Recovery, chapter nine
summary: Ian dies of cancer. Anthony goes back to the house for the first time since his death.
warnings: mild language
rating: pg-13
A/N: happy valentine's day!
His day started with a phone call. One he really didn't like. Kalel handed him the phone, and he took it begrudgingly, already in a sour mood despite just waking up.
"Hello?" He spoke into the receiver, his voice low and gruff, weighed with drowsiness.
"Anthony dear, it's me, Cheryl." He sighed. Ian's mom, probably checking in on him.
"Morning Cheryl. How are you?" He sat up, running a hand through his curly hair.
"I'm well, thank you. Listen, the reason I called you is because I'm going over to Ian's house today. I'm cleaning it out and selling it and I thought you'd like to come with me." She explained in a gentle tone, but his stomach dropped with unease.
"Cheryl, I-"
"Please, Anthony, I've only been in there a few times with my daughter, I can't stand the thought of going in alone." Cheryl pleaded, and for the first time Anthony heard the old age in her voice. Guilt settled over him, and he swallowed the lump in his throat.
"Yeah, Cheryl, of course. I'll meet you there in an hour." Anthony hung up his phone and climbed out of bed, tangled in the sheets he was sweating in.
"Where are you meeting her?" Asked Kalel from the doorway, and he drew a long breath before responding.
"Ian's place." Without looking her in the eye, he went into the bathroom to take a shower, not looking forward to what was to come.
***
When he turned onto Brookside Drive, he felt like his chest was going to collapse into itself. He was nervous to go back, at the house where he'd lived with Ian for so long. The place held so many memories; good ones for him, and bad ones for Ian, memories unknown to him consisting of cancer and pain. He turned onto Ian's street and sucked in his breath at the familiar sight, looking the same as it always did.
Finally, he parked in the driveway of 701 Oakwood Avenue, seeing Cheryl's car already resting there. Wiping the sweat off his brow, he got out of his car, staring up at the house. It looked the same as it did any other cloudy day, but it felt so different. It seemed as though he hadn't been there in months, but in reality he had gone just two weeks and a day ago, the last time he saw Ian alive. See you later, he had said.
He walked up to the front door, then paused, wondering whether or not to knock. Wasn't this once his house, too? Gathering his strength, he walked in, calling out to Cheryl as he did.
"I'm in here, Anthony!" She responded from the living room, but as he walked further in to find her, he noticed how off the place felt. After a moment of not being able to place it, he looked down at his shoes, and realized he was stepping on a new carpet.
"Is this a new carpet?" He asked, and the polite smile that had been on Cheryl's face faded away.
"Yes, well, I had to get it replaced after Ian - after Ian passed away." She looked quickly at a spot in the hallway. "There was too much blood, I couldn't stand looking at it."
Anthony looked at the spot too, not ten feet away from where Ian had fainted that one awful day in May. Blood from stomach cancer? What was he doing, throwing it up? A sudden wave of nausea hit him and he sat down in the black chair that Ian usually occupied. Looking around, he pieced together that all the furniture had been moved back to their original spots after the carpet was changed, but all an inch or two away, so the whole house felt unbalanced to anyone who knew it well.
"I'm going to sell the furniture and big pieces in the auction, dear, but the smaller things we don't want are going to that nice church Ian was going to. According to that lovely Deacon Franklin, he was donating things all the time."
"So you just want me to-"
"Just decide what you would like to keep and take it dear." She walked towards Ian's room, then paused. "You should start with the prop room and go on to the office after that."
He nodded solemnly and followed her down the hall, then as she entered Ian's room, he continued to the prop room, looking around at all the bins full of colorful costumes and toys. He figured they would need the props for Smosh, but a large part of him wanted to set the room on fire and walk away forever, hating the reminder of all he had to do now without Ian by his side. Noticing there was already a box of black garbage bags there, he pulled one out, opened it up, and looked through the bins for props he needed.
He remembered coming in one day to a drastically cleaner prop room, the bins actually being used and everything sorted and labeled. He had thought then that it was just Ian growing up, but now he realized too late that Ian was cleaning up, preparing for death. As he tried to figure out what he needed and what must go, he found that Ian had done that too, thrown away anything unnecessary. He felt something tug at his insides as he questioned if Ian had partially done the same to him.
He quickly stuffed all of the props into bags, then dragged them to his car. Coming back, he entered the office where the computer, desk and safe were, looking tidy. Slowing himself, he leaned over the computer and looked at all the little sticky notes, adorned with passwords written in Ian's sloppy handwriting. Glancing over at the safe, he reached over and hesitated trying to remember the combination. Finally, typing in his birthday, he opened the safe. Ian always told him he was bad with numbers, so he put in his birthday so he wouldn't forget. For a moment he almost laughed over the fact that he almost forgot it anyway.
Opening it, he pulled out the first thing that caught his eye, an old watch. He studied it for a moment before placing it on the desk, then sifted through the other papers. Filming permit, deed to the house, security pins, Ian's birth certificate. With a shaking hand, he found Ian's will, and he picked it up, scanning the pages and recalling how awful he'd felt at even the thought of Ian's eventual death. 'Anything you want from the house, unless my mom asks you not to take it.'
He didn't want anything from this house. If it could give him his friend back, he would take that, but nothing else.
"Oh, good, you know the password." He heard from the doorway, and he dropped the will as Cheryl walked in. She looked over the papers nonchalantly.
"There's more files in the desk drawers, I think you may need them for Smosh. Oh, my grandfather's watch, I knew he had this." She picked up the old watch Anthony had set aside. "He never cared much about family history. Poor dear." She looked distant for a moment, and rather sad, and then said to him, "Is there anything you need from your room, or maybe Ian's?"
"No, no." Anthony replied quickly. "Just sell it all, throw it away, I don't really care."
She nodded but said nothing, then slowly walked away. Anthony sighed, then took everything out of the desk that pertained to Smosh, put it in his car, then emptied his room of personal effects. Not wanting to go anywhere near Ian's room, he went to the hall closet, planning to leave right after he was done checking it. He felt miserable and alone, the loss of Ian and his presence in the house making him weary.
The only things in the closet were two jackets, an umbrella, three pairs of shoes, and a folded pile of clothing on the floor. Getting on his knees, he read the note that sat on top: Anthony, you left some clothes and shoes behind. They're clean and folded -- Ian.
He suddenly grew hot with anger staring at the little pile, and in said anger crumpled his note and stood.
"Fuck this. Fuck all of this!" He yelled, throwing the paper to the ground, and Cheryl rushed in, a look of concern on her face.
"What's wrong?"
"What's wrong? What do you think is wrong, Cheryl? Do you not see this situation, do you not see where we are?" He pointed around the room. "Your son, my best friend, is dead, and we have to clean up his mess and ignore the fact that he knew what was coming! He knew, Cheryl, and he didn't tell us! Two shitty notes, that's all I got! I didn't want my last message from him to be here are your goddamn shoes!"
As he yelled, Cheryl's face changed from concern, then to fear, then to sadness, but for some reason, he couldn't quite feel guilty. Temporarily, she was just there, not all the way at the point of being a human being, not hurting like he was.
"I didn't deserve this, I didn't deserve any of this! He should've told us, that idiot, he should've told us so much sooner! He shouldn't have lied and told you he was going to live, he shouldn't have written me that note saying he was in lo-" He hesitated and decided not to discuss that - thus far he hadn't with anyone but Kris, and he wouldn't quite call that a discussion. "He shouldn't have done this to us, we're his family and he tore it all apart and threw it in the shit!"
He realized then that there were tears streaming down Cheryl's still stoic face, and he halted his words, the thought of harming her making his stomach churn slightly, though not as much as it once would have.
"I know this is hard, Anthony. I know his actions didn't seem to make much sense. But I understand." She looked so strong for someone so weak, and that put him off for a moment.
"Well I don't." He responded simply, and lowered his head.
"Anthony, stop being so picky, Jesus, this is the eighth place we've been to." Ian rolled his eyes at his friend, who was inspecting the house they were standing in front of with squinted eyes.
"Dude, we're going to be living somewhere together for the next few years. Do you want to accidentally pick a shit-hole?" He stepped in front of Ian and pulled the key the landlord gave them from his pocket.
"Let's just hope this is a good one, okay? It's a good price." Ian said, though he actually sounded a bit nervous. The prospect of buying a house, filling out paperwork, having a landlord, it all sounded like growing up, and it created a dull yet constant terror brewing in the bottom of their stomachs.
They opened the door and went inside, checking the place out.
"Nice kitchen." Anthony noted.
"We don't cook." Ian pointed out, and Anthony smiled. "Are you liking this giant mirror?" He pointed to the mirror on the wall and made a funny face at it.
"Hella." Anthony answered, making a tough sort of face and joining Ian in making foolish faces for the next five minutes. Laughing rather hard following that, they explored the rest of the house, their moods lifted by their friendship.
"So, what do you think?" Ian asked him at the end of their little self-guided tour, giving him a beaming smile.
"I think we found our new home." Anthony smiled back, his own more subdued, but still caring. "Are you sure you're ready to commit to living with me all the time?"
"More than ready." Ian answered, and Anthony couldn't imagine loving a friend more than he loved him.
"Anthony? Are you alright?" Cheryl approached him cautiously.
"Wha- yeah." He shook himself from his reverie. "I'm sorry Cheryl, let me buy you dinner."
"No thank you, my dear, I already have plans with my family." She replied, and he suddenly felt very awkward.
"Oh. I uh, I'll just leave then, I'll just go." He could feel his cheeks burning as he picked up the pile of clothes and scooped up his shoes. "Sorry." He mumbled as he moved to leave.
"Wait, at least take the video games. He would've wanted you to have them." She pointed to the small stack of games on the shelf beneath the television.
"No, sell them. I don't want them." He refused her offer, and left quickly, not wanting to think of the games or the mourning mother or the dead friend.
The shower of rain outside cooled his skin as he exited the place, and the weather was the coldest it had been since June. It was the first time it rained since Ian died, and he was sure that somewhere, many people were grateful for its cooling effects. He, however, could care less, and as he drove home, he was unaware that something had broken within him; something deep and necessary. His grief was bending him, changing his mannerisms and flawing his persona, and his insides were slowly becoming as dark as the cloudy skies above him. He hardly noticed that was the last time he would ever enter that house.
warnings: mild language
rating: pg-13
A/N: happy valentine's day!
His day started with a phone call. One he really didn't like. Kalel handed him the phone, and he took it begrudgingly, already in a sour mood despite just waking up.
"Hello?" He spoke into the receiver, his voice low and gruff, weighed with drowsiness.
"Anthony dear, it's me, Cheryl." He sighed. Ian's mom, probably checking in on him.
"Morning Cheryl. How are you?" He sat up, running a hand through his curly hair.
"I'm well, thank you. Listen, the reason I called you is because I'm going over to Ian's house today. I'm cleaning it out and selling it and I thought you'd like to come with me." She explained in a gentle tone, but his stomach dropped with unease.
"Cheryl, I-"
"Please, Anthony, I've only been in there a few times with my daughter, I can't stand the thought of going in alone." Cheryl pleaded, and for the first time Anthony heard the old age in her voice. Guilt settled over him, and he swallowed the lump in his throat.
"Yeah, Cheryl, of course. I'll meet you there in an hour." Anthony hung up his phone and climbed out of bed, tangled in the sheets he was sweating in.
"Where are you meeting her?" Asked Kalel from the doorway, and he drew a long breath before responding.
"Ian's place." Without looking her in the eye, he went into the bathroom to take a shower, not looking forward to what was to come.
***
When he turned onto Brookside Drive, he felt like his chest was going to collapse into itself. He was nervous to go back, at the house where he'd lived with Ian for so long. The place held so many memories; good ones for him, and bad ones for Ian, memories unknown to him consisting of cancer and pain. He turned onto Ian's street and sucked in his breath at the familiar sight, looking the same as it always did.
Finally, he parked in the driveway of 701 Oakwood Avenue, seeing Cheryl's car already resting there. Wiping the sweat off his brow, he got out of his car, staring up at the house. It looked the same as it did any other cloudy day, but it felt so different. It seemed as though he hadn't been there in months, but in reality he had gone just two weeks and a day ago, the last time he saw Ian alive. See you later, he had said.
He walked up to the front door, then paused, wondering whether or not to knock. Wasn't this once his house, too? Gathering his strength, he walked in, calling out to Cheryl as he did.
"I'm in here, Anthony!" She responded from the living room, but as he walked further in to find her, he noticed how off the place felt. After a moment of not being able to place it, he looked down at his shoes, and realized he was stepping on a new carpet.
"Is this a new carpet?" He asked, and the polite smile that had been on Cheryl's face faded away.
"Yes, well, I had to get it replaced after Ian - after Ian passed away." She looked quickly at a spot in the hallway. "There was too much blood, I couldn't stand looking at it."
Anthony looked at the spot too, not ten feet away from where Ian had fainted that one awful day in May. Blood from stomach cancer? What was he doing, throwing it up? A sudden wave of nausea hit him and he sat down in the black chair that Ian usually occupied. Looking around, he pieced together that all the furniture had been moved back to their original spots after the carpet was changed, but all an inch or two away, so the whole house felt unbalanced to anyone who knew it well.
"I'm going to sell the furniture and big pieces in the auction, dear, but the smaller things we don't want are going to that nice church Ian was going to. According to that lovely Deacon Franklin, he was donating things all the time."
"So you just want me to-"
"Just decide what you would like to keep and take it dear." She walked towards Ian's room, then paused. "You should start with the prop room and go on to the office after that."
He nodded solemnly and followed her down the hall, then as she entered Ian's room, he continued to the prop room, looking around at all the bins full of colorful costumes and toys. He figured they would need the props for Smosh, but a large part of him wanted to set the room on fire and walk away forever, hating the reminder of all he had to do now without Ian by his side. Noticing there was already a box of black garbage bags there, he pulled one out, opened it up, and looked through the bins for props he needed.
He remembered coming in one day to a drastically cleaner prop room, the bins actually being used and everything sorted and labeled. He had thought then that it was just Ian growing up, but now he realized too late that Ian was cleaning up, preparing for death. As he tried to figure out what he needed and what must go, he found that Ian had done that too, thrown away anything unnecessary. He felt something tug at his insides as he questioned if Ian had partially done the same to him.
He quickly stuffed all of the props into bags, then dragged them to his car. Coming back, he entered the office where the computer, desk and safe were, looking tidy. Slowing himself, he leaned over the computer and looked at all the little sticky notes, adorned with passwords written in Ian's sloppy handwriting. Glancing over at the safe, he reached over and hesitated trying to remember the combination. Finally, typing in his birthday, he opened the safe. Ian always told him he was bad with numbers, so he put in his birthday so he wouldn't forget. For a moment he almost laughed over the fact that he almost forgot it anyway.
Opening it, he pulled out the first thing that caught his eye, an old watch. He studied it for a moment before placing it on the desk, then sifted through the other papers. Filming permit, deed to the house, security pins, Ian's birth certificate. With a shaking hand, he found Ian's will, and he picked it up, scanning the pages and recalling how awful he'd felt at even the thought of Ian's eventual death. 'Anything you want from the house, unless my mom asks you not to take it.'
He didn't want anything from this house. If it could give him his friend back, he would take that, but nothing else.
"Oh, good, you know the password." He heard from the doorway, and he dropped the will as Cheryl walked in. She looked over the papers nonchalantly.
"There's more files in the desk drawers, I think you may need them for Smosh. Oh, my grandfather's watch, I knew he had this." She picked up the old watch Anthony had set aside. "He never cared much about family history. Poor dear." She looked distant for a moment, and rather sad, and then said to him, "Is there anything you need from your room, or maybe Ian's?"
"No, no." Anthony replied quickly. "Just sell it all, throw it away, I don't really care."
She nodded but said nothing, then slowly walked away. Anthony sighed, then took everything out of the desk that pertained to Smosh, put it in his car, then emptied his room of personal effects. Not wanting to go anywhere near Ian's room, he went to the hall closet, planning to leave right after he was done checking it. He felt miserable and alone, the loss of Ian and his presence in the house making him weary.
The only things in the closet were two jackets, an umbrella, three pairs of shoes, and a folded pile of clothing on the floor. Getting on his knees, he read the note that sat on top: Anthony, you left some clothes and shoes behind. They're clean and folded -- Ian.
He suddenly grew hot with anger staring at the little pile, and in said anger crumpled his note and stood.
"Fuck this. Fuck all of this!" He yelled, throwing the paper to the ground, and Cheryl rushed in, a look of concern on her face.
"What's wrong?"
"What's wrong? What do you think is wrong, Cheryl? Do you not see this situation, do you not see where we are?" He pointed around the room. "Your son, my best friend, is dead, and we have to clean up his mess and ignore the fact that he knew what was coming! He knew, Cheryl, and he didn't tell us! Two shitty notes, that's all I got! I didn't want my last message from him to be here are your goddamn shoes!"
As he yelled, Cheryl's face changed from concern, then to fear, then to sadness, but for some reason, he couldn't quite feel guilty. Temporarily, she was just there, not all the way at the point of being a human being, not hurting like he was.
"I didn't deserve this, I didn't deserve any of this! He should've told us, that idiot, he should've told us so much sooner! He shouldn't have lied and told you he was going to live, he shouldn't have written me that note saying he was in lo-" He hesitated and decided not to discuss that - thus far he hadn't with anyone but Kris, and he wouldn't quite call that a discussion. "He shouldn't have done this to us, we're his family and he tore it all apart and threw it in the shit!"
He realized then that there were tears streaming down Cheryl's still stoic face, and he halted his words, the thought of harming her making his stomach churn slightly, though not as much as it once would have.
"I know this is hard, Anthony. I know his actions didn't seem to make much sense. But I understand." She looked so strong for someone so weak, and that put him off for a moment.
"Well I don't." He responded simply, and lowered his head.
"Anthony, stop being so picky, Jesus, this is the eighth place we've been to." Ian rolled his eyes at his friend, who was inspecting the house they were standing in front of with squinted eyes.
"Dude, we're going to be living somewhere together for the next few years. Do you want to accidentally pick a shit-hole?" He stepped in front of Ian and pulled the key the landlord gave them from his pocket.
"Let's just hope this is a good one, okay? It's a good price." Ian said, though he actually sounded a bit nervous. The prospect of buying a house, filling out paperwork, having a landlord, it all sounded like growing up, and it created a dull yet constant terror brewing in the bottom of their stomachs.
They opened the door and went inside, checking the place out.
"Nice kitchen." Anthony noted.
"We don't cook." Ian pointed out, and Anthony smiled. "Are you liking this giant mirror?" He pointed to the mirror on the wall and made a funny face at it.
"Hella." Anthony answered, making a tough sort of face and joining Ian in making foolish faces for the next five minutes. Laughing rather hard following that, they explored the rest of the house, their moods lifted by their friendship.
"So, what do you think?" Ian asked him at the end of their little self-guided tour, giving him a beaming smile.
"I think we found our new home." Anthony smiled back, his own more subdued, but still caring. "Are you sure you're ready to commit to living with me all the time?"
"More than ready." Ian answered, and Anthony couldn't imagine loving a friend more than he loved him.
"Anthony? Are you alright?" Cheryl approached him cautiously.
"Wha- yeah." He shook himself from his reverie. "I'm sorry Cheryl, let me buy you dinner."
"No thank you, my dear, I already have plans with my family." She replied, and he suddenly felt very awkward.
"Oh. I uh, I'll just leave then, I'll just go." He could feel his cheeks burning as he picked up the pile of clothes and scooped up his shoes. "Sorry." He mumbled as he moved to leave.
"Wait, at least take the video games. He would've wanted you to have them." She pointed to the small stack of games on the shelf beneath the television.
"No, sell them. I don't want them." He refused her offer, and left quickly, not wanting to think of the games or the mourning mother or the dead friend.
The shower of rain outside cooled his skin as he exited the place, and the weather was the coldest it had been since June. It was the first time it rained since Ian died, and he was sure that somewhere, many people were grateful for its cooling effects. He, however, could care less, and as he drove home, he was unaware that something had broken within him; something deep and necessary. His grief was bending him, changing his mannerisms and flawing his persona, and his insides were slowly becoming as dark as the cloudy skies above him. He hardly noticed that was the last time he would ever enter that house.