Where to Run? Where to Hide?

"Zach, I'm fine." I repeated once again, growing tired of having to repeat myself over and over again. For the past three hours, Zach had been following me around the house, constantly asking if I needed anything, if I was okay. I'll admit, it was cute for the first five minutes, but it just got aggravating after a while.

"Are you sure? I could get you some water, make you a sandwich, get you-" Zach began to rant again, his voice speeding up as he continued to list all the possible ways he could help.

"Dude, calm down. She's fine. Too proud to admit she needs help, but fine." Alex spoke up from where he was sitting on the couch, watching some show I had never heard of.

I rolled my eyes at his remark, turning back to face Zach. "I'm fine, really." Looking up at the clock on the wall, I added. "You need to get to bed, you haven't been getting much sleep."

Zach looked at me skeptically. "You'll call me if you need anything?"

I smiled sweetly at him. "If it'll make you happy, fine. Now go." I said, pushing him slightly.

He rolled his eyes to get up, bending down to give me a hug. "If you wanted privacy to talk to him, you could've just asked." he whispered in my ear before pulling away, smiling.

I rolled my eyes again. "Just get to bed."

He flashed me another one of his smiles before heading over to the stair. That left Alex and I in the room. Alone. Great, cause that always ended well, didn't it?

We didn't talk, just stared at the screen. Alex had refused to go back home, saying he had to make sure I was fine, even though I told him I had Zach and my mom if anything happened. After about a half an hour of arguing, I have in, telling him he can sleep in the spare room with Zach. He didn't seem all too happy about that, but he agreed. Seriously, what was up with him and Zach?

The TV screen flashed a bright, white light before turning black. Confused, I turned to Alex. He had his arm raised, remote in hand, staring blankly at the black screen. Slowly, he turned his head in my direction. The expression he wore was hard to read, but by the looks of it, it wasn't a happy one.

"We need to talk." he stated, placing the remote on the coffee table, and turning his whole body in my direction.

"Really? 'Cause I don't see any reason to." I stated, crossing my arms around my chest, still staring at the blank screen.

"Oh, don't give that shit, Irony. We need to talk and you know it." he snapped, shocking me. I still wasn't use to him snapping. The Alex I was use to was gentle, calm, collected. This Alex was none of that sort.

I turned to face him, my eyebrow raised. " What is it you wanna talk about so badly, then."

"What the hell happened before? Who was that guy? What did he want from you?"

"That," i began, looking back to the screen, not wanting to see Alex's angered face. "is none of your business."

"The hell it isn't! If it weren't for me, you'd be in a comma at the nearest hospital."

I lowered my head to look at my lap. Damn, why did he have to be the one that came? Why not a next door neighbor other then him or something? Once again, the odds were always against me. Damn damn damn damn damn.

"Scar." I whispered quietly.

"What?" Alex asked, his voice sounding much calmer now, to my relief.

"Scar." I repeated. I sighed, looking up to face him. "His name is Scar. He was my drug dealer."

Alex froze, staring at me in a blank stare. He didn't speak, just stared. His eyes on me was staring to feel unconformable. I shifted in my seat, crossing my arms tighter around my chest.

"You do drugs?" Alex asked in disbelief. Finally I thought.

"Well, no. I did drugs. Not anymore, I quite a about six months ago." I said, deciding to leave the part about wanting to get some more a couple of days ago out. No need to put fuel in the fire.

"Then what did that Scar guy want with you now?"

I sighed again looking down at my lap again. I slid a bit lower in my seat. "He came to collect his side of the deal." I said, smiling a bit shaking my head at how ridiculous this is.

"What deal?" Alex asked, his voice turning hard.

"The deal I made with him to get Zach out of that hell hole." I muttered, only loud enough so he could hear.

"Wait, how did Zach get in the middle of this?" he demanded, hissing Zach's name.

I sighed, realizing I had to tell him the whole story. He wasn't going to like it, but hey, he asked for it. "A couple of days ago, I was... tired, you could say. Tired of everything that was going on. Tired of you, of my friends protectiveness, the damn pity eyes, the past, everything. I just wanted an escape from it all. Even if it was only for a few minutes." I took in a deep breath. "So, I called up Scar."

"Irony." Alex began to say something, but I cut him off.

"You wanted to hear it, so don't start interrupting." I hissed, still not looking up at him. Again, I took in a deep breath before continuing. "I told him to meet me at the park, where we usually made our deals. So I went, expecting to see Scar or one of his little followers there. Instead, I saw Zach. He was so young, not the usual Scar would hire. Plus, he didn't have any signs of handling drugs. He was so shy, so antsy. Then... I saw the choke marks."

I paused, closing my eyes, remembering. "I couldn't just leave him like that, so I took him back to Scar's house were he was staying. The way that mother fucker was treating him was fucking unbelievable. It made what you do to him look like a pat on that back. I told him that I wanted to take Zach away. He said sure, at a price." I opened my eyes again. "He gets a date with Lauren."

I laughed, humorlessly. "After all that mother fucker and his fucking asshole of a friend had done to us, he had the nerve to ask. Naturally, I denied, thinking I would find another way to take Zach later, he could last another few nights here." I sighed. "That's when he told me Blake was returning back." I looked up at Alex for the first time since I started, He was looking at me with that same, unreadable expression as before. "You have to understand, Blake is a soulless asshole, he wouldn't take a minute to think before killing Zach. Scar practically promised it would happen. I had to take him out of there."

I sighed, for what felt like the billiont time today, looking away from Alex. "The rest you know."

As I expected, he didn't say anything. Not a word. I was becoming use to these silences between us. Under normal occasions, I would have enjoyed it. A moment without fighting with Alex? Brilliant! But now? Now it was more aggravating then him not talking at all.

"Damn it, say something." I hissed, looking at him from the corner of my eyes.

"Say something? Say what? Say how idiot I think it was of what you did? Remind you how you nearly gotten yourself killed, and for what? A fucking cutting runaway?" Alex practically screamed at him. I guess I should've expected him to say something among those lines, but it still shocked me to hear him actually say them out loud.

"Don't talk about Zach that way." I hissed again, turning in his direction to glare at him. "If your going to judge him for cutting, you might as well judge me as well. I'm no better."

"Yeah, but it's different." he shouted.

"How? How is it so different?" I screamed back, taking him off guard. When he didn't answer, I continued. "We both did it to make our self's better, to release the pain. The only difference between us is that I quite."

"No matter what, you should never hurt yourself to make yourself feel better." Alex spoke softly, trying to make me calm down was my guess.

"Well, that doesn't matter when you feel there's nothing else you can do." I said, trying to lower my voice. "When you feel you've lost everything, that theres nothing else you can do, that cutting is the only solution, what else do you think were going to do?"

Alex shook his head, looking away from me. A pained expression was making its way known on his face. That shocked me. Out of everything that I expected, disgust, repulsion, shock, I did not guess pain.

"What?" I asked, softly.

"Why did you start? And don't lie, I can tell when you lie." he asked, still not looking my way.

I was taken back. I didn't expect that either. Well, wasn't he full of surprises today. "Um.. uh, well, I thought that that was obvious." I stated. When he shock his head, I added. "Well, how did you expect me to react to my best friend ends up missing without a fucking warning? I thought you were dead!" I said, raising my voice to a shout.

"I thought you'd get over it, that you would forget me." he whispered, shacking his head in astonishment.

" I don't know about you, but all those years of friendship and promises actually meant something to me" I spat at him, my anger still at a dangerous level.

He looked up at me in complete and utter shock. " You don't think that that meant anything to me? You actually thought I could just forget all about you? All about us?"

"What else was I to think when you just disappeared without telling me?"

"I was fourteen! I was a scared, young kid! What do you expect me to do? Go act all hero and do all the right things?"

"I expected you to at least care enough to tell me that you were okay, that you were going to be okay." I stated, my voice deadly calm. I didn't like how this conversation was going. Not at all. Sure, it was better than our other fights in ways, but it was still a fight.

Alex sighed, getting up and sitting down right next to me. "Give me another chance, Iry. Please. I know I messed up, and you probably wanted to kill me when you first saw mw in school, but can't we at least try? For real this time? Not say you forgive me when we both know that you didn't."

Now it was my turn to sigh. What he was saying is what I knew I wanted. To try to be friends with Alex again, to forget about the past. But the past had a way of finding its way back into your mind, no matter how much you tries pushing it away. Was it possible to forgive him completely To move on from it?

"What guaranty do I have that you wont do it again?" I asked, looking him straight in the eyes. "What guaranty do I have that you wont decided that you hate this town and will just disappear frim my life once again without warning?"

Alex reached for my hand, holding it in both of his. "I wouldn't do that. If I did, let lightning fall from the sky and strike me dead."

I gave a small laugh, getting up and heading out of the room. He grabbed my hand gently, not allowing me to go away. "Where you going?" he asked.

I gave a small smile. "I'm getting away from you. I wouldn't want to be around when that lightning hits you."

"Iry,-" Alex began, but once again, I cut him off.

"Goodnight Alex." I said, smiling, and, against my better judgements, gave him a peck on the cheek, before walking up to my room. I hope that he understood what that peck meant. We will try to be friends. I just hope it turns out right this time.