The Neighbor

Part 2: Making The Next Move

Smasher

  "Hi!" I open the door for her to walk in.

  She walks in cautiously. "Hey guys." She smiles brightly, looking at all of us.

  "Hi." We say in unison.

  Nikayla walks over to Amaya. "How are you?"

  "I'm really good." Amaya answers her reassuringly.

  "You are? Even after your run in with Landon?" This surprises Nikayla, but I can tell that she's very happy.

Amaya nods. "Yeah, honestly I kind of forgot about it."

    "Oh, good." She fidgets with her hands. "I was coming over to tell you that you don't have to worry about him anymore. I took care of him."

   "How?" Amaya sits up straighter, eyes focused on Nikayla.

     "Last night, after I saw you, I knew I had to do something. He'd gone too far this time." She stared off, reliving the call she made last night. Amaya's eyes start to water as she listens to her friend explain. I watch the interaction, reminded once again what a great person my girl is. "I decided that I needed to report him. He needs help."

Amaya's eyes nearly pop out of their sockets. "You reported him?" She pauses. "That was so brave of you."

  "I had to." She said sheepishly. "He would've seriously hurt someone, or worse." She shivered, giving me the urge to protect her.

  "What ended up happening?" I move beside her, focusing on her. "Where is he now?"

  Niki looks at her feet then back up at me. "He was admitted into an insane asylum."

  Blade and I look at each other. "An insane asylum." Blade echoed.

  She moved her head in agreement. "Yeah, he's in some place called Clementine's Residence."

  Our eyes all grew wide. "Nikki, doesn't that name sound familiar to you?" Amaya's asks.

  Her face scrunches up in concentration, which I find adorable. "Not really. Should it?"

Amaya breaks the barrier and tells Nikayla the secret we've all been keeping from. I'm glad she does because I've been starting to feel guilty for not talking to her about my past. "That's the place where Blade was, when he was picking up Smasher. Remember when we were searching for him?" Amaya questions her. I watch as it dawns on her.

     "Oh my gosh, now I remember!" Nikayla gasps. She looks, putting two and two together. In that moment I wanted nothing more than to disappear. "You lived there?"

I stare at my feet and nod in agreement. "For a little bit yeah." I can't bring myself to look at her. I don't think I want to know what she's thinking about me right now.

  "Why?" I can hear the shock in Nikayla's voice as she asks.

     "Doesn't matter really, he never should've been in there." Blade jumped to my defense. "We've all had tough times."

   Nikki ignored him, her eyes still on me. "Smash?"

I counted the floorboards to ease my anxiety. I know I needed to tell her the truth at some point, it might as well be now. If she wasn't okay with my past it wasn't going to work out between us anyways. I prayed she could look past this. "I went a little crazy when my ex died. I did some things that I guess could be considered insane." I finally build up the courage to look up at her. I need her to see me, the real me. "I just felt so guilty you know? I didn't know what to do with myself."