The Heart of It All (HeartSick Series Book 1)

by Weston Mitchel

This made Catherine chortle at herself as she moved to the next number on her list. She was fairly certain there was no need to keep following this trail, knowing exactly where it would lead. However she couldn’t help herself from obtaining more proof to back up her crazy idea.

  I mean must be crazy right? How could no one else have picked up on this?

  She kept thinking it over and over not giving in to her belief until there was undeniable proof so no one could have a glimpse of denouncing any part of her findings.

  There was another little nagging voice just behind her self proclamations of being insane. A voice that kept telling her to find out more about these scatterings of blood donations through out the country every 56 days exactly. She thought that not only was Mr. Ford aware of what was pumping through his veins at this very moment, but that he was handing it out like free candy on Halloween.

  Dumbass.

  Home Again, Home Again Jiggidy Jig

  Brian and Austin got back to the apartment right around two o’clock in the afternoon on Black Friday. It could have been a half hour or so sooner, but they had to make a few impromptu stops along the way to satisfy there never ending hunger. Hot boxing apparently left you ravaged for nourishment.

  Although the Teflon Austin so badly hoped would keep his feelings at bay, didn’t work the entire time, it had kept the mood light and the conversation flowing, leaving only small amounts of silence that led to him thinking about Mia. It might have been the stupidest thing he had ever done, letting someone as stoned as he was drive for over six hours, but it did keep his anxiety down to barely a blip on his radar. A screen that was normally lit up green from edge to edge with panic.

  Maybe it was a benefit from the weed, maybe it was him thinking about what happened the night before, or maybe it was just a result from him trying not to think about the night before. Either way, it worked.

  Once the bags were in, all two of them, Brian took off again to go meet up with Ashley. After all, it had been going on 14 hours since they had seen each other last. In young adult years that was nearly a decade.

  Austin understood though, maybe now more than ever, knowing he couldn’t just go see the one his heart and groin longed for whenever he wanted to anymore. A pang of jealousy clouded over his eyes as he started to go through his bag, putting the toiletries back on the counter in the bathroom, throwing dirty clothes into the hamper.

  Hey I might not have a long kiss and a butt grab waiting for me, but this dirty laundry is giving me a flirtatious look, so ya know, yay.

  He kicked the half-full collapsible, white, mesh hamper and it just bent and flexed back into shape letting out little bursts of creaks that sounded to Austin like it was laughing at him.

  Now that the hamper knew who was boss, Austin dug his wallet out of his back pocket. He needed to make a cash deposit into the bank, which still meant one of the hidden compartments in his desk.

  Now that I’ll have jack and shit to do everyday I guess I can go open up an account somewhere.

  He was about to put the money he hadn’t used over the trip home, back into the stack, figuring he should have close to $4,500 still in there plus the three hundred he was about to add back. $3,000 left from the savings he brought with him from Luckwell at the beginning of the semester, after paying for the rent in advance through the New Year. Plus, what was left from the first big payment from the good folks at The K Prize Foundation. His mood perked up a bit knowing he was about to have another two grand to add to his pile in a few weeks, but just a bit.

  Walking through his bedroom to the desk in the corner, he thought something looked a little off, like a scene from the first Poltergeist movie, the original with the creepy tiny lady not the remake with the creepy tiny man.

  Once he was a few feet away he could tell that not just a couple drawers had been left open but every single drawer had been pulled out and left ajar. He knew he closed every single one of them when he left, always had, that way no one could figure out the combination it took of open and closed drawers in order to pop out the secret compartment. Hell, now that he was in Austin he was sure he was the only one who even knew the compartments existed. At least, he was the only one that knew.

  His heart sank even more in his chest, any more sinking after the last two days and he thought he would have to buy an extra sock and show for it.

  You gotta be kiddin me, there’s no way that-

  He stopped the thought mid-sentence and slammed each door back closed, with a solid clacking thump ringing out each time echoing off the bare walls in his room. Before Austin let his thoughts run wild with possibilities and accusations, he needed to check to make sure there was anything to get wild about in the first place.

  First, he checked the two small drawers with a false bottom, even though he only ever used one of them anymore. The empty one was still empty, duh dumbass, so he moved on to the one he had gotten used to referring to as his personal bank account in his mind. Pulling it out, a few pencils and and pens rattled around loosely among a few rubber bands, a couple of nickles and a ragged loose piece of yarn. He yanked on the thread and opened the bottom plate of the drawer carefully looking underneath at bare wood grain staring back up at him, where a cheap money clip should have been pinched over a wad of bills. He let go of the yarn in a huff and slammed the drawer shut out of frustration.

  Of course, I mean what else would I expect to happen, get my heart stomped on, my life savings stolen, all I need now is a kick in the nuts to round it all off.

  Out of habit Austin reached a protective hand down to cover the boys with a weary gaze peeking out of squinted eyes because with everything else going on you can never be too sure.

  He grabbed a knob on the left upper most cabinet door, leaving it open. He then slid his fingers around a small sanded down knob on the drawer in the bottom right and slid it open. He did the same to a small drawer set dead in the middle of the upper shelves of the apothecary looking part. He kept slowly sliding this one out until he heard the slightest whisper of a click, not nearly as loud as the day he turned 13, with the edges of the wooden gears wearing down over time.

  Austin took a deep breath, stalling for just a moment before he pushed the rolltop up a bit more to it’s secondary position revealing the hidden compartment. Another breath was taken before he could bring himself to lean over and look inside the deep void of the last hiding spot.

  To his astonishment, everything was just as he left it. If the drawer with the false bottom had been his bank account, he thought of this as his personal safety deposit box.

  Obviously it would still all be here, any idiot could have found the money just by dumping the drawers out. The false bottoms would have fallen out as well. But to find this, first you would have to know it even existed then know exactly what to do to open it. And even then it didn’t always work unless the drawers and door were in the exact right position.

  He was finally able to let out a breath that wasn’t from fear or trepidation or just to stall his own cowardly ways, but one that was due to an exhausted relief pouring out of his lungs.

  This final hiding place had largely gone unused since his dad revealed it just because he didn’t really have that much stuff to keep hidden away. Sure, there were a few things from time to time he threw in there. Especially after his sister starting getting her monthly visit a few years ago. Any chocolate he had back in the day went straight in there.

  On the few occasions when she was really suffering from the effects of it or if she was just being completely annoying for another random reason and getting under his skin, he would steal her phone while she slept. Austin would turn it off and place it in this hidden spot and act like he never saw it, not putting it back until she went to sleep the next night. He would turn it back on, then put it under her bed or in between the cushions on the couch and offer to call it for her again the next morning at breakfast.

  He couldn’t do it too often or she would figure it out that it was him and not her dits
y teenage brain accidentally leaving it somewhere. A teenage girl with out her phone for 24 hours? Armageddon was not too strong of a word to use when describing her waking hours.

  The last two years he lived at home before he left for college, after his car accident and subsequent near death, Austin and Brooke’s relationship really took a turn for the better. They were closer than ever, she wasn’t as annoying and he wasn’t so unforgiving. So for the most part the big hidden compartment at the back of the desk went largely unused. Really couldn’t think of much to put in there, until Mia.

  No, Austin didn’t play keep away with Mia’s phone, even though it crossed his mind once after a night of hanging out with her eyes barely peeling away from the small screen. He figured not only would it be a dick move, but then he also wouldn’t have a way to face-time her goodnight, and that was his favorite part of the nights that she didn’t sleep over.

  Since that first night the quartet formed when they all went to Dave and Buster’s together, Austin had been keeping small trinkets and whatnots that reminded him of Mia. He thought he might bring one or two out from hiding from time to time like on an anniversary or just random day when she needed more of a smile than he alone could give her.

  His collection of doodads meant to be used as memory cards, saving moments in their shape that they could one day look at and be brought to an earlier time of love and opportunity. Thanksgiving night was the first time he had pulled one out of it’s relative safety, to be taken out in to the world, and most likely it would be the last time any of these would see the light of day unless they were going into the garbage.

  He took his backpack off his shoulders, whirled it around in front of him, and took out the plastic coffee cup with the mermaid logo on the front. Even now, when he wanted least to think of it he could see her burst through those doors in a whirlwind of tousled hair, smelling like honey and strawberries in that flowered sun dress that billowed at her knees.

  Austin let a heavy sigh fill his empty room and placed the cup in it’s original position next to a purple golf ball he swiped from Peter Pan’s Putt Putt. Next to that sat a keychain with a rubber fob in the shape of a roller girl that he had gone back to get, a week after their ill fated date that was cut short at the Blood Shed.

  He almost felt like a stalker as he looked down at the memorabilia of their relationship now that everything had been blown up between them, like he was a visitor to a creepy museum of their failed love.

  Austin picked up another token of what was unspoken love just 24 hours ago that now at this moment seemed like a talisman of heartache and wasted energy. He rubbed a solemn thumb over the tape that appeared to be holding a pair of black framed glasses together in the middle. The glasses from her costume on Halloween night that fell off as her face she brushed against his when she fainted. He could feel his heart quicken the way it did in those terrifying minutes waiting on that ambulance, as she laid helpless in his arms.

  He wanted to throw them at the wall and yell and curse her name at the ceiling as he tried, in vain, to rage away his pain. He knew from previous pains in his life this would do little to no good, so he focused his anger on the newly found problem at hand. He gently placed the glasses back among the other things, sending one more wish of maybe up to the sky, that would most likely fall on the star’s deaf ears just as the hundred or so he had thrown up there since last night.

  Austin closed the two drawers and door then rolled the top back over the desk as if it would keep hidden not just his tokens but also his thoughts of Mia and what he could possibly do to change her mind. As the cover banged into place in it’s home on the desk an image of Brian flashed briefly through his mind. It was from while they were at one of their many pit-stops along their high times how-to road trip back home.

  Austin gave little to no thought about Brian offering to pay for the snacks and drinks at every stop, or the tank and a half of gas Brian paid for. Chocking it up to a friend helping another friend when he was feeling low. Frankly, it was only fair since Austin paid for it all on the way to Luckwell so again he figured he was just quite literally repaying the favor.

  Until now that is, when Austin reviewed the image in his mind that kept popping up, of Brian digging into his wallet to cash out for the gas and arms full of goodies. A wallet that Brian was famous for bitching about always being empty, constantly shrugging off checks from waiters and delaying his share of bills on account of him being too broke, made even more prevalent since he lost his last job and hadn’t turned in a single application to another as far as Austin knew.

  Austin suddenly knew why this picture kept dragging it’s way into his mind over and over. It was clear as day, Brian’s ever-empty wallet, so crammed full of light green bills that Brian could barely fold it back all the way.

  If Brian did it though, that means he would’ve had to do it before we left for Luckwell.

  Austin tried remembering the order of events as the packed up the jeep and left, did Brian have time to ransack his desk? And even if he did have time, would he have?

  If he knew where to look, then of course there was plenty of time. He’s been my roommate for months now, even as secretive as I’ve tried to be surely he would realize I had to keep my money somewhere in here.

  So it was obvious he had the time, and the knowledge of it’s presence being in the vicinity of Austin’s room.

  But would he?

  Austin wanted to say no to this last internal question, wanted to say it, and believe it, and be done with it, and move on. He stood there questioning everything about what he knew about nearly everyone in his close circle now. Mia told him that he didn’t even know her, said she had been lying to him this whole time, about what he still had no clue. So if the woman he loved, and yes he was sure of it now, he loved her, if she could pull the wool over his eyes, then what was stopping Brian from doing the same.

  Brian has been acting a lil off lately.

  Austin just thought it was from his never ending squabbles with Ashley finally taking its toll on him. Or the fact that he couldn’t keep a job down, even ones that were near impossible to get fired from. Austin could hear him tossing and turning through the walls some nights, complaining about always being tired almost as much as he did about being broke.

  Maybe he was into something else, something that pushed his back against the wall, leaving him no room but to make a bad choice. But still… Brian wouldn’t… he’s too… he wouldn’t have…

  Guess there is only one way to find out.

  The last time Austin thought those words it ended with his tears making divots in the sand. He hoped this time would have a brighter ending.

  Chow Time

  Mia slowly, and groggily came out of her slumber. Last night, or this morning rather, her body had been begging to sleep off the trip, the sickness, and everything else in her life. Once her body snagged the reigns of rest away from Mia’s control, it relished in it, not relinquishing power until her stores were fully replenished, muscles now stiff and sore from laying still in the same position for so long.

  She turned over, grabbed her phone off the small table next to her bed so she could check the time. There wasn’t a single clock on the wall or anywhere in the room for that matter, why take up the much needed room?

  When she squeezed her phone on the sides, her phone refused to light up. She did it again thinking her hands that were just roused from sleep were too weak the first time. The third squeeze, however, was full of pure annoyance at the stupid phone for not working.

  Shit.

  Suddenly comprehending the fact that she forgot to plug her phone in before falling asleep last night when they got back to the room. Mia could remember, and in fact did so in vivid detail, every minute of the last few days. Starting from the the boys packing up the Jeep, all the way up to her and Ashley riding the elevator up to their floor in the dorm early this morning.

  Once the doors opened and they got out of the elevator, however, it was all pret
ty much a blur. A sudden flood of exhaustion had joined with the fatigue that had been nipping at her heels the entire trip, and before even then if she was truly being honest with herself, became too much to fight. It dragged her down before she knew what hit her. A vague memory floating to the surface now of Ashley playing the part of a worried nurse, taking care of her and her things.

  She rolled over a bit more, her body now half-on, half-off the edge of the bed as she reached down to the floor to grab the business end of a charging cable laying on the ground. Mia slid the plug into her phone, then tossed it gently back on the table, and raised her hands straight above her. Stretching out the sore stillness that took shelter in her muscles and joints over night. The creaks and pops mixed in with her groan as evidence of the comatose like state she had slept in.

  Wondering if she had moved at all through out the night, or morning and afternoon rather considering she could see the sun already hanging low in the western autumn sky, peeking through the tiny cracks in her blinds.

  Before Mia had the chance to wonder about much more than that Ashley came bubbling through the door.

  “Hey, there’s my lil sleepy head. Bout time you’re awake, thought I was gonna have to go steal a crash cart like on Grey’s Anatomy,” Ashley said taking off her jacket and throwing it on the bed with a solid thump. “Oops must’ve left my phone in there. Anyway, how are you feeling there Meems?” She asked moving from her bed to Mia’s, Ashley’s hand reaching out for Mia’s forehead like a mother checking for fever on a sick child.

  “I’m fine, really,” Mia replied moving her head back and away trying to dodge Ashley’s searching hand. Mia couldn’t tell if she was just in that lazy funk you get from sleeping too much all at once, or if she was in a depressed, drained out mood from the recent events. Maybe it was neither, and Morgan’s prognosis had been on the more hopeful side after all.

  Mia’s stomach growled out to remind her of it’s presence, she hadn’t eaten since the feast at the Kyle house.