FicWad

Chapter Four – Time Takes Us All


Mikey’s POV


“Hi, Grandma,” I whispered shakily, my voice hoarse from a combination of crying and the cold that was quickly costing me all sense of feeling in my fingertips. My quivering fingers traced the name on the daunting grey stone of one of the few people who ever actually cared, a group of people that was now only two members strong due to her death. It had been eight, painfully agonizing months since the day we had got the call saying she was… no longer with us. Eight full months and I could still feel the behemoth of hole in my heart where my grandma should have resided. But no. She got sick, she went to hospital, she got worse and she died.

What people say about things like this getting better with time? Bullshitters, the lot of them. Time won’t bring anyone back from the dead; only make the precious memories faded and harder to remember. Those precious memories that hurt to remember but can’t be allowed to disappear as they’re all you have left, time tries to snatch those from you, just as it took the deceased in the first place; time doesn’t make things better, only harder and more painful until time claims you too. Maybe that’s what they mean; perhaps it gets better in time because in time you will join the deceased, courtesy of time itself. Perhaps it would have been easier for me to get over if I didn’t have a load of jackasses constantly picking on me or a million other things going on in my mind. I couldn’t speak to Gee about it, he loved her too and I couldn’t bring myself to upset him by bringing it up.

But why her? Why did time have to take such a kind, generous, caring person who was instantly loved by anyone that had the fortune of meeting her?

Well, what should I have expected? Nothing good ever happens to good, honest people and when it does it quickly gets cruelly stolen away from them. As I had just learnt. Had Frank really meant any of that? The regret? The kiss in the first place? When his luscious lips had been pressed caringly onto my own, unworthy ones, I had finally felt like I belonged, like somebody actually cared about me. But no. Frank felt that he’d fucked-up. Because that’s all I am; a fuck-up in human format.

My heart felt like a stampede of infuriated elephants had had a party on it and then left it for the vultures to scavenge from. Frank really was beautiful; in every way imaginable. He could easily be rubbing shoulders with the most popular kids at Belleville High instead of slumming it with a loser like me, but because ten years of an extremely strong friendship meant more to him than looks and popularity we had stuck together. It’s like Frank’s able to see people for who they are, not what everyone else believes them to be; perhaps that’s why I had been stupid enough to believe that I stood even a slither of a chance with him. I had dreamt of that kiss for so long, but not like that, not with tears pouring from my eyes and Frank telling me it was a mistake. Gee hated me, had made it painfully apparent that he’d had enough with my pathetic, stupid self, not that I could blame him. Frank thought I was a fuck-up and was probably too freaked out about the fact we’d kissed to actually want to be my friend anymore. So I had ran to the cemetery, to the only person who still loved me, who still cared. But even she was dead, rotting in the ground without arms capable of wrapping around my crying body until I was all cried out., unable to fill her lungs with air so that she whisper soothing placations into my ear until I actually believed that everything would be alright again.

My beloved grandma was long dead. All my poor parents did was worry about me, yet fail to come anywhere close to understanding me. My amazing big brother and best friend actually hated me. And Frank didn’t love me. That’s the one that stung the most. People are always saying all of that romantic bullshit like “all you need is love”, but no one ever stops to consider what lonely freaks like me need because love is never an option, not for me, who’d be stupid enough to love somebody like me? Someone that nobody actually likes? Somebody that can’t deal with his own problems? Somebody who only ever succeeds in bringing down the ones he cares about the most? Someone who fantasizes about their own death?

“Grandma, I miss you,” I wept pointlessly, as though I hoped that she would hear me and arise from the grave, just to comfort me. I rested my forehead on the top of the rounded stone, my eyes squeezed shut and unwilling to stare into the dents of the stone marking out my grandma’s death date.

A hideously beautiful thought crept into my mind and took control of my body; fuck waiting for time to take me, time’s taking too fucking long!

I hastily grabbed a crumpled piece of paper from skinny-jean pocket and reached for my two most prized possessions; my pristine black Parker pen that Gee had bought me for my tenth birthday, five years ago, and my antique pocket knife that Grandma had bought me for her last Christmas with us. I can still remember that Christmas as though it’s branded onto the back of my eyelids; we were all so happy. It was just ten months ago, yet things have changed so much and all for the worse. We (Mom, Dad, Grandma, Gee and I) were all in our festively decorated living room, even Gee had managed to get up early for it. We all exchanged presents and smiles, no one even considered frowning, how could we; it was Christmas and nothing could bring us down! Mom and Dad fell asleep soon after Christmas dinner, leaving just myself, my brother and Grandma awake. She’d told us a story of when she was younger and when she’d gotten lost on Christmas Eve, out all alone in a snow storm. She’d told us all about the creepy dark forest she’d had to walk through to get home, but also about how she’d never given up hope because she knew that there had to be someone out there looking out for her, her own Guardian Angel.

But I can also remember that day, a little under two months later that Gerard had come up to my room to show me one of his drawings. He was only showing it to me to try to cheer me up after coming home from school with yet another fresh rash of bruises. I didn’t mind though; even if he didn’t think much of his drawings I believed that they were worth more than any Van Gogh or Leonardo Da Vinci crap. It was zombies this time; I think it was a zombie family eating some sort of rancid dinner. It had made me laugh, no matter how empty the laugh may have been and Gee had immediately seen through it. He had scooped me into his arms and had tried to make me feel better, but it just wasn’t working like it had done the million times before that point. There just comes a point when something gets broken so much that it just can’t be fixed, no matter how much superglue or duct tape is wasted on it. Then there had been a knock on the door. Mom came in, tears streaming down her face. She had told us then, but it was more like she had just been telling Gee, like I hadn’t been there at all. Gee was crying too, but stopped when he saw me; I was drained of all colour and shaking like a leaf. He’d said something, but I couldn’t hear him over the pounding in my aching head. And then I’d passed out, cursing time for taking my grandma from me when I’d needed her the most.

I yanked the lid of my pen and started scribbling wildly onto it, not caring that the combination of my relentless tears and the stinging rain was making the black ink run like blood.

I quickly wrote; “I’m sorry for all of my fuck-ups, I’m sorry for all of the hurt I cause. Love you all.”

I picked up the small switchblade that had failed me once before; I couldn’t fuck this up, not again.

“Here I come, Grandma.”





A/N: Cliff-hanger time! Review if you want to know what happens next :) I’d love to know what you think/like/dislike about the story so far. I wasn’t sure about this chapter, it’s definitely the heaviest thing I’ve written so far, so please let me know how you think it went. Thanks for reading! :)
P.S. Thanks to the lovely, fantastic people that've reviewed my story so far - you guys are the best! :)