Buried Myself Alive

I walked slow on purpose. Dreading going up the steps into the old apartment that were about 5 feet from my own. Jeff would just shout and yell at me form the couch throwing whatever he could get his hands on at me, until he finally passed out. I sighed and realized I had stopped walking.

I slumped down on the crumbling steps. Why am I here? Why don’t I leave? ‘Cuz you can’t. One more month, just one more month in hell. That’s it. Then I can leave. I can leave and never ever come back.

In one month I turn 18. And then I won’t need Jeff, I won’t need anyone… I breathed in the night air that reeked of car exhaust. And pulled a ciggarete from my pocket.

“Need a light?” I jumped up.

“Who the fuck-”

“The name’s Mikey.” A guy in super tight jeans with chick legs, and a Dickey’s shirt sat next to me.

I was taken back by the guy’s forwardness and prayed he wasn’t going to hit on me.

“Mikey... Okay, sure I could use a light.” He dug into his pocket for his lighter. When he finally got it he tossed it to me. I caught it with my right hand almost like if you had done it in slo motion it coulda been a part of the matrix. Too bad I hate that movie.

It flickered to life as I held it to the cig dangling from the corner of my mouth. I handed the blue plastic lighter back to ‘Mikey’.

“So how old are you, Mikey?” I wasn’t sure if he was older or younger then me because of his height. I couldn’t tell if he was tall or short for his age, or normal for mine. Since I’m kinda on the short side..

“How ’bout you tell me first.” The guy was smart. Even though I was a little cautious about talking to this random guy who seems a little weird, I felt very comfortable around him.

“I’m 17.” I waited for him to say something.

“So you’re the same age as my brother..” He still hadn’t told me his age.

“Brother?”

“Yeah he’s two years older then me. I'm- uh- 16..” I watched him turn away for a second. So his brother was 18? Well that's not that much of a difference.

“People usually think he’s the younger brother. The only thing that makes people think I’m younger is my glasses. Which is weird because usually people associate glasses with being old..”

This kid likes to talk a lot. I took a glance at his face. Very pale, you could see it in the dark, white outline of his glasses around his eyes, and two toned hair that looked straightened on his head.

“I never got you’re name.”

“Oh, it’s Frank.”

“So do you mind if I ask you something, Frank?” If he asks me if I’m gay, I’m gunna punch him right in the fucking nose.

“Give it a shot.”

“Okay, what were you doing out here by yourself?”

“Um, watching the stars?” Moron there are no stars. God you’re such a bad liar.

“Dude unless you can see past those clouds and layers of factory fog their’s no stars up there.” He looked up at the night sky where you can barely even see the moon.

I stay silent. We both just sit there for a while. After about 2 minutes, I toss my cigarette to the ground and crush it with the toe of my vans. I guess he gets the point I’m not going to talk about it.

“Anyway, would you like to come and hang with me and a couple guys at The Green Eagle? Ray has this friend that makes I.D.s that he’s bringing so he could make one for you. And you don’t look like you hang out a lot. So whatcha say?”

Okay, so I’m just sitting there with this guy who seems pretty cool, who invites me to hang with his friends at a bar. And I don’t have a lot of friends, and I’m not good with new people, and I hate beer since I see what it does to people, so I’m about to say no when I hear a window fly open.

“FRANK! WHEREVER YOU ARE, YOU BETTER GET YOU’RE ASS UP HERE! SOON AS YOU GET HOME YOU’RE GUNNA BE HURTIN' YOU PIECE OF SHIT!” Of course.

Mikey just looks at me. I think almost in pity, and then he blinked. His eyes changed back to the norm and he asked the question I hated to answer.

“Who was that?”

“My dad.”