"Thank you, girls, for cleaning up around here," the old guy said, waving his arms around as best he could with out them breaking off. "Willa, Ariel, here's your twenty dollars. Don't spend them on smokes like I did. I breathe through a tube at night."

"Twenty? That's it?" Ariel asked, irked.

Willa scoffed, said, "Be grateful for this amazing man's twenty bucks. And for life! You only get one, I always say, just like true love."

I looked at Rae.

"Oy, it's starting to rain," the old guy fretted. "I don't know about you girls, but I'm gonna go sit in my chair, eat a date, and watch Maury on cable."

"See ya," Ariel said, waving a quick goodbye and then strutting down the street.

"See you later, girls!" Willa said to me and Rae. "And I'll see you for weekly Bridge, Albert!" She blew a kiss in his direction, and then skipped away back to her home across the street.

The old man waved one last goodbye, and then retreated inside his now-toilet-paper-free home.

There was an awkward silence between me and Rae. She turned around and started walking toward my house. I spun and walked behind her.

"Rae, if you tell me you're okay, I'll leave you alone about this. I need to know you're okay," I negotiated. She started walking faster.

"Please tell me what's wrong," I said. She kept walking faster. "Rae!"

"Let it go, Jack," Rae said finally, but it wasn't enough.

"I wanna know if I can possibly make anything better. Please, just answer me this: Are you okay?" She didn't say anything. "Rae!" I shouted, catching up, and grabbing her arm.

"Don't you ever touch me!" Rae yelled, yanking her arm away, a steady stream of tears flowing down her round, traumatized face.

"I... I will never hurt in a trillion years," I said, looking into her eyes.

"Jack," she said. It looked like her knees were giving way in front of me, and she slowly crumbled to the ground. I dropped on the ground, too, and stared at her, feeling my own tears get caught in my eyelashes. Her hand gravitated to her bruise, and then up and into her hair, and she clawed at it like having it out of her head would make it better. Rae was getting smaller; I saw it. I crawled toward her, and did the boldest thing I could do, which also turned out to be the thing we both needed.

I held her. My arms around her shoulders; letting anything malicious or angry in me go, so all I was was love for her. Maybe she could tap into it. Maybe she could just be there.

Rae spoke, her voice cracked like glass. "I don't know what to do."

A car came down the road and started honking when we ignored it's presence. It lurched forward, trying to get us to move. I looked back and pleaded with the driver.

They turned their car off and waited for us.

* * *

The sun shone through the suburban trees and the clouds — which were spitting rain slightly. Once we resumed walking, we sniffled amongst ourselves.

"He doesn't hurt me, you know," Rae said, and I couldn't wait to hear what she had to say. "It's not like he hits me or anything. He just gets... really, really angry and he grabs my arm or my face, and doesn't let go until he gets his message across. When he wants to hit, he hits the wall. He's not a monster. He's just isn't doing a great job of being a dad, I guess."

I didn't know what to say. Stamping my foot on the pavement and declaring war might not be the best option, though it's what I wanted to do desperately.

"You know it's not okay right?"

"Well, yeah. I know that," she said. "I'm sorry, I don't really want to talk about this."

I didn't try to hide the worry on my face. "Rae—"

"I know, I know, but I promise I'll talk to my mum," she convinced me. "And thank you, Jack, for... caring. At all, in the slightest."

"Yeah, of course," I said, tucking my hair behind my ear. My house was now in sight, and we walked in silence as the rain grew increasingly rugged. When we came upon the path leading to my front door, we said goodbye.

"I'll see you later," she said. I smiled and nodded my head. I walked up the yard and entered my house. Before I closed the door, I glanced outside, where Rae had sat down on the curb, watching both ways of the road for her father to pick her up. The wind was starting to pick up, not another moving thing in sight, save for a stray Doritos bag rolling down the street — it was all a very dismal tapestry. I walked back down the path and tapped her on the shoulder. She looked up at me with those glorious brown eyes. My heart dropped a million times. "

Why don't you come inside and wait for your dad? It's... raining." I was half way though the sentence before I realized she probably already knew that it was raining.

Rae thought about it. A spark danced trough her eye for millisecond. "Okay. Thanks." She got up and fallowed me into the house. I closed the door behind her.

Phil walked into the hall with a large tub of yogurt. "S'up, Rae? Hey, Jacky," he greeted us.

"Hey, Phillis," I said. If he's gonna call me 'Jacky' I'll call him 'Phillis', as neither are our names.

"Hi, Phil," Rae said. She looked at his oversized vat of yogurt. "You like yogurt."

"You like girls."

Even the voices in my head were too dumbstruck to speak.

I barely was able to pick my jaw up off the ground. I didn't think Phil was in any way intelligent, but this level of stupidity was shocking even for him.

"Well, I'm going to scream at my mum later," she said, nodding her head slightly. Phil shovelled more yogurt in his mouth like he didn't just obliterate the entire universe.

"You obviously know, too." she pointed at me. I smiled and inadvertently showed way more teeth than I had intended.

"Okay," Rae said, defeated, and continued up the stairs. She turned back when I didn't follow. "Are we going to your room?"

"Are we?" I said, as cooly as possible, which is to say, not.

"Sure," Rae said. "I want to see if there's as many gothic posters as I imagined." She continued up the steps.

Phil took my hand and placed an object in my palm. I opened my hand and saw a lip balm.

"Whatthefuckisthis?" I asked rapidly. Phil pumped his eyebrows. I threw the balm at him. "Oh, my god, Phil! You are such an asshole."

He smiled and backed away smoothly, like he was on wheels. I turned my back on him and stomped up the stairs after Rae. I walked down the hall, fumbled the door open and flourished my arms at the walls.

"Not much to see," I said.

"Not true," Rae said. She was looking at some comic strips I had drawn earlier in the year. "This is like a window into your soul or mind or something. Who are these?" she asked, pointing at #16, which consisted of three panels. In the first, two adequately drawn humanoid-dogs sat at a bar. In the second, the dog on the left asked the dog on the right if she wanted to see her calf. The dog on the right said no. In the third panel, the dog on the left plops her toned calf on the counter with a villainous look in her eye.

"On the right, that's Sonny. And on the left, that's Tina," I said. "The abridged version is that they're two dogs who hang out at a bar all the time and meet all sorts or weirdos and drink a lot."

"Cool," Rae said, taking her time to read #17 and #18, before noticing my poster of the cast of Suicide Squad. "Oh. You like Suicide Squad?"

"Uh, well, yeah, I mean, it sucked, but I really love Harley Quinn, so." I inhaled gravely, "I... am sorry about Phil. He's... the worst."

"That's okay," Rae said, scratching her perfect nose. "I guess I didn't expect him to know, since, you know... You didn't say anything."

I blinked twice. "I didn't think it was any of my business," I said, tucking my hair behind my ear. "I just thought your mom was calling about mom things, and she was really screaming, so I asked what's up, and, well, yeah, so, yeah, I guess my mom just told us—"

"Jack," Rae asked, making wicked eye contact. "Are you...?"

Her question echoed in my head like she had screamed it off a canyon.

"Um." I didn't know why I wasn't answering her straightly — if 'answering her straightly' was even possible. But, before I give her a definitive answer, she reached out and took hold of my face in an unyielding grip, her index fingers tucked behind my ears, and kissed me on the lips.

I'm cool. Cool cool. Coolcoolcoolcoolcoolcoolcoolcoolcoolcoolcoolcooooooooooooooooooool... cool. COOL.

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Nuff said.

(Ps. I got an alert that said Wattpad will be in 'writing mode only' tomorrow, so we'll see if it lets me post the next chapter at the usual time. Anyway, have a lovely day!)