A Future To Die For || Nano 13

19

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Chapter Nineteen

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The next morning was no easier. My limbs were heavy. Not only with sleep, but with longing. I could almost feel the ghost of everyone I was related to hanging around me,. Like I picked them up at the house. I wish we could have stayed, even if my family was gone. I loved the farm and it was all I had. On the other side of things, I was glad we left. I thought it would make it easier to let it go, not being surrounded by things I know they touched.

We had beans for breakfest. Beans, in their mushy brown glory. As I ate, I thought. I ignored those around me,  their conversations and debates. I tried to relive my best memeries. I also tried to remember some of the worst. It was harder then I thought it would be. Memories are like abstract paintings. You see in them what you want to. I could remember the feelings and surrondings, but I couldn't remember my thoughts. I couldn't remember the feeling of peace and the look of gratitute on my mother's face when I handed her the toy I made out of crumbled leaves when I was five. I couldthink up an idea, what I used to think was the happiest moment of her life, and believe it.

The truth is, I didn't know. She could have been sad, that all I offered was a broken pile of leaves as a present. My whole past could be a lie and I wouldn't even know. That's what hurt the most. The thought that my memories of my family, of my father even, might not even be fully true.

That's when I stopped thinking. It hurt to much. It made my head ache and my eyes burn with tears I could just barely swallow back. The beans went down with an acrid burning, as if each and every one was a piece of my torn heart. I pushed the beans aside and left the table without addressing the others

Three days later, Blake came storming into the back room. I expected more sympathy. More time. Instead, his face was burning like a forest fire, the smoke so thick that I couldn't read any expression other then the anger. It scared me, to say the least. I cowered even deeper into my blanket until he ripped it away from me.

He didn't speak and I didn't struggle. Blake's fingers clasped around my wrist with a force I couldn't fight if I tried to. I didn't have the strength to bother. He pulled me out of the back room and into the kitchen. 

He didn't stop moving until we were outside in the alley, hidden from the sun in the shadows. Only then, did he turn to me. He didn't release his grip, as if afraid I would bolt on him.

His words were as blunt as getting hit in the face with a paddle,"I am sick with your never ending self pity."

He was loud, so loud that it echoed down the alley. The ice in his voice made me flinch, not that it effected him in anyway. "We are all suffering, Drew. I don't care if it's your family. I have lived without my parents for three years now," he paused, "Three years! I have survived. If I could survive, at fifteen, you can survive at seventeen."

"So much has happened," I said quietly.

"Stop with that! You don't know what you are talking about, Drew. You aren't a special case here! Sam died right before Nate's eyes, you didn't see him hiding out for days on end, did you? I have been through hell and back. I've dealt with shit far worse then you could even imagine. The old world wasn't perfect and neither is this one. I learned that long ago, but you still haven't seemed to wrap your head around it!" I took a step back as he advanced.

"I know I haven't went through shit compared to you," I said slowly in effort to calm him down.

"Then why, the hell, are you acting like it!" 

"I'm grieving."

Blake jumped forward, slamming my body against the wall of the building. With his hands on my shoulders, he leaned forward, his face mere inches from mine. His ragged breath was ragged in my face, "We're all grieving, you selfish fuck!"