When I was little, I used to think about running away all the time. Just to say I did it. I didn't want to die or anything, I just kind of wanted someone to think I could. Someone to hold me a little tighter when I came home at night, and say they were worried about me.

And more than once, I almost did. But every time, I would step out into the living room of our tiny, smelly apartment, and I would see my mom drunk or high passed out on the couch and I would be reminded all over again. No one would care. No one would hold me closer. No one would say they were worried.

Because it simply wouldn't be true. Those memories are some of the bitterest of my childhood. The ones that made me question why I even existed. The ones that taught me all the truths about the world. Truths like things happen for a reason. And not always a good one.

Logan had taken me here, to this quiet, sweet little apartment for a reason. The reason being the rest of our family and how they treated me. I felt like I had been in a daze since Tyler told me and Emma to go upstairs. I was barely aware of what had happened on the drive over, or directly after we came here. It was like I was here, but I wasn't. Like physically, my body was moving towards something but my soul had gotten left behind somewhere dark and awful. I had forced down a few bites of pasta in silence when Teo, Logan's boyfriend, invited us in but quickly I felt too full to eat much else.

Teo was nice. He looked at me with the same sad eyes as Logan did, but I couldn't bring myself to mind. It was human nature to pity those who are smaller than us in ways we don't even realize. I took a shower after I ate. I didn't feel the water against my skin. I felt utterly numb. So much so, that I didn't even notice the water getting so hot it left a patch of red, splotchy skin on my back until I saw the mark in the mirror.

I didn't say much to Logan or Teo after I got out. They had been talking to each other in hushed whispers all night. I didn't care enough to wonder what they were saying, to be honest. I felt so empty right now. I was emotionally exhausted in ways I had never been before. It hurt. Everything hurt. And what hurt worse, was the realization of how long I'd been hurting. Years. Years and years. My whole life it seemed. And god, being numb and hollow was so much worse than feeling everything. Or maybe it wasn't. I couldn't decide which hurt worse. Nothing, or everything.

I liked the view from the bedroom Teo had told me was mine for the time being. I could see all of Harlen from here. It was a busier city. Not like Brinley at all. This city didn't feel like home. Brinley, even in the darkest places, was home. I never thought I'd miss it so much. Never thought I'd ache to go back to that dirty little apartment, with its wine-stained walls and my drugged-up mother. It was wrong and awful. But it was home.

I vaguely heard the door open behind me. I didn't move. I knew it was Logan. Teo wouldn't come in without knocking first. But maybe he did knock. I wouldn't have heard it anyway. There's no sound in this dark world of mine. There's nothing here. And it is terrifying. I felt the bed dip down. My eyes remained glued to the city.

"Hey, Belle," I could sense that Logan was worried about me. I suppose I should feel bad about worrying him. I didn't. It was nice for someone to worry about me for once. It reminded me that I'm still here. That I had not yet become a ghost externally as I had internally.

"How are you feeling?" Words stuck to the walls of my throat. I couldn't breathe. I hadn't been able to for a long time. A long, long time.

"I'm fine." I forced out through the lump of emotion.

Logan shook his head. "Can I hug you?" He asked quietly. I nodded and he wrapped his arms around me, bringing my small self to his chest. "You're not fine, baby. You're just not," He whispered into my hair. "I'll say it again, and a million more times until you believe me. It's okay, to not be okay. I promise you, it is."

I didn't say anything. I wasn't sure if I agreed or not. My mind said no. It told me the moment I admitted to not being okay, the dam would break. It would all come crashing down and it would all be my fault. But my heart begged me to relent, just a little. It told me the pressure of keeping it all in would kill me faster than any dam filled with emotion. So I wouldn't say anything. I would just squeeze him a little tighter and lie through my teeth until some part of me was truly okay. Then, I kept telling myself, it wouldn't be lying anymore. Then it would be okay.

"Do you wanna skip school tomorrow?" He asked. A hand ran up and down my back. It reminded me of a rare childhood memory, waking up from a nightmare and my mother being there to comfort me. A rare one indeed.

I sighed, inhaling his scent of laundry detergent and cheap cologne. I didn't find any comfort in the way he smelled. I suppose it was an odd comfort to hope for, but I was looking for any way to not feel so alone, even as I was wrapped up in his arms. I thought for a moment.

"No," I whispered sullenly. My throat felt dry and scratchy. The aftermath of crying so much I would guess. "No, I wanna go." I would only make things worse for myself by staying here. I would think until my brain went numb, and work myself up until I exploded. A distraction would do nicely for now. Even if it meant risking seeing the one who had been the cause of all this in the first place. I had more or less forgotten about Brayden for a short while. I had no idea how I planned to handle him.

All I knew was I loved him. Even if I hated him with every fiber of my being, I still loved him. He was my brother. And would forever be the best friend I'll ever have. That didn't mean I forgave him, and I wouldn't for a long time. I wasn't even sure I wanted to. But I did want to speak to him. Whatever that might bring, I needed to do it. Logan looked down at me sadly.

"Iz, are you sure? I can skip classes tomorrow and you can stay-"

"It's fine," I interrupted softly. "I want to go. I like school."

He hesitated for a moment, his face twisting into confliction.

"Okay," He muttered under his breath. "But if you change your mind tomorrow morning or even when you get to school, let me know okay? I'll come and get you right away and take you back here." It was clear that he wasn't excited about my persistence to go to school.

He thought I needed rest. He didn't know how right he was. But rest, as in sleeping or staying home and doing nothing, wasn't the type I needed. I needed my mind to shut off. I needed my soul to catch up. I needed my heart to stop aching. And I have yet to find a way for all of those things to happen.

"I'll be fine," I attempted to reassure him, but I don't think it did much. I took his hand into mine, leaning away and mindlessly, gently, twisting his fingers. "Really." I didn't bother to try and smile. I fear that may have only made things worse.

"You used to do that all the time," He said suddenly. I scrunch my eyebrows in confusion, looking up at him. He looked so sad. It killed me that it was my fault. "You had this fascination with fingers when you were really little. From the day you were born, you were always trying to grab our hands," He smiled reminiscently. "You'd do it mostly when you were upset."

I looked down at our hands, mine absently linking and unlinking with his. I supposed I did do that a lot. I used to do it to Marley and Brayden all the time. I never thought much about it. Marley always said it was a nervous habit, the same as biting my lip.

"Huh," I breathed, not letting his hand go. It was oddly comforting, in a familiar, sad sort of way. "I never knew that."

Logan sighed. "You would always do it to Emma. We'd lay you two down next to each other and you would immediately grab Em's hand so tight, we sometimes couldn't get you to let go." He laughed. I couldn't help but be thankful that we were on to a simple conversation. This was so much easier to contend with than the constant questions about my well-being.

"It's funny," He seemed distant now. Not quite lost in his head like me, but certainly somewhere else. A memory, perhaps. A time before all this. "You used to always want to be touching someone. You'd cry when we set you down by yourself, always looking for one of us or Emma to be close enough to touch."

And now I'm this. This panicked soul would rather curl into a ball and hide than touch another person without my consent. "Guess some things change," I whispered. Logan looked into my eyes. I could feel them glossing over, tears stinging my bottom lids. "I'm sorry, I don't know why I'm crying again." I huffed a quiet laugh, but I had never felt less like laughing.

"Oh Izzy," he whispered, squeezing my hand in his. I shook my head.

"I'm fine, really," I wiped my cheek with the back of my hand. "Just-just a lot right now, that's all." It was so much. So overwhelming, so overstimulating. So much. I took in a shaky breath and tucked a strand of loose hair behind my ear. "I'm kinda tired," I whispered, letting go of his hand. "Think I'm gonna go to sleep."

Logan nodded slowly, his eyes shining with tears that hadn't been there a moment earlier. "Okay, buddy, sleep well. I'll be in the next room over if you need anything." Cautiously, he stood up. When he reached the doorway, Logan turned back to me with an unreadable expression. He opened his mouth to say something but seemingly decided against it, closing his lips slowly.

"I'm always here for you Izzy. Sleep well." He said.

I muttered a good night as the door clicked shut. And then I was alone. Then I was back to the quiet chaos of my brain and the internal war I would never win.

I layed back on the twin-sized bed, eyes once again glued to the city that's not my home, and never will be.

THE WORLD THAT WAS MINE

The cold felt nice. It stung in the best way. A way that made me feel less numb. I was right to leave my sweatshirt at Teos when I left this morning. Had Logan seen me leave, he probably wouldn't have agreed but he didn't understand why I needed to feel it. Why I needed to put myself in pain for a while to feel better. I wasn't sure I even understood it. All I understood was it felt good. I felt it. That's what I knew.

So I didn't have to understand how, because I already knew why. I had left before the sun even came up this morning. Pulling on the pair of running shoes and the shorts I had smartly grabbed the night before, I slipped out of the quiet apartment without anyone noticing. Teo and Logan were still asleep. I had heard them up late talking to one another. At some point, I think I heard one of them, Logan I think, crying softly. I was tempted to go out and see but I didn't need to, to understand what was going on.

They were talking about me. It didn't take a genius to figure that out. I should have been more upset about it, but I was too tired to think about it enough to get angry. There was no fuse left in me. Like a firework that had already been set off, I was burned out and useless. Or that's how I felt. I hadn't slept at all last night. I looked out the window at the city and wondered what I had become. What I would become.

I thought back to that skeleton I would inevitably become. The empty shell of a person that lacked life and light. I felt like I was headed for that quickly. Too quickly. The thought should have made me panic, but how can I panic more when I never stopped? I felt empty. So goddamn empty. And so helpless too. So I did what I knew best.

I ran. I woke up feeling empty and numb, just as I had gone to sleep, so I ran. To nothing, from nothing, I simply ran. I got lost very quickly in this city that wasn't home. I didn't know where I was. I almost didn't want to. It was freeing in a way to be as physically lost as I was mental. I found myself on the other side of the city when my legs finally felt raw enough to stop running. I had taken off when I stepped outside and hadn't looked back. It wasn't smart but it was necessary.

I stopped outside a tiny cafe called Stars Aline, immediately feeling the warmth from inside engulf my freezing body. I didn't think much about it before stepping in. I didn't have any money, but I was far from hungry anyway, so I didn't waste much time sitting down at a table in the corner, absorbing the heat as best I could.

"Can I get you something?" The woman behind the counter asked, looking at me with warm eyes.

I shook my head. "No thank you. Just warming up a little." I wondered if Logan would mind that I left. I hadn't told him. I hadn't told anyone. But I needed this, and I needed him to understand that I needed this.

"It's pretty cold out there, huh?" She kind of reminded me of Sadie a little. Brown hair, streaked with grey, sad brown eyes, and a forced smile. She reminded me a lot of Sadie.

I nodded, sighing slightly. "Yeah, just a little."

The woman frowned slightly. "Well, I would imagine that it's mostly from your lack of a jacket darling. It's too cold in these parts for bare skin this time of year."

I shrugged. I had dealt with heat in Georgia, I can deal with cold in Maryland. The weather was far from my biggest concern.

"You're not from here are you?" She asked with narrowed, curious eyes.

I sat up a little straighter and shook my head. "No ma'am, I'm from Georgia."

Her face lit up a little and she gasped softly. "Me too, honey, where are you from?" I knew her accent wasn't from around here. Southern women had a certain aura about them. A warm, comforting, sometimes frightening aura that had a place in my heart like no other.

"Brinley," I said softly.

She hummed, her grin growing a little wider. "I'm from Willow Creek, right next door," She said, turning around to do something behind the counter. The sun hadn't yet come up. I wished it never would. I didn't have the energy to start another trying day. "But I knew a girl from Brinley. Marley Jacobs, she and my daughter dated for a while when they were young. You know her?"

I felt all the color drain from my face. My heart had never slowed but still, it picked up the pace. "Uh yeah," I muttered, feeling colder on the inside than I did out. "Yeah, I knew her."

"Whatever happened to that girl? She was sweet as pie, but she and my Amelia didn't end up working out. Did she ever go to college?"

I swallowed a lump in my throat. "N-no," I forced out. She never went to college. She never got the chance. She never had the chance to become anything other than a town tragedy. "No ma'am, Marley, she um, she died."

The woman looked up from whatever she was doing and looked at me with wide eyes. "No kiddin'." She mumbled. "Well, that's just awful. Poor kid, she was such a smart young girl." She tsked and shook her head. "Well, anyway, It's nice to find another person from Georgia around these parts. Always makes me think of home." She smiled again but this one was all too forced.

I hummed. "Me too."

The woman came around the counter, a steaming drink in hand. "From one southern girl to another, warm-up honey." She smiled and handed it to me. I could smell the chocolate from a mile away. I held the drink under my chin, letting the steam heat my cold face. It was nice. Too nice.

"Ma'am, I'm sorry, I don't have any money," I said holding it back out to her.

The woman again shook her head. "I don't need a dime from you darling. Just drink up and get warm before you freeze, you poor thing."

I hesitated before I did just that. The first sip was good. The second was better. We sat there for a while, the sun still dipped below the sky and the world for a short while. No one else came in, but the woman, Abby, as I came to know her as, said the business wouldn't pick up until at least seven. I was halfway done with my drink when I heard the door chime. I didn't look up right away. But when I did, I would wish I hadn't.

"Good morning Thomas, how you doin'?" Abby asked casually. My heart jumped to my throat, any regained color in my face slipping away. Thomas Calder. The man who haunted my dreams stood in the doorway of this cafe, looking at the kind woman in front of me with a smile that made me want to puke.

"Morning Abby." He said softly.

I felt a tear slip down my face. I couldn't do this. I couldn't peel my eyes away. I wanted to but I couldn't. His eyes looked at me. They widened. Brown eyes. Brown, monstrous eyes that haunted me every day of my life.

"Isabelle." He whispered in disbelief.

I couldn't breathe. I couldn't breathe at all. I stood up as fast I could, my legs feeling unsteady and sore. I didn't care. I dropped the cup, barely even hearing it when the liquid splashed against the tiled floor.

And then I ran. I ran as fast as I possibly could, past him and back the way I think I came. An hour later I reached the apartment. I banged on the door furiously, and when Logan pulled it open looking bewildered and disheveled, I immediately threw myself into him without a second thought.

"Izzy, baby, where were you?" He asked, holding me tightly. I sobbed into his shoulder, gripping his shirt for dear life. I couldn't speak. I couldn't breathe. I couldn't. I couldn't. I couldn't. "Izzy, what is going on?" Logan asked, sounding panicked.

"I don't wanna go to school." Was all my mind could manage in my state.

In this world running is not always the answer. But sometimes it is. For people like me, running is the answer in every meaning of the word.

But sometimes, people like me who need to run from what scares them, run too far.

And then they're lost. Then they're gone.

I ran too far and the world had to remind me to stay in my place.

A/N-A quick update while I procrastinate school. I'm literally in class right now lol. So I threw a twist in there at the end. What do we think? Izzy saw Thomas. Thomas is Marley's killer if anyone forgot, and Braydens brother. I know I said the Izzy/Brayden confrontation would be this chapter but I lied lol. Sorry. I just couldn't fit it with all that I wanted to do.

Any predictions? They're all going to be wrong but I'd like to hear them anyway :)

Ahhh we have almost 200k reads on this story! I'm in shock, y'all are amazing. This app had been so good to me, and it just recently helped me get through some pretty tough times. I can't thank you all enough you deserve the world each and every one of you.