What's The Worst That I Could Say?

Chapter 18- No crack head

"Mom, do you know where my sweater is?" I yelled down the stairs to my mother after giving up looking for my sweater. As I waited for a response, I picked at the mahogany banister and bit the inside of my cheek. It was cold out today and I didn't particularly want to freeze, did I?

"Which one?" She called back, and I heard her soft, old slippers padding against the wooden floor as she made her way near the foot of the stairs. 

"The black and white stripey one?" I offered, staring down at my Converse thoughtfully. There was a pause as she thought about it before she gave me a reply.

"No, sweetie, I haven't. Did you leave it at the Way's? The last time I saw you wearing it was when you went to see Gerard yesterday!" She giggled slightly at the end of her sentence. I rolled my eyes, quietly sighed and grumbled something along the lines of that I'd wear something else. She was undoubtedly right, I had worn that sweater to see Gerard yesterday, I must've taken it off and left it somewhere in that cave of a bedroom of his. Trudging back into my room, I headed straight for my closet, opened the doors and peered inside. 

It had been three days since Gerard and I spent the day being thirteen year olds again, an entire weekend since we made up. We spent our days off of school hanging out with the guys as if nothing had happened, as if the events of my fourteenth birthday had never occurred. Gerard didn't ask what happened after he left, it seemed as if he'd completely forgotten to ask me. I hope he had, I liked it the way it was right now.

Mom thought Gerard and I's friendship was a little more than just 'best pals', but I practically took no notice of her and her weird assumptions. 

"Fuck it," I muttered under my breath, pulling off my grey hoodie off of one coat hanger and my black leather jacket from the other before shutting the closet doors shut. As I shoved both of the garments on, I heard the quiet buzz of my cell phone that sat waiting on my bed. I straightened myself out as I looked into the mirror, turned, and then scooped up the phone to check the text I'd received.

Gerard:

Get your ass out here :P we're gonna be late for school

xo 

I rolled my eyes, a grin spreading across my face as I tapped back a stupidly short reply:

K.

There was nothing more that Gerard hated than a simple 'K' in a text. Mikey did it all the time, simply because he loved seeing Gerard pissed off. And, well, because he could. I chuckled and grabbed my backpack that sat waiting at the foot of the bed and headed out of my room while slipping my cell into the back pocket of my black skinny jeans. As I descended down the staircase I yelled to my mom that I was off to school, hung around for a few moments for her response and slipped out the front door, slamming it shut behind me.

I'd been expecting Gerard to be standing at my mailbox, or at least somewhere in sight, but he was nowhere to be seen. My eyes scanned both of our front yards, and I frowned to myself as I took my cell phone from my pocket and checked the time. It was 8:17, school started at 8:30. Maybe he'd just decided to leave because I was taking so long? He probably didn't want detention, I guess. I shrugged, slipping my cell back into my pocket and began to walk across my lawn towards the side walk, the sound of Paramore playing at a fairly low volume through my earphones. Despite the coldness, it was actually in my eyes a nice sort of day for Belleville. It wasn't really that windy and the sun occasionally peaked out from behind the gloom of the clouds. But as I thoughtfully stared up at the sky with the glowing clouds an unsettling feeling grew in my stomach. I wasn't alone.

Two arms circled around my waist from behind before I could even realize what was happening  the arms tightened and I was pressed against the person's chest. My heart raced at a million miles, my scream caught in my throat making me only manage out a horrified gasp. Before I even began to struggle and cry for help I heard my captor's familiar chuckle and relaxed slightly against him.

"Never send me 'K' messages, got it?" Gerard whispered huskily into my ear as he spun me to the left and straight back to the right. I squirmed out of his arms immediately after he set me back down onto the side walk, turned so I was facing him and angrily smacked his arm.

"Ouch!" He yelped, his brow furrowing as he rubbed his arm with mock hurt. "What was-?!"

"Never," I cut him off. "-Never sneak up on my like that again!" I glared at him, but my anger didn't seem to really help on my part, and he simply grinned and wrapped an arm around my waist and pulled me to his chest. 

"I scared you, huh?" He chuckled, his hazel orbs brightening with amusement. I rolled my eyes, wrinkling my nose as I jabbed my index finger into the middle of his chest. He was wearing a batman t-shirt, which was undeniably cute.

"Whatever, we're gonna be late now, c'mon!" I quickly grabbed onto his free hand, wriggled from his weak grasp and began to tow him along the sidewalk. He groaned, trying to slow us both down as I threw him a small glare over my shoulder.

"I don't wanna go to school," He pouted. "Can't we skip?"

"No."

"Why?"

"Because," I began. "We'll get into the habit of skipping to the point where we'll be doing it every day."

He scoffed. "And how would you know about that?"

"I used to skip all the time, that's how. Me and my friends at my other school used to hide in this abandoned block of student apartments a few miles away from the school and smoke a little pot. You know, from time to time. We rarely got caught, but it got to the point where when we were in class we had no fucking idea what anyone was talking about. And uh, we weren't even baked or anything at that point." I explained. Gerard was silent as I muttered my little story, frowning to himself as he processed what I'd just said. He suddenly came to a sudden stop, and after a couple of attempts of pulling him onwards I sighed and stopped too. He pulled his hand away, raising his eyebrows skeptically. 

"You've taken drugs?" He asked, a little surprised. I stared at him blankly for a few moments, turned and began to walk on.

"Yeah."

"Is there anything else I should know about?" He asked, hurrying after me as I shoved my hands into my leather jacket's pockets. I didn't reply at first, instead glancing off towards a middle aged guy that lived at the far end of the neighborhood from us. He was scanning over his paper as his dog barked excitedly, trotting around him in a big circle a few times. I smiled, almost forgetting Gerard's question. 

I sighed. "Uh, how do you mean?"

"Well," He stared down at the sidewalk as he responded. "What are you? A junkie now?"

I threw my head back and laughed. "No, Gerard. I've just uh, dabbled, that's all. I'm no crack head, don't you worry. My gran would've found out and munched on my fricken' toes."

"Your toes?" Gerard laughed this time. "Hells, you've got a screwed up imagination, you know that?"

"I try my best, now c'mon, slowpoke! If we get there to be given a special VIP pass to detention then I'll ram my foot up your ass!" I threatened, playfully glaring at him as we quickened our pace.

Yeaaaah, this was just a little update, because I said I would and I wanted to keep my word. It's not a lot, but it's just something to keep you all on your toes, you know?