What It's Like Loving an Idiot

Sixty Two || Last Night Night Didn't Happen

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Vena's POV

I pace on a floor that I never thought I would on.

"Coffee? Rum? Orange juice? Absinthe?" She looks back at me from the kitchen.

What an odd arrangement of beverages. I shake my head, "No, I'm fine."

She turns around, leaning against the cabinets. "You know, when we're here, I am above you." She says, making me jolt my head up to her.

"Don't start." I warn.

She sighs, crossing her arms over her chest. "Don't be stupid. I'm saying that I'm above you, but I'm also above everyone else here. Whatever this thing is that you're not saying, I will find out because I always do."

I shake my head, stopping my steps. "Why would you care? You don't like me, I mean, I think it's safe to say that you hate me."

She smiles briefly, but it quickly disperses off her face. "I have something to protect here and you constantly getting in the middle of it, getting in the way fucks that up."

"No, I don't buy it. You hate me, like at a rate that is more than me just getting in the way. You want me to disappear off the face of the earth."

"For just a moment put yourself in my position."

I face her, "I would never."

She nods, but is silent after that. "I do what I have to do to get my job done, Vena. It's nothing against you, it's just bad timing I suppose."

Bafflement takes over me. "Bad timing?!" I repeat back to her. "Really? That's what you're going to call it?!"

She raises an eyebrow like my outburst is just so fucking hilarious.

"I was in the right place at the right time and so was he, you were not. You broke the algorithmic flow of 'being in the right place at the right time'."

She shakes her head, "You are absolutely ridiculous. Have you forgotten where exactly James came from before you?"

"Yeah, his parents in New York, that's where."

"No, before that."

I turn around, facing my back to her. I look up and find a large picture frame with some sort of painting showing pain and fear. By that, I mean that painting literally has the words pain and fear painted over and over again, overlapping sometimes. What the fuck is this shit?

"The difference between you and him is that you ran back here and he stayed put. If that can't simply make you understand that he wanted a different life and a better life then I can't help you."

"Sit down."

I turn around and find her sitting at a dining table. It's not big, maybe enough room for three people. I cross my arms over my chest, "What else is there to discuss?"

She looks down at the liquid in the hot mug that he holds tightly in her grip. "Plenty," she looks back up at me. "Sit."
I debate it, but end up silently agree. Sitting down on the hard-plastic chair, I fold my hands in my lap.

"What did my brother do?"

And I told her everything that I know. Without much convincing either. I can't exactly put an exact explanation to why I tell her, except for this: In a place filled with the horrors of anything I've ever been afraid of, she's not that. I'm not afraid of her, I never have been. On the other side of this situation, she is the only left that I can talk to about this, about anything.