“Nikkie, what are you doing here?” Ken’s husky voice echoed around me.

I felt like fallen, everything in the room was spinning around me. Something was tiptoeing inside my entire body, and slowly crawling pass my stomach causing it to rumble violently. I heard my name being called from someone faraway but I couldn’t figure out who it was. As my chest became unbearably full I knew I was going to vomit. I frantically tried to run to the trash can but I didn’t make it. I threw up all the contents of my stomach on Ken’s carpet.

I stood there with my head in the palms of my hands trying to catch my breath. A warm hand was at my shoulder, “Nikkie, are you okay?” asked Ken behind me. His voice had a hint of worry in it but I didn’t care.

“Get the hell away from?” I growled at him as I smacked his hand away from me. “How could you do this to me? I thought you loved. I thought you were going to wait for me. How could you do this today of all days?”

“I’m sor…”

“Shut it McCall. I have had enough sorry today” he moved back from me and that’s when I finally got a good look at her.

She was sitting at the edge of the bed, ready to make her escape out of the door. Yet, she hadn’t put her clothes back on, her nakedness was covered by a thin white sheet. Her eyes were everywhere but at me. Why did that have to happen?

“How could you?” I asked her, my voice so small that it surprised me that she heard me.

She turned her eyes to me but it wasn’t what I expected to see. It wasn’t the eyes of my best friend looking back at me. It was the ones of someone who have been to hell and back. Her broken spirit was visible through her eyes. I temporarily soften but I also cached a glimpse of pure hatred on them. I had the impression that I broke my best friend but I couldn’t figure out how.

“You killed him.” Neither her glare nor her voice faltered but I had a problem understanding what she was saying.

“What?”

“You killed dad.”

“What the hell are you talking about? And what does my dad’s death has to do with you sleeping with my boyfriend.”

“Now, he’s just Your dad. You think You’re the only one who had to suffer.” She walked up to me, “He was my dad too. I actually thought we were sisters but I guess I was wrong.”

“So now I’m the one to blame? I’m not the one lying in bed with somebody else’s boyfriend.”

A sinister laugh came out of her, “boyfriend. You were always so naïve, you actually thought he was your boyfriend. He was probably banging half the school behind your back. He jumped so fast at the opportunity when I told him I wanted to sleep with him. You should have put out little sister but like always you were trying to be a saint. You’ve always thought you were better than everybody else even me. Boohoo your mom died when you were six. But at least she cared about you. My parents don’t give a danm about me. My father abandoned us and my mother made me her personal free maid ever since. I had to take care of three little brothers while staying on top of my school work and extracurricular activities. What have you ever done? Nothing.”

Anger was building inside me but I didn’t know how to unleash it. My face was burning hot with rage. I felt it cooled down with my tears, I desperately tried to stop them but they flowed even more.

“The only thing anybody ever asked of you was for you to stay home and take care of dad but you couldn’t do that. Little miss perfect had to achieve her selfish dream of going to school far away from home. You know I proposed to stay with him after you told me he had leukemia but you know what he told me. He said “no Roxie you have to go make something of yourself. I don’t need someone to babysit me.” Bullshit. He obviously needed you; why else would he fake a disease to make you stay with him? But you just had to have it your way. Look where your selfishness brought you. Now, you’re just a scared lonely little girl crying over her cheating little boyfriend who never gave a crap about her.”

“Okay, Roxie. I think that’s enough now.” Ken came between her and me. He attempted to pull her away but slapped his hands away.

“Don’t touch me. I cared about you Nikkie. I did but you were too blind to see that. What do you have to say for yourself now, selfish little b…”

I didn’t know what I was doing. I had no idea how it happened. It seemed that I blacked out and once I came back up my right hand was burning. There were smudges of blood on my knuckles but I couldn’t remember where I got them from.

“Why did you do that?” I turned to see Ken at Roxie’s side as she held her cheek in her hands. There was nothing but furry in her eyes as she glared at me. That was when I realized that I had punched my best friend. Wasn’t I supposed to feel guilty? ...Because I only felt bliss at that moment.

“Okay, let’s just calm down.” Ken approached me like I was a ticking bomb, “Nikkie, I’m sorry. Believe me I don’t know what happened but I never meant to hurt you.”

What did I ever find attract about him? The very look of him disgusted me. I had to get out of here. She could have him because I couldn’t stand either of them anymore. I began backing out the door when Ken’s arms wrench me back to him, “Nikkie, wait. We can talk about this.” He seemed so vulnerable but before I could fall back into his lies, I slapped across the face and ran out.

“Is everything alright Ms. Craig?” I heard Ella called out on my way to the door but I didn’t stay to give her a full report on what had just happened. She would find out eventually but I had to be out of this out by the time it happened.

Once again I felt loss. I didn’t have anywhere to go. My house was bombarded with people, I didn’t have a best friend nor a boyfriend to run to. I guessed I was all alone. However, for the first time I didn’t want to run away from my problems. I wanted revenge.

I drove aimlessly under the dangerous climate. I needed to clear my head and let go of my ghosts. I parked my car in front of the park where my mom took her last breath. I passed under the chain blocking the entrance to the park. When I finally reached the bridge, my feet ached of walking under inches deep of snow.

I let out a long exasperated sigh. I was face to face with the place where my troubles started. I couldn’t help wondering how would my life had turned out if she had been had some place around that time. She was simply at the wrong place at the wrong time and it was all because of me. I destroyed my family.

“I knew you had a little crush on me but stalking is not my favorite quality in a girl.” I didn’t have to turn to know who it was. Why couldn’t he leave me alone?

“From where I’m standing you’re the stalker with the crush.” I kept my eyes ahead not wanting anyone to see the moister in my eyes especially not him. However, my plan didn’t last long since he was on my line of vision before I could bat an eyelid.

“I have a feeling that those tears are not being shed for your father.” His soft tone gave the illusion that he actually care but I knew better. I could only count on myself.

“Why do you care?”

“I don’t but my mom told me I had to comfort a girl when she’s crying so I don’t come out as an asshole” he shrugged carelessly but I detected a pint of worry on his face.

“Sorry to disappoint your mother but it’s kind of too late for you.” I smiled cheekily at him. Wasn’t I supposed to be sulking over my best friend’s betrayal?

“Yeah, she was never the best judge of character.” I saw puff of air slipping out of his lips as he breathed in the cold air. He plunged his hands deeper in his jacket, “Do you want to talk about?”

“No.”

“Oh, thank God.” He sighed heavily as if he had been holding his breath for a long time and just tasted clean air, “No offense but I really didn’t want to listen, I have way better things to do than freeze myself to dead in an empty park. See ya.”

And he walked away. The bastard actually walked away from me, leaving me alone with my mind again. I needed his company right now even if he I didn’t want to admit it. Anything to not be alone with me, I might end up killing myself.

“Gotcha!” He shouted behind me making me fall flat on my butt. Ouch! Wasn’t the snow supposed to soften my fall? Instead, it felt worse than all my previous fall off my bed. I heard Jake’s throaty laugh booming in the air, “You should have seen your face.” He held on to his chest as he continued to laugh at my misery.

I got up and angrily marched toward my car. I opened to door but before I could get in, he hauled me back to him.

“It was a joke. I’m sorry.” He said but his laughter hadn’t subdued yet.

That was undeniably the worse thing he could have said to me at that moment. Sorry is nothing but a careless attempt at fooling someone after who’ve screw them over. I didn’t want sorry as an apology anymore.

“Sorry? That’s all you had to say?” I punched his chest but ended up hurting myself more than him. His slim figure seemed so fragile, how come he was hard as rock underneath that jacket?

“Calm down, I didn’t mean it” his hands were at my shoulders trying to pacify me but I wasn’t ready for that tonight. For the past weeks, I’ve been lied to, betrayed, and abandoned. My blood was boiling with an insurmountable amount of fury. Too bad he was the one in front of me when it he began to surface.

“Calm down, is that the only thing that everybody can say now days?” I shoved him, this time his body moved an inch away. “People don’t need to know what you’re going through but they all want you to come down whenever they say it. Well guess what buddy? This is me calming down.”

I don’t know how I managed it but apparently I was strong enough to thrust him on the floor. His eyes widen when I straddled him and took his jacket in my fists. My face less than an inch away from him, I began to blast his ears off. I was mute for the past few years of my life but I wanted to shout out my frustration. Nobody wanted to listen but I will make someone listen.

“I have had enough of being walked all over. My father just died, my best friend slept with my boyfriend, and I’m all alone. I don’t need another self-absorb idiot in my life thinking I’m a joke. Do you think I’m a joke?” I shook him violently.

“Yes… I mean no. I don’t think you’re a joke, I swear” he stuttered.

I was puzzled as to why he was letting me do that to him. He could have lifted me off of him easily but he lay still, letting me screamed at him for things he had nothing to do with. Even though his voice showed he was afraid, his eyes told a different story. He wasn’t afraid of me, he pitied me.

I got off of him, “Why?”

“Why I don’t think you’re a joke?” he asked genuinely confused.

“No, why did you let me do that? You’re way stronger than me so you could have made me move with no effort.”

“You needed to blow off some steam” he shrugged as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. “If anyone knows about blowing off steam, it’s me.”

Curiosity took the better of me, I was supposed to be mad to the point of no return but I can never pass on an intriguing story. “What’s your story?”

“I’ll tell you mine if you tell me yours.”

“Are you kidding me? Everybody in this town knows my story, it was headline for an entire week.”

“I moved here last year and I’m not that good at making friends.”

“I wonder why” I murmured under my breath.

“What was that?” He lifted himself from the floor wiping away the white mess on his clothes.

He was willing to listen, maybe I should give it a shot. After all what have I got to lose. I’ve had already lost everything worth holding on to. “It’s a long story.”

“I have a ridiculous amount of time to waste,” he inched closer to me, “and the drama behind the school’s perfect girl is kind of killing me.”

Then without any warning, he left. I was alone once again in the middle of the streets covered in snow. What was it with me driving people away? Seriously, I needed to find it out sooner rather than later or I would end up a grumpy old lady with a cats as my only confidants.

“So tell me,” A shriek broke into the air startling my fragile heart before it dawned on me that it was coming from me. “How does one becomes the school’s best and brightest?” He brought a bottle to his lips and offered the other one to me.

“Alcohol, seriously Jake?”

“Yep, now drink up.”

I looked at the can bottle in his outstretch hands, it was so tempting for me to take it. I wanted to rebel against my instinct to walk away from it but it was hard moving from an ideal that had been ingrained in me since I was born.

“I don’t think we should do this, isn’t it illegal?”

“So is breaking and entering?”

“It wasn’t breaking and entering. I was just…” I’ve hit a brick wall. I had no idea what I was trying to do when I entered the park. I guess I needed closure, and I wanted a clam place I could feel safe and think. How ironic? I could only feel safe at the place where my mother was attacked.

“Someone looks like they need a drink “Jake smirked while shaking the can teasingly in front of me.

“Fine,” I snatched it from him. I popped open the tab, and threw my head back as I took a generous amount of the liquid in my mouth. I forcefully swallowed it before I could spat it out. For the second time in the night, I felt like vomiting. The bitter aftertaste kept me gagging long after the warm feeling that had settled in my stomach was gone. Jake couldn’t stop laughing at my reaction. “Jerk!” I hit him on his shoulders “how can you drink that stuff?”

“It grows on you,” His eyes stayed on me as he finished his can. He crushed it and threw it in the streets.

“Hey, that’s littering. Go get it.”

“Sure.”

I watched him leave but he took a different direction than where he threw his can. He disappeared from my view as the night swallowed him whole. I stood frozen on the spot waiting for his imminent reappearance. At least, I hoped it was imminent. He wouldn’t leave me here by myself with a can of alcohol in my hands while I was underage, right? I was about to go look for him when I saw his shadow come out of the darkness with his hands full. As he came closer, I could see a pack of beer in one and the other had what I guess was a bottle of… rum?

Oh God, is that boy trying to get us arrested?

“How do you feel about a two people party?” he exclaimed as lifted the beer pack high for me to see.

“What’s in the other hand?”

“Water” he answered it so casually that I second guessed myself but I was no fool.

“You like jail that much?” I questioned annoyed at his lack of caring for his own life.

“We will go to jail only if we’re caught so why don’t we hop in your car and drive somewhere we will not be caught.” He smiled cockily at me, “and you could tell me your little story with no unsuspected ears.

I weighted my options, it was either, stay here in the cold and eventually go back to Jill’s house where I would cry myself to sleep, or go in a secluded place with the boy I suspected was stalking for the past months without anyone knowing where I was.

“I don’t know anywhere to go.” I watched him hopeful that he had a plan.

“I do” He tucked the bottle under his armpit and opened the passenger seat of my car, signaling me to get in.

“I’m not letting you drive my car while you’re intoxicated with alcohol.”

“First, how can you drive when you have no idea where we’re going? Second, I had only one beer which doesn’t make me intoxicated. And third, you’re the one who seems to be intoxicated.”

He did have a point or rather three. I had no idea where we were going and I was feeling myself since I’ve had that one sip of this devilish drink. My head was fuzzy and I felt like I was about to fall at any moment.

I slipped my hand in my pockets and threw the keys at him. He let them fall on the floor and gave me ‘what the hell’ look. He put the drinks down and retrieved the keys on the ground. He opened the back the door to deposit the drinks and then he got on. I was still standing in the snow when he started the car.

“Are you waiting for an invitation or what? Get in.” He honked the car loud enough for anybody in the neighborhoods to hear.

 Ken had spoiled with him always opening the door for me. Wait, why was I thinking of this jerk again? I was moving on. I shook the thought out of my mind and got in the car.