Far From Home - Chapter 23: Chapter 23
You are reading Far From Home, Chapter 23: Chapter 23. Read more chapters of Far From Home.
Early November
Jake thought about it for two more days. He thought about it every waking moment, from staring off at the wall in the middle of class, to the shower he took before he went to bed to try to clear his head. He thought about it when he should have been talking with the girls at dinner and he thought about it when he should have been sleeping but had instead resorted to staring at the ceiling wondering what Connor was doing, or where he was, or how he was feeling.
He thought about Connor so much it hurt.
The ceiling was striped with shadows from the blinds illuminated by the streetlamp outside, but Jake had already counted each line, tracing each one in his head until he could think of numbers instead of Connor—to his misfortune, it didn't work. Connor liked numbers, he liked facts and truths and things he could calculate, but Jake didn't know how to do that. Jake knew how to worry, he knew how to fear, and overthink, and listen to the voices of the demons in his head telling him what all could go wrong. Jake couldn't deal with cut-and-dry decisions—for him the world could never be so black and white. He knew a great deal about the gray space in between, and right now he settled himself into the cloudy mess his mind had made and let the dismal state consume him whole.
Uncertainty was a feeling Jake knew quite well, but this wasn't that. Jake was certain how he felt. He knew the way his fingers had subconsciously ghosted over his lips as he stared off into the shadows of his room was just a reminder of how he wished Connor's lips would replace them. He knew the memories his mind wandered to when he was supposed to be doing homework were evidence of how much he missed him. He knew the urge to text Connor at any given moment just to see how fast he would respond was a sign that those feelings were as strong as ever, and that trying to avoid them in the middle of the night was doing him no good.
He let his hand fall still over his face as he blinked into the darkness of the night.
If I texted Connor right now, would he answer?
Even now, at whatever hour it is, would he still be awake?
Jake knew he had crawled into bed nearly an hour ago—if not more—but while Andre had quickly fallen into a deep sleep after the long day they had had, Jake couldn't bear to close his eyes and risk something intrusive taking Connor away from him. He couldn't let himself imagine some twisted reality where everything went wrong and all the time he had spent carefully going over Aaron's reassuring words was just a distraction from real problems he had failed to catch before it was too late. He had caught them all, right? With all the time he spent thinking, he would have hoped he thought up every possible worst case scenario, but there would always be one or two that would evade him, and as much as he knew that he couldn't control it, the fear of that one or two being the one that would break him suffocated him every time.
Rolling his head over to see his roommate peacefully sleeping in the bed beside him, Jake grabbed his phone from off of the window ledge between their beds. The screen lit up with the time 12:08 plastered in white font that seemed too bright for comfort, but it reassured him that however long he thought he had been spiraling, it had in fact only been forty minutes. He squinted as he swiped through his messages—finding an unhelpful text that only said fuck off with no other context from McKenna, and a text from Ricky an hour ago asking if he wanted to go out.
He frowned as his fingers hovered over the keyboard, wondering why the hell Ricky wanted to leave this late and where the hell he was going.
Why are you going out?
Albeit an hour after his initial text, Ricky was quick to respond.
Felt like a drive. Don't know where I am, but you should've come.
It's midnight?
Yeah, nobody is on the roads. It's nice.
Jake should have felt inclined to ask him if he was texting and driving, but somehow the thought that Ricky wasn't home sent a weird sensation fluttering in his chest that left him startled more than anything else. His fingers hung idly over the keyboard, but he didn't know what else to say. Swiping out of the screen, Jake let the phone fall down onto his chest as his heart began steadily beating faster in his chest. He felt the phone move with the deep rise and fall of his chest as he took a breath, but his adrenaline was kicking in to the point where he couldn't register that detail as important anymore and he didn't know why.
Ricky's not home.
Why do I care?
His sleep deprived brain wasn't catching up fast enough to slow his heart from calling the shots. Fumbling the phone back up into his hands, his attention went to Connor, swiping into his messages and watching the cursor on the keyboard antagonize him to find any words to say.
What do I fucking say?
His fingers typed and retyped messages, each one varying in some inconsequential way from the one before it. Tapping his middle finger along the back of his phone case, he stared at the screen expecting an answer for the perfect text to type that just wasn't coming. Eventually, he gave up and sent the first thing that came to mind.
Hey.
When the message went to delivered, Jake nearly dropped his phone on his face. Fuck. He stared at the clock in the top corner of his screen as the time changed from 12:10 to 12:11 and tried to swallow down the weight of anticipation that swelled in his throat, constraining every breath.
Typing bubbles popped up on the screen by the time the clock agonizingly turned to 12:13 and Jake's heart nearly flipped in his chest.
hi.
Hi! Fuck, yes. Thank you.
You awake?
rewatching daredevil.
you good?
Jake smiled as he shook his fist next to his phone in personal victory. His heart pounded in his ears with the familiar echo of a bad idea, but all the other bad ideas he had had with Connor turned out to be some of the best risks he'd ever taken—despite the fact that he had told Connor once in an upset state that they weren't. He typed out a quick text as his feet found the floor next to his bed, and before he even saw it go to delivered, dropped the phone out on the bed behind him.
Yes.
This is my best bad idea yet.
Jake thought about it for two more days. He thought about it every waking moment, from staring off at the wall in the middle of class, to the shower he took before he went to bed to try to clear his head. He thought about it when he should have been talking with the girls at dinner and he thought about it when he should have been sleeping but had instead resorted to staring at the ceiling wondering what Connor was doing, or where he was, or how he was feeling.
He thought about Connor so much it hurt.
The ceiling was striped with shadows from the blinds illuminated by the streetlamp outside, but Jake had already counted each line, tracing each one in his head until he could think of numbers instead of Connor—to his misfortune, it didn't work. Connor liked numbers, he liked facts and truths and things he could calculate, but Jake didn't know how to do that. Jake knew how to worry, he knew how to fear, and overthink, and listen to the voices of the demons in his head telling him what all could go wrong. Jake couldn't deal with cut-and-dry decisions—for him the world could never be so black and white. He knew a great deal about the gray space in between, and right now he settled himself into the cloudy mess his mind had made and let the dismal state consume him whole.
Uncertainty was a feeling Jake knew quite well, but this wasn't that. Jake was certain how he felt. He knew the way his fingers had subconsciously ghosted over his lips as he stared off into the shadows of his room was just a reminder of how he wished Connor's lips would replace them. He knew the memories his mind wandered to when he was supposed to be doing homework were evidence of how much he missed him. He knew the urge to text Connor at any given moment just to see how fast he would respond was a sign that those feelings were as strong as ever, and that trying to avoid them in the middle of the night was doing him no good.
He let his hand fall still over his face as he blinked into the darkness of the night.
If I texted Connor right now, would he answer?
Even now, at whatever hour it is, would he still be awake?
Jake knew he had crawled into bed nearly an hour ago—if not more—but while Andre had quickly fallen into a deep sleep after the long day they had had, Jake couldn't bear to close his eyes and risk something intrusive taking Connor away from him. He couldn't let himself imagine some twisted reality where everything went wrong and all the time he had spent carefully going over Aaron's reassuring words was just a distraction from real problems he had failed to catch before it was too late. He had caught them all, right? With all the time he spent thinking, he would have hoped he thought up every possible worst case scenario, but there would always be one or two that would evade him, and as much as he knew that he couldn't control it, the fear of that one or two being the one that would break him suffocated him every time.
Rolling his head over to see his roommate peacefully sleeping in the bed beside him, Jake grabbed his phone from off of the window ledge between their beds. The screen lit up with the time 12:08 plastered in white font that seemed too bright for comfort, but it reassured him that however long he thought he had been spiraling, it had in fact only been forty minutes. He squinted as he swiped through his messages—finding an unhelpful text that only said fuck off with no other context from McKenna, and a text from Ricky an hour ago asking if he wanted to go out.
He frowned as his fingers hovered over the keyboard, wondering why the hell Ricky wanted to leave this late and where the hell he was going.
Why are you going out?
Albeit an hour after his initial text, Ricky was quick to respond.
Felt like a drive. Don't know where I am, but you should've come.
It's midnight?
Yeah, nobody is on the roads. It's nice.
Jake should have felt inclined to ask him if he was texting and driving, but somehow the thought that Ricky wasn't home sent a weird sensation fluttering in his chest that left him startled more than anything else. His fingers hung idly over the keyboard, but he didn't know what else to say. Swiping out of the screen, Jake let the phone fall down onto his chest as his heart began steadily beating faster in his chest. He felt the phone move with the deep rise and fall of his chest as he took a breath, but his adrenaline was kicking in to the point where he couldn't register that detail as important anymore and he didn't know why.
Ricky's not home.
Why do I care?
His sleep deprived brain wasn't catching up fast enough to slow his heart from calling the shots. Fumbling the phone back up into his hands, his attention went to Connor, swiping into his messages and watching the cursor on the keyboard antagonize him to find any words to say.
What do I fucking say?
His fingers typed and retyped messages, each one varying in some inconsequential way from the one before it. Tapping his middle finger along the back of his phone case, he stared at the screen expecting an answer for the perfect text to type that just wasn't coming. Eventually, he gave up and sent the first thing that came to mind.
Hey.
When the message went to delivered, Jake nearly dropped his phone on his face. Fuck. He stared at the clock in the top corner of his screen as the time changed from 12:10 to 12:11 and tried to swallow down the weight of anticipation that swelled in his throat, constraining every breath.
Typing bubbles popped up on the screen by the time the clock agonizingly turned to 12:13 and Jake's heart nearly flipped in his chest.
hi.
Hi! Fuck, yes. Thank you.
You awake?
rewatching daredevil.
you good?
Jake smiled as he shook his fist next to his phone in personal victory. His heart pounded in his ears with the familiar echo of a bad idea, but all the other bad ideas he had had with Connor turned out to be some of the best risks he'd ever taken—despite the fact that he had told Connor once in an upset state that they weren't. He typed out a quick text as his feet found the floor next to his bed, and before he even saw it go to delivered, dropped the phone out on the bed behind him.
Yes.
This is my best bad idea yet.
End of Far From Home Chapter 23. Continue reading Chapter 24 or return to Far From Home book page.