All I Have to Give

When I got back to my apartment, I found Zacky in the kitchen pulling dishes out of a box and placing them in the cabinets. He took one look at me and put down the plates he was holding and crossed the room to pull me into his arms.

“He said he doesn’t love me anymore,” I said, tears filling my eyes once more as I buried my face in Zacky’s chest.

“Let’s go sit down,” he mumbled.

I nodded and followed Zacky over to the couch where he pulled me into his lap. He held me there while I cried. After a while Zoey dropped the toy she was playing with and jumped up on me, licking my hand as if she were trying to comfort me as well.

“I know I’m being ridiculous,” I said as I wiped the remainder of the tears from my face. I’d finally cried until I couldn’t cry anymore.

Zacky let me move off of his lap to sit on the couch next to him though he never moved his arm from around my shoulders.

“You’re not being ridiculous, Melanie. You just had your heart broken and you have a right to be emotional. There’s not much out there worse than a broken heart.” He looked pained for a moment, but it passed in the blink of an eye. Maybe I was imagining things.

“I’ve known it was coming all along. I should’ve been prepared for this. He stopped talking to me two months ago. He said that I-I should've taken that as a hint that it was over. He-I- God why did I ever change my mind about him?”

Zacky looked at me with a sad smile on his lips. He brushed some hair away from my face and behind my ear then he planted a kiss on my forehead. Hmm that was weird, we never kissed each other like that before.

“It’ll take some time, but I promise you’ll get past this. Just remember, you’ll always have me.”

I managed to force out a small smile as I thanked him for waiting here for me while I went to talk to Johnny. I don’t know what I’d do without my best friend.

~x~

I was woken up the next morning by a crashing sound coming from the kitchen. I leapt up from the couch and ran toward the kitchen to see what the hell was going on.

Zacky was looking back at me with a sheepish grin on his face when I stepped into the kitchen. There was a pile of pots and pans and even a broken plate lying on the floor around him.

“I got in a fight with the cabinet and it kind of won,” he explained.

After laughing until tears were rolling down my cheeks, I straightened up and was capable of speaking again.

“I don’t know what I’m going to do with you,” I said as I shook my head.

“You could help me make breakfast,” he suggested.

“That sounds good to me.”

I crossed the kitchen and grabbed a broom to sweep up the broken pieces of the plate while Zacky put the pots and pans back into their rightful places. Once that was done, I got out everything we’d need to make chocolate chip pancakes, scrambled eggs, and bacon. I was happy that my dad had even stocked the fridge for me.

Zacky volunteered to fry the bacon while I prepared the mixture to make the pancakes. I silently wondered whether or not he’d ever cooked bacon, but I shook it off. Surely he would only volunteer if he knew what he was getting himself into.

Two minutes later I had neglected the pancake mix in order to laugh at Zacky. He was dancing around trying to avoid the hot grease that was popping out of the skillet.

“Ow shit. How the hell do you make it stop?” He finally screamed after being burned a few times.

With a laugh I decided to take over, stepping in to inspect the very well done bacon. I took the skillet off of the heat and took the bacon out.

“It’s a little crispier than most people prefer, but you did alright kid.”

Zacky glared at me as I picked up the waffle mix to start making those.

“Eggs I can handle.” He said as he picked up the carton and he seemed sure of himself so I just shrugged my shoulders and turned back to stove. Almost immediately I heard the sound of an egg cracking against the floor followed by a frustrated cry of “Fuck!”

“You just clean that up and get out plates and leave the cooking to me.”

“Will do,” he said before grabbing some paper towels and cleaning up the egg.

~x~

“This is amazing,” Zacky practically moaned out as he took a huge bite of pancake.

“It’s cause you didn’t have a chance to sabotage them.”

I burst into laughter, narrowly dodging the chunk of egg that was hurled at my face. I grabbed the egg from where it landed on the table and threw it back at Zacky, hitting him on the forehead. He met my gaze with a malicious gleam in his eyes. I knew what was coming.

“Don’t even think about it,” I warned him, never taking my eyes off of him.

He responded by grabbing a handful of eggs and slowly getting to his feet.

“Do not throw food all over my new kitchen!” I exclaimed, getting to my feet as well.

“It can be cleaned. You’re going to pay for hitting me with the eggs!”

“You threw them first. Be fair, Zacky. Do not throw those eggs at me,” I begged.

“Okay,” he said, lowering his hand and turning back to his plate. I had just let out a sigh of relief when Zacky lunged at me, tackling me to the floor. He sat on top of my stomach with his knees on top of my arms so I couldn’t move. With a laugh, he released the handful of eggs on my face.

“Baker, I’m going to kill you,” I said calmly.

“You can’t kill me if you can’t get up,” he pointed out, poking my sides until I started squirming.

“You can’t stay here forever.” He shifted his weight slightly and that was enough for me to know that he was contemplating running.

“I’m not scared of you,” he said quickly.

“You will be when I get done with you.”

Zacky threw his hands up in the air as if in surrender. “Okay let’s not get crazy. Let’s settle this like the adults we’ll never be.”

“Okay then, get your fat ass off me.”

Zacky pretended to be shocked and let his mouth fall open, but he did get off me. I took my opportunity and jumped to my feet quickly. Before Zacky was even fully to his feet, I grabbed the back of his head and pushed downward. It may have knocked both glasses of orange juice over, but seeing his face go into the plate of syrup covered pancakes was the best thing that had happened since I’d been back in California.

“Now it’s settled,” I said smugly as Zacky looked at me in horror with food falling off of his face.

He grabbed a pancake and hurled it at me like a frisbee, followed by a second then a third. I snatched up my now empty plate and used it as a shield to deflect the bits off egg he was throwing my way. Then I managed to get my hands on the bottle of syrup and squirted it right at his face.

“Okay, okay! Shit! I give up!” he screamed and I spun around while doing a stupid victory dance I made up on the spot.

I stepped forward and pretended I slipped so I could tackle Zacky to the floor. We landed all tangled up together on the floor, both of us laughing until we cried.

“I'm going to shower right now!” I exclaimed as I pulled myself up off the floor.

“Hey I need one too. We could conserve water and do it together,” Zacky said with a smirk as he started to get up too.

“In your fucking dreams, perv!” I shoved him back down and ran off giggling.

Amazingly enough, this time with Zacky had actually made me forget about Johnny for a little while. That didn't last very long. As soon as I was alone in the shower the tears filled my eyes again. I sank down onto the floor of the shower and brought my knees to my chest, letting the hot water rain down onto me. I had never been hurt like this before in my life and I never wanted to be again. The pain was bad enough that I wasn't sure if I could ever be with anyone again.