Forever

Roman

    “Roman where the hell-” 

    I scoffed erasing yet another message from my mother asking me where I was. 

    It was the sixth message she had left so far and I knew it wouldn’t be the last. I still can’t understand why she tried so much, the action was meaningless. We both know she doesn’t really care where I am, but she has to keep up appearances. What would the neighbors think if she didn’t play the part of the doting and worried mother?

    Newsflash mother, the neighbors can hear everything, they’re not stupid they just know not to get involved. That’s basic human nature, isn’t it? Keep your head down, don’t get involved, and pretend like everything is okay. 

    As if the neighbors really didn’t know that my dad liked to use her as his main punching bag. That his drinking was so out of control that he almost beat her to death just a few nights ago. As if they really didn’t know that he was such a sadistic bastard that he very much enjoyed doing it. As if they couldn’t really hear him shouting everything through the paper thin walls. As if our family wasn’t already the talk of all of our neighbors.

    Jake Marrow is the worst piece of s**t on this planet. I would know, unfortunately I’m a product of the bastard, and yeah, he liked to beat on my mom. I had tried to get involved once. Only to have my mother defend him and turn on me instead. I never got involved after that as long as the bastard stayed away from me and my sister.

    This happened and everyone knew, but no one ever dared to get involved.

    Pathetic. 

    If you see something you should get involved, not cower away with your tail tucked in between your legs. That’s f*****g pathetic. You man up and you stand up for the people who can’t fight for themselves. You act like a decent human being. But no, people would rather pretend like bad things didn’t happen. Like we weren’t surrounded by tragedies everyday, as if people out there weren’t suffering. 

    No.

    People would rather pretend like nothing could penetrate the little bubbles they had settled themselves into. They tried to escape their realities, only to be constantly reminded that they will never be able to escape it. The reminder would always be there, staring back at them in the mirror eating away at the conscience they try so hard to kill.

    I would know, I had tried to do the same thing.

    I scoffed at myself. Look at me becoming self aware about my crap and simultaneously judging everyone else for doing the exact same s**t. If I were a better person than I actually was I’d be impressed. 

    But I’m not a good person and I’m not even slightly impressed with myself. I’m as much of a problem as anyone else. No matter how much I wished I was part of the solution. I’m only human what can I say? No matter how idealized I am, I know that sometimes the only people you can really stick your neck out for are the ones you really trust. 

    I could count my friends on less than ten fingers. Sure I have more friends than most people do, but our relationship spans throughout our entire lives. We don’t always get along but we always have each other’s backs. I could call anyone of them now and sure a couple of them might b***h at me calling them at nearly midnight but they’d be there nonetheless. 

    How many people can really say that someone they considered a friend would do that for them? Not many. Most people couldn’t even name three people they trusted unconditionally.

    My phone began beeping once again. Couldn’t I just enjoy the peace of the night in silence? Granted the roof of our apartment building was probably not the best idea but it was twenty stories high and provided one of the better views of the city. It was peaceful in a way. The city felt far away but still at arm's length so it didn’t feel so far off. The comforting sounds of the city just steps away. You couldn’t help but feel as if you were on top of the world. As if you were invincible even for just a short period of time. The silence was a nice break from the chaos I was constantly surrounded by. As dangerous as the peace was it was nice while it lasted. 

    I checked the screen, frowning instantly as Kenzie’s name popped up on the screen.

    It wasn’t strange for Kenzie to call me, she called me at least twice a week, and we texted every day. It was strange that she would call me at this hour though. I didn’t give it a second thought, ignoring the unsure churning in my stomach, as I answered her call.

    “Kenz?”

    “Roman.” 

    When her voice came through the speaker and the churning in my stomach became even more violent than before. Something was clearly wrong. Kenzie wasn’t necessarily an overtly upbeat person but it wasn’t as if she were devoid of all emotion. She never called me by my full name she always preferred calling me Rome and not Roman. She had never really told me why, all she had said was that it rolled off the tongue better. Whatever the hell that meant.

    “I need your help.”

    I could feel the dread beginning to set in. “Sure, what’s going on?”

    I could hear her taking a deep breath and moving around before she continued speaking.

    “Can you come to the shop, please?” She pleaded. “I need your help.”

    Kenzie’s voice broke at the last words and that lit a fire under my ass. I had known Kenzie all my life and I knew when there was something wrong with her. I was already making my way off of the roof.

    “Okay, I’m on my way over Kenz. Are you okay?” I asked her. I really needed her to be okay in that moment. 

    “I…” She started choking on her words, her breathing becoming more and more labored as she tried to speak. “I don’t know.. Please hurry, Rome.” She was nearly sobbing now. 

    I couldn’t hold back the curse that slipped out of my mouth. The stairs seemed to go on forever. How the hell had I managed to get to the roof so fast? Why the hell was it taking so long now? I could hear Kenzie breathing heavily through the phone every once in a while she’d mumble something but I couldn’t make out anything that she said.

    “Kenz, listen to me, I’ll be right there, just hide somewhere and I’ll find you when I get there.” I panted taking the stairs two or three at a time, trying not to send myself tumbling straight down. 

    “Okay.” She breathed out, her voice still trembling and her breathing slightly erratic. “I’m in the back room, I’ll wait for you here.”

    I managed to tell her to keep hidden before hanging up and sprinting down the last flight of stairs, the thought of putting my phone away not even passing through my head. Instead, I gripped it in my hand, just in case something happened and Kenzie called back. I plowed through the few people who were scattered around the lobby. I didn’t bother apologizing to whoever I ran into I didn’t have time to sit and act like a model citizen, I had to get to my friend. 

    The shop Kenzie worked at wasn’t too far away, maybe about a ten minute walk, or with the speed I was going at a five minute run. The shop was weird, it was as if they couldn’t decide between a barbershop or an actual salon so they combined the two things. It was a weird cluster of things that just didn’t match. Not to mention her boss was just a big creep who liked to ogle at all the girls who worked for him. 

    Had that creep Dan, or whatever the hell his name was, done something to her? He couldn’t have, could he? No. If he had done something to her she wouldn’t still be at the salon… Right?

    s**t. 

    I ignored the burning starting in my thighs and just kept running as fast as I could. The only time I stopped was when I saw Nolan’s just a few feet ahead of me. You couldn’t really see inside the shop, the windows were blacked out as a “security measure.” That’s what Kenzie had said when Erik and I grilled her about it when she first started working there.

    I went to push open the door only to find a pretty big blue butterfly resting on the handle. What in the hell? I reached for the handle and the bugs wings flapped instantly. A second later it was floating away. 

    I watched it, almost mesmerized by the brightness of the color of its wings. Even in the crappy yellow tinted street lights the blue stood out, as bright as an afternoon sky. The second it was out of my sight I was barreling inside the shop.

    Out of all of the things that had crossed my mind of what could possibly have happened to make Kenzie as frantic and dissonant as she had sounded on the phone, I could have never imagined the scene before me. 

    My stomach twisted in on itself and my throat closed up. If it hadn’t I would’ve probably vomited all over the floor in that moment. There was blood everywhere, an ocean of red covering the dirtied black and white checkered floor. A man was face down into the poll of what had to be his own blood. And Diana… s**t, she was thrown into the corner, her neck almost black and very clearly just as dead as the man. s**t, Kenzie, what the hell have you gotten yourself into?

    “Kenzie!” I swallowed back the bile threatening to spew out again. Doing my best to avoid staring at the corpses or stepping into blood I made my way to the back room where Kenzie said she’d be. 

    “Rome!”  

    I ran as fast as possible to the back, the anxiety bubbling up at the thought of whatever the hell had happened, and the possible state Kenzie could be in. 

    The reality was a lot worse than anything I could have thought of. She was cowering in the corner, trembling worse than anything I had ever seen. Her skin was pale where it wasn’t covered in drying blood. Brown eyes were wide and unfocused, tears leaking from them every once in a while. A purple bruise had blossomed on her cheek and it had swollen tremendously. There was even a cut on her lips with blood that had dribbled down her cheeks and dried up.  

    “Kenz.” 

    She looked up then, another wave of tears and trembling hitting her the moment she saw me. I walked over crouching beside her before pulling her tight to me. She was nearly choking on the intensity of her sobs.

    “Kenz what the hell happened here?” I asked, trying my very best not to panic. 

    She tried to take deep breaths but nothing would come out except some more strangled sobs. But I needed her to tell me what the hell had happened. Because right now it looked like she had murdered two people. She was covered in blood for craps sake! From head to toe she was covered in blood! She looked like something had dragged her through hell and then spat her back out. 

    “Kenz!” I gripped onto her shaking head forcing her to focus on me. “There are two bodies out there! You are covered in blood, now I need you to tell me what the hell happened!” 

    I watched her take a few deep breaths trying her best to calm herself down. She was still trembling like crazy, but she managed to stop sobbing. At least, somewhat.

    “This guy came in, and he just-” Another sob escaped her, but she managed to calm herself down rather quickly. “He started attacking Diana. He wouldn’t stop! He started choking her and I panicked! I didn’t know what to do!”

    “I grabbed a pair of scissors and I stabbed him. Then he turned on me and he was going to kill me.” She trailed off, the trembling finally stopping. 

    I was almost hesitant to ask. “What happened then?”

    I felt Kenzie shrug against me. “I don’t know.” 

    I frowned instantly pulling her back to make sure I was looking at her. “What do you mean you don’t know, Kenz? There are two people dead out there!” I hadn’t meant to scream at her but what the hell was I supposed to do? What do you even do in this situation? How do you help a friend who possibly killed someone? 

    “I don't know!” She yelled back. “I closed my eyes for a second and when I opened them again he was dead and there was blood everywhere!”

    She gripped on to my jacket tight, her nails painfully pinching into my arm. “You have to believe me Rome, I didn’t kill him.” 

    There was a crazed, desperate look in Kenzie’s eyes I had never seen before. Sure the situation didn’t make her look innocent but I knew her. She was one of my best friends, not some cold blooded murderer. This was the girl who had selflessly given Erik her ice cream cone when the i***t had dropped his off the roof while he was goofing around. The same girl that had climbed into my window and stayed with me after a particularly hellish beating from my dad. She was not a killer, no matter what it looked like. And now I had to be there for her, just like she had been there for me whenever some crazy s**t had happened to me. 

    I grabbed her face once more trying to get her to focus again. “Hey, I believe you, it’s okay.” 

    Kenzie stared up at me. “You believe me?”

    I was almost insulted that she didn’t believe that I believed her. “Of course I believe you, Kenz. I mean come on, it’s you, you're incapable of hurting a bug, much less actual humans.” 

    That managed to get a strangled sort of chuckle out of her. At least I got her mind off of things, even for just a second. Too bad none of this was over.

    “Come on, we should get-”

    A piercing scream from the front of the store broke through and I felt my heart drop to the pit of my stomach. s**t, just when I thought things couldn’t get any worse, they manage to get much much worse. How had we not heard the door chimes?

    I quickly grabbed onto Kenzie hauling her off the floor, she stumbled a bit, but otherwise kept silent. She grabbed her backpack and both of us creeped to the edge, managing to be unnervingly quiet. I grabbed her blood stained hand in mine, pressing her against me while we tried to listen to whoever was scrambling around in the front. It couldn’t have been more than a minute that we stood there, waiting anxiously for something to happen, but it felt as if it had been years. Finally the bells chimed again and frantic footsteps faded away. 

    Whoever had come in had run out and were now probably trying to flag one of the cops that frequented the streets. 

    “Come on.” I tugged Kenzie behind me, heading to the back door where luckily there was no chimes or alarm set up. “We need to get the hell out of here.”

    As soon as we were out into the alley I broke out in another run, pulling Kenzie along behind me. She stumbled a lot but managed to keep up. I just kept gripping her hand as tightly as I could. It was hard to ignore the stitches that had flared up in my side from running so much that night, or the burning in my thighs. But I had to ignore it, we needed to get the hell away from Nolan’s as fast as possible. But we also needed a place to lay low, especially with Kenzie covered in blood and looking like she had just committed a homicide. 

    We ran for a few more minutes until the burning in my lungs and thighs became unbearable. We were far enough away from the shop, but I still pulled Kenzie into the alley, we couldn’t afford to have anyone see her. 

    “What are we going to do now Rome?” She panted, leaning against the wall and trying to catch her breath. 

    “We gotta hide.” I shrugged. I was an accessory now, no matter how innocent I believed Kenzie was, her chances weren’t looking good.

    “Where?” She said the franticness beginning to overcome her once again. “Where the hell are we supposed to go?” 

    She came in closer, lowering her voice so no passersby could hear. “We ran from a crime scene. I’m covered in blood. Where the hell are we supposed to go?” 

    It was like a flash in my head, an instant thought that just passed through unintended. “Ian.”

    “Ian?” Kenzie repeated. 

    I nodded. “Ian he can help us, no one will bother us there.”

    Kenzie looked unsure. “I don’t know, Rome. I already feel bad enough about getting you involved in this, I don’t want to screw up Ian’s life either.”

    Is that what she thought? I scoffed. “Kenz, we’re your friends, and we would do anything to help you.”

    “But-” I cut her off before she could start on a tangent.

    “No. We’re your friends and we’re going to help you. All of us would do it for each other. If I were in trouble would you help me?” 

    There wasn’t even a slight hesitation on her part. “Of course.” 

    I nodded. “And the same goes for the rest of us. Now I’m going to call Ian and we’re going to figure out our next move, because there is no way in hell I am letting you deal with this on your own. And I’m pretty sure Ian isn’t going to let you deal with it by yourself either. Not when we can help you.”

    Kenzie looked slightly shocked and unsure. I couldn’t blame her, it’s not like we found ourselves in this situation every other week or something. Still, it was nice to realize we had each other’s back. Even I was surprised with myself at that speech. It’s not like it’s untrue though, my friends were my family, and you protected your family. 

    I pulled out my phone instantly dialing Ian’s number as Kenzie and I walked further down into the alley. Ian’s house was only a few blocks away and knowing him he was still just sitting at home doing nothing. Can’t blame him too much, he’s been going through a lot.

    It only took a few rings for Ian to answer. 

    “Rome?” He sounded groggy, I must’ve woken him up. Well he was sure going to be awake after the news I gave him.

    “Hey, Kenz and I need a place to lay low tonight, can we crash with you?” I asked. If I could avoid telling him what had happened I would. This wasn’t the type of news you told people through the phone. 

    “Sure, that’s fine.” He sounded more awake now. “You guys okay?” 

    I groaned. “Long story, I’ll tell you when we get there, just prepare yourself.”

    I knew he was instantly alert at that moment. I could hear the shuffling and a small curse slip out of him. “How bad is it?” He asked.

    It wasn’t the first time that one of us went to him when s**t wasn’t going right at home. Ian was always welcoming us with no questions and open arms. He was always ready to help.

    I lowered my voice, glancing back at Kenzie who was spaced out in her own world. Good, I didn’t need her to hear this next part. “It’s Kenz, and it’s bad.”

    I heard the sharp intake of breath. Ian loved Kenzie like a little sister, he was probably the most protective over her out of all of us, and anything that happened to her he was pouncing and ready to attack like a wolverine. I still remember when Kevin Lang had spread the rumor that he had had hooked up with Kenzie in one of the school’s broom closets. The i***t had made the whole thing up, and though Kenzie wasn’t bothered by it, Ian had decided to confront Kevin on her behalf. The i***t had managed to annoy Ian and had found himself duct taped, beaten, and left inside of a broom closet for an entire day. It wasn’t until the janitor was cleaning up for the day that they found. Turk had provided the duct tape, while James and Eric kept look out for the rest of us.

    So maybe Ian hadn’t been the only one, we had all helped, but he was the most pissed about it. And had been the one to, oh so generously award Kevin with a black eye and a busted nose. The whole thing was hilarious and it showed everyone that Kenzie was off limits. No one messed with Kenzie after that. There was no doubt how far we would go for our friend after that.

    “Is she okay?” Ian’s voice was gruff, I could hear the anger lacing his words. 

    “I’ll tell you when I get there, just try not to bombard her with questions, she’s had a really long night.” 

    He sighed. “Alright, get here quick.” 

    I turned back to Kenzie, hearing the dial tone as Ian hung up. “Come on.” I held out my hand, now matted with dried blood, like hers had been. 

    “How are we going to manage to live through this?” Kenzie’s voice was meek as she asked this. I wish I had the answers, but I don’t. And with the dark feeling churning in my guts it didn’t feel like it was going to get any better. 

    Another flash of a thought, just an image this time, a flourish of red with a black shadow staring back at me. It was gone quicker than it came but the feeling deepened and my heartbeat quickened. Something was coming for us and whatever the hell it was, we weren’t getting out unscathed. 

    Staring down at Kenzie I found her watching me, waiting for me to give her some sort of hopeful response. I hated having to lie to her but right now she needed to feel like everything would be okay. Even if I knew deep within me that nothing would be okay anymore. I had to at least make her feel slightly better.

    “We’ll get through it.” I tried to smile at her. “We always do.” 

    At least I hope we would.