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:
If you think I own anything, go to the nearest psychiatrist. Please. As a service to all humanity.
Note to Readers:
Get out the tissues; you're in for a big blow… no pun intended. I expect all of you to cry. Read the 1,310 words and weep. I know you will all hate me at the end of this chapter, but hopefully I can regain your confidence. –evil cackle--
Story: "Party in a Box"
Chapter: "Dead Laughter"; Fifteen
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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It was a dark, cloudy grey autumn day as Anita, Scottie, Trevor, Walter, Audrey and many other walked along a stone path. The sound of their shoes clicking against the rough rock sounded amplified twice as loud since everything else was so quiet. The wind blew in a gentle and cool breeze past the lonely and empty little eleven year old girl as she sobbed miserably, walking beside the crowd of other people. She felt the cold air surround her body as it blew through her open coat, but she didn't care enough to button it up. "What could be the worst that could happen from being cold?" she thought to herself as her mind tossed thoughts to he brutally: "If you got pneumonia and died, you wouldn't even be fit to be near him, because your stupid prank cost him his life. He had been so kind and unharmful to everyone and you killed him dead for no reason. You should be in prison. You set up the prank. You aimed the ball. You laughed when you heard it hit the floor, from upstairs, glad that you had pulled another fast one on him. But you never once told him you loved him. And maybe you didn't." A kind hand reached over her shoulder and pulled her jacket closed, and she herself noticed her shuddering body for the first time.
Looking up, she saw Anita looking back at her, with a face empty of joy and laughter as it usually was, but full of compassion and forgiveness. "Don't cry, Megs. …He loved you." she spoke softly, managing to hold back the wells of blistering hot tears in her eyes.
They all marched on through the grave yard and looked across the sea of tombstones, toward the empty plot of ground in the lonely open field, that lay ready and waiting to fulfill it's purpose. Everything in the whole outdoors looked dead, today. The trees held an eerie yellow tint and the sky mourned in a valiant grey for the lost boy. It seemed forever until they reached the plot of soil where the casket was destined to sit at the end of the ceremony. For everyone in the presence of that group, the loss of Drake Parker left a deep, empty hole in each of their remembering hearts.
The pallbearers, (who where Walter, Scottie, Trevor and Josh), were carrying the coffin high off the ground and walking slowly toward the burial area, as everyone followed behind them. They carried an open casket because, as a special request of Josh, Meghan and Anita made to see his face one last time before he was lowered in to the earth, never to return from it.
Josh himself was barely able to handle it all. He stood at the front right hand corner of the casket, holding to the protruding handle and fighting back deep, soul shaking sobs. All he could think about was how he was ever going to make it with out his brother beside him. No more laughs, no more jokes, no more fights over food or girls or Meghan would her ever be able to share with Drake again. How could this be? He kept asking himself this same question over and over again. He had never imagined that he'd be carrying his brother in a shining mahogany oak casket, coming closer and closer with each step to saying goodbye to him forever. With an unfathomable pain in his heart, he remembered the last embrace he had shared with his brother after he had seen him crying in such awful pain. If only he could have one last hug-- one last, single embrace from not a boy to boy, but brother to brother. The way he felt now about Drake was the way he had never felt about anyone. No longer did he feel the wall of step brotherhood looming between them. For that was all gone. Now at last, they were blood brothers. They were one soul, one heart, one love.
But now it was too late. As it had been too late to save him three days earlier, in the garage, it was too late to tell his brother how much he meant to his heart and his life.
And with those same thoughts, maybe an hour later, he, his little sister, Anita and the now only two sibling's parents stood looking at the boy for the last time.
His hair was smoothed back gently in a wave over his forehead and brows and his normally sparkling brown eyes where now shut, forever, in downfall. His lips that once had been rosy and pink with life where now cast permanently with a deep blue color. Anita stared at them and felt a shuddery sob escape her as she remembered the few, sweet kisses he had shared with her. How sweet and innocent, yet longing they had been. But now there would never again be the light of love or passion in his eyes. Never again would he look affectionately in to her eyes and speak with his soft voice. She closed her eyes and murmured: "He never got to tell me 'I love you'…" A hand rested on her shoulder as he squinted her tear straining, blurry eyes to look at the lifeless boy: "He did love you, Anita. He told me that night that he didn't want to hurt you and that he never wanted to loose you." Anita pressed her lips together at Josh's soft comment and tried to keep herself under control.
A few more minutes passed and after Meghan, Anita, Audrey and Walter had said their goodbyes, Josh looked down at his still, silent brother and felt a tear slip from his eye. He reached down to touch Drake's cold hand. He could hardly believe how cold and unresponsive it was, when it hand once been warm and full of life. With a shudder in his breaking heart, he murmured a soft sentence: "Drake… if you can hear me where ever you are, I want you to know I love you. I'll always love you. It's too late to tell you that face to face… but I'll never forget you, brother… Goodbye."
Stepping away with out hardly any feelings left in himself but utter pain, Josh closed his eyes, capturing the last picture of his brother in his mind eternally. With that, the funeral workers walked forward and finally lowered the lid of the casket, slowly, but surely putting out the last light of day for Drake Parker. And after lowering the wooden box in to the ground, they all bowed in prayer and said goodbye in their hearts for the teenage boy who they could never get back.
