Short Of a Breath

|Chapter 14|

"I'm sorry, sir but you're seventeen, you have to be eighteen to purchase a room." After walking almost an hour to find a hotel, what were the odds that we couldn't even get in.
We walked out of the hotel, freezing cold, and tired. It was almost 6 in the morning.
"What the hell are we going to do, Frank?" Ryan poked at me. I shrugged him off and continued to walk down the alley next the the hotel building.
"I dont know, Ryan, that was the plan at first. We have to think of something better..."
Ryan starting rambling and freaking out
"Wh-what if they find us, Frank? What If we go to an even worse place, even longer than we did before- I can't."
"Okay Ryan stop, I don't need this right now we need to th-"
"Think what? It's over are plan failed I cant-" both me and Ryan start yelling, and barking remarks at each other until Tyler unexpectedly pushed us apart, almost slamming me into a brick wall.
"Tyler, what the fu-"
"Shut up" he turned to look at me
I did what he said and stopped talking.
What? It's the first time he ever stood up for himself. It's a start.
"I remember Josh telling me about his house not far from here, I'm not sure if his parents still live there though."
Ryan scoffed, crossing his arms.
"You can't think your little institute boyfriend is going to save you, do you? Relationships are a joke, he's gone, dont-" Tyler cut him off, as he raised his fist to Ryan's jaw, colliding with a large whacking noise. Ryan falls against the wall holding the side of his face, looking up in shock. I stared at him like that as well.
Love changes you in ways you can't even explain
Gerard use to tell me that all the time, when he talked about his first girlfriend. Of course I was jealous and sad about it, but he was happy.
That's all that matters to me.
Well..mattered..
No, Frank. Stop thinking about him. He's gone.
"Listen, let's just listen to Tyler, okay?" I help Ryan up and he stayed silent, following Tyler's lead, who was also uncomfortably quiet.
After almost an hour and a half of walking up and down dewy hills and foggy roads, we made it to the house Tyler had described.
He smiled, putting his hands in his hoodie.
"This is it, the one I'd see in all his pictures. Let's go." Before he could walk up the walkway I stopped him by the arm.
"I don't think this is a good idea, Tyler, you don't know who's in there, Josh might not even be here." He stops and looks to the ground.
"It's your turn to trust me, Frank." He looks up at me and turns to the front of the house. As he walked up to the porch, me and Ryan slowly made our way up the side walk as well, being as quiet as possible.
Tyler knocked on the door, and waited. I could tell he was shaking by the way his body moved, and I was too. We were all ready to run if we had to.
A middle-aged woman answered the door, with almost the same features as Josh, no surprise.
Tyler fidgeted for a while.
"Um-hi, I'm tyler and we're Josh's friends, we were wondering if we could talk to him?" He let out, looking like a deer in headlights.
She rubbed her eyes and glanced at all three of us.
"What are y'all boys doing up so early? You can see him but he's about to go to work" she opened the door to let us in. As we walked through the door we greeted her silently.
Their house was beautiful, brown, almost cinnamon like color on the walls, pictures and pictures of their family.
It made me feel terrible.
I never had a fixed family, nor did I have family portraits or school photos hanging on the walls.
I guess it's not that way for everyone.
"Josh is taking a shower right now so you can go wait in his room of you'd like, do you boys want anything to eat? Drink?" We wanted to be polite and say no thank you, because asking a stranger for their food seemed wrong, but we were so hungry and tired, that we nodded instantly.
"I'll make y'all some pancakes, I'll call you when they're done." She smiled and walked into the kitchen.
Josh's mom is a complete opposite of my mother.
It's upsetting.
We made our way down the hall into his room.
We really should have stayed in the living room.
There were pictures and pictures of Josh with a girl that looked his age, with red hair, and other with the same girl but blonde hair. Now, I would say it could be either a friend or family thing but in a photo on his desk was a photo of them at what looked like a dance, kissing each other.
I automatically glued myself right next to Tyler. I wanted him out of this room.
"Tyler...let's go" both me and Ryan try to move him to leave the room but he doesn't budge. He just stands and stares at all of the photos.
"He- he never told me about this girl.." I turn to his face and see tears slowly falling down his cheeks. He falls to his knees in an instant, scaring me to death.
"T-tyler!.." I drop to the floor, grabbing him, holding him as tight as I could. As he cried I rocked him back in forth, mumbling 'its going to be okay' , almost close to tears myself.
He's been through so much. Yet there's only so much you can do.
"What the fu-holy shit, Frank? Ryan?" Josh walks into his room holding a towel around his waste.
He shuts the door, and stops to look at me when he hears the sobbing noises coming from behind me.
"Is... everything okay?.." he looks at me confused and sorrowful.
With no expression on my face I move away from Tyler, making him visable to Josh.
"No, everything is not okay" I stand away from Tyler, who's now staring at josh.
"Holy- Fuck, Tyler- are you..what's going on.?" Josh mumbles, walking closer to him. He looked sad and somewhat happy to see Tyler.
Tyler moves back against Josh's bed and grabs the photo of both him and the mystery girl.
"I-i think I should be asking you..the same question."