The Writer & The Player #Wattys2016

Chapter 4

My back ached, and all I knew was that there was way to much light streaming in the room and a muted thumping noise that I assumed was just in my dream. I opened my eyes hazily, remembering where I was.

Instinctively, my hand went straight to my neck to search for my necklace.  My fingers laced around the small golden 's' that hung from the chain, as I let out a breath of relief. It had become a habit. I was so damn afraid of losing one of the most important things of my sister's.

My feet were hanging over the arm rest of the tiny couch and my back was curled into a backwards C with a cushion shoved under my chin. I squinted, the morning light streaming into the otherwise dark room.

I yawned, my head pounding from my little amount of sleep and lethargically drew my eyes towards the couch. Zac was still asleep, his body completely straight along the couch, stiff and almost lifeless. I rolled my legs off of the couch and sat still in the chair, my head cuddled into my palms, as I started to inspect Zac's face.

His cut was looking averagely the same as a few hours ago, but the swelling in his eye had gone down.

I looked around the dimly lit room with streams of warm morning sunlight and began to realise the noise I had assumed was just in a dream had continued up again, and was only getting louder.

The banging was coming from outside in the hall and it wasn't on my door.

I desperately searched for my phone, my brain thumping loudly in dizziness from my little amount of sleep. I attempted to unlock my phone, and again, and again, until I came to the realisation that it was completely and utterly dead.

I bolted into the bedroom catching a quick glance at the antique beside table clock then back out to the lounge room towards the door as my suspicions were beginning to come true.

It was 7:30am.

"Shit!" I exclaimed.

I hurriedly opened the door, and just as I had thought, Rafael was across the hall, violently banging on Zac's door, yelling out profanities.

I cleared my throat behind Rafael, attempting to calmly grasp his attention.

"Rafael." I hollered.

He turned abruptly, almost surprised, even more so when his eyes scanned my body as I realised my particular choice of clothing at this point in time.

"Miss Houston! I'm sorry for this racket, I've been trying to get a hold of Zac all morning. You haven't seen him, have you?" He spoke haphazardly.

My mouth dropped to a small 'O' and I didn't know how exactly to approach the situation.

"He's uh-" I pointed with my thumb behind me sheepishly. "He's on the lounge."

Rafael pushed past me into the room in a rush barely giving me enough time to gather my thoughts on any of this.

It was only then, that when I returned back into my room from the hall way that it came to my attention that Rafael had three daily papers in his hands, all with the exact same front story. Zac Bleu's wild night. There was a photo of Zac with two security guards throwing him out of a club with the exact same bruise around his eye and cut on his forehead.

By the time I had walked back in, Zac was standing up half asleep and yet totally engaged and aware with what Rafael was saying to him.

"Zac, it's everywhere. This is the kind of stuff you do not need right now. You know that. What were you thinking?" Rafael paced around the room causing a cool draft, waving the three papers in the air.