The Great War

Chapter 1

The clouds look soft. The sky is so blue. Houses look so tiny. People are so miniscule, as if they don't even matter at all. I close my eyes as I'm leaning my head against the window. In less than an hour I would see my brother again. The last time I've seen him was at our mom's funeral. That was 5 months ago. We used to be really close but then he moved to New York for college. He had a lot going on and we kind of drifted apart. After 2 years he dropped out to work at some company that some friend ownes. I don't even know what exactly he's doing now. When mom got sick last year everyone dealt with it in their own way. Dad threw himself into work, at least until she died then he rather turned to booze. Jackson, said brother, distanced himself more and more. He visited less and when he did he never stayed long. And I just kinda froze. I stayed exactly how I was that afternoon when mom and dad came home from the hospital to tell us that mom got diagnosed with cancer. But I'm 19 now and I basically just paused a whole year of my life. Moving to New York is supposed to be turning over a new leaf. A new chapter starting right now. Catching up on all the things I never experienced. My thoughts were interrupted by the flight attendand announcing that we'll be landing soon.

When I finally got off the plane and claimed my bags I walked out to look for Jackson. I scanned the crowd for his familiar face. I didn't have to wait long since he spotted me immediatly and kept walking very fastly in my direction yelling my name. When he reached me he wrapped his arms around me almost squeezing me to death.

"I missed you." he said.

"I missed you too but maybe you could let me breath." I tried to wiggle away from him.

"Did you grow? You seem taller." he said while taking my suitcase.

We walked to the car together, which really suprised me because I did not expect Jackson to have a car, let alone a fancy one like this. It was some kind of black SUV. He loaded all my bags in the trunk and walked over to the drivers side. I got in while still looking at him quite baffled. I was expecting to take the subway to some rundown downtown studio apartment. This car was defenetly way too expensiv for a college drop out.

"What do you do again Jackson?" I asked quite curious.

"I told you I work for my friend Hayden. It's really not that interesting." he explained.

"You said you work for some friends company. I thought you were talking about some college drop out's start-up. How can you afford this car?" I said pointing out the obvious question.

"It's a decent company. And he's not a college drop out. He's actually pretty great most of the time you'll see." he said.

"I don't think I'll be seeing your boss much." I said looking out of the window.

"He's quite private but I think there's no avoiding him since you'll be living in his house."

I will what? I took my eyes off the passing fall trees outside and looked very wide eyed over at Jackson. I was not informed of any of it.

"I will be what? What are you talking about Jackson. I think you've just skipped a couple of pages."

"I told you, didn't I?" he said not very certain of himself.

"Told me what, Jackosn?" still not following.

"I really thought I told you. I'm living with Hayden. It's quite a big and nice house so he's letting me rent one of the bedrooms." he explained. "When you told me about moving to New York I asked him if you could get the other room and he agreed."

"So this just somehow slipped your mind?" I asked as Jackson pulled into the driveway.

The house in front of us was made of grey bricks. It was two stories high and so beautiful. I couldn't belive my eyes. I did not expect this at all. There were some vines of ivy running up the wall and around one of the large windows. Jackson opened the trunk and grabbed one of the bags. He walked up to the door unlocking it. I followed him inside the house. We stood in a halway with stairs leading up on the right side of it. To my left was the living room. I only caugt a glinmpse of a dark maprbel fireplace. On the other side was the kitchen. It was actually very nice and clean.