After a few days of quiet concern, Emily's parents finally broke down and discussed the options. They invited Julia, Josh's fiancée and Emily to be in on the discussion & ultimately the decision. After a lot of back and forth conversation, it was decided that they will not be filing a missing person's report. He seemed to leave on his own accord. They were going to respect his need to leave in the hopes that it would encourage him to return some day.

While sitting in her room, half-heartedly trying to read a book to distract herself, Emily kept getting urges to call out to Josh in his bedroom, who would slowly make his way over and they would talk and laugh for a few minutes. He was always good for a few laughs but he really was great at listening as well. They had a slightly better than normal sibling relationship, never really fighting too much. Above anyone else, Emily trusted her brother and wanted him to feel that way about her… but obviously he didn't trust her the same way that she trusted him. They wouldn't be in this situation if he did. If he could just tell her what was going on he wouldn't have to be all alone somewhere – possibly injured. She hated to think about it.

As much as she went over it in her mind, she still couldn't make much sense of the whole incident. One thing that plagued her thoughts was the ridiculous amount of dirt by his bedroom door. Josh wasn't the outdoorsy type. Wasn't. She was now thinking of him in the past tense. The thought alone was jarring. Josh isn't the outdoorsy type, he doesn't like to get dirty too dirty and to be honest, he's something of a wimp. Where did all of the dirt come from? It is more than he could have dragged up here on his shoes, it's as if his entire body was covered in it. Seeing that she wasn't getting far not thinking about her brother's disappearance, she made a plan to get coffee with Julia. She wanted to talk to her about what happened, not that it mattered much now, but maybe Julia could take comfort in talking to someone about it.

She decided to get in her car and go for a drive to clear her head. She drove for what ended up being over two hours and didn't feel much better when she returned, she had absentmindedly driven past what seemed like all of the places Josh frequented. She even went inside the comic book store that he went to religiously when they were younger. To her dismay, someone asked about him, recognizing her from years before. She had to tell them, without sounding crazy, that her brother had disappeared. That he just left. Never to be seen again, or at least that's what it felt like for those who were close to him. It turns out that people aren't prepared for statements like that… a half-hearted apology was offered by his acquaintance. If people weren't prepared to hear something like that then she felt a little bit better about feeling the way that she did. Or, more likely at this point, what she didn't feel. She was dancing between two worlds, one closed off and numb to what was going on around her and the with a never ending supply of pain.

It had been hard to talk to anyone these past few days, even Jackie, the person she talked to most only had snippets of what was going on. How do you talk about someone who's gone… not dead, but gone. It was hard enough using the proper verb tenses when talking about him. No, talking to Jackie alone wouldn't do, she would definitely feel better after talking to Julia.

.

The next morning, Emily had to get back into her normal routine. That meant going to her part-time job at Starbucks, dealing with people who were usually too distracted by their cell phones or the endless drink choices to figure out how to order properly. It also meant TV night with her best friend, to catch up on the shows that amassed on the Tivo. Honestly, she wasn't looking forward to either of those choices. Not that she didn't want to see her best friend, but she knew it would be another night of talking about Josh.

Work wasn't actually terrible today, it passed the time better than anything else had in the past few days. She even went so far as to pick up a few extra shifts. Today, fewer people asked questions. The ones that did know her didn't want to pry, which she was beyond thankful for.

Just after seven, Sara arrived, nearly taking the front door down in her fervor to get inside. She immediately embraced her best friend. They could have been hugging for seconds or days, but when they separated, both had wet eyes. "Do you want to talk about it?" she asked.

"Not right now," Emily answered, shaking her head. She knew that she probably would end up telling Sara the whole story tonight, so she decided to put it off for a bit longer. They both plopped down on the couch and flipped on the TV. The seemed to know that whatever they ended up watching would probably be forgotten soon and settled at a mind numbing episode of 'Wipeout'.

"It feels like he died." Emily stated a while later. "He's just disappeared."

"I can't imagine why he would've left… he's going to school, he's got a fiancée…?" Sara's voice drifted off at the end, her confusion evident.

"And the waitress said he looked like he was in pain! And the dirt…" she continued. Sara looked at her quizzically.

"Dirt?"

"Well, when he came home - while I was sleeping of course - he left a ridiculous amount of dirt by the door in his room. I don't know what to make of it at all."

"That is really bizarre," she mused. "I hope he's not injured or something."

"There is one more thing though. Right before I went to the bathroom, I told him something," she started. Here goes nothing. "I… told him that I'm gay." She avoided Sara's eyes.

After a slight pause, Sara's mood shifted to outrage. "THEN HE LEFT?" Emily looked up, smiling slightly. "Why the hell would he do that?"

"I don't know… I honestly didn't think it would bother him." It was obvious that she was really hurt, on top of the loss of her brother. Sara put her arm around her best friend.

"Oh and I can't believe you came out to your brother before your own best friend. Jerk."