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Chapter 19 – Between the Lines

Jake sat on his bed that night with the sketch still in hand.

The edges were worn, the ink smudged from years of wear — but the image was unmistakable.

Don.

Not the quiet boy who now smoked behind the schoolyard.

Not the one who barely spoke and flinched when praised.

This Don in the sketch stood tall. Jaw clenched. Fire in his eyes.

A leader?

A fighter?

Jake didn’t know what disturbed him more — the drawing itself, or the idea that Don had drawn it and left it inside his books like it didn’t mean anything.

He turned the paper over. On the back, written in faded pencil:

> “We ran the streets like kings. Now we hide like ghosts.”

Jake’s breath caught in his throat.

Don had never spoken about his life during those missing years — the time between the gang disbanding and his return to their school. Not to Jake. Not to Gor.

And Jake had never pushed. He was too afraid Don would disappear again.

But something inside him was shifting.

He needed to know the truth.

---

The next morning at school, Don sat quietly beneath the banyan tree. Smoke curled between his fingers, his eyes half-lidded with exhaustion.

Jake sat beside him without asking.

For a moment, neither said anything.

Then Jake held out the sketch.

“I found this,” he said simply.

Don didn’t react. He looked at it, then away.

Jake waited.

Finally, Don muttered, “You shouldn’t go through my stuff.”

“You left it behind.”

Silence again.

Jake stared at him. “Who were you, Don?”

The question hung heavy in the air.

Don blew out a long breath. “Someone I had to be… to survive.”

Jake’s eyes softened. “Were you part of something?”

Don didn’t answer directly. Instead, he said, “Sometimes, when you don’t have family, you find one in the wrong places.”

Jake wanted to ask more — What did B.F.G. mean? Who were the others? — but he saw the way Don’s shoulders stiffened, how his fingers clenched the cigarette tighter.

So he stayed quiet.

Just sat with him.

That was enough.

---

Elsewhere, Gor was going through his own internal battle.

He’d noticed the shifts.

The dark circles under Don’s eyes. The way his hands sometimes trembled during classes. The way he avoided certain corners of the school.

And now Jake was acting strange too — distant, distracted.

He knew something was happening.

He just didn’t know what.

---

After school, Gor found Don outside the cramming institute. Don was leaned against the wall, half-asleep, waiting for the bell to ring.

“Hey,” Gor said gently. “You okay?”

“Same as always,” Don muttered.

“You haven’t been writing lately.”

Don didn’t respond.

“You always used to say writing helped you breathe.”

“I don’t have time to breathe anymore.”

Gor sighed. “Then maybe… you need help.”

Don gave a tired smile. “I’ve had enough help to last a lifetime, Gor.”

He turned and walked inside.

---

That night, Jake couldn’t sleep.

He sat by his desk, the sketch in front of him, beside it Don’s half-burnt notebook — one Don had tossed in the bin weeks ago.

He flipped through it.

Lines of poetry.

And something else.

Names.

Just first names.

Some scratched out.

Some circled.

One underlined.

"Reaper."

Jake whispered the name aloud, a chill running through him.

He didn’t know who Reaper was — but he had a feeling this name mattered.

Maybe it was time he started finding answers.

Even if Don didn’t want to give them yet.

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End of Chapter 19

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