Stepping out of Alex’s house was a relief. Don’t get me wrong, it’s an absolutely fantastic house but the tension that had started to build up as soon as I stepped into it…well, it made me feel incredibly nervous, especially when Alex’s friend, Rian was in the room. Out of all the people that I’ve met, I never really thought that it was possible for a single person to hate me so much as soon as they heard my name; but I suppose that there’s a first time for everything though, right?

For the first ten minutes of the walk from Alex’s house to the small coffee shop that he knew so well, neither one of us knows what to say to the other. To some other people, it may have felt or seemed a bit weird and uncomfortable but the truth is to someone who has been around loads of other guys and loud noises coming from various guns and other weaponry, the silence that had fallen between us was actually rather comforting and it certainly made a nice change, at least to me. When I glance sideways at Alex, he must have thinking the same thing as me as he closed his eyes and lifted his head up to the sky slightly as he walked, a small smile was ghosting across his lips as he feels a light breeze sweep through his light brown hair.

It takes me a moment to pull my eyes away from him, my cheeks feeling flushed as I tried to hide the embarrassment by looking over to the other side of the street for a minute. Alex must have seen me blushing as the moment that I turn my head back to face him; he was looking at me with a small smile on his lips, his hands tucked into his hoodie pockets, protecting them from the light Baltimore breeze that was slowly getting colder. Judging by the colour of the sky, it would start to rain soon and knowing what the weather is usually like in Baltimore, thunder and lightning would soon follow. I was just about to start working out at what time the rain, thunder and lightning would start to hit, when Alex spoke up.

“I apologise for Rian’s behaviour back there, he’s not usually like that but he can be a little…overprotective of me sometimes. Although his overprotectiveness has kind of been escalating for the past few weeks, especially after all that’s happened.”

“You don’t need to apologise, it’s okay, honest. I mean he was a little bit intimidating but, it’s fine.” I reply, sending him my best smile as he carries on walking besides me. “I get why he was acting like that. Rian’s worried about you and he doesn’t want to see you get hurt again, it’s completely understandable. He seems like a good friend.”

“Yeah, he is. He’s the best.” Alex whispers, averting his gaze from me to look down at his feet.

I’m not even sure what to say in response to that. In my whole life, I’ve never had a friend like Rian. In fact, I’ve never really had a friend before that has cared about me as much as Rian cares for Alex. When I was growing up, every kid that knew my name; thought that I was weird…that I was a freak just because I didn’t care to be included in their immature schoolboy games. I suppose that in a way, I brought my loneliness childhood on myself but in all honesty, being alone when I was young has helped to shape me into the man that I am today, a man who I’m proud of being; a man who my Mother is proud of raising. I couldn’t ask for anything more than that. But Alex…Even though he’s been going through a lot of troubles lately in his life, Alex really is a lucky guy, because he’s not going through it alone.

“The café is just round the corner…” Alex motions with a little nod of his head, bringing me out of my thoughts of the past.

Looking up at the street sign that was place on the corner of the road, I could tell that my eyes had lit up as a full grown smile began to spread across my features. Thames Street. I remember this place, the coffee shop round the corner was my safe haven; I would go there whenever I felt the need to skip classes, which I guess was pretty much all the time. If I close my eyes and concentrated, then I can still picture the layout of the tables as well as feeling the warmth of the sunlight shining through the big windows before bouncing off of the pale yellow walls and hitting my face, making it feel as though I was in my own private little bubble. If I concentrate even harder, then I can still smell the heavenly scent of coffee beans that had been freshly grounded first thing that morning.

“I remember this place,” I say to Alex, sending one of my most dazzling smiles in his direction, as I jog a couple of steps in front of him towards the corner and turning left in order to see the same powder blue canopy above the café door that was there back when I was in High School. Upon seeing the confused expression on Alex’s face, I take a breath and quickly explain to him what I meant. “I used to come here a lot when I was younger…although it was mainly to get away from people.”

“Oh. That’s like me in a way; I come here a lot too…although it’s mainly to get away from Rian.” Alex laughs quietly at his little joke as he makes his way through the entrance of the coffee shop and over to the counter where he proceeds to order us two Latte’s.

~*~*~*~

“Tell me about your childhood.” Alex inquires curiously as he takes a long sip of his Latte, his soft golden eyes never straying from mine. “What was it like to grow up in the city of Baltimore?”

“Well…I suppose that it depends on who you ask to be honest. Everyone has a different story and opinion about what it was like to grow up in Baltimore, but for me…I really do want to say that my childhood was just like anyone else’s but that would be a lie.” I explain truthfully, taking a sip of my own Latte before placing it back down in front of me, taking my gaze from his own and instead concentrate on rotating the coffee cup in my hands. “I’m not going to deny the fact that I was always a little different from the other kids, because I was. I wasn’t interested in what all the other kids wanted to do, I wasn’t interested in playing a part in their immature little games, all I wanted was to be left alone.”

“I take it that you got what I wanted?” Alex asks softly, his beautiful golden eyes softening even more as he waits patiently for my answer.

“I did, but it wasn’t quite how I pictured being left alone to be. Instead of having people ignore me like I wanted, the kids that knew me and who were surrounding me during school times, well they decided to take it upon themselves to make my life hell; whenever they saw me, they’d attempt to trip me up or if they saw me walking down a corridor then they would go out of their way to walk next to me and shove me away as they walked past. Back then, I just tried to shrug it off and carry on with my life but…” I hesitate and bite down on my bottom lip so hard that I’m sure that I’m going to draw some blood at any moment.

It’s not that I don’t want to tell Alex the next part of the story, as it would help him get to know me more which in turn would help with his English assignment, it’s just that I’m not sure if I can tell him as not only is it painful for me to even think about, but if I told him then he would know about a secret that I’ve tried to keep to myself for too long now; one that only my parents, siblings and Matt know about, which to me is five people too many.

“Jack?”

I look up from my hands and into Alex’s eyes, as soon as they connected my stomach made a dreadful lurch as I saw how much concern, curiosity and sadness was swimming through his expression. I had to look away from him; I couldn’t handle seeing it on Alex when that was the exact same expression that I saw everyday on my parents face when they found out about…what happened just before I went and joined the army. I close my eyes and take a deep breath. I may as well just get this over with and if it turns out that Alex hates me after, well…it won’t be the first time someone’s turned their back on me.

“Things started to get a whole lot worse for me when I started High School.” I explain, my voice threatening to crack so I take a moment to take another sip of my Latte. “I know that when people say that High School is hell, they’re exaggerating a little but for me it was true. The kids that shoved me in the corridor, they started to wait for me after classes, waiting to punch or kick me for no reason, and they would follow me to my locker and slam my head against it. That wasn’t the worse of it though.”

“How much worse could it have gotten?” Alex asks me, a look of horror on his face as he lifts his Latte up with shaking hands.

“It got to the point where I was hospitalized by them. They slammed my head one too many times on the locker before throwing some punches when I was on the floor. They managed to crack three ribs and my collarbone. If it wasn’t for Zack…” I stop myself at the mention of his name just as a sob was working its way up my throat; I take a moment to clear it before finishing. “If it wasn’t for him, then another few kicks to the head and I would have died.”

“How did Zack stop them?”

At the mention of his name from Alex’s mouth, I flinch in my seat slightly before composing myself again.

“Zack was the star Quarterback at High School. Everyone respected him, if he said to stop, then if you knew what was good for you, then you’d stop and walk away. Except they didn’t stop this time so he had to get a bit physical and he ended up breaking the guy’s nose.” I explain as I look back up at Alex and note the way that he had his fists clenched ever so slightly. “Anyway, after that they soon backed off, me and Zack started to become great friends, he always had my back.”

“You said ‘was’ the star Quarterback…what happened?”

“He…He died in a car accident six months before we were due to graduate. I was in the car with him at the time…but, I don’t really remember what happened…” I bow my head and within a second, Alex’s hands were grabbing hold of mine.

“I’m sorry, Jack…” Alex whispers, his eyes dropping from my own and focusing on our entwined hands.

“Don’t be…Zack was a great guy, I’ve just got to hold onto the time that I had with him and be grateful that he was in my life.” I say confidently as I look up at Alex. “Which brings me to the point of my story…I know how you’re feeling and what you’re going through…to lose someone that meant so much to you can be totally unbearable, but it…” I start to say but Alex snaps his head back up to look at me, his eyes narrowing slightly into a deathly glare.

“No. No, don’t you even think about going there. Don’t you dare say that it gets better!” Alex hisses quietly, his eyes building up with tears as he pulls his hands away from mine and folds them securely into this lap.

“Alex, I know that you think that everything is going wrong for you at the moment, believe me, I do. I went through the same denial that you’re going through now but you have to trust me when I say that it does get better…you’ve just got to give it a little time.” I say softly, not daring to look into his eyes as I know what I’ll see; anger and a dash of regret – regret for agreeing to come out to get coffee with me.

”No…no you don’t know anything about me or what’s going on in my head so don’t you even try and bond with me over something like this…just because you’ve lost someone in your life doesn’t mean that you have the right to try and believe that it’s the same thing as what I’m going through.” Alex pushes his chair away from the table as he stands up, glaring down at me with tears in his eyes. “It won’t get easier over time. How can you even say that it could when you’ve been left alone by every single person that ever meant a damn to you?”

“But you haven’t been left alone, Alex!” I say exasperatedly, pushing my own chair away from the table as I stand up, my eyes meeting his. “Just take a good look around you, you’ve never been alone! Yes it’s true that I don’t know what you’ve been through and I know that it probably isn’t the same thing that I’ve been through but you have people around you that care about you so much that they couldn’t bare to lose you or see you get hurt!”

“STOP IT! Don’t you dare bring Rian into this!” Alex snaps back, his voice rising with every word. “I don’t know what happened to you after Zack died, but I can take a guess that you had your family around you, comforting you and telling you that everything would be okay. THAT’S having people around you. I don’t have that, not anymore. The only person that I have left in my pathetic excuse of a life is Rian. He’s the only one that cares; everyone else couldn’t give a shit about me.”

I realise that the whole café had grown quiet as Alex started to yell but I don’t care that everyone is watching us and listening to every word that’s being said. They’re not important, Alex is. Just watching and listening to him had made me realise something, it had made me realise that the boy in front of me, was more broken than he cared to let on. He may not see it now, but he will start to get over his grief, even if I have to be the one to help him, I will. I know what it’s like to go through the various stages of grief, and he’s right; I wasn’t going through it alone when I lost Zack, but I know that if I was alone, then I wouldn’t have made it past the first few days after hearing the news.

“Alex…” I start to say, but it’s already too late; he’s out the café door before I can even finish saying his name.

~*~*~*~

As the rain crashes down around me, I push myself forward as fast as I can in the same direction that Alex had taken off in. How could I have been so stupid as to say the things that I did? I shouldn’t be giving people advice about getting over grief; I’ve only lost one person in my whole lifetime. Alex on the other hand…from what he’s told me in his letters and from what he said in the café, he seems to have lost quite a few people in his short lifetime.

I wanted to kick myself for not thinking my words through; I know that everyone takes their own time to get through a loss of a loved one and it was clear to me that Alex would need more time than anyone else, but I couldn’t stop the words from coming out of my mouth. The amount of anger that Alex had in him as he stood there shouting, made me want to back away from him, but I couldn’t do that – he needs help and I’m determined to be the one to help him, alongside Rian; that is if he’s calmed down enough to let me.

Through the rain I ran, back down the route that I had taken with Alex to get to the café, my mind repeatedly playing over a plea of ‘please let him be at home’ all the way down the winding sidewalks. My feet were getting soaked as I ran through puddles and my hair had begun to stick to my forehead, the rain water making its way down from my hair and into my eyes, causing them to burn slightly. I shook my head and wiped at my eyes as I turned the corner to Alex’s road, spotting his house just a few yards ahead of me. With one final push of my body, I made my way up the drive and knocked as loud as I could on the door. I only had to wait a few short minutes before the door opened and I was faced with a red faced Rian.

“You’ve got some nerve coming back here.” He says coldly, folding his arms across his chest as he blocks the doorway and the sight of the occupants that were inside.

“Rian, please tell me that he’s here? Please just, tell me that he came back here…Please?” I plead, not wanting to get into a fight with him as by the look of things, he’d be able to break me without much trouble; it doesn’t matter that I’ve got army training, it won’t save me from Rian when he was this mad. “Alex came back here…please tell me that he came back here.”

“Yeah, he came back.” Rian confirms as I breathe a small sigh of relief. “That is if you class coming back with tears streaming down his cheeks, his clothes all soaked and sticking to him as he bursts through the front door and up to his room before slamming the door closed.”

“Rian…I didn’t mean to get him upset, I was just trying to help…” I say in a small voice as I bow my head down, letting the rain drip from my hair and down to my feet. “I didn’t mean for him to run off.”

Rian doesn’t say anything; he just stands there with his arms folded across his chest. He’s protecting his best friend, I get that but surely he should be pleased that I want to help Alex, to connect with him on some level so that he doesn’t feel so alone. But maybe that’s what he wants…I certainly did, but then again look where that had gotten me; outcasted by everyone who ever tried to be my friend and beaten to an inch of my life. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone, certainly not Alex.

“Can I see him, please? I need to apologize and tell him that I was wrong to say what I did. That I do want to help him and that I won’t hurt or leave him.”

“I don’t think that he wants to see you for a long time.” Rian states as he shifts to close the door over but I jam my foot in the doorframe.

“Please…if he doesn’t want to see me, then can you at least give him my number and tell him that if he ever wants to talk again, then he can give me a ring or a text, anytime of the day or night, I’ll be there to answer him.” I plead, digging out a piece of paper and a pen before scrawling my number down and handing it out to Rian. “Please, Rian? Do this for me…”

Rian hesitates but he doesn’t drop the glare. He reaches out for my number and before I can turn away he’s pulling out an envelope from his pocket and handing it out towards me. “When he got back and went up to his room, he wrote this, told me to give it to you if you ever came by. I don’t know what it says but if I were you, I’d read it and maybe you can find a way to work things out with him. I don’t particularly like you, but I can see that you want to help Alex, so you can’t be all that bad. Just take the letter, read it and give Alex some breathing space for a few days.”

I nod a quick ‘thanks’ to Rian as he closes the door in my face. Letting out a sigh, I shove the letter into my pocket and pull out my cell phone, dialling the number to the local cab service and asking them to send a cab to pick me up from the corner of Alex’s street.

~*~*~*~

Dear Jack,

For the past hour and a half, I’ve been sat at my desk thinking about what to write in reply to your letter and in all honesty, I’m not even sure what I can write to you that would make you understand why I went off like that earlier. I am really sorry about that by the way. It’s just that…Everything that I want to say to you in person, I can’t. I thought that it would be easier to write everything down and have you read it when you’re alone, but then I changed my mind. If I just hand you everything written down on a piece of paper, then I’d be worried about your reaction and I’d get paranoid about how you feel about me as a person after you’ve read it all; that in turn would just lead me into another panic attack and I’m not entirely sure if I can handle one of those just yet. I guess that it’s just going to take me a little bit more time to open up to you, to get over the shock of seeing you in the flesh. I hope that you understand.

There’s a lot about me that you don’t know, and I hope in time that I can trust you enough to tell you about everything that I’ve experienced, just like what you’re doing for me but, I can’t just yet. I don’t have an excuse about why I can’t tell you yet, but I think that once I know a little bit more about you, I’ll be able to relax and open up. There are some secrets in my past that I don’t want to reveal just yet and you may get frustrated or hate me for it, but just know that with each day I’m just that little bit closer to telling you.

You’re probably going to turn up to my place and try to see me, but maybe it’s better if you don’t. Maybe it would just be better if we went back to just being what we were; pen pals with a purpose. It was a stupid idea to have ever met up with you, and I regret letting you see me in the state that I was in but maybe you could forget all of that, and forget about meeting me. For the sake of both of us, let us just go back to writing to each other and wondering what the other person would look / be like.

It would be for the best.

Alex