Alice

vinny

After noticing my mental state, Justin offers to walk me back to the Ice Nine Kills bus.

"I'm not sure that's the best idea, our bus is kinda covered in fake murder." Spencer says. Ricky agrees with him.

"He can stay with us, we have a pull-out couch." Chris says, gesturing to the bus behind him.

"Yeah, and I can go get August, I'm sure she'd be more than happy to spend some time with you." Ricky says.

"We don't drive until morning, right?" Justin asks.

"Yeah, well noon but... anyway its like a 3 hour drive." Chris says.

"Yeah, you guys take Mikey. We'll meet up again tomorrow." Spencer says. He puts a comforting hand on my shoulder.

It's hard to think he could imagine how I feel right now, after all he does this all the time and is usually fine afterwards.

He pulls me into a hug and says, "First one always hurts in its own way. You'll be okay, kid." I feel tears start to burn in my eyes.

I wrap my arms around him and hug him back. Eventually I follow Chris into the bus and Ricky wanders off.

Soon enough, Ricky returns with August and Andy. Andy enters the bus first and walks over to me immediately.

"I heard what happened, are you okay?" He asks, picking up my hands and looking at my knuckles. Its only now that I realize they are bruised, and one of them is busted open, probably on my brother's teeth.

August isn't far behind him. "Mikey, holy fuck are you okay?" She asks, immediately wrapping her arms around me in a hug.

"I'm okay, I'm okay." I say, more to myself than to August. She lets go of me and holds my face, carefully looking for any bruises. Of course there are none.

"Busted your hand pretty fucking good there. Chris can you grab me a fist aid kit?" Andy asks. Chris reaches to a top shelf and pulls down a small box.

Andy opens the box and takes out a butterfly bandage and a roll of gauze. He puts some anti-septic on my knuckle before putting on the butterfly bandage and pulling the open wound closed.

It stings, bad enough for me to bite down on my bottom lip and almost make it bleed. August puts her hand on my shoulder as emotional support.

"I know, kid. Be glad I'm not washing it with liquor." Andy says. I laugh a little bit, and he smiles. He wraps the gauze around my hand about 7 times before cutting the end and taping it down so it stays.

"Come see me tomorrow and I can take a better look at it, okay Mikey?"

I nod.

"Good. Other than that, you alright? It can definitely be rough watching something like that, let alone being involved in it."

"I- I'll be okay. I always am. I just, didn't expect to be as okay with it as I am. I'm not worried that I just killed a man, I'm worried that someone might find him, and then they tie it back to me, and then Spencer, and then I lose the closest thing I've ever had to family and-" I start to talk franticly.

"Hey, hey, no one here is going to let you lose anything, alright? You want to stay here, we will help you stay here. Now breathe, nice and deep." Andy says, breathing deeply. I breathe with him.

"You killed someone?" Vinny asks. Oh god Vinny...

He walks over and sits on the couch next to me. I look down at my hands, one of them bandaged and bleeding, the other bruised.

"Dude, that's... what happened?" He asks. Chris and Andy look at each other, both seeming concerned. Justin just looks at Vinny, equally concerned.

"My brother. He's not a great person. He found me and tried to drag me back home, he had a knife, I panicked and just..." I make a slight stabbing motion. I didn't lie, but I didn't tell him everything.

"Your brother tried to kill you?" He asks, still talking quietly.

I nod.

He wraps his arms around me in an awkward side hug. It's more comforting than I expected it to be.

"You'll be okay, I'm sure anyone would forgive you for that. You were just defending yourself." He says.

He doesn't know about all of the murder and kidnapping from the people he's in tour with. He isn't involved in their accidental crime circle, but he still understood, he still forgave me when I didn't ask him too.

"Thank you, Vin, you have no idea how much that means..." I say, wiping the tears from my eyes.

"We all have our own ghosts, Mikey." He says.

I look up and see Chris, Ricky, and Justin standing silently. Chris and Ricky look shocked, Justin looks like he's holding back tears himself.

"You spending the night?" Andy asks.

"Yeah, Spencer thought it would be best given their bus décor." Chris says.

"Can I stay over too? For Mikey's sake?" August asks. Andy nods and August sits down next to me and Vinny.

"I'll grab you some clothes and drop them off. You guys know her rules right?"

"Like the back of my hand. Don't worry dude we'll watch them, they'll be fine." Justin says. He subtly wipes his eyes and walks Andy off the bus.

"Bye dad!" August says as they leave. I lean into her and she wraps her arms around me in a hug. "You want to watch a movie? Try to distract yourself?" She asks.

"Yeah, yeah that's probably a good idea." I say.

Vinny stands up and grabs a CD book. He flips through it.

"how about a Disney movie? I know they're childish but its always comforting." He says.

"Honestly I haven't seen many Disney movies. If I couldn't find it online I couldn't watch it." I tell him.

"what? Really?" Chris asks, sounding offended on my behalf. He walks over and takes a disc put of the cd book and puts it in the TV.

"What did you grab?" August asks.

"Rapunzel, probably." Justin jokes. Chris stares at him judgingly and Justin busts out laughing. "Is it actually Rapunzel?" He asks.

"Yeah man, it's a good movie!" Chris says, laughing with him.

We all laugh a bit while Chris puts in the movie. Justin opens a cabinet and takes out a few bags of chips.