Chapter Text
He hit the ground running, the meadow spooling itself out behind him. His heart caught in his throat, his fingernails bit into the meat of his palm, and he was falling apart. He would say he was falling apart if each breath didn’t remind him how painfully present he was, air scraping the insides of his lungs like a dagger, scraping away at the flesh of his body.
When he reached the cover of trees he fell to his knees, coughing and spitting. He looked behind him, after the retching had stopped. The lights of their flashlights had faded, and he couldn’t hear voices anymore—which wasn’t a sure sign he was safe, but John didn’t think he could run anymore. Using the trunk of a tree as support, John pulled himself to his knees and began limping deeper into the forest.
If there was still someone behind him, he didn’t think he’d be able to out run him again. He didn’t have anything left in him to give. Blindly, he stumbled through the woods in the direction he thought the highway might be.
John lived with his sister and his father in a suburb closer to the center to Main Street, but their town was a pretty mixed bag. Wincing, John smashed his leg against a fallen log. He could already feel the blood racing down his leg. Fuck it all. The Striders lived on this giant estate surrounded by farm land, a big run-down mansion that wouldn’t’ve looked out of place in the antebellum south. It came complete with a ballroom and everything, giant staircases with railings that were perfect for sliding down.
Dave had invited him out what was supposed to be a total rager in the middle-of-fucking-nowhere—no cops, no neighbors, just booze and Dave’s hot sisters—but a fight had broken out and knives had been pulled from nowhere, and an older man had shown up, with ice-white hair, tattoos, and ridiculous anime glasses, packing heat, and shit went down fast. It seemed like Dave’s family was fighting a whole bunch of their guests, but it also seemed like something from a movie, Ponyboy vs. The Socs.
And John was more than a little drunk.
On school Monday, John was sure Dave would make a joke out of it, slap him on the shoulders in the middle of the hallway and say something like, “You fucker, you can’t take a joke?” or “What a fucking pissbaby, Jonathan,” and John would laugh and say, “Yeah, I know right?” and be the butt of every joke for a next few days but—
A few other drunk adults had chased after him on the lawn, and John had been genuinely afraid for his life. Dave’s family was bad news, he should’ve listened to his sisters, but Dave was so *cool*, and John was so *not*. And Dave’s sisters were pretty hot And
There were a million reasons for him to go to the party, and he regretted every one of them.
He hadn’t seen Dave after the fight broke out, but he was sure his friend was okay. The Striders were always pulling shit like that, and Dave always came out in one piece. John abruptly found himself at the edge of their driveway and he stumbled along it, heading towards the gate that kept the driveway separate from the main road. As he walked, he fumbled with his phone, desperate for a signal.
*janey* he texted *you up*
He made it a good 300 yards before she answered.
*Yes.*
*John, what happened? Are you okay?* Jane was the best sister he could’ve asked for.
*yeah im fine. pick me up? im too drunk to call dad*
There was a longer pause, where John knew she was deciding the benefits of helping him or telling on him. If she helped him, she was the better sibling and he owed her. If she left him hanging, she would be teaching him a lesson about the evils of alcohol and hopefully, preventing him from making the same mistakes next time. But he knew Jane. She would never leave him hanging.
*I’ll be there in 15* she said, and he breathed a sigh of relief as he squeezed around one of the pillars that held up the Strider’s gate.
*love you*, he replied. She left him on read.
Jane found him fifteen minutes later, sitting on the side of the road, letting the gravel and dirt from the asphalt run through his fingers. No one had come through the gate while he waited, and he wondered if the fight was still going on. The terror fading and adrenaline leaving his veins, it felt silly that John had been so scared early. That he’d run out of the party without saying goodbye to his friend, or even attempting one last wink in Roxy’s direction.
Jane honked her horn impatiently, startling John out of his thoughts. She gave him the eyebrow as he climbed into their father’s SUV. “You smell like beer,” she said. Janey could be a little sanctimonious.
“I know, I was drinking.” John leaned back into his seat and groaned, putting a head on his forehead. “God damn, that was a terrible party. Janey, next time I want to go to one of those things, tell me not to?”
Jane rolled her eyes at him and did a perfect k-turn in the middle of the empty highway. It was less of a highway and more of a two-lane road with a speed limit of 60. “I told you this afternoon not to go, you never listen to me.”
“I know.” John rubbed his temples again. “You’re too good to me. You’re an angel, did you know that? I owe you whatever food you want.”
Jane smiled, her cheeks dimpling. “I know I’m an angel. You’d be lost without me. You can buy me noodles tomorrow.”
John laughed, and looked out the window. Their grandmother and father owned a bakery, and everything the Egberts owned smelled perpetually of sugar. The inside of their car was not an exception. As they raced away from the Striders’, streetlights began to accumulate and the flickering lights of a shopping mall appeared on the side of the road.
After a few minutes of silence, Jane looked at her brother. “What happened? That you needed to leave.”
John rubbed his nose again. Thinking about it now made him feel so silly, but at the moment, he’d been terrified. It was the worst night of his life. “Everyone was pretty drunk,” he started, hesitantly. “And then Dave’s weird older brother got there—not Dirk, I like Dirk.”
Jane hummed, she liked Dirk too, but like. She like-liked him.
“Anyways, their weird older brother was there, and I think he had a gun, and then he started trying to fight with these other kids from the next town over, and I got spooked. It didn’t feel like a place I wanted to be anymore. So I—I left? I just left out the front door. But then these kids started following me.
Like, they were a bunch of kids from that ‘School for Alternate Learning,’ or whatever,” John did the air quotes, “And they started chasing me across the yard, and I was pretty sure they had weapons, and I was really afraid Jane. It was so weird.” He shivered, and held onto his elbows. “I know that sounds fucking weird.”
Jane shook her head. “I believe you. Those kids are the worst. I was working in the bakery the other day, and this girl wearing the SAL uniform comes up to the counter and told me that my ghosts were piling up. And then she left, she didn’t even buy anything.”
John yawned and rolled his eyes. “Weird motherfuckers.” They sat in silence for a few more minutes. “But, thanks for believing me. I know if I tell Dave on Monday he’s just going to say—“
“That you were making it all up, or something. That it was all in your head.” Jane nodded. “He’s not very nice to you, you know.”
John shrugged. “I think pushing me around makes him feel a little more normal. I mean, Jesus, if I had the family he had . . . “ The two of them sat in silence. “Can you not tell Dad about this?”
Jane mimed zipping up her lips and throwing away the key. “I gotchu baby brother.” She reached over to ruffle his hair, and he laughed, squirming away from her.
“Only by thirteen minutes,” he protested, but he was too sleepy to do more than that. When they reached him, Jane led him out of the car and up the stairs by his elbow, whispering instructions to him the whole time. The last thought John remembered having was a comforting one. They couldn’t find him here. They couldn’t get him now.