Neighbors

Jealous Minds

Alex stood outside of Madison's house for the eighteenth night in a row, desperately throwing garden pebbles up at her window and just as all the other nights his desperation was left unanswered. Alex sighed in temporary defeat and let the rest of the pebbles fall from his hand as he walked back to his own house. He quietly maneuvered through his house and up to his bedroom where he threw himself onto his bed, groaning into his pillow.

Madison woke up to a bony finger prodding her right cheek. "hmrgh" she groaned, mindlessly swatting the intruders hand away from her face. She snuggled deeper under the sea of warm blankets, a sigh of content escaping as she dozed back off. However, her sleep only lasted a few minutes before the covers were yanked from her body.

"Wha--?" Madison rubbed the sleep from her eyes and yawned before her eyes settled the lanky boy standing at the end of her bed with a bunch of roses in his hands.

"I don't even like roses" Madison glared at the sheepish boy.

Jack sighed, setting the flowers down on the night stand as he moved closer to her.

" They were left on your doorstep, just thought I'd bring them in for you." Madison raised an eyebrow in curiousy as jack pulled a small card from his back pocket. "This was left with it" he handed her the card, Madison's eyes quickly scanned over the familiar messy hand writing "I'm sorry xo-A"

"Cute" she bitterly laughed and tore the card into pieces letting them land haphazardly on the floor.
Jack nervously ran a hand through his hair before flicking his eyes up to catch Madison's green eyes narrowed at him.

"What are you even doing here Jack?" She finally asked. Sure, she and Jack and been hanging out more but he had never come over unannounced unless he wanted something. More specifically, he never came over unannounced unless he wanted to bug her about forgiving Alex.

"I-I just wanted...I just thought maybe you'd want to come to band practice today. I mean, it's been a few weeks..."

"No," Madison stood up and crossed the room to her vanity table. She grabbed a hair tie and effortlessly pulled her hair into a messy bun.

"C'mon Mads, he didn't mean it. He was just jealous, ya know?" Jack tried to reason but his confidence when he looked up from his fiddling hands to find Madison glaring coldly at him from across the room with her arms folded angrily over her chest.

"It shouldn't matter, Jack. He obviously doesn't think very highly of me if he thinks I would kiss him and then go after his best friend! Aside from that...even if I wasn't dying I would still be pissed that he would be such a jerk to me."

Jack looked down at his hands once again and sighed in defeat, "sorry" he muttered. Madison sighed and wrapped her arms around his waist. "Don't be, I know you're just being a great friend to Alex. Your loyalties lie with him, I get it" Madison spoke softly, feeling vulnerable at her own realization that even her only real friend wasn't really hers at all.

Jacks arms tightened around her protectively, though he too knew that her words held the weight of truth. He had known Alex longer and even though he knew Alex was in the wrong he would still do anything for him.

"Have you heard back from the doctors yet?" Jack asked, he had finally gotten more comfortable with talking about the seriousness of Madison's disease. Though, her cynical sarcastic attitude still left him feeling pissed off that she could take the matter so lightly but he had given up on trying to change her.

"yeah..." Madison sighed, removing her arms from Jack and instead wrapping them protectively around herself instead.

"And?" Jack pushed his voice impatient and laced with worry.

"And....i'm okay" Madison shrugged.

"Okay? What does that even mean, Madison?!"

Madison's head snapped up at the sound of her full name. She hated hearing Jack say it like that, as if she were a child being reprimanded.

"It means that I'm not dead yet, Jack" Madison snapped, adding extra venom to his name.

"Mads..." Jack reached out towards her only to be pushed away.

"You should go, and take these with you. Roses don't mean shit. They're ordinary and plain, a shit effort if you ask me. I'm sure you'll tell Alex, yeah?" Madison shoved the flowers into his hands and pointed to the door, scowling as she watched Jack walk away dejectedly.

Jack pushed the roses into Alex's arms as he opened the door.

"What?"

"She doesn't like roses." Jack snapped, pushing his way past Alex and stomping down the stairs and into the basement where Zack and Rian sat on the old couch waiting for their band members.

"Dude, what is your problem?" Alex demanded as he followed the guitar player into the room.

Zack and Rian sighed in annoyance. They were so tired of the constant tension swimming around their band members for the last few weeks.

"Guys, you need to fix this. We have a huge opportunity to play main stage at the festival in a few weeks and until you get your acts together we're not going to be good enough to land the gig." Rian said, standing up and leaving the room.

"Ri, is right you guys. So I guess call me when you get your shit figured out and we can practice" Zack pointedly looked at each of the boys before silently leaving the room just as Rian had done.
Alex fell back onto the couch and sighed "they're right..."

"I know" Jack nodded in agreement and sat on the couch beside Alex. An uncomfortable silence sunk in between the two boys each fiddling with their hands and casting quick glances towards one another, sizing the other up. Fifteen minutes of silence has passed before Jack finally spoke up, "that day, did you really think I'd just take her from you, Lex? Do you really think I'd do that to you?"

Alex looked up and his face fell as he saw the hurt in his best friend's eyes. He never wanted to make Jack feel that way and he himself wasn't really sure where his intensity came from that day. "I—I just felt so jealous seeing her so close to you. It just got to me that she seemed to let you in effortlessly when I'd been busting my ass to get her attention. I wasn't thinking, Jay...honestly. I know you wouldn't do that to me, Jay...and I'm sorry" Alex admitted.

"I get it, Lex....but you really messed up. I-I don't know if we can fix this"

Alex nodded "I know" he sighed, angrily blinking back the tears that kept building up in his system no matter how hard he willed them away.

"I don't know what else to do, Jay. I've apologized, I've sent flowers...I've waited for her every single night for hours..."

Jack bit his lip with an internal battle going on in his head "I'm going to give this t you" Jack pulled a folded piece of paper from his wallet and handing it to Alex. "She's going to kill me for this if she finds out but I'm counting on you to fix this, Alex"

Alex curiously unfolded the paper to find a small handwritten list. At the top the words " Things Madison wants to do/experience," his eyes scanned the list:
Go to the beach
Pet a tiger
Go to an aquarium, one with sharks
Chase the end of a rainbow
Take a road trip
Visit Disneyworld
Go to a party
Play all of the festival games/win a prize
Have an '80's movie-esque romance (total cheese factor required)
Go to a real concert; preferably new found glory
Fall in love
Get married
Have a family
Live a full life
" I can't give her some of these things..." Alex spoke dejectedly.

"I know...but you can try, Lex. She knows she won't get the major things, Alex. She knows that she's dying but that doesn't mean she doesn't think about what her life could be....I know you haven't gotten to talk to her about all of this Alex...but she hides behind this huge wall and she acts like she is perfectly okay with dying but just from this list I know that she is terrified."

Alex nodded his head, his mind already devising elaborate plans to win Madison over and give her the best life that he can manage. More than anything Alex just wants her to be happy, he wants her to smile and live and it scares him how much she already means to him, especially when he knows that he's going to lose her in the end no matter what he does.