Found Missing

"This is weird. No one's been in here for weeks." I glance around Martha's room, almost as if I'm afraid she's going to burst in at any given moment to yell at me for being so nosy.
"No one's been in here since-"
"Since she killed herself." Gerard cuts me off.
"We don't know what happened to her." I fold my arms across my chest. "We shouldn't be in her room, let's go."
"It's not her room anymore."
He sits on her bed, still cradling the shoebox in his arms. "Sit."
I don't want to sit. I don't want to be in her room, it's making me feel uneasy, but there's something in his tone that makes me do as I'm told. I take a place next to him, watching as he rummages through the box until he finds what he's looking for. "Martha loved this." He tells me. "I love it as well, she looks so happy." He hands me a photograph. It's of me and Martha; my arms are wrapped tight around her shoulders and we're both grinning into the camera.
"I can't get my brain around what happened to her on the best of days, but it's things like this that really do my head in, y'know?"
I can't find the words to argue with him again. Deep down I know he's right.
"You look happy, too." He adds. "You're smiling, you never really smile."
"I smile all the time."
He shoots me a look that tells me otherwise.

When Detective. Woodford searched Martha's room she found a diary. I'd seen her writing in it but of course, even through my curiosity, I'd never read it. Detective. Woodford had taken it away. She thought she'd be able to find some sort of lead to what happened to Martha, but there was nothing in her girlish ramblings that helped at all. Detective. Woodford returned the diary, making sure to place it under Martha's pillow; exactly how she had found it.

Gerard is holding the diary in his hands now, tracing his finger tip over the baby pink spine. It's as if Martha's simple thoughts are the most priceless scriptures in the world, by the glazed expression on his face I can tell that, to him, they are.
"Are you gonna' read it?" He's opened and closed the pages three times now, he's beginning to make me feel anxious.
"I already have."
"You what?"
"Yea. I used to read it when she went to the bathroom, or whatever. It's full of bullshit. There's stuff about me, you, Johnny Depp. It's cute, but utter bullshit."
I'm not sure if it's out of delirium or if he genuinely finds Martha's bullshit ridden diary funny, but he starts to laugh. "She talks about how she can't stand the way I wrinkle my nose when I don't like something, I mean, can ya' believe that? I don't even wrinkle my nose, like, ever."
I start to laugh as well.

Gerard has let me keep the photo. I'm thankful for this, I'm surprised to feel thankful for him. It was easy to talk to someone about Martha who wasn't going to start sobbing on my shoulder after three minutes. Gerard isn't the most open of people and this suits me just fine, fine until our conversation turns sour. It's the way he's looking at me, or maybe it's something I've said, whatever the reason may be he's darting down the stairs quicker than I have time to tell him to fuck off.

He's left me alone in Martha's room with his precious shoebox and my boiled temper. I'm pretty sure the spaghetti hoops went untouched on the dining room table, he didn't even say thank you. What angers me the most is that I can't understand what it is that's suddenly made me care so much.

*

Daffodils were Martha's favourite flower. Every spring she'd coo in delight, pressing her face to the window at the first sign of their bloom. Now, Daffodils remind me of Martha the most. They're yellow like her hair had been, bright just like her smile, too. I've been laying her grave with Daffodils every Tuesday for the last six weeks - Tuesday because that was the day she went missing. Nearly everyone seems to curse this day, I however think it should be celebrated for the last time we were blessed with her presence. If Gerard and I were to share at least one thing in common it would be that he likes to lay Martha Daffodils on a Tuesday as well. We're usually able to avoid each other, I'll visit her resting place in the morning and he'll appear sometime in the afternoon, I guess, only today is a hiccup in our pattern.

He kneels beside me on the dew sodden grass, carefully placing his Daffodils next to mine. I can tell by the strong stench of liquor on his skin that he's hung over, possibly still drunk. I wonder what it is that's dragged him out of bed so early.
"I woke up in the back of my car. Someone took my keys away last night, so I had to walk home. I should be grateful, really."
It's as if he can read my mind.
"I used to walk through the cemetery every time on my way home, I used to find it peaceful. I haven't done it for a while, I can't..." He pauses and for the first time, spare Martha's funeral, I'm concerned for the waver in his voice. "Now I only come here to see Martha, in the evening, when I can bring myself to bare it. I thought, maybe, it'd all look a bit more beautiful in the morning, y'know, the light's different, everything is supposed to look better, pure. It's still ugly." He sniffs, wiping his nose with the back of his sleeve, muttering "I need to learn how to shut the fuck-"
"I come here in the morning because I like to be alone." I say quickly. "Sometimes, if I concentrate hard enough, it's like she's here."
"Maybe I'll just leave you to it-"
"But sometimes I think it'd be nice to have company as well." I move to meet his tired gaze. The December morning has flushed his cheeks, uncommonly for him, almost as uncommon as his unguarded expression.
"England, I don't-"
"Last week you called me Elfie."
"Sorry?"
"Last week, at the coffee shop, you didn't call me England, or kid, you called me Elfie."
"Right, so, what's your point?" He's starting to bite his nails. The last thing I want to do is irk him, but I've been holding my irritation for too long. Three years too long, and this doesn't even cover what I'd really like to say. "Do you think it would hurt to call me Elfie more often? I mean, it is my name."

I listen to him suck the blood from where the ends of his fingernails should be. He clicks his tongue and I already feel ridiculous for trying to make peace, after all, we've never been close.

"Okay."
I stare at him, he stares back as if I'm mental.
"What?"
"I said okay." He pulls a face as if his answer is the most obvious one I could expect. "Fuckin' hell, Elfie, if it really bothers you that much you could have just said something."

I can feel the heat rushing to my face. The details about Gerard that ire me the most have been nothing to him all along. All this time it's been a joke whilst I've been silently seething.

"Right, thanks for that." I mumble, wishing that the corners of his mouth would stop twitching at the expense of my embarrassment.

Notes

Soooo I'm thinking I should make my summary a bit better, but I've always sucked at summary's... I never know what to say! Any ideas?