Songboy

IX

Ryan still couldn't see a way out of what he had seen. He was too close, of course. The warning was clear, but he didn't want to be close. He wanted it all to go away. He wanted Zach to be out of the hospital. He wanted Sean to not be dead. He wanted Blake to be okay. He wanted everything back to the way it was before Sean was murdered. Tears ran down his face, because it didn't make any sense why this was all happening. He couldn't think of why it was to him. It was to his friends that this was happening to. They wanted to torture him more than anyone else.

"Ryan, get some sleep. Moping around isn't going to help anyone." Detective Lo put a hand on his shoulder as his knee bounced anxiously up and down. "This is the fourth time you've been here, this week. I know the murders are constant, and I know they're all near you, but you have to understand that what we're doing here is the best we can do."

"And you have to understand that I legitimately cannot leave without speaking to you. Just this once, will you take me seriously instead of trying to shoo my statements off and blame them on some mental illness that you're convinced I have?" He hissed. "Look, Lo. The murderer. They called me. They threatened me. All of them are connected somehow. The initials! They're the initials."

"Ryan, go home."

"Please, just listen to me. They're targeting my friends, carving their initials into the bodies. I... you can't just tell me that that isn't a pattern!"

"I'll talk to my team. Okay? Just... please, kid, you're hurting yourself." He strutted off, and Ryan was left to storm out of the building with tears in his eyes. No one believed him.

It made no sense.

The one time he could be useful, and help, and do something about it instead of sitting back and watching people die, they wouldn't let him. They wouldn't even talk to him about it. They treated him like he was some sort of lost puppy, trying to justify why he was out on his own when in reality, no one would take him in.

He found himself trudging back to his dorm, his heart in pieces, his eyes puffy. Every time he'd gone to the police, they'd shoo him off. They would always pin it on his vivid imagination, or his creative tendencies. He was beginning to believe they thought he was a madman. He was no stranger to the feeling of abandonment that set itself in his chest right under his heart. He had felt it before. It was as if someone had taken a toxic mixture of confusion and helplessness and shoved it into his rib cage, telling him to just, "Live with it."

But he was so close to figuring it out. He just needed help.

He couldn't tell Zach. His friend was barely out of the hospital, drowning in student debt and medical bills. Ryan knew that if he told his friends, any of them, they'd worry about him, too much. The call had to be kept a secret from the others, at least until he figured out more.

But how on earth was he supposed to do that?

—

"Zachary I swear to god of you try to sit up one more time—"

The voice was familiar to Ryan. It was feminine, and innocent sounding, and decently loud considering he was two doors down and could still hear the bickering from his friend's dorm.

He shouldn't check in.

Ever since Zach screamed at him to take back everything he had said in that hospital room, the boy was convinced that his friend wanted nothing to do with him anymore.

Yes it was an irrational fear. Of course it was, but the rational side of Ryan's brain had been thrown out the window when Sean was killed, and all he could focus on was his the tension in that hospital room never seemed to dissipate.

Zach didn't need him.

Zach had whoever was helping him in his room. He had so many other people. He didn't need the boy that inevitably almost got him killed.

He needed someone else; someone who could protect him, and help him, and be a better friend than what he had with Ryan, because let's face it, Ryan had been terrible to Zach ever since Sean died.

"Can you check on him, please?"

Now that was Zach.

Ryan didn't mean to eavesdrop, but it was the only thing that distracted him from the terrible things he'd witnessed over the phone. It was the only thing that distracted him from the fact that he could do nothing to help, because the professionals said they'd handle it.

Of course, he was broken from his daze by a sharp knock on the door.

He swung his legs over the mattress, finding his footing rather easily, considering his clouded mind. He trudged over to the white painted piece of wood, stepping over the carpet that he used to cover up the remnants of the bloodstains. He opened the door. "Hello?"

To his surprise, Margaret was standing on the other side of the door, a curious but solemn look on her face. She gave a small smile. "Uh, Hey."

"Hey." It was a deadpanned statement of confusion. His eyes scanned her for any sort of foul play, but her relaxed stature and her soft features suggested nothing of the sort. "What's up?"

"Zach wants me to check on you." A small smile came onto her lips after a moment, watching as Ryan still gave her a skeptical look.

The girl was dressed in dark leggings and a hoodie that was much bigger than her frame. A hoodie he was almost sure he'd seen Zach wear before. "Yeah, but why?" He felt his skeptical glare turn into a smug grin as a small laugh clawed its way up his throat and out into the air.

"Because he knew you were still mad at yourself and everyone else was busy. I was his only option," she pouted.

"Okay but why are you wearing his hoodie?"

"He keeps it arctic in his dorm," she frowned, grabbing Ryan's wrist, ceasing the boy's laughing. "You two have some talking to do," she insisted. She dragged the lanky college student to Zach's door, unlocking it and shoving him inside, stepping in after.

"Margaret I told you to check on him not being him here," Zach complained. "I look like a train wreck."

"That's what you're worried about?" Ryan inquired, looking over the boy, laying in his bed with three pillows behind him, propping him up.

"What else would I be worried about?" Zach questioned, blinking at what seemed to be a confused, skinny boy across the room.

"You aren't mad?"

"Why on earth would I be mad, Ry?"

Ryan thought for a moment, having a seat at the desk across the room. His eyes scanned the other for any source of joke, but as far as Ryan could tell, sincerity was the only thing that Zach was displaying. "Because of what I said."

"I get it." Zach crossed his arms. "I'd do the same for you, which is why I'm not gonna have you hiding in your dorm all day, trying to find out how to stop this killer."

"Then what am I supposed to do?" Ryan asked, slowly relaxing. He was relieved that Zach was slowly coming back to his old self. He felt less alone.

"You're supposed to let me help you."

"Look what happened the last time you tried to help me, Zach." He felt his defense mechanisms fire off quickly, his relief vanishing as quickly as it came, because he wouldn't let Zach get hurt again.

"It wasn't that bad."

"You were dying."

"I know."

"You're being stupid," Ryan insisted, crossing his arms to match Zach's smug stature. He hated how his friend could get sometimes.

"You gonna stop me?"

Ryan thought for a moment, thinking of everything that had happened. He was thinking of the threat they made to Zach. He was thinking of the murder on the other line. He was thinking of the sickening feeling he got when he thought of facing this alone.

He couldn't do it alone.

"I don't think I am."