Alex’s POV:

“Hey, ‘Lex, you gonna drive me home?” Jack asked as we started up the stairs in Rian’s basement.

“Nah, sorry.” I shook my head, reaching the top of the stairs and opening the door to the hallway.

“The fuck! Why?” He complained with a childish whine.

Before I could reply, Ms. Kathi interrupted from further into the house. “Excuse me?!”

Jack rolled his eyes and exhaled. “Sorry.”

“I’m going over to see Mickey.” I told him as I looked behind me to see Rian and Zack following us upstairs as well. “I promised I would come over today after practice.”

“Awe, man, I haven’t seen her since she passed out at school,” Jack said.

“Me neither,” I commented, “that’s why I’m going to go now.”

“Can I come?” he asked out of nowhere, not even giving himself enough time to consider the whole idea of coming with me.

Of course, it made sense that he would want to see his friend that hadn’t been at school for the past three days. However, he could have made it very awkward as well. You see, don’t get me wrong, Mickey and I did things other than sleeping together. If anything, we spent more time doing things other than that. But then again, it had been three days since I saw her, even longer since we had last been with each other. So, this could have just been us meeting up to change that.

Lucky for him, however, those weren’t our intentions. I really was just going over to check up on her and see how she was doing. The thought of having sex hadn’t even crossed my mind. Honestly, I probably wouldn’t even have gone through with it if the opportunity did arise. Mickey was still recovering from her concussion, and I didn’t want to risk disrupting that.

“If Mickey doesn’t mind,” I shrugged. It wasn’t my choice. I could both imagine Mickey being okay with it and also being absolutely annoyed with it. She was obviously better enough to have me over again, but that didn’t mean she was prepared for how hyper Jack could get.

“Hang on,” Rian jumped in, “are you guys going over to see Mickey right now?”

“Yeah.” Jack nodded excitedly.

“Mind if I come?” Rian asked. He, however, did analyse the situation a little better, and didn’t want to intrude either. “I get if you don’t want me to or if Mickey rather wouldn’t, but it would be nice to see how she’s doing.”

“I mean, I don’t give a-- I don’t care,” I shrugged and caught myself before I would get scolded by Ms. Kathi as well. “It all depends on what Mickey wants. But it doesn’t hurt to show up, right? Zack, do you want to come as well?”

Zack looked up at me, a little surprised I even asked. “Do you think she’d want me to come? I don’t know her as well as you guys.”

“I mean, you are one of her closest friends based on the four she has,” Jack told him as an encouragement.

“Jack!” I scolded and punched his arm. “That’s rude.”

“What?!” He defended. “Are you telling me she has more friends than just us?”

I opened my mouth, about to say Olivia’s name, but stopped myself in time. That friendship had ended. So, my mouth closed again and I had to take a few seconds to think. When it hit me, I clapped my hands. “Jordan! That guy we met on tour, her friend from a few years ago.”

“He wanted to leave her to die, I hardly call that a friend,” he scoffed and crossed his arms as we went to the front door.

“Okay, well, whatever,” I dismissed him and focused on telling Zack he was one of Mickey’s friends even though he didn’t see her as often as us. “She is the one who set you up with your girlfriend, so… if that doesn’t say anything, I don’t know what will.”

Zack smiled a little at the memory and the thought of his girlfriend. “Okay, alright, I’ll come.”

So, off we went, starting the long trek to Mickey’s house. I honestly was pretty lucky that my girlfriend was one of my best friend’s neighbours. Especially since I would be at that best friend’s house multiple times a week. Of course, it would have been even better to be the one living in the same street as her. But then again, my house was her favourite place to go to now when she just wanted to get away from it all.

I was the one to ring the doorbell, waiting for the door to open as my trusty three friends were standing behind me. It didn’t take long until Mickey’s mom appeared. She had been staying at home a lot more while Mickey was on bed rest. Usually she’d work long days and-slash-or nights.

“Hey, guys,” she greeted with a big smile and stepped aside for us to come inside, “Mickey’s in the living room.”

“Thanks, Carla,” I returned the friendly gesture and entered the house.

Jack immediately gasped, “first name basis! How did you get on a first name basis?!”

“Boyfriend privileges,” I shrugged acting like it was no big deal. Honestly, it was quite a big deal. It had only been a recent thing. To me, it still felt weird calling Mrs. Kingsley by her first name, but she insisted. I was just trying to push through until it became normal.

“Oh, look, it’s all of my boys.” Mickey was looking at us over her shoulder from the couch she was sitting on. She reached her arms above her head and stretched out, clicking some of her bones in the process.

“All your boys?” I raised an eyebrow as I approached her, swerving around the couch before letting myself plot down beside her.

“Yeah, I own you all, obviously,” she scoffed with a roll of her eyes.

“I mean, I did get paid to hang out with you,” Rian admitted while he and the others spread out on the other couch and the lounge chair.

“Do you buys want anything to drink?” Mickey’s mom asked us,

We all told her that we were fine and I mentioned that I would gladly help myself if I did want something later, to which Rian agreed. She said she was going to go to the study and to call her if we needed anything.

Mickey focused on the coffee table in front of her and gesturing to it with both hands. “Welcome to my kingdom of bedrest.”

To me, the table just looked a little cluttered. Paper was scattered all over the place, some in the form of loose sheets, others in piles, and the occasional sketchbook inbetween. It was further decorated with pencils and pens mainly in shades of grey or black and white. There was a large jug of water accompanied by a glass that was still filled until just about half-way. And then there was the floor furthest away from the couch yet closest to the TV that was covered in balls of paper. This mess was something that Mickey converted into her ‘kingdom’.

“Over here we have the paper plains,” Mickey pointed at the paper spread around, “not to be confused with the paper planes, which we will get back to later. The plains have the occasional boulder in it, but don’t worry about them,” she referred to the pens. “Then over here, we have the castle of good ideas,” she moved our attention to the one sketch book that was being used properly and was on the part of the table right in front of her. “Unfortunately not all ideas are good, so we have the pit of doom on the other side of our kingdom. Many planes have crashed here. Enter at your own discretion. And then we have the water tower to keep the place running.”

“You seem like you’re a little bored,” I laughed while simultaneously nodding. It was quite impressive that she created an entire story, even more impressive if she came up with it on the spot.

“Very,” she sighed in desperation, “there’s only so much drawing and channel surfing I can do. But I have been trapped! There’s no way out!”

“It’s for your own good.” Mickey’s mom interrupted before her complaining went any further, coming from the hallway.

“At least just let me go and do something.”

“I’m not letting your drive a car just yet.” It was obvious this conversation had happened many times before. “Maybe in a few more days.”

“What about a walk? A walk is safe, right?” Mickey tried to compromise with a hopeful look.

“Okay, fine,” she gave in before switching the subject. “Anyway, I’m here because there’s somebody on the phone for you.”

“So?” Mickey shrugged, seeming the least interested anybody could be.

“It’s California…” Carla mentioned, a small smirk growing on her face.

This changed Mickey’s mood completely. Her eyes went wide and she stared at her mother while sitting up a little straighter. When the statement wasn’t followed with a ‘sike’ or ‘just kidding’ or any other indication it wasn’t what she thought it was, she jumped up and rushed to the study. But it didn’t go as smoothly as she had intended. A few seconds after suddenly standing up, she froze and clutched her head.

“Be careful!” Her mom warned. But Mickey didn’t really listen. She started running as soon as she felt a little better again, causing her mom to shout out once more before following her into the study. “Mickey!”

When the two women had left the room, all eyes were on me.

“What?” I questioned.

“What’s ‘California?’” Jack was the first out of the three to ask.

“I don’t know…” my gaze shifted to Rian and I raised an eyebrow. “Do you know?”

“Why would I know?” He responded.

“Maybe she got a call from a college?” Zack suggested, the only one actually thinking of options.

“Did she apply to anything?” I directed my question to Rian again.

“I don’t know! Once again, why would I know?” He made very clear.

“She tells you things she doesn’t tell me. Usually stuff about that,” I shrugged, thinking my thought process was just reasonable.

“She hasn’t said anything… Maybe it’s another old friend?”

“No, I don’t think there’s any more secret best friends we don’t know about.” I shook my head. “But then again, I never know with Mickey.”

“Well, she obviously was excited, so that’s a good thing, right? Nothing to worry about,” Jack brought forward.

It was true, but at the same time it was not. “A bit worrying that this seems so important and I don’t know anything. But then again, I did spend more time with her trying to figure out what caused her concussion than discovering anything else really.”

“Yeah, what actually happened?” Rian became curious.

“Oh, long story short, she slipped on beer bottles on the stairs at Michael’s and slammed her head on the steps and the floor. So, technically she was right when she said she didn’t hurt him. But I think it’s his fault for leaving those bottles all over the place in the first place.”

Before we could start speculating again, Mickey came back. She didn’t look as happy as she did before. If anything, she looked a little sad. My mind immediately went to the college suggestion, but they wouldn’t call her just to reject her. So, why not just ask?

“Who was that?” I brought it up like it was just me showing interest and not like we had been discussing it.

“Just some family,” she replied acting like it was no big deal.

“I thought you hated your family.” I frowned, not understanding how her earlier reaction could be about the same thing.

“I do.” She nodded, looking off into the distance for a bit before snapping out of it. “Anyway, do you guys want to come on that walk with me? I really can’t hang out inside any longer.”

Although it was dark outside, we all agree for her sake. She really did seem to be going stir-crazy. However, I was the only one that could sense that she really was feeling upset after that phone call and not just that her mood had calmed down. To show my acknowledgement, I pressed a kiss to her temple but didn’t want to push it.

Notes

I'm coming back slowly but surely this summer!