Questionable

Chapter 12

I'm ripped out of my stomach wrenching memories to find myself running up the beach with tear stained cheeks. When the hell did I get out of the car? I'm struggling to run through the sand and push the thoughts out of my head at the same time.

"Abby, sweetheart...It's your brother..." No, stop Abby. Stop thinking.

"It was the impact of the car on the drivers side, it's a good thing the two kids weren't sitting on that side, we're lucky they're still here..."

"Shut up!" I scream out loud. I haven't felt this hysterical, or this much pain for a long time, and it's awful. When I finally reach my car again, it begins to rain.

"Shit!" I curse as I search my pockets for my keys. My eyes are still flooded with tears and on top of that its pouring rain. After five minutes of searching, I've settled on the fact that I've lost them. Whether I locked them in the car or dropped them while running, my keys are missing and I have no energy to search right now. My body slides down the side of the car until I'm sitting on the wet gravel ground with my head between my knees. I cry for a couple more minutes and curse at myself. Why the hell did I get out of the car? After a second go at searching for my keys, I give up and pull out my phone. My numb fingers dial the number of the most reliable person at the moment, my best friend.

"Niall?"

...

"What the hell were you doing in the pouring freezing rain? Why are you at the beach? It's 3 in the morning and your running around on the beach? Jesus Abby your insane!" Niall scolds. I was surprised he wasn't drunk when I called him, with the party happening and all.

"Shut up Niall! I know it was a bad idea to get out of my car, and it's none of your business why I came down here!" I snap back. I'm not in the mood for this. Niall looks like he is about to scream back at me, but he seems to stop himself when he sees my bloodshot puffy eyes.

"Abby...a-are you ok?" He asks, his eyes full of worry. I sigh. There's nothing to keep from Niall, he's my best friend.

"I just miss him a lot, that's all." It's quiet for a moment. Niall sighs.

"Yeah, me too." He breathes. I don't say anything.

"Here." He tosses a black sweater into my lap. I pick it up to reveal a white label printed across the front.

"Your North Face?" I gasp. Niall is practically in love with this sweater.

"You're soaking wet and freezing your ass off, and it's the only thing I have. Now put it on before I change my mind." I pull on the North Face and slip my wet t-shirt off from under it.

"Can we get hot chocolate?" I don't know what gives me the nerve to ask, especially since Niall doesn't seem to be in too good of a mood, and I don't have any money.

"What do you think this is? And I can guarantee you've got no money." He replies.

"Please Niall?" I beg. I really want hot chocolate.

"No." He says sternly. He sighs a few moments after.

"Listen, if you have hot chocolate at your house, we can have a cup there. Plus I don't really want to go back to the party." Annoyance takes over his features.

"Sounds good." I say.

By the time we get home and the hot chocolate is made, its almost 4. The party is still going strong next door, and Niall still doesn't want to go back. We open Netflix and Niall chooses some dumb action movie. I find my eyelids becoming heavy, and before I know it, Niall is shaking me to wake me up. My eyes flick to the clock under the TV set. 4:46.

"What do you want?" I mumble.

"I'm gonna sleep here tonight. The party still hasn't died down and I can't go back there." I almost say, "go tell them all to leave", but I know he won't do that. They should all be gone within the next hour anyways. Niall's parties never usually last this long, it's kind of weird.

"Yeah, whatever, you know where the sheets are." I say. The amount of nights Niall has spent in that guest room is uncountable. Niall would end up here a lot, from when we were kids and he didn't like his mom's new boyfriends, to sophomore year when she would come home drunk and they would fight. It was, after all, his second home.

"Night." He says and disappears up the stairs.