We formed letters, symbols, pictures of things out of the pieces from the bottle. We still had no clue about anything.

“I guess we have come to a dead end,” Peter said.

“What? Do you want to die here?” I asked.

He sighed and shrugged.

“Come on, we can't give up! We were on a roll. We have to think, I'm very positive it's not that complicated or far–”

“Oh my God, look!”

Michelle's voice was shaking as much as her hands were. She was holding up a piece of folded paper.

“The fuck…where did you find that?” I said.

“In the small ball! I was playing with it. I pressed on it a little hard by mistake and it just popped open!”

“Nice Michelle!” Peter exclaimed and asked for the paper.

“I cry out in pain
Red liquid dribbles down my chest
Eventually it fades
Long after I lay down to rest," he read out.

“Well, these clues got dark fast. Have any clue what this one could be talking about?”

“Nope,” I said, ignoring his pun.

“I think I might have an idea,” Michelle said.

“What is it?” I asked

“Michelle let's hold on for now, okay? Let's go and see what we can do about ourselves first,” Peter said, sighing in exhaustion.

I looked down at my clothes. As expected, our clothes were filthy, our hair was in the worst condition and we hadn't had a proper meal in days.

“Yeah, first what do we do about our clothes?” I asked.

“We can dry clean them,” Michelle suggested.

“Well there's soap.” Tanya emerged from the tent and sauntered over to us. She stopped and stood above us with her arms crossed.

Somehow, she managed to look a bit less unkempt than the rest of us. And that wasn't helping matters with me and the whole situation.

“So we wash them and put on what?” Peter asked, giving her a pointed stare.

“There are some clothes in ther–"

"What? No fucking way I'm putting on clothes that I don't know how long they've been here or who has put them on."

"There are actually some neat clothes there. Freshly washed jeans, some t-shirts." She uncrossed her arms and let them fall. "We don't have to put them on for long. Once our original clothes dry, we change back. Sounds good?"

“That's the best idea we could get, I think,” Peter surrendered. “Alright you girls go right ahead. Larry and I will come later."

“Come on Michelle.”

They walked into the shed and emerged with some clothes, a bar of soap and a rope. Then Tanya gestured to the right and they started to head down.

“She's looking down in the dumps.”

“Yeah…”

Peter raised an eyebrow at me.
“Hey, she started acting that way ever since the both of you came back from the whole sunset thing. Did…anything happen between you guys? Did you argue? Now I see it, I haven't even seen you guys exchange words since.”

I felt like I couldn't really hide the hurt and guilt. It was hard. I felt like I could talk to Peter at least. And I really wanted to tell someone.

“She um…told me that she liked me.”

Peter's brows rose so high I thought they would jump off his forehead. His mouth was hanging open and his eyes were as wide as saucers.

I chuckled at his expression. “Yeah, that was my expression too."

“What…? That's crazy. And what did you say to her?”

“I did like her back. But…nothing could happen between us.”

“Why…?” he whispered looking at me with a stare I couldn't really read.

“Because…as I worded to her, ‘I’m fucked in the head’ and I'm not ready for anything like that because I have a lot going on and I don't want to hurt anyone.”

He nodded solemnly. “What happened?”

I looked down at the ground.

“You don't like talking about certain things about your past. I noticed that.”

I looked up at him.

“And I know it's probably hard but you can always talk to me.”

My stomach twisted just thinking about it. I didn't know if I could even say it out loud without breaking apart and that was the last thing I wanted to do there.

Maybe I could try. And Peter was my friend.

“When I was younger,” I began and Peter nodded at me to go on.

“If it's too much you can stop.”

“I was reckless. And I was a kleptomaniac. I was always fighting and stealing and being a bad kid. My parents tried their best to make me stop. I didn't ever listen to them. My best friend too. I wonder why he was ever friends with me.

“So um, one day I stole something and I was caught and…the police, they were after me. And…my family, they were just coming out of the grocery store and my best friend was with me. Once they were all in the car, I jumped in and they already knew what was happening so my dad just drove, hoping that we would escape but we didn't…

“We crashed. And everyone apart from me, they…” I sobbed. I couldn't go on again.

“Christ…” Peter murmured and came over to sit next to me. He put his arm around me and tried to console me.

“I'm so sorry.”

“Don't be,” I managed to say though my sobs, “I'm just so fucking stupid.”

“But it wasn't your fault. The kleptomania–”

“I knew what I was doing, stealing what I stole,” I said stiffly.

“But…” he started. “Oh my God.”

His hand was over his mouth.

I hated talking about the incident. The first days in my first foster home, I was forced to have therapy sessions. They said talking about it would make things easier. It didn't. I hated the pity too. Like don't do that, I pity myself enough. I would even appreciate it if you were mean to me after knowing the whole story.

Peter looked up at me.

“Dude I'm sorry, it's just a lot you've dumped on me right now,” he said with a short laugh. “First, the Tanya thing. Now this.”

“Yeah…I'm sorry.”

“No, no. I'm the one who asked.”

“Still, no one would expect a story as fucked up as this. Heck, I should have started with a trigger warning.”

Peter chuckled softly and squeezed my shoulder.

“Can I ask a few more questions?”

I sniffed. “Sure.”

“How did you really end up here? In the woods?”

“Like you probably guessed. I ran away.”

“Oh…” He shifted a little. “Why?”

“It was stupid. I know–”

“No, I wouldn't know so I'm not judging but…why did you really run away?”

“Because I couldn't take it anymore. They were trying…I think. But they just couldn't fill that hole in me like they thought they could. And I…” I opened my palms up below me and balled them into fists. “I guess I just felt like if I left that world behind, I'd leave the past there too.”

I sighed and dropped my face into my palms.

“I don't know if that's working. I mean,” I murmured and looked up and around us. “I'm stuck in a forest that I can't leave and I'm solving clues and barely surviving. I don't know.”

“Maybe. Maybe all you needed was, like you said, to get out of that world. You needed to escape your past. But I don't think running away was a good idea Lars.”

“Yeah, first thing I said to you.”

“Oh yeah,” he said with a chuckle. “But you really didn't think this through did you?”

“Nope. I…uh, didn't want to overthink it. So it won't stop me.”

“Say we found our way out of this forest eventually, yeah? Where would you go?”

“I don't know,” I admitted.

“Where would you want to go?”

I ran my hands through my hair and took a really deep breath, letting it out sharply. “I don't fucking know Peter…you think I fucking do?”

He froze, startled. “Oh I'm sorry, I–”

I got up suddenly. A mixture of emotions were swirling within me. I couldn't tell if the negative ones were outweighing the positive ones or vice versa.

My chest ached and I tried to take calming breaths. The world was closing in on me. I was having a panic attack.

I dropped to my knees and wheezed. I felt a hand on my shoulders.

“Hey, hey, breathe.”

I tried. I was so fucking confused. And fucked up. My throat ached and I let out a strangled noise. I let myself fall to the floor and I sobbed.

“Do you need me to stay…or leave?”

I sat up slowly. My head spun.

“I think I need to be alone.” I managed to get up, and suddenly felt a bit embarrassed about the whole thing.

“I'm gonna take a walk.”

With that I walked past him quickly and disappeared into the trees. I took a deep, shaky breath. I felt lightheaded but I didn't stop to rest. I needed to take a walk. It helped most of the time. I hoped it would help.

+_+_+
A/N

Am I an annoying little fella?