Grand Theft Autumn

There's a light on in Chicago, and I know I should be home.

The cop was waiting for me to come with him, but I just stood there on the lawn with the others.

"What if I refuse?" I said and this made the officer automatically pull out hand cuffs.

"She's pretty much eighteen, doesn't that count for anything?" Pete asked pausing the officer's actions.

"But she's not yet." He said blatantly. "Now we can do this the easy way where you get to say goodbye or I can handcuffs back out." The cop said prompting me to give Pete a sad look. I reached my arms around Pete's shoulders and he put his at my waist.

"I'm going down swinging." I whispered in his ear and I swear I saw a quick grin on his face before I took off running, fast. I was almost a block down the street before anyone, but Pete, realized what I had done and before the cop decided to get in his police car and come after me.

Before I knew it I was being handcuffed and thrown into the back of a police car.

"I'm not going to charge you or anything for taking off like that, is there any reason why you don't want to go home?" The officer asked me from the front seat.

Great, I think I just made it look like my parents beat me.

"No, they just don't care about me too much. Their really nice people, I guess." I shrugged. It was true when they were around they were nice and loving, but they just worked all the time. I strived to be the perfect kid all my life so maybe they would just notice me and spend more time with me.

The officer stayed silent until we reached the police station, and so did I.

He openened the back door for me and let me out.

"If I unhandcuff you, you promise not to run?" He asked.

" Too late to run now." I answered and he freed me from the tight metal around my wrists and led me inside.

The moment I saw my parents sitting there with their eyes lit up from seeing me, dread washed over me. Summer was over for me.

They both hugged me tightly and I didn't hug them back. How dare they lie to me and take my happiness away from me.

In the car driving home as the sun set they kept trying to talk to me, but I ignored them. I just kept thinking about how one minute I was with the people that cared about me having fun, and the next on my way back to Michigan.

I began to feel really uncomfortable for some reason. I guess all this sitting on the ride home made it evident to me I had been sitting on something.

I reached under me and felt around then pulled something out of my left back jean pocket. I held up the sparkling gold heart necklace. I felt my heart break.

I pulled out my phone and decided to send Pete a text but saw I had a few I hadn't seen from him.

"What's going on? Are you really going home?" "I love you, there has to be a way around this" I closed his texts and started one of my own.

"I love you too. I'll be eighteen soon and I'll be back, if you don't forget about me. I found the necklace, pretty sneaky Peter Pan" as I pressed send I felt my eyes begin to well up with tears.

"I will make damn sure of that, how could I ever forget you? I haven't since we were were little kids." He sent back. "Were all really upset over here, I think I'll sleep in your bed tonight, mom said I couldn't touch your stuff though."  As I read this I remembered all of my stuff was still there. I was going back if it was the last thing I ever did.