Miss Perfect and The Bad Boy

fifteen - missing

Three hours had passed, and Alex still wasn't home. I had called his phone about thirty times to no answer. I even went to go check by his house, thinking, hoping, that maybe he forgot to come back to mine. Luckily, his dad wasn't there, but neither was Alex. Finally, I called Kelani and asked for Aiden Sinclair's address. If anyone else knew where Alex could be, it would be him.

"What are you doing here?" Aiden asked as soon as he opened the door.

"Is Alex here?" I asked immediately, not caring about his rude greeting.

His face went white. "What do you mean? I thought he was with you."

"He said he was meeting up with some dealers his dad owed money to," I explained. "They wanted five thousand today."

"Did he have it?"

"He was three hundred short."

"Oh my fucking god," Aiden cursed loudly. "He really had a death wish, doesn't he?"

I could feel the panic coming on. Wherever Alex was, there was no doubt he was in trouble. "We have to find him."

Aiden turned around and yelled, "I'm going out," into the small house. He turned back to me with keys in his hand. "I'll let you know when I find him."

I raised an eyebrow. "Excuse me? I'm going with you."

"No, you're not. This is dangerous and Alex would kill me if he knew I brought you with me. I'll call you-"

"I'm not just sitting at home, waiting and crying while you're out aimlessly driving around. He's my-" I broke off, not knowing exactly what we were. "He's my friend, and I'm going with you."

Aiden rolled his eyes. "I don't know how Sanchez puts up with you."

♡

"Please leave a message at the beep." The phone went straight to voicemail for the 3rd time.

Aiden and I were still in the car and we had been trying to find Alex for an hour, but so far, no luck. We had driven around the whole town and texted at least 20 people if they knew, but no one had seen him.

"Should we call the police?" I asked nervously. I was on the verge of tears, but I refused to cry in front of Aiden.

"No. If we call the police, they start asking questions, and then we're all fucked," Aiden said, like I should know all of it.

I sighed and tried not to think too much. I tried calling him one more time but, of course, no answer.

"Why do you keep calling him?" Aiden asked.

"Maybe he'll pick up, I don't know."

"He hasn't picked up your last 29 calls, I doubt he's just ignoring you at this point."

"You're not helping," I snapped.

After a few minutes, I realized we're near the train tracks. They shut down years ago and no one ever came here anymore. A perfect place for drug deals.

"I think there's something over there," Aiden said, nodding his chin towards the tracks.

I sat up straighter in my seat to look over. The only light came from the headlights of Aiden's car. I couldn't see anything clearly until the car got closer to the tracks.

"Oh my god!" Alex was laying on the floor, unconscious. I threw open the car door before Aiden could come to full stop and ran out to his side. His head was in a pool of blood. "Call 9-1-1!" I yelled to Aiden.

My heart was beating out of my chest and I couldn't really see anymore, my eyes were spilling tears. My cries were mixed in with Aiden's call for help. I was choking on my own sobs. "Wake up, wake up, wake up."

I put a hand on his wrist to check his pulse. It was very faint, but it was there. It was there.

♡

2 hours later, I was a mess, sitting in the hospital waiting room. Aiden was sitting across from me and his head had been in his hands for the last 20 minutes. He kept bouncing his leg up and down. I had texted Kelani and she rushed to the hospital as soon as she could. She was sitting next to me, looking at Aiden, but helping me from not having a full on mental breakdown.

"Are you here for Alejandro Sanchez?" A man in a white coat came out of a room with a clipboard with a nurse in a blue uniform.

"Yes," I said, standing up quickly. "Is he okay?"

The doctor looked down on his clipboard. "He will be. I'm Dr. Gale, by the way. He's lucky to be alive. The police are going to conduct an investigation to know who did this, but so far we know the patient has a concussion, he had to get 13 stitches on the back of his head, 3 fractured ribs, a broken arm, and multiple abdominal injuries. The recovery will be slower because X-Ray's showed he's been injured in the same arm and a few ribs before but luckily they were clean breaks. He's still asleep, and when he wakes up, which is going to be soon, he's going to be in a lot of pain."

"When can we see him?"

"Only immediate family can at the moment."

I furrowed my brows. "Do you have any time estimate?"

"Not yet, sorry-"

Aiden cut him off. "We're the closest thing to family he's got. His parents are definitely not coming here."

Kelani and Aiden turned to look at me. The doctor looked at us and then reluctantly said, "Fine. You can visit him one at a time for 10 minutes only."

Aiden spoke to me, "Go ahead."

My hands were shaking as I walked into Alex's hospital room. He was laying on the bed with his eyes closed in a hospital gown. His arm was in a cast and I could see bandages around his stomach and ribs. He was hooked up to a bunch of machines.

I sat down next to him and held his hand in mine. I let out a shaky breath as tears began falling from my eyes. How much more does he have to go through?

"Don't cry." I looked down at Alex. His eyes were half open and he was looking up at me.

Of course, I started bawling my eyes out when I saw him in this much pain. "I thought I was gonna lose you," I said in between sobs. "The doctor said you're lucky to be alive."

I could see tears on the edge of Alex's eyes. He lightly squeezed on my hand. "I would never leave you, I got you, Nikki."