Fever Dream Red

5

When I came out of the shower, it dawned on my that it was early early morning. I'd never gotten back to bed after the banging, only going on a midnight adventure to kill my curiousity.

I went back down to where Skye was before I went out. They were still there, with Matt this time. His jagged and chaotic frame was leaning over this map, and I still had no idea what Skye was planning with him.

"Still at it?"
They both glanced up, saw it was me, and then their eyes shot down again.
"Planning takes time." Matt insisted.
"It seems to be taking quite a lot of time." I vaguely challenged Matt, looking for some excitement in the haze of boredom.
"Think you can do it better?" Skye finally looked up, eyebrows raised.

Just then Doug walked in, his hands clasped over what looked to be a bowl of cereal.
"What you got there?" I asked, almost immediantly. Anything to change the subject.
"Coco pops?"
Doug placed the cereal on the table and held his hands up.
"You guessed right, Finny. How?"
I shrugged. "I thought you would. You can tell a lot about a person by what cereal they eat."
"I don't eat any cereal, Pheonix. Does that say anything about me?"
"Plenty. In truth, I don't either. I don't like breakfast food."
"You should," Doug used his spoon to point at me,"it's the most important meal of the day."
"As I've heard."

Doug's face relaxed into a quiet smirk.

Doug was one of those people who could laugh at anything, whether it was actually funny or not.

Doug and his... friend Alfie had taken care of Sunny since they were fifteen years old. Sunny was abandoned as a baby, left on the doorsteps of the orphanage was babies often were. They tool care of her until they turned eighteen, at which point they adopted her. Doug and Alfie must've been nearly thirty.

"Where are the rest of them, anyway?"
"Everywhere." Skye answered.

I sighed and was just about to exit when Doug called after me.
"Finny!"
"Hm?"
"Inez and Danny were looking about for you."
"Where are they now?"
"They went that way." Doug pointed down the corridor where the other occupied rooms were. "You could ask Eli and Mimi?"
"Nah. I'm not yet suicidal."
Doug rolled his eyes."Come on Finny. They aren't that bad."

I raised my eyebrows at him.

"It's not like they'll kill you."
"I'm not sure. I think one of Eli's stares could probably send me six feet under."

That was it. Doug burst out laughing. I wasn't being that funny, but Doug laughed at anything. Even though he was twice my age, Doug still had the maturity of a teenager. It always got on Alfie's nerves.

Just then a door opened. It was Eli's door. At that point I had to bite down on my lip so hard. I couldn't laugh. I couldn't.

He caught our eyes as he started walking down the stairs to the kitchen, presumably. He looked us up and down and then seemed to roll his eyes.

Doug was probably biting his tongue. I could see he had his hands held behind his back, and he was rolling on the balls of his feet. He always did that when he was trying to stop himself from laughing.

It took about five seconds, and we burst out laughing. We couldn't keep it in.

I had almost forgotten that I had stored all that mirth inside me for safekeeping.

But Doug could always help me to remember.

"Tell you what. I'll come with you to find Danny and Inez."
"Thanks."

We walked down the stairs.

"We shouldn't have been laughing. After all, there is people dying." I sighed, trying to instantly disapprove of the fun that I had had.

That set Doug off again.

"You know, Kourtney?" He registered my blank expression. "You know what, nevermind. It was before your time."

"But anyway, just because people are dying doesn't mean we can't enjoy ourselves. In fact, I think that it's all the more reason to find joy in life. I suspect all the people that are dying now wouldn't want us to cry and be miserable because of them. They'd want us to be grateful of the life we still have, and in turn enjoy as much of it as we can. That's how I would feel, anyway."

I nodded. The whole thing was very much Doug.

We found Danny and Inez. They were with Alfie and Sunny.

Danny and Inez and Alfie and Doug got talking about whatever. They were hunched round a fairly big desk which was now a coffee table of sorts. They were making their own coffees with the stupid tiny sachets of instant coffee and sugar and the kettle. They had been relegated from the dining room because of the map, so they had to go to the lounge instead.

Sunny was sitting on the end of the bed nearby. I was stood looking out of the window onto the beach. The rain was pattering down heavily now. You could hear it hammering down on the roof. It was like nature was knocking on our door to evict us. Even she knew we did not belong here. We shouldn't have been alive, let alone alive here.

"How have you been?" Sunny asked, making a perhaps lazy effort to start conversation. I had nothing better to do, so I followed her.
"Alright, I guess. Before the whole apocalypse thing."

An awkward pause settled, like dust on a tiresome book.

"How have you been?" I asked her. I couldn't bear the pounding on the roof being the only sound registering in my brain. If I didn't anchor myself down into a conversation, I would think too much and too hard. Then I would get stuck in my head, worrying and worrying until I felt frogs leaping about to my throat.

"Good. I've been getting along better away from here. It's a shame it all had to go."
"What?"
"Everything I had. My life was actually starting to go to plan, and now it's all gone dark."

Sunny sighed.

"You shouldn't worry about things you can't control."

I follow the voice to Lily, sat cross legged on the bed. She was knitting, her fingers intertwined with yarn.

Her black lace up boots left a slight memory of mud on the sheets of the bed as she twitched them absentmindedly.

She was wearing one of those long flowly dresses she always seemed to wear, with a haze of curly hair, tied back from her eyes.

Her eyes were focused on her work intensely, as if she was in some sort of trance.

With every flicker of movement she made, her rings, earrings and bangles and necklaces moved with her.

I hadn't even realised she was there.

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Thanks to PavoCartel and dojacant for doing so. It is appreciated :)