*Trigger warning*
-Ezra-
Two AM. It is Two AM. Half the van is alseep. I'm taking my driving shift, and the girls are obsessing over A. Still. Chris is awake, ready for his turn in a few minutes. Every few minutes he'll ask the girls to shut up, but it doesn't work. So he comes up and sits with me.
"Hey." He mutters.
"Yo." I reply.
"What's up."
"Driving."
"Cool."
"Yup."
I use the road as a distraction from him, and he taps his foot, bored.
"Soo..." He says. "Ready any good books lately?"
I laugh. "You don't read."
"Yeah, I know..."
"Chris, if you want to talk about something, you can just talk."
"Alright..." He sighs and checks to make sure everyone's asleep. "I have a... theroetical question. If say, you got Aria pregnant and then you two.. like, broke up. And you didn't pay child support..."
"Aria and I haven't had sex." I point out.
"Yeah, what's up with that man?"
I laugh. "I was her English teacher, man." I roll my eyes. "My point is, this clearly isn't about us. Who'd you knock up?"
He sighs. "No one."
"Really?" I don't buy it.
"Just... listen. Can they like, throw you in jail for it?"
"Did this person ask you to pay?" I ask.
"It's not me. But, yeah. A lot."
"Then yeah. They can bring it to court and if you don't pay you could face some jail time. Now, who is this person?"
Chris's eyes water up - a sight I hardly see.
"Ezra..." He whispers. "I'm in deep shit, man."
I look to him for just a second. "Who's the girl?"
He opens his mouth to talk, but the timer goes off. It's time for him to drive. We drive in silence till I reach a red light and we switch, and I sit next to him.
"How much money do you need?"
He shakes his head. "Way too much."
"Chris, do your parents know you have a kid?"
He shakes his head. "No."
"You need to tell them, they can help you!"
"No, Ezra, they can't!" He nearly shouts.
"How much is it, Chris? And who is this woman?" I ask once again.
Chris is quiet for a long time, but finally he speaks. "A million dollars."
"For CHILD SUPPORT?"
"No. Because she knows that I know who A is. And who killed Ali. And it'll take a million dollars to shut her up."
So many questions run through my mind. Well who IS A? Who's the mom? Why does it matter if you know? Why does she hate you so much? How does she know who A is? Ali was killed? And who did it? And how does he know?
I ask all these questions but Chris has clamed up for the night. He won't answer a thing. It's nearly four before I give up and try to sleep. I go to the bathroom, first, though. When I'm in there I see Aria's make-up bag. It makes me smile for some reason. But my smile slowly fades when I see a box of tampons sticking out of them. I remember the confession - "I kept my blades in a tampon box."
I dump the box out and a piece of tissue paper with eight blades fall from it. I hang my head in dissapointment. She lied to me. To all of us. I wrap the blades in a paper towel, put them in my bag and go to sleep.
