She stood there eyeing the things she had so often passed by in the hall on her way to Denny's or Evan's or even the bathroom. Everything was exactly as he'd left it…exactly the way things were supposed to be. Only he was gone and the house had fallen into that sudden silence she had always longed for. Except for her mother's soft sobs in the middle of the night, she could almost pretend that he had never even existed.

Almost.

Stepping across the comfy threshold and into the room, she instinctively glanced behind her to make sure her mother wasn't awake. Not that she particularly cared. She would just rather not get into why she'd disturb his room when Dylan's mom would be by any second to pick her up for school. But she didn't care about that either. She always ended up behind the elementary school eventually to smoke a joint and piss away some time with the guys. And Dylan would just bitch some more about how pointless gym class was and how he wanted to tar and feather every last one of those posers that dared to call him out on his lack of athleticism. For fuck's sake…what did he think she was, some type of pussy that would hold his hand and cry with him about it?

He hadn't even asked about Bradley. Dylan had been Bradley's favorite.

It should have been right at the door…no…there! She picked up an unopened box of hairspray. The color read "Red Rhapsody" and was marked down to a dollar from the past Halloween. They'd had a good laugh over that one…promised Bradley they'd help him get Dylan's famous red fringe and proceeded to blow smoke in his face and ask just what he would do with such a hairstyle. "Be more like you, sis!" His voice had irritated her beyond belief…such admiration…such life…so she had laughed the hardest and sent him on his way with something about conformists. She could still recall Dylan's snigger…Georgie's snort…Evan's cracked frown and disappointed stare. The morgue held less terrifying faces than that of her eldest friend that cold November night.

Shuffling further in to her brother's domain, she swept her hair to the side and counted his plush dinosaurs. They were all huddled up in a corner and, upon two counts, lay sixteen strong. Their leader was Bradley's beloved Brontosaurus, who wore stitches of threads in motley shades of gray to mask the knife wounds he had suffered months before. She still didn't know exactly why Georgie had been so pissed that day. That morning he had called her a "big fat hen" and promptly broke Evan's favorite cane in half. Why she'd even brought him to her home that night was a mystery to her…perhaps a part of her thought Bradley would have him cackling and wear his temper out. Instead they had walked through the door and Georgie seemed to make a beeline straight for the dinosaur. She'd actually obeyed her mother's ban on her friends for two whole days. Bradley had begged to allow them back and back they came. He had even greeted Georgie at the door with a smile.

Sighing, she turned to face his bed. His duvet was small and flat against his stark white pillow and if she squinted just so she could almost see his blonde head bobbing with short, raspy snores. The smallest, seventeenth member of the dinosaur gang lay lopsided and confused beneath a pale green blanket. It stared at her accusingly and forced her to duck her head in shame. She suddenly felt as though she was stepping on her brother's grave.

The sudden screech of her cellphone vibrating against her leg made her jump, and she carefully fished inside of her stockings to whip out a small black flip phone.

Dylan 7:32:35 AM : wer r u?

She stared at the screen a long while before responding and letting the phone go limp with her hand. Trying to take in everything at once, she did a small circle in the middle of the room before finally eyeing a photograph tacked to a makeshift bulletin board opposite from the doorway. She approached it slowly, appreciating the creek in the carpet a foot from the bed and the smell of mint in the air.

The image immortalized Christmas Day of 2005. Bradley was dressed in dinosaur footie pajamas and she in a flimsy pink nightgown with a daisy on the chest. Her mousy brown hair was caked atop her head and a foolish grin was painted on her chubby face. Her initial reaction was to rip the picture apart, but something inside of her held her hand in place by her side.

"I've got super powers, you fat bitch! You'll never terrorize me again! I'm off to find my real family. Shablagoo!"

The world became so silent and so still that the sound of Dylan's mother honking the horn could have been an atomic bomb.

Hurrying down the stairs and out into the street, she jumped into the red Impala and snapped the door shut.

"Christ, what took you, Henny?" asked Dylan as his mother raced angrily down the street.

She had to blink at her reflection in the window to keep herself focused. "Just saying goodbye to the only real thing I've ever known."

Dylan twisted in his seat and lifted a black brow at his hefty friend. "As long as it wasn't the Marlboros, you'll be okay."

For a moment, she thought it was raining. Then she realized the only trail of water was the one pulling itself down her cheek. "Yeah."

It only took a moment of quiet before Dylan sighed and she saw his hair brush the glass with a flippant flip of his head. "So anyway…you won't believe what that little punk Phillip Russ called me the other day. I swear…if I have to go to gym one more time, I am going to fucking kill myself."