Things Not Said

Chapter 5: Andrew

Andrew

I hear the music loudly in my ears. The sounds of Viva La Vida make me hum while my brush strokes the canvas. That’s what I love about painting: nothing but you, and your art.

The bright blue lightens when I add a touch of white to it and I bring my brush down to the light green before sweeping it across her eye. I breathe in the smell of the paint and am about to start singing to the music. I am quickly interrupted when I hear a ‘ting’ come from my phone.

I look backward to my radio and walk over to turn down the volume before grabbing my phone off the table and flipping it open. On the screen, a box reads ‘1 New Message’. I click the center button and see a text from Shane reading: ‘Party, my house, now.’ The period at the end of the sentence makes the text an order, more than an option. I sigh and look to my canvas.

All the lost sensations I’d felt while painting were gone and I had a feeling there was no getting back. Not tonight anyway. I hit Reply and type: ‘Coming.’ I send the message and grab my jacket off my chair. Leaving behind my painting uncovered, knowing my dad would never come in anyways, I walk out of the room, and slam the front door shut behind me just in time to cut out my dad’s questioning. 

 ~~~

Since I have no car, I have to walk all the way to the run down building that is Shane’s ‘house’. Even if he doesn’t live there he calls it his house, because that’s where all his parties are held. And boy does he hold a lot of parties. I think the point of having a bash in the middle of nowhere is so that there are no surrounding houses to complain about the noise, which I start hearing about three blocks away.

This part of town hasn’t been used in years. Nobody knows why, but suddenly everybody that had lived in the houses had up and left and the places were never rented again. As I near the building, I can already feel the beat of the bass thumping in my chest.

“Why didn’t I bring ear plugs?” I mumble.

I climb the stairs to the porch and let myself into the house. Nobody would’ve heard the doorbell anyway.

The noises, smells, and sights hit me like a wave, thrashing at my senses. The alcohol smell overpowers the one of sweat and bad breath. Everybody thrashes around the house, dancing or yelling above the music. Upstairs, the rooms are probably full of horny young adults doing things I probably shouldn’t describe.

I ease my way to the kitchen. This house hasn’t changed since I was fifteen. The wooden staircase still leads the way upstairs with wooden railing on either side. On the top floor, you can still see the doors to the rooms from where I stand. The white balustrade is covered with red and blue plastic cups and shiny golden garlands.

Maybe it’s a late Christmas party, or some kind of prank played on Shane because there are no other reasons he would put up garlands in a party this crowded.

I walk past the clogged bathroom: Shane hadn’t bothered to start the plumbing up again not wanting his parents to know he had parties in a house, miles away from the nearest hospital. But, sniffiing the smells coming from the bathroom, I would prefer getting yelled at by my parents than having to walk by this dump almost every day. I walk on, away from the horrible odor.

In the kitchen, the music booms at it’s loudest, the stereo being in the open living room next to it. Nicki Minaj’s Super Bass screeches at my eardrums and I wonder when Shane had lost his good taste in music.

I look at the faces that pass me by, looking for someone, anyone I might recognize. Nada. Shane had made a lot of new friends since I’d moved. I feel the moving bodies lead me to the cooler sitting on the table next to disco lights. I peer inside finding beers swimming in the water and ice. Digging my hand in and moving the bottles around, I look for a red can with white writing on it.