Fix You ~Completed~

Act Sixty-Three

One great thing about a big city like San Francisco is the fact that two people can just start randomly kissing in a crowded place like Golden Gate Park and no one will bat an eye. Eddie and I spent the next thirty minutes in that park, stealing kisses and holding hands like nervous schoolchildren, and not a single person threw us a weird look. We weren't even acknowledged.

I imagined it was a normal site in an area such as this; the people were used to it by now.

I kept Eddie and I's hands locked tight while we walked, unable to believe I was allowed that. Whenever I wanted, I could just reach out and take his hand, kiss him, ask him to hold me. I could do that because he was mine.

Gale was sitting hunched over at the edge of his bed when Eddie and I walked into the hotel room nearly two hours after leaving him be. He had a trash can at his feet while he flipped through the channels on the television, groaning quietly. At the sound of the door clicking shut, he lifted his head. "Hey, you crazy children," he mumbled, nodding to us. It was an ironic statement since I was actually older than him, but I wasn't sure Gale was aware of that, so I let it go. His eyes moved across our faces, giving me a moment of panic believing that he knew what had happened. "How was your day?"

"You were missed," I promised, hopping over to take the empty spot beside him on the bed. I hugged Gale with one arm and checked out what he had playing on the screen. "Are you actually watching a reality show?"

"Don't judge. I love watching girls wearing cheetah print dresses sock each other with their manicured hands," Gale shot back, gently nudging me. "I'm actually looking for some cartoons. I can't find the darn cartoons."

Eddie came up to us and handed Gale a thermometer. "Check your temp, Asher," he asked. "I'd just shove it in your ear, but the last time I did that you nearly shoved me into a bathtub."

"Is there a good story behind that?" I inquired, giving Eddie a huge grin. It was hard not to smile while looking at him and those pretty ocean eyes.

"Freshman year, I got violently sick with the flu and my mom let Eddie come over while she was at work to watch me. I was so out of it I really couldn't focus and he tried putting the thermometer in my ear to check if my fever had broken yet, and... let's just say, he had a lump the size of an orange on the back of his head after falling into the bathtub," Gale sighed, rubbing the back on his neck sheepishly.

I tried to laugh at that; I could tell by the way Ale and Ed were smiling I should have been laughing. It should have been funny to me, but it just wasn't.

Kyla had shoved me into our bathtub once, although it wasn't an accident. He was pissed at me for cutting my jaw while shaving and knocked me right into the tub. I wasn't allowed to get up until he finished "punishing" me. I didn't even rise out of the tub when he told me I could; I just laid there, red seeping down my throat steadily, and tried to stop shaking.

I still had a little scar from that. When Eddie had pointed it out, I was honest and told him I nicked it while shaving, but I didn't think he believed me. I had lied so often about the marks on my body, it must have been hard for him to take anything I said as the truth.

"Ah, I am now at merely ninety-nine degrees! Swell," Gale sighed happily, handing the little white stick back to our friend. Eddie sent him a worried look while Gale responded to with a frown. "Dude, I am fine. I honestly feel great right now. My temperature is down, my stomach no longer is attempting to do summersaults, and all is right with the world! Now, tell me about your wonderful adventure in San Francisco without me!"

Eddie and I looked at each other. We hadn't talked about what we would tell Gale. I didn't know if he wanted our friend to know about us or what happened. It was possible it was just gonna stay between us... and I guess I could have lived with that. "Nothing really happened," I spoke up, shrugging. "Nothing worth telling, at least."