Carry Me Home

Eighteen

Evelyn

The constant ringing of my alarm woke me up from my very deep sleep since last night Hayden thought it would be utterly amusing to be up until early in the morning doing nothing but talking and eating tubs of ice cream. He was sprawled across the bed opposite mine and his arm was dangling off the edge.

I rubbed my eyes and slowly got out of bed in order to cherish that last bit of warmth before welcoming the bitterly cold winter air of England that invited itself into my room. Despite me not wanting to wake Hayden up, I had to since we both - along with Rowan and Aubrey - didn't go back home for Christmas therefore we had to go to breakfast now unless we wanted to starve until lunch.

"Haydie," I nudged him but was only pushed away. "Come on, Hayden, it's food time."

"'O 'way," he said, pulling the duvet across his face obviously forgetting the fact that I had hands too and those hands were capable of many things, as well as pulling duvets down.

"Hayden, come on. It's Christmas."

"Presents?"

"Yes, presents. Now get up."

"Ok."

It took Hayden around half an hour to listen to me and in that time I was impatiently leaning against the door so that as soon as Hayden was done I could run downstairs. When arriving at the canteen Rowan waved over to the two of us from where he was seated.

Rowan and I are good. There aren't anymore awkward silences and Rowan knows when to stop talking so that he doesn't step over the line. Would I call him a friend though? No. Whenever Rowan is around a sense of security yet desire surrounds me and I find that terribly uncanny.

"I'm going to get breakfast," Hayden whispered, patting my arm before walking off. Rowan was still looking to see if I was going to sit at his table and I was going to but my legs failed to respond.

He continued to wave me over and I finally did get my legs to cooperate and move on his direction. Immediately as I sat down a rectangle box wrapped in sparkly festive wrapping paper was thrown my way.

"You didn't have to, Rowan," I said, smiling in gratitude towards him.

"Did you get me a gift?"

"Yes, but-"

"You didn't have to either but you still still did so I can get you a present even if I didn't need to. Now open it," his head was held up by his hand resting on his jaw whilst he looked at me unwrapping his unnecessary present.

At first sight of the gift I was confused until Rowan decided to explain the meaning behind it.

"Instead of drawing your feelings on your skin, write them out onto paper. Then when you do make progress you can visibly see how much you have."

"Thank you, Rowan."

"You're welcome, Angel. Now where's Hayden with the breakfast?"

xxx

"Cyrus says that he's going to kill me the next time he sees me since I didn't come home for Christmas," Hayden randomly states as we headed towards the car. Rowan found this restaurant that's open on Christmas so to make our day more enjoyable we thought of heading there.

Hayden called shotgun so I was left to climb into the backseat and listen to the sound of insufferable singing escaping from the mouths of both Hayden and Rowan. The first song they sang was completely for their own entertainment, but after realising that I was repetitively cringing at them they carried on just to bother me.