My hands shook with anticipation as I drove towards 713 Hickory Avenue. The road signs seemed to fade into the shadows around me. 713 Hickory Avenue. I swore I'd never go there again. I swore it.
I found myself turning into Roman's driveway. I dug my phone out of my pocket and dialed his number. It rang and rang and with each break, my anxiety rose. On the third ring, he answered, half asleep.
"Mmm... hello?" he grunt-whispered.
I swallowed, temporarily reassured that he actually answered. "He's back," I closed my eyes.
I felt the air between us stagnate. I tapped my fingers impatiently as I waited for his response. I knew he would ask if I was here already.
"Are you sure? Wait-- are you here?" his voice cracked.
"Yeah," I laughed nervously and cracked my knuckles.
"Don't start with the knuckles again," he whispered. I heard him begin shuffling around his room, dressing and collecting in the dark. I heard a thud and a groan as he bumped into something in his rush.
"Three minutes," he cleared his throat and hung up.
I kept drumming my fingers as I waited. He's going to lose his mind, I thought, we both might.
"178... 179...." I counted to myself.
A shadow leaped across my passenger side window, and i almost screamed, but Roman quickly opened the door and got in. I gasped and started my car once more, but not before taking him in.
He had gotten paler in the year I hadn't seen him. His face had gotten more serious and less alight with curiousity. His eyes darted back and forth in weariness, no longer resting on anything in order to take it in. He seemed tired, not the kind that being woken up at 2 a.m. created, it was a soulful tired that I could relate to.
"Let's make this the last time," Roman murmured as I backed out into the dark and empty street.
I bit my lip to keep from showing any hurt on my face. He fiddled with the radio until he found a hauntingly slow Lana del Ray song that perfectly fit our current car drive. The two of us were too jumpy to do much else.
"How, this time?" he seemed to force himself to speak.
"Ice-cream truck," I replied, not wanting the conversation to end, but at a loss for how to continue it. He only nodded.
What does one say when their sadistic and psychotic immortal ex best friend returned only to cause chaos in the lives of every living thing in a one hundred mile radius?
I smiled wistfully. "Remember when--"
"Don't," Roman stopped me.
"No," I insisted. "We have to talk about the fact that we're about to murder-- for real this time-- our once--"
"Stop it," Roman interrupted again. He shook his head in exasperation. "What do you want me to say, Alexis? Do you want me to go on about how none of us had any family, so we had to be each other's family? Or do you want me to discuss how we were tricked into being immortals by the same person that we had put all of our trust into?" His voice had risen now.
"I know that," I said just as loudly, so he wouldn't keep talking. Each word he said had felt like a needle in my skin, a flood of painful memories torn from both of our minds.
The anxiety rose as we got closer and closer to Hickory. I watched the porch lights grow scarce as we let ourselves be immersed in the shadows, too.
And at last, we made it. The East Side was upon us.
"Just like we learned a long time ago," Roman whispered.
We got out of my car and walked down the vacated street and straight towards the eerily empty looking house that was smack in the middle of nowhere. The grass around it was overgrown, the windows were tinted with years of built up mildew. I held my breath as we stepped up to the door.
