I gave myself a few choices for this chapter. (Or maybe the next one.) The one I chose is going to make you all veryyyyy angry with me, but let me just say this; DON'T. STOP. READING.

I. HAVE. FINALS. NEXT. WEEK. I'm such a freshman…all terrified and stuff…*Melts into a puddle of goo*

Remember to please review. C: I love reviews, and I ALWAYS reply! I promise! PROMISE! AGHHHHHHHH WKRLQJDKLJWMSLFKWELS: .

Well…now I know why no one wants to talk to me. xD;;;

Also, sorry this chapter is so short, but…stuff is gonna happen. xD And…uh…sorry if there are a buttload of mistakes. I didn't proofread. :B


"Nny, you would never understand." Squee whispered as the man's fingers curled around his neck. His head slowly began to turn to the side, feeling Johnny's thumb make a small trail across his throat.

"I understand more than you know, Squee," Johnny whispered in an equally soft voice. Talking loudly, now, just seemed deafening. "I always have. If it weren't for me you wouldn't know the values you know now."

"You didn't teach me anything…you just gave me nightmares," Squee murmured bitterly, looking to the side at the rotting floorboards. He closed his eyes as Johnny let out a low hiss of anger.

"I taught you so much. Everything you know now is thanks to the knowledge I gave you. If those damned parents were the only influence you had when you were younger, you'd be dead."

Squee slapped Johnny's hand away. "Sh-Shut up! My parents try their hardest. You wouldn't understand since you won't even consider settling down with a wife and kids!"

"I don't want a wife. There isn't a single person on this earth I'd consider spending possibly the rest of my life with. I don't like women, Squee. I find it hard to trust anything that bleeds for five days a month and doesn't die." Johnny explained thoroughly.

"You liked Devi," Squee objected, perking up defensively.

"Well-"

"And if you're going to say she's a woman, I'll also bring up Edgar!" Squee nodded firmly. "I know that you really did love them both, but you just refuse to listen to your better conscience."

"Well I also don't like chi-"

"I'm a child!" Squee snapped before Johnny could finish. "All of your explanations are void, Nny-"

(This is where I almost typed 'Squee' as 'Flea'…I should be getting to bed.)

Johnny's hands were slapped down firmly on either side of Squee; he was beginning to get an irritating scratch in the back of his mind. They stared daringly at each other for a good few minutes, before Johnny's head dropped and he scooped Squee up. He carried the boy to the room he hadn't visited in well over half of a year. "Fighting is stupid," the man murmured. "There's no use in spending this little time we have together yelling at each other."

"Little time?" Squee questioned, all anger cast aside as he stared at Johnny in confusion. The maniac very gently laid the boy down on his bed, furrowing his eyebrows.

"I'm going to have to leave soon, and I won't be coming back this time," Johnny explained calmly. There was an entire speech he'd planned in his mind many times over the last six months, but he'd managed to sum it up in one, careful sentence.

Squee stared up at him, eyes wide, "No…what? What!?" he cried. "What do you mean!? Never!? Like never never!?" Squee screamed, pulling on Johnny's shirt collar.

Johnny chuckled, though it sounded pained and weak. "Like never never," he affirmed, looking down at his feet, then up at the ceiling. "Because…you're too old for me now- not in a weird way- and it's past the point where I just can't convince you people are evil anymore. I'm sorry Squeegee…"

"Wait! Nny! Please," Squee begged. "I can cha-"

Johnny shoved his hand violently at Squee's mouth, making the boy pull back and wince. "No, Squee. I can smell the alcohol on your breath, and I found this in your pocket."

Johnny pulled out the small joint he'd discovered on Squee's person. He twirled it in his fingers, and shook his head, then flung it into a trashcan. "I refuse to stay here and watch you fall at your own destructive hands. Because, well…I…I lo…you're a very good friend Squee."

Squee felt sobs trying to escape, effectively choking him up. "N-Nny," he whimpered, putting his head in his hands.

"Don't cry…"

"N-Nny…" Squee's voice went up in pitch as he began to cry, shaking. "Nny…Nny…" The small boy repeated the name like a mantra, rocking back on forth.

"Squee listen-" Johnny tried to get a word in edgewise, but Squee was already on the verge of a panic attack, so the maniac sighed in agitation and pulled the boy against him, petting his hair gently until the noises stopped and he was breathing evenly.

"Nny…" Squee whimpered lightly in his delirium, reaching out before he settled down and seemed to hurtle into a deeper, less animated sleep.

Johnny put his head in his hands and rubbed his temples. He was so confused. He new he loved Squee, but his interpretation of the word was so sick and twisted. He loved Edgar, even though they had only had one conversation, and then he killed the man. He'd loved Devi, and then was convinced by his muses to try and kill her. And now he loved Squee, and he was afraid that the boy would be next on his serial heat-of-passion killing list.


It had taken awhile, but Squee had managed to get his life back to normal, if he could even call it that. He and Pepito were back together, he hadn't seen Johnny again in a few weeks, and his parents were ever the abusive pair.

"Alright, Todd, we're coming up to the house now, okay?" Zita chirped, leading the boy by his frail shoulders down the overcast streets.

Squee nodded lightly, unconsciously waving his arms in front of him. The children laughed. What they had planned was very terrifying, apparently, but Squee had no idea what they could be planning. It was some form of initiation, or something, although they'd been friends for about a year.

It was oddly cold for a Summer day, but then again their town was very strange.

uddenly the girls stopped him, giggling like mad. "Alright Todd! This is yourrrr..." they both inhaled deeply and looked at each other, then threw their arms into the air as Brian took off Squee's blindfold. "INITIATION!" they finished with a yell.

Squee blinked, his eyes automatically glued to his house. But they didn't know where he lived, did they? He suddenly realized they were all...looking elsewhere. He reluctantly followed their curious looks to that house. That decrepit, old, sickening house.

"Rumor has it the person behind all those murderers lives here," Melvin whispered. "And so you're initiation is to go in there and get something important...like...a photo, or...uhm...some clothes, or something, and if you come out alive, you are officially part of the group!" he explained vigorously. The girls and Melvin all made 'scary' noises, trying to make Squee nervous, but it didn't seem to work.

"Well aren't you scared?" Brian drawled. Squee shook his head, making everyone even more confused.

"It's okay. This will be easy," Squee said, stonefaced. It really would. Johnny probably wasn't home, and even if he was, what would he do? He'd tried to convince himself over and over again to kill the boy, but he just couldn't do it. Before anyone could stop or question him, Squee was already squeezing through the small gap between Johnny's boarded up window. He really had put on some weight thanks to Pepito insisting he eat right. He was still a little underweight, but not somuch as he had been before. It was quite the task to squeeze through the window, but he managed to.

Squee stood up once through the window and inhaled the familiar scent of blood. He exhaled, and closed his eyes, beginning to look around. He knew Johnny kept some clean clothes under the bed; he didn't want to bring the other children clothes drenched in blood, or Johnny would get in trouble. He hummed as he felt around under the bed, his hand brushing against something square. Curious, he took it out and immediately recognized it as a shoe box.

Squee looked around nervously, wondering if he should invade Johnny's privacy or not. He decided it wasn't such a bad idea. The sounds of his friends laughing and playing around to pass the time could be heard outside of the room, so he tried to focus on that. Tried to think of all the good times the group will have together in the future. He'd finally be considered a human; someone that his friends could count on.

Squee opened the box, tilting his head at the curious looking polaroids. His eyesbrows furrowed there were pictures among pictures among pictures of him. Sleeping, sleeping in all of them. Every. Single. One. He rubbed his temples. This was weird. Really, really weird, but he couldn't help but feel a little flattered. Upon further inspection he found a picture of a woman, that he could only figure was Devi.

"She's pretty..." Squee murmured to himself, running a finger over her hair as if she could feel the halfhearted pet. He sighed and set the picture back in the box, picking up another one he was sure wasn't him. He made a small hum sound, and rubbed the back of his head. He bit his lip slightly and turned the picture of some man he'd never met before around. "Edgar? This is the infamous Edgar?" he chuckled lightly. The man was unconscious, lying on the floor. Squee knew Johnny had some kind of habit of taking pictures of his victims. Maybe for some sort of remembrance or reassurance?

That's the impression he always got. Squee put the picture in his pocket and picked up another one, letting out a small laugh at a false nostalgia.

It was a picture of Johnny; he was obviously much younger, maybe a freshman in high school, and his hair wasn't as spiky as it was now. He looked like he was in the middle of a dramatic speech, the back of his hand was placed over his forehead and he was bent backwards as if he were going to faint. The few kids around him were laughing; not at him, but with him.

Squee could not recall Johnny talking about any friends, but that's what it appeared to be. There was a large sign that read 'Drama Theat-' and then the edge of the Polaroid cut it off, but Squee knew what it said. "I didn't really think Nny would be a Drama person," he murmured.

Then again, he was pretty sure Johnny didn't even see himself like that. Johnny could barely remember anything before he came to the house. Actually, he could barely remember coming to the house, or falling victim to its evil. He had told Squee he remembered being picked on as a child, but he must not have remembered having friends beyond the evidence contained in the picture.

Although Squee would have really enjoyed keeping such a lighthearted picture of Johnny, he wouldn't be able to take it in good conscience, so he set it back in the box. He finally found a specific picture he'd been looking for. It was one of he and Johnny when they were both a bit younger. He smirked slightly, knowing the picture would make his friends nervous as to why he was hanging out with a maniac.

He figured he'd divert their attention from the theory that Johnny was a homicidal maniac and claim that he was just his neighbor and a friend of his parents. Nothing more, nothing less. He giggled at his own plot, and stuck the picture in his pocket, putting the lid back on the shoebox, and placing it back under the bed.

As he felt around under the bed, he felt something curious…a book? He pulled it out and recognized it immediately as Johnny's diary. He swallowed nervously and opened it, curiosity nearly killing him.

Dear Die-ary,

I had another one of those dreams. The ones where I'm not asleep, but it's not real. A hallucination, I suppose you can call it. It was a party and I was actually invited! There was Edgar, and Devi, and some other people I sort of recognized too. They were all having a really good time. I was looking around for someone, but I didn't know whom, so I decided to sit down. No one stared at me, and no one was talking about me negatively, so I was actually smiling. I didn't feel the awful, horrible intent of murderer, which only heightened the ecstasy. Finally I found who I was looking for. It was my Squeegee, but it wasn't. It was some horrible awful, disgusting thing that was just wearing the skin of Squee. He was almost akin to…those awful human beings I rid the earth of. Die-ary, I think I have to kill him.

Squee shivered and skimmed through the pages, seeing his name several times, especially towards the end of the diary. He finally made it to the last page.

Dear Diary,

I found Squee's poetry/story journal. He stopped making the amazing poems that always made my heart cringe with…maybe it was guilt? I'm not sure, but it was very odd. Diary, oh, Diary, how I wish I had my dear Squeegee back…

Squee's eyebrows furrowed guiltily. He put the Diary back into its place and walked back to the window he'd entered from, sliding through until his small hips got stuck. He held up the picture to his friends and gave thumbs up, smiling. His friend promptly cheered.

"Good job Squee! You're part of the group now!" Aki cheered happily, clapping.

"It wasn't hard! You guys are all wrong!" Squee replied, trying to turn his hips in the right direction so they'd fit through the boards.

"About what?"

Squee cringed. This would happen just lovely. Suddenly, he felt himself being pulled. His eyes widened and he tried to hold onto the sill. "A-Ah! Wait! Stop!" he cried, trying to pull himself back out. "Help! You guys! Help!" he squeaked, reaching out for someone to take his hand.

Brian rolled his eyes, "Stop messing around, Todd," he yelled to him.

Zita and Aki looked at each other worriedly as Squee disappeared. "I-I don't think he was playing around, Brian!" Zita squealed.

"He's gonna get murdered!" Aki cried.

"Shut up. No he's not. We'll just wait for him to stop being stupid," Brian snorted. He'd never admit to it, but secretly he hoped Squee would be murdered.