Norton Show. Or the several gif posts that contain exercises I can do within the confinements of my room, but I can’t be bothered doing them at the moment because they require me getting off my butt and right now, I think that’s asking for a bit much.

There’s a knock on my door and I groan, closing my computer screen and placing it on my bed so whoever it is at the door (one of the parentals, who else would it be) won’t tell me off for whatever I’ve done wrong. It seems that whatever I do, I’m always making a mistake and there’s no way to fix it. I’m tired of being constantly ridiculed for the smallest of things, and when I try to fix what I’ve done wrong, I do another thing wrong and there’s this constant cycle which I can’t seem to escape.

“What?” I say, annoyed at whoever’s planning to walk through my door at any moment.

It’s no surprise that when Mum walks in, her eyebrows are drawn together in disappointment. She glances around at the state of my room, with last night’s clothes strewn over my desk, my study notes and various highlighters scattered in the corner of my room, and a half eaten container of blueberries chilling on my nightstand.

“You’ve been sitting inside for too long,” she chides. “Go outside or at least get out of your room for an hour. You can do that, can’t you?”

“I have been outside,” I inform her. “Where do you think I got the berries?”

Her thin lips press together, the lines on her forehead deepening. “Natalie.” When she uses my full name, I know she’s pissed, but I can’t bring myself to care. Doesn’t she know that my heart is completely broken and the thought of moving, let alone leaving my safe haven of a room is the one thing I don’t want to do?

“Fine,” I grumble, after only ten seconds of her hard stare. I slip my bare feet into a pair of bright jellies and grab my headphones and iPhone, throwing the now empty blueberry container into the bin.

“Good,” she says approvingly. “You need some fresh air; you’ve been holed up in that room for the whole day. Isn’t there a party tonight? Why don’t you go hang out with Mick?”

Mum says his name so casually, but when I think of it, my heart crumbles. God, it hurts. It hurts so much.

“I hung out with him last night,” I tell her, avoiding her eyes. “No party tonight, either.” There is a party tonight, but it’s a friend of Georgia’s which Georgia invited me to. I declined this morning though after telling her yesterday I’d go, lying about some family gathering that didn’t exist. I know for a fact that Mick’s going to be there and I’m not sure if I’m ready to see him just yet.

In the attempt to avoid any more of my mother’s annoying questions, I slip in my headphones and listen to something calming, turning up the volume so I can’t hear anything. I question whether to let my family know of my disappearance, but figure they can just call me if they need to, so I decide not to and instead, channel my inner ninja and leave the house with little quietness, walking to wherever my feet decide to take me.

I hope it’s not far though, because I can’t be bothered walking a long distance back.

About five full songs play through my headphones until I look up to find myself at the Laundromat. It’s the first shop in a string of little shops, with a café and a pharmacy and a grocery store. It’s an old Laundromat, one that’s supposed to be closed down but the lady who used to hold the fort down decided to move to the US and closed the Laundromat down, leaving it deserted ninety nine percent of the time. The lone one percent is me, when I stumbled on it for the first time with Mick.

”This isn’t a new place, you know that, right?” Mick tells me as we walk into the deserted Laundromat. There are not many people outside, as it’s about eleven at night and no one goes grocery shopping or eats at a closed café or buys anything from the twenty four hour open pharmacy, except for the odd male who rushes in to buy a box of condoms, or a box of tampons. It’s funny how opposite the items are yet it’s always the males rushing to buy them.

I look at him oddly. “Do you take me for an idiot?”

“Just checking,” he says with a smile, pulling himself up to sit on top of the washing machines. “Have you ever thought about doing it on a washing machine?”

Conversations with Mick can swap from light to heavy or innocent to sexual in a matter of seconds, but it doesn’t bother me because it’s the way it’s always been between the both of us.

“Nope,” I say truthfully, opening one of the dryers. I wonder to myself whether I can fit in there, for no particular reason other than the fact that it looks big and I’m fairly small. “It’s uncomfortable to lie on, don’t you think?”

Mick lies down on it, his head on the edge of the washing machine closest to me. “What are you doing?” He questions, watching as I open the dryer lid and crouching down onto my knees.

I ignore him, climbing in and realising with a grin that I can, in fact, fit into a dryer. I cross my legs Indian style and let my hair flow out; giggling at how stupid I must look.

“You’re a freak,” Mick tells me once he’s realised what I’ve done.

I stick my tongue out at him childishly, but I’m not really that annoyed. It’s kind of comfortable, once you forget about the circular frame hitting your head.

“Yeah, but you love me,” I say nonchalantly, or at least, trying to be as chill as I can because it’s Mick and even though he’s my best friend, it’s only sometimes when I have no idea what he’s thinking or feeling.

There’s a pause. Neither of us move and I wonder whether I should have not said anything at all, because right now this silence is growing just a little bit awkward, at least on my part anyways.

“Yeah yeah,” Mick replies offhandedly, but when I look into his eyes, there’s a spark in them and I can tell that he does feel some sort of affection to me, whether he likes to admit it or not. I could’ve gotten him to openly admit it, but I decide not to because right now, I’m the happiest girl in the world and no one can take that away from me.


I’m sitting in the same dryer I did when I got Mick to tell me he loved me, and it’s times like these that I wish we could go back. Back to the times where my feelings for Mick was just a questionable crush because I didn’t know whether what I felt for him was real or because I thought he was handsome. But now, now that I’m aware of my feelings, it consumes me to a point where I don’t know whether I can function around him, or act normally like I’m his best friend and nothing more.

And that’s the saddest thing of all, really. I am his best friend and there is nothing more.

I change my mind. Love fucking sucks.
♠ ♠ ♠
outfit

I haven't edited this, and I should be reading over my notes for tomorrow's exam but instead I was inspired and this is what came out. Tell me what you think so far!