I'll Bow for Your King When He Shows Himself

I'd shut myself out from everybody again. It has been two weeks since I've left the apartment for anything other than work. I haven't seen Matt or Oliver, but that's mostly because I wouldn't take the phone calls. And if you're wondering, Andy is still pissed. I'm pissed too, sadly. Not at him though, at myself.

I promised myself that I wouldn't do this to my brother, no matter how bad things became. I yelled at him, like a child, about something he couldn't have stopped. I should have been happy that he was even okay in the first place, that he actually had left the apartment long enough to not walk in on whoever was in the apartment that night. Who knows what would have happened? He could have gotten hurt and the only thing I worried about was money.

I've always been afraid of growing up. When I was younger, I would do anything to keep my youth alive, meaning I slept all day and stayed up all night, drinking. I worried about myself, and nobody else. There was even a period where Andy didn't come into the picture at all. I was so scared of becoming my parents, worrying about money and what's going to happen next. I didn't want to think about it, period.

But no matter how hard I try not to, I'm going to become my parents. It's inevitable, and that's terrifying. I realized that if I didn't grow up, and if I didn't grow up fast, that my entire life would crumble because I would lose Andy. I wasn't ready to give him up yet.

I stepped into the apartment two weeks after the incident. It was a Friday, one of our busiest days of the week at work. It was also two days before Christmas, and I hadn't so much as glanced at my brother for more than one minute, just to watch him walk into the apartment, grab a new set of clothes, and leave again with Derek following him. I knew Derek was getting sick of it. But I also knew he was scared because he'd never seen this happen to us before.

Luckily, he wasn't around when I cracked.

The apartment still wasn't clean. It was a fucking pigsty. The couch was the only thing left in the living room and it was toppled over. When Matt stayed to help clean, all we did was fall asleep in my room, exhausted from such a long night. I knew that I was dragging it out. I didn't want to clean, because then that meant that it actually happened, and we were actually broke. And I would break.

Of course, I've been working nonstop these past two weeks. Every day, every night, no breaks in between. I've made about three hundred pounds, though, and that wasn't enough for food when I had to pay rent.

I walked into the kitchen and grabbed the loaf of bread off of the top of the fridge. It was moldy and started to stink, since it was vegan, but I had gotten good at tearing off the bad parts and eating the parts that were still good. I'm going to get sick one of these days.

I decided to lift the couch up finally and slammed it against the wall again, making the living room somewhat easier to look at. I sat on the couch and stared at the wall where the television would have been, pretending to watch Doctor Who with Andy.

It was already three in the morning by the time I started drifting off to sleep. I would have to wake up in three hours to go back to work, of course.

A loud banging on the door made me jolt awake. I grew scared just by the sound, knowing full well how late it was and that we were robbed. I cautiously walked up to the door and peered out of the peephole.

With a sigh of relief, I pulled the door open without turning the knob (the door's broken), and let Oliver inside. He was carrying a giant box but I decided it wasn't even worth it to ask.

"You haven't answered our calls," he stated bluntly.

I paused. "Yeah, I've been really busy." I didn't tell him that I cut off the phone company.

"Carrion, we thought you were dead." He sounded worried and I didn't know what to do.

"You could have gone to the shop. I've been there."

He dragged his feet over to the couch and sat, pretending not to notice the place was bare. Of course Matt had told him. He had to have known. Oliver pat the space beside him and I sat, pulling my legs up with me and leaning against the arm rest.

He stared at me sincerely for a few minutes before he spoke again. "How much have you made?"

I shrugged my shoulders. "About three hundred."

His face collapsed in itself. "That has to be illegal, Carrion."

I shrugged again. "Apparently not."

"You don't have insurance?"

"Oli, we're broke," I said, my voice cracking.

He looked away from me, as if he was embarrassed by his question. "I've been talking it over with the guys..."

I closed my eyes and shook my head at him. "Oliver, you don't have to help me. I'm not going to take the help from you, I barely even know you."

He placed his hand on my leg. "I know myself. I'm a fucked up kid, who works too hard and laughs too little. I believe I have no place, and that I don't deserve to be affecting the people that are there for me. I see myself in you, Carrion. I know you."

It was true. I haven't had this much comparison with anybody in my entire life. Never. And that's weird.

"I've been talking it over with the guys...and we really think you can help us."

I lifted my head up again. "Help you?" Wow, that isn't conceited at all.

"And in return, we'll be helping you."

I blew my greasy hair out of my face and decided to listen to him anyways. "How?"

At this point, Oliver took out his car keys and sliced open the big box that was sitting on the floor in the middle of the room. When he pulled out shirts, I began shaking my head.

"No."

"You don't even know what I'm asking."

"I don't have the time, Oliver. I'm working 20 hours a day, every day. I can't," I told him.

He shook his head. "Then quit your job."

I furrowed my eye brows and squinted my eyes at him. "Don't tell me what to do." I was getting mad.

He took one of my hands in his and leaned his head into me. "Stop lying to yourself, Carrion. You don't want to live like this, and I know that. We would give you 75 percent of the funds of course, and just making them alone costs thousands. We talked it over with the management, and we really think it's going to help you."

"How?" I asked again, calming down.

"Well, each shirt would cost 12 pounds or 20 dollars, wherever we're going and we would sell them at every show. So you would be getting 15 dollars just on one alone. And we sell out really fast while we're on tour, so just imagine."

I bit my lip and looked down at my ripped tights. "You're really bad at math," I whispered to him, a smile creeping up on me.

He shrugged his shoulders and cracked a smile back.

I took the shirts out of his hand and threw them back into the box. When the sad look on his face came back, I pulled out a sketch pad and pencil. "Tell me what you want."