Focus

5 Days Or 5 Seconds?

"Wait, so you mean you've only known this guy for five days?" My older sister plops down on the couch next to me and switches on the tv. I turn to her, and sigh. "It feels like I've known him longer though." She snorts. "That may be true, but I don't think it's a good idea for you to be running off with a group of teenage boys, especially not with what happened after..." her voice trails off. Brandon. "You know, Sarah, why don't you just say it out loud?" I snap.

"He was your friend and he hurt me, and now he's sitting in jail, and you're paranoid about me even leaving the house again." She looks down at her hands. I can see the pain on her face. She's really trying to make herself available, but I think she's running out of ways to be there for me. "Why are you so scared?" my voice rises. "It's not like anything happened to you!" Daisy, our schnauzer, pads over to me and sits at my feet. I ignore her and stand up, rubbing my face with my hands.

Silence hangs in the air for what seems like forever, then she takes a deep breath and looks up at me. "You've never even tried to reach out," she begins in a soft voice. "Eversince we were little, you've been so reserved." I shake my head, exasperated, but let her continue. "I'm supposed to look after you. I just don't know what I'm gonna do if anything like this ever happens again. Hell, I don't even know what to do now."

Her voice is deadly quiet, and I can hear the fury behind each word. "Hannah." I turn around and look her in the eyes. Her facial expression is tired. Our eyes linger on each other for a while. I love her so much. It must be painful for her as well; she and Brandon had been friends since the 6th grade, and now he's rotting in a jail cell. The room is silent. Finally, she stands up, and says in a subdued tone, "I'm going to kill him."

My eyes widen. "Sarah - " "No," she insists, making her way around the couch to me. She places her hands on each of my cheeks and looks me straight in the eye. "When they release him from jail, and they will... I am going to kill Brandon Russo." Anger I have never seen before smothers her voice. Her jaw clenches as she talks. I'm geniunely afraid of what she might do.

"Okay," I say softly. "I won't go." Her head shakes and she wrings her hands. "Han, that's not it. I want you to be able to have fun if you want." She turns away from me. "None of this should have happened. It's just not fair to you..." her voice breaks and I can tell she's crying - but it's not the kind of tears that you can fix with words, so I decide to just pull her into a hug. My heart hurts so badly.

The pain I felt from Saturday comes flooding back and everything aches as we lean on each other and cry. This goes on for a while. Soon she pulls back, drying her eyes with her shirt sleeve and saying she has to get ready for work. I nod and walk to my room.

Thursday morning, my mind is swimming. I feel relieved but also slightly disappointed about the road trip, but I don't know what I was expecting - the whole idea is just so impractical and rushed. I also feel guilty about snapping at my sister last night. She just lost a close friend, and I should've been supportive of her. When I get to school, I barely made it two steps into the building before Michael sneaks up behind me. "Hey," he says casually, walking next to me. I blink. Um, okay.This is weird. Are we friends now? Is this normal? I choose my next words very carefully. "I talked to my sister last night."

He looks at me sideways. "Yeah, I was gonna ask you about that. What did she think?" I sigh and pull at the hem of my shirt. I feel kind of bad for what I'm about to say, but I know it's the right thing to do. "She wasn't violently opposed to the idea," I begin. "But I don't think it's the best thing for me right now. You know, with everything that's...happened." He nods slowly.

"Don't worry about it," he says. "It wasn't very fair of Calum to ask you to do that anyway." I shrug, and he walks me to first period. Walking with him makes me feel safe. He just looks so... badass, I guess. Like the kind of guy you don't want to get in a fight with.