Chapter 2

"Rouge, wake up."

Rouge's eyes slowly fluttered open as she struggled to stand up. Clutching on to her cabinet's handle to support herself, Rouge lazily brought her hand to her face to cover her eyes, immediately shielding her irritated eyes from the blazing sun that shined through the spaces in her window blinds. When she felt she was balanced enough to walk, Rouge let go of the cabinet handle and proceeded towards the medicine drawer in her bathroom. Once she had reached her bathroom, she gently tugged the doors of the drawer open, grabbed a bottle of aspirin, took two pills, and placed the bottle back, leaving the doors of the drawer wide open as she walked back into her kitchen.

"Hey Amy."

A petite pink hedgehog looked up from her cell phone and annoyingly looked at the bat, disappointment lurking within her eyes. She watched as Rouge pulled out two bottles of water from her refrigerator and pushed one towards her.

Rouge unscrewed the cap to her bottle and popped the two pills in her mouth, quickly washing them down with water. After screwing the bottle cap back on, Rouge leaned in on the counter towards the hedgehog, who was able to directly look Rouge in the eye due to the height of the chair she was sitting in.

"What? No hi?"

Amy rolled her eyes at the bat and looked back down at her phone, ignoring the bat's question.

Sighing, Rouge turned around to open her pantry doors and pulled out a box of cereal, shaking it.

"Want some cereal, Ames? You hungry?"

Amy continued to ignore Rouge, rolling her eyes each time the bat addressed her.

Aggravated, Rouge snatched the phone from the hedgehog's small hands, automatically eliciting a gasp from Amy.

"Hey, give that back!"

"No! You will not give me the silent treatment today!"

"Yeah, well, what do you want me to do?! Nothing else will fucking go through to you!"

Rouge's mouth immediately shut when she heard Amy curse. Amy was known to never curse unless thoroughly provoked and when Amy was angry, she was angry. Rouge had only heard Amy curse once or twice in her life and even at those times, Amy had automatically gotten embarrassed and apologized. But today, that wasn't going to happen. Rouge could see that Amy was truly hurt and angry at her by her body language; her fists were clenched, she was breathing quickly, and her foot was repeatedly tapping against the chair.

"I don't mean to be mean, Rouge. But nothing I say to you works. Every time I stop by to check up on you, I find you on the floor, drunk. It's honestly devastating."

Rouge looked away from the pink hedgehog and towards the ground, muttering slowly.

"Amy… It's not easy… You have to stop treating me as if I can just recover so easily. I will relapse. And I will relapse hard. That's part of the process. But, hopefully, I'll be able to recover one day. It will take time but I know I can do it. You just gotta keep praying for me."

Rouge looked up at the hedgehog and was surprised when Amy had reached over the counter and hugged Rouge, refusing to let go. A small smile crept onto Rouge's face as she wrapped her hands around the hedgehog's small form. After a few seconds, they departed from their hugs and Rouge watched as tears slowly ran down her friends face.

"I'm sorry, Rouge.. I.. I just don't know how to react.. You're my best friend and I know I should be more understanding but I just get so worried.. I'm really sorry.."

"It's okay." Rouge said, ripping off a paper towel for her friend. "It's okay, I promise I'm not mad."

Amy smiled at Rouge as she took the paper towel and dabbed her eyes gently with it. Jumping off from her seat, Amy reached down to pick up her purse and pulled out a small compact mirror, quickly examining her face to check if her makeup had smeared or not.

Rouge smirked as she watched Amy care for how she looked and went over to the bathroom mirror to take a look at herself. She saddened at what she saw; her hair was a tangled mess, her makeup was smudged, and drops of alcohol had managed to stain her favorite night gown. Sighing, Rouge walked over to her friend and gave her another hug, quietly crying into Amy's shoulder.

"I need a hug really badly right now…"

Surprised and wordless, Amy nodded and wrapped her arms around Rouge, gently rocking her back and forth. She was still shocked at how Rouge's life had strangely turned upside down; Amy and Rouge were childhood best friends ever since they were two years old. Amy knew everything about Rouge; she was there for it all. Her first cell phone, her first kiss, her first car… And Rouge was there for all of Amy's experiences. Yet even though Rouge was known to be spontaneous and adventurous, Rouge was reserved as well. Which explained why even though Amy knew almost every one of her secrets, Amy still had no idea what caused Rouge to break down one day and succumb to a life of drugs. But Amy refused to watch Rouge spiral more; she would get Rouge help and have the girl who would show up at her house at four in the morning to go on a hike on Emerald Hill to watch the sunset. She would have her best friend back, no matter what it took.

Amy slowly rubbed Rouge's back as she continued to rock her back and forth, gently reassuring Rouge that she was going to be okay, that it was going to be alright. But even as Amy tried to soothe the bat, Rouge continued to cry, breaking the hedgehog's heart each time she heard her friend sob loudly.

Rouge finally released her friend, using her hand to wipe away the remaining tears that stained her face. Forcing herself to smile, she thanked Amy for the comfort and invited her into the living room. As they both walked into the room, Rouge walked over and sat down on her couch, patting the spot next to her. She watched as Amy walked over and sat, fixing her skirt as it tried to ride up her waist.

"So, Ames, how's Sonic?"

Rouge smiled as she watched Amy giggle and go into extreme detail about the couple's adventures and fun within the past week. Rouge couldn't help but be a bit jealous that her friend had managed to find someone that loved her so much when Rouge was always getting hurt in her relationships. But Rouge was glad that Amy had found love; she would never wish anything harmful to happen to her best friend. Amy knew everything about her; well, almost everything. There were a few secrets that no one would ever know about Rouge and she liked to keep it that way. It was the only way she felt safe and protected, even if it distanced her from others and made her feel more alone than she already was. But she had Amy as her friend, a kind caring person who did anything to make her smile. Rouge only wished that she could find the same type of love in Amy and Sonic's relationship and not always the opposite.

A.N.:

"It is an absolute human certainty that no one can know his own beauty or perceive a sense of his own worth until it has been reflected back to him in the mirror of another loving, caring human being." -John Joseph Powell

Short chapter but I felt this was pretty necessary to the plot. Many times, people struggle to understand how hard addiction is to fight; my parents always make fun of alcoholics or drug users because "they got into that mess, it should be easy to get out of just like it is to get in". But most of the time, people turn to drugs due to something bad happening to them and once you're hooked, it's hard to get off cause it's a mental and physical battle.

So I made Amy be a caring friend, even if she doesn't understand what's happening to Rouge because Rouge is the only person she knows who has this problem. And even though Amy is angry and worried about Rouge, she realizes that Rouge is still her best friend and she needs help; that's why she's so determined to help her.

Rouge feels awful about everything that happened to her and feels bad about what she's doing to her best friend. But she doesn't want to open completely up to Amy because she feels it'd be better to have a few things kept to herself instead of sadden the hedgehog more.

So yeah, I'm sorry it's short but this was necessary to the plot! Next chapter, though, will be much longer and your favorite hedgehog will be in it ;) Anyways, thanks for reading! Love you all!

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With Love,

Celesta Asta xoxo