Just Friends

A/N This story is a completely random piece taken out of my mind, the Bob Marley calender in the corner of my eye, and the fact that I haven't smoked anything for three days. It will be continued, though I doubt anyone will bother to review. First chapter is short, I know, but I just wanted that little bit of background on Friday and Adrian before going into the plot. Thanks for reading.

Oh, and if I mention Bob Marley too often than it is the calender's fault.
Nothing by Bob Marley belongs to me (Disclaimer).

Chapter One: Concrete Jungle

"I'm so happy right now." My best friend's voice floats up to me from through the smoke. I lift my head and look down to his head on my chest, the mass of dark curls splaying over my paler, bare skin.

"You're stoned, mate," I reply, eyes aching from tiredness as I push my head back into the pillow of the couch. I look towards the ceiling, watching the smoke spiralling upwards with no place to go. Strands twisting into each other, moulding together and breaking apart, a whirlwind of desire to escape.

But there is no escape. So instead they fan out, thinning, strands like graying silk instead creating a sheet of thin fog above my head, pinpricks of light shining through it like the lights on the other side of the misty lake in a trashy horror novel.

Oddly enough, I'm the one who isn't stoned. Maybe there is something to this second-hand smoking thing after all.

I turn my head towards where my friends must be sitting, but the only proof of their presence is shadows and silhouettes of bodies, as the room fills with ever more smoke. One of my arms is hanging off of the sofa next to me, his fingers trailing up and down my forearm, nails scraping lightly over my skin from elbow to wrist. My breath catches slightly every time his nails run over the sensitive part of my inner wrist, where white streaks as thin as the smoke mar my skin.

"Adrian, we should get out of here and leave the potheads," a voice says to me through the thin fog of contaminated air, "Or we'll end up stoned, too."

Harriet's voice makes me pause mid-yawn to listen to her, but I shake my head, even though she cannot see. The smoke begins to sting at my eyes, and tears pinprick in them a little at the corners, disappearing down the skin next to my eyes and into my sand-colored hair.

"No, no, I have to stay here with Friday." My toes curl as I yawn, left hand stroking up and down Friday's back to relax him even more. He seems to purr as he shifts slightly, legs twining with mine, pushing me deeper into the stuffy couch. Harriet mumbles something about me being boring and tied down before shutting off from speaking. Her and I are the only non-stoners in this room, and it is only Friday's third time. Being maybe a little too over-protective, I feel I need to be with him whenever he is not sober to make sure that no harm will come to him. I have no excuse for when he is sober, but it is not often anyone asks for one.

"I'm so happy right now," he repeats himself, sounding dazed and surprisingly clear at the same time. I cannot help but smile.

"I know, you already said that," I tell him, our friends voices floating in and out of my concentration. They speak in whispers through the veil of smoke, and I hear my name every now and then. But right now, with Friday sprawled across my body and undoubtedly happy, I could not care less.

"That was ages ago," he replies, sliding his fingers into the palm of my hand. I fold my own fingers across to brush against his. "I can feel my heartbeat everywhere, even in my fingers. And I can feel every taste-bud on my tongue." He tells me, fingertips tracing the lines on the palm of my hand.

"It was only a few minutes ago," I correct him, lifting my hand from his back to rake gently through his glossy black curls. I look off to the side again, through the smoke to the other people in the room. How many are there? Seven? Eight? I cannot remember, the only person I can distinctly see right now is Harriet.

She is talking to the others, though whether or not they are listening is beyond me. I can see no more than their outlines, and they all look so similar that I give up on trying to tell who is who.

Maybe it is just knowing someone for as long as Friday and I have that makes you care so much about them, but I feel a strange fixation towards keeping him safe. I don't know what I would do without him. And not just him, either. I don't know what I would do without his mother (her half-Jamaican side showing through, the bright colors she wears, the bright smile that she saves for me) and his father (his half-Italian side shining in his mop of unruly black curls quite like Friday's own). I feel I am a part of his family. I spend almost as much time at his as I spend at my own.

In my thoughts I find myself lost with memories of his family. They brought me up almost more than my own family did. They would tell me off when I got detentions, praise me when I did a painting they particularly liked, offer me money whenever I went out. I even showed my report card to them before my own parents.

So that must make Friday like a brother to me?

That I cannot get my head around. He is not much like a brother. We hug too much and are together too often and I care for him a lot more than I do my own brother.

I feel him shift again on top of me, moving to tilt his head up so that he can look up at me. Large, clear brown eyes and chiselled, pretty-but-not-quite-feminine features stare happily up at me, a grin spread across his face. Italian, American, Jamaican, Friday.

"You know what? I love you, Dri," he tells me, rather light-heartedly, the electric lights that are dulled through the smoke playing off of high cheekbones and making his eyes seem to glitter.

"I know," I reply, feeling secure on the fact that I do know that. "I love you too." Maybe a little too much.

"Awww, would you look at the love-birds," Harriet says, and I look towards her to see her rolling her hazel eyes, closer to us than I had realised before. Our friends always seem to find it amusing to tease us on our closeness, though I would say that none of them suspect anything. Not that there is anything to suspect.

"We're just friends, Haz, you know that," I tell her, slightly dazed in amazement as the light glints off of her many piercings.

Second-hand smoking is not my friend.

"Yeah," Friday says, though it is muffled by the fact that he has his face pushed into my chest. "Just friends."