Olly sat in the parked saturn with the shattered back window in the dingy parking lot of the 7/11 smoking a cigarrette as Abby changed in the bathroom inside.

  He couldn’t tell you why he had gone so far out of his way to help this girl. He was going to swing by centennial, pick up a dub and just chill with Nadya and Max. Play some madden on Max’s tv.

  No that was a lie he could tell you exactly why he had helped her. Olly stared out the windshield as the memory came back yet again, like the stalking of a wolf come again to take what it can.

  Olly’s surroundings dissapeared as he fell again into the memories that were best forgotten and replaced by the house he had not seen since 2011. He did this from time to time. Stared blankly at a single spot and completley lost the here now for the there and then.

  Olliver woke up in the pitch black darkness of home. Naked against the blue fitted sheets that had popped off of one corner to reveal a stained yellow and brown mattress underneath. He didn’t remember going to bed that night but Olliver had alot of blank spots in his memories as a kid.

  His mouth was dry and his head felt like it was stuffed with cotton balls as he blinked into the dark silence that was his grandmothers home.

  His dad had moved back in with grandma taking him along for the ride which excited him at first because Grandma always made the day better. But when dad was around, whenever he woke up he felt I'll and was almost always sore. He missed the apartment with mom, He missed the winter snows and his friends that would ride scooters and bikes with him.

  This night he had been watching T.V. when his dad came back wobbly like he did late at night smelling like his special water. He had given him something to drink and then he woke up.

  Olly didn’t like that medicine his dad gave him. It tasted like his juice but he never warned him when he gave it to him and than suddenly he would wake up feeling all fuzzy with no memories and hurting bad in his special places. Sometimes there was even blood but he couldn’t remember what had happened. He had asked his dad why this happened when he took his medicine and his dad got the scary look in his eyes and told him he’d give him a knuckle sandwich if he told that to anyone. It must have been real top secret stuff for dad to get scared like that.

  Tonight not even the fan was blowing like it usually did, his dad snored loudly next to him In the pitch black dark. His eyes would adjust to the dark soon. Maybe he could turn on the tv and he wouldn’t wake up. If he woke up though dad would give him one.

  Like when he had accidently bent the bunny ears and he had sent a can of his grown up soda at his head. It never hurt at first when his dad gave him one. Just lost feeling as the blue lights flashed across his vision but it would hurt a few seconds later and bad too.

  He remembered the grown up soda making darkness that time. He woke up on the floor in a puddle of his mess and dad had made him clean it up after. Usually it just made blue lights, sometimes yellow but that time he just went to sleep. His head hurt for a week and he was so tired. He had been bad though he shouldn’t have bent the bunny ears it was stupid of him to not be careful.

  Olliver crawled out of the bed, his hand hit a wet spot, coldness covered his hand. Dad had an accident again. Olliver couldn’t see the alarm clock that usually had the big red numbers. He sure hurt bad tonight, it hurt to move. His medicine must have really worked tonight.

  Olly moved across the matress with a creaaaak of the bedsprings filling the darkness and dad stopped snoring. Olliver froze as fear filled him. He had woke him up and dad hated being woken up. Maybe if he didn’t move he would go back to bed. Last time he had woken dad up he had to hide. Not under the bed though his dad could reach him there. He had ran as fast as he could to the front yard and climbed the tree as though he was running away from a rabid dog. Only rapid dogs didn’t scream at you the things he would scream.

  Tonight Olliver wouldn’t be able to get away fast enough, not with the hurt how it was and he was always a little wobbly after taking his medicine. The fear filled his throat as his arms started shaking against their will. He couldn’t cry he would hear that and it would be the bad place again.

  The mattress shifted in the darkness as his father cleared his throat and sat up.

  Abby Opened the car door snapping Olliver back to reality. The cigarrette in his hand had extinquished into a slightly charred filter that sat jumping in a shaky hand on his lap against the ripped and faded jeans he wore.

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  Olly quickly put on a smile and looked over to see Abby looking like a brand new person wearing a bright orange long sleeve and basketball shorts…Only complemented by the stolen pair of knock off white vans on her feet. She had decided to let her hair hang down instead of putting it up. He remembered his sister mentioning you can’t put up wet hair.

  The rain had finally stopped as night took the day leaving behind only the wet sheen on the roads and the smell of rain. He looked over at the girl in his passenger seat.

  She wore no makeup, of course if she had been wearing any it would no doubt have been erased by the rain. But she had beautiful features. A heart shaped face, button nose and ocean blue eyes. She looked at him curiously as she hugged her knees into her chest. One eyebrow hiked up so high it would disappear into her hairline if it shot up any farther.

  “When's the last time you ate?”, Olly asked as he clamped another cigarrette between his teeth and lit it with his trusty zippo.

  She shrugged casually and said “This morning I had a pop tart”

  Olly gave her a small smile and said “ So the noodles that were on your shirt. You didn’t even get to enjoy them huh?”

  Abby rolled her eyes and said “It’s hard to ingest any when its sent your way at mach jesus”

  Olly nodded as he pulled on the smoke and said “So what happened?”

  Abby tapped a drum beat on her knees and pursed her lips before saying “Actually not exactly your business now is it?”

  Olly sat there smoking. The cherry filling the darkness of the cab of the car with a soft orang light illuminating the space between them as the smoke vanished out of his rolled down window. He said nothing. What could he say? If he had hit a nerve he wouldn’t press the issue. He wasn’t exactly sharing his baggage with strangers either.

  “Look we still haven’t figured out where to take you”, Olly said finally as he put the cigarette in between his lips.

  Abby sat her chin on her knees and looked out of the windshield at the illuminated store with its signs advertising all the lower class food groups.

  35 packs of natty light on sale, pyramid cigarettes buy two for five. Delta 8 thc sold here ect.

  She finally said after a long pause only filled by the soft hum of a neon sign “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t snap like that. I’m just not exactly having a good day. I don’t have anywhere I can go.”

  Olly nodded and said “Look I share a place with my older brother he won’t like it but you can crash on the couch until you get your ducks in a row.”

  Abby sat in the passenger seat looking like she wanted to vomit as she stared out of the windshield, the glow from the store covering her features in a soft yellow light that highlighted the shine around her eyes. She pressed the heel of her hand into on high and sniffed before looking at Olly and saying “Why are you doing all of this seriously. I can’t even pay you back”

  Olly smirked. She had gone from about to cry, sucked that shit back in and ignored it in the span of a moment. She was a bottler. The guestion was how much more ould the bottle take before she imploded. Olly considered her guestion for a long time before debating on whether or not to lay his cards on the table. The flourish that said ‘I know’

  Olly crushed the smoke and said. “ I could have driven away when I saw you shivering in the rain.

  but then I would have had to lay awake tonight saying ‘what if’ . I live my life without regrets and I have to live with myself. So miss Abby I am going to help you out a little bit. We all need a little bit of help sometimes”

  I wish someone had helped me

  Abby looked at him for a long time saying nothing, the light from the store leaving her face buried half in the darkness before she asked “Why do you live with your brother?”

  Olly smirked and said “an answer for an answer”

  Abby rested her chin on her knee before nodding and saying “ok” so quietly he wasn’t sure if she hadn’t just mouthed the words.

  Olly nodded and let out a tired sigh before saying “My mom died when I was five and I don’t know about my dad. I haven’t talked to him in a very long time”

  Abby perked her head up at that with a strange look on her face and said “how did she pass?”

  Olly gave her a small smile and said “No ma’am. An answer for an answer. Why were you walking around barefoot in the pouring rain?”

  Abby rested her chin back on her knee and mumbled “I guess I finally had enough. So I left”

  Olly reached back into the back seat into the tub and pulled out a modello as he brought the bottle into the front of the car Abby snatched the bottle and threw it out of her open window to shatter onto the parking lot. The foam of the beer floating away with the rain water as the goldwrapped neck sat shattered in the space beside them.

  Olly whistled at that and said awkwardly “I was going to offer that to you since I am driving”

  Abby’s look of anger shifted has her mouth dropped into a surprised ‘o’. Her face grew red embarressed at he over reaction as she mumbled “sorry”

  Olly couldn’t help but laugh, as she sat there growing a cherry red, Olly looked at her for a moment before saying “Ok shoot”

  Abby shook her head no and mumbled “Its a long story”

  “So give me the fast version”

  Abby pressed the heel of her hand into her eye socket again her face filled with frustration but not sadness as she said” My dads an asshole. Tonight he was an asshole about the mac and cheese”

  Olly Nodded at that and said “it's alright, I’m an asshole for prying. I get it.”, He paused for a moment resting his hand on the steering wheel and said quietly “I watched my mom choke on her own vomit as she od’d”

  Abby’s eyes widened in the dim light of the store to the size of goose eggs. She hadn’t been expecting that answer. She opened her mouth but no words came out. What was she going to say?

  I'm sorry your mom shot up too much H? I’m sorry you didn’t know CPR? I'm sorry narcan wasn't in the medicine cabinet?

  Ollly raised a hand and cut her off speaking first saying “it was 12 years ago. I’m over it. Besides I didn’t really get a chance to know her”, Despite his attempt to sound uncaring the words left his mouth with a bitter edge as Abby nodded and said at a mere whisper “My dad was driving the car. My mom was in the back seat because I just had to sit up front and play my music off of the aux”

  She paused for a moment as the silent rage burned behind her eyes. The water fell out of her eye before she could stop it. She jammed the heel of her hand into her eye socket and sucked it back in” Some drunk asshole t boned the car on her side.”

  A heavy silence filled the car as they both absorbed the gravity of each other's words. Olly was shit at offering condolences. His philosophy had always been ‘two tear drops in a bucket fuck it’

  Maybe sometimes it was ‘fuck em feed em fish heads’

  He should know what to say but he didn’t.

  Abby broke the silence first suddenly “I don’t want to play this game anymore”

  “yeah me neither, you wanna get high?”

  “whats it like?”

  “Better than this”

  Abby nodded yes as Olly put the car in reverse. They had some friends to go see.