Hearts Of Gold h.s

Chapter 48

E

I'm standing outside of my childhood home for the first time in nearly five years.

I had the same conversation with Harry that I did with Niall, telling him that he doesn't have to stay in Maryland if he doesn't want to. I also told him he didn't have to come here with me today.

His response was something along the lines of "I'll be here as long as you are. I'll go home if I need to go home."

So, it looks like it's the four of us here for a little while.

Jackson walks past me, he has a few boxes in his hands and some garbage bags in those boxes. Our goal is to just clean the house, get things that we personally want from it. 

We're selling and donating whatever we can. I have no idea what condition a lot of the stuff in here is in, so we might have to just throw a lot away.

As for my Dad's condition, not much has changed. He's alive, but it's looking a little more grim as the days go. His blood pressure is dropping, he's no longer in and out of consciousness, he's just out all day. He's being tube fed since he can't stay awake long enough to eat much of anything.

It's just a waiting game right now. That sounds morbid, but that's what we're doing. We're waiting for the call, we're waiting for the last breath, we're waiting for the inevitable to happen. Well, unless a miracle happens, but no one is seeming very optimistic.

I shouldn't call it a miracle, if he ended up living someway, it would just be a medical phenomenon, not a miracle. Him living is not a fucking miracle.

"You ready?" Niall walks up to me.

I've been standing, leaning against the car, looking at the house for a good five minutes. Jackson already went in and started taking lots of empty boxes in so we can package everything up, but I haven't moved yet.

Niall has stayed next to me, and Harry is just grabbing things from the trunk to hand to Jackson as he comes out.

No one has gone in except Jackson and I know that's because I won't go in. Niall and Harry won't move until I do.

"No." I tell Niall. I'm not ready to go in, but will I ever be? The answer is still no.

"Okay, what do you want to do?" he asks me.

I look over to him, trying not to make a smart ass comment to his question. There's lots of things that I'd rather be doing than going back into the childhood home where every single one of my nightmares stem from. Trust me, I'd rather be doing anything in the world.

"Doesn't matter what I want. It needs done and I'm, once again, having to exert more of my energy for him, so I guess we can just get it done and over with." I say, trying not to sound like I'm mad at him, because I'm not, I'm mad at the situation I'm left in.

I start walking away, towards the house, but Niall stops me by grabbing onto my forearm, forcing me to spin towards him.

"Get off." I shake my arm out of his grip, not wanting his hands on me right now.

"What you want to do does matter. If you want to leave, I'll take you back right now. If you don't want to be here, we don't have to be. You don't have to be." he tells me.

"And I appreciate that, but I do need to be here because my Mom's stuff is in there and it'll get thrown away or donated if I'm not here. So, let's just get it over with. Rip it off like a bandaid." I tell him.

"Fine. Let's go." he says, nodding towards the house.

I look over to see Harry watching the two of us from the back of the car, but he quickly diverts his attention from us to the inside of the car.