Eli
I jolted awake, bolting upright in bed and staring at the opposite wall.
My heart was pounding furiously as I stared, craning my senses in every direction.
I wasn’t sure why I’d woken up so harshly, but something had jerked me awake.
I didn’t sleep as deeply as Milo, but I wasn’t a light sleeper.
Something had to happen to wake me up at.
..God, it was almost four in the morning.
A thump jerked my head toward my doorway, and I frowned, easing out of bed to pull on a pair of shorts to cover at least part of my nudity.
I’d once said how I did the same thing last time I thought someone had broken in, and Milo had joked that I should have come as I was.
Apparently, having the owner come at you with a weapon while butt naked was far more terrifying than if they were wearing clothes.
I had to admit it made sense, but I never liked the idea of my vulnerable bits being exposed if I had to fight someone off.
I blinked and rolled my eyes when I heard a soft laugh, followed by “Oww.”
Milo. A drunk Milo, no less.
“Whew,” he groaned, and I heard another thump I thought might be him kicking off his shoe. “I wanna be an Oscar Meyer wiener...ohhhh, I wanna be an Oscar Meyer wiiiiener.”
A drunk Milo stuck in a song loop, no less. Wonderful.
Shaking my head, I stepped into the hallway to find him sprawled in the entrance way.
He was on his back, his shoes off, and flopped carelessly in front of the door, along with one of his socks, the other sock hanging halfway off his foot.
He had partially unbuttoned his shirt, one button from the bottom and the top three, leaving the last one to hang on for its life.
His pants were undone, zipper not opened yet, apparently forgotten as he repeatedly sang his jingle.
“Someone had a good night,” I muttered as I stared down into his face, his eyes closed, and a smile as he murmured the jingle again.
“Hmm?” he hummed in thought, ten seconds after I’d spoken, his brain pickled enough to delay processing.
“I said, it looks like someone had a good night.” I prodded him in the side with my foot and raised a brow when he didn’t jerk away from the touch.
Milo was incredibly ticklish; it didn’t take much to make him flinch and squeal.
It took a great deal of alcohol to make him so numb that he didn’t react to being prodded in a ticklish spot.
So much alcohol in fact that I’d only seen it twice before, which meant I probably didn’t have long until he decided to have a nap.
..a nap that was going to last sometime into the late morning. “Oh God, you’re drunk drunk.”
“I can’t stand,” he said with a giggle. “Of fucking course I’m drunk.”
“Yeah, but there’s drunk and there’s holy shit you’re drunk, you’re the second.”
“I ammmmmm.”
“And this is why you require adult supervision,” I said with a shake of my head.
“I’m not that drunk,” he protested with a slur impressive enough to make a binge drinking alcoholic pause.
“Uh-huh. You threw up tonight, didn’t you?”
“Only once!”
“First of all, once is more than anyone should while drinking. Second of all, that means you puked, felt better, and went back for more drinks.”
“Maaaybeeee.”
“Milo.”
“Whaaat?”
“Quit whining at me.”
“Rude.”
I sighed heavily, rolling my eyes again.
My annoyance at being scared awake and at his state was disappearing.
God save me, but I couldn’t help but find drunk Milo endearing.
He was stupid as hell for getting so drunk, but it seemed like he’d been having a good night.
When Milo was having a good time, he didn’t pay attention to how much he was drinking, and unless someone was there to remind him, he could go overboard.
Plus, he’d been so stupidly nervous to meet his dad that I could see him starting with a few drinks to calm his nerves, and then if it went well, which it probably had, he got rolling on more drinks to enjoy himself.
“Were you out this whole time with your dad?” I wondered, trying to keep him from drifting off since he still hadn’t opened his eyes.
“Who?”
“Your dad. Marshall?”
“Oh! Yeah! God, we had a...had a blaaassst.”
“Clearly.”
There was no hope for me because I found this shit cute.
It wasn’t good, but it was understandable, and a sufficiently drunk Milo was like a half-trained puppy; he was doing his best but kept forgetting what the best was.
He differed from the puppy in that he wasn’t likely to piss on the rug.
Not likely, but it had happened once before, and he was going to live that incident down about the same time as the death of the universe.
“Don’t you dare pass out,” I told him, reaching down to pat his face with enough force to jiggle his head slightly. “Because I know your ass needs to take a piss.”
“Yeah, but I’m comfy,” he grumbled, and I sighed when he rolled over, using my shoe as a pillow.
“Absolutely not, get up,” I snorted, pulling my shoe out from under his head.
“Rude,” he groaned, rolling onto his back in a starfish pose.
I waited a few seconds before growling and poking his head with my bare foot. “Milo!”
His eyes flashed open in annoyance, then his brow furrowed as he peered up at me. I raised a brow, and his face split in a wide grin. “Hi!”
“Hello,” I said in amusement. “Are you conscious now?”
“Oh yeah,” he said, delighted as he awkwardly twisted his arm around himself to push up into a sitting position. “How long have you been there? I’ve got soooo much shit to tell you.”
And if I was tempted to stay annoyed with him, it would have been destroyed by how delighted he was to see me while he was drunk off his ass.
Maybe I was just a sucker for him, but I would challenge anyone to look into his dopey as fuck face, see how overjoyed he was to see them, and not be charmed by it.
“Well, why don’t you tell me about it when you’re not sprawled in our entryway like the world’s ugliest rug?” I asked him.
“I’m not an ugly rug,” he snickered as he tried to push himself up.
His arms and legs were on two different frequencies, sprawling everywhere.
Well, and his cast wasn’t exactly helping.
Even sober, he wasn’t careful with that arm, but drunk?
The damn thing was flying all over the place, and if I didn’t step in to help, it would be a miracle if he didn’t injure it again.
With another roll of my eyes, I bent down, hooked an arm under his armpit, and helped him until he got his legs under him and could get to his feet.
I held him as I eased back, ensuring he could stand before stepping back completely.
Triumph flashed over his face before creasing into a frown. “I have to pee.”
“Kind of figured you did,” I said with a shake of my head. “You do remember where it is, right?”
He laughed. “C’mon, I only pissed in the hallway that one time.”
“Once was enough. I can lead you to the bathroom if need be.”
He snorted as he stumbled past me, realized how his legs were supposed to work, and made his way down the hallway. “What, you wanna hold it for me too?”
The thought sent an odd zing through me. “What, do you want me to? Or do you need me to?”
Milo gave a little chuckle, and I watched as he ran his hand along the wall, not quite leaning against it to keep steady but using it as a guide. “Temptiiiiing.”
Good Lord, he was making dirty jokes at my expense? That was a whole new level of drunk for him. “Get your drunk ass in there and quit trying to be funny.”
He laughed, clearly not taking my tone seriously, which.
..fair. I wasn’t that mad at him anymore, not when he was so obviously in a playful mood; his night with his dad had been a success.
Considering the state he was in, though, he was going to need someone to keep an eye on him before he finally passed out.
Waking him up like I had, before he could fully drift off, would give him a second wind, but I’d bet that within the next thirty minutes, he would pass out and sleep deeply for about ten hours.
That meant I only had a limited time to get food and water into him.
Keeping my ears trained for the sound of trouble from the bathroom, I walked to the kitchen and dug out leftovers, preferably the kind that would be good cold.
The key to getting Milo to eat while he was wasted was finding the right window and knowing it wouldn’t last long, so you had to hop on it as soon as it appeared, or it was gone for good.
The best way was to have food ready, and cold food was always ready.
It took him long enough in the bathroom for me to wonder if the idiot had fallen asleep.
I knew he was generally a smart enough drunk to take a seat rather than risk pissing all over the place after he’d made that mistake before, but to fall asleep sitting there?
On second thoughts, that’s exactly something he would do because I’d done it once, and if I was capable of it, he was capable of even worse.
I took a breath to go check on him when I heard the thump of the seat cover slamming down and the roar of water as the toilet flushed.
The damn thing was loud enough to wake the dead, and it usually managed to wake me up if Milo took a piss in the middle of the night.
It was a sign that he was still alive and conscious, so I busied myself finishing his plate and getting a bottle of water.
By the time I got the remainder of the food into the fridge, he was wandering out, calling my name a shade too loudly for four in the morning.
“Right here,” I told him, slapping the plate of food onto the counter. “Come in here and eat.”
“Oh, thank God,” he groaned as he came around the corner. “I’m starving.”
“Good,” I said, then raised a brow as he sauntered in completely shirtless. “Jesus, did you get sick?”
“Huh?” he asked, dropping onto a stool to pull the plate of food to him. “No?”