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Chapter 7: One Step Forward

Chapter 7: One Step Forward

~Ollie~

       I haven't really left the house the past couple days and honestly, I hated it. I wanted to leave so many times but I could never force myself to do so. I couldn't even go as far as putting on my shoes.

       So most of my days were spent with me either lying in bed or on the couch. I tried to lie in my bed all day but nobody wanted me to, so I settled with lying on the couch, watching movies. Besides, Zelda liked snuggling with me on the couch so I guess it wasn't a bad thing.

       Grant walked inside after being out somewhere, noticing that I was still lying on the couch. "Have you moved at all since I left?"

       "I moved a tiny bit to get in a comfier position, and because Zelda put her butt on my face," I said. "You know I would move if I could. I can't even go outside on the porch."

       "Sorry, I didn't mean it like that," Grant said as he walked over to the living room. He set down a takeout bag from the dinner on the coffee table, before handing me a banana milkshake. "Here. You might not want one right now but I figured I'd get you one on my way from from the hospital."

       Just hearing the word hospital made a pang of guilt for not going to visit Shaw at all since he has woken up. I wanted to. I really wanted to but the too many bad memories surrounded the hospital for me. When I was in there because of the school explosion. When Grant was in there because of his overdoes. When I was in there because of my body handling the alcohol withdrawal.

       I was going through way too much right now to even step foot in the hospital.

       And I hated it. I really missed Shaw and I wanted to visit him so he knew how much I cared about him as my older brother. 

       Grant told me that Shaw understood why I couldn't visit him but that wasn't enough to convince me. Shaw was probably upset about it and hated me a lot.

       "I also got you some onion rings," Grant said, opening the takeout bag and grabbing the onion rings for me. "Though it might not be smart for you to eat it right now because I know what Zelda is like when anyone has food. She'll just stare at us with those adorable puppy eyes and coax us into giving her our food."

       "Yeah, I'm not too hungry anyway," I said. "I mean, I'll gladly drink the banana milkshake but... No food."

       "You'll eat something soon, though, right?" Grant asked.

       "Probably," I said. "We'll see."

       "So I have a question," Grant said. "It's a very important question that I haven't asked you before, so I need you to listen carefully and answer honestly."

       "You're going to ask me to have sex, aren't you?" I asked.

       Grant was silent for a bit as he reached into the takeout bag and grabbed some fries in there. He took a fry and ate it before saying, "You know, I suddenly forgot what was going to ask. It's like it just left my mind. That's so weird."

       "Yeah, weird," I said. 

       "But since you brought it up, can we have sex?" Grant asked.

       "No, thanks," I said. "I'm comfortable on the couch watching this movie that I haven't even been paying attention to so I have no idea what's going on. Besides, Zelda is snuggling with me and she doesn't like moving."

       "Fair enough," Grant said. "I'm also eating right now and I don't want my burger to get cold. Or my fries. I could sort of handle a cold burger but cold fries are a no-go."