Generation 4, Chapter 2: Whatever floats your boat

The existence that I led lacked originality. I was an amateur archaeologist who had yet to make any real interesting discoveries, and I sure wasn't going to find anything like it by staying in Bridgeport. How I got Jack to convince me to come here still boggled my mind.

Jack Harrison had been my best friend since 8th grade. Though he may have been the most childish person I had ever met, having teased me about my glasses all the way through Maths, we ended up as friends after we both got detention for starting a fight. He stood by me after the loss of Sarah, so in turn, I had to stand by him.

I was doing him a huge favor. His parents forced him to start in the military to learn some discipline. I doubted that it would work, but they were out of options. My best friend nearly fled the country, had I not intervened and convinced him to comply with their wishes. His parents agreed to a compromise, and that he would live out his party lifestyle before enrolling in the military.

Everyone won in the end, except me.

"Exactly how does this coffee machine work?" Jack called from the kitchen, visibly fiddling around with some of the buttons. In his rather agitated state, he gave the coffee machine a hard smack.

I sighed. "Just read the instruction manual, Jack."

"The manual might have gotten burnt by one of my cigarettes last night...," he lowered his head, peeking around his mug as coffee suddenly spurted out of the machine. "But it seems that's no longer necessary. The age old tradition of slapping the machine seems to work best!"

"You were lucky... And you really need to stop smoking. You've burnt holes in almost all of your clothes."

"Lucky or not, it works again... Or maybe not. Dude, this stuff seems to be half solid, half liquid. Is that normal?"

For all his supposed handiness that he kept boasting about, Jack was useless at fixing things when the opportunity presented itself. In the past, three toasters had broken, and all three times Jack had electrocuted himself by trying to fix it. He was a walking time bomb for disasters.

The very unmanly scream that emanated from the kitchen was enough to make me peel my eyes away from the screen and actually pay attention to what he was doing. "Jack, what the hell?"

"I was trying to make the coffee stop from coming out," he said, rubbing his eyes that had been reddened by the steam attack. "It had the opposite effect, but hey, now I have a coffee flavored brownie covered in the same flavored sauce."

"Whatever floats your boat," I cringed away at the idea of what was sloshing around in his mug. "And I'm not referring to the mixture currently occupying that mug."

"You're such a sour worm, you know?" Jack shook his head as he rounded the kitchen counters. "It's at times like these we need Sarah here again. Anyways, I watched something that you'll find really interesting. See, there's this story..."

The remark stung, and everything entered a stage of being hazy. It didn't feel real, sitting in the living room with my best friend yammering on about subject that he found interesting. My kept kept wandering off to the image of Sarah. The only girl I had ever really loved, the one who now troubled my dreams every night, turning them into nightmares. I had taken countless medicines to counteract them, but they never worked.

"Dude," Jack's handed started waving in front of my face, more specifically in front of the eye region, "are you even listening to what I'm saying?"

Clearing my throat, I shifted my position on the couch, forcing my attention back to him. "Sorry, what did you say?"

He groaned in response. "Dammit, Daniel. I went through a lot of trouble explaining it, but just because you're a good friend, I'll explain it again... Don't you think it's ironic how you have the entire name of a character from Stargate: SG-1? And then you follow his career path...mostly. Worst of all, I have the name of a general from that story, and then there's-"

"I fail to see the irony in that," I interrupted him when that fact suddenly dawned on me. Most of my attention had wavered away from him, but it was enough to notice that mistake.

"You don't? Huh... So maybe it's not irony. You know how bad I am at language and all of its bloody terms. Then it's just weird, isn't it?" he plumped down next to me, deep in through about his newest revelation. The aroma emanating from his mug ended up being pleasant, much to my surprise.

"I guess so," shrugging, I turned the TV on, skipping through the channels until I found one broadcasting the weather.

I hadn't expected Jack would abruptly rip the remote away from me and shut the TV off.

"What was that for?" I exclaimed as he threw the remote on the floor.

"Danny boy...," Jack stared into my eyes, making me feel extremely uncomfortable. He never did say whether or not he was gay. I sure wasn't. "Something's bothering you, and I want you to tell me about it. What it...that dream? About you-know-who?"

On his first try, he had guessed right. Sighing, I buried my face in my hands. Hearing that fact coming out of someone else's mouth made it so much worse. "Yeah."

"Oh, man... Me and my big mouth. Sorry that I brought it up, it was a mistake."

"It doesn't matter... I think about her everyday, Jack. Her face keeps haunting me."

"No no no, you can't allow that, Daniel," he firmly shook his head. "It's been four years. You need to let her go, otherwise you're never going to find another girl. You're be forever alone, just like those those memes suggest."

The way he easily judged me aggravated me. He hadn't been the one that was engaged. He wasn't the one who was in love. And he sure wasn't the one that stood by, watching her die. "You'll be singing a different tune when you lose a loved one."

"And that's exactly why I don't form lasting relationships. It protects me from getting hurt."

"In the end, you're just gonna be a sad old man with no one to love," I growled, grudgingly getting up from my seat to turn the TV on.

"I don't entirely think so," Jack chuckled, missing the seriousness in my voice. "I get the chance to look at pretty girls, like your sister over there."

"You're despicable," I rolled my eyes. "You'd never stand a chance at dating my sis, and my dad would skin you alive if you tried pulling a move on her. While she's a guest at our apartment, you're going to have to treat her with some respect."

"Hey, don't you go saying anything to your pop just yet. It's Darcy's decision who she wants to go out with, okay, and if it happens to be me..."

"Jack, she cut her hair super short when you complimented her on how nice her long hair looked. I think the chances of that are definitely zero."

"It helps to be hopeful," he shrugged. "With my attitude on life, I'm never depressed like you are."

"I'm not depressed," I gritted my teeth, "I'm just struggling to deal with the loss of someone I cared for, alright?"

"Alright, keep lying to yourself for all I care. I'm just saying you need to get closure or something."

"Closure..." The word stuck with me, my thoughts reeling with all the possibilities to what it meant. To get closure, I had to go back to where everything happened. "Jack, for once, you're right. I need to go to Paris."

"Huh...," he raised an eyebrow, not completely understanding the implications of that statement. "Hey, whatever floats your boat, I guess!" he laughed, repeating the words I had used earlier.