Matches: Why We Burned Out

eleven // towers of books

eleven // towers of books (edited!)

My phone rang. It was Romeo. I answered. "Hey," he muttered quietly. I was curious about why he was calling at this time in the morning. It was 2 AM.

"Is everything alright?" I asked with a yawn. He sniffled and I realised he'd been crying. My heart rate increased immediately.

"I need you," he stammered as something smashed in the background. I became more and more scared the longer I stayed on the line. I couldn't let him stay on his own.

"I'm on my way."

Once I reached Romeo's house, he was waiting by the door for me. He hugged me so tightly I could've exploded. His chin was on my shoulder as I was encased in his strong arms. Gradually, his breathing slowed down and synced with mine. When he pulled away, I noticed how red his eyes were, but he quickly turned away because he didn't want me to see him cry.

"Are your parents home?" I asked.

"They're at the hospital," he said as he took my hand and led me inside. I wasn't going to let my curiosity get the best of me – if Romeo wanted to tell me what was wrong, he would, and if he didn't want to, I wasn't going to force it out of him.

We went into his bedroom, but I stopped in the doorway. I was shocked by how untidy it was in comparison to when I last came. But I realised that it wasn't that Romeo was a messy person... he'd thrown a tantrum in here. Clothes were strewn across the room, his chair was pushed onto its side, the mirror in the corner of his room had been shattered into millions of tiny shards and his bookshelf full of books had been toppled over.

My immediate reaction was to help tidy up, but I was stopped. "That's not your mess to clean," said Romeo.

We both sat down on his bed. "What happened?"

He brushed a hand over his face. "I'm lonely, Mia. And I know I've got you here with me, and you're wonderful. But my parents are never home, and whenever I'm not with you, I've got nobody. But...my mom was gonna give me a sister. I was gonna look after her and teach her things and speak to her. And my parents said they'd be home a lot more when she arrived. But mom lost the baby and...I don't know. Maybe I need to calm down."

"No, you're being completely reasonable," I reassured him. He lowered his head and began crying again, and all I could do was hold him until he stopped. When he did eventually relax, I got off his bed and began to stack the fallen books into towers.

"What are you doing?" he asked. "You don't need to do that."

I playfully rolled my eyes with a smirk, "Shut up and help me." And he was submissive. He stacked towers of various heights. We pushed the fallen bookshelf upright and began to arrange the towers into the spaces. Together, we hung his clothes back in his wardrobe and rearranged his desk. While I made his bed, he swept up the shards of glass on the floor – he made sure I stayed far away from that because he didn't want me to get injured.

Once we were done tidying up, I heaved a sigh of relief and Romeo walked me to the door. He said his dad had the car so he couldn't take me home. As he leaned against the doorframe, he stared deeply into my eyes and gave me butterflies. Blushing, I turned around and began to walk back home, but Romeo called me back.

"Stay safe, petal. Don't talk to any strange men," he teased, ruffling my hair. With a giggle, I tiptoed to kiss his lips momentarily before backing away. "Stay safe," he repeated.

"Of course I will, worryguts," I assured him. "Don't freak out again. If you need me, call me, okay?"

He nodded and waited for me to disappear around a corner before he went back inside.