After their last encounter the last thing Zoe expected was for Tom to turn up on her doorstep, but nonetheless he did. It was 3 in the morning by the time Tom had gotten through all of the beer he had stolen, and by this point he was a couple of seconds away from collapsing.
Thankfully it had not been Zoe who had answered the door, for she would almost certainly have been flattened, instead it was Max who had to pull a six foot two man into Zoe's home by himself.
Upon hearing Max groaning and moaning as he attempted to get Tom onto the living room couch Zoe rushed forwards, grabbing Tom's right arm and pulling it over her shoulder, helping Max guide Tom over to it and into a seating position.
Zoe immediately ran over to her first aid kit and pulled out a pen light, shining it in Tom's eyes and rolling her eyes.
"Hey! Wake up!" Max shouted at him, shaking him slightly in attempt to rouse him.
"He's blind drunk. You won't get anything out of him." Zoe sighed, replacing her pen light in the kit.
"What should we do?" Max asked, staring at him with more than a hint of distaste.
Max had more than one bone to pick with Tom, for he could see the effect that trying to get him to stop drinking was having on Zoe's emotional health. Though he would never say it, Max was glad that Zoe had supposedly washed her hands of Tom the previous night. At least now, he had hoped, she could focus on herself.
"Leave him there until sunrise. We'll sort out what to do with him then." Zoe replied, yawning.
"Fine. But I hope you mean 'get him out of here' by sorting out what to do with him." Max said with a warning tone, staring down at the wrecked man on the couch.
"Max I don't want to argue. I know you're only looking out for me but I haven't gotten any sleep in two days and I have a shift starting at ten. Please, can we just go to bed?" Zoe pleaded.
"Fine." Max said curtly, walking towards the bedroom.
The rest of the night went off without a hitch, Tom sleeping soundly on the couch most likely because the alcohol in his system was having a sedative effect, whilst Zoe and Max got some rest also. When Zoe finally awoke she found herself in her bedroom alone, Max having vacated his space around an hour ago.
"Wake up!" Max shouted in the living room.
Zoe dashed out of bed and grabbed her dressing gown, heading for the living room as quickly as she could.
"Max what are you doing?!" She shouted when she entered, for Max was attempting to pull a groggy Tom off of the couch.
"Getting this waste of space out of here." Max replied as he continued to pull Tom by his arm.
"Max.. please.. my head.. kills…" Tom murmured.
"Well that's what drinking yourself stupid does to you, I'm afraid." Max replied unapologetically.
"Max stop. Tom, what are you doing here?" Zoe asked while giving Max an irritated look.
"Where am i?" Tom muttered, placing a hand on his forehead.
"In my house. You turned up here drunk last night." Zoe replied flatly.
"Zoe…. About yesterday…" Tom mumbled as he dragged himself into a seated position.
"You mean the day before when I came to visit you and you acted like an asshole?" Zoe said irritably.
"No… yesterday. I did something stupid." Tom muttered.
"Big surprise." Max sighed.
"What did you do?" Zoe demanded, taking a step towards him.
"I stole a crate of beer… from a corner shop." He replied.
"A crate?!" Zoe exclaimed, "Where is it now? Maybe we can just give it back."
"I drank all of it."
"How in the heck are you not dead from alcohol poisoning?" Max demanded.
"By this point his body had probably built up some kind of tolerance." Zoe said, staring at him with disgust and adding, "So this is who you are now, hmm? A drunken thief?"
"Zoe… I need help." Tom replied, rubbing his eyes.
"You're not kidding." Max muttered.
"I… I know." Tom replied, defeated.
"Tom…" Zoe sighed, sitting down on the sofa next to him, "I want to help you, really I do, but right now you're hung over and depressed. Frankly I don't know if I can trust that as soon as this wears off you won't go straight back to the bottle."
"Zoe please! I want to change! But I can't do it on my own… I'm… I'm afraid of what I'm becoming." Tom said fearfully.
"Tom I-"
"She can't help you." Max said coldly.
"Max! I am perfectly able to speak for myself!" Zoe snapped.
"Not when it comes to this guy you're not. You tried and tried to help him and all I saw was you becoming more and more stressed and upset. I know he lost someone close to him but you can't keep getting stringed along by this guy, Zoe! He needs to prove that he's actually willing to commit to making change before you try and help him again to the detriment of your own health." Max implored.
"And I will! But I can't do that if you cut me off! Please, give me a chance!" Tom begged.
…
This update was a lot later than I planned… sorry about that! I've got a lot going on at the moment.