Hold On Till May

3. mcdonalds and dead relatives

I had to bribe Tay with intoxicating fast food to get her to wake up and tag along. She was sprawled on the messy sheets of her bed, hair tossed in a big heap of tangles, as I tried poking, shoving, nagging, and sheet-tugging in order to get her ass up. In the end, food was my last resort.

“Oh c’mon, we’ll stop by McDonald’s to get breakfast or something,” I said with a taunting roll in my eye. Shortly afterwards, Tay’s voice appeared muffled through her pillow.

“You paying?” She murmured, the first sentence she’s said all day.

I sighed, “Yes, I’ll pay.”

At this, she finally came to a sitting position on her mattress. Her mocha hair was sticking up in all directions, and she still reeked from the party last night. I cringed at her appearance, noting she desperately needed to freshen up.

“Why do you want me awake, anyways?” Tay interrogated. She had a knack for questioning everything, even the simplest of things, but I guess in this situation she had a right to.

“You’re coming with me on an errand,” I answered, partially true. Maybe it wasn’t an “errand” per se, but it did need to be done—well, I needed it to be done. For my own sanity, let’s say.

“Why? Are we out of food? We can just do take out, who cares—“

“No, not like that.”

“Then… like what?”

She eyed me and I squirmed under her intense gaze. I fidgeted with my fingers, trying to see how the scrambled explanation in my head could ever slip through my teeth coherently. I honestly didn’t know how.

“Just… take a shower and get ready, you’re a mess.”

Tay rolled her eyes and chucked a pillow my way to get out. She missed, or I dodged—whichever and I quickly slipped out of her organized-mess-of-a-room. I waited out in our kitchen, actually finding we were deprived of anything edible, but not caring enough to mark what was missing. We always ordered take out, or went out separately—food in the fridge wasn’t really necessary. Still, it was good to have snacks lying around.

Tay emerged out of the hallway about half an hour later. Her hair was still wet, but the sunshine was battering outside. Her casual attire—a t-shirt by some online company, skinny jeans, and vans—hugged her petite figure. It was around nine in the morning, I want to say, and just glancing at Tay you could tell her hangover finally kicked in.

“My head feels like it has its own fucking heartbeat,” She winced in pain. Tay pinned up her palm, much like she had last night, but with more soberness and agony. She quickly snatched her sunglasses from the kitchen counter, seeing as it was terribly light out, and slipped them on with less discomfort. Sighing, I walked over to the door, held it for Tay to go through, and took the four flight of stairs we were forced to.

“We’re going to do the errand first, though,” I noted once we escaped into the parking lot. I hurried in front of her so I could open my car door, and heard Tay’s signature groaning behind me.

“I want pancakes though, can’t we just stop by really quick?”

“Uh, no?” I said as if I were stating the obvious. I opened the passenger door for her, but Tay settled in the back seat instead, giving me a spiteful glare as she did.

“No, no, sit up front, I’m not your chauffer,” I protested.

She shook her head and shrugged her shoulders. I rolled my eyes at her stubbornness and took my driver seat. I didn’t care if she preferred sitting in the trunk, I just wanted to get this car on the road and down Scranton to, yes, check on Alex.

I have lost my mind, because to be honest, you will not find one single ounce of sanity left in that bottomless void. I was going to check up on a stranger I met yesterday who was on the verge of a suicide, only to soothe my own worries. I was mostly afraid of finding a corpse, and just the thought of that made my skin crawl.

“Hey! Hey! There’s McDonald’s! Make a turn!” Tay’s voice interrupted my train of thoughts. I rolled my eyes and shook my head.

“No, we’re doing this first, I already told you.”

“Bullshit,” She whined.

“Yeah, well, suck it.”

The rest of the ride was palpable with irritation. Tay would not, for the love of God, shut up. Whether she was whinnying, groaning, interrogating, or just making weird noises—the atmosphere was congested of her words. In the end, I just turned the radio on, concluding that hearing today’s awful poppy music beats Tay’s nagging any day.

Finally, we arrived to the apartment on Scranton—one that was just slightly nicer than Tay and I’s living arrangements. I could see her elbow propped up against the window with her cheek rested on her first from my rear view mirror. She was annoyed, tired, and still hurting from her headache. When I finally slowed into a parking space, her expression twisted.

“Hey, what gives?” She complained, again.

I sighed, “We’re here.”

“And what exactly are we here for?”

“Visiting a friend,” I answered, bluntly. Well it was partially true—we were visiting someone…

“Who?”

“Just a friend…”

“Is he worth McDonald’s hotcakes?”

“Oh shut up and c’mon.”

We exited the car and made our way to the front entrance of the building. Buzzers were located on the side of the door, something our apartment managed to lack. Tay found it cool, I was just looking for how to work it.

“What’s their last name?” Tay asked, studying the chart above the caller box. I inspected it too, but realized I had no clue whatsoever. He just gave me his first name—any of them could be it.

“I don’t know, I just know his first name,” I confessed, scratching the back of my neck.

Tay sighed in exasperation, “Well, what is it?”

“Alex.”

“Is he a special friend?” She cocked an eyebrow.

“No,” I dismissed quickly, too quickly, “I just met him at the party.”

“Again; is he a special friend?”

I rolled my eyes, “Are you going to help or what?”

“Alright fine, just hold on.”

Tay ended up buzzing a random number—number four—and waiting until someone picked up on the other line. I mouthed the words, “what are you doing?” in a panicked expression, but that had little effect on my short friend.

“Yes?” Someone on the other end said. She gave me a pointed look; is it him? I shook my head, she sighed.

“Yes, hello, sorry for the inconvenience but is there an Alex living somewhere in this apartment building by any chance?”

“How the hell should I know?” They spat back.

Tay narrowed her brow, “Well you don’t have to be rude about it.”

“You woke me up!”

“It’s ten in the morning, get a fucking life—“

I removed her finger from the button, seeing as she was already going overboard. After a couple seconds of her recollecting herself, she buzzed number three—I crossed my fingers.

It wasn’t Alex, but the woman on the other end was willing to help. He lived in the apartment 2B, and she was even nice enough to buzz us in. Afterwards, we quickly climbed to the second floor and searched for 2B. Tay found it, and suddenly, I began to think this wasn’t such a good idea.

“Well, go on then,” She urged, shoving me lightly towards the door. I gave her a nervous smile as I tried to pep talk myself in the darkest corners of my head. Finally, I mustered enough courage to knock on the door, only to feel a pang of regret and start heading for the stairs. But Tay got in my way and hauled me back to his door, just in the nick of time to witness him opening it.

Alex had definitely just woken up—hopefully not because of me, but chances were, it was because of me. His hair was tousled, even messier than usual, whilst he wore baggy sweat pants and a black t-shirt to match. He scratched the back of his neck and looked me over with squinted eyes—I definitely woke him up.

“Jack? Wh-what are you doing here?” His voice was heavy with sleep, very raspy and groggy. The sound and tone of him made my throat clasp, dried from anything verbal to say.

“Jack…” Tay whispered from beside me. She wasn’t in view of Alex; Tay was leaning against the wall, and if she hadn’t spoken up, Alex would have never noticed her. He looked at her then back at me, confused.

“Is this some intervention or something?” He asked, pretty ticked off.

I let out a nervous laugh, shaking my head, “Um, no, I just wanted to see if you were… okay.”

“Well, I am. Why?” His eyebrows—very furry—came down into an arch out of puzzlement. My mouth opened and close to form words, but nothing but tips of air managed to fly by. In the end, I tightly pressed my lips together to form a line, curled them up to form an innocent smile, and shrugged my shoulders.

Alex sighed, “Well, won’t you come in?”

Tay and I walked in a line to his apartment, Tay following shortly behind. She marveled at how clean it was, heck, I did too. The only mess in plain sight was the stacks of paper thrown across his coffee table, which apparently, had an acoustic guitar leaning against it. He plays?

“Holy shit he’s clean,” Tay muttered, more to herself than us. She continued to scan the room in complete adornment, as I just shook my head at her way-of-being.

“Um Alex, this is Tay my roommate, Tay this is Alex,” I introduced formally. Tay wasn’t very interested in Alex as a person, but was very interested with his choice in decoration.

“Hey.”

“Hey.”

And that’s as much as that conversation went. I then remembered a little detail Alex gave me last night, just as I dropped him off. I instantly regretted bombarding so early.

“Did we wake your mom?” I asked, worried.

He narrowed his brow, “My mom…?”

“Yeah,” I said slowly, “The one you said you lived with…”

“Oh,” He giggled, nodding in remembrance, “I lied about that; my mom’s dead.”