Alice

a big one

Its been maybe 3 weeks since we all told Chris. Since then what August calls the"mikey protection detail" has gotten together. I still get baby sat by Chris and Justin when spencer is busy with things.

Today, spencer woke me up while we were still driving. "hey mikey, you up? We're almost in Colorado." Spencer says in a whisper.

"uh oh toto, we aren't in Kansas anymore" Patrick jokes, also in a whisper.

"I'm up, I'm up, why are we whispering?" I ask, whispering back. I slowly and carefully crawling out of my bunk, still in my pjs.

"Don't want to wake up anyone else. We're going to have a meeting with Chris, Justin, Ricky, and Vinny." Spencer says.

"is it what I think it is?" I ask. Spencer nods. "can we get August there too?" I ask.

"they drove with motionless so I just assumed they were also coming." Patrick says.

"okay, let me get dressed." I say, grabbing clothes from my suitcase and going into the back room to change.

I ended up with plain black jeans, my binder, and one of those novelty state shirts I got from a gas station. It has some plant printed all the way down the sleeves.

By the time I step out, we are less than 10 minutes from the assigned parking spots for our busses.

When we do stop, I follow spencer and Patrick to the motionless bus. Ricky (o) answers the door.

"hey guys. We should probably do this outside, Ryan is sleeping on the couch." Ricky says.

"where's August?" I ask.

"Ryan gave her his bunk. She's up though if you want her out here too." Ricky says.

"are we all talking out here?" August asks, leaning around Ricky.

"yup. Go get chenzo." Patrick says. August nods and dissapears into the bus again. Ricky steps out, followed by Justin and chris, followed shortly by August and Vinny.

"you guys wanted to talk about something? It everything okay?" Vinny asks, immediately looking at me and August.

"we wanted to kind of, let you in on something." August says.

"you and mikey are dating?" He says. I can't tell if he's joking or not. "cause everyone saw that coming."

"no, its not that. It's about mikey." She says. I see spencer trying to keep his composure.

"you know the thing about having to hide mikey from his dad?" Spencer asks. Vinny nods and glanced between me and spencer.

"my biological father is dead. Has been, as long as spencer has had me." I say.

"what? Did you? I swear to god spencer if you or anyone else hurt him." Vinny says. Why is everyone so protective of me? I've never even seen vinny be angry.

"Vinny you know me, you've known me for years! I would never hurt a kid." Spencer says.

"he didn't hurt me. Trust me if he did there's a line of people waiting to help me there, spencer being front and center." I say. Vinny looks at me, sighs, and looks back at spencer.

"you know my... issues."

"the violence ones? I'm starting to get concerned what this has to do with mikey." Vinny is pissed.

"a little kid put a name on my list. That name was mikeys dad. I had an issue, I resolved the issue. Mikey was caught in cross fire."

"you have a list?"