We'll Get There {AntiAverage} (ABANDONED)

13: T B

Words: 1273
I'm not super happy with this one tbh

My eyes flew open when a loud scream carried through the house. The sound was high-pitched, panicked, and it seemed it originated from somewhere close. The noise had woken me from an already uneasy sleep, and I could sense that Greyson had woken, too.

"What was that?", my brother asked, his small voice dripping with fear.

"I don't know..." I could hear muffled words from the other side of the wall, and then sobs that left whoever was in distress gasping for breath. It took my drowsy thought process longer than I'd like to admit to put the pieces together.

Obviously it was coming from Dad's room, but it didn't sound like my father. The sounds were laced with sporadic imperfections, like the voice was glitching, and that really only left one person that made sense. The question was, why was Anti in my dad's room?

Maybe it had something to do with whatever happened to him over the last few months. Or maybe they were together-?

I banished the thought from my head with a grimace. Nope, nope, not going there.

I hesitated, before telling Grey to go back to sleep. It wasn't our business, and I clearly didn't need to be disturbing whatever was happening. That wasn't going to stop me from interrogating my family tomorrow, though.

____

I managed to wake up at near ten o'clock, almost two hours later than usual. That was an effect of the house; when it was chaotic it was impossible not to get swept up in it, but when it was quiet, there was a ethereal sense of peace.

Grey was still sleeping, so I decided to leave him be. When I exited the room, sure to leave the door open a crack so my brother realized I had left, I saw Robbie making his way down the stairs. The zombie's low motor skills forced him to cling to the railing for dear life as he moved very slowly down each step.

"Need a hand, Rob?", I asked, quickly stepping to his side.

Robbie nodded gratefully, and I extended an arm for him to take. It didn't do too much, but he could move faster with support on both sides. We slowly made our way to the ground floor.

Once we reached the bottom, Robbie smiled softly at me, revealing oddly well-kept teeth. "T...thank you.", he said, a surprising amount of earnest in his growly voice. He always was kind of intense.

"No problem.", I did a loose two-finger salute before walking towards the kitchen.

He limped off to the living room to turn on the TV, and I turned my attention to the cabinets of food. I pulled one open to reveal a package of English muffins that I was sure hadn't been there before. Shrugging it off, I grabbed them by the bunched-together excess plastic at the end.

I pulled the sealing clip off and grabbed one of the spongey breads from its box, before roughly tossing the cardboard back in. The cabinets were tall, okay?

By the time I had cut the bread in half and popped it in the toaster, I realized that the resident zombie would probably have a hard time making something if he was hungry. I was... pretty sure that he could eat human food. I'd seen him eat a sandwich before, anyway.

"Hey, uh, Robbie?", I called, leaning over the counter on my elbows. The action reminded me of my mom, and a whole plethora of mixed feelings about this place kicked up. I shook them away as Rob tore his eyes from Steven Universe to look at me. He tilted his head expectantly, waiting for the next part of my question.

"Do you want some food? I can make you something."

He grinned in a surprisingly childlike manner, nodding his head with as much excitement as his stiff muscles would allow.

"Cool. Uh... anything specific?", I didn't really know where to go from a simple nod, but I guess I'd figure it out if I had to.

Luckily, Robbie only thought for a few seconds before forcing, "Trix... plea..se."

I nodded, giving him a thumbs up, before turning back towards the cabinets. I had to open a few before I found the cereals, and had to do even more rummaging through the millions of boxes before I found the Trix. I didn't really know if he liked them with milk or not, but I decided that giving Robbie an open bowl of liquid (especially liquid that wasn't water) was a bad idea.

So I grabbed the largest cup I could find and filled it to the top as compensation. When I walked it over to him I couldn't help but be reminded of the times I had to look after Greyson when he was little. Robbie nodded his thanks as I set the cup on the coffee table, which for some reason he was sitting in front of, despite the perfectly fine couch behind him.

I heard the toaster ding as I began to walk back. I quickly pulled the bread slices out and dropped them on a paper towel, hissing at the unpleasant heat on my fingertips. I began to rummage around in the fridge for butter, and this is when I heard someone walking down the stairs.

I poked my head around the refrigerator door, retreaving a half stick of butter poorly re-folded into the wrapper, and saw my father. Chase looked... tired, to say the least. His hair was a mess, one of the rare times it was seen hatless, and the bags under his eyes were exceeding their normal size. His eyelids were drooping, and he looked paler than he had the night before.

I closed the fridge after finding some cheese and finished preparing my breakfast sandwich, as Chase half-stumbled over to the coffee maker. "Uh...you okay?", I asked hesitantly, scooping up my food and moving to sit at the counter.

He looked up at me with a forced, half-baked smile on his face, "Yeah. Yeah, doin' great, dude."

I furrowed my eyebrows skeptically, letting out a disbelieving hum.

"Hey, that's my dad face you've got on there.", he chuckled, loitering by the machine as it began to produce coffee.

"Guess I've picked up a couple habits. You sure you're okay? You look crazy tired.", I said the first sentence with less volume than the last two.

"I'm fine, Trey. I'm supposed to be pestering you, not the other way around.", I could tell my dad was brushing the question off.

I debated it for a moment, before asking another, "Wouldn't have anything to do with... whatever happened last night, would it?"

Chase stiffened. "Shi...oo...t, did that wake you up?"

I nodded, taking a bite of my sandwich. "What exactly was 'that'?", My mouth was full as I asked, something that would've drove my mom crazy were she present. I was thinking about her a lot today, huh?

"Er... Anti had a nightmare. It's... not really my place to talk about it. I'm sure you've already figured out something happened, though. He, uh, he went through some stuff this year.", he shook his head as the coffee machine beeped, letting the room know a fresh pot had been completed.

I would've asked another question, an annoyingly nosey part of myself flaring up this week apparently, but Greyson's footsteps could be heard coming down the steps.

I silently processed the new information as my brother asked for Cocoa Pebbles, connecting the new dots to the older ones I'd been forming.