Apartment 206

The End (Of the Beginning)

The News:
     I slowly walk in to Olivia's room, and as quietly as possible. Andrew notices me first. "Hey, Cara. What's up? You're usually louder."
I stand still and Jake notices. He stands up, and says,"Cara, are you okay?" I stand still, and don't say anything. Olivia and Andrew stares at me in concern.
"Come on," Jake says, now standing next to me, with a hand on my shoulder. "You have to tell one of us, Cara."
"My mom died."
    Everyone is dead silent: Jake, staring at me, with his arm on my shoulder, Olivia, sitting on the ground and staring at me in shock, and Andrew, sitting on the bed, now getting up.
Everyone in the room is teary eyed because here's the thing: now all of our parents are either gone or dead.
     We all stand there quietly, and begin to cry.
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Parents:
    Jake's parents were first:
    Jake had a really hard time in school because he always had to leave in the middle of school. His mom would pick him up, and bring him to court.
    Jake's mom gave birth to Jake at age 27. She wasn't married to Jake's dad. Five years after they had Jake, his dad cheated on his mom. They broke up, and in elementary school, his mom and dad had an argument about who would keep him.
    They made a compromise that Jake would see his dad on the weekend, and see his mom on the weekdays. All was well until Jake's dad died.
    His dad was addicted to alcohol and drugs. He would always smoke weed outside of restaurants, sneak out to clubs when he thought no one was awake, come home at 3 am, completely wasted; smelling like pot. Of course his mom hated this, but there was no stoping it. If you tried, he would yell, and most likely break something.
    Drug addiction is what got Jake's dad killed. To much marijuana, too much of everything, really.
    Jake's mom was always a cautious lady; she would make sure everyone's seatbelt was on before driving, she would always remember to activate the econ button if there was bad weather, stuff like that. But maybe one day she wasn't too cautious.
    On her way home from work one day, it was raining. She could only barely see five feet in front of her. She had a tough day, so she was more angry than usual. There was a car in front of her, and it wasn't moving. She honked, and she thought the car moved, so she drove. The car didn't move one inch. She crashed into the car, and the airbags went off.

Next were Olivia and Andrew's parents:
Olivia and Andrew are siblings. Twins, actually. Andrew is older by eight minutes.
Growing up, Olivia and Andrew never had a mother figure in their life. Five weeks after their birth, their mom's work building caught on fire.
Their dad was pretty abusive after that. He was obviously traumatized by the death. Like Jake's dad, all he would drink was whisky or beer. Andrew tried to stop him, and that resulted in him having to get stitches because his dad broke a beer glass on his head.
Apparently their dad felt sorry for what he did, but Olivia and Andrew didn't give him an apology, which made him feel worse. He jumped off a building three days after.

    Then there were my parents:

    I never had a dad. Apparently when the guy found out my mom was pregnant, he left and never came back. My mom has raised me on my own, for 17 years.
One day, my mom got sick. She got so sick that she was spitting blood, every morning. She threw up almost everyday. She would have headaches all day.
She started basically living at the hospital, and when I thought she would get better, she got worse. She eventually died.

All of our families were pretty dysfunctional. That's why we're now best friends. We all met at a therapy session at school called "Dealing With Family Issues". What they said there didn't help any of us.
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The News [Part Two] - Resuming to me crying:

Everyone has stopped crying but me. Jake is still hugging me, Olivia is in the bathroom, redoing her makeup, and Andrew is sitting on Olivia's bay window, looking outside, at the rain.
Jake and I are on the bed. We are sitting there, staring at the white wall. Jake tries comforting me, but it isn't working. Endless tears stream down my face. We have been like this for forty-five minutes.
I rest my head on his shoulder. He keeps hugging me.
None of us talk. We all sit in silence.
Finally, Olivia gets out of the bathroom,"I have an amazing idea."
None of us say anything.
"What if we all move into a huge apartment? If we add all our bank money up, we can afford a four roomed apartment!" She says, enthusiastically.
Andrew snorts,"Please," He gives Olivia a listen to me, I am most likely right look. "If we did that, we'd be eating ramen our whole life."
Jake smiles,"I'd like that!"
This manages to get a smile on my face,"This isn't actually a bad idea. If we don't do this, there will be one empty bedroom in all of our apartments. What would we do with those rooms?"
"Fair point," Andrew says.
"I'm in." Jake says, standing up.
"Am I a genius, or what?" Olivia congratulates herself.
"So we're doing this?" I ask for confirmation.
The three of them nod.

Andrew adds all of our bank money up, Jake finds apartments, and Olivia packs and I help her.
"I am not going to lie, this is the best idea you've ever made," I say, finally able to smile.
She punches me lightly in the arm,"I've had good ideas before! One of them: being your best friend. See, I do make some good decisions!"
"True that," I say, still smiling.