Runes Pt 1 (unfinished)

The morning started out like any other, cold and tiring. Derek usually slept with dim lights and music to fall asleep. The combination kept him from sleeping to heavily, so he could wake up easier. However, it was the weekend and so he’d turned off everything for some extra heavy sleep, and the result would be almost like taking Nyquil. Although the coldness of the wood floor was almost breathtaking, it did little to lift his excessive sleepy eyelids. He wandered to their small timid bathroom that reminded him of his closet, to do what ninety percent of all humans do when they wake up. He hated his cousins’ apartment, but beggars couldn’t be choosers, as his dead mother always prophesized. The apartment was so small and closed in that you could use the bathroom while watching to make sure the eggs didn’t burn, with the use of a couple mirrors anyway. He finished using the bathroom and left to make the coffee he made every morning for his ever-constant hangover of a cousin, plus the addition of pancakes this particular morning. He didn’t usually make pancakes, but he prided himself in making them completely random-like, for no reason whatsoever, and usually to the delight of his cousin. 1

As he threw the ingredients together, as they never bought the quick-mix stuff, he remembered delightfully how his dad had always made pancakes; a heart here, a Mickey Mouse there, and sometimes he’d go as far to do a smiley face with blueberries. They didn’t have blueberries, but he grinned deviously as he imagined his cousin’s face when he brought heart-shaped pancakes to him in bed. He might even just make it a full-fledged joke and put on a maids outfit and make-up. The thought brought a good laugh from his lips, although he knew it was impossible, as he nor his cousin kept maid outfits or make-up laying around the small apartment. Although he might get even more evil and ask the gay guy next door to bring the pancakes to his cousin himself, maybe have him dress up in nothing but a Speedo. The thought made him laugh even louder, although he knew it was mean; it would be nothing but payback. 2

He grew quiet as he heard his cousin groaning from his hangover, he didn’t quite want him to wake up yet, he was usually in a better mood when he woke up to coffee that was completely done making. Derek quickly turned on the coffee pot with the coffee grounds and water already set up from the night before. He resumed his pancake making and daydreaming as the coffeemaker began gurgling. As he formed a Mickey Mouse pancake, he remembered how much his little sister had giggled when their dad had first started making the pancakes with shapes. The delightful memory of Karen, his little sister, made Derek grit his teeth. After the accident, the SRS wouldn’t allow her to live with her seventeen-year-old brother, only her over religious scum of an uncle and aunt. He didn’t mind religious people, heck he was religious himself, but they were just positively insane. They believed everyone in the world who didn’t worship Jesus specifically worshipped the devil, but even more annoying was their stubbornness in general. So when they heard Derek was living with his party-hard cousin, they tried to get a stupid restraining order on him! Of course they won, him living on ramen noodles and them on lobster and caviar, Derek couldn’t even afford a lawyer to represent him. They hadn’t wanted him to be a bad influence on Karen, and because of there stubbornness they never even checked to see what he did with his time, and now he couldn’t even legally give his little sister a hug.3

A sly smack on the back of the head followed by the smell of burnt pancake assaulting his nose brought him back to reality. He quickly pried the black pancake from the pan and threw it on the pan in the oven used to keep them warm. He quickly reapplied the cooking spray and restarted the task of making pancakes. Nate walked over and poured himself a cup of coffee allowing his bed-head-hair to do the wave as he plopped down at the small kitchen table. He laughed as hard as one can in the morning and spoke as matter-of-factly as he could through his grogginess, “You know, we should just kidnap your little sis if it’s going to cause us anymore African American Mickey Mouse pancakes.” Despite of Derek’s bad mood, he puckered up a hard and long joyful laugh. He wasn’t racist, but that was funny. 4

Even though the good laugh lessened his bad mood, it still didn’t dissolve it completely. The only thing that would at the moment would be if there really was a plan to kidnap Karen. He flipped the pancake onto the pan in the oven and set to making another heart-shaped one. He imagined her jumping into the car packed and ready to go, him leaving a note saying something extremely smart on their fridge, but he knew it could never be like that. He knew his only hope was to wait for when she turned sixteen, and to have a good daily income and his own house, then he just knew somehow it would work out. He could only hope that he got her out of the house before she committed suicide, which he knew she’d never do, but he sometimes felt like it just being in the same room as his own uncle and aunt. 5

He finished with the pancake and put another one on to cook. His thoughts turned to more trouble, such as the paper he had to do this weekend. It was about anything you wanted, but for Derek that was possibly the worst assignment ever in high school. He missed the days of five-paragraph essays about your favorite pet choices, or your favorite holidays. Now the five page papers about whatever you wanted or about stupid stuff he could give his opinion about in less than two paragraphs made him want to just write a funny inappropriate story for the teacher. It actually worked one time, they’d been asked to do a five-page paper about the negative affects of smoking pot. He’d laughed himself a good one when he took an entire week to write a five-page story about what his cousin did when he got high. He knew he’d probably get his head smacked when the teacher read it but got a surprise when sixty-year-old Mr. Robinson began cackling very loudly during class, and Derek himself had a good laugh when he found that it was the best grade he’d ever gotten on any paper.6

He flipped the pancake onto the pan in the oven and began making yet another pancake. Even more troubling was the factor of having to work on a Saturday. Saturdays were supposed to be days of freedom, do whatever you want to do. Instead, this Saturday was going to be spent being yelled at by his boss all day about not getting his nonexistent work done. He hated his boss, who was a small bald forty-year-old drunk who beat both his kids and his wife like they were his personal beanbags. Often enough Derek dreamt about beating him to a bloody pulp, but he felt he couldn’t go to jail for he always needed to be there for Karen. He grimaced as he remembered the high-pitched voice of his boss, and it was just low enough for it to be even more annoying then someone being choked and trying to sing at the same time. Not to mention he had a whining voice that made him sound like a little puppy being forced to lick hot sauce off the floor, and he really did whine every chance he got. 7

Yet another pancake went into making and he took the ones that were already made and put them onto a plate to give to Nate. He set the pancakes down and took the syrup and butter from the fridge to put on the table as well. Nate yawned considerably large while trying to talk at the same time, making it sound like he was yelling at Derek, “Thanks mom… I hope you can make me supper too, I have a long day of doing nothing ahead of me, and you know how much doing nothing does something to your head.” I grinned knowing the day that he didn’t eventually find anything to do would be the day that he died at exactly midnight.