Lachambers- What If?

17

TW: Subtle mention of depression.

It was now the end of January, which was around eight weeks after Chris and Gordie broke up. Both boys had developed awful habits to cope with the confusion and sadness they were experiencing.
Chris was now spending more time with the Cobras than ever. That meant he was drinking a lot more, smoking a lot more, and taking his frustration out on random kids on the streets. As for relationships with girls, (which was how the rest of the Cobras coped with their problems), Chris would never touch one. For some reason in the back of his conscious he felt like he was cheating, even though he and Gordie were no longer together. Chris never kissed a girl, dated a girl or had sex with a girl after Gordie.
He knew that the break up was mostly his fault, but he never bothered to confront Gordie about it. Chris did regret treating him the way he did, and it pained him to think about how idiotic he was. There were so many signs and red flags that showed how upset Gordie was, but he never took him seriously. All he ever felt like doing was dropping to his knees on Gordie's front porch and begging for forgiveness. He had nearly done that several times when he was grievously drunk. Chris would pace around outside of the Lachance's home debating on throwing his pride away and breaking down on their front porch. He never did it though. Instead he would just return home at a late hour and go to bed, holding onto his pillow protectively, pretending that it was Gordie so he could actually fall asleep. Then in his dreams he would actually be cuddling into the small brunettes back, holding onto him without a care in the world. When Chris would wake up in the morning though, those dreams would fuel into his terrible coping mechanisms. It was a obsessive cycle he was trapped in.

Gordie would cope by crying or sleeping all day. He had become quite unmotivated and never wrote anymore. He would possibly show up to school if he got that bored.
Gordie's grades dropped significantly after they broke up. He never studied or did his homework. The best grade he had was now a D+. Nothing mattered to him anymore.
In the morning he would wake up, skip breakfast and show up to school late. (That is if he showed up to school at all.) On the weekends when he actually had the motivation to do something other than sob he would get up (which wasn't very productive either. He would usually just pace around the house for a little) Gordie would spend most of his time desperately torturing himself with the wonders of what he could've done differently to make Chris continue to love him. Or what he did that made Chris stop loving him.
Gordie would always look like a mess as well. Appearance used to be very important to him, especially at school. His outfits would always be color coordinated and somewhat professional. Now Gordie would show up in the sweater he had slept in the night before and the jeans he had been wearing for the past two weeks. His hair would also be untamed as well, his bangs sticking up as it they were reaching their arms up to the sky. His eyes were always bloodshot and had lost their innocent shine. Usually Gordie wouldn't be caught dead looking like this in public, but he just didn't care.

As for Chris's school status, he had completely dropped out of high school. He was in his senior year now, which meant him and Gordie had to apply for colleges back in November. The two boys were still together in November, which Chris knew all too well. He also remembered that Gordie had convinced him to apply to some colleges, which meant he would be getting a ton of letters from the schools he applied to pretty soon. Chris wasn't going to bother looking at them. All he was planning to do was throw them out and continue his life with the Cobras.
These letters would arrive at the end of January, telling them which colleges had accepted them and which ones didn't. Chris knew that the only college that accepted him was the community college up in Portland. He didn't even have to check. Chris wasn't planning on going to college anyways, so he didn't care.

Gordie was accepted into some pretty high up colleges, but he knew once the schools saw his dramatic grade drop he would not be allowed in. Not that he cared anymore.
Every single day of his life felt like a blur of standards he used to be able to reach. Average self care was difficult for him. Keeping his mind busy with something other than Chris was a challenge too. It haunted Gordie that Chris was the only person left who loved him, and now he was gone. Now no one loved or cared about him.
Gordie assumed Chris probably had a new girlfriend and a new best friend and that everything was going great for him. All these thoughts would raid his brain the second he woke up in the morning. Sure, the day time was bad, but at night was when things would get the worst.
Every night once his parents had gone to bed he would immediately reach under his bed to grab his secret stash of polaroids from last summer. Gordie would go through these photos every night before bed. Most of the pictures were of him and Chris, plus a couple that were only of an off guard Chris. There were some polaroids from last summer that were sneaky shots Chris took of Gordie, but Chris had insisted on keeping them for himself. Gordie had always wondered what Chris had done with those polaroid pictures after they broke up or if he even kept them. (Chris did in fact keep them and went through them a lot, especially when he had to fix a 'problem' in his pants.)
In Gordie's favorite picture, which was the one he was currently staring at, Chris was holding the camera upwards with one arm and his other arm around Gordie. Gordie was in the middle of a laughing fit while Chris was staring down at him with the sweetest look on his face. It almost looked like Chris was admiring the way he looked, instead of just laughing with him. It pained the small boy to see such a naturally happy expression on Chris's face, and how it was only a temporary thing. Oh the things he would do to get Chris to look at him like that again.