BILLET-DOUX ✦ CLASSIC ROCK

65 - tom petty ⁴

For the kind DiphylleiaHeart ! I loved this idea so much! I'm so sorry you had to wait so long, dear. I intended this to take place during the early Mudcrutch years, if you wanted some context!
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Anxiety built up in your chest as you watched the rain patter rhythmically on the living room window. The sky had clouded up, fit for bursting, and a few strikes of lightning lit up the sky. Florida storms weren't foreign to you, as you had lived here all your life. The thing that did unsettle you was the noise.

You had always hated thunderstorms ever since you were a little child clinging to your mother's skirts. Loud noises of any kind startled you, and you thought it had a lot to do with your father's boomimg baritone voice as he shouted at you and your mother over the dinner table and in restaurants and... everywhere. His voice would shake you to your core, causing you to seize up and cease to function, ears ringing and begging for the sounds
to stop.

Thunder reminded you a lot like your father. It always did.

So you couldn't help but clutch at the window sill, chewing at your lower lip and praying for it to go away. Maybe this wouldn't be a thunderstorm at all. Maybe the weathermen had overexaggerated. But you knew deep down that they were right and there was no stopping Mother Nature. Your knuckles grew white as they clasped the scuffed wood as an ominous rumble rolled over the hills.

It was coming.

God, it was coming. Where was Tom?

He had been due home half an hour ago from his dead-end job at Junior's Swamp. You hoped he hadn't been bit by some snake or fallen off the boat and been eaten up by some gator. Tom did have the habit of tripping over his own feet, and you wouldn't be surprised if he flipped the boat over in his excitement over an alligator getting too close for comfort.

Another warning ripple of thunder echoed across the sky, but this time it was louder than the first. You flinched backwards from the window, stumbling into the couch. A few more claps of thunder followed, eliciting a gasp and pitiful whimper from you. It made your heart clench up in your chest as the beginnings of a panic attack started to take hold of you.

"Tom," you whispered, collapsing on top of the couch. You could feel your chest heaving panicked breaths each time a rumble of thunder rattled the shudders. "C'mon Tom."

As the sounds grew more overwhelming, you found yourself scrambling for the quilt – for something to wrap around your head to block out the noise. It only worked so well, and you were still trembling each time the walls shuddered around you and the rain poured harder and harder upon the roof.

Endless worries ran circles through your head. Would this be a hurricane? Would the house flood out? Where would you go? Was Tom safe? Where was Tom?

You sighed shakily, squeezing the quilt harder against your ears. Tears burned at the corners of your eyes as you tried to stave off a full-blown breakdown. The storm just kept getting louder and louder and louder until the sheer anxiety of it all took over your body. You were left fretting, body seized up and watching the steadily darkening window with Tom's name on your lips like a prayer. Eventually, you grew so upset that your body simply shut down, and you slowly fell asleep.

The sound of wheels crunching against gravel stirred you awake from your dreamless sleep. You were shivering, your hair a mess as you laid around a strewn quilt. Rain could still be heard falling, but it seemed that the thunder had let up for the time being. Lifting your head, you watched the door with interest.