an abundance of problems (short story)

three: foreign tourists

The first night. Me and Joel unpack our clothes into the dressers and closet. We make our suite comfy and homey. It's 12:34 AM. I'm so tired and jet lagged so I decide to shower in the morning. I choose the left side of the queen sized bed. I snuggle up and think about how I miss my parents. I drift off to sleep at the sound of the shower water running as Joel gets in.
I am woken by Joel's voice. 12:47 AM. "Elizabeth!" I hurriedly get out of bed and crack the bathroom door open. "What do you need Joel?" I ask with a raspy voice. "Will you get my Shampoo out of my duffle?" He asks. "yes, one moment." I close the door, turn on the beside lamp and rustle through his bag and finally lay my hands on a cold bottle of shampoo. I open the door with one hand on my eyes and slowly walk to find his hand. He giggles. "What?" I ask, still covering my eyes. "There's a shower curtain, love." He says. "oh" I saw uncovering my eyes. I hand him his shampoo and leave the room, and get back into bed.
I'm slowly drifting back off to sleep around 12:53 AM, until a shirtless Joel flings the covers off of me and jumps into the bed, purposely waking me up. "Oh i'm sorry, were you sleeping?" He cackles. I'm in love with the sound of his voice, his laugh even. "you're such a pest." I roll over away from him and try to fall back asleep. I do.
I dream that my Mum is in labor, she has a new baby boy and a baby girl, but then the doctor comes back in after rushing them out. They were attached at the brain, he comes to inform my Mum that they passed and my I see my mother bawling. she's all alone, Dads not there. I can see her but she can't see me, I can't move. I try to scream, but nothing comes out. I try to move and flail my arms and legs but I can't. I don't move. I can only watch my mum's heart being shattered into a million pieces.
I feel a strong force of pressure on my arms and I then wake up screaming, kicking and punching. The pressure was Joel, shirtless Joel. "Hey, hey, hey. shhhhh. it's okay. jane. it's okay. shh." He says holding me down. He flips me towards him and I land with one hand on his stomach and my head on his chest. My breathing is irregular and heavy, I'm crying uncontrollably. He just holds me and strokes my hair. "Shhhh, it's okay. It was just a bad dream. You're okay, everyone and everything is perfectly fine darling." He whispers into my ear. I control my breathing, now a constant stream of silent tears fall from my eyes. I close my eyes and think of Joel. I pull myself closer to him, as if I'll never let go. And I feel as though he doesn't want me to.

*Buzzzzzz* *Buzzzzzz* *Buzzzzz*
The sound of my alarms fills the room. Joel reaches over me and snoozes it. "5 more minutes, I just wanna lay here." He says. He sounds very awake. "How long have you been awake Joel?" I ask him. He doesn't respond, he just looks at my brown eyes. Like I said before, his blue eyes don't compliment my brown eyes. "I never went to sleep." He finally says. "What?! Why?" I ask, raising up to face him. He looks at me with disappointment for a moment, then he looks away. "I had to make sure you were okay for the rest of the night." He says as his eyes meet mine again. I smile, but quickly look away and stop smiling. "He doesn't feel the same Mollie, stop trying to make yourself believe that he does." I sigh and get out of bed.
"Mollie what's wrong? Did I say something wrong?" He asks following me out of bed. "No!!" I say, "Just remember the harsh truth of reality." I say. I walk into the bathroom to brush my teeth. He follows me. "What's that mean?" He asks me. "You wouldn't understand." I sigh out, and start to brush my teeth. I look at him in the mirror, his face is full of confusion. But it's better if he never knows.

I do my makeup and hair and he fixed his self up. I pick out his outfit and he picks out mine. He chose my black high waisted mom jeans with a pink purple and black striped t shirt with a jean jacket and white tennis shoes. I chose a simple black jean paired with a mustard yellow t shirt and a jean jacket with white and black adidas sneakers. We posed for some pictures before we left. He grabbed his black leather rucksack with his wallet, phone and ID's in it. I grabbed my shoulder bag with all my things in it, and we headed out the door at 7:32 AM to meet up with everyone in the lobby at 7:35 AM for breakfast.
Everyone looks so excited to go out on the town and explore. Except for Joel, he looks as though something is on his mind. "Joel are you okay?" I ask. "Yea I'm fine love." He immediately brightens back up. I'll find out what was on his mind before the day is over.