Drums Of The City Rain
Chapter 11
TW// slight mention of eating disorder, calories and weight
I lay there for a good hour or two. Mikey had fallen asleep almost instantly but I couldn’t do the same. I was thinking a lot. Not the bad overthinking, I mean I wasn’t really scared or upset, I was pretty content. I was just not asleep. I decided to go and get myself a warm drink or something. We had had tea to be polite but I was gonna be pissed if there was no coffee in this place. Lucky we’d packed our own. I giggled at the idea of packing coffee.
Softly, I climbed out of bed, careful not to wake my brother. From what I could tell the entire flat was in darkness and everyone was asleep. I crept down the hallway with the light from my phone and began to hear a soft noise from the living room. I hovered outside for a moment listening carefully and could hear the sound of someone singing under their breath and an incredibly quiet guitar. Pressing my ear against the door I could make out the voice was male, probably frank. The faint guitar had a pretty rubbish tone to it but that was just where it wasn’t plugged into an amp. He sounded talented I mean it was a pretty complex sounding song. It was frustrating how little I could hear, I wanted to go in and listen but I didn’t want to somehow cause a fuss or upset him. I forced myself into the kitchen, I was being kinda creepy listening to a stranger through the door like that. I decided to pour myself a glass of milk, the kettle would be far too noisy. As I put the milk back in the fridge I heard a noise behind me. Looking round I saw frank stood in the doorway.
“Alright?” he asked quietly.
“Yeah, couldn’t sleep” I replied.
“Me neither” he whispered “I was just practicing some of my songs unplugged super quietly”
“Yeah I heard through the door a little bit” I admitted.
“Oh you should have come in, I’d love to show you” he suggested.
“Hmm, I didn’t wanna disturb you if you were having like some time to yourself”
“Oh right yeah I guess, anyway do you wanna come and watch some telly I can’t see myself sleeping anytime soon”
“Okay” I agreed. We walked into the dimly lit room, sat on a sofa each and he grabbed the tv remote. We looked through the guide, there was crap all on. Eventually we settled on a 2am showing of ‘project runway’ giggling at how low we had sunk.
“So, what brings you here? I mean Ray mentioned abuse and anorexia” He asked trailing off slightly.
“Basically. My parents are just arseholes, they simply don’t give a shit, to them me and Mikey are literally just things to take their anger out on, especially Mikey. A-and then a few weeks ago I found a bunch of stuff in Mikey’s drawer, blades and laxatives and a diary thing and I realised he really wasn’t okay, he has anxiety as it is but now he’s developed an eating disorder and probably depression on top and I decided where we were was not a safe place for him to recover” I explained.
“Shit man, is Mikey alright? I mean I noticed he was really quiet and looked pretty skinny” He murmured.
“Yeah he’s normally quiet but I’m really worried about him, when I found out about all this he was only 92lb and he gained a few pounds at first but somehow he’s still losing, he was having only like 200calories a day but now he’s having anywhere between 500 and 700 but it’s still not enough, he passed out the other week, I’m surprised he made the journey to be honest”
“Oh man, well it seems like you two have a good relationship and you are both safe here, it can only get better from here”
“Yeah, I know, thanks” I agreed “So what about you? I know hardly anything about you”
“Well, I’ve been living here for a year and a half on and off since a few weeks after my 15th birthday-” He started.
“Wait, so you’re 16!?” I possibly rudely, interrupted.
“Yeah Ray’s 19, Lynz’s 20, I’m normally the youngest”
“I’m 17, only a few months older than you I think, I thought you were like 20, anyway, sorry didn’t mean to interrupt what were you saying?”
“Ah okay, don’t worry, on and off I’ve been living here I mean I didn’t run away my parents know where I am and we see eachother quite a lot, I mean I’ve only just finished my GCSEs so running away wouldn’t be possible, but yeah they wouldn’t let me live with them after I told them I’m gay, I think they still care, I just can’t spend much time with them because it’ll ruin their amazing christian image”
“That’s gross what the fuck” I replied “But you’re gay? I- I’m asexual”
“Oh wow nice to meet a fellow queer” he laughed “Are you romantic or?”
“Yeah well I only actually heard all these labels, I was chatting to a lesbian on the train who gave me a bunch of info on it but from what I learned I’m grey panromantic asexual ”
“Oh wow, you’re like a gay people magnet today! So does that mean you feel a bit of romance but like not much”
“Yeah pretty much honestly it’s only ever a tiny little bit, I’d much rather have an emotion based relationship”
“Oh okay, and to any gender?”
“Yeah”
“That’s awesome, are you out?”
“I- I guess, I told my brother right I don’t mind you guys knowing and apart from my parents that’s literally everyone I know”
“Cool”
We got sucked into the crap on telly but I ached for the conversation to keep going. It felt weird but I wanted to stay up and listen to Frank talk all night. I wasn’t sure whether it was just the lack of interaction with people apart from with my brother up until that point doing it or something else but I had a warmth towards that kid.
***
“Gerard!” Frank hissed my name. I opened my eyes wearily and looked up at him, remembering what was going on, I must have fallen asleep in front of the tv “I can hear your brother I think he wants you”
I jumped up and darted up the hallway, aware of Frank following behind me.
“Gerard?” I heard my brother cry nervously as I got nearer. Shit, he’d just woken up in a strange new place and I had disappeared from next to him.
“Shh, It’s okay, I was just getting a drink” I whispered as I went in “Nightmares?”. He nodded and I sat next to him on the bed. “It’s okay, it’s not real, you’re safe here”
“I’ll leave you two to get some more sleep, it’s 4am” Frank smiled, closing the door.
“Thanks, night, well morning” I giggled as he left and curled up next to Mikey who had relaxed slightly “It’s okay, I’m here”. I wrapped my arms around him and he mumbled something and snuggled into me and within moments I was asleep.
***
We woke up at about 10am the next day and I could hear buzzing from the living room. We wandered through, sun streaming into the flat, the living room door open.
“Morning” Lindsey greeted us.
“Morning” I smiled, sitting down “Sleep well?”
“Yeah, well for some reason I woke up like 20 times but apart from that fine” She chuckled.
“Same here” I agreed “I couldn’t sleep til like 3am”
“Yeah I thought I heard you and frank chatting at an unholy hour” she commented “What about you Mikey?”
“Erm- you know okay well like I had a you know nightmare but like I- I er apart from that slept fine” He muttered, nervously.
“Ah nightmares are a bitch” She remarked. He nodded in response.
“Good morning!” Ray beamed, emerging from the kitchen “If you guys want anything to eat there’s a ton of cereal in the cupboard and there’s some coffee, I know how much you love it Gerard”
“Awesome, thanks!” I grinned getting up, Mikey following. I worried about this whole eating disorder thing but didn’t press the topic of food and just got him some coffee, myself some coco pops and coffee and sat on the sofa eating. I did need to get food in my brother but I really didn’t want to cause a fuss, he was in a pretty good mood, I didn’t want to ruin it.
About an hour later, Frank stumbled through looking sleepy and sat on the arm of the sofa like when we first arrived.
“You okay?” He murmured to me.
“Yeah, I don’t know” I replied.
“I’m going for a smoke, do you wanna come and talk out there” He offered. I agreed but felt bad for leaving Mikey. He needed to get close to everyone himself though. We went out onto the balcony, it was a pleasant, sunny morning and I could hear the hum of the city “So what’s up?”
“My brother has an eating disorder” I sighed.
“I know, I don’t know what to say honestly” he replied.
“He hasn’t eaten since 2pm yesterday” I mumbled.
“Okay he needs to eat” he stated.
“I fucking know” I cried.
“We can get him medical attention” he said, softly.
“We can’t though, what just turn up at the doctors? ‘Hello here is a seriously ill 13year old with no education, money or medical records, living in a flat with some teenagers but we don’t expect him to be taken into care or anything’” I ranted.
“I suppose but what are you gonna do? You can’t go on like this forever, at some point you’re gonna have to see a doctor or get an education” He murmured.
“Thanks for the reminder” I hissed “This entire thing was a mistake”
“No it wasn’t, it’s the best decision you’ve made, wait and see”
“Sorry Frankie, I’m just fucking stressed ignore me” I felt some tears escape my eyes.
“It’s okay, you shouldn’t have to deal with this” he rubbed my shoulder sympathetically “Just focus on now, getting Mikey to eat this one meal, baby steps”
“How are we gonna do that?”
“How have you done it before?”
“I don’t know, just trying to be encouraging I guess and maybe shedding a few tears”
“Well just do that again but hopefully without the tears, also it might be worth talking to Ray, his step sister had the same thing”
“Yeah I know, maybe”
“Lemme get him” Frank swung back on his chair and slid the balcony door open. I could see Mikey talking to Ray and Lindsey, I smiled happy he was being a bit sociable “Ray!”
“What is it Frank?”
“Come out here” Frank called swinging forward again and Ray slipped through the door, closing it behind him.
“What’s up?” He asked.
“We were just talking about little Mikey” Frank replied “He hasn’t eaten since 2pm yesterday”
“Oh okay, we need to get him to eat” Ray informed us.
“Yeah we established that, but we were hoping you’d know how” Frank told him.
“Well Cass normally needed two things, motivation and love, I overheard her saying about how an eating disorder is like a toxic boyfriend once, it was always there for her, when everyone was angry at her for not eating, it was there encouraging her, when everyone was putting pressure on her to eat more because she ate a bit, it was there for her to fall back on she could just stop eating again, when she was sad it was there, when she was happy it was there. To get Mikey through his you need to be there for him constantly, you need to be there the rare moments the eating disorder isn’t, the times the eating disorder makes his hair fall out or makes him faint, the times the eating disorder makes him feel like shit” Ray explained slowly. My jaw dropped and I didn’t know why but I just burst into tears right there.
“Oh Gerard this must be so tough for you” Frank murmured and Ray pulled me into a hug. I could just sniffle in response "It's gonna be alright though.We'll sort this"
I lay there for a good hour or two. Mikey had fallen asleep almost instantly but I couldn’t do the same. I was thinking a lot. Not the bad overthinking, I mean I wasn’t really scared or upset, I was pretty content. I was just not asleep. I decided to go and get myself a warm drink or something. We had had tea to be polite but I was gonna be pissed if there was no coffee in this place. Lucky we’d packed our own. I giggled at the idea of packing coffee.
Softly, I climbed out of bed, careful not to wake my brother. From what I could tell the entire flat was in darkness and everyone was asleep. I crept down the hallway with the light from my phone and began to hear a soft noise from the living room. I hovered outside for a moment listening carefully and could hear the sound of someone singing under their breath and an incredibly quiet guitar. Pressing my ear against the door I could make out the voice was male, probably frank. The faint guitar had a pretty rubbish tone to it but that was just where it wasn’t plugged into an amp. He sounded talented I mean it was a pretty complex sounding song. It was frustrating how little I could hear, I wanted to go in and listen but I didn’t want to somehow cause a fuss or upset him. I forced myself into the kitchen, I was being kinda creepy listening to a stranger through the door like that. I decided to pour myself a glass of milk, the kettle would be far too noisy. As I put the milk back in the fridge I heard a noise behind me. Looking round I saw frank stood in the doorway.
“Alright?” he asked quietly.
“Yeah, couldn’t sleep” I replied.
“Me neither” he whispered “I was just practicing some of my songs unplugged super quietly”
“Yeah I heard through the door a little bit” I admitted.
“Oh you should have come in, I’d love to show you” he suggested.
“Hmm, I didn’t wanna disturb you if you were having like some time to yourself”
“Oh right yeah I guess, anyway do you wanna come and watch some telly I can’t see myself sleeping anytime soon”
“Okay” I agreed. We walked into the dimly lit room, sat on a sofa each and he grabbed the tv remote. We looked through the guide, there was crap all on. Eventually we settled on a 2am showing of ‘project runway’ giggling at how low we had sunk.
“So, what brings you here? I mean Ray mentioned abuse and anorexia” He asked trailing off slightly.
“Basically. My parents are just arseholes, they simply don’t give a shit, to them me and Mikey are literally just things to take their anger out on, especially Mikey. A-and then a few weeks ago I found a bunch of stuff in Mikey’s drawer, blades and laxatives and a diary thing and I realised he really wasn’t okay, he has anxiety as it is but now he’s developed an eating disorder and probably depression on top and I decided where we were was not a safe place for him to recover” I explained.
“Shit man, is Mikey alright? I mean I noticed he was really quiet and looked pretty skinny” He murmured.
“Yeah he’s normally quiet but I’m really worried about him, when I found out about all this he was only 92lb and he gained a few pounds at first but somehow he’s still losing, he was having only like 200calories a day but now he’s having anywhere between 500 and 700 but it’s still not enough, he passed out the other week, I’m surprised he made the journey to be honest”
“Oh man, well it seems like you two have a good relationship and you are both safe here, it can only get better from here”
“Yeah, I know, thanks” I agreed “So what about you? I know hardly anything about you”
“Well, I’ve been living here for a year and a half on and off since a few weeks after my 15th birthday-” He started.
“Wait, so you’re 16!?” I possibly rudely, interrupted.
“Yeah Ray’s 19, Lynz’s 20, I’m normally the youngest”
“I’m 17, only a few months older than you I think, I thought you were like 20, anyway, sorry didn’t mean to interrupt what were you saying?”
“Ah okay, don’t worry, on and off I’ve been living here I mean I didn’t run away my parents know where I am and we see eachother quite a lot, I mean I’ve only just finished my GCSEs so running away wouldn’t be possible, but yeah they wouldn’t let me live with them after I told them I’m gay, I think they still care, I just can’t spend much time with them because it’ll ruin their amazing christian image”
“That’s gross what the fuck” I replied “But you’re gay? I- I’m asexual”
“Oh wow nice to meet a fellow queer” he laughed “Are you romantic or?”
“Yeah well I only actually heard all these labels, I was chatting to a lesbian on the train who gave me a bunch of info on it but from what I learned I’m grey panromantic asexual ”
“Oh wow, you’re like a gay people magnet today! So does that mean you feel a bit of romance but like not much”
“Yeah pretty much honestly it’s only ever a tiny little bit, I’d much rather have an emotion based relationship”
“Oh okay, and to any gender?”
“Yeah”
“That’s awesome, are you out?”
“I- I guess, I told my brother right I don’t mind you guys knowing and apart from my parents that’s literally everyone I know”
“Cool”
We got sucked into the crap on telly but I ached for the conversation to keep going. It felt weird but I wanted to stay up and listen to Frank talk all night. I wasn’t sure whether it was just the lack of interaction with people apart from with my brother up until that point doing it or something else but I had a warmth towards that kid.
***
“Gerard!” Frank hissed my name. I opened my eyes wearily and looked up at him, remembering what was going on, I must have fallen asleep in front of the tv “I can hear your brother I think he wants you”
I jumped up and darted up the hallway, aware of Frank following behind me.
“Gerard?” I heard my brother cry nervously as I got nearer. Shit, he’d just woken up in a strange new place and I had disappeared from next to him.
“Shh, It’s okay, I was just getting a drink” I whispered as I went in “Nightmares?”. He nodded and I sat next to him on the bed. “It’s okay, it’s not real, you’re safe here”
“I’ll leave you two to get some more sleep, it’s 4am” Frank smiled, closing the door.
“Thanks, night, well morning” I giggled as he left and curled up next to Mikey who had relaxed slightly “It’s okay, I’m here”. I wrapped my arms around him and he mumbled something and snuggled into me and within moments I was asleep.
***
We woke up at about 10am the next day and I could hear buzzing from the living room. We wandered through, sun streaming into the flat, the living room door open.
“Morning” Lindsey greeted us.
“Morning” I smiled, sitting down “Sleep well?”
“Yeah, well for some reason I woke up like 20 times but apart from that fine” She chuckled.
“Same here” I agreed “I couldn’t sleep til like 3am”
“Yeah I thought I heard you and frank chatting at an unholy hour” she commented “What about you Mikey?”
“Erm- you know okay well like I had a you know nightmare but like I- I er apart from that slept fine” He muttered, nervously.
“Ah nightmares are a bitch” She remarked. He nodded in response.
“Good morning!” Ray beamed, emerging from the kitchen “If you guys want anything to eat there’s a ton of cereal in the cupboard and there’s some coffee, I know how much you love it Gerard”
“Awesome, thanks!” I grinned getting up, Mikey following. I worried about this whole eating disorder thing but didn’t press the topic of food and just got him some coffee, myself some coco pops and coffee and sat on the sofa eating. I did need to get food in my brother but I really didn’t want to cause a fuss, he was in a pretty good mood, I didn’t want to ruin it.
About an hour later, Frank stumbled through looking sleepy and sat on the arm of the sofa like when we first arrived.
“You okay?” He murmured to me.
“Yeah, I don’t know” I replied.
“I’m going for a smoke, do you wanna come and talk out there” He offered. I agreed but felt bad for leaving Mikey. He needed to get close to everyone himself though. We went out onto the balcony, it was a pleasant, sunny morning and I could hear the hum of the city “So what’s up?”
“My brother has an eating disorder” I sighed.
“I know, I don’t know what to say honestly” he replied.
“He hasn’t eaten since 2pm yesterday” I mumbled.
“Okay he needs to eat” he stated.
“I fucking know” I cried.
“We can get him medical attention” he said, softly.
“We can’t though, what just turn up at the doctors? ‘Hello here is a seriously ill 13year old with no education, money or medical records, living in a flat with some teenagers but we don’t expect him to be taken into care or anything’” I ranted.
“I suppose but what are you gonna do? You can’t go on like this forever, at some point you’re gonna have to see a doctor or get an education” He murmured.
“Thanks for the reminder” I hissed “This entire thing was a mistake”
“No it wasn’t, it’s the best decision you’ve made, wait and see”
“Sorry Frankie, I’m just fucking stressed ignore me” I felt some tears escape my eyes.
“It’s okay, you shouldn’t have to deal with this” he rubbed my shoulder sympathetically “Just focus on now, getting Mikey to eat this one meal, baby steps”
“How are we gonna do that?”
“How have you done it before?”
“I don’t know, just trying to be encouraging I guess and maybe shedding a few tears”
“Well just do that again but hopefully without the tears, also it might be worth talking to Ray, his step sister had the same thing”
“Yeah I know, maybe”
“Lemme get him” Frank swung back on his chair and slid the balcony door open. I could see Mikey talking to Ray and Lindsey, I smiled happy he was being a bit sociable “Ray!”
“What is it Frank?”
“Come out here” Frank called swinging forward again and Ray slipped through the door, closing it behind him.
“What’s up?” He asked.
“We were just talking about little Mikey” Frank replied “He hasn’t eaten since 2pm yesterday”
“Oh okay, we need to get him to eat” Ray informed us.
“Yeah we established that, but we were hoping you’d know how” Frank told him.
“Well Cass normally needed two things, motivation and love, I overheard her saying about how an eating disorder is like a toxic boyfriend once, it was always there for her, when everyone was angry at her for not eating, it was there encouraging her, when everyone was putting pressure on her to eat more because she ate a bit, it was there for her to fall back on she could just stop eating again, when she was sad it was there, when she was happy it was there. To get Mikey through his you need to be there for him constantly, you need to be there the rare moments the eating disorder isn’t, the times the eating disorder makes his hair fall out or makes him faint, the times the eating disorder makes him feel like shit” Ray explained slowly. My jaw dropped and I didn’t know why but I just burst into tears right there.
“Oh Gerard this must be so tough for you” Frank murmured and Ray pulled me into a hug. I could just sniffle in response "It's gonna be alright though.We'll sort this"
Notes
I'm not feeling so confident with this chapter. Idk i felt pretty sure of myself bc I knew they'd be running away n now they actually have its just like lol now what.
ALSO FRERARD
I think after this star chart thang imma focus on g n frerard a bit for a few chapters if thats okay :)
So whats been going down w everyone? Recently this has been getting comments from more ppl than the one loyal person which is rad.
Michael clifford omg i hate 5sos with a passion but fuck that looked nasty.
Anyway have a lovely day <33
7/8/15 Update:
Hello yeah basically, I slightly altered this chapter, took out the star chart thing, I'm so sorry how crappy this has been n how bad @ updating i've been
Megan x
@snailthesaints (twitter)
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Please come back to this
2/19/16