Madferit: The Novel

Chapter 113

            The morning sunshine lit up the whole dining room as it beamed in through the big windows by the table. Its warmth quickly rose with the summer temperature of the new day.

Noel and I sat quietly across from each other at the table. He was hidden behind his morning newspaper while I had my nose buried in a magazine.

"When Johnny Cash was asked what his definition of paradise was, d'ya know what he said?" He inquired flicking his newspaper a bit to get my attention.

"No. What?" I replied glancing up to only see his fingers gripping the sides of the fanned out paper.

"This mornin', with her, havin' coffee."

I smirked a little feeling my cheeks start to heat up.

"Not us though, no." He turned the page fanning the newspaper out again. "'Cuz we don't even drink coffee...and you don't even drink tea!"

I rolled my eyes. "I-" I stopped myself when he finally lowered his newspaper and flashed me a shit-eating grin.

"You know I'm right!" He remarked.

"No you're not!" I shook my head.

"Well, I'm right today!" He nodded at my glass of orange juice in front of me. "That's not tea!"

"Well, no sh-"

"This is tea, yeah? A proper cuppa." He held his cup of tea up to make his point.

I shrugged my eyebrows not interested in starting a debate with him. "So what's your definition of paradise then?" I asked.

He smiled. "This mornin', with her, havin' tea."

It had become the new normal. Or the sort of new normal anyway. I had always offered breakfast the morning after the night before but Noel was never that interested when he was on a comedown. He preferred Pot Noodle and could've eaten his weight in it every day if he wanted to. And most days he did. When I suggested replacing it with real food I sometimes felt like I was force feeding him...but I knew he couldn't survive on junk food as much as he would've liked to try.

That all changed on June fifth though. All the party guests were cleared out of our house along with every drug Noel could've won a gold medal for taking.

"I didn't give 'em up 'cuz I think they're bad." He defended. "I gave 'em up 'cuz they got borin'. The atmosphere, the bullshit, all of it was the same thing everytime and it was gettin' dead old."

I played along like I believed him but I knew better. That day was just too special for him to just give up drugs for no reason other than they weren't fun anymore. Of course, he'd never share that information with the press.

The first thing I noticed after all the gear had been expelled from Noel's system was how much light shined through his eyes. They'd always been full of life I suppose but now they weren't hidden behind a glaze. The summer sun made them sparkle even more than they already did.

Noel was adamant we stick to our new normal. The new routine we created adding things into it as we went along. Not super spontaneous of course. Noel's rigidity was mad fer routines and rules.

"I like makin' rules." He revealed. "And I like makin' people follow my rules."

"Mmhmm." I hummed in sarcastic agreement.

Some things would never change.

But a lot of things still did though and it was wonderful. Noel's definition of paradise truly was paradise and we didn't even have to go on holiday to get there.