Chapter Six

It wasn't long after the group met up at the front of Six Flags that they decided it was time to head back home. Everyone was tired from walking and felt the need to just relax the rest of the night.

After deciding that it was a bit too early to head back to the hotel, Dave, Adam and Stacy agreed to come back to Randy's house to hang out for a little bit. While decisions were being made for dinner, Emily excused herself up to her room.

Today had been a good day. She really enjoyed the time she spent alone with John, but it seemed as though her mind wasn't able to get away from the grief she had been experiencing. She sat on her bed and pulled out the photo of Brian that was tucked away under her pillow.

Flashback

Emily proudly walked across the stage, the small slip of paper in her hand. She had done it. She was done with high school. She looked out into the crowd. There was her dad with the video camera, smiling with tears in his eyes. His little girl was growing up right in front of him.

Her mom was next to him, proud also and crying tears of joy. She always seemed to overreact and make everything seem so much bigger than what it really was.

Then, the most important person, at least to Emily, her brother. He had recently been dishonorably discharged from the Marines and had served a short sentence in military prison and Emily wasn't sure he was going to be able to make it. But he did.

His eyes connected with hers before turning to the person beside him. Emily had to take a close look to realize who it was. Her jaw clenched tightly when she did. Brian Hamilton.

She finally made her way back to her seat and sat down and watched the rest of the ceremony to conclude. With silly string, confetti and graduation caps flying through the air, Emily fought to find her way to her family. It wasn't long before she spotted her big brother and ran and jumped into his arms.

"I'm so proud of you, baby girl," he said, holding her tightly.

"I was afraid that you weren't going to make it," she said, pulling away.

"Nothing could keep me away. Not even jail."

"I leave your brother for three months and look what happens."

Emily looked next to Randy to see Brian clad in his military uniform. His hazel eyes were shining in the brightly lit auditorium, his dirty blond hair was unkempt.

"I didn't expect you to be here," Emily told him.

"Why not? I'm part of the family, aren't I?" Brian replied, giving a smirk much like his best friend's.

She shook her head and met up with her parents before they left and headed back to their home. By eleven thirty, her parents had called it a night and all of Emily's friends had gone home from the small get together to celebrate their graduation.

Emily was nowhere near ready to go to bed and neither were Randy and Brian. She walked down to the furnished basement and saw her brother and his friend sitting at the small bar.

"Why the hell did you go AWOL? What possessed you to do that?" she heard Brian ask.

"I don't know," her brother replied before knocking back a shot of Jack Daniels. "I guess I realized that going into the Marines wasn't the right thing for me."

"I knew you rushed into it. You let those recruiters get into your head and you let them think that it was the best thing for you."

"Like you have any room to talk. You're in the Army for three more years."

"But, Randy, I was working at a gas station making minimum wage and doing nothing with my life. I had no money to go to any type of trade school or anything and I just barely graduated from high school, there's no way I would've gotten any scholarships. Just because it was the best decision for me, doesn't mean it was for you," Brian explained as he poured each of them another shot.

Emily decided to make her presence known and walked up and sat beside her brother who just brought out another glass and poured his sister a shot. He knew what she wanted. While Emily was a straight 'A' student and on the honor roll, she was also known for her sometimes excessive partying. And Randy and Brian were the ones mostly responsible for that.

"So, Em, what are you going to do now that you're out of high school, besides become an alcoholic?" Brian asked, sarcastically.

"Haha, very funny, Bri," she laughed. "I don't…"

"She's going to college and getting a better education," Randy interrupted. "She's going to be a lawyer or something that makes her a lot of money."

Emily drank the amber liquid in her glass."Actually, Randy, I was thinking about going into the Air Force."

End Flashback

Randy was so mad when she told him that. Brian on the other hand was incredibly supportive. He didn't, however, want her to make a decision she would regret like her brother.

Emily sighed as tears stung her eyes once again and then stood up and began digging in her suitcase that had yet to be unpacked. She removed all of the clothes until she spotted the bottle of Jack Daniels.