Damaged Together

Chapter Thirty Seven

Alyssia’s POV:

“Let’s go somewhere.” The worlds tumble out of my mouth without much meaning, just the sad thought either of us leaving each other’s sides running through my head.

“Where?” He replies, a small smile playing on his lips.

“Let’s go to the Reserve.” I think about how long it’s been since I’ve been there.

“What’s that?” he asks.

My jaw drops open, “You’ve never been to the Reserve?!?” My eyes widen and surprise is evident in my voice.

He puts his hands up in surrender, “Nope!”

“Can you stay out tonight?” I ask him as I text my mom and tell her that I’m “going over to my new friend, Hannah’s, house.” Complete bullshit but a second later I get the confirmation that she believes it.

“I can stay out whenever I want. They don’t notice.” My heart aches for this beautiful boy infront of me as the words fall out of his mouth.

How could you not notice him? How could you not instantly fall in love with those beautiful eyes that pierce through your soul. And his child-like personality that reminds you to be happy. How could you not love him? And how could you ever lay a finger on him.

I interlace his fingers with mine and hold on tight, “Well I will always notice when you aren’t by my side.” His eyes soften and he squeezes my hand. “Okay, let’s run to wal-mart, grab some supplies than go to the Reserve.”

We walk out of the ice cream place and the guy behind the counter wishes us a good night.

Jesse drives us over to the giant illuminated Wal-Mart across the street. We decide that it’ll be a “short trip” but we end up walking out almost an hour later with arm fulls of food, drinks and a big knitted festival blanket.

“Are you excited?” I ask him as the GPS spits out directions.

“Well I am still pretty curious what the Reserve is since you won’t tell me.” He laughs.

“We are close!” I watch out the window as the trees pass quickly.

I try to race them with my eyes, a habit I developed after repeatedly coming here with my family. I do it over and over, losing track of time.

“Oh shit, turn right here!” I tell Jesse, almost making us miss the turnoff. “The GPS takes you to a facility thing, we don’t want to go there.”

It’s a small dirt road with thick forest on either side, wide enough for a single car and in the dark guiding yourself becomes more difficult.

Jess slowly makes his way down the pathway, carefully watching where he is guiding the wheels.

“About one more minute!” I inform him. The memories from this place come rushing back. Good and bad.

All the family ones are bad but the place I am taking Jesse was my little secret. Every time we stayed here I’d run off to my secret spot and live in my own happy world for a while.

While caught up in my thoughts I barely notice that Jesse has pulled into the parking lot and stopped the car. The tall deep green trees canopy over us, making it almost pitch black.

I step out of the car and the familiar smell hits me like a wave- A moist, thick, organic smell that used to be one of the most acquainted smells I’d encounter.

We throw all the food and drinks into the blanket and Jesse carries it as a sack over his shoulder, holding it with one hand and holding my hand in the other so I can lead him in the dark.

After a short hike down a small trail we reach where my family used to stay for the day with all the other neighborhood families. It’s a flat dirt square with 20 picnic tables lined up and across the area.

“My family used to come down here all the time. It was kinda the normal thing to do on our street. Almost everyone did. This was obviously before Ellie died. I always wanted to escape though.” I begin to pull him towards the small, hidden trail that I’ve walked numerous times.

“Because if I wore shorts, which I did most of the time because it was hot, Ellie would make fun of my fat thighs. If I talked about how beautiful it was she’d call me names. If I said the slightest complaint she’d call me a bitch. But my parents forced me to come. So I came up with a loophole,” I tell this story for the first time of my life. I have never shared my secret spot with anyone. “One time my entire family ganged up on me, made me cry, and yell, and scream, it was pretty bad… But anyways, I ran. They didn’t even try to stop me either. I just ran, tears falling down my face, not able to see.” I remember this day like it was just earlier and recalling it doesn’t bring back good memories.

“So anyways, I tripped over rock on the ground or something and I fell. I stopped running, briefly feeling a stinging in my leg. I looked around and it all looked the same- the big tall trees that all looked identical surrounded me. I had no idea which way I had come from or where I was going, so I picked myself up and listened. For anything, people, animals, music, anything. And I heard a loud water rushing; I decided to go that way.”

I start to hear the loud splashing and I know we are getting closer.

“I walked, feeling hopeless. I had already figured out that I was only going to kill raccoons but never deer. And I would live in a tree.” I smile at my 11-year-old unrealistic expectations.

Jesse chuckles but says nothing.

“Then I came upon this.” I say as I pull back a branch and lead him to my special part of the Reserve.

I hear him gasp and a big grin pulls at my lips.

Just the reaction I wanted.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Hey guys. So sorry updates have been spaced out a little. This update is longer than usual though!! It’s kinda a cliffhanger but not a Jesse/Alyssia cliffhanger!!

I’ve literally had so much on my plate this week. Don’t know if I will be able to update this weekend but I’ll try I promise.

I hate not writing, like you guys don’t understand, it pains me to not write.

Anyways, 1. Incase anyone is curious, I listened to Lydia’s album Illuminate while I wrote this. (Check them out. Literally one of the best indie-rockish bands I’ve eveer heard.)

2. I know I have talked about the amount of readers that I have lost and I realized that I have so many dedicated readers already. So thank you guys so much for sticking with me through the good and bad chapters. It’d be awesome if you could tell your friends to check this story out. That’s how I’ve found some amaziiing books on here!

Oh and there is going to be a new character soon that’s gonna be pretty important, who’s readddyyyyy?(:

Vote and comment, comment, comment.

Emily