Defying Gravity
Chapter 3
The dawn broke later than usual, as slowly the passing days looked toward winter. Harsh yet subtle chills flew in from over the ocean, which teetered on the edge of the city, causing thin layers of frost to form amongst the branches of trees mourning the loss of their leaves to the ground below. A crystal clear sky hung, beautifully mounted in the air, and slowly it tainted the sky a stunning shade of blue. Then silently life flowered in the city, and once again the sound of cheerful twittering brought the morning to a delightful start. Well delightful for some.
A heavy drilling noise filled Gerard’s empty, thoughtless mind, and chipped away at his patience like a woodpecker on a tree somewhere deep in his sub-consciousness. After a while it really started to irritate him, because somehow that little woodpecker had turned into a rather large man, with a very big mallet bashing at the inside of his skull, and truthfully Gerard wished he’d just go away because he really wasn’t in the mood; eventually he managed to drift into a uncomfortable half-sleep, half-awake state, and it was only when the horrid gut wrenching feeling filled his stomach, that he finally fell out of bed to run to the bathroom, before throwing up in the toilet basin. Gerard sat slowly backward and grimaced at the vile taste of the bile rising in his throat. He stood up slowly and looked around his grotty little bathroom, combing his fingers through his untidy black hair, some of which was plastered to his face, and sighed.
“I am going to kill Frank. Damn him for buying me those bottles of Jack Daniels.” Gerard stumbled out of the bathroom; still feel ever so slightly ill,
“Damn him and his social life, and his silly little car.” He flopped aimlessly onto his crinkled bed sheets, and began to stare at the ceiling, continuing to rant openly.
“It’s a shitty little car anyway. I wish I had a car. Frank doesn’t even use his car!” He exclaimed throwing his arms upward toward the ceiling, as if arguing his case in a court battle, he continued once more,
“Well he was using his car yesterday when he phoned me, but that’s different! Because that was yesterday, and yesterday was yesterday. See what I’m saying?” The flat remained silent as he rattled off pointless questions, and not even the streets outside answered, with their usual endless droning noise. Gerard sat up and put his head in his hands, before taking in a sweeping glance of the room,
“Dear God. I still sound drunk. Maybe I ought to put my brain into action and get some of that work done. Or I could stop talking to myself.” He pondered aloud a while, before taking a shooting glance at the alarm clock, he groaned, the digital clock face read, 12:31pm exactly, far too late in the day for his liking. Though mainly it was his fault, as he had been the one who had woken up at 11 o’clock feeling depressed, and decided that binge drinking would be an easy way out, he now knew that that definitely wasn’t the case. Gerard shook himself, in an attempt to get his body to respond to the signals his brain was sending it, it was no use, his body felt heavy and as he stood he once more, he had to balance himself to prevent a swift trip to the floor.
Tiny little hammers proceeded to knock away at the inside of his skull, distracting him slightly from the ugly reality that surrounded him; a reality that contained an assortment of liquor bottles, sweaty socks, and one hell of a lot of work to be done. And once more Gerard partook in the ritual that was getting changed, and seeing as he had a rather large hangover filtering around his brain the whole incident took considerably longer than first anticipated. After about ten minutes of busy fumbling around his room, Gerard emerged dressed and ready for the day ahead, although technically he was only wearing an old black t-shirt, sweat pants and a pair of odd socks that he’d found under his bed - and lord knows how long they’d been there, he considered this to be fully dressed.
But his mind was on greater things, like the prospect that there may be just enough poptarts left for breakfast, his stomach grumbled echoing his thoughts and with a slight hint of anticipation in his step Gerard bounded into the kitchen, with a little too much spring for someone with a hangover. Just like the rest of the flat, the kitchen wasn’t much of a sight to behold either. It was small, grotty, and held only a few cupboards and a tiny little fridge which hummed and buzzed away in the corner happily to itself, the ceiling was covered in a few patches of damp, and it was obvious that the floor was in need of a very good sweeping.
Reaching the far side of the room and taking hold of the old creaky PVC cupboard door, Gerard flung the little door open, a rather rough grin dancing about his jaw. Then with a look of confusion his expression dropped, slowly he reached into the depths of the cupboard and pulled out an empty Poptart box with a small post-it note attached, it read:
“Dear Gerard,
I owe you two Poptarts,
Lotsa Love
Frank xx”
Gerard frowned, he couldn’t quite recall when the last time Frank had been in his flat was, let alone when he had last touched his Poptarts.
“Bastard.” He uttered under his breath, still re-reading the note just to make sure he hadn’t misread it. After several moments of disbelief, Gerard reluctantly threw the box in the bin, along with Frank’s note, and turned toward the section in the kitchen in which he kept Jars, and others assorted food stuffs, in the hope of locating some coffee to ward off his hangover and fatigue. He reached the other side of the room and began shuffling around jars and containers, and quickly located the place in which he kept all his coffee jars. His stomach growled again in the hope of having at least something filling it, even if it was only a mere glass of coffee.
Then once again his grin dropped suddenly, he violently snatched something from the back of the pile, causing a couple of small containers to topple and clatter together. Gerard gawped in disbelief and slowly shook his head,
“That bastard.” Gerard proceeded to proof read the small piece of paper in his hands over and over just to make sure he wasn’t hallucinating. It read,
“P.S:
I needed some Coffee, so I went ahead and took yours cuz I knew you wouldn’t mind.
Lots More Love,
Frank xx”
Gerard inhaled and exhaled slowly, and eventually, after thinking of several ways in which he could mutilate and torture his best friend; Gerard decided he would have to do without coffee and Poptarts this morning, and for the next few mornings until he was able to get to the shops, as he knew they wouldn’t be open on a Sunday. Glancing around for some sort of alternative, Gerard sighed as his ‘search’ proved fruitless.
After a while he had settled with a simple glass of tap water, after all those health enthusiasts on TV were always ranting about how water is so much more ‘regenerating’ for your body than caffeinated drinks, such as coffee. Gerard decided after a few forced mouthfuls that he didn’t agree with them.
“Bastards.” He grumbled, then after a small amount of consideration, Gerard decided he should really find a new insult, as ‘Bastards’ was starting to become old. He would have time to think about that after his list of other activities, firstly, killing frank, secondly, writing to all those health advisers on TV telling them where they can shove their healthy fad diets. After much time pondering, Gerard tossed his glass of water into the sink and ventured into the living room, half expecting his television to be gone with a post-it note in its place.
Two hours or so passed, and though Gerard had attempted to get some work done on his laptop, he now found himself on Google searching for new insults, but not many of them held the same kind of zing that his original favourite had. So he gave up on that too. He tried flicking through the television channels, finding it hilarious whenever he crossed a dieting program, or some sort of health food advertisement. But as all the other things had, this soon began to bore him, and so the television was turned off.
Gerard flopped back heavily on the sofa and stared at the ceiling, tracing shapes in the chipped plaster that lay above him. He sighed heavily as the sound of police sirens screeched past somewhere outside and children wailed on the pavement below the block. He closed his eyes in an attempt to shut everything out, like a pathetic attempt at meditation, but without the spiritual enlightenment. Small flickers of colours danced behind his eyelids and formed shapes which hopped about in a world of their own. And slowly Gerard began to slip into a state of pre-sleep-like bliss.
He was awoken shortly after by the sound of the phone buzzing on the desk in front of him. Sleepily, he reached out toward it and snatched it up with a slight moment of hesitation, before speaking calmly into the receiver.
“Hello?” He rubbed his eyes, pushing away the fuzzy shapes that still danced there.
“Oh hi G, it’s me Frank.” the chirpy voice down the other end squealed.
“You woke me up you bas-, umm I mean, annoying person.” He grumbled.
“G, I don’t know whether you noticed, but it’s half past 2 in the afternoon.” Frank replied sounding slightly amused and ever so slightly concerned.
“Well done captain obvious. Anyway, what do you want?” Gerard replied back, a cynical tone wavering in his voice.
“Well I just wondered if you were free to go out today? Cuz I feel bad leaving you out all the time. We don’t have to go anywhere big if you want, just so we can have a chat.” Gerard pondered over the offer for a moment; he looked back over at his laptop and sighed heavily.
“Frank, I’d love to but I’ve got a deadline for this project that I have to meet.” Frank butted in abruptly,
“Oh please G, we won’t be out for long! C’mon you know you want to.” Gerard could almost see Frank practically on his knees on the other end of the phone. He rolled his eyes and gave another long sigh.
“Okay, but just for a while” Gerard chuckled slightly as Frank cheered down the phone,
“Okay Gerard, I’ll see you in half an hour, you best be ready.”
“Yea, okay whatever, See you.” Gerard laughed, then paused suddenly “Oh yea, and Frank?” There was a slight pause,
“Yes Gerard?” Frank asked sounding rather intrigued. Gerard grinned.
“You owe me two fucking Poptarts.”
A heavy drilling noise filled Gerard’s empty, thoughtless mind, and chipped away at his patience like a woodpecker on a tree somewhere deep in his sub-consciousness. After a while it really started to irritate him, because somehow that little woodpecker had turned into a rather large man, with a very big mallet bashing at the inside of his skull, and truthfully Gerard wished he’d just go away because he really wasn’t in the mood; eventually he managed to drift into a uncomfortable half-sleep, half-awake state, and it was only when the horrid gut wrenching feeling filled his stomach, that he finally fell out of bed to run to the bathroom, before throwing up in the toilet basin. Gerard sat slowly backward and grimaced at the vile taste of the bile rising in his throat. He stood up slowly and looked around his grotty little bathroom, combing his fingers through his untidy black hair, some of which was plastered to his face, and sighed.
“I am going to kill Frank. Damn him for buying me those bottles of Jack Daniels.” Gerard stumbled out of the bathroom; still feel ever so slightly ill,
“Damn him and his social life, and his silly little car.” He flopped aimlessly onto his crinkled bed sheets, and began to stare at the ceiling, continuing to rant openly.
“It’s a shitty little car anyway. I wish I had a car. Frank doesn’t even use his car!” He exclaimed throwing his arms upward toward the ceiling, as if arguing his case in a court battle, he continued once more,
“Well he was using his car yesterday when he phoned me, but that’s different! Because that was yesterday, and yesterday was yesterday. See what I’m saying?” The flat remained silent as he rattled off pointless questions, and not even the streets outside answered, with their usual endless droning noise. Gerard sat up and put his head in his hands, before taking in a sweeping glance of the room,
“Dear God. I still sound drunk. Maybe I ought to put my brain into action and get some of that work done. Or I could stop talking to myself.” He pondered aloud a while, before taking a shooting glance at the alarm clock, he groaned, the digital clock face read, 12:31pm exactly, far too late in the day for his liking. Though mainly it was his fault, as he had been the one who had woken up at 11 o’clock feeling depressed, and decided that binge drinking would be an easy way out, he now knew that that definitely wasn’t the case. Gerard shook himself, in an attempt to get his body to respond to the signals his brain was sending it, it was no use, his body felt heavy and as he stood he once more, he had to balance himself to prevent a swift trip to the floor.
Tiny little hammers proceeded to knock away at the inside of his skull, distracting him slightly from the ugly reality that surrounded him; a reality that contained an assortment of liquor bottles, sweaty socks, and one hell of a lot of work to be done. And once more Gerard partook in the ritual that was getting changed, and seeing as he had a rather large hangover filtering around his brain the whole incident took considerably longer than first anticipated. After about ten minutes of busy fumbling around his room, Gerard emerged dressed and ready for the day ahead, although technically he was only wearing an old black t-shirt, sweat pants and a pair of odd socks that he’d found under his bed - and lord knows how long they’d been there, he considered this to be fully dressed.
But his mind was on greater things, like the prospect that there may be just enough poptarts left for breakfast, his stomach grumbled echoing his thoughts and with a slight hint of anticipation in his step Gerard bounded into the kitchen, with a little too much spring for someone with a hangover. Just like the rest of the flat, the kitchen wasn’t much of a sight to behold either. It was small, grotty, and held only a few cupboards and a tiny little fridge which hummed and buzzed away in the corner happily to itself, the ceiling was covered in a few patches of damp, and it was obvious that the floor was in need of a very good sweeping.
Reaching the far side of the room and taking hold of the old creaky PVC cupboard door, Gerard flung the little door open, a rather rough grin dancing about his jaw. Then with a look of confusion his expression dropped, slowly he reached into the depths of the cupboard and pulled out an empty Poptart box with a small post-it note attached, it read:
“Dear Gerard,
I owe you two Poptarts,
Lotsa Love
Frank xx”
Gerard frowned, he couldn’t quite recall when the last time Frank had been in his flat was, let alone when he had last touched his Poptarts.
“Bastard.” He uttered under his breath, still re-reading the note just to make sure he hadn’t misread it. After several moments of disbelief, Gerard reluctantly threw the box in the bin, along with Frank’s note, and turned toward the section in the kitchen in which he kept Jars, and others assorted food stuffs, in the hope of locating some coffee to ward off his hangover and fatigue. He reached the other side of the room and began shuffling around jars and containers, and quickly located the place in which he kept all his coffee jars. His stomach growled again in the hope of having at least something filling it, even if it was only a mere glass of coffee.
Then once again his grin dropped suddenly, he violently snatched something from the back of the pile, causing a couple of small containers to topple and clatter together. Gerard gawped in disbelief and slowly shook his head,
“That bastard.” Gerard proceeded to proof read the small piece of paper in his hands over and over just to make sure he wasn’t hallucinating. It read,
“P.S:
I needed some Coffee, so I went ahead and took yours cuz I knew you wouldn’t mind.
Lots More Love,
Frank xx”
Gerard inhaled and exhaled slowly, and eventually, after thinking of several ways in which he could mutilate and torture his best friend; Gerard decided he would have to do without coffee and Poptarts this morning, and for the next few mornings until he was able to get to the shops, as he knew they wouldn’t be open on a Sunday. Glancing around for some sort of alternative, Gerard sighed as his ‘search’ proved fruitless.
After a while he had settled with a simple glass of tap water, after all those health enthusiasts on TV were always ranting about how water is so much more ‘regenerating’ for your body than caffeinated drinks, such as coffee. Gerard decided after a few forced mouthfuls that he didn’t agree with them.
“Bastards.” He grumbled, then after a small amount of consideration, Gerard decided he should really find a new insult, as ‘Bastards’ was starting to become old. He would have time to think about that after his list of other activities, firstly, killing frank, secondly, writing to all those health advisers on TV telling them where they can shove their healthy fad diets. After much time pondering, Gerard tossed his glass of water into the sink and ventured into the living room, half expecting his television to be gone with a post-it note in its place.
Two hours or so passed, and though Gerard had attempted to get some work done on his laptop, he now found himself on Google searching for new insults, but not many of them held the same kind of zing that his original favourite had. So he gave up on that too. He tried flicking through the television channels, finding it hilarious whenever he crossed a dieting program, or some sort of health food advertisement. But as all the other things had, this soon began to bore him, and so the television was turned off.
Gerard flopped back heavily on the sofa and stared at the ceiling, tracing shapes in the chipped plaster that lay above him. He sighed heavily as the sound of police sirens screeched past somewhere outside and children wailed on the pavement below the block. He closed his eyes in an attempt to shut everything out, like a pathetic attempt at meditation, but without the spiritual enlightenment. Small flickers of colours danced behind his eyelids and formed shapes which hopped about in a world of their own. And slowly Gerard began to slip into a state of pre-sleep-like bliss.
He was awoken shortly after by the sound of the phone buzzing on the desk in front of him. Sleepily, he reached out toward it and snatched it up with a slight moment of hesitation, before speaking calmly into the receiver.
“Hello?” He rubbed his eyes, pushing away the fuzzy shapes that still danced there.
“Oh hi G, it’s me Frank.” the chirpy voice down the other end squealed.
“You woke me up you bas-, umm I mean, annoying person.” He grumbled.
“G, I don’t know whether you noticed, but it’s half past 2 in the afternoon.” Frank replied sounding slightly amused and ever so slightly concerned.
“Well done captain obvious. Anyway, what do you want?” Gerard replied back, a cynical tone wavering in his voice.
“Well I just wondered if you were free to go out today? Cuz I feel bad leaving you out all the time. We don’t have to go anywhere big if you want, just so we can have a chat.” Gerard pondered over the offer for a moment; he looked back over at his laptop and sighed heavily.
“Frank, I’d love to but I’ve got a deadline for this project that I have to meet.” Frank butted in abruptly,
“Oh please G, we won’t be out for long! C’mon you know you want to.” Gerard could almost see Frank practically on his knees on the other end of the phone. He rolled his eyes and gave another long sigh.
“Okay, but just for a while” Gerard chuckled slightly as Frank cheered down the phone,
“Okay Gerard, I’ll see you in half an hour, you best be ready.”
“Yea, okay whatever, See you.” Gerard laughed, then paused suddenly “Oh yea, and Frank?” There was a slight pause,
“Yes Gerard?” Frank asked sounding rather intrigued. Gerard grinned.
“You owe me two fucking Poptarts.”
♠ ♠ ♠
WooI finally updated 8D