Short Story: Always A Pair

Short Story: Always A Pair

Peter woke up one morning to find he couldn’t move. Not even a little bit. Even his eyes were fixed upon a single point on the wall and no matter how hard he tried he couldn’t look away. He felt nothing, not the cold wall against his back, the satin sheets against his legs, nothing. Panic started to rise within him but he couldn’t feel his heart beating in his chest. His breathing wasn’t rapid as he would have expected. He desperately tried to breathe in and couldn’t, he wasn’t breathing at all.

'I must be dead.'

Billy woke up one morning to find he could move. Not even just a little a bit, he could move a lot. His eyes were no longer staring at a fixed point upon the wall and no matter how hard he tried he couldn’t keep them from looking away. He felt everything, the cold wall against his back, the satin sheets against his legs, everything. Panic started to rise within him as he felt his heart beating hard in his chest, just the sound of it was deafening to him. His breathing was getting rapid and he tried to stop himself from doing it, but the urge was overwhelming.

'I must be alive.'

******

Peter would wake up around 10am and then spent the next twenty minutes dozing. Eventually he would get himself up and wander into the living room. He would turn on the television and channel flick whilst eating some slightly soggy cornflakes. He would make some more coffee. At around lunchtime he would turn on his computer and play on the internet for a while. At around two he would start some work whilst eating a salt and vinegar crisp sandwich. At 5.10 he would ignore a call from his mother. From the hours 5.20 to 7.30 he would play on his games console whilst eating a delivered pizza. He would return to work until 1am when he would go to bed. This is how Peter chose to live his life.

Billy would wake up every morning around 5am and stare at the wall. He would listen to the goings on in the house, the television, the phone ringing, and the computer keyboard tapping. He would go to sleep around 1am. This is how Billy had to live his life.

When they were young they had been inseparable, they would play board games for hours and Peter would even let Billy win sometimes. They would go to the park and Billy would watch Peter play football with the big boys, being told he was far too little to play as well. But Billy didn’t mind, he liked sitting on the bench on the sidelines watching Peter run rings around the older boys. Peter never forgot to wave when he scored a goal. They would walk home hand in hand and chat about the game and how smelly Toby Rogers fell down in the mud. Some of the girls from school would snigger at them, calling out names such as ‘soft’ and ‘pansy’ but Peter would chase after them with a spider until they cried and said sorry. Sometimes they would fall asleep on Peter’s bed cuddling. His mum thought this rather sweet, his dad did not.

“It’s not normal for a boy his age,” Peter’s dad muttered as he watched Peter and Billy play. “He should have lots of friends, not spend all his time with that Billy.”.

“It’s just a phase he is going through” Peter’s mum put her hand on his shoulder. “In a few years he will fixated on girls and football, you mark my words.”

But in a few years Peter did not change. He was quite happy to spend all his time with Billy. They even went to the same university and shared a room in halls. Peter even took Billy along on his dates which raised a few eyebrows, but people accepted that they came as a pair. However eventually, his father cracked.

“Listen my lad, do you realise the stick I get about you in the village?” he yelled down the phone. All the blokes down the pub sneer behind my back when they talk about their sons and their girlfriends. I constantly have to ignore quips about Julian Clary and ’guy liner’ – you’ve made this family the laughing stock of the whole community!”

“But dad, you just have to ignore them...”

“Enough is enough! You even dare to bring Billy back into this house again and it will be the last time you are welcome here!”

“But dad...” Peter heard his mother sob as his dad hung up the phone. He turned to Billy who was sitting on the bed having listened to the whole conversation.

“I’m sorry Bill, I know you’ve nowhere else to go for the hols, but I have no choice. You know what my dad is like. I won’t be long, only a few days I promise.”

Billy knew what his dad was like and understood. The amount of times he had thrown him out of the house were too numerous to mention. His mother on the other hand would bring him back in and gently clean him up. Billy had often wished that she was his mother.

Billy spent a very lonely Christmas day on his own in the university room. He couldn’t go out without Peter, they were a pair. He felt cross that Peter had chosen his family over him – him, Peter’s constant friend and companion who loved him unconditionally despite what people said. By the time Peter retuned from the holidays, Billy had grown bitter towards him. He had been a lot longer than a few days and Billy had been stuck in the room the whole time.

He waited for the apologies to come flooding him, for Peter to take him in his arms and hold him tightly. But Peter completely ignored him and turned the TV on instead. Eventually Peter rolled into bed silently and Billy caught a glimpse of an angry looking black eye.

'What happened to you Peter? Why have you ignored me and shut me out?'

No reply came. The next day Peter had got up early and gone out without Billy. He was gone all day and Billy grew concerned. Eventually, drunk and swearing Peter returned home and passed out on the sofa.

He has gone out drinking without me. You never go out without me.

Peter spent little time with Bill during the next few years at university. The only times Billy would see him was when he would come back drunk. Sometimes he would take Billy into his arms and cry into his shoulder until he fell into a drunken sleep. But when Billy would wake the next morning Peter would be gone.

Then one day Peter brought back a girl, Billy watched as he embraced her passionately before laying her out on the bed. He caught Peter’s eye once or twice but it was like he looked straight through him. This happened again and again and Billy grew jealous. He had never been with a woman and he was aware that he probably never would be. There was a time after every new experience Peter would share everything with Billy; describing every detail and every sensation. But now Peter would practically rub Billy’s nose in the fact he could never have what he had. He could only watch from a distance.

'It is not fair – why do you get to live without me whilst I can’t live without you?'

*****

A few years later Peter and Billy had finished university and Peter had got a job working as a computer programmer. Like an unsaid agreement Peter allowed Billy to stay with him, but they still never spoke a word. Whenever his family came to visit Billy was shoved in the freezing yard to hide until his father had left.

'It’s all your fault. I wish you were dead.'

Billy wished with all his might that some hideous fate would befall the father that had obviously turned Peter against him all those years. But nothing ever did. He watched through the window as Peter’s mother tried to clean the flat for him, only to be met with objections and harassment from Peter. He thought about his mother’s gentle hands that had wiped dirt and grime off him in his youth.

'You don’t deserve her. Either of you.'

Over the years, Peter stopped bringing home women, stopped coming home drunk and spent his days in the flat with Billy. Billy helplessly watched as he wasted his life day after day. They existed in a silent prison broken only by the television, the phone ringing and the tapping of the computer keyboard. Then one cold Monday he eventually spoke to Billy.

“Dad has died.”

Then the silence returned as quickly as it had gone away. That night Peter got drunk and starting smashing up the room, then fell to the floor sobbing.

'I’m here for you Peter, come back to me. I forgive you. Let me comfort you.'

Peter crawled over to where Billy was sitting and took him into his arms and sobbed. He took him through to the kitchen and sat him down on a chair. He opened one of the drawers and took out a large black bin bag and approached Billy, his blood shot eyes full of rage and grief.

'What are you doing Peter? I’m your best friend, you wouldn’t do this to me – I am there for you Peter!'

Darkness. Silence.

*******

'Peter, help me I don’t know where I am!

Dark, so dark.

Peter I need you, where are you?

Nothing but silence, why so silent Peter?

Peter.

My Peter.'

'Light, the light has come!

Peter, my Peter you have come back to me!'

Peter’s hair had started to go grey and wrinkles had begun to form on his brow.

'How long have we been separated? You look so different. But you are still my Peter.'

“Oh Billy, you haven’t changed a bit, lucky old thing. But I have a wonderful surprise for you!”

That night, Billy slept alongside Peter just as they did when they were young.

'I forgive you my Peter, now we will be together as we always should have been.'

Just as Peter was going off to sleep he let slip the surprise.

“Oh Billy, you are going to be very happy in your new home I have found for you. The children will love you very much at the hospital.”

'But I don’t want a new home; I want to stay with you – my Peter. We are a pair, we shouldn’t be separated. I wish to stay here.'

*****

Peter woke up one morning to find he couldn’t move. Not even a little bit. Even his eyes were fixed upon a single point on the wall and no matter how hard he tried he couldn’t look away. He felt nothing, not the cold wall against his back, the satin sheets against his legs, nothing. Panic started to rise within him but he couldn’t feel his heart beating in his chest. His breathing wasn’t getting rapid as he would expect. He desperately tried to breathe in and couldn’t, he wasn’t breathing at all.

'I must be dead.'

Billy woke up one morning to find he could move. Not even just a little a bit, he could move a lot. His eyes were no longer staring at a fixed point upon the wall and no matter how hard he tried he couldn’t keep them from looking away. He felt everything, the cold wall against his back, the satin sheets against his legs, everything. Panic started to rise within him as he felt his heart beating hard in his chest, just the sound of it was deafening to him. His breathing was getting rapid and he tried to stop himself from doing it, but the urge was overwhelming.

'I must be alive.'

Billy cautiously sat up on his own for the first time and looked back at the brown teddy bear with the white chest lying silently on the satin sheets. Its black button eyes fixed upon a single point on the wall.

“See Peter, my Peter, I told you we can never be separated,” and he pulled Peter close to him holding him tight.