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I Can Change Your Life

Alive

I woke up to the sound of the doorbell ringing over and over again. I had fallen asleep sitting in the hallway again. It seemed to be a daily thing now. Ever since I returned home, I had found myself constantly sitting in the hallway and staring at the blank wall while Marky's bedroom door and duffel bag stared at me, never leaving my peripheral vision. I hadn't been doing much in the days that I had been home.

I had fallen into a new routine for the past couple of days.

First, I would wake up as soon as daylight hit and workout. I would do my daily crunches and pushups, followed by some breathing exercises that I used to do on tour to keep my voice and lung capacity in the best shape I could. Then, I would shower and get dressed into comfortable clothes. Most of the time it would only be leggings, pajama pants, or sometimes no pants and an old t-shirt that was either one of the Key Street shirts that Tony and Jaxin had given me or one of Marky's old shirts that I had either acquired from over the years or found lying around the house. Today's case was a pair of paint-stained leggings from when we had painted Vic's bedroom and Marky's AC/DC shirt that I found while cleaning the house the other day.

After I was ready for my day, I would clean. I cleaned the house every day - rescrubbing the counter tops and rewashing the dishes. I felt like everything - even the things that I had already cleaned - were still dirty. The house was just tainted and dirty from the feeling of emptiness. I felt like I could never get rid of the smell of dust and old, no matter how vigorously and repetitively I scrubbed and washed everything. I wanted the house to feel new again. I wanted to try and scrub the past from the counters and wash the memories out of the blankets and sheets. I even scrubbed the tile floors and spot cleaned the carpet. I wanted to call and have the carpets cleaned, hoping that maybe the carpet was the final thing that could get rid of the feeling of emptiness, but I didn’t want anybody to come over. I didn't want to talk to anybody on the phone. I didn't want to see anybody.

And then after I cleaned for hours on end, I would somehow find myself sitting in the hallway, staring at that blank wall, hoping that if I stared at something so simple and plain, that my mind would follow suit and go blank as well. Maybe things would become simple enough if I managed to train it to see simplicity. But even then, I couldn't only see the simplicity. I could feel the cobwebs on Marky's bags crawling on my skin. I could smell the dust that had collected on the backpack that was sitting by his door - I could feel his bedroom door staring at me. I could see his belongings in my peripheral vision; haunting me and telling me that it was never going to be simple and that the house was empty, and I was alone. Just me and Marky's bags that were stuffed full of the reminder that my brother was dead.

I would fall asleep against that wall and dream the same thing every nap I took. I would relive the first day I had to return to our home without him.

Before my memory could play though, I heard the doorbell again, but I couldn't find the strength to even so much as look down the hallway to try and look out the window beside the door. It's not like I'd be able to see out of it anyway - the shades were drawn on every window in the house so it was dark and cold; no light allowed in.

I heard banging on the door this time. Whoever was at the door really wasn't giving up. The pounding stopped for a moment though, just enough time for me to immediately fall back into my routine and shut my eyes.

"I can't do this, Vic," I admitted, clutching onto Vic's shirt as I approached the first step that led to the front door. “This isn't right. Can I stay with you? Just one more night?"

"Meedie, this is your home. You need to go inside."

"This isn't my home. It was our home. I can't go in there without him."

Vic sighed, wrapping his arm around my waist and pulling me into his side. "We have to take care of some things, Meedie, we can't just leave everything to sit," he said, referring to Marky's belongings. I couldn't think about that, though. It was too soon, but then again, I felt like no amount of time would be the right time to organize Marky's belongings and put them away. Where would they even go? Was I supposed to pack up his room and clear it out? Or was I supposed to leave it alone?

"Come on, we'll go with you," Jaime's voice was suddenly there. I turned around to see Mike stepping out of his car after just having parked it. Tony stepped out of the passenger’s seat and the two of them started to walk over to where I was standing with Vic.

"What are you guys doing here?" I asked, trying to hide my sniffles.

Mike smiled, but it didn't reach his eyes. "You really think we'd make you face this by yourself?"

I smiled as much as I could and nodded my head, turning my attention to the steps. "Can you guys go ahead of me? Carry up the stuff. I just need a second."

"Are you sure?" Vic asked. "Shouldn't you be the first one to go in?"

I shook my head. "No." I didn't want to walk in and feel the emptiness that my condo held. I needed them to go in first and break up the air that had been sitting. I needed the condo to feel a little more lived in before I went inside.

Mike was the first one to march up the steps, carrying a pillow and a backpack. Jaime followed after him holding a guitar case in each of his hands. I looked away - I couldn't even stand to look at Marky's guitar case. There was no way I could do inside and see his things lying around the house.

Vic followed after, carrying my duffel bags and pillow. He gave me a sad smile before ascending the stairs. I watched how he took the steps with such ease - like they were just stairs. And they were just stairs to them, but not to me.

I looked down at the first step and felt like I could almost see the outline of Marky's shoes from the years of stepping in the same place to head back into our home. I could see an imprint of a pair of my shoes and lifted my foot, ready to place it right over where I tended to step first when heading up the stairs. I took on the first three stairs with ease, but began to panic once I saw the remnants of a bloody handprint on the railing of the stairs from when Marky had come home after getting in a fight at a party. I couldn't stand the sight of his blood, of the memory. He was in my mind so clearly, except I couldn't imagine his face as it really was in the memory, instead he was gray and pale, his eyes rolled back with vomit on his shirt.

I let out a breathless cry as I began to collapse mid-step, my weight going backwards as I tried to revoke my stepping action by lifting my foot up. I was somewhat hoping that I could fall down the stairs, maybe I would hit my head hard enough that my memory could be erased. And I could start a new life. Start over like nothing happened. But then again, I didn’t want to forget my brother. I just wanted to forget that he had died.

Before my head could crack against the floor from my fall, a pair of strong arms scooped me up, catching me so I was being held bridal-style. I buried my face into the black shirt that the man was wearing and breathed in, not completely recognizing the scent. I looked up to see an owl tattoo looking down at me.

“I got you, Meedie,” Tony breathed, letting out a small grunt at the impact of me hitting him. “I got you.”

I allowed myself to nuzzle my face into his shirt even more, my tears staining the fabric and pieces of my mascara smeared on the white words on his shirt. I went completely limp in his arms, allowing him to carry me up the stairs and into my new life.

“Meedie!”

I cracked my eyes open at the sound of my name, but I couldn’t lifted my head to look and see who was calling out to me. It sounded like Tony.

“Meedie!” I heard it again. I knew that was Tony’s voice, but I also knew that he wasn’t there. I was still dreaming – imaging that he had come back to San Diego to see me.

I could feel his presence in the house – the emptiness was gone and I was no longer alone. For a moment I wondered if I was dead and had made my way into heaven where I could imagine a perfect life for myself. Where everything I wanted would be there. But I cracked my eyes open enough to see that I was still in hell.

“Shit,” a voice cursed. I couldn’t keep my eyes open to see what was going on or who was there. “Meedie?”

I let out a groan as a response. I couldn’t stay awake. My eyes were shut and my mouth was too dry for me to try and respond.

“Meedie!”

“Ye..ah…” I managed to grumble.

I felt hands gently tapping my face, but even then the feeling was faint. My eyes were heavy and my head was even heavier. But I had finally found simplicity. My mind was blank, and I wasn’t worried anymore. For a moment, the house didn’t feel so old and empty. For a moment I felt like I had left that cold, lifeless condo and retreated to somewhere happier. Somewhere I felt like I belonged.

I woke up to the feeling of something hitting my lips. It was cold and startled me, but the smell of it made me open my mouth and welcome it to my tongue. I mulled the food over with my tongue before swallowing it. The feeling was weird to my throat – what was it that I was eating?

Eating. When was the last time I had even eaten?

The spoon was back at my lips, forcing them apart. I opened my mouth again and clamped my mouth around the spoon, keeping the food in my mouth while the spoon was retracted. I swallowed the food quicker this time. I wanted to open my eyes and see exactly what it was that I was eating and who was even feeding me, but my eyes were still too heavy, and I found myself losing the battle to stay awake once again.

The next time I woke up, my stomach felt heavier and my throat wasn’t so scratchy and dry anymore. I was being carried, and I could feel that my clothes had been removed. My eyes still couldn’t open though. It wasn’t until I was lower into something warm and soothing that my eyes actually managed to open. I lifted my arms and looked down to see what I had been placed in a bubble bath. The bubbles covered my body from sight, but from what I could see, my arms were unnaturally thin. Much thinner than I had remembered them being.

“Meedie?”

I turned my head to the side, blinded by the light that was peering in through the open bathroom door – the light came from a window in my bedroom that was attached to the bathroom that we were in.

A figure stood in front of the light, but I couldn’t quite make out who it was because of the beam of light that was hitting me right in the eyes. The figure disappeared for a moment to go adjust the blinds. They were still open, but just lowered a bit to block the sun. He turned around and I nearly stopped breathing when he entered the bathroom again.

“Meedie,” he said softly as he kneeled at the edge of the bathtub.

I immediately scrambled to try and sit up. I wanted to wrap my arms around him. “Tony,” I whimpered. “Tony.”

“Shh, shh,” he said. “I’m here.”

I needed to touch him. I needed to know that he was real and that he was really there.

“What’s going on? Why are you here?” I asked, my eyes studying each and every aspect of his face. His dermal, his thick-rimmed glasses, his slightly chapped lips – it was really him. He was there. Sitting beside me. Taking care of me.

Tony chuckled a bit at how frantic I was. “Calm down,” he said, placing a hand on head and running it down so he was cupping my face. I leaned into his touch – my skin tingling where his hand was. “Nobody could get a hold of you. Vic had been stopping by and calling for days, but you never answered. He thought you left.”

“What?” What was he talking about? The boys were on tour. There was no way he could have been stopping by for days.

“I decided to come and check myself. I knew you were here. I could just tell.” Tony stopped to sigh and pulled his hand from my face. “You had no food in the cupboards. Not even a crumb. The fridge was completely empty as well. There wasn’t even an ice cube in the freezer. When was the last time you had eaten?”

I furrowed my eyebrows. “I got rid of the food because it was spoiled. I guess I forgot to go get something to eat…I never…I don’t know…”

“You can’t just forget to eat,” he said. “How long were you laying in that hallway?”

I sunk a bit lower into the bathtub, suddenly feeling foolish for locking myself away. “I don’t know, since earlier this afternoon, I guess,” I answered. But had it really only been since earlier this afternoon? Why was Tony back from tour? “What are you doing here? What about the tour?”

Tony sighed, his eyes drooping as he moved himself so he was sitting on the edge of the bathtub. “The tour’s over, Meedie. It’s been over for three days now.”

“That’s impossible,” I shook my head. “Vic just called me like two days ago, when I got home.”

“What day is it, Meedie?” Tony asked, his eyes finally locking onto mine.

“Thursday,” I said. “May ninth.”

Tony sighed loudly and removed his snapback so he could slick his hair back. “It’s Thursday,” he said. I stared at him with a knowing look.

“Yeah, I know,” I said.

“May sixteenth.”

I stared at him for a moment longer, waiting for him to say just kidding or something that told me that I was right and that he was just exaggerating. There was no way that I had been sitting in that hallway for a week. I had been cleaning. I cleaned everything. Three times over. But only three? How could I have only cleaned it three times when so many days had gone by? I was cleaning every day, shouldn’t I have cleaned more than three times? I lifted my hand up and touched the roots of my hair, where the bath water hadn’t hit yet.

It felt like the water had already soaked it though – it was greasy and clumped, like I hadn’t showered in…a week. “There’s no way,” I said. “How?” I dunked myself under the water and wiggled my head around to try and clean myself off. But I suddenly felt all of the dirt on my skin. I felt like I hadn’t showered in years. I had never felt so dirty before – not even while on tour, when showers were a luxury.

I stopped wiggling, but remained under the bathwater. I opened my eyes, the sting of the bubble soap making it almost hard to keep them open, but in a way I welcomed the pain. I sat in the hallway for a week – feeling no emotions, thinking nothing. But wasn’t that what I wanted? I stared at that wall hoping that my mind would learn to go blank. And maybe it did, and that’s how I was able to sit there for so long without even noticing. Was I even awake? How did I not get hungry? Did I get up to go to the bathroom?

I felt my lungs tightening as my body demanded air, and I quickly shot up – splashing the bathwater all around me. I noticed a few spots get on Tony’s glasses after he flinched. He removed his glasses and used the bottom of his jacket to wipe them clean.

“Jesus, did you forget that you needed to breathe?” Tony asked, a playful smirk on his lips as he watched me gasp for air.

I continued to struggle for air. I felt like I hadn’t even been breathing for the week that I had blanked out. “Yeah,” I breathed out, “I actually did.”

Tony’s playful expression faded and he furrowed his eyebrows and looked down at his hands, his back facing away from me as he continued to sit on the edge of the bathtub. I wondered what he was thinking about. Was he thinking about us? Was he thinking about the fight we had before he asked me to leave?

I sure as hell was thinking about it. I wanted to feel angry and betrayed for the way Tony treated me, but I felt like he could hardly even remember what had happened because he was drunk – not that I would accept that as a valid excuse. Drunken words are sober thoughts, and something was clearly bothering him that night when he thought he saw me cheat on him with Abby. I wondered if it was my sexuality that was bothering him. He said that I couldn’t have both – I couldn’t have him as my boyfriend and a girlfriend just because I was attracted to both genders.

The idea of that never even crossed my mind. Not even when I was still confused about my sexuality and sudden attraction to Tony. I may be attracted to both genders – but I believe in being faithful. I’ve been cheated on before, and it’s not something that I would put someone through. I’ve also been the other woman when Lindsey cheated on Tony with me before she left him for me. Tony acted like it didn’t faze him because their relationship was dead, but I know that it did. I know that the day Lindsey showed up on the bus to talk to him he was confused and still hurt. I could tell in the way he was rigid after she begged for him to go back to her. I knew that he was thinking about it.

But I also knew that Tony felt strongly for me at that time. He turned her down, and maybe it was because he just genuinely wasn’t interested in her, but I had a feeling that I had something to do with his decision.

This boy meant so much to me. I was never a person to think so much about things – and not in a good way. I was reckless and drank way too much, and I know a part of me is still inside of me, but Ton helped to tame me a bit. He made me grow up, and not by forcing me to change, but just by making me realize that I have more to myself than being Motherfuckin’ Mad Meedie. I’m capable of love – genuine, real, selfless feelings that I can apply to another person.

He had changed the way I think about everything, and when I wasn’t around him, when I left the tour, I had slowly started to revert back to my old ways. I tried not to think about everything and I was selfish again – doing anything I could to just forget about Marky and Vic and the guys in my band. I was only thinking of myself and how I wanted to forget about Marky, but that’s not what I need to do. I need to be selfless again, because that’s the best way I can heal myself.

Tony showed me that it’s okay to be dependent on other people in certain ways. That being dependent doesn’t mean you can’t be independent. And that being independent doesn’t mean you’re alone.

I let out a long sigh as I blinked myself back to the bathroom, locking my eyes on Tony before I spoke up, clearing the silence that had fallen over us for a long while.

"I could write a list the length of a novel for all of the times you've changed my life, Tony Perry."

He furrowed his eyebrows as he sat at the edge of the bathtub that I was laying in. He turned around to gently move the bubbles with his fingertips. "All for the better?" he asked with concern.

"I don't know."

I knew that Tony did help me become a better person, but he also unleashed a whole new me that I sometimes wasn’t proud of. Was it good to feel so much? Maybe I had started to feel too much even.

Tony nodded, but didn’t say anything else. He sighed as he turned on the tub and reached over to the ledge to grab the shampoo and conditioner that was sitting there. He snapped open the lid and brought the bottle up to his nose to smell it.

His eyes closed as he smelled it, a smile taking over his face. I chuckled as he seemed to lose himself in the scent of the shampoo. My laughter made his eyes open though, a smile still on his lips and a blush slowly creeping up to join.

He poured some shampoo into left palm before setting the bottle down. He placed his hands together and dunked them into the water for a split second so he could lather up the shampoo a bit. He scooted along the edge of the bathtub so he was sitting just beside where my head was resting and then placed his hands on top of my head. I was a bit embarrassed when he first started to work the shampoo into my hair because of how greasy it was – but I allowed myself to relax and give in to the massage. Tony made sure to get my hair from root to tip before he lowered me into the water, keeping on hand under my neck to support my head while only my hair was submerged in the water. He rinsed it out and then reached for the conditioner.

I watched the way he moved, admiring every action he performed. He was such a beautiful human being, and I felt like with him around, life was worth it.

“We have a lot of stuff that needs to be resolved, and I know that,” Tony muttered as he worked the conditioner through my hair.

I opened one of my eyes to look up at him, but he didn’t notice. His face was relaxed as he stared at his hands running through my hair.

“I’m not trying to act all extra nice in hopes of you forgetting or forgiving what I have done and said to you, just know that. You know I’m not the kind of person to just let things go like that. I’m very confrontational,” he paused to laugh for a second, “and I know that what I did and said was wrong on so many levels – please don’t forgive me as easily as you’d like. I deserve your anger and whatever you want to say to me. And I want you to say all of it. I want to hear everything that has gone through your head since the night it happened.”

Tony remained silent for a moment as he went to submerge my hair once again. As I was laying in the water, he finally met my gaze and smiled widely at me. I smiled in return – looking up at him was probably the best sight I had ever seen.

“Just, not today. We’ll talk it over tomorrow, okay?”

I nodded and bit my lip. “Will you stay the night?” I asked, my voice quieter than I intended. “I just don’t want to be alone tonight. I’m scared.”

Tony seemed to understand what I meant by being scared. I was scared of being alone. I was scared of sitting in the hallway again – of turning myself off to the world. I wanted to be alive again. And Tony made me alive.

Notes

Hey guys - here's an update for you! Sorry it took a while. I didn't quite know how I wanted this chapter to go.

What do you guys think? Let me know! Just a warning, this story is coming to an end very very soon :((( I'm very sad because this story had been my baby, but it's time. And there's not going to be a sequel, which I believe I have said before. I'm sorry! But I will definitely be starting a new Tony story for you guys once this one is finished. :)

Love you all! muahhh xoxoxo

Comments

About 5 hours cause my phone would start to die and then I would get into my movie to lol

@taylorlovesptv
I've missed your comments! I remember you commenting. I'm glad you're back on here. I've been MIA from my stories for a while :/ But I just updated! I hope you like it and will read the sequel when I announce it :D

eliseypoo eliseypoo
6/19/15

@Mike'sArmy
How long did it take you to read all of it? haha. Thank you for reading and commenting! :D I hope you liked it and will stick around for the sequel :)

eliseypoo eliseypoo
6/19/15

So I started reading this today. I've read all of it today lol. I love it and I'm excited to see what's next. I honestly think that meedie and Tony were ment to be. There for a minute I thought she was pregnant because of throwing up.

literally so in love with this story, I think I started reading it like a year ago and I haven't been on here in like a year and I immediately started reading this story again and I can't wait until you update like I'm so in love with the idea of Tony and meedie and I just want them to get back together :D

taylorlovesptv taylorlovesptv
6/14/15