CHAPTER SEVEN: ESTATE

The fool generalizes the particular; the nerd particularizes the general; some do both; and the wise does neither. 
-Nassim Nicholas Taleb

The hangover I have right now is honestly worse than anything I've had in a while, not to mention when I woke up both the girls were gone but the house looked like it got cleaned up a little.

Nell texted me and said she had a therapy appointment, so they couldn't stay.

Having no clue what happened last night, save for when I first started drinking which was a bunch of laugh and swearing over monopoly, there was no reason for me to assume this was a lie.

I didn't have time to question otherwise, to worry.

Because I got a call from this place called Grey Estate, and Micah was on the other end telling me to get my ass down there.

Sadly, those two fuckshits London and Chance come along.

They keep pushing me forward and making fun of me for having a hang over, since they know I don't drink a lot, and it's the most annoying thing in the mood.

Being in a bad mood, snappy and having a hang over, I know I'll both sound and look like a complete douche-bag but honestly at this point I don't give two fucks.

"Can you guys please shut the fuck up?" I ask, being shoved into the room.

This makes the two idiots start yelling at me, not even the exasperated security guard bothers to stop us before he slams the door shut.

"Shut the fuck up, all of you." Micah snaps at us, making me grin at him. 

He's in a shit mood. Good. 

Maybe this kind of pain might teach him something other than how to destroy himself.

"This is...fuck," My best friend sighs, motioning to a short blonde girl beside him before running a hand down his face, eyes pointed in a glare. "This is my therapist, she's obsessed with mangoes."

That's random, but hey, there are worst things to be obsessed with.

I'm all too aware that sometimes my grin looks like a smirk, which I think might be what makes the girl wince but then I catch the creepy ass real smirks the idiots have and wince too.

"Hi! I'm AJ." She says, inching closer to Micah -who doesn't even care. "Like he said, I'm his therapist but I also work with most of the long term inpatient cases. I'm really happy to meet you, you being here will help, even if it seems to do the opposite it will."

He must like his therapist.

Chance leans onto the table making me want to shove him, "What does the AJ stand for, a gorgeous girl, perhaps."

What the fuck -that's not how letters work!

God, am I still drunk?

"Uh...gorgeous, that starts with um, a 'G' not a J. And um, that's just my name?" AJ thankfully replies, looking a tad scared but mostly just tired. "Mangoes. Do you want a smoothie?"

"All I want," London replies, the way he draws out the words making me a bit nauseous myself, so I can't imagine what the girl thinks. "Is a part of you."

"Human, human smoothies would uh, taste bad I'm pretty sure." I'm sure she's not really even meaning to be funny, but I have to hold back a laugh at this. "Are you a cannibal?"

London's smirk turns into a frown, "No?"

AJ gives him a weird look, "You're confused if you're a cannibal or not?"

"No! I mean no," The idiot rushes out. "I don't eat people."

"That's...nice."

"Sit down. Now." I'm the first one to do what Micah says, being able to sit in front of him. "Now introduce yourselves."

They introduce themselves and I almost regret not sitting in front of the girl because of how uncomfortable she looks when they make suggestive remarks.

I catch the girl looking at me and I give her a once over, noticing the fur on her. Mostly, I just want to meet her cats.

"Keagan Monikol." I introduce myself, voice sounding weird to even myself. Partly because it's a little slow still, but mostly because I'm so anxious about being around Micah again that I'm completely stuck in my head. "I won't ask if you like being eaten out or not, unlike those two dumbasses. I'm nice like that."

"Real fucking nice," Without warning, Chance slaps me in the back of the head, making me jerk forward and turn to glare at him. "You still said it, making you the bigger dumbass."

"Oh yeah, I'm the fucking dumbass. You can't even pass a freshman English class, you prick."

London jumps at defense of his friend, voice raising over my own. "Has anyone ever told you you look ugly when you yell? Because you do. What classes are you passing that gets you on such the high horse, huh? None."

More like AP English Literature and Composition, AP Physics C: Electricity and Magnetism and AP Calculus.

Not that the dicks would care if I told him that.

If anything, they'd call me a liar.

Micah slams his hands down at the table, shutting us all up again. "If you fuck heads are going to do the same stupid shit you always do when we're together you can fucking leave."

Letting Chance and London get their stupid out before I get serious, I sit through them asking about this 'shit hole' like it's not the best place for them.

My fuse nearly blows when London asks if Micah can still party and as if he didn't try to kill himself, Chance agrees.

"He's going to be an addict for the rest of his life and you can either choose to help him fight for the only life he has and make it a story with a good ending instead of wallowing in it, because if you can't help him you need to get out of his way." His therapist puts them in place. "Just because he's sober doesn't mean anything other than he's not high. An alcoholic is still an alcoholic the day the get their thirty year chip, he can never go back to the way he was before and you should be grateful for that instead of trying to make him get worse. Change is uncomfortable, it always is, but it's necessary for proper development."

Probably feeling insulted, London's response to this is to ask for a mango smoothie after Micah commented on her obsession again.

"All I want to know," I interrupt, kicking London underneath the table. "Is what his future looks like so I can plan accordingly. I really need some predictability here, I there like a manual for this shit? Oh, and I second that smoothie thing."

Drinking something like that helps with hangovers, and I'm not passing up the opportunity to ease my pain.

"Yeah me too." Chance says. "What's in them?"

"Mangoes." Micah deadpans, making me shrug at him. Though he might be grumpier, he actually looks...he looks healthier.

And he's only been here for two-ish weeks.

"And the manual?" I ask.

"Uh...his future is well, like you said, unpredictable. All I know is that he's going to get worse before he gets better." I knew that part and I'm really fucking scared of what it entails. "And you three need to be there for him without changing your views unless it's changed for the better."

Micah turns to her, fear lacing his features in a way that would tell anyone that doesn't know him that he's angry as he growls out, "Well doesn't that make me so fucking hopeful about the future."

"You don't have to be hopeful about the future," AJ says, frowning. "You can just be mildly curious about what's coming next. That was enough for me, and knowing you, curiosity can help you thrive."

"What if he doesn't want to thrive?" Chance, stupid fucking Chance McShonic says. "He never has before, and he's okay with that. It doesn't seem like a big deal, really."

He has before because he's addicted to drugs. Because he's depressed. Because he wants to die.

How in the fuck is that okay?

"People with depression score higher on tests of realism. Intelligence is positively correlated with mental illness, suicide and addiction. What this should tell you, if you haven't figured it out yet, is that if the mind understands too much about reality, it wants to destroy itself. Human life is existential horror." Once again, AJ has the perfect reply. "So please, never minimize what your best friend is going through."

But then, probably annoyed, the therapist stands.

"I'll go make those smoothies, and I'll be back soon."

Micah and me stay silent, London whistling lowly as Chance turns to me, making my glare come back. "Dude you're fucked up today, did you get laid last night?"

"Yeah," London adds on. "Who'd you dirty up?"

"A girl isn't 'dirty' because someone has touched her and she certainly isn't a whore because she had sex." I grumble, hands clenching into fists on top of the table. "If you think every time you fuck someone that you're making them less pure, then something must be wrong with your dick."

My body...it definitely feels like something happened last night.

But other than intuition, there's no proof.

I don't like that I can't comfortably deny it, because I really fucking hope nothing happened while I was drunk but if it did, it definitely wasn't with Nell and Robin is my crush...

Either way, I don't feel good about it.

"Do you need to borrow my sunglasses?" Chance asks, smirking. "They're cool."

"If you think it's so cool then you keep wearing it." I reply.

London scoffs, "I don't know how I'd wear you. Aren't you supposedly one of the coolest guys in school?"

"Clearly you haven't read Silence of the Lambs." Micah grunts, arms crossing.

Nodding, I manage to glance at my best friend. "That's a good book."

"Dude," The idiot laughs. "You know how to read?"

"No." I deadpan, sighing and say "It's an audiobook exclusive." knowing full well that it's total bullshit.

Without telling us why, London gets up and leaves -bumping straight into the boy that was protectively sitting across the hall. The red-head has to explain that he's going to the bathroom, which prompts Chance to follow him.

The room quickly fills with a very awkward tension.

"Mick, I-"

"Keg, look-" 

We both cut ourselves off, my head snapping up to look at my best friend as his eyes fill with tears. I give him the room to talk, nodding at him.

"I don't hate you and I...I really shouldn't have said that," He says, jaw clenching. "You're the only person who has ever wanted to help me. Literally the only one. You're my best friend, just...thank you for not letting me kill myself, I guess. Fuck, this is hard."

Standing up, I open my arms wider for a hug, grinning at him. "I love you too."

Micah gives a watery chuckle, standing up to meet me in a hug.

Patting his back, I ruffle his hair only to trick him and flick his forehead a moment later. "If you ever get that bad again, I'll be there for you. But you have to let me be there for you. None of this handling things alone bullshit, okay? I'm a much better friend than heroine is."

"Eh," Micah grins, pretending to think about it with a half shrug. "That's probably true."

He's getting better but Micah is still human in the way a the dandelion flower is considered a weed.

And me?

Well, I'm a human in the same way a graveyard is a playground.