Wake Me Up

I can feel Vic laying behind me, running his fingers up and down my spine. He’s warm beside me; so warm I don’t think I’ll ever need a blanket again. His body softly curves around mine and one of his arms has found it’s way underneath me, now holding on to my belly. I want to scoot further into him, to mesh our bodies together until we are no longer two separate individuals, until we are no longer two minds. I want to create bridge between our heads, so I’d never have to explain anything to him. He would just know.

“It’s only sometimes,” I lips whisper before I can lock them shut. Vic’s hand stops momentarily, but starts again just as quickly. He leans his forehead against the nape of my neck.

“What is?” he asks. I can feel his warm breath against me and it makes me shiver. He scoots closer to me, stopping his hand movements and winding his arm around me.

“My dad. He only does it sometimes,” I say, pausing when Vic pulls me just a little tighter into his chest. “Just when he’s mad, you know, and I get in the way. Or if I do something stupid. Most of the time I bring it on myself.”

“Hey,” Vic says. He turns me around so we’re face to face and holds onto to either side of my face, “You do not bring it on yourself, do you hear me? You’re allowed to do stupid stuff, you’re allowed to fuck up every now and then. That does not give him the right to do that, okay?”

I nod my head instead of replying and rest it against his shoulder, closing my eyes. He brushes hair out of my face, playing with it. We lay there for a while longer and I’m about to fall asleep when Vic whispers again, nonchalantly.

“What if you just stayed here?”

“I can’t just stay here,” I say, lifting my head to stare at him. He bunches his eyebrows together, staring at me.

“Why not?” and I want to sigh because he’s acting like a child. I can’t just not go home. Everything that identifies me as me is there; my birth certificate, my social security number. Everything. And it wasn’t like my father would just let me leave like that; I’m a minor and no matter what everything I do boils down to whether or not he’s okay with it.

“You know why,” I say, shaking my head. From the look on his face I can tell he knows I’m right.

“Well I can’t just let you go back there,” he says, keeping his lips tight. I know he’s angry and I appreciate that he’s trying to control it.

“There are some things you can’t save me from, Vic. Some things I can’t save myself from. All we can do it wait for it to be over,” I don’t bother looking at him because I know nothing I say will do any good.

“Maybe I can’t save you, but the police can,” he mutters, and I know that he doesn’t want me to reply to that but I have to nip it in the bud now. Because I do not want any pigs sniffing around my house.

“Yeah? With what evidence? It’s my word against his and who is going to believe a snotty teenager? Besides, let’s say they did believe me and my dad went to prison. Where would I go after that? My closest relatives live in Texas. It’s going to be pretty hard for you to hold me if I’m that far away,” I say, hoping this will calm him down but it only angers him more. He lets go of me completely and pushes back, putting space in between us.

“You think I’m that selfish? You think I would let you stay in a house like that just so I-”

“I don’t think you’re selfish. Just respecting my wishes. Because as crazy as it sounds I don’t want to leave you. And I don’t want to go to Texas. I don’t even know how to ride a horse,” I say, cutting him off. He looks at me for a second before bursting out laughing. I smile at him while he grabs onto my shoulder and laughs into the pillow.

“I don’t think they all ride horses you know,” he says and I nod back at him, because obviously they didn’t all ride horses. “Fine. But here’s what we’re going to do. I’m going to drop you off as late as possible, then in the morning you’re going to call me as soon as your dad leaves and I’m going to pick you up. You can spend the night too. It’ll almost be like you live here.”

“Okay,” I burry my head into his chest and close my eyes. He gets the hint and stop talking, just re-wraps his arms around me. We’re quiet for a while; I let him hold me.

“What happened to your parents?” I ask, moving my head away from him so I can look up. He’s not looking at me; instead finds the wall interesting enough to stare at.

“Didn’t I tell you?” he asks, while gnawing on his lip. If he bites any harder it’ll bleed.

“You were vague,” I don’t mean to push, but I just told him the most personal thing I’ve ever told anyone. He could at least tell me something about himself.

“It was my fault,” he whispers. I watch his eyes, the way they droop lazily. His hand finds it’s way to my hip, squeezing it lightly, “They shouldn’t have been out that night. But I...I had snuck out of the house. I was only eleven and...Mike and I had gotten into an argument. Whatever he said had made me so mad that I opened my window and just left,” he pauses, closing his eyes and pinching his nose, breathing in and out.

“I was only a kid though, and I didn’t know where to go. So I just wondered around, walking further and further from the house. I don’t know how far I got before it started storming. It started to thunder and lightning and I was scared because I had never been outside when it was like that before. So when I got to the nearest gas station I called them from a payphone. By then I wasn’t even mad at Mike anymore; I just wanted to go home.”

“The roads were wet,” he whispers, shaking his head, “I should’ve thought about how wet the roads were. I shouldn’t have called them to come get me, I should’ve just sucked it up and walked back home. But I was scared. I was so scared, Kellin, you have to understand. I didn’t mean for it to happen. If I could go back, if I could go back for just a second,” his voice cracks at the end. He still refuses to look at me, now his eyes are glossy and wide and it’s almost like I can see him reliving the night through his eyes. “They drove out to get me and...they were going pretty fast. They lost control of the car and crashed into a tree. They both died that night.” I’m about to say something when he starts laughing, bitterly.

“I was so mad at them. I thought they weren’t coming on purpose as like punishment or something. I didn’t know they were...I didn’t know they were dead.”

By now, there are small tears trickling down his cheeks and his nose had a faint red undertone. I reach my hand up to brush them away softly, petting his hair along the way. His eyes are rimmed red and his cheeks have a slight puff to them. He looks like he wants to crawl into himself, to disappear completely in the corners of his mind. But I’m here and I won’t let that happen. I won’t.

“It was my fault,” he whispers, closing his eyes so tightly I’m sure it hurts.

“Hey,” I say, grabbing his face and waiting for him to look at me. When he does I say in my most stern voice, “That is not your fault. You were a kid, a child, you couldn’t have known.”

“I should have,” he whispers, “I shouldn’t have ever tried to run away.”

“Listen to me,” I say, grabbing his jaw and forcing him to keep eye contact with me, “There is no way you could have known what was going to happen. It is not your fault. Kids run away all the time.”

“Did you?” he asks, looking up at me. I want to tell him that I did, that I ran away all the time, just to make him feel better. But I never did. I never had the opportunity.

“I had a different kind of childhood,” I whisper. He nods and then rests his forehead against mine, closing his eyes again. Vic winds his arms around me again and slowly traces his hand up and down my spine. It feels good; just being here. Living in the now.

We stay that way until my stomach grumbles. Vic gets up, ignoring my protests of not being that hungry, and drags me with him. His fingers lace with mine as he pulls me out of his room, walking towards the family room. We’re quiet as we make our way around the corner, until we get a full view of what’s been going on without us.

Tony is laying on top of Mike, straddling his waist. Their faces are attached, but honestly it looks more like they’re trying to eat each others faces than kiss. I look over at Vic, eyes wide, while he just smirks.

“On the family couch? Really Michael?” Vic calls out, louder than really necessary. Tony flies off of Mike, landing on the other side of the couch. His cheeks are bright red as he looks around, flustered. Mike takes a little longer to react, sitting up and rubbing the back of his neck.

“Uh, hey guys. I thought you were asleep?” Mike asks, quietly. He scoots closer to Tony when he thinks we’re not looking. Vic laughs and squeezes my hand.

“And I thought you two weren’t dating,” Vic says. I snicker at him and kick his shin, mostly because I feel bad for Tony; I know if i were him I’d be incredibly embarrassed right now. He looks at me, now holding in his laughs.

“Well...” Mike trails off. Him and Tony share a look before Mike drags Tony closer, basically on his lap, “You thought wrong.”

Vic laughs again, dragging me out of the room and muttering “fucking finally” under his breath. He pulls me into the kitchen, letting go of my hand to open the pantry. I push myself onto the counter, watching as he pulls out random ingredients.

“What are you making?” I ask, watching as he gets a small pot out, filling it with water. He leans over and flicks my nose, laughing when I back away quickly.

“Just some pasta,” he says, putting the pot on the stove to boil. I spend the next half an hour watching Vic make us food, laughing when he almost burns himself three different times. After that we make our way back to the family room, which is now vacant of a certain two boys, eating our food and watching a show called The Haunted. I stay at Vic’s house until it’s gets dark out and Vic drives me home. After much reassurance to Vic, he agrees to leave while I go into the house by myself. My dad isn’t home yet so I take a shower before bed. For the first time in a while, I fall asleep excited to wake up again.