7 3.2: Plastic (1/2)
~listen to a person when they look at you, not just when they're talking to you~
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I am not in the 'Darkoom'. No, not this time.
And funnily I actually don't know where I am, but I know that I am 'standing' in a small, yellow-lit 'room'. More of an attic made into a room, really. And it's apparently a stereotypical teenager boy's room with Marvel posters everywhere, and some smart-looking, historical shit stuck on the walls (maps, things about the development of the first telescope, and thingies about the solar system).
The bed next to huge, sticker-covered windows is messy with a few open books scattered on it. Beneath the windows stands a table heaved down by a ton of books and a switched-on desk lamp.
I step back and notice a telescope, and a clock shoved beneath his bed. It really looks like I've landed in some genius' room, and maybe it's some kind of miscalculation from God, cause all the people I knew were dumb as fuck.
I cross my arms across my chest and roll my eyes. Now, what? Spending alone time in a crappy, stinky room is my sort of punishment? Yes, it stinks like food and sweat, and I wonder if its occupant is even human to survive such stuffiness.
And out of nowhere, the attic's ladder is pulled down right where I stand, but somehow I don't fall, and just remain 'floating' on spot, and this realization no longer freaks me out. I move (or wade?) away, and look down curiously at the inhabitant that needs to understand the definition of hygiene.
I am met by huge, green eyes in black-framed glasses. I am almost intrigued until I remember his room's stench. He climbs up, two steps at a time, and I raise my eyebrows at his dark, messy hair.
Once he's in the attic, his nose crinkles, and he shakes his head.
Oh, a functioning nose? Thank God.
I have to gasp at how tall this guy is. He even has to stoop in his pyjamas that he immediately strips off to his boxers, oblivious to my 'spiritual' presence or whatever. He then approaches his window, and yanks it open, exposing a starless night sky.
I am left his untoned back to watch as I await my 'suffering' that I am so looking forward to because I've no idea how a guy I don't even know can hurt me. I scoff as he turns around, sighs, takes off his huge glasses and throws them on his bed. He rubs his eyes, and when he drops his hands away, I'm impressed by how handsome this guy is without the glasses that really ate most of his facial features away.
He unknowingly gets closer to me, and I am almost creeped out by how close we are, and how small this attic is. He then drops on the bed with a loud creak. I glance at the clock that he kept crammed beneath is bed and purse my lips when I realize it's midnight.
So I can exist in many places at the same time? Or no, I can be sent to different places at the same time? I don't even know how this shit works anymore.
I stare at this stranger on the bed who now has his nose tucked into a book that I squint to read its title. History of the Peloponnesian War.
”Who the hell reads about war?” I whisper distastefully under my breath as I watch him focus on the text. His thick eyebrows are furrowed, and his lips are turned down in focus.
Hm. A nerd, of course. His phone chimes a notification, but he continues reading, utterly unaffected by it.
Well, a nerd gotta be a nerd.
After almost half an hour of watching him read- a well-thought-of punishment, cause I almost re-died from eternal boredom- he snaps the book shut with a sigh and a small smile. He then stretches his long arm across the bed to reach for his phone that rested on his messy desk.
He uses his other hand to push back his hair that obscured his eyes and switches on the phone. A minute later, his hand doesn't leave his hair as it normally should've, and his facial expression is fixed to emptiness.
I shift uneasily in my spot as I watch his eyes widen as he sits up, leaving his phone on the bed. He looks down, a hand on his bare chest, his breaths fastening, and deepening. I watch him curiously, closely.
His lips part open, and he looks up. The grief his face carries shocks me to breathlessness. He quickly darts up, and shuffles to his desk, now breathing loudly, and disorientedly. I watch him shake his mob of dark hair before he swipes everything off his desk, the books falling down with one loud thud after the other
I gasp, and he turns to me, eyes red-brimmed, and teary. He walks right through me, and I gasp, quickly turning to find him rummaging through his impossibly tiny, broken closet. He's gasping for breaths, and turning to me, red-faced, and helpless when the attic ladder is forcefully pulled down.
I shriek, startled as the guy drops to his knees in front of the opening in the ground.
”William?” A woman's concerned voice comes from down, and I watch on my toes.
”Mom-Mom-!” He gasps out throatily, as he curls his right hand's fingers, and moves his thumb down as if he's pressing on something.
”Your inhaler?!” His mother gasps back, and William nods, now using his right hand to press on his chest.
By the rapid succession of footsteps, I know that his mom left to fetch it for him. William remains on the ground, fighting for his breaths as tears leave his eyes in abundance. I watch his dark, messy hair stick to his sweaty forehead and bite down on my lip.
I feel sorry for him.
In a minute or two, his mom has climbed up the ladder and is sitting sprawled next to her son, a hand on his shoulder, and the other forcing the inhaler up his mouth. William's whole body shudders as he takes the inhaler with both of his hands, presses it, and breathes in very, very deeply.
His mother, a thin, tall lady in her mid-forties, looks really concerned as she watches her son's breathing calm as his tears continue to stream down his red face. She looks behind her, assessing the damage her son has done before she sighs heavily.
William's shoulders relax as he drops the inhaler next to him with a final deep breath.
”Baby, what happened?” His mother looks at him with her wide hazel eyes, and he looks back at her with frowning, quivering lips.
”Roseline-” He breathes out, shaking her head. ”You know, Roseline?”
His mother looks as taken aback as I must look too right now. ”What about her, love? What have- at such a time-?”
How does he know me?
William takes a deep breath, and shakes his head, clasping his shaky hands. He then gulps and looks at his mom. And then very calmly and collectedly, he says, ”I'm sorry I woke you up.”
”You were not breathing right-”
”I'm sorry-” He presses, pushing himself off the ground. ”It's -uh- ridiculous-”
I raise my eyebrows.
”I don't think anything that would cause you this is ridiculous, Will.”
William averts his gaze and sighs. ”She's -uh- she's got a new boyfriend-”
William's mom tsks, and I chuckle humorlessly. So apparently in William's dimension, I'm alive, and quite a go-getter. Interesting. But why did he lie? I'm sure that text he got was about my suicide.
”Well-” His mom sighs. ”We've had this discussion before, Will. If it's meant to be-”
”It'll be, I know-” He says. ”I was- I overreacted-”
William's mom looks at him curiously, and I know she knows he's lying, but she doesn't press.
”William-” She locks his eyes. ”You know that you can always talk to me about anything, right?”