The Incredible League of Goth Pizza Haters (RH)

Part 79

---Sylvia---
Maybe twenty minutes after we'd arrived at my mother's house Cody pulled in the driveway and came sprinting to the door. He hugged me and my mother made snacks for everyone.

We all settled on the couch and watched movies, I think for my benefit because I still wasn't feeling exactly like I should be running a marathon. It was touching and all.. Except that it felt like everyone was almost expecting me to be all sick. At one point I even got up and walked to the kitchen to see what would happen.

They stared and Cody even trailed behind me. Fucking hell. Yeah, I felt bad and kind of wanted to sleep but I wasn't going to.. Definitely not if they were going to act like this.

Some time later Ricky went home to shower and change, saying he would visit tomorrow. He didn't press on the subject of me coming home and I didn't bring up the alcohol.

The next few hours passed pretty uneventfully. Cody thanked my mom for the snacks, hugged me again and left. Mena left for her afternoon shift at work. Nick and Dani retired to their rooms and I took a nap on the couch.

Which was a mistake because I woke up at seven thirty at night. My back was aching from the couch and I was missing my cat. I got up and walked to my mom's room, requesting a drive back to my own house.

She said no at first, but like back at the hospital, I managed to convince her. I gathered everything I needed, all my pain meds and we drove there. She let me out of the car and I walked up and knocked. My key was in my car. My car was fuck knows where.

Ricky opened the door. His hair was wet and his face was a mixture of surprise, then terror. He froze for a minute then stepped back and let me in.

"Hey - I thought you were going to stay the night with your mother."

"I missed my cat.. And.. I live here." I said and he nodded and began rambling.

"I - uhm - it's a bit messy. I'm sorry.." I walked down the hallway and stopped in shock upon seeing the state of the living room and kitchen. Pillows everywhere, the coffee table looked like it had had a rough day. Everything that had been on the counters was thrown to the floor, one of the table's chairs was broken and there was a goddamn hole in the wall.

"Jesus Christ what the hell happened, Ricky? It looks like a hurricane swept through." I said it half jokingly but when I looked him in the face he looked kind of depressed.

"Sorry," he mumbled, "I had a bit of a mental breakdown yesterday."

"Why?"

"I thought you died.. Or.. the way the police officer described it, she made it sound a lot worse than it was. Like you were paralyzed or something." I let my bag fall to the ground as I moved forward and hugged him, squeezing even as my chest began to ache.

"It's alright. You've been so emotional. That's my fault, isn't it? I'm sorry for putting you through all this. You should be touring right now with your friends." I murmured.

"...No," he angled his head down and kissed me, actually on the lips this time, "I'm glad I'm here."

We cleaned up a bit, though there was still traces of the wreckage in the holes and scratches on the walls. I made my setup in my room upstairs, a nice change considering I'd been sleeping in Ricky's for a while. Why change? One simple, very significant reason.

My room had Netflix on the TV.

Well, and my bed was softer.

***

"Here ya go." he said, handing me my plate.

"Thank you." I grinned. Leftovers are better than nothing. And definitely healthier than chips. Ricky climbed in beside me and turned his attention to the screen.

"What are we watching?"

"The Golden Girls."

"The show with the old ladies?"

"The fantastic show with the old ladies." we fell silent and watched the screen as I ate.

".. Is that Betty White?"

"You're just now noticing that?"

"A lot of old ladies look like Betty White."

"Not true. It's just the hair." I said, He fell silent.

"..I suppose."

More silence. Time passed. I finished my food and he convinced me to change the channel. It didn't seem like much was on and we watched some shitty horror movies straight off of the On Demand free movies section. We cuddled, and I felt pretty good. By movie number two our eyelids were drooping.

My bed was smaller in size and with my unhealthy amount of pillows and puffy blankets we were a bit cramped.

"You can go back to your room if you want." I whispered. He was half asleep.

"No, I'll stay in here if that's okay with you."

"Alright. Yeah, it is" The annoying blankets and pillows would probably be kicked off the bed in the night anyways. A process of elimination. The natural selection would remain.

"Good," we shifted around a bit to get comfortable and my head ended up on his chest. I could hear his heartbeat, this steady metronome that kept everything intact, "Your bed is softer."

That night was sweet, and I was glad for it because the following few were hell.