Apathy Aftertaste

I honestly think that life is pushing me to the tip of suicide. 

I look behind, to see him give me a soft wave and nod to look back at the teacher and I sigh, trying not to fiddle even more with the notebooks, my mind humming far too loudly and the clock which has no sound, is far too loud in my head, muting everything and I just keep replaying nightmares in my head which had been last night, spitting out blood in the sink and noticing how all my temples had gone gray. 

“It shouldn’t be hard.” Jack told me as he arrived at four a.m. parents no longer caring and all under a healthy doze of Xanax, waiting for me to pack my bags, but Jack insisted that this should still be the place where the ritual of getting rid of the past should be and he proceeded to dye my hair until there was pounding on the door and we emerged, just for mom and dad to think we fucked. 

Jack waved at them and they prayed that Meg was indeed his girlfriend, as I would smoke outside, Jack scratching the back of his head, thinking-

“I can’t take you in.”

“I know.”

“Shit.” 

Jack lights his own cigarette, silence musing outloud as the stars are no longer seen and it’s far too early into the last year. 

“Get a hotel for tonight, we’ll figure out something tomorrow.”

“That’s fucking fifty quid.”

“Yeah, well, that’ll be one hundred in they fucking catch you in my bed, wanker.” I start shaking and Jack looks ahead before he pulls me into an awkward hug with a pat on the back and I just narrow my eyes in frustration but he doesn’t see it. 

I just stare at him before I break down crying. Jack just keeps cursing as he keeps pulling me closer, rocking me from side to side and even kissing me on the top of my head. I grab him by the hem of his shirt and pull him into a harsh kiss for no goddamn reason, my mind far too foggy and Jack lifts his arms up but complies, I feel his sigh, but he kisses me back and rubs his tongue on mine a bit.

“You’re still not sleeping on my bed.”

“Carpet?”

“Fine, just stop nagging about my posters.” I flip at him, my body now shaking from the kiss, which seems to leave no impact on Jack and he just sees it as from one disaster to another. He turns to face me.

“You collapsed drunk and couldn’t go back home and you’re dating Alison.”

“Fuck no, she fucking keeps nagging that since she stalked my house, I should date her.”

“To my parents.”

“They’ll nag to the school.”

“Choose a beard then.”

“Kate’s alright.”

“She’s with Pete again.”

“I’m the lover.”

Being in Jack’s room felt surreal after we had made out and it wasn’t even how I imagined it. I tried to calm down about the fact that I got kicked out but it seemed to sting and my heart was racing as Jack would keep switching sides on the bed and I was there under a blanket on the carpet for the next few hours, if I tried hard enough, I could imagine I was on bed with him, but carpet seemed pleasant enough and we were woken by Jack’s mom who didn’t blink twice,

I was on the carpet and mothers are far too daft, so Jack just dressed up, as I watched him, peeking from the blanket and his thoughts were clouded with my own, as my own anxiety tried to make peace with me, my shaking hands were more than enough.

When I woke up my age seemed to be oblivious to me and the new hairdye seemed to remind me of gray I had gotten the night before, leaving me in this abyss

As I dressed up I tried to forget that time whenever we’d go to the sea and I’d have sunblock thrown at me at all times and how the dinners would never be quiet, too many noisy questions and a few pokes at the fact that I should’ve gone for Alison, who my mom already had a fondness for. And I recall how we would just watch something on Friday and even the silence we would hold, seemed nostalgic, I gag on the toothpaste taste for some reason and too many memories flash, but I don’t let them into my consiousness and I have no idea what to even do.

Jack waits for me, breakfast in his room, juice, toast and cereal. 

I play with the milk a while, but I realize that I should just suck it up and I take a spoonful of cereal, feeling a bit deja vu to the milk taste and Jack just opens his mouth to say something, but instead he sighs and we both eat in silence. My mood swings far too much and reminds me of a swing swinging sideways instead of backwards and forward, I’m going nowhere, the panorama in front of me never becoming closer. 

As the house slowly starts waking up with Jack’s numerous siblings, I stay in one of the bathrooms, dunking my face in the cold water, trying to peel loneliness away and it seems to dawn on me, that from now everything changes

I don’t even how tuition will be handled, how even I will sleep this night

I always seemed to be lonely growing up, clinging onto too many people which would leave far too early and it seemed to get worse when I would meet Jack and I would be struck by how come he seemed to be out of everything, playing guitar on his own and refusing Catholic school just because he couldn’t take his amp with him. Society doesn’t allow men to be attracted to other men and I just figured that I might just be admiring his smile after all and it seemed hypnotic to watch him smoke, when we would manage to shoplift a bottle of vodka once because no one of us had any idea of how to get a fake ID and we had laughed far much more than any drunkard would. 

It felt like he was slowly luring me in, without knowing it, it felt like he was playing with me harsher than any of the girls he would be with before with Meg or even Meg. 

It was far too slow to see myself elevating, not realizing what was going on and it was a stupid slip of the tongue-

I cough and I yank myself out of the basin-

I had uttered the words before even touching any other bloke, because I just wanted to touch Jack and that was enough

The thought all of a sudden was the sin. 

And the loneliness was the complication which was forced upon and Jack ends up opening the lock and sees me still catching my breath and he pulls me into a hug. I ease up, feeling his faint scent of cigarettes which he sometimes smokes and then makes sure that he doesn’t have any trace as he would tiptoe back into the room.

He knows.

“If you’re gay, then do you like any bloke?” Jack asked, the first question after I had come out to him something I surely would not expect and I just stared at him wide eyed, shaking from the resolution, from his interest in his eyes and how he had lit me a cigarette as we just sat outside at night in his yard, not the best place to come out, but we had still done it, he had listened to me and just shrugged, saying that it was ok, that it was still me. He looked away a bit worried and then back at me, exhaling and then pulling me into a hug, telling me not to be scared

But he had nothing to tell.

“A few.” I had said, my throat dry. Jack’s curiosity still lingered. “N-no one specific.”

“Good.” Jack smirked. “Coz I’m taken. And you’re not my type. I don’t want some gay heartbreak.”

I sighed and he just punched me in the shoulder. 

“It would be just like any heartbreak, you moron.” Jack exhaled and tried to look ahead, before laughing softly at his comment. 

“I know. I just wouldn’t want you to break my heart.” 

“Why the fuck not?”

“Sounds like you’d break some bloke’s heart quite badly.” Jack grinned and I shrugged and looked ahead, feeling his leg against mine, my body still shaking from coming out to him and realizing that he had no tale to tell, no mutual talks, no nothing. He did have Meg and neither did he seem interested in anyone other than women. I just shrugged and he dismissed my tears as fear rather than loss of something I had wanted to achieve from this talk. 

Why wouldn’t you love someone who you trust more than your own girlfriend? And I thought that as he let go of the hug, asking me if I were alright. I shook and nodded after a few pauses. I wasn’t sure anymore. My body shaking even more from loss and gain of nothing.

People say that you should get out of your comfort zone to see who you really are, well, the thing is if you’ve got depression you don’t see who you are, it’s like an autopsy, you’ll see my insides, but you’ll have me die in the process as well.

We resume the leftover breakfast and Jack just tries to smile at me and I just look away. It’s far too intimidating to think that the only four walls which accept me for who I am are Jack’s and for some moment only. That’s the problem and I keep wondering where should I even go, as Jack starts talking and I feel like I’m underwater, when you push yourself down, it feels like an oblivion and I feel like I’m getting a deja vu sense of death and I’m sure that if I were to see either the death or the devil who’d come for my soul before death, they’d offer me themselves as Jack and the price would be low, because I’d have already given myself over to him, all they had to do was to make him love me.

I always wondered if there was a love potion, how would it happen? I seemed to imagine it before sleep, like in that ball scene with Romeo + Juliet and it would wear off just as easily, Jack just having the feeling of glitter on his lips, until rubbed off and then I would collapse

When you watch telly and you see a couple, which would’ve been dating if they weren’t same sex, all signs show but for some reason they just don’t go for you

That’s Jack.

“James!” I raise my eyes to see the teacher look at me with their big glasses, giving me some sort of faint primary and I glance back at Jack.

Depression is so loud you don’t hear anything.

“Cell wall.” I mutter and the look is gone and shifted onto another.

Depression is so vivid that my memories are erased, I don’t even understand how I got to school. Depression isn’t colourful, it’s white like the walls if you’re psycho you imagine to die within, trembling, no blood spilt because none raised against the walls to break the skin.

“You always think that the best things in life already happened, but because they didn’t happen yet, you think there’s nothing else.” Is what Jack tells me once the bell rings and he heads over to me and I quickly glance at his lips, wincing which Jack dismisses as a sign of being solely depressed and I sink my head into my arms against the table. I recall the kiss and how he had hesitated and I can’t help but sigh, still wishing I’d feel the warmth again. It feels like torture and knowing that it just gets worse, that I’m the one who has to release myself from the cage yet I still keep the key in my pocket, not letting myself go anywhere, not due to anxiety, but due to sole ridiculousness. 

Jack glances around and as we take our backpacks, Jack loosening his tie and then my own with a smirk as he doesn’t even flinch that I keep my gaze on him, used to it as I glance at everyone and I wonder what would happen if I were to kiss Jack again, just now and how would everyone else who I knew take in my sexuality? 

Jack lets go and I start following him until he turns around and motions towards the exit, I presume it’s for a fag but he increases his speed and soon enough we’re out of the school grounds. He doesn’t even ask me if I wanted to get out. 

“I was thinking. We need an excuse for you to stay on my carpet, while you find a place of your own.” He muses out loud. I just sigh and he puts his hand on my shoulder as we’re a block away and the stores start coming in with their autumn sales. “What if I move in? Then I can surely play at night, fuck the neighbors.”

I blink.

“You need to pay half the rent, wanker.”

“Yeah, well, then it’s easier. We both have to find a job which covers half and then we just get food off my mom or something.” He pauses and I just look away, trying not to let the heavy weight speak it’s concern to me, it’s hard enough knowing the problems itself before they speak. “You can still bring your boyfriends in. I’ll be in headphones. As long as I can shag Meg anytime I want as well.”

Ah, Meg.

I sulk.

“You’ll find a lovely lad, Jamie, honestly, just wait.” Or wait for his straight ass to realize he isn’t so straight. I’m waiting for a brojob request these days. I just keep glaring at him and he just waves me off, trying to focus on the shop windows. I don’t shift my gaze anywhere and Jack looks back at me. “What?”

“Why can’t we fuck?” I fucking speak it out and my head starts aching, I want at least something positive in my life. Jack clears his throat and just shakes his head.

“You cheated on Meg with Alison. It’s not like you’re very monogamous or honest, y’know?”

“Yeah, well, I got excited once I found out that she had no chances with you and she realized all her problems are solved now with you off the market.” Jack winked at me and I just grumble. “Wait, how do you know?”

“She told me that I’m losing her.” I roll my eyes. “Trying a band with her was disasterous a few years ago. Shouldn’t have done that.”

“Find a lovely lad. I’m telling you.” I can’t stop glaring at him and he flips me off, before he heads into the bookstore, going a bit ahead and I just stand near the new section looking at all the straight novels, which seem alien to me and the other day before I fell asleep I even honestly asked myself how do people have straight sex? Doesn’t it get boring doing the same thing over and over again? I take one of the novels and I start flicking it through, my eyes too tired to even focus on words. 

“How do straight people have sex, Jack?” I ask him as he approaches me and he smirks, hands in pockets and soon enough even the tie is off, which is wise since the school colours are there, but then it’s not like we’re the only ones missing lessons anyway. I haven’t missed even one this year yet and it’s still halfway through September. 

“I dunno, you just fuck?” He answers a bit comically confused, pulling now off my tie as it gets caught in my hair and Jack tugs on it heavier. 

“I thought you knew, since you’re not a virgin anymore.” I smirk, still trying to concentrate on the words and trying to understand the meaning behind another straight cis novel. 

“Asks the virgin.”

“Yeah, well, apparently our knowledge is the same then.” I laugh, closing the book and looking at my taller friend. I hesitate a bit, I either shyly watch from afar or pounce. I’m pouncing. “I wouldn’t be if you fucking tried, Jack.”

-

I started writing this around two months ago and I was heavily depressed, I was solely tempted by the idea that I didn't have a Jamie/Jack high school story and I kept musing on how I would do it and then I guess, please understand that I don't know why Jamie squatted and this is just my musing, head canons and whatnot. 

I just still feel very exiled because I had fought all my life to study in the UK up to the point that I still have dreams and I was very baffled by the results of the Scottish independence and I guess with the lights of all, I think it's rigged and Cameron is an asshole and I think I've said it enough and if I were Scottish or cared, I would really try to do something, but I don't know whose hands were the ones rigging me even if I know briefly, I still cared too much about this today. 

It's really hard to know that you're just kicked out and I thankfully have Callie which supported me and sometimes I would joke that she took the hits more than I did, but in reality she just helped me and we'd just go on, because there is no other way. And that's the thing I can't see myself as noble, when for instance I admire Jamie Hince for everything in his life, but I can't admire myself, so yeah, hello depression

and I'd just like to say thank you again to everyone for their kind words and thank you so so much, you really yank me out of depression and you know who you are and thank you so so much

I was nearly crying and not believing 

Thank you and I wish that my stories will still bring the support I receive at hard times

The first line I believe was written when I was in Portugal, stuck and that's how I felt and I think it's one of those few lines I've rewritten because I had forgotten the original one.

I think one of the most bone crunching moments was when I was brushing my teeth and I had realized that half my head went gray, my roots were silver and that just shocked me because Callie was the one who laughed that she would go gray and there I was. It just dawned on me how much I had lived through and how I seemed to be breaking down and I just wanted to show Jack as Callie is to me. I've told her many times and sometimes all my stories are big love letters to her, just the sole open poetry is the one which aren't published, you base love of somewhere, all exes of the exes, betrayed friends and people who mean off everything, I dunno, I think the Beats inspire me too much. 

I was watching Howl with James Franco when I realized that I was fluid and the other Ginsberg movie (forgive me, I'm sleepy xD) 

And that's why I always relate to Jamie, because I just sometimes feel like no one knows what it's like to have no one behind your back and you have to earn for food, work like clockwise, grab everything and still create art. I still make a point of making it free, I dunno, I'm just tired, really, but I guess… this is something and yeah, I enjoy what I do and I'm still a writer and frankly many years ago I decided that I didn't want to be published, I didn't want to be censored and I don't want my queer sex scenes to be chopped off and neither do I want to be something available for those who are in the UK or the US or who have access to English bookstores. Art should be free, so frankly that's why I just get angry when I get charged for museums. I know maintenance, but when I get told that because I'm out of education I should pay the same fee someone who has worked for years, it's gross. 

And I dunno, I saw my generation fall, everyone get kicked out and jobless and I am angry and maybe this is all I can do, I can scream and sometimes people read my screams, but they still will go and Read IT, they will still like Arcade Fire and it's the Kurt Cobain effect, you'll love Nirvana but you'll be a wanker to like Guns and Roses and there's nothing I can do about it.

I don't really like writing plain dialogue but it seemed fitting and it was fun to do for these two and I love symbolism, so Jamie getting his hair dyed there before he left was much more metaphorical than realistic. And I dunno, it cheered me up to see there's an interview where you can see his gray hairs and in general if you notice, his hair is always dyed. I dunno, I like relating to people, I like knowing that I'm not alone. 

Fifty quid is the rough price of a hotel in Stockholm so that's why I said it, really xD some stories are just set abstractly, I know. Don't worry I use all my settings, so expect a story with my current setting soon, I'm just taking a while to start posting the new things as I'm posting the last chapters of older things and whatnot:) 

The kiss was unplanned and I love how harsh it is and in general the kiss is always a breaking point in a story and I always push it far ahead I think and here it is. 

Callie keeps laughing at the dialogues and in general, no matter how dark my stories are I enjoy doing some comedy, I dunno if the influence is felt, but my favourite all time movie is Trainspotting because it has all genres in one and after I watch it I know I can do anything and again, Renton leaves the UK which became symbolic to me after years. I'm sad that they excluded Renton being bisexual in the movie, the book is amazing, but I do prefer the movie. 

My stories all have a darker tone and flirting with the edge of suicidal so I apologize for that, but it's been hard a year later and in the end a lot of people don't care and only a few do. And I guess I just wanted to make Jamie go through this and yeah, I shouldn't be spoiling and this is really a different Gandalf's Inhaler, because you've got different situations, you've got different disasters and different loves. GI will be updated soon, sorry for the wait, that one is harder because it describes the process while this one is me just describing my depression and love is always well describeable sometimes xD 

I guess now my latest topics are discovering sexuality because it's not that long ago that I realized my fluid side and well I am heavily attracted to men now, so it's interesting on the other side, if you must. So yeah, that's a reaccuring topic. 

Initially Jamie was going to live alone, but then I realized that it would be more fun with them too and I seem to have that topic in Snap Out Of It as well, well, briefly, Callie tells me I over worry and I do, so if you enjoyed it please tell and I'm just looking through, the story tells by itself and it was me binge writing in the pendeltåg and elsewhere, I just was obsessed with the idea and I couldn't stop and that's why it's so huge. 

Jamie flirts quite in your face or either shyly (*cough Miles RAK studios*) so it's fun with his flirting and I guess it echoes with what I had tried once. I'm demisexual so it gets me a while to get into people and there was this bloke and he was quite older and he started flirting and he'd deliberately did it for days and he just reminded me of this other bloke I liked before (who in my head had the ideal writing style which was really him copying Kerouac in a modern way and I always aspired to write like him) and they looked very similar and I wasn't sure of my gender and I had just gotten from a messy nearly on relationship with a girl and then I just saw that he was into me. Fucking hell, it's embrassing but I was like, fuck this, I'm no Ice Queen and I would flirt as openly as I could and that was the most open I ever did. He had a girlfriend and I'm not sure what happened between those two, but either way, it was odd and me and Callie met him a year later and it was still awkward. So anyway, I've tried aggressive flirting, it's… not effective, but you think it is or you're just like "fuck you, I know you like me" xD 

I've been called out on cisphobia and heterophobia too many times, but you know what, fuck it. I don't know how heteronormative people have sex and as long as they shame me, so will I and I don't understand what's wrong with me being queer and trans and I dunno, I know I am angry but yeah, I will be and I always was and well, some read me and yeah, meaning my anger gets somewhere and my desire to be heard and spread the gay really xD

OK THE TITLE CAME FROM I was thinking I want something and I looked at all the Scarfo title songs which have a Russian undertone and I was like fuck, what's Russian and I was like vodka and I was like would that even be serious enough even if I enjoy vodka. And I can even say which one I prefer xD I dunno maybe these are my roots speaking but I like taking one unit and that's all so yeah. Anyway, then I was thinking how the one I currently bought and like doesn't leave an aftertaste like the numbing one and I was like, ok, let's look in a thesaurus for synonyms and apathy was listed as a opposite and I was like what the fuck and I am actually proud of this name, I love it, it matches the story and yeah, I'm sure they will drink vodka at some point anyway. Yay for vodka xD drink responsibly. 

Thank you all for your kind words and thank you for all your support and tell me if you enjoyed this story as I really enjoy writing it (halfway through the second chapter) and thank you so much all of you for making me know that I am someone you enjoy reading

<3

Jamie