I know it's been a while, I was just re-reading this and thought I would write a little more. I'd like to maybe work towards finishing it but I'm going to promise anything.
Enjoy!
Heartbreak Warfare by John Mayer
XXX
Lightning strike
Inside, my chest to keep me up at night
Dream of ways
To make you understand my pain
Clouds of sulfur in the air
Bombs are falling everywhere
It's heartbreak warfare
Once you want it to begin,
No one really ever wins
In heartbreak warfare
If you want more love,
Why don't you say so?
If you want more love,
Why don't you say so?
Drop his name
Push it in and twist the knife again
Watch my face
As I pretend to feel no pain, pain, pain
When I opened my eyes the room was blurry and I had to squeeze them closed from the pounding in my head. I groaned and shifted on the couch, squishing my face into the back to block out the light, although it wasn't as bad as it normally was. Someone must have closed the curtains.
"About time you woke up." My whole body stiffened at the voice. I felt the end of the couch dip down as someone sat, and I refused to turn and see if my mind was tricking me or not. I remembered bits of last night, and more than losing Mia, I wanted the end of the night to be a dream. "Come one, son. You need to drink this, and take these. It'll help." I very slowly turned to see my old man holding out a glass of water and a couple pills.
"What the hell is happening?" My voice failed me slightly, and when I shifted around to sit up straight, the room tilted dangerously.
"Don't move so fast. Here." He took hold of my shoulder with the hand that wasn't holding anything and pushed me against the back of the couch so that I didn't fall off. Once I was upright, he handed me the water and pills. I almost thought about tossing them at him, but there was no way I'd be able to fight him, so I swallowed some water and took the pills, washing them down with another gulp.
"There you go. Now get on up to your room and sleep this off, you'll feel better tomorrow."
"What time is it?" I asked. Even though everything was still spinning, I had to meet up with the guys. We had things to talk about with getting the next round of drugs out to people. The thought made me want to puke more than I already did. What did it matter anymore? Mia was gone, I had no idea where she was, meaning I couldn't protect her. Selling these drugs was useless now.
"Almost 4 in the evening. That Steven guy you're always hanging around with came by a couple hours ago looking for you, I sent him away so you could sleep." Anger bubbled up in me and I stood up, although the quick movement sent everything turning around me and I had to collapse back onto the couch.
"Why the fuck do you care?" I snapped as I held my head in my hands to try and make everything stop moving. "Since when have you given a shit about me and whether I sleep off a hangover?" There was silence for a moment, and I was waiting for him to grab me and beat me, but instead all I heard was him huff and sit on the coffee table, although it protested his weight.
"Listen, son. I've been fucked up for so long that I know I don't have the right to try and do anything to help you. But your ma came by the other day looking for you, sayin' she had heard about you and that Mia girl breaking up. It's been a long time since I've seen her look worried and something about it sobered me up. Her and I had a long talk and we both realized the mess we made out of not just our marriage but raising you kids. We know there ain't much we can do at this point to make up for it – especially me. We've both started going to meetings to help with our drinking."
"Well good for you." I said as I slowly stood up, making sure to not let the room tilt this time. "But you're right, you both fucked up and there ain't nothing you can do to fix it. Making sure I sleep off a hangover doesn't make up for all the years of abuse I put up with from the both of you." I started for the stairs to go to my room, since my head was still pounding and all I wanted to do was sleep it off. Plus sleeping meant I didn't have to think about Mia, which was always a bonus.
"You called for her in your sleep all last night." I froze on the bottom step, not really understanding what I was supposed to do with that information. "You said you were sorry a lot too, and that you wanted her back." I didn't turn to look at him, I just stood there, and feeling like everything in me was turning to ice. I had thought it was just something I had made up in my head, that I hadn't actually dreamt it. But his next words changed that, "You kept saying that you loved her." No, no, no, no. After everything, after all the crap that I'd been putting us both through for months. How could I only be thinking that now, when she was gone?
"It was just a dream." I said as I started to walk up the stairs. "It didn't mean anything."
"Son, I know what doesn't mean anything looks like, and that was not it."
"You don't know shit!" I snapped. I almost spun around, but falling down the stairs was not something I wanted to do. "You don't know anything about what I felt for her, or what we were going through, or the bullshit I put her through." I had to sit down, my head was pounding too hard and even though I was standing still, I was starting to feel dizzy again.
"Right. Because I don't know that you've been dishing out drugs in different parts of town with that gang you run." The fact that he knew almost sent me tumbling down the stairs. He was never around when I sent the boys out to wherever the drugs were being sold. He shouldn't know anything about it.
"How do you know anything about that?" I asked as I looked down at him from where I was sitting on the top step. He sighed and leaned against the wall.
"Because when I was your age, I started to do the same thing. Don't sit there thinking this is some new thing, drugs have been around a long time and people have been making money off of it just as long." He shook his head, sitting down a few steps from me with his back to the wall. "Your mother didn't know for a long time. We'd been dating since we were 16 and I was ready to marry her. She was a beautiful woman when she was younger, so full of life. I wanted to buy her the best ring I could find, unfortunately my part-time job didn't make me enough money to do that. So a friend of mine said that if I helped him out, he would get me some extra cash. I didn't know what I was getting into, and by the time I did it was too late. I never told your ma, she would have left me." I didn't know how to feel about what was happening. I hadn't talked with my old man since I was about 7 years old, anything after that was a fight. It was also creeping me out how similar my life appeared to be compared to his. "But you're doing something better than me, son. I got involved more than just selling. I started taking some for myself. It was only a little at first, but then the portions got bigger, and I stayed high longer. I was at my worst when you're mother found out. She was furious, even when I told her that I had no choice if I wanted to buy her the ring she was so proudly sporting around town. She left me for almost a month. It was the worst month in my life, and at first I used the drugs to try and forget until I realized that if I wanted to get her back, I had to stop. So I sobered up and went begging for her forgiveness. We got married 3 months later. But I don't think she ever fully trusted that I wouldn't go back to those old habits. I know for a fact that she wasn't surprised when I turned to drinking when I lost my job."
"How did you get her back?" I asked. "How did you get her to trust you enough that she was willing to marry you?" The old man looked up at me, and I didn't know how to feel about the lack of threat in his eyes. There had always been hatred and anger bubbling just under the surface, which had kept me on my toes, ready for a fight.
"A whole lot of begging. Constantly telling her how much she meant to me helped too, but in the end it was faith that she loved me. If I had thought she didn't, I wouldn't have bother. But women are funny when it comes to that sort of thing. No matter how anger you make them, even if they say they never want to talk to you again, if they love you and you try your hardest to make it right, they'll come back."
"I don't know how to make this right." I said as I looked out the window beside the door. I could see now that what I thought was a good parking job last night was actually really bad. "I fucked up so bad. I don't even know where to go to try and make everything right. She could be anywhere by now." The old man sighed and stood up.
"If it's meant to be, she'll come back. Even if she doesn't come back for you, those boys she's always with are family to her, and she'll come home for them." He walked towards the kitchen, leaving me wondering what I was supposed to do with anything that we had just talked about. I still couldn't wrap my mind around the fact that we had just had a conversation that didn't result in a fight, and I knew that without some sleep I wouldn't be able to process any of it.
With a grunt of effort, I got up and made my way to my bedroom. I couldn't be bothered to arrange the sheets in any way to get under them, so I just collapsed on top and fell back asleep.
XXX
"Shepard!" My eyes shot open when I felt myself being lifted from my bed, and for a moment I had no idea what was going on. That was until Steve's face came into focus inches from mine.
"What the hell is wrong with you?!" I snapped as I wrestled my way out of his grasp. "What are you doing in my house?!" That was when I heard thumps on the stairs, and Soda, Darry, Two-Bit, and Ponyboy came into the room in time to grab Steve before he lunged at me again.
"You made her leave!" Steve said as he struggled against the guys, until Darry grabbed his arm and yanked him into the hallway. Two-Bit didn't even have to say anything when he turned towards me. I'd never seen him so serious so I just walked out the door and followed Soda down to the living room. I didn't know where the old man had gone, or what time it was, but at least the pounding in my head had stopped.
"This is your fault, Shepard." Steve said from where he was seething by the window. Darry was standing between him and me, and I was thankful that he appeared to be level-headed enough to not want to have to deal with a fight. "You pushed her so hard that she left town. What the hell did you do to make her so upset?!" I didn't answer, instead I just leaned in the doorway of the living room.
"Is this really necessary right now?" I asked in a tone that I hoped sounded bored. "I'm not really in the mood for this right now."
"How about I put you in the mood?" Two-Bit came and stood right in front of me, his face inches from mine. "Tell us what you did to make her leave. She called us from Johnson City in Tennessee, saying she wasn't coming back for a while. You're the only reason she would leave." I just looked at him. I couldn't tell them anything, though at this point I didn't know why considering I didn't have anything to lose at this point. I just knew that telling them all was a bad idea.
"I fucked up." It was all I could think to say. It was the first truth I had said to them in a long time. "I fucked up, and she left. Why she didn't leave sooner, I don't know." I turned away from them and started for the stairs. "Get outta my house." I didn't wait to hear if any of them had anything else to say before I walked back to my room and closed the door. I dropped back down on my bed and starred at the ceiling. A numb feeling was settling over me, and I didn't know what to do to make it go away. All I knew was that what the old man had said was true, I did love Mia. I loved her more than anything, and I wanted her back so that I could tell her. But that wasn't going to be enough. I had to tell her the truth, no matter the consequences. She could handle herself, and if they killed me because of it, I wouldn't care as long as she believed me. There was just one problem. I had no idea where she was, or where she was planning to go. Two-Bit had said Johnson City, Tennessee. That meant she was going east. What was east for her to go to?
I shot up in bed, my head spinning in circles as realization set in. No. But yes, of course she would. She didn't know anything, and seeing Jessie and David probably reminded her of the city. That was the only place where she would go to be with people she knew.
I started to get up from the bed to grab my keys, but stopped. I couldn't go right away, they would know I was looking for her. They probably already knew she was gone. I had to be smart about it, I had to wait before going to find her, and I couldn't leave during the day.
With a sigh, I sat back down on the bed, trying to think of not just how I was going to find her, but how I was going to tell her the truth and have her believe me.
Clouds of sulfur in the air
Bombs are falling everywhere
It's heartbreak warfare
Once you want it to begin,
No one really ever wins
In heartbreak warfare
If you want more love,
Why don't you say so?
If you want more love,
Why don't you say so?
Just say so
How come the only way to know how high you get me
Is to see how far I fall
God only knows how much I'd love you if you let me
But I can't break through at all.
It's a heart, heartbreak
I don't care if we don't sleep at all tonight
Let's just fix this whole thing now
I swear to God we're gonna get it right
If you lay your weapon down
Red wine and Ambien
You're talking shit again, it's heartbreak warfare
Good to know it's all a game
Disappointment has a name, it's heartbreak, heartbreak
It's heartbreak warfare
It's heartbreak warfare
It's heartbreak warfare
XXX
Reviews would be great! It'd be good to know if anyone cares if I continue this or not.
~Stay Gold!
