Everything You Are - Brendon Urie *completed* (part 2/3)

fifty-eight: summer's on it's death bed

I woke up to my phone ringing, and I turned to look at it and see that I'd slept in past noon and Rachel was calling me. Why the hell did I sleep in so late? 

"Hello?" I answered, letting out a yawn as I laid back against my bed and wiped my eyes. 

"Charlie?" I heard her sniffle on the other end and suddenly I sat up and turned my full attention towards her.

"Rachel? Is everything okay?" I asked. 

"Um... Not really," she choked, and took a deep breath. "Dallon and I broke up." 

"Oh no, Rachel, I'm so sorry," I said. "Do you want to come over?"

"Yeah, I'd really like that," she sobbed, and I felt so bad for her. 

"Okay, do you want me to come pick you up?" I asked, already getting out of bed and walking to my dresser to grab some clothes for the day.

"Yeah, I'm not at home, I'm at the park down the street from your house," she said. "I could probably just walk there from here." 

"Are you sure?" I asked. "No, let me come pick you up. I'll be there in about 10 minutes." 

"Okay," she replied one more time before we hung up and I immediately started getting dressed, not bothering to make my bed. I checked through my texts and didn't see any from Brendon. I frowned, beginning to slightly worry but knowing I had other priorities to take care of first. I looked in the mirror and rolled my eyes at the hickey he'd left on my collar bone that was now red instead of purple, being a few days old. I didn't understand why he loved to mark me up so much when we were having sex, especially if he wasn't going to talk to me hardly at all for a few days at a time now. 

I didn't even bother covering it, it wasn't even that noticeable and I knew Rachel wouldn't bother bringing it up with how upset she clearly was. I slipped on some shoes, quickly brushed my teeth and threw my hair into a ponytail as I went out to my car to pick her up. 

When I got there, she was sitting on a bench facing the other way and when I approached her, her eyes and cheeks were red from crying, her mascara smeared slightly and her hands were fidgeting with her phone in her lap. 

"Oh, Rachel," I said, and she stood up and slowly walked up to me as I pulled her into a hug, rocking her back and forth a few times. "Come on, let's go back to my house." 

When we got back, she informed me that her and Dallon mutually decided to call it quits because they both knew it just wasn't working out. They were fighting too much and the only thing holding their relationship together was sex and they both knew how unhealthy it was. I was proud of her for being able to realize that it wasn't healthy to be doing that but I still felt bad. I knew they didn't have the greatest relationship ever but they seemed happy for a while. 

I helped her clean up the messy makeup from her face, then forced her to make cookies with me to help cheer her up. She was smiling and laughing a bit by the end of it, and I was glad that I was able to make that progress from her previous state. I decided that while she was in the somewhat good mood that we should go shopping, so I took her to the mall with me to walk around and look at everything there. Being friends with Rachel and in a relationship with Brendon was making me learn to not hate shopping so much. 

"This would look really cute on you," I said, reaching out and taking a casual floral dress from a hanging rack nearby and handing it to Rachel. "God I wish I could wear dresses they make nowadays, I'm just too tall for it unfortunately." 

"That's okay, when you do find a dress that fits you, it always looks so good on you," she said, taking the dress from my hands. "This is a really cute dress though, I agree with you there." 

We looked around at a few other racks of clothes, I tried to stay interested in them but was just more interested in the conversation we were having instead. 

"How are you and Brendon doing?" Rachel asked the question I knew was going to inevitably pop up at some point during our conversation. I sighed, not knowing how to answer it exactly. How were we doing?

"Oh no," she said. "What's going on?" 

"I don't know, he's been acting weird lately," I said. "When Josh came over for dinner with my family the other night, he got super jealous for no apparent reason and then we got into a fight about it, but we made up that night and he even spent the night and everything and I thought we were fine after that, but he's hardly spoken to me at all over the past few days. I don't know if I'm just being clingy but I'm just starting to get really worried because he never acts like this." 

"Oh Charlie, I'm sure it's probably nothing," she said. "Brendon is crazy about you, we can all see it. Especially if he got jealous about you just talking to Josh? He's protective and he's probably just throwing himself a pity party. I wouldn't sweat it too much." 

"Yeah, you're right," I sighed. "I don't know, it's just weird because all summer we were so close, and now all of a sudden we get into this fight and he gets all distant and weird about it. I shouldn't be worrying so much, I mean after all he always comes to me pouting when he knows we've been fighting and apologizes."

Rachel ended up absolutely loving the dress, so I bought it for her and she thanked me for getting her out of her own head and spending the afternoon with her. I drove her home and went back to my own house, it was still about mid afternoon and Brendon had made no effort to contact me all day. I found myself irritated with him being such a little bitch and with a huff of annoyance, I got up from my bed and found myself at Josh's front door, knocking on it. 

To my delight, he was the one who answered and greeted me with a big, squinty smile. "Hey Charlie! What's going on?" 

"I was just wondering if you wanted to come on a hike with me," I said. "I've got nothing to do all evening and wanted to hang out with someone." 

"Yeah, let me go ask my mom really quick," he said, nodding and disappeared back into his house, shutting the door behind him. I waited a minute or two outside, habitually chewing my nails as I waited, checking my phone to see that I had no new notifications. 

He poked his head back out the door, smiling at me again. "Hey, she said it's chill. I'm gonna go change and get my shoes on and stuff, should I meet you out here in... 5 minutes?" 

"That works," I smiled back at him, turning back to my own house and going inside to fill a couple water bottles and Clif bars for us in my small backpack and headed out the door, getting into my car and moving it to Josh's driveway. He reappeared back outside not long after, getting in the passenger side as I drove to my favorite place to hike. It wasn't my fault that it just so happened to be the same trail I took Brendon hiking on when I first met him. 

We talked the entire time we hiked the short mile and a half trail, realizing that we had a lot more in common than I realized. Josh reminded me a bit of how Brendon acted when we first met, how he would laugh at everything and always seemed to have a smile on his face. Thinking about Brendon started making me irritated, knowing that he was probably going to be annoyed when he were to find out that I was hanging out with Josh, but I'm allowed to have male friends just like he's allowed to have female friends. In fact, just to spite Brendon I decided to take a selfie with Josh while we were hiking and post it to Instagram, continuing in my mind to know that there was nothing wrong with me hanging out with Josh and Brendon was just being a jealous asshole. 

When I got home in the evening, I ate dinner with my family and retreated to my bedroom, where I sat with the open window and decided to paint for a little while. Before I went to bed that night, I checked my phone one last time to see if Brendon was going to make some sort of attempt to talk to me at all that day. 

None. 

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