What we do in the Dark

Chapter Twnty-Two

It was the next day, me and Zev had just finished breakfast and were about to head out. My mum made sure we were all warm and bundled up. We headed out.

I had an idea of how I wanted to tell him my secret. It was something even my mum didn't know about.

I never kept it from Zev intentionally, I just wanted to pretend it didn't happen, but deep in my heart, a few things made me not want to forget. It's a part of me now and it always will be.

We walked in mostly silence, the streets were empty. I can still hear their voices, the motorcycles.

I could tell Zev was nervous. He was probably nervous because he could feel that I was nervous, but he wasn't asking any questions. He just walked silently next to me for 10 minutes.

We arrived at the place. Zev stopped. I turned back to him. He looked very confused. The place I had taken him to was an old concrete railroad bridge. The bridge itself was small compared to others. It was located in an abandoned area of the town. The area was mostly trees and greenery. You could see buildings in the distance but there were none around here. It was a completely quiet unpopulated area.

"Where are we?" he asked, looking scared.

"Well there's not much here anymore from what I hear. Don't worry, there's nothing bad here." I smiled softly at him. It hurts to smile. The painful memories come back one by one. Who I really am. The past I tried so desperately to forget. He could tell I was in pain, I could see the pity in his eyes. He didn't say anything else.

I lead him to one of the pillars, the 4th pillar from the left is it. The pillars were large, and this one was hollow, it must've been used for storage in the early days of the bridge's operation. But we used it for something else.

The cement door was cracked open, it took some muscle to open it. Inside was dark. I felt around for the pull switch. I'll be lucky if the lights even still work. I guess it was my day because when I pulled the switch the light slowly flickered on one by one revealing everything. It brought back all the memories. Their voices, the yelling, the gunshots. The place was a mess, just like how it was when I was taken out of here. Of course, there was some new damage and graffiti, probably from teenagers that hang around the area.

The chairs were broken on the floor, the old mattresses torn up. I walked over to the bench, it was flipped over. I picked it back up. My eyes gazed over the handprints on the wall. Six hand prints in red paint. I lifted my hand up to my print. It no longer fits, I've grown since then. It was almost eight years ago.

I sat down on the bench and waved for Zev to come sit with me. He was looking around in shock.

"What is this place?" He hesitantly walked over and sat next to me.

"It's my old hangout from high school." I'm a horrible person. How could I have been a part of something like this. But Zev deserves to know and make the decision if he wants to stay with me or not.

"Why'd you want to show me this? This place is kinda scary," he asked with concern. I found comfort in him being here with me.

"It's not so much the place I wanted to show you, it's the story. It's who I was. I wanted to forget but I can't. I need you to know who I used to be..." he raised an eyebrow at me. "I was a member of a street gang back in high school." His eyes widened, it was hard to face him, it was hard to see the shocked look on his face. I don't deserve his love after what I've done.

"Really?" He didn't look sad or disappointed in the slightest, just confused and shocked.

"Yeah, I hurt a lot of people and did a lot of bad things... I never meant to keep it from you. It's just because I was trying to forget so I never told anyone. No one except for the people I worked with, no they were my friends at the time, knew what I was part of."