Once again, we don't have to walk too far, but the silence is kind of unnerving, since nothing in the neighborhood actually dares to disturb it other than the occasionally car here and there. Lyle has been silent for a change, and although I have many questions about this Newt guy and the Outcast, I decide to keep them to myself until the mood lifts up a little.

Soon we stop in front of a two-story house with a metallic curtain sealed shut and full of graffiti. Lyle knocks on the door twice before a woman opens. She peeks out on the street first, then she smiles at Lyle and glances at me with curiosity.

"Hi there, Lyle. Are you here to see Charlie?"

"Hi, Mrs. Newton. Is he available?"

"I think he's recording right now, but please, come in." She makes room for us and we enter a small room furnished as a store, but obviously closed. "Will you introduce me to your friend?"

"Oh, this is John. He's new in town." I lift a hand to mimic a lazy wave. Lyle turns to me, gesturing at the woman. "She's Newt's mom."

"Oh, new in town, you say?" She looks at me with new interest, and I almost expect a million questions about Celadon Bay. "I hope you like it here so far."

"Thanks. I do," I lie to her, even managing what I hope looks like a buyable smile.

"Mom, what's going on?" The voice comes from the end of the room, and when we look that way, we see a guy's head peeking from a staircase I didn't see at first. But then he sees me, and his brows pinch in anger. "Who are you?"

"Yo, Newt." Lyle stands in the way, pointing a thumb at me. I lift my hand again like I did with the woman. "This is John, the new kid in town."

"I told you a million times not to bring anyone with you here, didn't I?"

"Don't be rude, Charlie," the woman chastises.

"Chill, man. He's nice."

Newt gives me a once-over before looking back at Lyle. His anger is trying to leave his face, but his brows are still pinched together.

"I don't buy the 'nice' thing," he replies at last, his face now sealed shut in a mask of skepticism. "In Maple Heights you're either bad or an Outcast. So which one is it, new kid? Should I hate or pity you?"

"Charles Newton! That's enough!" His mother snaps, making her way to the end of the stairs. "Come down here and welcome our guest."

"But, Mom..."

"Now!" The power of Mom wins the argument. Newt growls, and slowly makes his way down the stairs. His mother turns to me. "I'm sorry, John. He's not bad, but he's been through stuff and he isn't quick to trust strangers."

"It's fine," I say, and then look up at Newt, who's finally landing next to his mother. He has some nasty bed hair (that could use a cut) covering his honey eyes. "It's nice to meet you, Charles. I'll be leaving now if it makes you uncomfortable."

"That's okay. Sorry about that," he says, unable to hold my gaze and scratching his neck. His mom approves with a nod, and her features soften again.

"I'll bring you some drinks."

"Can you take them up to my room?" He does some elaborate handshake with Lyle.

"Sure thing, dear."

"Okay then, follow me."

So we walk upstairs, and we go through the first door down the narrow aisle. The room we enter is also small, and even smaller with all the shelves that populate three of the walls, each and every one of them filled with different tech parts and components, cables, screens, computer parts, video game consoles, boxes and boxes filled to the brim with even more stuff, and a small table covered in tools and even more spare parts.

"There's not a lot of room, but please, make yourself at home."

Lyle jumps on the bed, which is about the only surface where one would be able to sit in. There's so much in this room to take in that I can't stop looking around.

"Pretty impressive, huh?" Lyle grabs Newt's pillow and places it behind his back, leaning against the wall.

"Dude, this is impressive!"

"Most of it is still working, although the vast majority of those are already outdated hardware."

I pick up a big graphics card from one of the shelves.

"Isn't this an HD 6970?"

"Oh, you know that one?"

"This is one hell of a video card," I tell him, although I'm pretty sure he knows that better than I do. "It would definitely bottleneck with my computer, though."

"I fried that one, but I managed to get myself a 7970."

"Duuuuude."

I look at Newt, and he's giving me a proud smile, the first I see in his face.

"Could you guys please stop the nerd talk already?"

"You're no fun, Lyle," I tease him, and he rolls his eyes.

"Whatever. So Newt, there's a reason why we're here today."

"I hope so. You know you shouldn't be seen around here at all."

Lyle sighs heavily, deflating in the process.

"I'd love saying 'eff those dungs', but I know you have a point."

"So why did you risk it?"

"It's about the new weirdo and now nerd standing there," he explains, his palm gesturing in my direction. Newt fixes me with a curious look. "He doesn't quite buy the idea of the Outcast. He goes as far as to believe it's a good idea to become one."

"And here I was starting to think he was kind of smart." Newt presses his palms to his eyes, rubbing them a little. "You have no clue what happens when you're an Outcast, do you?"

"Well, to be fair, I heard about it not fifteen minutes ago."

Newt turns to Lyle. "So you brought him here so I could lecture him?"

"Pretty much."

"And you think that's just okay for you to do?"

There's two knocks on the door before Mrs. Newton enters the room.

"I brought the drinks, kids."

"You can take them back. They're leaving already." I don't know why, but Newt is now pissed. He crosses the small room and snatches his fried video card out of my hands and pushes me outside.

"Charles! Would you please stop being rude to your friends?!"

"I have no friends!" he snaps back at her. "They shouldn't be here either, or they'll have to go through hell like we did! Is that what you want?!" He then turns to Lyle and me, raising his voice and bursting into angry tears. "Is that what you guys want?!"

"Look, man. I know what you mean, and that behind your anger you mean well." Lyle places his hands on Newt's shoulders. "But consider two things: One, we're not them. We aren't here to mess up with you. And two, if you kick us out like this, someone might see, hear or notice. That beats the point, don't you agree? You understand that, right, Newt?"

"Lyle, we should get going," I tell him in my lowest voice, trying not to disturb Newt any more than he already is.

"No, wait..." Newt rubs his eyes again, this time to dry away his tears. "Lyle's right."

"I'll leave this here." Mrs. Newton places a tray in her son's desk before leaving the room. Newt takes a few deep breaths to right himself enough to speak again.

"Sorry, guys. I didn't mean to."

"It's fine, Newt. I'm sorry you had to go through this." Lyle apologizes, sitting back in the bed.

"It's okay if you don't want to talk about it, though," I add. "It obviously makes you uncomfortable, so I don't want to push it."

"It's fine. You need to know before you make mistakes you might regret." He turns around and serves some drinks before passing us some glasses. He sits again in his desk chair, takes a long swig of his drink, and finally looks ready to speak. "I'll go with the short version, if that's okay." I nod at him, sitting in the bed next to Lyle and leaning forward so I don't miss any details. "I used to have a crush on a girl, and it was sort of unrequited. Still, I tried too hard and she ended up hating me. That's when her brother found out I was bothering his precious sister and started picking on me. First it was some shoving here and there, then one day he started hitting me, and when he made sure I wouldn't let him bother me, he went as far as to destroy Mom's store." He pauses a little while. He gathers his guts and continues. "That's when I switched to next town's High School, but then they'd be waiting for me when I came back home, so I had to drop school, and eventually I even stopped going out of the house altogether. I've spent my time holed up here ever since."

"Wait a second. Didn't your parents notify the police or anything?"

"Yes." For the first time since he started talking, he meets my eyes. "But this guy, Rude? He's backed up by The Fist."

"The what?"

"The Fist. They're a gang from the outskirts of town. Big ass gang. They roam the town freely, especially at night. For the most part they behave, but if they decide to do whatever they want, the police won't try to stop them."

"Pussies!" I snap, spilling a little of my own drink. This whole deal with Rude and the Outcast keeps spiraling deeper and deeper, and knowing that Newt has no way out of it really pisses me off. "How come they do nothing?!"

"If they tried to stop them, Maple Heights would become a war zone," Lyle replies, and takes a sip. "Neither of them would risk that, so there's some cold truce between them, and nobody messes with each other so long as The Fist keeps their end of the bargain. At least that's what most people think, which makes sense, I guess, because as Newt mentioned, they behave, mostly."

"Since this started, Mom's been trying to sell the house and move out, but the problems with The Fist are well known in the neighboring areas, and Maple Heights isn't such a good place to live either way, so there's no luck."

Such a shit-hole you dragged me into, Mom. I don't think neither her or Dad knew anything about it, though, so there's nothing I could possibly blame on them.

"Amanda has her eyes on John, since he's new in town and all."

"You should be extremely careful, then."

"Yeah, Lyle said as much." I look around the room, five minutes ago so damn cool, now becoming such a small prison cell. "Isn't there anything we can possibly do to stop this?"

"I don't think so, man." Lyle stands and serves himself another glass of the drink, reminding me that I didn't try my own. It's iced tea, and tastes amazing. "Other than stepping out of the radar."

"I gather they still don't know that Lyle visits you here, right?"

"He's pushing his luck coming here." Newt nudges Lyle with his elbow.

"I'm too stubborn to stop being your friend, bitch."

"You're gonna get in trouble for this if you're caught."

"Okay. I made up my mind," I say, and both of them turn to look at me. "Since you obviously don't want us to visit, at least give me your phone number so we can still get in touch."

"Uh, no."

"What do you mean 'no'?"

"I'm not giving you my phone number."

"Why not? You look like a cool dude and I want to stay in touch with you."

"One stubborn imbecile friend is enough."

"Hey!" Lyle reacts.

"It's true. You're one stubborn imbecile who doesn't know how to stay the hell away from trouble."

"As soon as he gets in trouble, I'm in for some trouble as well," I tell Newt. "He's pretty much my only friend here so..."

"This dung is your only friend? Now I feel sorry for you."

"He's so much fun to tease, though," I add, and Newt finally allows himself to laugh.

"You guys are so mean!"

In the end, Newt cracks up and allows me to have his number and Skype with the condition that I never contact him out of my own house, and I book him with a fake name.

Later, we leave Newt's place after double checking the street is nice and empty. We walk in silence for a little while, and when I catch a glimpse of Lyle's face, I see he's smiling to himself.

"What's with the creepy smile, though?"

"Straightforward as ever, aren't you?"

"Kind of badass too, not to mention handsome."

He laughs. "You're pushing your luck now. But I kinda agree with your badassery, if that makes you feel better."

"It hurts my feelings that you don't find me handsome."

Lyle rolls his eyes and shakes his head. He finally changes the subject. "I feel good about today."

To be honest, I feel the same, although it started as hell on earth back at school.

"I can't help but pity Newt, though." He reminds me of the John I used to be back at Sunset Central. Always by myself, always jailed at home, with no friends, and avoiding making new ones. Lucky me, Martin changed that once I moved to Celadon Bay. I thought that Sunset Central's John would be back when I first moved in here, but I guess I'm glad that Lyle followed me after school.

"It sucks that we can't do more for him." He shoves his hands deep in his pockets, looking kind of depressed, but that's short-lived. "Although I'm glad that you didn't hesitate to become his friend. I guess that makes you a real fearless dude."

"Kind of badass too, not to mention handsome."

And this time, he laughs.