Silver Roses [h.f-t. & j.l.] (ON HOLD)

Chapter 3 - Drown

drown - seafret (bring me the horizon cover)

"I want to care for something. Anything at all. I want this anger inside of me to leave me alone so I can breathe again without wanting to punch the air back into my lungs. I need to care .. I feel like something is pressing against my rib cage, pushing outwards, like I'm too big for the room, too angry for the world."

hero

My mood has been on a weird up since Sunday when I had gotten that little notification on my phone that usually didn't mean anything to me. It was probably just because I was feeling slightly guilty about telling Josephine off the way I did last Thursday and the fact that I now knew she wasn't holding a grudge anymore. Not that I care if she would. I also tried to show my aunt that I wasn't completely useless and swallowed my sarcastic comments down that were threatening to blurt out if my mouth to everything she said.

I forced myself to nod along and shove whatever food was in front of me in my mouth, so I didn't have to answer. I said I was trying so I feel like that's a good start. My dad had tried to call me on Monday, but I let it ring, earning weird looks from the customers in Mari's. I didn't feel like having this cliché "How are you doing, son-I hope you are happy blah blah blah" conversation and if something happened, I would call him anyway so there was no point for a useless father-son conversation over the phone.

Weirdly enough I found myself turning towards the door whenever I heard that little bell over Mari's front door ring, not sure why I was doing that. I brushed it off, blaming it on paranoia since I haven't talked to anyone back home in over the week, I have been in Australia now. Not that anyone would care enough to fly over. My dad was way too busy, and my sister has been in Africa for the past 4 months, with no contact at all.

"Hero, are you listening?" I was ripped out of my thoughts by my aunt's voice and I looked up at her across the table. She was looking at me with her fork raised and one eyebrow raised. I blinked a few times before clearing my throat and nodding, avoiding eye contact as I shoved another fork of the salad in front of me in my mouth. I hadn't listened but my aunt didn't call me out on it as she continued speaking.

"Well, I just mean that you could go, I don't need you at work on Saturday." Okay, maybe I should have listened to what she was saying earlier. I look up at her and she sighs when she sees my expression. "The bonfire, Hero. I'm pretty sure Kit had mentioned it yesterday already. It's in 2 days, on Friday. It might be a good way for you to find some friends." She says and I almost roll my eyes as I swallow. "I have friends. They are back in London," I lie. Truth is, I haven't talked to any of them in almost 4 months," I don't need new ones."

Ignoring my comment my aunt goes on: "Kit will also be there, maybe even Carla's son Micky and I'm sure Josephine will also be the-"

"Why would I care if Josephine was there?" I cut her off and she closes her mouth with a light smile before shrugging and looking at her plate, poking a tomato with her fork.

"I don't know. You seemed to be looking for someone the whole week and Murphy told me you asked him if she's delivering this week." She says and a vision of me kicking Murphy in the face flashed before my eyes for a second.

"That was- I was just wondering because I saw that you were running low on salmon." I noticed that my words didn't sound as confident as I wanted them to be as my aunt chuckled.

"I don't want to talk about her. I'm not going anyway." I mumble, dismissing the subject and I was glad when my aunt went over to tell me about her plans for new tablecloths for Mari's. As usual, I was only half listening but this time because a certain blonde kept slipping into my thoughts.