if by chance | ✓

04 | i'm like, 104% tired

[ 04 ]

R H Y S

✦

It was pouring profusely ─ on the rooftop, the windowpane and my pillow.

Everything felt like it would crumble down on me, crushing me down to the core. The rumbling thunder sends a sudden chill down my spine and my heart on a race. This wasn't new. Ever since I discovered that my dad left us when I wasn't even born, it has been like this. A dark and gloomy monotonous life.

He could have chosen to stay ─ to be there for my mother and me. But he didn't. He chose to live like a vagabond, to wander around and not wanting to take the responsibility of a 'family', which in his words (as my ma says) is 'not worth it'. And what hurts the most is that I spent my entire childhood believing a lie. I believed my father was dead when the truth was ─ he's out there somewhere, probably happy and has probably, married again.

And even though I have a father, it feels like I don't. Maybe it was better in a way ─ living in oblivion, believing that he was dead. But now that I know he isn't ─ it breaks me. Every single time I see my mother, her worn out condition and the struggles she goes through on a regular basis.

Maybe that's when I had decided to work so hard that she didn't have to worry about me again. Maybe that's why I never allow myself to fall back, to give in to the wanderings of my mind. Funnily enough, the mind-wanderings might be a gene I've inherited from my almost nonexistent father.

A single tear drop falls on the snapshot that I was holding for so long. It's a picture of my father ─ holding up a fishing rod and a glistening tuna hooked to it. He looks happy, almost, with a triumphant grin on his face that was so young back then.

Ma says it's the last picture of him that she has. She says "those were the good times, the times before everything came hurling down to a nothingness."

I take in a deep breath, putting it back to the central pages of my journal. Maybe one day I'll get to meet him and I'll hand it back to him that day. That day, perhaps ─ he would have to answer all the stupid questions which I never even got a chance to ask.

"Rhys! Eugene's here to meet you!" Ma's voice reaches me and I get up to my feet, hurriedly bringing back my composure.

Eugene, my best pal since we were practically toddlers, was waiting down in the living room, having a slight small talk with my mother. He waves at me as I walk down the stairs, heart still pounding heavily against my ribs.

I don't know how some people manage to put on fake smiles so perfectly. But I'm not one of them ─ so I try my best to not let anyone know that I had been crying like a baby.

"Library or your room?" Eugene asks, raising an eyebrow.

"Uh...library."

"Man, seriously! What's with you and your obsession with that creepy building?" He groans and I chuckle.

"I don't know, I love that place. And the scent of old books." I shrug as we walk out into the street.

The rain had reduced to a slight drizzle but as per weather reports, there was a cyclone and it was going to be a stormy weekend. Typical London weather, I think. It is a five minutes walking distance to the library from my house, so we reach there quite fast, yet kind of soaked.

"You alright?" Eugene asks as soon as we are into the warm library building and seated in one of the corners.

"Yeah. Why?"

"Nothing, you just look kind of tired." He says, frowning.

"I am. I am tired." I let out a sigh, looking up at the high ceiling that has not been dusted for a long time.

"Anything you wanna share?"

For a moment, I think of letting it out. What do I have to lose anyways? But then, it just occurs to me that sharing my emotions meant having to answer too many questions, having to give explanations ─ which I am really too tired to give.

"Haven't slept well last night. Anyways, you wanted to solve the practice papers right?" I blurt out, deviating the topic.

"Sure thing. Um, lemme bring a book, it's in the second floor I guess ─" Eugene offers, getting up.

I sit back, resting my head against the shelf, taking in the whiff of books that are mostly old with some rare recent additions. Not more than five minutes have passed when I hear a sudden thud, quite close, followed by the shrieking of a girl. It makes me flinch. Who else is in here?

Running to the next row of shelves, I find out.

✦

Coraline. It was her. The greenish-blue eyed girl that I met two days ago, in the cab ─ leaning over someone who has apparently fallen down causing the 'thud'.

"What are you waiting for? Me to lift up his body like a hunk?" She glares at me. I realize I had been stupefied, so I quickly walk over to her, crouching down and immediately recognize the guy on the floor. Eugene Cooper.

It takes me a moment to actually believe it was him. I mean, only minutes ago he was right beside me, talking like a normal human being.

"Hey, Cooper! Come on up man! What's wrong?" I shout, flopping down on the floor next to him and Cora, not knowing what to do.

"Uhm, you know you are talking to a person who is unconscious, right?" Coraline raises an eyebrow. She was really blessed in the eyebrow department, I notice, although it wasn't exactly the right time to do so.

"What happened to him? He went to bring a book and ─ " I look at her, dazed.

"And he fainted. Now don't sit here like a dumbass, call an ambulance!" She flicks my forehead, which somehow brings me to my senses even though I was still pretty much in shock.

"You kids, I already called the hospital. They are on their way. Just carry him out to the front." The librarian, a tall lady with cat-eye glasses and full lips, commands.

"Oh wow, I'm like 104% tired and here comes more trouble! Way to go, ha!" Coraline groans and then pulls her always-messy, kind-of-curly hair into a bun. Even at this moment of distress, I can't help but stare, observing the ways she is different yet similar to my classmate, Noah.

"What were you even doing here? I mean, I thought you weren't the type that goes to libraries, especially on rainy nights?!" I ask her as we move a stiff, blacked out Eugene to the front porch of the library building.

"Well, I wasn't the type that would, for the third time this week, run into a dufus like you, either!"

✦

a/n : i figured that i'm writing more characters with daddy issues. also, there will be chapters with rhys' pov, just like this one, because ─ his side of the story deserves to be told.