Page 40 of This is Me

From Bad To Worse

“Pete,” a familiar voice carried me out of my sleep, and God I hated them for that.

“Go away,” I mumbled, digging my face further into my pillow.

“I need to talk to you.” Paying more attention to the voice, I realised it was Brad, which made me hate him even more.

“I’m going to rip your throat out. Let me sleep.”

“Pete, your alarm is going to go off in ten minutes, and I wanted to catch you before school.”

“Brad, ten minutes, means everything before school.”

“This is important,” Brad pressed, and I groaned.

“What do you want?”

“Get up and dressed and meet me downstairs.”

“Fine. Now get out of my room.”

After a few moments of silence, I heard Brad make his way out of my room. Weighing up my options for another minute, the thoughts of being a good brother and seeing what Brad wanted were too overpowering, and I flung my blankets off and rolled out of bed.

Soon, I was down in the kitchen, sitting on the middle island, eating my patented cheese on toast, and Brad was sitting on the other counter, avoiding eye contact.

“Oh, gee, I could have sworn someone woke me up for some Goddamn reason,” I said sarcastically, and Brad finally looked at me.

“Look, I don’t know what to say,” Brad said, before shaking his head. “No, I mean, I know what to say, I just don’t know how to say it.”

“Jesus Christ, Brad.”

“Maybe I shouldn’t say anything at all,” Brad mumbled, and I almost flung myself across the kitchen to attack him.

“I swear to fucking God, if you woke me up ten minutes early for no reason, I’m going to rip your intestines out.”

“That’s a little graphic.”

“And you’re a little slag.”

“Okay, I’m just going to say it,” Brad said, taking a deep breath and finally looking at me, though continuing not to say anything.

“I’m seriously going to kill you,” I threatened, finishing off my breakfast and glaring at Brad, feeling more tired by the second.

“I saw,” Brad mumbled, which made me even more tired and confused.

“What?” I mumbled, struggling to keep my eyes open.

Moving closer to Brad, and rubbing my eyes in the hopes to wake myself up, my mind started to run his words through my mind. As they echoed in my mind, my heart began to beat faster as my brain began to focus on one particular thing.

“On Friday night,” Brad said, and I could feel my hand begin to shake as I clenched my jaw.

“Don’t say it,” I muttered, wishing I could get out of this situation. Hoping that I hadn’t done anything to get myself into it in the first place.

“I saw the video,” Brad said, jumping off the counter and closing the gap between us.

I could feel my heart almost bursting out of my chest, and my stomach falling to the floor. This couldn’t be happening. This wasn’t supposed to happen.

“How?” I managed to get out, feeling my hands shake.