Love Song (LGBTQ+) (COMPLETED)

25. Higher (Interlude 5)

With her skateboard in her right hand, I followed her off of the bus and onto a long stretch of sidewalk as I found myself in the 'rougher' part of Ely. It wasn't a "bad" area, which was made obvious by the size of the houses and the people that lived in them, it was just rough. They weren't the types of people to take crap from others, from strangers. They just simply weren't going to take anything from anyone.

"Erin, by the way." she turned around and smiled somewhat smugly, continuing to carry the relaxed demeanor she had approached me with.

Looking to my left, I saw people watching me as I followed the newly-named Erin down the sidewalk and along the wooden fences. "Lynn."

As Erin walked backwards, her eyes seemed to follow mine in the same direction and watched the people go by as we passed them. Raising a middle finger with a fearless smirk, she carried it from her left to her right as she made sure everyone looking had seen it being pointed at them, remorselessly flaunting her disrespect towards anyone who decided or wanted to look. It was awing to watch, to see someone so openly, so bravely tell the world to leave her alone.

Maybe it was because I knew I would never be like her, that I would never be type of person to come out and speak my mind. I would never be the type to openly say screw the world and anyone who disagrees with my way of thinking, my way of seeing. As much as I wanted to be like those people, it would never truly be the type of person I was. As much as I could pretend to be like those people, it would never truly be the type of person I was. It just simply wasn't who I was or ever would be.

"Pretty little name for a pretty little rich girl." she dropped her skateboard and jumped onto it as she gave a small kick forward. "So, rich girl, why're you trying to get fucked up?"

Slowly, my strides became larger to keep up with her as I eyed the splits in between the square pieces of concrete. "Fucked up? I just don't want to feel anything anymore."

Erin pulled off her hat, a smile lifting each end of her mouth. "One and the same, rich girl. One and the same."

I only wanted to feeling nothing. Nil. Nada. Zip. Zilch. I just wanted to go to a place where the pain didn't exist, where hope and misery weren't the same thing, where thinking of her wasn't every thought I had, where every image in my head wasn't of him. Had it been too much to ask for that, and to keep what happened buried? That was all I could ask for, to be free of everything that was trying to hurt me.

Stopping just like earlier, she ceased her movement and kicked her skateboard into the air as she turned to her right, pushing the fence open. Curling her finger towards herself, she motioned me to follow her into and through the fence, which was exactly what I did. But it was as soon as the fence closed behind me that it hit me like a bucket of ice water going down my back. I was in the exact situation I hoped I would never find myself in again.

I was following a stranger into a place I had no idea existed, with nowhere to run and nowhere to hide, with nowhere to escape to. I could have died right at that moment and no one would have known where I was. Not my parents, not Nathan, just strangers. I would have died alone with only strangers to witness it. I could have been murdered right there in that spot, and nobody would have been the wiser.

"Yo." she threw her skateboard into the grass. "The fuck are you up to?"

As Hit The Lights' "Back Breaker" blared from the house, a huge, short-haired blonde guy came out from behind a tall bush wearing a gray hoodie and sweating like a sinner in church. He wasn't overweight or even chubby, he was just flat out muscular and had clearly just finished working out not long before we had shown up as he brought a towel to his sweat-doused beard.