2 kids

Afternoon drink.

Ashley.

I feel like I've fallen deeper into a dark hole I've dug for myself.

Stepping out of the train, I realise I don't want to go home. Being stuck between four walls of my own room feels too suffocating. And the sun shining is like a perfect invitation to spend the afternoon outside. So I'll accept the invitation and wander through the streets of New York for a while.

Sleep is still something my body and mind are desperately needing, but losing sleep to spend a day with Mae was worth it. Now that I'm alone I feel a strange feeling of sadness and loneliness settling in my chest, and her words keep on repeating in my head. That's not my explanation.

I always knew Alex kept a million secrets, yet I always accepted them for their history goes back long before I entered his life. And with the way he opened up to me, it was easy to pretend there wasn't anything he was hiding from me. Cause it really felt like I knew him, in the greatest detail, even if only for a while.

It wasn't hard to understand there was something more to them all. Not just Alex, but Ace and Mae too, and their whole friend group. From the second I saw her, with her vibrant pink hair and that bubble-gum in her mouth, I knew I wanted to be friends with her. I just knew she had that something to her. I wasn't able to label it with words, and neither am I now.

She brought some spiciness to my boring, almost colourless life. From the way she talks to the way she acts, to the way she makes one feel special. They have a peculiar power, a peculiar charisma that makes people turn their heads. To some it screams confidence, to some arrogance. It doesn't matter what it is, because either way it catches their attention.

Mae's attempt to reunite me with Alex only awakened the questions I feared to ask. When it comes to taking action, I chicken out. And so I never asked her anything that has been killing me for years.

Crossing the street my eyes land on a beautifully decorated bar. Industrial, elegant and dark. Cinnamon coloured leather chairs with a brick wall behind and bronze coloured light bulbs in the most original lamps, with minimalistic paintings on the walls.

And in that bar Ace is sitting. Not in the back, not in the front, somewhere in the middle. Even though his hair is no longer a vibrant eye-catching colour, but a light caramel brown, but a light caramel brown, I notice him instantly.

I stop before the entrance. Pondering whether I should or shouldn't enter, I decide to open the door before I get cold feet.

Slowly I walk over to him, only standing next to the table, unable to sit down. "Can I join you?"

His eyes flicker up to me, empty of his sparks. "Ash!" A cunning smile creeps onto his face as he nods. It's the same smile as always, yet it's not as bright and wide and usual. It only reaches his eyes a tiny bit. There's something dark and cloudy covering his always energetic and positive face. I've never seen Ace like this before.

"What are you doing here?" I ask and take a seat. It's a little too early to be sitting and drinking alone and he still isn't of legal drinking age.

"Enjoying an afternoon drink." He raises his gold tinted liquid with ice cubes floating.

"Isn't it a little too soon to be drinking?"

Ace just shrugs, sipping from his drink. It seems like a bar for high class people, not teenagers sitting around. It leaves me wondering if they perhaps don't know the owner of this place too, or if his fake ID just failed to raise suspicion.

"Shouldn't you be at the studio with Alex and River?"

I can't bring myself to directly ask him what the reason behind his afternoon drinking is. Instead I'm fishing for the right words while attempting to get him to tell me himself.