So Long, Not Goodnight

Chapter Seventeen

All the text in each book were small and their paper felt thin, almost tissue, with a pulpy grain that time turned rough and worn. Small indecipherable scribbles were in most of the margins, linear footnotes. He saw images of palmistry and prayer in a demonic setting, the lines of the hands and feet shown with dotted symmetry mapped to a key with what each line and crease meant and how pressure points could heal with certain technique. It was all so intricately explained. Most of the books were all open to a random assortment of pages that Gerard referenced back and forth, scribbling his own notes as well as book and page number and paragraph sourced. He was completed lost in theory and rhetoric as there was a sudden thump on his door and the knob jiggled. He jumped at first and then laughed to himself; it must have been Mikey checking in on getting home safe and sound. Gerard uncrossed his legs and pulled himself up from his bed and unlocked and opened his door, but the hall was empty. Still dark and quiet from when he initially made his way upstairs. He leaned out into the hallway and looked back and forth. No one was there, only him. Mikey's room was black and still across his own. 

Twisting behind him, the books all lay open and earmarked on his bed, the indentation of his body slowly filling with his absence from where he was sitting. There was a noise from downstairs, it was barely there, but was an obvious flash in the dark. Feeling the floor beneath him and the wall behind him, Gerard tried to peer around the corner at the staircase, but the first floor was still pitch. He silently moved down each stair, careful to skip over the third that was loose and always creaked with the feintest step and made his way over to the kitchen. The spigot dripped in the sink and it's echo brought relief to Gerard. "Motherfucker," he whispered to himself and leaned his head back against the doorframe. 

"What the fuck, Gerard!" Gerard almost jumped out of his skin as he noticed Mikey's face in the green glow of the microwave's clock holding a small white dish with mashed potatoes and chicken casserole.

Gerard shook his head side to side and pulled at the skin of his face. "You scared the fuck out of me, Mikey!"

"Sorry," Mikey took another bite of potato. "I just got back and figured that mom had something for us. I didn't mean to wake you up."

"You didn't," Gerard decided to help himself to a plate, he hadn't eaten since that morning. "I was reading."

"Anything good?" Mikey wiped at some stray casserole from his chin with the back of his hand. 

"Just the stuff Toro leant me," Gerard pulled a forkful of chicken into his mouth. "Which, by the way, I was making progress with until you interrupted me."

"I said I was sorry, Gerard," Mikey repeated. "I was just hungry. I tried to be as quiet as I could."

"I don't mean in the kitchen, Mikey," Gerard mixed potatoes with the casserole and shoveled a heap into his mouth. "I meant," he spoke out of one side of his mouth as he chewed. "When you knocked on the door and tried to come in."

Mikey looked down at his plate and back up to Gerard, spooning the last of his food into his mouth. "Whadda you mean? I just got back and was fucking around in the kitchen... I haven't been upstairs yet."

Gerard froze, his fork right before his lips as he brought it down to his plate still full. "What?"

Mikey spun his finger around the remnants of his plate and brought it to his mouth before depositing his wares into the sink and soaked them with a slight stream of water from the tap. "Ray just dropped me off. I hadn't made it past the kitchen where you found me."

Gerard stared into his mashed potatoes and blinked repeatedly. "You alright, Gerard?"

Gerard met his brother's eyes and smirked. "Yeah... Just lost my appetite, I guess."