Good Morning.

He was laying on my brother's bed. He always found the worst places to show up for me, and the worst times. I was so frustrated with the paper I was supposed to be writing that I would have been upset at anybody for bothering me. But him? Of all people, the one who could really grind my bones together and make me break? I booted up the computer and made a beeline for the door. He asked for a beer on the way back. Great. I'm barely back in my own house one day and already I'm getting him a beer. Hallucinations aren't supposed to be drunks too.
"I'm not a drunk," he mentioned. I quickly made my way to the stairs. I went for the first thing I could get my hands on - ibuprofen. Wolfing a couple down usually gave me enough umph to handle the kid in my brother's room. He wasn't much older than me, but I had a feeling he was ready to prove just how much more he knew - he'd start an argument right away, about anything. Something big in the pit of my stomach told me it would be my term paper. He sat up expectantly when I walked back in the room, and scowled when I tossed him a diet coke. I immediately sat at my computer and hit the "Stumble" button.
"Don't you have a paper to write?"
"Yes."
"Shouldn't you be... writing it?" A nag. Always a nag.
"Please wake up and check the clock," I said. "My brother and I watched Superman. I'll work on my paper in the morning."
"School's starting soon."
"So's your execution." He laughed at that, a laughter that reminded me of the time that I actually enjoyed having him around, when I thought it was romantic and special to have a man no one else could see follow you. Now he was a pest. He had even stopped trying to kiss me. His laughter was soon drowned out by a swish and a fizz, and the springs of my brother's bed sighed as he lay back down. "I've missed you, Char."
Here he goes again. Why's he always coming back? Because he misses me. "I heard that," he said.
"You see me enough," I expelled coldly, hoping he could hear the horrible, nasty words that were going through my head. He didn't talk for a long time. I was emersed in a fiction blog when he finally continued the conversation, and it took a few tries for him to get my attention.
"You know it's not seeing you I miss," he said. "Your thoughts used to be so pure, so funny. I could wrap myself up in them and be the happiest person alive." I rolled my eyes. "I miss the sweet you. Without the thoughts of hatred and without the stupid stuff you got yourself into. You think you're the shit now cause you're in college? From what I see, you've thrown it all away and you went down some path I don't want to follow you down." I was standing at the side of the bed. "Don't lose me, Char."
"You're the reason." I sat down and emptied the last sip of his diet coke. "I'd prefer to know why I had you. Maybe I wouldn't be so keen on losing you. As far as I'm concerned, you've been stalking me and peering into my life without my permission, just hoping I was ok with it. And once you started, you kept it up because you couldn't let go of me. And nothing I could drink or swallow or inhale has ever gotten you to stop." He sat up quickly.
"If you really wanted me to go, I would have been gone. You're the one who can't let go, Char."
"But..."
"Work on your paper." He stood and walked through the door - the one in midair. The one that I couldn't follow him through. He didn't even say goodbye.