Breakfast Monkey

I decided to stop by my grandma's house before going home. She lived near me but I liked spending time with her because she's always been nice to me. I avoided doing pills when I went to see her, she got very sad when she saw me intoxicated or high on some antidepressant. I walked towards her living room, it was filled with pictures of Mikey and me from when we were young and naive.
"Pumpkin pie! You came! How have you been sweetie?"
"I'm doing great gram, I just got a lot of work"
"How's that going? How are things in New York? Did you make any new friends?"
"No, in fact that's what's bugging me. They introduced us to new staff today. Everything's going to change so they brought two new artists, they majored in Germany"
"Are they mean or too good?"
"They're very talented. It's a guy about my age, really attractive and a girl who's a couple years younger than me. She just, I don't know"
"Do you like her?"
"She's pretty but I don't know, I treated her really bad today. She seems very kind but I don't know what got into me"
"Gerard, that isn't good. What if she's got similar interests like you, what if you just ruined a possible great friendship there?"
"I know gram, I feel weird. I'll sleep it off, I was probably just tired"
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The next morning I was feeling better, I was actually feeling cranky because of exhaustion and changes, I never really adapted well to them plus I'm the king of social awkwardness.
The last few days were a bit tense, Sophia didn't look at me anymore. I started thinking she actually tried to avoid me. I woke a little early and followed my daily routine. I was relieved it was Friday already, that meant two days away from her. By the time I got to my subway station I was surprised to find out that it wasn't as crowded as usual, I checked the clock to see if I was late but I wasn't. I was just in time. I stared at emptiness while I waited for my station when I saw a friendly face get in, it was Sophia. She was wearing an elegant long black coat, a short crimson dress, and black leather boots. She was very pale, I could tell she hadn't sunbathed in a long time. Her hair was pulled up in a messy bun, she was wearing headphones while her eyes hid behind her big glasses. Apparently she didn't see me, I was surprised to see her by herself I wondered where Matt was. They seemed to go everywhere together. While we got closer to the station I noticed she didn't move, we had 15 minutes left to get there. I thought over the idea of calling her attention and telling her she had to get down here but-
She was gone.
I got out the subway and looked for her around the station while I made my way out. She was very fast, I didn't even get to see her move or leave... Maybe she saw me. As I walked closer to the building I saw her walking rapidly towards the main entrance. A part of me felt relieved, I feared something had happened to her. I waited for a while so that we wouldn't be in the same elevator feeling awkward. The day went by fast as usual, although Sophia and Matt didn't speak to each other. She spent the entire day sketching while listening to her iPod. Matt looked at her from time to time. It was almost time to leave when I saw her storm out with red eyes and tears rolling down her face. Matt ran after her but returned shortly, I supposed she didn't want to talk to him. After a few minutes she came back to the studio with a serious expression on her face and placed a ring on top of his table. He looked at her for a while and apologised. She put her headphones back on and kept sketching. That was weird, I mean... Why? Why did I fucking care or felt like I had to make her feel better? It was already 8, everyone had left the studio but Sophia and me. She sketched like crazy, I guess she noticed how late it was that she started gathering her stuff. I did the same thing but pretended I hadn't seen her. When she was done she approached the door and looked around. We made eye contact for a long time, her eyes were red and filled with tears. She didn't say a word nor took her headphones off. She walked away with her head down. I didn't feel like going back to Jersey so I walked to my favourite comic book store. I picked up a few issues of Batman and made my way to a coffee shop or something. It was raining softly when I got to the coffee shop.
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The weekend went by pretty fast, I couldn't stop wondering why was Sophia so upset or what did the ring mean. On Monday she didn't go to work, Matt looked a little happier and had been talking to some girls from the finance department. By now you must be thinking I don't work at all or that I'm a creep but he called too much attention to himself. I started realising that he was the real problem, a small part of me longed to be that social and good with girls. The only girlfriend I ever had cheated on me with the school fucking janitor.
By Tuesday, I was wrapped up in the closest thing I had to a TV series which was Sophia and Matt's issues. I had gotten so involved I started sketching her, she was the co-protagonist in one of my latest sketches. While I left to work and rode the ferry as usual I noticed something weird happened in the city. An airplane had been flying really low near the WTC, our building was just six blocks away. I thought it was probably some important business man arriving on his private jet or something, I mean I don't even fucking have a car and these people have fucking private jets. I went in the subway as usual but got stopped midway, they told us we had to evacuate due to technical difficulties. I was fucked, I was going to be late for work, I ran for about 10 blocks before I needed to rest. I thought to myself I needed to stop smoking and probably drinking vast amounts of coffee. I finally made it to the studio and was only 15 minutes late. Traffic was awful that day, apparently there had been several crashes amongst the main entrances to the city plus the difficulties with the subway. When I got there I saw very few people. I sat down for a while and rested from my long run. Sophia got in running also and pretty tired, not as tired as me but her cheeks were as red as tomatoes. We looked at each other for a while, she grinned at me. Our eye contact got interrupted by a loud explosion like noise. It had been so hard the floor had shaken a bit. The few of us ran towards the huge windows and looked outside.
We saw it.
A plane had crashed into one of the WTC towers. I was shocked, the entire building was known for being a workplace and living place for hundreds of people. One of the managers came inside the studio yelling, he said we had to leave the building as soon as possible. We weren't sure what was going on but we started to evacuate. My first theory was that... Well maybe they thought our building was next but that would mean it was a terrorist attack. Nah, that's... It's too movie like. As soon as I got outside the building I saw Sophia take off a professional camera and run towards the WTC. I didn't even think it twice and ran after her. We were three blocks away , she kneeled down and started taking pictures. Suddenly, she sat down and put her cameras side her bag, she looked as if she was in shock. She was sitting in middle of the road. I didn't really get what was wrong until I saw the building, people were throwing themselves from the building. I heard as if bags of potatoes were falling to the floor but I didn't think it was people. I guess she saw them with better detail with her camera, she was still sitting there in shock. My thoughts were interrupted by the sound of another big explosion, people started to scream, sirens started to go off, horns were being honked and that annoying sound of people's skulls crashing against the floor drove me crazy. Sophia was still sitting there, I saw a piece of the first tower fall down in slow motion. The sound it made when it hit the floor made my ears buzz as well as the concrete shake, a large cloud of ashes came like a tidal wave. She wouldn't move. I ran towards her.
"Sophia, let's go! Cover your mouth!"
She didn't say a thing, she just looked at me with empty eyes. I felt the ash cloud grow dense. I couldn't let us both die there. I grabbed her and carried her, I don't know where I got the strength to run and carry her at the same time. While in my arms she covered my mouth with one of her hands. I took her to the ferry station, I must've run very fast because we got there in almost 10 minutes. We payed almost 100 dollars for both of us. Overpriced of course, these people made me sick they were making money off people's survival instinct. The whole ferry ride I looked at the towers burning and falling down, the image of people throwing themselves off the building made me cringe. Sophia sat by my side silently, she put her head on my shoulder and hugged me. We didn't say anything, I was starting to think her vocal chords had been cut off.
When we arrived to Jersey, I helped her get down. She didn't let me go, she was holding my hand. I could tell she was really scared.
"Ge-Gerard" she mumbled
"Yes, Sophia?"
"Thank you" She squeezed my hand harder and hugged me, her hair smelled like ashes and cinnamon.
"No prob-lem" I said while I pressed her against me. I had realised I saved her life.
"Gerard... May I stay with you? I don't know anyone here in Jersey"
"Sure, sure, yes"
She laughed at my triple affirmation.
I couldn't help to think, where was Matt?
I didn't have a phone and lines where surely collapsed. We took a cab to my parents' house. The entire ride she hugged me and laid her head on my chest, we held hands all the time.
"Okay so, this is my parents' house. I know it makes me sound like a loser but... Well I'll talk to you about that later. My mom's probably freaking out so... Chill, okay?"
She nodded and smiled, clearly she was still in shock.
As we made our way to the front door, my mother was hysterical.
"GERARD OH MY GOD I WAS SO WORRIED ABOUT YOU, THANK GOD YOU'RE OKAY!" I hugged her and tried to calm her down while Sophia just looked at us smiling.
"Mom, I'm fine. Although it's chaos out there. This is Sophia, she works with me. I hope you don't mind I brought her here, I couldn't leave her back in New York."
Sophia walked closer to my mom, extending her hand. My mom hugged her tightly while letting a few tears out.
"Oh, Gerard it isn't any trouble at all! I'm just glad you two kids are okay."
When she finally let her go, Sophia introduced herself.
"Thank you for having me Mrs. Way. My name's Sophia Schulz and yes, I do work with Gerard. I'm so grateful you can have me and hope I don't interfere too much"
She sounded so polite and diplomatic, I wasn't aware her surname was so German. I needed to get to know her better and most certainly avoid being an ass.

Notes

hey guys, I'm really starting to like this story. I wasn't sure about it at first but... I hope you like it.


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