Walking the Gallows ✔️

Chapter 1

He didn't need an alarm. That ticking inside Andy's head was enough to wake him in the early hours of the morning. Somehow, it was always right.

6:00 AM. Right again.

Though alone in his quiet little bedroom, somewhere inside of him a voice began to call out. It told him to stay in bed, that nothing out there could match the comfort felt from his own mattress. Besides the fact that the warmth of his covers had long been leached from them, he couldn't help agreeing. He rubbed his face into his pillow to clear up his tired eyes. There was too much to do to stay asleep. Despite the nagging at the back of his head, he got up from his bed. Like always, he reached up towards the ceiling. Harsh cracks sounded everywhere from his wrists to his feet as he stretched even higher. The ceiling was still far away from his fingertips although he stood on his toes. Andy was a small fellow. His mother used to call him nimble, but even that wasn't true. He was shorter than most men and as thin as a twig. Though being in his early thirties, people believed he was still a teenager at first glance.

He sighed deeply as he stared at the mirror on his bedroom door. Such a waste, he thought. He left the room in a hurry, not wanting another second alone with himself to be reintroduced to all his insecurities.

The house smelled of vomit and alcohol, again. He smelt it the very moment he opened his bedroom door. He walked swiftly down the stairs to his kitchen table, where his brother lay face down in a pool of his own vomit. Whacking the bottle of whiskey from the unconscious body, Andy pulled on the back of his brother's shirt. He groaned in response.

"Jesus, Andy." He whined as his senses came back to him. The odor was overpowering. The sour smell of sickness led him to puke again.

"For fuck's sake, Vin." Andy left the kitchen in disgust for two oven mittens lying on the stove. He put them on hurriedly and used them to guide Vin by the waist to the bathroom. Broken glass and rubbish littered the way. It was a struggle to keep Vin's dangling feet away from the shards. Somewhere in his mind, he thought maybe it wasn't such a bad idea to let him get cut a bit.

Not the bath, he thought as he dragged him the rest of the way. He was so hungover he could have drowned in the tub. He placed his mildly disappointing brother into the shower with his clothes still on his body. Vin sat in the corner of it pouting, knowing what was to come.

"Think of this as your punishment," Andy said as he turned on the freezing cold water to wash away the vomit. The water sent Vin into shock and he puked again. This time, it went down the drain. The smell became less and less the longer he stayed in there. He turned off the water in an annoyed manner and threw a towel at him.

He can deal with the rest, he thought.

He didn't expect that he, the youngest of the two brothers, would be the one to take care of the eldest. He grabbed the small kitchen table covered in the contents of his brother's stomach and threw it into the backyard to hose it down. He wondered if there was any point to it at all. The table would probably be more useful as firewood now that the puke had seeped into the wood and between the cracks.

While he cleaned the germ-infested table, he admired his garden. Unlike the contents of his home corrupted by his own brother's filth, the flowers and trees that almost always bloomed in the spring looked beautiful, as usual. It was a sight to see, the mix of roses and tulips that were patterned along the dirt bed. There were also fruit trees by the side of the yard close near a fence. Lately, they had the sweetest taste to them and no one had any idea why. Not even Andy knew how it was possible. It was almost overnight the change suddenly occurred. If he had any friends, he would share them too. Vin was always three quarters into a bottle, the fruit was the last thing on his mind.