Chapter 3
Deathcast did not call Tagoe Hayes today, because he was not dying. The day before, however, his best friend and brother, Rufus Emeterio, received a call from them yesterday.
To his surprise, he received a call from Aimee.. He never received anything from Aimee.
12:10 PM
Tagoe’s POV
My whole life, I’ve only cried twice. I’m a pretty practical guy. I live, I learn, and I move on. But today..I just can’t.
Today marks the third time that I am crying. I never knew that a human could cry this hard. My hoodie sleeve is drenched in tears and probably snot that I’ve been wiping off of my face the past night. I miss Rufus. He was too young to die.. He was gonna make it, man. If any one of us was gonna make it, it was going to be him. He was smart, caring, and all of that other cliche bullshit that you hear in obituaries.
He deserved to love. He deserved to be in love and live a long happy life with the person who he loved. But no, the world is fucking cruel.
I get up out of bed. There’s not a single trace of Malcolm. I miss him, too. This is bullshit. All of this is bullshit. One of my brother’s just died, and now, I can’t even find the other one.
Somewhat on cue, I hear a knock on the door.
“Yo? Who is it?” I say in between sniffles.
“Malcolm.” His voice is quiet and gentle, which startles me. I’m not used to that.
“Why are you knocking? It’s your room too..”
He walks in and sends me a gentle smile. He’s being too god damn nice today. He takes a seat on his bed.
“Where were you?” I probe, sitting next to him.
“Out. Why does it matter?” He shrugs.
“I was worried! You just got up and left out of fucking nowhere!”
Malcom laughs, “It’s not like I got the call-”
Silence.
“Fuck.” He sighs.
“Too soon, man..” I shake my head.
“Will it ever not be too soon?”
His voice cracks. For his sake, and maybe mine, I don’t mention it. Hell, if I did, who knows what could happen. Maybe he’d punch me, set me straight. Or maybe, we’d cry together. Either way, I’d probably need whatever he did.
“I don’t think so. He was the fucking sun in our Solar system, dude.” I choke out, holding back my tears.
Malcolm lets his tears fall. “Shut up. He’d so make fun of you for saying some cringey shit like that.” He laughed through his cries.
“God, things are never gonna be the same, are they?”
“Nah.. it’s never gonna be the same. Something will always be missing, Tagoe. But, we can’t dwell on it forever. That’s not what Rufus would want, yo. We’ll make new moments, and meet new people. No matter what though, we can never replace our Roof.”
We both sat in silence for a few minutes. I couldn’t tell what was going through Malcolm's mind, but I knew that we were both thinking about Rufus. I couldn’t hold back any longer. I needed comfort. Screw this tough guy front, I miss Rufus and I need a hug.
“Malcom?” I ask, obviously crying. Embarrassing.
“Yeah?” He looks at me, concerned.
“Can I ask you something weird?”
“Man, nothing can get weirder than these past 24 hours. Go ahead.”
“Can I have a hug?” I don’t look back at him.
“Nevermind, you’re weird as hell..” He says in attempts to tease me. “Of course. I need it, too.”
He pulls me into a hug, the tightest hug I’ve ever been in, in fact. We stay like this for a while, no gay jokes involved. Now isn’t the time. We weren’t hugging in an awkward or uncomfortable way, it was nice. I started to feel a bit better, I no longer felt alone.
My phone rings. We both jump at the sudden noise. It’s Aimee. Aimee never, NEVER calls me. Something has gotta be seriously wrong. Malcolm makes an ushering moment with his hand, telling me to pick up the phone, which I do. I turn the phone on speaker.
“Hello?” Aimee sounds way too fucking happy after what had just happened.
“Hey..? What’s up?”
“You’re never going to believe this.” She yells into the phone.
“What is it, Ames?”
“Rufus is fucking alive.”
My heart drops into my stomach, and I’m sure Malcolm's does, too.
“Ames..That’s not cool to joke about, yo.” Malcolm chimes in.
“You think I’m kidding?! I mean it! If you don’t believe me, you should go see for yourself.”
What a weird fucking suggestion.
My head starts to pound. My whole body is shaking, and I’m finding it hard to breathe. My vision almost starts to cave in, before Malcolm shakes me back into reality.
“See for ourselves..? How are we supposed to see for ourselves?! He’s dead, Aimee! He got the call from Deathcast! He’s DEAD! There’s no possible way that he’s alive!” Before I realize it, there are tears streaming down my cheek once more, and my free fist is clenched so tight that it starts to turn purple.
“I know! I couldn’t believe it either-”
“How do you know that he’s alive, dude?” Malcolm interrupts.
“He called me.” Her voice quieted down.
My voice raised.
“HE CALLED YOU AND NOT US?!” NO FUCKING WAY HE WOULDN’T CALL US!”
“TAGOE! CALM THE FUCK DOWN!” Malcolm snatched the phone out of my hand and started to speak. “Aimee, can we see him?”
“Yeah..that’s what I meant by ‘see for yourselves.’ I’ll send you guys an address and a time, okay?”
“Okay.. Bye, Ames.”
The phone hangs up.
I’m still in hysterics, but through the tears and pain, I feel something in my heart. No, not my heart, my gut. Something in my gut tells me to believe Aimee. That may be me just being in denial, but still.
Maybe Rufus is alive.