“hey, kid.” you look up from your phone with only a split second to stop a bag of your favorite chips from hitting your face. upon impact, because you weren’t going to be able to block it, he cackles. “i did not ask for this treatment??” you yell as he walks out of the room, continuing to cackle. and that sums up your relationship with your older brother, jeonghan, pretty well. he loves you, but he’s really annoying about it.
“hey, kid,” he says another day, more gently than usual. he prods you from outside of the blanket burrito you’ve wrapped yourself into. your door was definitely closed, but was he ever one to respect that? not really. “what’s wrong? i haven’t seen you in days. who am i supposed to make fun of?” he pokes you again.
getting no response, he straight up pushes you aside to lay down next to you and add himself as a layer to your burrito. "i know you’ll tell me what's wrong eventually, but whatever it is, i’ll always be here for you. you know that?” from inside the blanket, you close your eyes and take in the warmth of his embrace and his words. he really was always there. you didn’t even have to ask.
Time: 12:46 PM
Pages: 5
Word Count: 1253
Listening to: x
Topic: Jamie’s turning
I know I said I’d do part two of Jamie hunting tonight but Jamie had other plans.
It was a humid July night and James McMorrow didn’t know where he was in the slightest. Maybe if he’d ever learned star navigation he’d have a clue because if nothing else, he’d never seen such a clear night sky.
It was an odd occasion for the homeless boy to lose track of where he was or where he was going. Most times it was as simple as follow the road or the train tracks—but somewhere is his fatigued, hungry stupor he’d wandered from the road and hadn’t been able to find his way back.
That was a day and a half ago. Maybe more; he’d lost track, to be honest, and out here all the days ran together. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d eaten a full meal and the pain and gnawing ache in his stomach was almost crippling. Not to mention he felt feverish and ill and sometimes the coughing fits could last several dreadful minutes. He wanted nothing more than to curl up his sore limbs and sleep right there in the dust, but he knew that meant certain death. Expending the energy to keep walking meant wasting away more quickly, but staying put left him no chance of finding anything or of being found. If he kept walking he at least improved his odds.
He was in luck, though, he thought. Perhaps it was only a mirage of his starved mind, but he could swear there were lights on the horizon. He couldn’t tell how near or far they were but if he kept walking, eventually he’d have to come across something. If he could just keep pushing.
He only needed to cover that distance and pray someone would take pity on him in his malnourished state to offer him even something as simple as a slice of bread. He could work for food, eventually, once he had a few calories in him to give him strength to keep going. He always preferred to pull his own weight when he could. Right now all he wanted, though, was to collapse entirely and give up. Succumb to the growling pain and the soreness in his limbs.
His sheer exhaustion grew ever more apparent in each footstep, dragged achingly across the dusty ground. He’d lucked out in that he hadn’t been suffocated by one of this big, dark, looming storms yet—the ones from which dust seeped into every crevice and strangled the life of plants and animals alike. He was less lucky in that it seemed one such storm had already swept through here and left neither water nor edible vegetation in its wake. He’d even settle to eat prairie grass if it meant getting the throb in his gut to leave him alone for a few minutes of peace. There was nothing for miles, only dusty plain as far as the eye could see.
How on Earth his mother’s ancestors had managed living in this hellish landscape for so long bewildered him. The thought of it was enough to distract and occupy him for a few yards of movement before another hungry growl ripped from his stomach, followed by a cough that rattled his lungs and scraped against his throat until it was raw. All he could do was wrap his thin arms around himself and try to keep from doubling over. All he could do was press on.
Somewhere, behind him, he heard the shuffle of footsteps. Hopeful, maybe for rescue of some sort, maybe just for directions, he turns. “Hello?” His voice comes out as little more than a rasp.
There was no answer and also no one present. Maybe he was so desperate that he had started hallucinating. So he turned back to face those twinkling lights that promised civilization somewhere not too far from here.
Another several minutes passed, each yard covered torturously slow. He was alone and hungry and sick and hardly had strength left in him to even stand. All he had was silence and the knowledge that somewhere up there, amidst the glittering stars, God sat on his throne in Heaven watching him as the shepherd tended to their flock.
He didn’t have the strength or voice to pray out loud but at least in his head he could say a Hail Mary—if nothing else, it would occupy him for a minute.
Hail Mary, full of grace.
Our Lord is with—
Hands clamped down on his bony shoulders like bear traps, fingernails like claws sinking into his flesh. James cried out in shock as the attacker yanked down on him with all their weight. James crumpled to the ground and the assailant followed, sliding one clawed hand to James’ throat and dragging the boy into his lap.
James did his best to fight, lighting his hands to the fingers that curled around his throat. His own thin fingers pried and pulled at the stranger’s, but the grip was too strong. His fingers were like ice and his skin like granite and his grip unbreakable and the more James tried, the tighter his assailant’s grip become. He could only just choke breath in and out of his lungs and his vision grew dark around the edges.
If he couldn’t pull the hand that choked him away, he would do his best to beat the attacker. Frail hands curled into fists and pounded at the attacker’s legs under James, but the man didn’t even seem to notice.
Then there was a searing hot pressure at his neck, the base of where his throat met his shoulder. James cried out once more, in pain, hot tears forming in the corners of his eyes. Something that felt like teeth broke through skin and muscle, sinking in to flesh like James’ throat was nothing more than a juicy steak.
As time passed with the stranger’s mouth at his throat, his already weak body only became weaker. The longer the attacker remained latched at his neck, the more tired he felt. If he thought he’d been fatigued before, he’d been blissfully unaware. His limps went limp, arms resting and on the legs of the attacker and fingers uncurled.
He was dying, James realized with a start. This was what death felt like. And all he could do was lay there like a gutted fish, too weak to even look at his killer.
Silent tears leaked from his eyes as he stared up at the Heavens. His parents would never know. Their boy, their James, would die alone and in agonizing pain at the hands of another, and he couldn’t even fight it. All that time he spent picking fights and he couldn’t even manage it one last time when it really mattered.
He shut his eyes. And he waited for it to be over.
And then there was a blinding light and voices and for a moment James thought he was dead and that maybe this was Heaven, but he was in too much pain to be in Heaven. Maybe it was hell.
He felt his assailant toss him aside and he hit the ground harder than he expected. Even still, he couldn’t force a cry of pain past his lips. That’s when he knew he was still alive. He couldn’t open his eyes or make a sound, but things kept happening around him. There was a scuffle, and some of the voices faded into the silence of the night.
One voice stayed with him. James could recognize that he was being addressed, but couldn’t comprehend what was being said, nor could he find the strength to reply. Something in his gut said he should nod, so he tried—but he wasn’t sure if he was successful.
Hands wrapped around him again, this time with no malicious intent. Gentle hands lifted him off the ground and he could feel each of his limps fall to the side. Dead weight, dangling from an almost-corpse. They dragged him down and tethered him to Earth. Each rise and fall of his chest seemed to drag on for an eternity, each beat of his heart seemed slower than the last. His thoughts were fuzzy and incomprehensible, even to him--if he even had any thoughts to begin with. His brain was too clouded for him to know.
The man said something in a hushed tone and someone brushed the hair from James’ face.
Time: 1:38 AM
Pages: 4
Word Count: 916
Listening to: x
Topic: Jamie hunting / revisiting Jan. 21 writing
I stopped a bit early tonight to allocate the last 20 minutes to revisit my writing from last night. I was unhappy with it and never typed it up, so I decided to spend some time going over it and revising it. It counts because I say it does. It’s now up and available to read, if anyone is interested.
Tonight’s ends on a bit of a cliffhanger, so I’ll finish it up tomorrow.
The problem with doing things Hayden’s way was that Jamie had been doing it his own way for nearly 80 years. It was a difficult habit to break, especially since both ways of feeding took place in the same types of place and exposed Jamie to the same kinds of people.
He was starting to learn though, and all diets must start somewhere. He was learning the tricks of the trade—the kind of look these characters always had about them, how to read the body language of those around them. Sometimes the scent of perfume still distracted him, sometimes a woman with a little too much in her system would come sauntering up to him with her blood smelling thick and tasty. In worst case scenarios he’d try to remove himself and move to another bar just to get out of there and start fresh. Other times it was as simple as stepping out for some fresh air and a smoke break.
And then the hunt would begin again.
Tonight was no different. A quick flash of his convincing yet fake ID—a gift from a wealthy vampire friend who knew all the right people—was all it took to grant him access to the seedy bar with the messy conglomeration of neon lights out front. Inside the air stank of alcohol and smoke, and the speakers thumped out a booming rhythm loud enough that it reverberated in his chest and almost felt like he had a working heart.
He ordered a drink, something simple and cheap, and retreated to a vacant table in the corner to sip at it quietly while he watched the crowd. There’s something predatory in his gaze, something hungry in those dark eyes of his.
There’s a woman and her gaggle of loud friends celebrating what must have been her 21st birthday, complete with obnoxious pink sash. Happy couples and chance meetings and potential one-night-standers crowded the dance floor and daring men and women flirted at the bar in a tangled mess of suave leans and crossed legs. Nothing out of the ordinary—yet. Give it another twenty minutes and if nothing reared its head, he’d take his business elsewhere.
There—in the corner as far from both the door and the bar as one could get, there was a commotion. Nothing too big, like they were intentionally trying not to draw attention to themselves. Jamie watched for another moment before deciding it was worth investigating. With a groan, he pulled himself from his chair and slunk over to the small crowd that gathered.
“What’s the issue?” he asked, tapping the shoulder of the man who seemed to be ring leader of the disturbance—a tall, thick man with a bushy beard and mustard-stained shirt that was too small for his beer gut. Probably a trucker, probably named something ridiculous like Tiny.
“No problem,” the man grunted, but when he turned to face Jamie he revealed the presence of a tiny girl with slim fingers giving her glass a death grip. Her lips were pursed and her eyebrows downturned, an irritated glint flashing in her blue eyes.
“He botherin’ you, miss?” Jamie asked, looking straight at her and gesturing to Tiny. She only took a moment to look Jamie over and hugged in response, offering a curt nod before glancing away. The way her gaze darted across the bar told Jamie she was looking for someone—a bouncer, probably.
She smelled like peaches. Tiny smelled like rotten eggs. Why was Jamie doing this bullshit morals-friendly diet of Hayden’s again? There was nothing appetizing about the way Tiny looked or smelled.
“Why?” Tiny asked, lip curling in amusement. “You wanna do something about it? Gonna start a fight? Kid, you look like a butterfly could break you in half.”
The insult elicits a curt laugh from Jamie, one that slips past his lips as little more than a scoff. Personal insults: classy. “Wanna put that to the test?”
“Not worth my time,” Tiny laughs, a loud and bellowing sound. “I’d feel bad about snappin’ you like a twig.”
“Ten bucks.” It’s a dare said with a completely straight face. Jamie knows he’ll win, and he knows he’ll get the money either way. A corpse couldn’t stop a thief from running off with their wallet, after all, and Jamie wasn’t opposed to taking cash from a dead guy. Still, it’s a ruse, a ploy, an attempt to draw the man outside and get them out of public view.
“I ain’t takin’ your money. Not from a scrawny kid like you. Go back home to momma, kid. Quit tryin’ to play hero before someone accepts your dare and you wind up dead in a trash can.” And Tiny turns away.
That’s not good enough for Jamie. He stills needs a meal, and this is possibly his best bet for the night. It’s getting late and if he doesn’t seal a deal here soon, he’ll have to go crawling back home unfed and irritable.
“I’m stronger than I look,” he hisses, lip curling in a snarl as he grabs Tiny by the shoulder and yanks the man around to face him. Before Tiny can even counter, Jamie slings his arm back and launches his fist forward. It collides with Tiny’s jaw with enough force to knock the larger man to the ground.
Once he collects his bearings, Tiny glances up to Jamie with murder in his eyes as he rubs his jaw. “Outside, now.”
Time: 12:21 AM
Pages: 5
Word Count: 1482
Listening to: x
Topic: Jamie’s anger
I will not be posting tonight’s writing on account of I feel terrible and this writing is terrible as a result. I don’t have the energy to type it up. But know that I did it and it is in my journal.
In summation: I promised myself I wouldn’t use this blog for roleplay purposes but Hayden (regiium) and Jamie got into a fight via kik tonight and Jamie was so pissed off he wouldn’t let me write about anything else. He put his fist through the apartment wall and then walked to the park to light a cigarette and clear his head.
I might revisit this tomorrow and clean it up for the sake of positing this.
EDIT: I revisited this on 1/23/2016.
There’s an ache in his head and a shake in his hands when he slams the door behind him and steps out into the brisk winter air. He’s not sure what he’s expecting will happen tonight. Maybe he just needs fresh air to clear his head, or maybe he’s so high-strung that he’s itching to get into a fight. He deserves to get the shit kicked out of him, anyways. Regardless, he hopes that at the very least the chill of the wind will cool his fiery veins and the icy sting of it will bring him back to his senses.
Not to mention he needs time to think. If nothing else he has to figure out how he’s going to explain the fist-sized hole in the wall near the door. He’d hit it hard enough that his knuckles opened and bled, but only for a few minutes at most before scabbing over.
Jamie feels lost and confused. Nothing from the last hour makes sense. He doesn’t understand what happened—why Hayden was so angry at him, why he was so irritable and so quick to feed off that anger and escalate it. How a simple confession from Hayden led to Jamie punching a wall and shattering the drywall.
Sure, anger has always been a problem. Even his parents recognized it early in his youth; Jamie internalized everything and kept it bottled up and as consequence would lash out at inappropriate times and inappropriate people. But something was different here, something was wrong, and he couldn’t put his finger on it.
Maybe his sour mood was only a reflection of Hayden’s. Maybe he was mirroring the other, or sopping up the negativity like a sponge. Maybe Hayden had been throwing bad vibes across the headspace unknowingly and it threw Jamie off whack.
Not that Jamie was entirely innocent, here. Ever since he woke up a few months ago and they’d told him he’d died at the hands of the demon plaguing Hayden’s mind, he’d felt a series of complex emotions he wasn’t sure how to process. Numbness, confusion, apathy. Anger. He’d been more irritable and prone to outbursts than usual ever since the incident.
Maybe it was some lethal combination of the two. Fire and gasoline. Bleach and Ammonia.
Whatever it was, Jamie had blown up at Hayden at quite possibly the worst of times. All Hayden had wanted to do was confide in him, only for their conversation to escalate so violently. And things had been going so well for them; it felt like their friendship was finally being stitched together and the wounds they’d endured were starting to heal over.
But Jamie knew if it were the other way around, if he’d tried confiding in Hayden only to be treated as such, he wouldn’t likely confide such things in the other for a long time to come.
And for what was not the first time and would likely not be the last, Jamie found his thoughts focused on how much better off Hayden would be without him. Last time he’d tried to leave, he hadn’t really wanted to. It was easy enough for Hayden to convince him to stay.
Now, though… maybe there was a small part of him that really, really wanted to go. To hit the open road and be alone again, to not feel suffocated and chained and pinned down. To feel free, not like he was on a leash with his progeny at the other end, tugging at him sharply whenever he stepped out of line. He wanted to be as far from this mess as he could possibly be, away from all these mistakes that just wouldn’t stop resurfacing.
He was being rash, he was sure. Or that’s what Hayden would tell him if he even tried to leave again. So he pulled his jacket tighter around his thin frame and kept going, kept walking aimlessly. Jamie just needed time to clear his head. He’d see how he felt about it when he returned, after he’d cooled down and had time to reflect on where things had gone so wrong so fast. All he could do now was walk and try to suppress the burning tears that stung the corners of his eyes. Was he angry? Was he sad? He didn’t know.
As he so often did when he was upset, Jamie gravitated towards the nearest park. Conditioning from his youth, he figured—even if he didn’t know where the park was, he somehow always managed to find it. Not that he minded. There was something comforting and nostalgic to him about being able to climb a tree or sit on a swing to just exist for a little bit.
Once he hops the fence he pulls the worn leather of his jacket tighter, fastening it with a quick zip to preserve whatever heat he could salvage—not that there was much to begin with. Considering Jamie’s status as a corpse, body heat was a rare commodity and even his favorite jacket couldn’t trap and hold heat that wasn’t there to begin with. Skin like ice didn’t do much to protect against freezing winter air: the coat was more his shield from the elements than anything.
Thin fingers wrap around steel chains from which a swing dangles and he leans into the seat of it. His feet are still planted firmly on the ground in front of him when he sits, but it’s more the idea of swinging that he loves than the actual act of swinging itself.
Once he relaxes, takes a moment to sit and sway, Jamie searches his jacket pockets with still-trembling fingers and digs out a cigarette and his lighter. Almost immediately, lighting up and pressing the cigarette to his pale lips helps calm the shakes and the nerves. His eyes finally dry and he can think again.
The silence of the night washes over him and the biting wind seemed to blow the darkest, angriest thoughts straight out of his head. The idea of packing his things and leaving still lingered in serious consideration, but when was the thought of the open road and open sky not on his mind? He’d have left ages ago were it not for Hayden and the way he begged. It was just his nature. Leaving was the only thing was good for, right? The caged bird that wouldn’t sing.
He couldn’t even figure out how to be a good friend, sire, or brother. Didn’t even have any of that going for him.
With a groan, Jamie retrieved his phone from his jacket pockets and stared at Hayden’s contact info, ready to shoot something, anything his way. An apology, maybe, or a ‘fuck you.’ He wasn’t sure. It took him several seconds to form a message in his head, a message asking forgiveness and expressing his guilt at the way their conversation had ended. His thumb lingered over the send button, only for him to delete the message in its entirety and stuff his phone away as if the thought had never even crossed his mind.
It was too early, he decided. Hayden probably still needed time. At best, they just needed a night of space. A few hours to cool off. At worst, Hayden probably didn’t want to speak to Jamie again, maybe even hated him. Though, after all they’d been through, Jamie found it difficult to believe Hayden would hate him. Part of him wondered if Hayden even had it in him to hate Jamie.
Besides, Hayden was (hopefully) with or at least in contact with Hunter. They didn’t need him or his innate ability to fuck everything up so consistently. They were happy together.
The passage of time went almost unnoticed with the exception of the death of his cigarette, which he crushed under the rubber toe of his worn Chuck Taylors. What was a few hours to an immortal with a century behind him? He was so lost in thought, debating whether or not to leave, debating where their conversation had gone wrong, trying to figure out what he needed to do to better rein himself in for the future. It wasn’t until the moon dipped down and the sky became that familiar damning dawn gray that Jamie realized he’d lost such track of time.
He needed to get to wherever he would be spending the day before the sun came up. He couldn’t go back to the apartment, that much he knew. Going back to the apartment meant running the risk of having to share that cramped space with Hayden for another twelve hours until the sun set and they were able to go their separate ways again.
So Jamie slunk off into the night, making a beeline to the outskirts of town while he searched for the familiar, homey glow of a VACANCY sign somewhere on the immediate horizon.
Time: 12:17 AM
Pages: 6
Word Count: 1460
Listening to: x
Topic: Jamie’s Childhood
People say that children are simple and carefree, that their lives exist free of stressors of the adult world. It’s as if they see children as living in a bubble. It’s important to note, however, that everyone who says such things about children were, at one point, children themselves. They all had a childhood, believe it or not, and make assumptions and generalizations based on the way they remember the way they grew up.
I remember childhood very differently. There was never a bubble of protection around me; even from the get-go I had stress and responsibility thrust upon me, family burdens weighing on my back like Atlas. It was Atlas, right, the guy I’m thinking of?
I was born the second child of a mixed race family. My mother, Elizabeth, the half-Apache daughter of a woman forced into an American boarding school and my father, Scott, an Irish immigrant straight from Dublin with a thick accent that gave him away to everyone he met. The two were constantly struggling to make ends meet, as there were few places that hired Irishmen and fewer that paid them well enough to raise a family. I was born in my mother’s bed with only my father and older sister present. I was born sick, with fluid in my lungs and a cough that sounded like a death rattle, and my poor parents could afford no doctor. The best they could do was wait and pray their first son survived the night. This continued for months.
They named me James Edison. James, after Pa’s father, and Edison, after the man who invented the lightbulb. I’m not sure why they thought Edison was a fitting name for a little boy. Ma would later tell me they had hoped to inspire perseverance in me.
They knew from the beginning of course. There was no way of knowing exactly what I was in for, but based off of family standing in the world, they knew life would not come easily for me. There wasn’t even guarantee of my survival until sometime around my first birthday. Finally I was sleeping through the night without waking in coughing fits. Finally I was able to fight off diseases on rare occasions without contracting dangerous fevers. I would continue to be a sickly child for years to come, but Ma would always look back and say that when the coughing stopped and she saw color in my cheeks for the first time, she knew I would survive.
My brother, Theodore, was born a short time after I was; a little less than a year later. He, too, struggled to survive. Both McMorrow sons, only infants, fought nightly for their lives. But Theo lived and before long was outpacing me developmentally in every sense of the word: physically, mentally, emotionally, and intellectually.
When I first began attending school was when it became clear something was wrong. My sister, Catherine, had learned to read before she began school. My peers could all read. Even Theo, almost a year younger than I, was beginning to read. Yet there I was. Stuck. No matter how desperately my parents tried—and God, did they try—I just couldn’t pick it up. The letters all jumbled on the page. Simple sentences made no sense and even phrases my teachers considered easy only frustrated me to tears.
I was seven when my teachers finally gave up on me and encourage my parents to do the same. A boy who can’t even figure out how to read can never amount to anything, they’d said. The other children were no better. As if the teasing about the heritage of my parents’ and the poverty-stricken lifestyle of my family wasn’t bad enough, now I had teachers making it known that I was the class failure, the dunce
. For many years, my brother was my only friend; even then, that was tentative at times. It was hard not to find myself resentful or jealous of the way Theo surpassed me on every level. He was younger than me and also better than me at almost everything: reading, speaking, sports, making friends. He was the talented, charismatic brother and I only the family failure, and that weighed heavily on me even as a young child.
I was probably about eight when I witnessed death for the first time. Her name was Bette and like all McMorrow children, she was born ill. She suffered a long six months before she died in her sleep. I was awake and hovering near her crib when it happened but I was young and didn’t understand and I let it happen. The way Ma sobbed kept me awake for weeks, staring at the water-stained ceiling of the room Theo and I shared. Some nights, despite the way I resented him, I would crawl into his bed and listen carefully to be sure he was breathing.
I was only ten when Pa lost his job. He worked in one of the oil plants on the edge of town and when the economy crumbled, Mr. Wallers decided he didn’t want immigrants working for him anymore. Only full blooded American men who deserved a paycheck would be found working in his factories, he’d declared. After that, Ma cried often and Pa was quiet a lot and we only ate one meal a day. Dinner would have consisted of soup and toast, and Ma stopped baking cookies every weekend.
I adjusted. Contrary to what was said about me, I was a resourceful kid. I taught myself to pick pockets and locks, practicing on my siblings and my bedroom door. It only took a little bit of loose change to buy a treat for myself and my brother from the corner store.
It wasn’t long after that when I first met Lee. She and her father moved in next door just a little after Pa was fired. Mr. Evans was a thick man with more hair on his lip than on his head and he reeked constantly of alcohol and sweat. Lee, on the other hand, was a small, frail girl who wore white dresses and flowers in her hair and always somehow smelled of vanilla. It was my Ma who introduced us and at first, Lee only hid behind her legs.
We didn’t speak much until a week later, at school. Buck Wallers, the snotty son of the oil tycoon, was picking on her—as he did everyone—and I wouldn’t stand for it. I knew what it was like to have no friends and feel defenseless and Buck’s reign of terror had once been a cloud over my head. I wasn’t about to let a pretty girl like Lee fall victim to his antics. It wasn’t the first nor would it be the last time I got in a fist fight with one of the seven Wallers’ kids, but it was possibly the best of the motives for such a scuffle.
Once the teachers pulled Buck and I apart and I cooled down, the first thing I did was check on Lee to be sure she was okay. Theo and I walked her home from school that day and the next morning the three of us walked to school together. By the end of that week, Lee and I were near inseparable.
The weirdest thing about Lee was the way she was always covered in bruises. She wasn’t afraid to play rough and tumble with Theo and I but we never bruised her. Each other, maybe, but never Lee. When I asked my mother about it sometime that summer, she set her mouth in a thin line the way she always did if she disapproved of the way I was talking at the dinner table. I didn’t understand why my concern for my friend had made Ma so angry until a little while later. Lee and I had been playing together until her father stumbled out of their house and started yelling curses at me. He marched over and grabbed Lee by the wrist and dragged her back to their yard. My Ma, alerted by the commotion, came outside just in time to see Mr. Evans smack Lee.
Ma wasn’t going to stand by and let that happen. She turned into a whole new woman, then. Elizabeth McMorrow was not a woman who was angered easily, nor did she regularly display angry behavior—yet after the way she spoked to Mr. Evans, I didn’t dare open my mouth the rest of the night.
After that, Lee would sometimes crawl through my bedroom window in the middle of the night and sleep soundly under my bed. Theo pretended not to notice and if my parents ever knew, they never said anything.
