What Matters

A gentle rain splattered against the cool glass window of his room. The sky was an inky black, with the clouds so thick the full moon behind them was hidden in their velvety folds. Somewhere in his heart, he knew it was midnight, even before the little beeping on his watch chimed at the hour. Outside, a street light stood amongst its kin as sentinels against the obtrusive darkness, though even it was blurred when the rain decided to spit hard at the Earth. Its light highlighted Danny’s face in stark, pale relief, with the crossed metal bars on his glass window casting blurry shadows on his pinched, thin features. He stared out at the black pavement of the road, perfectly kept by the town’s board. Even in the darkness he could see the sharp edge where the road met the curb. The sidewalk beyond it was also well kept - in the daylight, not one blade of grass or dandelion could be seen poking through the space between the large square pieces. The large front lawn of his house was dimly lit by the residual light of the streetlamp, and Danny noticed its well manicured blades of glass lightly reflecting in the night. 

The house creaked, but Danny knew the different creaks the big old house made, and this one was simply a gust of wind knocking against the side. The driveway on the left side of his house, just barely visible from his window, was empty, and he knew the garage it fed was likewise bereft of cars. He touched the cold October glass with his thin fingers. Yesterday had been his 18th birthday, but both of his parents were away on business trips - his mom in Shanghai and his dad in Germany. They had promised when they left that they’d be back in time for his birthday, but he’d received a call a few days prior from his mom that she’d have to stay another week. That was fine, but his dad then called the following day saying he’d be late by a week. So Danny had spent his birthday going to school where the only person who might’ve known it was his birthday was absent from, and then coming home to an empty house which sucked away any hope of intimacy with its expansiveness. 

Of his 18 birthdays, his parents had been around for only seven, and those were intermingled with some horrific memories of big fights, threats of separation, and even an instance on his 12th birthday that he still forced down into the murky waters of his subconscious. He sighed, pressing his whole hand against the glass and feeling the bitterness of a New England autumn in its crystallinity. His room was large, though the night shrunk it down to just that which was lit by this small window - he kept the others with their blinds closed. His bed beckoned to him in the corner, and his desk stood near its foot. A table with some of his personal stuff was next to the bed, including his phone, which was lacking any notification that his birthday had passed.

He lay down on his bed and stared into the void of the ceiling. He knew it was only about eight feet above him, but his mind didn’t have to register that. To him, it was a black sea and he was standing at the shore, staring out before it and waiting to take the plunge into its still water. What beasts lurked under the calm currents, he didn’t have to know. He-

Danny’s thoughts were broken by a slight knock on his window. At first, he took it to be a heavier sheet of rain hitting against the glass, but then it continued. It got more hurried, more arrhythmic every second it went on, until Danny was forced to swing his long legs out of bed and face the window to see… 

“Holy crap!” His heart thudded somewhere in his throat at the sight of a hunched, hooded figure balancing on the windowsill and tapping now frantically against the glass. He saw the person’s eyes and immediately rushed to open the window. 

“Took you long enough, Christ,” said the person in a deep voice. He climbed through the window and smiled at Danny, dripping water from his jacket onto Danny’s carpet. 

“Jeremy? I can’t believe… what’re you doing here?” At the moment, his shock kept him from scolding his old friend’s messy arrival. 

“What is that, a trick question or something?”

“No, I mean…”

“It’s your birthday, ain’t it? Or rather, it was your birthday yesterday.” He smiled and closed the window behind him, taking off his shoes and placing them in a plastic bag he produced from his backpack by the window.

“Yeah, I mean you’re right, but-”

“Oh yeah,” said Jeremy, putting his jacket on Danny’s chair, “Sorry about not wishing you a happy birthday yesterday. My parents found that letter Ms. Darnell wrote for me and, uh… they didn’t find it amusing.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah, they grounded me for two weeks, actually. And they took my phone too.”

Danny couldn’t help but smile. “Y’know we have a front door, too,” he said jokingly. 

“Yeah, but y’all got that video doorbell, right? The one that tells you about ‘unusual activity’. Pretty sure a hooded man showing up at your door on a Tuesday night at midnight is pretty unusual. Plus, you know how your parents are with my parents. They tell ’em everything, so if they found out it was me - and who else would you let into the house at midnight, they’d know I broke their rules, and then…”

“Yeah, I get it.” Danny was used to Jeremy thinking things through - he was a pragmatic guy. “You haven’t snuck in this way since… oh god, must’ve been freshman year, right? When you had that new game you wanted to try out on my TV?” 

Jeremy chuckled. “Oh, you remember that, huh?”

“Of course I do.”

There was a moment of silence where each of them took stock of their situation. “Hey,” remarked Jeremy, “why’s it so damn dark in here?”

Danny felt shame crawling up his throat. “Uh, I was actually about to go to sleep-”

“You sleep in sweats in a room this warm?”

“What if I do?”

“Then I’ll know you’re lying. C’mon, we’ve had sleepovers before.”

Danny sighed and sat on the edge of the bed. “Alright, the truth is I was feeling like crap. You weren’t at school today, I texted you but you didn’t reply-”

“Because my parents took my phone.”

“Right, but I didn’t know that then, and my own parents are on opposite sides of the world right now… A pretty horrible way to spend your 18th birthday, huh?”

“I feel that.” Jeremy shook his polyester pants to get the last of the water off of them. “I sorta like this aesthetic though, y’know. Kinda moody, kinda mysterious. Maybe I gotta start staying up late with the lights off.”

Danny smiled. “You’re normally sleeping by now, aren’t you?”

“Yeah, and I had to wait for so long for my dad to fall asleep before I could sneak out. I actually had a cup of coffee at 9:00 just so I could stay up this late.” 

They chuckled, and Danny felt his heart softening a little. “We can turn on a light if you want, you know.”

“Nah man, this is cool. But hey,” he reached into this “Here’s your birthday present.”

“Aw you didn’t have to-” Danny’s jaw dropped as he saw Jeremy pull out an XBox 360 from his bag. “Oh my - how did you… what?”

Jeremy laughed airily. “I know your parents weren’t gonna let you have one in the house, and my cousin was selling it at a yardsale. It’s old, but I think it still works. I still have mine, so we can play together-”

Danny crushed Jeremy in a hug which nearly made his friend drop the console. Jeremy’s family wasn’t as well off as Danny’s - they lived on the South side of town, and Danny knew that even if this XBox was sold at a yardsale, it probably cost Jeremy a lot to get it for him. “Thanks, man. I really… I love it.”

“I knew you would,” he said with a grin. “Just make sure your parents don’t find it.”

“Ah, they almost never come in here anyway.”

“Cool. Well, there’s more. Since I knew you wouldn’t have any games yet, I brought my copy of Halo 3 - we can play split screen here. I also brought my controllers too. I hope they didn’t get too wet.” He had wrapped them in plastic and put them inside ziploc bags, but he still looked worried as he pulled out the heavy, smooth XBox controllers.

“Jeremy, I-”

“You wanna try it out right now? You still have that TV in your room, right?”

“Oh, yeah I do.” Danny led the way to the couch on the other side of his room, in front of a large, blinded window. The couch was a three-seater, and faced the opposite wall where there was a 55’’ TV mounted above a small TV cabinet which held his favorite movies, but no games or game consoles. 

“Alright, I’m gonna go plug this in.” Jeremy put the XBox on the cabinet and used the HDMI cable formerly used for Danny’s Apple TV to connect the console to the TV. He plugged in the power cable and then stood back as Danny turned on the TV. 

“Wow… it works!” Danny’s jaw was agape as he saw the XBox logo pop up on his own television screen - something which he’d been dreaming of since he was 14. 

“Awesome. Alright, I’m gonna put the game in.”

“Wait, don’t we have school tomorrow?” asked Danny, his eyes still glued to his TV.

“Yeah, so? You got any tests?”

“No…”

“Any quizzes?”

“No.”

“Any big homework due?”

“Mm… no.”

“And your parents won’t be home for another couple days at least, right?”

“Yeah…” 

“So…” Jeremy looked incredibly buoyant, like he’d been when he got the class math award in seventh grade. 

“Ah, alright.” Danny grinned and moved over on the couch.

“That’s what I like to hear! I also,” he reached into his bag, which Danny realized was larger than he’d first taken it for, “brought some soda and chips, so we don’t have to go hungry. I don’t know what you ate for dinner, but my parents were so mad at me, all I had was a salad.”

Danny was about to point out that he had all manner of chips and sodas downstairs, and that he didn’t even like Fanta that much anyway, but seeing his friend’s outstretched hand and hopeful expression melted the rest of his resentment away. He took the soda and smiled. 

“Thanks, man,” he said candidly. “I really needed this.”

“I know… trust me, I know.” Jeremy’s voice was likewise candid, and Danny was aware that of all the people in the world, his best friend would be the only one who knew the full magnitude of his troubles. It was his house he’d retreated to after the debacle of his 12th birthday, and it was his house he’d gone to when his parents were fighting. When they talked about who would get custody of Danny, he’d been secretly hoping neither of them would win so he could go live with Jeremy. 

“Alright, what do we do from here?”

“C’mon man, this is the loading screen. You’ve seen it at my house.”

“I know but it… it feels different when it’s your own, y’know?”

Jeremy laughed. “I guess.” 

There were two faint hissing sounds as the boys opened their sodas in near unison. 

“I’ve got paper towels in the closet over there for when our hands get dirty from the chips,” said Danny. 

“Ah, good idea. We’ll get ’em when we start eating. I wanna get a few rounds in first. Or d’you wanna play the campaign?”

Danny shrugged. “Either one.”

“Okay, let’s do a couple of split screen multiplayer games and then we can decide if we wanna go through the campaign. You know what happens, right?”

“Yeah, I’ve seen some playthroughs.”

“Cool. Then there’s no rush to do the campaign.”

“Guess not,” said Danny as the game finished loading. 

“Finally. Okay, let’s get into this!” Jeremy leaned forwards, and Danny copied him.

“Let’s do it,” he said with a grin. He looked over at Jeremy’s face highlighted by the bright glow of the TV and heard a spatter of rain against the window. He had looked into the void sea on his bed, searching for answers, and here one had appeared before him. A friend he didn’t deserve and yet felt no hesitation in hanging out with. Someone who knew the troubles Danny had at home and tried to fulfill his role in Danny’s life without fail. A fun, slightly misbehaving, and energetic boy turned into a thoughtful, kind, and still energetic adult. Who else would climb onto Danny’s house at midnight on a rainy night just to wish him happy birthday? Who else would spend probably around half their savings on a gift for their friend? And who else would think of every accoutrement needed for tonight, even down to the drinks and food? Maybe Danny’s parents had only been there for eight of his birthdays, but here was a man who had been there for eleven - every year since they’d met. A little sprinkle of shame crept into Danny’s throat as he recalled how caustic he’d felt towards Jeremy yesterday when he hadn’t even sent him a birthday text, but that was quelled by the knowledge that Jeremy didn’t care. He’d been Danny’s friend through many bouts of anger, and this would be no different. 

“Okay, I’m gonna let you win a couple so you get the hang of it, then I’ll start trying,” said Jeremy with his eyes focused on the screen. 

Danny had been staring at his friend, but he turned his gaze to the screen as the match began. “Bring it on, man.”