"Tyler. It's time to go."
Tyler's eyes are still closed, pretending to sleep. As a child, if you didn't want to go somewhere, all you had to do was close your eyes. Your parents would assume you were resting and let you be. No obligations, no expectations. If you were lucky, you'd be carried into your warm bed and left to fall asleep for real.
As a sixteen year old, pretending to sleep is just prolonging the inevitable.
"Tyler, we've got to go to school."
I watch as Tyler's eyes open slightly, only a fraction. His eyes are simply slits through which he squints at the world that is waiting for him to awaken.
"Come on, bro," I tease, punching his arm playfully.
"That hurt." Tyler mumbles, wincing and rubbing his hand over the spot where I had hit him. His eyes are open now.
"Sleep is for pussies."
Tyler yawns, stretching and laying his head back against the backboard of the bed. "You sleep, don't you? I mean, I never see you asleep, and it feels like you never do. But you've got to. No one can function or even survive without sleep."
"You can believe what you want." I shrug as Tyler focuses his gaze towards me for a little. He looks confused.
"Ok, then. Well, I better get up and head off to hell."
I roll my eyes at Tyler, but he's already scavenging through clothes in his cupboard. We are left in an awkward silence as he dresses in his school uniform. The silence makes me feel annoyed, and I want to say something to fill the silence, but there's nothing to say.
He turns to me, loosening the tie around his neck, a sour, uneasy expression spreading across his face. "I don't like this tie."
"That specific tie, or ties in general?" I ask, raising my eyebrows. What he'd said was quite vague.
"The general idea of something around my neck. It makes me..." Tyler closes his eyes, scrunching his face up in thought.
"Anxious?" I offer.
"I'm not sure. The word alludes me. I just can't think straight at this time." Tyler shakes his head, maybe expecting the word to surface like an answer on a Magic 8 ball.
A female voice calls from somewhere downstairs. Tyler hears it too, buttoning the final button on his shirt before opening the creaky old door that separates our bedroom from the rest of our house. "Mum's probably got our lunch ready," Tyler says. "We should go."
I nod, following him out the door. Not much is said as Mum gives us our lunches in greasy brown paper bags. We just leave the house, making our way to the bus stop.
"Mum hates me. You're the perfect child." I groan.
"Don't say that. You know I'm not perfect." Tyler says, his brown eyes falling to the sidewalk as we walk past the old dilapidated buildings lining the streets of our neighbouthood.
"Yeah, I take that back. Perfect people have friends!" I taunt, Tyler looking at me angrily.
"You're my friend." He retorts, trailing his eyes up from the sidewalk to meet mine. The dark eyes are full of fire as stares me down.
"I'm your brother, Tyler. I'm meant to be your friend." I tackle him into a quick hug, which he escapes from straight away.
"There's the bus." I point.
It stops, opening its doors to let us in. I remember mentioning to Tyler once how it looked like a mouth, swallowing us up as we are taken to be devoured. The metaphor seemed to explain the concept of school well. Tyler and I take a seat near the back, and Tyler puts his earphones in. He doesn't really care about talking to me, because he's got his music. He shuts me out, and lets his music in. He slips into the beats, the melody, the sounds. Music's the only thing that matters to Tyler these days.
Therefore, I spend the trip to school as I always do; in silence. So much silence. Ironic that the one thing I hate is the one thing I am forced to live with every day. I almost want to rip the headphones out of his ears, throw them to the ground and force him to talk to me, but I don't. I just stare straight ahead, moving with the bus as it passes over a speed bump.
As the bus spits all the students out at the school gates, I turn to Tyler.
"I'll come visit you in between classes if I can, Tyler."
"As usual. Nothing changes."
I nod at my brother, and he nods back. A mutual agreement.
YOU ARE READING
i will not be a goner // tøp
Fanfiction"Tyler. It's time to go." Tyler's eyes are still closed, pretending to sleep. As a child, if you didn't want to go somewhere, all you had to do was close your eyes. Your parents would assume you were resting and let you be. No obligations, no expect...
