Summary:
Typical Drake & Josh storyline. Drake and Josh plan to go to a concert where a famous singer will be, but get sidetracked when a mysterious box addressed to Walter shows up and Meghan's pranks take over. Drake also must deal with an annoying girl (who says everything with a "w") from his class, that also shows signs she has a crush on him. When he & Josh go to the concert, something terrible happens.
Disclaimer:
We all know that me, a thirteen year old girl with a psychopathic father doesn't own anything, much less anyone or anything in this story. Drake and Josh belong to Nick. Laws suck. If money didn't exist, I could just trade like 100 pigs or sheep for the rights to D&J. Not that I'd… have any sheep… I'm SHEEPLESS!
Note to Readers:
Well, guys, it's 5:40am and guess what I just got finished typing up? THIS CHAPTER! LOL. I hope with all of my heart that it at least makes a little bit of sense and isn't either overly dramatic or other wise way too un-emotional. I think I got a sensible storyline out of it, but then again, it's still almost 6am and I'm about having to prop my eyelids open with toothpicks. I was listening to Drake's cd the entire time so hopefully that inspired me in a good way and I have come up with some actually substantial material at such a weirdo hour. Pardon me if anything is grammatically or otherwise screwed up-- just try to make the best sense out of it as you can. Hope you're awake right now, because otherwise it might be hard to understand. Or then again, if you are asleep when you read this chapter you might be able to understand it as I did when I wrote it. I also tried to describe Drake in a hot way… so it might have turned out a little… um… how can I put this? Stupid? LOL. Annnnnyway, rofl, I hope it's acceptable. Read and review! Oh! And also, thanks for the nice reviews on the last chapters! Love you guys! Off to bed I go! (Aren't you all so relieved!) LOL.
Story: "Party in a Box"
Chapter: "Spawning Storm"; Ten
Written By: Ginger
Extras:
Italics in "quotation marks" symbolize thoughts of
Drake's.
Italic Bold paragraphs are flashbacks.
Italic, Bold, and Underlined "he"s refer to the mysterious man.
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A week had passed since the last very emotional explosion. Drake had become a little restless about staying in his room, but other than that, he was actually doing pretty much alright.
The pain in his middle wasn't as fierce and it was much less frequent and crippling. Anita had visited a few times during the week and that in itself cheered Drake up very much. In fact, he felt pretty okay. He had gotten to play his pricelessly signed guitar a bit and since Josh had surprised him with a new tv power cord, he could watch tv as much as he wanted. Well—that is, whenever Oprah wasn't on. At that time, Josh took over the tv set and Drake would always put the pillow over his head and go to sleep, hoping to not wake up until the program was completely over.
Today, that particular schedule had taken place, once again. It was Saturday afternoon and Oprah wouldn't have been on if it hadn't happened to have been a special sort of live fundraiser episode.
Suddenly, Drake awoke with a start. The phone in their room was ringing loudly. As he sat up from the bed and looked around, he gasped and looked across the room with disgusted shock. Josh was sitting on the couch, quietly watching Oprah and cuddling the card-board cut out version close beside him. Hearing his brother moving behind him, he grabbed the "Oprah" and stuffed it quickly under the couch. Drake got up from the bed and shook his head with a horrified frown scrawled across his face as he walked toward the desk where the phone sat, ringing incessantly. He turned to point at the tv and said: "Turn that thing down!" Josh complied and leaned closer to the tv to be able to hear, as Drake reached the desk.
He faltered before reaching to answer it, wondering if it was him. "What if it was? What would I say with Josh only like ten feet away and in the same room?"
He bit his lip & glanced fleetingly in his brother's direction before forcing his hand to pick up the phone with seemed to ring on forever.
"…Hello?" he said in almost a painful tone.
"Dwake! Aniwta towd me abowt your accident! How do you feewl?" the voice of Lyn squeaked into his ear. In a way, he was actually almost relieved that it was atleast someone other than him, but then again, how much better could it be talking to Lyn?
"Oh, hi, Lyn. Yeah I'm… fine." He mustered. "Oh gweat! I was so wowwied about you! I wish I cowld have known abowt it earwier—I would have wushed wight over to the howspitawl. When I heawd abowt you, I cwied and cwied." "Oh…? Thank you?" he said slowly with a frown of confusion. "Down't twank me, Dwake… I wove thinking about you…" she said with a bit of sass in her voice. "Uhh… uh—Call you back!" he said with a look of horror as he quickly hung up the phone.
Sighing, he shook his head. "What's your problem?" Josh asked, turning off the tv (since Oprah was over). "Nothing. Just don't enjoy waking up to you makin' out with Oprah and then on top of that have to talk to Miss "Wyn". Yeah… nothin' could beat that combination." he said, closing his eyes with a quick shudder. Josh glared for a minute and then said: "…What did Lynn want, anyway?" "Oh, nothing. She was just—flirting. Eww." Drake quivered. "Since… when did the king of flirtation ever 'eww' at a girl hitting on him?" Josh laughed with a disturbed look on his face. "Since he talked to Lyn." Drake answered with a blank sarcastic stare. "Oh, okay." Josh snickered, sitting on the couch: "…So! What are ya' gonn'a do about her if she's crushing on you?"
"Okay… I did not ever want to hear those last four, disgusting words. I have no desire to do anything about her… just to make her go away permanently." he answered, shaking his head in annoyance. "Man, she seems like a pretty stubborn girl." Josh said. "Stubborn? How can she be stubborn—she's got nothing left in her head!" "Hey, it don't take much in the head to be stubborn!" Josh said matter-of-factly. "Oh, yeah. You're right. You should know." Drake replied. "Yeah." Josh agreed: "…Hey!" "So, what am I gonn'a do? Apparently she's not gonn'a quit bothering me without some… encouragement." Drake asked, ignoring his brother. "I dunno, man. Hopefully she will just leave you alone." "Leave me alone? That's hopeless." Drake sighed: "Sometimes I wish that I didn't have to be so irresistible." "…Well that was humble." Josh replied, nodding once with a raise of his brow.
"Okay, fine! Don't help me!" Drake said, shrugging and slowly walking over to the window. Josh felt the slight tension in his step brother's tone and realized that he was worrying about something other than the task of ridding himself of Lyn's attentions. Josh began to say something, but he stopped himself, recalling what had happened between them last week.
Clouds were gathering darkly in the western sky, in the thick black piles, blocking out the sunlight and lending everything the tint of a musky, dirty green color that warned of the approaching storm. Drake opened the window and leaned a little way out, feeling the greenish glow reflecting off of his light skin. His chocolate eyes shimmered in the strange light and the warm wind blew a few strands of his hazelnut-brown hair across his forehead. His demeanor was more or less restless, but he still had a twinge of pleasantness about his present nature.
Josh sat in the computer – desk chair, staring at Drake in deep contemplation: "Why couldn't Drake just open up and tell me what's going on and what's bothering him so much? He's become so quiet and introverted ever since we argued that time in the hospital. …Two weeks he's been like this. And then, that episode last week when he cried. He NEVER cries! What is so wrong with him? It has got to be something horrible or else he wouldn't he wouldn't be so secretive. What could it be? It's not girl trouble—he and Anita are back together and she's become so close to him again. Maybe he's still resentful and depressed about the wreck? Is he upset with me about causing him so much trouble? I never meant to. I hope he understands that. It could be that he's still thinking about it, but then again, why would he be so quiet about it? Surely he'd tell me! He's not good at all at keeping secrets from me. What's wrong, Drake? What is it?"
Josh awoke from his thoughts at the sound of his mother's voice yelling up the stairs: "Drake, Josh—your dad and Meghan and I are going to her school recital, okay? I'm leaving you two home. See you guys later!" "Okay, Mom, have a good time! We'll be fine here! Bye!" Josh said, getting up and walking toward the door so his mother could hear him. Unlike his brother, Drake didn't stir from his spot at the window, watching the storm and nearly drowning in his over-whelming thoughts.
As the humid mist on the edge of the hot wind kissed the ends of his brunette bangs, making them slightly curl in the heat, he stared at the on-coming storm clouds in deep reflection. A silvery blue rod of electricity bolted from the clouds and struck to the ground, causing a huge explosion of thunder. He could feel the electric charge that the storm was giving him and it made his skin crawl with tiny goose bumps.
"Hey, Drake—" Josh interrupted, pulling him from the window and closing it: "Come on downstairs with me." "Downstairs? Wow… okay! That's a change! It feels like I haven't been down there in like forever and a day!" Drake replied, seeming to snap out of his queer daze he had been in.
He and Josh walked across the room and through their door, into the short hallway. When they reached the stairs, Josh began to go down them quickly when he realized Drake wasn't beside him. Turning to look up the previous four steps, he spotted Drake at the top of the flight, biting his lip and looking down the stairs uncertainly.
"Oh! I'm sorry Drake! I forgot!" Josh exclaimed, racing back up the steps after realizing that Drake hadn't been down the stairs yet. "Here—" he reached out his hand to him: "I'll help you." Drake smiled with a relieved and thankful grin and reached out to grab his brother's hand firmly as they both took the first step downward. Every now and then on the way down, Josh asked his brother if he needed to stop for a moment but Drake only replied: "Don't worry about me, brother. I'm okay."
When the two reached the downstairs, Drake patted his brother's shoulder as a "thank you" and went by himself to sit on the couch. "Hey, Drake, I'm gonn'a go make a sandwich in the kitchen, 'kay? I haven't eaten a lot today." Josh asked. "Sure, bro. I'm just gonn'a watch the weather channel." Drake replied with a chuckle, picking up the remote.
Almost as soon as his brother had stepped from the room, it began to ring again—the phone. Drake muted the tv and managed to stand himself up from the couch. The telephone had rung five times before Drake had reached it but it kept ringing. He sighed and yanked it up with a roll of his eyes: "Hello, Lyn." Suddenly he froze. Nobody would speak to him over the line but the harsh breathing let him know who it was.
"…H-hello?" he stuttered, feeling his hands beginning to shiver. "…Drake." An icy voice whispered eerily into his ear and through the tiny telephone speaker. "What do you want?" Drake asked quickly, nervously backing into the side of the couch, and barely being able to hold the phone; his hands were shaking so badly. "I want you. …And I want your misery…" the voice eerily shuddered it's way through his entire body. "Why? Please, just don't call me any more!" Drake pleaded. "No. I'll call you as much as I want to, stupid filth." the answer came back. "Leave me alone!" Drake exclaimed, trying to drown out his teary voice with a tough, hard one: "You can't do anything to me. I have a family, now—a good family that loves me—and… and you can't control my life the way you want me to be anymore!" Drake yelled in to the phone, hardly caring if anyone heard him.
The speaker on the other line began to speak once again, but Drake quickly tore the phone from his ear and shouted into it in disgust: "For God sakes, shut up and leave my family the hell alone!"
Suddenly Josh's voice came from the other side of the room, making Drake put the phone down: "Drake!" The over-wrought teenager turned and looked at his brother, trying to figure out what to say when the phone began to ring again. Each ring sounded louder and more taunting to Drake. He closed his eyes and bit his lip, clutching his ribs with one hand and running a hand through his hair, pulling on it as if this act would release his terrible tension.
As Josh stood in the doorway, staring in shock and the terrible phone kept ringing and ringing, Drake began to feel the old feelings of helplessness creeping back into his unwilling heart. The feeling of being unable to escape-- unable to free himself-- unable to make anyone understand, started to make his head spin. He struggled with this feeling for a moment, unbelieving that he had let it slip back into his life once again, but he eventually gave up the fight and slid hysterically to the floor in defeat, beginning to sob harshly. Each sob made him feel worse. Each tear made his ribs hurt worse and each ring of the phone made his spirits sink even lower.
"No… no… don't let him, Josh," Drake moaned, feeling his hope collapse inside of him like a tent in a tornado: "Please…" Josh was in sheer shock and seeing Drake--strong, tough, funny Drake-- be reduced to this pleading, helpless, listless form lying on the floor, crying hysterically made him feel like he wanted to crawl under the his bed covers and to not wake up until this nightmare was over.
With alarm sizzling quickly through him, Josh shook himself awake and rushed toward the ringing telephone, that seemed to be causing Drake so much pain.
Drake gasped painfully, trying to sit up: "No! Josh, don't answer it! Please don't! Josh, I'm begging you-- don't pick it up! Please!"
"No, Drake. I'm not listening to you this time, and for your own good." Josh answered firmly, holding the phone to his ear: "Hello?" "Drake--" the jagged voice began. For once in his life, Josh became tough: "This is Drake's brother. What do you want?" "I want to talk to him." the male voice growled rigidly. "Well, you can't. Who ever you are, don't call here again. I don't like people who hurt my brother. So back off of him--understand?" Josh answered gruffly, barely able to restrain himself from cussing at the top of his lungs. At this, he hung up the phone resistantly. He turned to face once again his hysterical brother. But when he did, Drake was no longer on the floor. He was sitting on the couch, wiping the tears as best as he could from his face and brushing a damp lock of hair from his brows.
"…We--we really need to talk about something, Drake." Josh managed, still feeling his heart racing as he walked to sit in the chair closest beside the couch. "I… know. I'm--I'm sorry about the cussing. It just slipped out and I--" Drake began slowly. "That's not what I want to talk about. …Who is this guy? And why does he have the power to scare you so much?" Josh said, being dead serious and with out so much as a hint of a smile for one of the rare times in his life. "He's… just a guy. I can't say who." Drake answered distantly, standing up and turning a little bit from the other boy: "He's been… never mind." he faltered, suddenly becoming quiet and not going on with his sentence. "Drake, this is serious. It's not a game anymore. You have no choice but to tell me something about what's going on--I won't take no for an answer, now. …For your own sake, tell me." Josh replied, determinedly. "He's a…" Drake turned back and stared at Josh as if he could almost see though him and the wall behind him, into the sky: "A stalker. Or that's what he's been doing, kind of…" Drake finished, answering slowly. S
"Why in the world did I just tell him that? I shouldn't have told him anything, much less that! No one except me is supposed to know about what happened! What will I do now? He'll be so interrogating!"
Drake snapped out of his thoughts, feeling his heart beat fast as he waited for a reaction from Josh. But still these monstrous notions whirled dizzily and mercilessly in his tired mind. "Drake… you're kidding, right? He's stalking you?" Josh asked with awe in his shocked voice. "Yes. He is. But… but Josh, I'm handling this myself. I've handled him before. If you get all proud of yourself because you're being the protecting big brother, you'll just drag me down in way more trouble. So… let me do this alone." Drake's words hurt Josh's pride tremendously, but before he could even begin to think of that and how his mind stood on those thoughts, a few words of Drake's little speech stood out un-mistakably. "Wait a minute…" Josh began, standing up and turning Drake to look at him: "You've 'handled him before'? …Drake what past experiences did you have with this guy that you're not telling me or anybody else about?" Drake's eyes filled with a look of rapidly mounting fear and torment. Those normally shining brown eyes never had looked so frightened to Josh, ever since he had met Drake. But now they began to fill again with wells of tears.
Drake stared at his brother with panic written heavily all over his features and finally he pulled from the hands that were gripping his shoulders with such curiosity. "Josh, don't do this to me. I thought you actually understood me last week when I had tried to explain to you why I can't tell you anything. But you don't understand, do you? I tried to tell you the best I could. I tried to say as much as I could, but now it's gotten to the point where I have no more to tell you that's safe for you to know!" Drake exclaimed through his tears as he walked a ways away from the couch. "I wish you'd just understand me. Just for once--right now." he pleaded, raising both hands to his brow and grabbing two fists full of hair.
This had struck a real chord with Josh, bringing familiar tears to his eyes too: "Drake… I'll try to understand. I just hate seeing you like this--seeing you so demolished, so really destroyed. Drake, what's happened to you?" Josh asked with tearful worry stripped all through out his voice: "…What's happened?" Drake bent over in tired loss at these heart-wrenching words and cried out loud. "Drake, don't cry--I'm here for you." Josh said, trying to calm him. But his brother continued to cry wearily and when he looked up, Josh was only about a step from him.
"Don't cry. I might be prideful in being a 'tough big brother', but prideful of not, I still plan to do what ever I need to, to protect you, brother." Josh answered, reaching over to the tissue box and handing his brother a tissue. After a moment of drying his tears and composing himself, Drake brushed his damp cheeks with his hand and said: "Thanks, Josh. But… don't get hurt just to defend me. I would rather be hurt myself than have to see you be hurt because of me." "I'll be careful for you. I promise. But he's not going to bother you anymore. I wont let him." the brother answered, slowly and surely. Drake breathed in a shaky breath and tried once more to dry his tears completely: "Thanks for trying, Josh."
Josh put a hand on his shoulder understandingly, patting it and nodded after a moment: "…Hug me, brother?" Drake let out a teary laugh and wrapped his arms around Josh's shoulders limply, feeling himself being lifted slightly off of the ground, and for the first time in nearly an hour smiling: "Yeah, brother. I think I probably need a big hug right about now."
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Things had pretty much settled down in the Nichol's-Parker house for the rest of the afternoon. Drake had settled himself down on to the couch with a bag of Smarties candies and a glass of mocha-cola and was intently studying a bound book of papers. Josh was in the kitchen cleaning out a cabinet of old food. This is the chore he had been assigned to do by his mother for payment of "attacking Meghan" two weeks ago instead of being grounded, because of the outcome of the car accident.
Josh stuck his head through the window of the kitchen that lead to the family room and caught his step brother's attention: "Hey, Drake!" "Yeah, Josh?" Drake said quickly, snapping from his daze as he was scanning the pages of the book, and turned around in his seat, facing in his brother's direction. "Do you still want these things?" Josh asked, holding up a tiny, colorful cardboard box.
Drake gasped and jumped up from the couch: "YES! I WANT THEM!" "Well, why? It's just a—" Drake interrupted Josh by snatching the box from his hand: "Why! Because their my very first box of my super-power-mega-sours!" "But their like… four months old!" Josh said with an amused confusion written on his face as he pointed to the box in Drake's hands. "So! Super-power-mega-sours NEVER lose their—" "Super-powered, mega sourness?" Josh asked with a chuckle. "Whatever! Their still—" "Still goin' in the trash!" Josh said, grabbing the box and beginning to walk away. "JOSH! Don't you even think about throwing those away!" Drake exclaimed. But when his step brother seemed to pay not attention, he jumped up on to the counter of the window and slipped quickly into the kitchen on the other side. "Give me that!"
Drake ripped the box away from Josh's hands and clutched it to himself, narrowing his eyes and muttering in a low tone: "Their mine." "Okay, fine!" Josh shrugged and rolled him eyes, with a look of annoyed confusion: "Well, can I atleast throw away these old gummy bears?" "Why?" "Because their old." Josh said with a chuckle. "Okay, okay! Throw them away!" Drake said, rolling his eyes as well and walking out of the room with a mumbled: "Tryin' to throw away my mega-sours…" Josh sighed and Drake went back in to the family room, sitting back down in his place and taking up his manuscript.
He began to drift off in to a dreamy daze of thought. He was thinking about lots of things. One particular was about the man who kept calling him. "He is so determined on calling me. He simply won't leave me alone. What am I gonn'a do about it? If it gets too bad I could call the police. But they won't believe me! And then Mom and Dad would ask about it and… and I couldn't even begin to describe everything. It's too complicated, now. Why did he have to weave such a complicated mess? How could I ever start to tell anyone after all of this? I couldn't… Could I?"
"You have to be kidding me!" Josh's voice suddenly spoke beside Drake. He snapped out of his state of bewilderment and looked up behind him to see Josh standing there, staring at him. "What?" "You're… You can't be actually… reading!" Drake's eyes took on a look of sarcasm and he said: "It's a story Anita wrote. I'm proof-reading it for her." "Woah! That's a laugh! You proof reading?" Josh asked. Drake sighed and began to speak to his brother, but the phone began to ring.
Instantly both brothers dropped their playfulness and turned to glance at the phone and then back to each other, with somber, slightly frightened faces. Josh began to walk toward the phone, but Drake managed to scramble up from the couch and drop his book, grabbing his brother's arm: "Josh, Wait—" Josh turned around and stared for a moment at his brother and continued: "I want to answer it. Let me answer it myself." Josh frowned and sighed, hearing the phone's ring sound over and over and finally he spoke in a soft voice: "Okay, Drake." Drake turned and walked toward the ringing telephone and paused a moment before picking it up to think. Finally he did, and put it to his ear with a slight wince and a racing heart.
"…Hello?"
