Mixtape For The End of the World

16. Gabe cleans blood off of Pete's face at Tea Monkey.

16. Gabe cleans blood off of Pete's face at Tea Monkey.

"Pete, what the hell happened to you?" I heard a familiar voice say. Before I even opened my eyes, I knew who it was. I tried to get myself off of the ground, but I didn't have the strength. Instead, I reached for Gabe's hand, and he pulled me up off of the cement.

"It was the Neo-Nazis," I grumbled, still struggling to speak or stand. "They beat me up after you ran off with that girl."

"Her name is Erin, and that was four hours ago," Gabe said.

"I've been out here for four hours?" I said.

"You're lucky that I found you," Gabe said as he led me into the parking lot. "I swear I'm going to kill those goddamn Nazis if I ever see them."

I took a few deep breaths, trying my best to relax, but the same images kept playing in my mind. I could still see their faces, and I could still hear every word that they had said. The Sunshine Riptide was quiet now, but I still had all of this ringing in my ears - it seemed like the noise inside my head would never go away.

Gabe and I approached the DeLorean, and I handed him the keys. "Let's drive to Fall Out Bros.," Gabe said. "You need to get cleaned up before you go home."

When I got into the car, I looked at myself in the mirror. Dried blood coated my face, my eyeliner was in ugly black streaks down my face, and my right eye was nearly swollen shut. My whole body hurt, and all I wanted to do was to just go home, but Gabe was right. My parents couldn't see me like this. How could I even begin to explain what had happened to them? They didn't even know that I had gone to the Sunshine Riptide in the first place.

Gabe turned on the radio and started to sing along, but even music couldn't cheer me up. I laughed a little bit when I noticed Gabe trying to sing and dance along to Depeche Mode and drive at the same time. However, happiness eluded me as the DeLorean raced down the street toward Fall Out Bros. Pizza. How could I bring myself to smile after everything that had happened that night?

Gabe parked the car in front of Fall Out Bros., but when we went up to the door, we saw that it was closed. In fact, almost every shop in the area had closed for the night, except for one. After we had wandered around for a little while, Gabe opened the door to Tea Monkey and said, "Why don't we go in here? They're open, and we can get you some tea."

"I don't like tea," I complained, but we had no choice. I couldn't go straight home - not like this.

When Gabe and I entered the shop, Patrick and Elisa were behind the counter, and Patrick was clearly having some sort of mental breakdown.

"When you have a bad day, a really bad day, try and treat the world better than it treated you," he said. "When you have a bad day, a really bad day, try and treat the world better than it treated you. When you have a bad day, a really bad day..."

"Patrick, quit being so dramatic," Elisa said. "We have customers."

All of a sudden, Patrick noticed Gabe and I. "How may I help you?" he asked. Then, he noticed my face. "Pete, are you okay? What happened?"

"I'm okay," I answered. "Trust me."

"We just need two cups of tea," Gabe said.

"Of course," Patrick said. He smiled, but the smile didn't quite reach his eyes. "What kind of tea would you like?"

"What kinds of tea do you have?" Gabe asked.

"They're all up on the wall," Patrick said.

Gabe pointed to a random tin on the wall and asked, "What's that?"