Breathe Again

13: You Get A Question, You Get A Question, Everybody Gets A Question

When the fire alarm goes off in the middle of the night, Isaac seriously considers letting himself burn. His bed is so warm, and despite not drinking much Isaac doesn't feel capable of getting up again for another few thousand hours, and so he grumbles, pulls the pillow over his head and weighs up the pros and cons of staying in bed vs escaping the fire. He won't lie, staying in bed is winning.

Liam has no such hesitations though and Isaac feels himself being poked in the side, and Liam is shouting him to get up. They must both know it's likely a false alarm, but Liam is as keen as he always is despite the circumstances and sadly when Isaac tells Liam he'd rather stay in bed, Liam hits him on the arm - harder than he thought Liam was capable of - and throws a coat and shoes towards him.

Isaac is still not fully awake when the two of them emerge into the cold night air and a look at his phone tells him that that's completely justified given that it's only 4am.

"Liam," Isaac whines, "when can I go back to bed."

"You're annoying," Liam shoots back with a roll of his eyes, "I could have just rescued you from a burning building."

They both gaze back at the hostel, which is very much not in flames.

"You could," Isaac says, "but you didn't."

"Wow. You're so ungrateful, imagine if I'd left you behind."

Isaac isn't quite sure the intention behind that statement, Liam's tone is light but there's something more serious behind it. A bite behind the banter. It makes Isaac want to shrink back into his coat, fold in on himself until he blends in with the dust around them.

"Thank you," he mumbles eventually.

"You're welcome."

While it's cold outside, Isaac is pleased to find that he's not freezing with his coat on. It is the start of summer after all, and while the weather is unpredictable (rainbows a common occurrence) it's not getting too cold overnight and the nights are becoming somewhat balmy.

But the night air is waking him up and Isaac hates it, knowing that his chances of getting back to sleep are dwindling with every passing minute.

"When do you think they'll let us back in?" Liam asks.

"Whenever they've confirmed that there's not a fire and instead someone has burnt some toast or something."

"Wow, I thought they were just going to let us back in with the fire still burning."

"All I know is that I'm gonna struggle to get back to sleep."

"Me too."

The two of them share a small smile and a thoughtful expression crosses Liam's face.

"Shall we just get out of here?"

"What?" Isaac can't keep the uncertainty out of his tone.

"Well apparently neither of us are going to get back to sleep, and we don't know when we're going to be allowed back to the room anyway, so why don't we go somewhere else. You're the local expert, take me somewhere cool."

Isaac recovers quickly and again weighs up going back to sleep vs spending time with Liam, it's not a very even battle.

"I've got an idea."

The two of them head out of the hostel car park and Isaac tries not to think about how strange the two of them must look, both in boxers and a t-shirt with a coat draped over them, It's certainly a Look but Liam hasn't seemed to stop to think about it so Isaac decides he won't worry about it either.