Welcome to the Family

*Brian’s POV*

I fell to my knees as I watched the car carrying Joey disappear down the road. She was gone. I had lost her. I didn’t know if I’d ever see her again. I couldn’t bear the thought, it was almost too much.

There was a honk that brought me out of my thoughts. I stood up and saw that Leana and Lacey were pulling into the driveway. The backset of the car loaded with bags.

“Brian why are you sitting in the middle of the street and…what happened to you?!?” Leana asked running over as I stood and walked toward them.

“They took her. They took Joey.” I replied.

“Oh my god! Wait, where are the others?” Lacey asked.

“They’re inside.” I said.

Lacey ran inside while Leana took me by the arm and led me into the house. The front entrance of the house was a wreck. A potted plant that had sat beside the door was broken and the dirt was strewn across the floor. Several other things were broken and glass littered the floor.

Sitting at the foot of the stairs was Matt who was attempting to stem the blood that was pouring from his nose with Johnny beside him nursing a large cut on his upper arm. Val and Gena both looked shaken. I didn’t see Vengeance at first but a moment later he came into the room, Jimmy’s arm draped over his shoulder as he helped him walk, his muscles shaky from the stun gun.

“What happened?” Leana asked.

Johnny filled us in on the first part. Apparently Matt had opened the door thinking it was the pizza guy and had been met by Brad’s fist in his nose. Yes Matt was buffer than the rest of us but not even he could withstand a surprise blow. Brad had then pushed his way in with Rebekka behind him.

Val, Michelle and Gena had gone for Rebekka but hadn’t been able to stop her. Like Joey she was good in a fight. Zacky and Johnny had been able to keep Brad at bay for a while. That was where I filled in what had happened with Rebekka. Eventually Brad had been able to get away and that’s when he’d tackled me in the kitchen.

“I just can’t imagine how they figured out where Johnny lived.” Jimmy said running his still shaking hands through his hair.

“Me either. I mean as far as I know she didn’t even know I lived down the street, let alone where any of the rest of you lived.” I said.

“Look how she found out where Joey was isn’t the point. The point is they have Joey now and god only knows what those fucking psychos are going to do to her.” Michelle said tears falling freely.

The lot of us sat in silence, all of us thinking about the girl that had been ripped from us moments before. It was broken when Jimmy’s phone rang. He pulled it out of his back pocket and flipped it open.

“Hello?” he asked.

He sat listening to whoever was on the other end for a moment before his eyes grew wide.

“WHAT?!? No! Why did you tell her? Oh my god! Fuck! I’ll explain everything later! Bye Mom.” Jimmy said and closed it with a snap.

He looked at all of us, “So it turns out that Rebekka called my parents and told them some bullshit story about wanting to get back in touch with me since she was back in town. They in turn told her that I was at Johnny’s and gave her the address.” Jimmy said.

“FUCK!” I screamed.

I heard the sound of a car in the front of house and ran out as fast as I could but it turned out it was the cops. The others followed and gathered at two police officers, a male and a female, got out of the car.

“We received reports that someone called in a break in and an assault at this residence?” The female cop asked.

“Yeah I did.” Johnny said stepping forward.

“Well I’m officer James and this is Officer Parker. Can you tell us what happened?” the officer asked.

We told them the story and they took notes. They interviewed us separately and took photos of all of our injuries and the damage to Johnny’s house. I gave them a description of Joey and they said they’d be on the look out for her. Once they had done all that they suggested that Jimmy, Matt, Johnny and I get medical attention. We denied it at first but the girls pushed it and we all went to the hospital.

Johnny got twenty five stitches in his arm from where he’d fallen on a piece of glass. Matt’s nose was broken but according to the plastic surgeon who looked at it would heal straight. I had several shards of glass removed from all over my body along with a few stitches in my shoulder.

They had almost admitted Jimmy. They thought that the stun gun had done some sort of damage to his brain or something. It had taken all of us and a nurse that was a big Avenged Sevenfold fan to convince the doctor that no Jimmy wasn’t brain damaged it was normal for him to run around screaming and do random shit.

Once all of us were released from the hospital we headed our separate ways. The drive back to Michelle and I’s place was silent. She drove and I sat in the passenger seat, thousands of thoughts running through my mind.

We passed Joey’s house on the way to ours and suddenly I saw that the front door stood open.

“STOP THE CAR!” I yelled and Michelle hit the breaks, the car jerking to a sharp stop.

“What?” she asked but I was already out of the car and running up the drive.

I pushed the door warily pushed the door the rest of the way open. The house was in decent order and identical in layout to mine. I walked in, keeping on guard. I walked up the stairs and looked in all the rooms. Everything was there but the drawers and closets were all empty.

The weird thing that I noticed was that one room that had a king bed and two separate dressers I took to be Rebekka and her husband’s, the one beside it was obviously not Joey’s as it was bright pink and had pictures of all those poppy Disney teens on the walls and the only other room was and office. If this was a 3 bedroom house where did Joey sleep?

I walked back downstairs and into the kitchen when I saw the door to the basement wasn’t attached to the doorframe. I wondered what that was about and decided to explore the basement. I had hardly gone down three steps when I realized that this was Joey’s room.

The smell of Lavender hit me first and I recognized it as her perfume. The room she’d stayed in at my house still smelled like it. I continued down the steps and saw the walls covered in posters of bands. I saw myself and the guys staring out at me from a few of them along with the likes of Escape The Fate, Bullet For My Valentine, Bring Me The Horizon and Eyes Set To Kill. Clothes were everywhere and the room was a mess but it was obvious that this mess was one that had been there for a while by the fact it was shoved into piles so that there was path to the bed and the bathroom.

Then my eyes fell on her bed. Sitting on the pillow was Boogie. He looked at me with his wide button eyes. I walked over to the bed and picked him up. I sat down on the bed and sighed looking at the plush gray animal in my hands. That’s when the tears started.

I felt the bed shift and I looked up to see Michelle with tears in her eyes sitting by me. She wrapped her arms around me and cried the same as I did.

“We have to get her back ‘Chelle.” I said after a few moments.

“I know Bri. We will. I promise. Joey will come back to us.” she replied and all I could do was pray that she was right.