Scratches // DNF

Chapter 15

George cleared his throat, shifting his seating to reciprocate the pressure in which Dream was pressing their thighs together.

I suddenly felt anxious to hear the night's tale. I'd heard its brief version when George gave his statement to the police. But other than that, he hadn't spoken a word of the incident since.

"Um, well, Dream was away, as you know," George began, his voice feigning strength. "He wasn't far, just visiting his parents in Orlando. But, yeah, he wasn't home."

He paused, his eyes darting across the knitted rug. He bit at his lip whilst gathering his thoughts before continuing.

"Sapnap had gone out the night before. I'm not even 100% sure where to - some college party or something."

It had been frat party shit that I hadn't even wanted to go to. My college friends, if they could even be classified as such, had practically forced me to go, calling me 'boring' and all this bullshit that I can't believe I submitted to.

Alas I'd gone and gotten drunk enough to stumble home just before the sun rose. I'm going to be honest, I can't remember a single thing of the party. I remember arriving, feeling a thousand uncomfortable pricks all over my skin and turning to alcohol to relieve the anxiety. I can't remember who I talked to, what I did or anything at all. It's a pathetic memory for the last night I was alive.

"I woke the next morning to find him asleep on the couch. He must have not bothered to go to bed."

I was wasted and probably exhausted.

"I hadn't heard him come home, but I'd gotten up at like 3 during the night, and he wasn't there. So it must have been pretty late.

"So I just let him sleep, he looked like he needed it. By the time I'd awoken, Dream had already left."

George looked to his side at Dream, who was nodding encouragingly, attempting to conceal his concern with support.

"I sat by his side and did college work for maybe an hour. It was lunch time by then, but we were always terrible with the groceries so the fridge was empty. I plugged my laptop in and popped down to the shop a block away. I left home and, well... that was the last time I saw him alive." His voice wobbled, so he paused to bite his lip harder until blood appeared. He ignored it.

"See the charger I plugged into my laptop - that fucking charger - was broken. It was frayed, with it's wires on show and everything. Dream and Sapnap had told me countless amounts of times to replace it. Why didn't I just replace it?" He grabbed his head with his hands, tugging at pieces of his hair. Dream's hand moved up George's back, rubbing back and forth apprehensively.

My parents were staring silently from the opposite side of the living room, patiently. My dad's arms were crossed and my mum's face remained completely expressionless.

"Apparently it overheated or sparked or something - it's hard to say," George continued, hands covering eyes. His voice had completely weakened by this point, his beginning confidence having chipped away until only a feeble, shameful whisper was left. "I'd left it perched above a cushion. So when it started heating up or whatever, that was the first to catch fire.

"Once it started, our shitty, cheap couch was the perfect fuel. The firefighters told me it probably didn't take long at all for one flame to practically set the whole sofa alight. But it wasn't necessarily the flames that was the problem - it was the smoke they produced.

"The smoke filled the apartment, racing into each corner. At some point..." George choked. "He must have woken up."

My coughing woke me, in fact. My desperate choking came on suddenly, snatching me from deep sleep. I slung off the sofa, the movement nauseating my hungover body, to bend over with the force of my coughing. I instantly felt something wasn't right. Lightheadedness washed over my entire body, but I'd just woken up; there could have been a handful of explanations for that.