City full of Empty People

13

𝙹𝙰𝚂𝚈𝚁𝙰 𝙱𝙰𝙽𝙺𝚂

I still remember the days I couldn't wait to grow up. Looking at my parents and thinking they had everything figured out, thinking they had found themselves completely, thinking they knew the answer to everything.

Truth is, they didn't. Grownups didn't know shit. They might thought they do, but they didn't. Yes, experience brings wisdom, but it also brings other stuff, shitty stuff, like trauma and shit.

I mean, who even am I? Who do I want to be? If anything, is that even my decision to make?

School has been boring all day and my mind had been all over the place. Rhett was as confusing as ever, even though I hadn't seen him since that night. He had skipped school yesterday, but I didn't care. I didn't care why and above all I wasn't worried about him. At all. That's right.

Since Neo had come out to me our relationship had somewhat changed a little. Mostly to the better. He was way more open and... himself, I didn't know how to describe it. It was just something you could feel. That did not, however, change his flirty side and attitude towards me.

The bell rang and hereby ended 6th period. Politics. I hated politics, not because of the subject itself, no, it was the topic they were talking about. The Great War between the Novak and the Oswin. Wasn't so great though, in my opinion.

It's okay to discuss it and I'm fine with discussing it, but a huge part of that war was... well, my father's death. But that wasn't even the worst part, since his murderer was apparently a person, sorry, a monster, who got way more attention.

I was, in fact, kind of thankful my father's death had stopped being the talk of the whole school and they had found other gossip, but now it was like...

like he's never even been here. Alive. It was like he had been forgotten and replaced. I understood that it's been some time alright, but for me it felt like it happened yesterday. There hadn't been a day where I haven't thought of him.

There wasn't a day where I hadn't asked myself what he would do in that situation. Because, to me, it still felt like he did have an answer to everything. But I didn't. The more I wanted to solve his death, find the reason, find answers, the more confusing it became.

I felt an arm rest on my shoulders making me look up.

"Here." Neo smiled holding three roses in his hand and giving me the fine bouquet.

"What is that for." I replied watching his lips curl before I continued hastily.
"Did I forget my birthday?"

He laughed and slowly went through his blonde hair.

"No, not this time." He said, watching as I admired the flaming red roses in my hands. I looked up at him again waiting for him to continue and finally tell me the reason. He slightly rolled his eyes.

"Can't I just give my beautiful friend a gift?" His hand rested on my shoulders again, guiding me through the door outside.

"No." I said, "But thank you."

-

I usually liked sitting in the cafeteria since I could spend time with Neo and talk about stuff, but today, wow, the food had been especially gross. I couldn't, for the love of god, figure out what that weird mash was. The color of it looked like the dish you'd serve on the toilet too.

"I won't eat that." I ate the last slice of apple and let my fork sink into the mash which, I could have sworn, just moved on its own.

"Good because I'd be concerned if you wanted to die young." Neo took both our plates and brought them back before making me exit the cafeteria. I grabbed my roses and followed him out.