He was an idiot. He was a fucking idiot that didn’t know when to see the signs. Hazel hadn’t been entirely right about his friends, but she’d been right about them being assholes. 

Kacey was the biggest asshole of them all. Mary and Padriac weren’t any better. They backed Kacey up like they couldn’t wait to get on their knees and suck his godly dick.

Varian was disgusted by the blatant worship. They let Kacey get away with whatever he wanted because he was “Kacey”—the guy that didn’t take no for an answer. 

They loved how chaotic he was. And Varian was at fault too. He let Kacey break down his walls, violate him, and stomp over his corpse because he thought it was fun teasing someone who was broken.

However, it might have been a mistake to just run without knowing where he was going. Where they were—essentially in the middle of nowhere—there was nothing but road and wide fields for miles. 

He ran down the street for a few minutes before he thought how they could catch up to him with no problem in the car. He took a sharp left and ran through the fields. If they wanted him they would have to get out of the car and he doubted they cared enough about him to do anything that would inconvenience them.

About halfway into the field, his gut started to burn. He gasped, his throat dry and scratchy from not drinking anything for awhile. What he had to drink had fucked him up. Stupid alcohol. He was never drinking again in his life.

He swore right then and there.

He heard the revving of an engine in the distance. He glanced behind to see the bright headlights illuminating the street in front of the blue car. The car stopped where he booked it to the left. It swerved to the side and onto the shoulder of the highway. Three tiny people jumped out and stood by the ditch.

Varian laughed. He came to a slow stop and whooped real loud.

It was strange seeing the three of them so far away. They looked like ghosts waiting for him on the other side.

There was Mary, shorter than the others, standing with her hands on her hips in the middle; then there was Padriac, taller than Mary on her right side, his hands in his pockets; and lastly, there was Kacey, standing taller than the rest, one hand lazily on his hip and the other holding a cigarette to his lips.

The foggy lights made them look larger than life.

Varian stilled.

They were beautiful. He hadn’t noticed until then. 

The sky was clear except for the few small clouds stretched out above him. They were like unraveled cotton candy that had been stomped until it wasn’t so fluffy anymore. He gazed up at them, watching as they slowly moved. The moon was tiny in the dark sky. Before, when he had laid beside Hazel, it looked like it was going to swallow him.

Now, it looked like he could squash it with his finger. 

Suddenly, a light sprinkle of rain fell from the sky. He imagined it was redundant to say the rain was falling from the sky, but he felt he had to clarify for the sprinkles of water seemed to come from nowhere. He wouldn’t have been surprised if he found someone was just sprinkling water from a rag above his head.

He held his arms out, palms facing up, and caught the cold droplets. They sunk into his jacket, leaving behind temporary stains—a token of their existence. The droplets splattered on his lips. They were chapped. It was as if Kacey had sucked the life out of them. 

He licked the rain away. He was so thirsty. He would drink straight from a puddle if there was one near him.

He was startled out of his stupor when the trio moved. 

He jumped back, ready on his feet to continue running the way he had been. The three of them were across the ditch now. They left the car running on the road and now they were heading steadily toward him.

“No,” Varian said aloud like it would have some magical effect. 

He also said it like he was expecting them to do something really horrible to him. But, he guessed, they had done something horrible to him already. They had ignored him and belittled him. That was reason enough to be angry with them.

And that anger was rapidly fading. He grabbed onto it and fueled it as best as he could because he knew if he lost his hold on it he would go back to them. He would forgive them and go back to being their little pet dog they told what to do.

They were gaining speed while he battled with himself. He found the strength to raise his hand. He flipped them off and stuck out his tongue. He wasn’t sure if they could see it, but it didn’t matter as much as the act itself. He was being mean and that was a start. The old Varian wouldn’t have done something so idiotic.

He turned back around and started running again. He tried as best as he could to ignore the burning in his side, but it was getting worse. The cold wind bit at his cheeks and hands. The ground was soft from being turned over and was now wet from the light drizzle. His feet sunk low into the dirt. His shoes were old. Water came through the falling apart soles. His socks were soaked and uncomfortable. He kept running.

Fuck them. Fuck them all for thinking he was a joke. He’d rather be alone than be something to laugh at.

But he didn’t account for the fact that town was miles away. His house was too far away for him to run there let alone walk. He would pass out before he managed to get halfway there.

The fields stretched on for miles. It was a never-ending plot that made his task even more daunting. He didn’t want to give up, but his body was going to.

And once a seed of doubt was planted in his head, there was no way of getting it out.

Pure conviction wasn’t something he possessed.

Varian collapsed in the middle of the field. The brittle yellow grass was as tall as knees. When he fell to the ground—pants now soaked from the damp soil—he was blanketed by the blades. He had a fleeting thought that maybe if he tried once more to be angry he could run a little longer.

It was dashed away when he heard melodic footsteps behind him.

Padriac walked in his line of sight first. He sighed as he looked down at Varian. It was the kind of sigh you would give an animal that had escaped. Not a human being. 

He crouched. “Where does it hurt?”

Varian gritted his teeth. “Fuck you.”

The anger was still there. Thankfully.

Padriac continued to stare at him. “Tell me. It’s not good if you’re hurt.”

Condescending. Padriac was a condescending prick who didn’t listen when anyone was talking to him.

Varian sagged down to the ground. He laid there in the wet soil and grass. He panted as he tried to stop the ache in his stomach. The wind was picking up and so was the rain. The sprinkling had turned to harsh pelting that was akin to hail. Each hit to his exposed hands or face was like someone biting him.

He squinted at the three figures he once called his friends. They were still his friends, but at that exact moment they might as well have been villains in a comic book. They seemed just as bad as the man that had taken him.

Worse because they were supposed to care about him.

“Get up, Varian.”

That was Kacey. Demanding as ever.

Varian stayed quiet. He hoped if he did they would eventually leave him alone. But he’d been wrong about them not following him out into the fields. He had been wrong about them not caring about him enough to put them in an inconvenient situation. 

“If you don’t get up right now, I’m going to carry you back.”

He still didn’t move. 

“Kacey—“

“Shut it, Mary. He’s acting like a baby. I’m done with this.”

Rough arms hauled him up off the ground. He didn’t fight them. He let his dead weight make it harder for Kacey to lift him up, but once again, he was wrong to think Kacey was weak. He managed to hoist Varian into his arms, holding him bridal style.

Varian grabbed his hood and pulled it over his face. It fell down over his eyes and that’s where he left it. The car headlights couldn’t reach them. He’d managed to run pretty far. The moonlight shined down on Kacey’s features. His shoulder length hair had curled some from the rain. 

Varian could only see Kacey’s sharp jaw line, thin lips twisted in a scowl, and slightly pointed nose. He traced the shapes with his eyes. He crossed his arms over his chest in the way they laid dead bodies in a casket. 

It was so cold. He felt the chill run though his body and settle in his limbs. He curled toward Kacey’s warmth, not caring that he did seem like a child when he did so. The chase hadn’t been fun, yet, there was excitement settling in his chest. He wanted to keep going. It was only his body that had broken down before he could be satisfied with the chase.

“Look at you,” Kacey softly said. Varian kept looking at his lips. He hadn’t forgotten why they were fighting in the first place. Kacey had started it all when he kissed Varian. And for what reason?

There wasn’t one.

“Sweet, sweet, Varian.” 

“Are you teasing him again?” Padriac was right beside Kacey and therefore, right beside Varian’s head.

His voice was harsher than it usually was. 

Kacey looked over at him. Varian could see more of his face, but not that much. His eyes were still hidden by the hood.

“You would do the same. Look at his face.”

Varian stiffened. “Just take me to the damn car you idiot.”

They all laughed. 

“There’s the Varian I know,” Mary said. Her bright voice cut through the unnerving air.

No one talked after that. Varian was glad. He couldn’t stand them at the moment. He didn’t know if he would be able to stand them even after he’d slept on it.

He was sure he would just get angrier.

The car door opened. The lights from the car headlights were shinning bright on Kacey’s face now. It was like Hazel’s heavenly glow when she was standing in front of the bright moon. Varian didn’t know why he thought of those two as being similar when they were the polar opposites. 

He really shouldn’t be thinking of them like that when he was in this sort of situation.

But he was slowly coming down from the hazy drunkenness that may or may not be the reason why he went ballistic. He couldn’t blame everything on the alcohol or his “friends”. Some of this was his doing and he was just going to have to own up to it.

He took one last long look at Kacey’s lips. He couldn’t stop thinking about how they’d felt pressed against his. It was a brief moment—barely a kiss if he was being frank—but it meant so much. He didn’t know what it meant or if he felt anything about it except anger. He felt like there was something there that he couldn’t quite name. It was a foreign entity and he just wasn’t sure if he was imagining it or if it was really there.

For now though, he let it slip away and to be worried about at a later time.

“Are you going to...” Padriac murmured.

“Yeah. Child lock the doors,” Kacey said.

Varian snorted. “I’m not going to fucking kill myself.”

Kacey set him in the middle of the backseat. Mary was already sitting in the driver’s seat. The locks clicked.

His legs were sprawled over Kacey’s lap as he sat in the right seat. Varian laid on his back, hood still covering most of his face. He could faintly see the car ceiling and a little of Kacey out of the corner of his eyes. Kacey closed the car door behind him. His hands held Varian’s ankles. His pant legs had raised up a bit in the position he was in. Kacey slid his cold fingers over his ankles. The touched was soft, hovering over him. 

Varian jerked his foot. Kacey’s hand tightened around his ankle so it didn’t shoot up and kick him in the face.

Kacey sent him a murderous glare.

Varian grinned, showing his teeth. “It tickles.”

He couldn’t help it when he let out a small giggle. He loved the way he could get under Kacey’s skin. It was hard to do it most of the time. Kacey was usually the one being the little shit. Now Varian could understand why he liked doing it. People’s reactions were kinda fun when they didn’t try to retaliate.

The car started. Varian closed his eyes. He listened to the car engine’s slow rumbling. Mary and Padriac whispered about something, but the words couldn’t be heard. Varian didn’t try to listen. He simply got lost in the slow melodic tracing of Kacey’s thumb on his ankle.

Soon, he fell asleep.