Page 11 of Four Letter Feelings

Chapter 5

He woke up in an unfamiliar place with a thumping headache and teeth that felt as though something was growing on them. Without sitting up, he slowly turned his head away from the window in an attempt to try and figure out where he was with as little movement as possible.

“Ah, you’re awake.”

AJ’s voice sounded way louder than Jeremy imagined it was in reality.

He groaned and dug the heels of his palms into his eye sockets, hoping to ease the throbbing pressure inside his skull.

“I don’t think I want to be,” he managed to say, grimacing when his tongue touched his teeth.

If I ever get out of this bed, the first thing I’m doing is brushing the crap off these damn teeth.

His mouth was dry and he could smell stale alcohol on his breath. There was a bottle of Gatorade and painkillers next to him on the bedside cabinet. He pushed himself up to sitting and popped the lid of the Tylenol bottle, eyeing an all too fresh-looking AJ who was typing feverishly on his laptop, his tongue poking out of the side of his mouth. As he watched him type, Jeremy realized that he had a darkening bruise on his jaw and a split lip. As a hockey player he had suffered his fair share of rough and tumble, though the injury looked as though it was borderline ER-worthy and Jeremy struggled to remember what had happened. Twisting the lid off the bottle of Gatorade he winced as his hand ached.

Oh God.

He frantically rifled through his memories in a bid to figure out just what the hell happened but he came up empty. He remembered taking a shot at the bar and going back to his seat and then nothing, until a flash of the back seat of the Uber and a final flash of hugging an unfamiliar toilet bowl. He closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose before drinking half the bottle of Gatorade, hoping it would wash away the dark spots in his memory.

He glanced back across the room at AJ who had finished what he was working on and snapped the laptop closed. “How are you feeling?” he asked, his brows pulled into a frown and his lips pursed.

“I’m ok as long as I don’t try to do anything crazy, like move, or breathe. What happened to your face?” he asked, though from the dull ache in his knuckles, he already knew the answer.

“You happened to my face, Jer. You get that one for free, but next time I hit back, 'kay?”

Jeremy’s eyes widened. “Next time? Why am I hitting you next time? Wait, why did I hit you this time? So many fucking questions, man.” He rubbed his palm over his jaw before running his hand through his hair. “What the hell happened?”

“TL;DR version?”

Jeremy nodded.

“Ok, well, you got drunk. You got mad. You danced. You fell over. You got mad about being drunk and falling over. You hit me. You passed out. You puked. You cried. You slept and that kinda brings us to the present.”

Jeremy knew his mouth was hanging open in surprise but he wasn’t being very successful in telling his brain to make it shut.

“I… cried?” He shook his head in despair, causing the thumping to get worse.

AJ shrugged. “It happens. Honestly man, why are you so hung up with hiding your emotions? You wanna cry, cry, and anyone who judges you for it is a douche canoe. You miss your parents and your home, that’s a legitimate thing to cry over. You’re not crying 'cause you broke a nail or something dumb.”

Jeremy could feel his cheeks get redder. “What… I don’t remember sharing stuff with you.”

“I imagine you don’t remember much, you were pretty wasted. I think Ryan said something that pissed you off, you came and joined Brad and me to cool off, but you were already three sheets to the wind. You danced to some cheesy eighties crap that came on and you tripped over what seemed to be thin air. You got pissed about that, both the thin air tripping you up and the fact you tripped. I suggested we leave and get you home, you got confrontational and said you were, and I quote, ‘fucking fine’. When I tried to encourage you to leave, you took a swing at me. You have a very good punch for someone who couldn’t even remember where he lived. I think it was maybe a lucky shot, you were kinda flailing around so I might have taken an elbow – it happened quickly and is a bit blurry – what with the bleeding and seeing stars. So I did what any good friend would do, ignored your bitchin’, got my enforcer on, shoved your ass in an Uber and took you here.”

“I’m sure your roommate is thrilled I took his bed and destroyed the bathroom.”

“I don’t have a roommate, and you didn’t make all that much of a mess. You puked once, cried, mumbled something about being homesick and missing your folks, collapsed into bed and started snoring.”

“Aw man, I’m sorry.” Jeremy suddenly felt embarrassed. He hated needing people or asking for help, but at the same time was also touched at how his new friend had taken care of him when he was being reckless, irresponsible and clearly aggressive. “Wait, you don’t have a roommate?”

“Nah, he pulled out at the last second and went to a university upstate.”

“Huh.” Was all Jeremy replied, as he flexed his fingers, shaking his head at the bruising.

“What?”

“I don’t have a room yet. I mean, I know I haven’t really sold myself to ya – crying, getting drunk and disorderly and, y’know, busting your face open and all, but if you’ll consider it, I’d happily be the Rachel to your Monica.”

“What makes you think I’m a Monica?” AJ asked, suspiciously.

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