Haven't Slept Since Sunday - Anderperry

Uptown girl

"It's really not that hard," Knox said, putting his feet up on the dashboard of the Cadillac his parents had bought him recently. He had stupid sunglasses on and the top buttons of his colourful shirt were undone. "Well that's easy for you to say. You stalked Chris until she went out with you...You're lucky she learned to like you." Despite the sunglasses, I knew he rolled his eyes at this. I placed my hand out of the Parked car, tapping on the door. "Alright, well, what do you look for in a woman? What's your type?" He asked, moving his sunglasses up to rest them on his head. I looked at him and sighed as I thought about it.

"I don't know.." I looked up at the clear, sunny sky, "I don't know, short light brown hair...Or dirty blonde...I like blue eyes, dimples are cute," I said with a nod. I could feel him looking at me with his eyebrows raised, I just knew it, so I turned to face him, "what?" I asked. "Nothing." He shook his head, taking his feet off the dashboard and sighing, "well, I'm sure it can't be that hard. You go to theatre club."
"Doesn't Chris have any friends you can introduce me to?"
"Uggghhhhh, okay fine, yes. I know she knows a girl who's sort of like what you described, she's a sweet girl too alright, you happy with that?" He asked and I smiled with a nod.

The booming music filled my ears as we entered the house. Why would anyone have a party on a Sunday? Who's house it was, I didn't know, but Chris knew and that was enough for us. "Alright boys, remember I'm not drinking tonight because I brought the car, don't try and convince me," Knox told us, and Todd and I both nodded. "The girls will be here soon," Chris told us, holding onto Knox's hand and walking off with him.

"Do you want a drink?" I asked Todd, putting my hands in my pockets and looking around, "yeah, please," he answered, leaning against the hallway wall. I didn't know what the drinks were, I didn't particularly care, so I just took the first two cups I could and went back to Todd. When I got back, the girls were there talking to Todd, so I went over and handed Todd one of the cups, "thanks," he said. The girls looked at me and I looked back at them. They weren't anything like what I had wanted, one had long blonde hair and the other had shorter, jet black hair. The blonde one had green eyes and I didn't pay attention to the other girls eyes, I wasn't interested. "Hello," I said with a sigh, still trying to be polite. The blonde said her name was Allison and the other one was Melissa, although I didn't really ask.

Sipping from my drink, I still didn't look at them, "you're Neil right?" Allison asked, and I nodded. I didn't enjoy the taste of the drink, but I needed a way to escape this. For a moment, I thought I could feel Todd looking at me but I ignored it, "that's a nice name," she said, "Thanks, my parents gave it to me." She giggled even though I said it with a serious tone. The way she giggled seemed artificial to me.

Moments and many many drinks later, the four of us were sitting on the couch. My tie was loose, my hair a mess. Todd's was also a mess, his eyes were red and he couldn't stop hiccuping. The girls yapped on and on about some drama in their school, something like that. I couldn't care less, and I could tell the Todd couldn't either. All of a sudden, the familiar tune of Uptown Girl by Billy Joel began to play. In unison, Todd and I gasped and immediately perked up, "I love this song!" We both exclaimed at the exact same time before jumping up. Allison and Melissa looked a little shocked and embarrassed as we began to dance and laugh together.

Considering we were pretty drunk, we stumbled around around a little but didn't stop laughing. We held onto each other's hands and spun around and did all sorts of dumb shitty moves, singing the words with breaking voices, Todd's hiccups making me giggle like a child. "I love you!" I yelled over the loud music, and I meant it. Although now was an odd time to say it, Todd was my best friend. It's normal to tell your best friends you love them. He smiled, showing off his teeth and dimples, "I love you too!" He yelled back, and I spun him around as we continued to dance, letting everything around us disappear.

"Well, it seems like they had fun," I head Chris say from the passenger seat as Knox was driving us all back. He just nodded, focusing on the road. "Todd..." I said, slurring slightly and snickering, "Todd you...You're small," I said as I raised my hand and pointed at him. He laughed and nodded, "let's-we..let's swap jackets...let's trade," I suggested, already laughing at the idea. Laughing too, he immediately took of his jacket and so did I. When he put it on, it looked pretty big on him. Of course I was a taller than Todd, my shoulders were broader as well. Not drastically different, but enough so that his jacket looked tiny on me. We both erupted with laughter when I put it on, "it looks so small!" He exclaimed, clapping his hands together. I almost fell off of the seat.

"Todd...Todd, do-do you wanna hear a dirty joke?" I whispered, still giggling. He giggled too and nodded. "Okay so...so there's a girl an-and she...She goes to her mom and she's happy and shit and she's like 'hey mom, these boys gave..gave me twenty bucks to climb a tree'" I started laughing harder than ever at this point, "and she...she is like..her mom is like you're so dumb they just wanted to see your panties! But then the girl is like...No, I took them off, cause I'm smart." We both started wheezing. The joke was not funny at all, but drunk boys will laugh at anything. Chris turned around, a disgusted look on her face, "that's gross!" She exclaimed. I shook my head, "it's hilarious..."

The next morning was very unpleasant. Like I had mentioned previously, the party was on a Sunday, meaning it was Monday now and I had school. When I woke up and I looked over at the bed next to mine - I did this every morning - Todd was gone. This didn't surprise me as I could tell from the light outside and the silence surrounding me that everyone must be in class. Of course this meant I was late, but I wasn't too bothered with this. One day couldn't hurt and I was feeling nauseous anyway so I had better go to the nurses office to explain the situation. Once I had gotten dressed and walked to the nurse's office, I saw why Todd wasn't there when I woke up. He was in his uniform, his hair a mess and his hands shaking, throwing up into a bucket as the nurse rubbed his back. She was clearly soothing him (or at least trying to) as tears rolled down his cheeks and sobs escaped his mouth.

Ignoring my own nauseous feelings (that were only amplified by the sounds of Todd's) I sat down next to him and patted his thigh, "Well, what's going on here Toddy?" I asked calmly but still in a joking manner; wanting to help him feel a little better. He sniffled and wiped his cheeks, "Sick..." He mumbled, his voice breaking. I smiled at this. I don't know why, perhaps I thought it was cute, but either way I wanted to help him feel better so I wrapped in arm around his shoulder. The nurse stood up as if to leave us alone and Todd fit perfectly in my arm, like some sort of puzzle. He didn't hesitate to snuggle into me. "There there Todd, don't worry, I'm here now," I said soothingly. The nurse looked like she was going to say something but then decided against it, walking into her office and leaving us alone in the dusty room.

Todd put the bucket aside, wiping his mouth and looking up at me. I smiled at him, a genuine smile as looking at him never failed to make me smile, and he weakly smiled back. "Sorry...I probably should have taken more care of you last night," I said jokingly with a laugh. He laughed too and shook his head, "no no, it was my own fault...drinking so much...Although I do still remember all of it." He chuckled slightly. "I remember it all too," I told him with a nod, "it was a lot of fun, eh?" I asked with a chuckle. He smiled, showing off his teeth this time, and nodded.

I had began to notice that over the course of talking to Todd my nausea had seemed to disappear as if he were some sort of medicine. Some sort of cure. It seemed that Todd also felt the same way as he was no longer throwing up and there weren't any tears rolling down his rosy cheeks. Was I a cure to him? Well I did hope so, but most likely I was just telling myself that to feel better or something. Not that I felt better. What did I have to feel better about? I never felt bad in the first place.

"Well, anyway, we better get to class or something," I said with a sigh, bringing myself out of my thoughts. He nodded and put the bucket down, "uh, I guess the nurse can just deal with that," he said and we both snickered, before standing up and walking to class together in unison.