Discalimer: I am not Ally Carter (gasp!), and I do not own the Gallagher Girls (sigh).

If you ever thought that spies were fearless, I'm sure you've realized that's not true. Fear is necessary. It keeps you on your toes, ready and alert. In healthy doses, it keeps you alive.

In unhealthy doses, it kills you.

And I realized over Winter Break, that it was killing me.

I was afraid to look Zach in the eyes, afraid to see pain that I put there.

As a result I spent two weeks completely hidden from him. He could not track me down. This meant though that I spent limited time with Cammie, and therefore Bex, and to do that I stayed out of Grant's notice, which in turn meant I steered clear of Jonas and consequently Liz, and therefore Macey. John was really the only person left.

However, I found, much like I had the first moment I met him, that John wasn't your average guy- he was better. He made me laugh, I mean really laugh.

Like one time I was over at his family's ranch. His mother was a school teacher, and his father a retired FBI agent ever since his grandfather had retired from farming, and needed him to take over. John drove the two of us in a tractor to go replenish the hay. At the time, my ranch knowledge being limited, I believed John when I asked, "When will the cows come?"

"You have to call for them," he said, "but they won't come if they think humans are nearby, so you have to get on your hands and knees and moo." I should've realized that he was smiling a little too wide.

"Really?" I asked although I was already getting down in position even though there was some snow on the ground.

"Really."

John must have let it go on for a good five minutes. Five minutes of me on all fours, craning my neck, acting like a cow. Five minutes! And then he started bursting out laughter.

"I can't be that bad!" I protested, "There are cows here!" And they were giving me a rather odd look.

"Here cows!" he called cupping his hands to his mouth, his voice pitching high and then low. The cows came running.

"Are you kidding me?" I nearly screeched. But his smile, well, it was irresistible, and it had been pretty funny so I could only laugh along.

But I was afraid to let go. I was afraid to leave Riley.

So one night when the whole group was going to the movies, and John's hand reached for mine, instead of reaching for his like I desperately wanted to, I stepped ever so slighting to the side so he missed, and quickly hooked one arm through Macey's and the other through Liz's. Another time, he tried to kiss me, but I purposely tripped so I got a bruised knee instead.

I was afraid for my father, knowing that when he called me on Christmas Eve it was the night he and my mother first met. Knowing how it felt to lose her, to lose a person you vowed you could never live without.

I was afraid to ride the Ferris wheel that was at the local school's winter festival, so everyone else but John went.

But by then I was afraid to really even talk to him.

I was afraid to be my name sake, afraid to be radiant.

I was afraid that I didn't deserve to be.

Because it was my fault. It was my fault that Riley was dead. I didn't see the tail in time. I didn't warn him fast enough. It was my fault that Zach no longer had a brother. It was my fault that my mother was gone. I didn't protect her, I didn't stall long enough, I didn't stop the CIA. It was my fault that my father had to go on without her.

It didn't matter how easily I could hide from other people, I couldn't hide from myself. That's not to say I didn't run, I had been running since that doorbell rang when I was 10 years old.

The running, the fear, the guilt, all of it was killing me, eating away at me until eventually there would be nothing left.

And I let it happen. I thought that's what I deserved.

Until one day, three days until we were to go back to school, John had come by with the other blackthorn boys unexpectedly, and quickly I slid out the back door, afraid to even look at John, afraid for Zach to look at me. It would've worked out perfectly except after I stepped outside, someone was already there.

"You never wrote back," said Zach, sounding wounded.

"I couldn't," I said, looking down at my feet shifting nervously.

"Why not?" he demanded.

"You were his brother," I begged, the guilt crushing me, knowing that I had forced Riley to the grave- the one place he couldn't follow.

"You were my friend."

And it was then that I finally forced myself to look up at Zach. Finally, I looked him in the eye. And it was then that I realized that Zach had been afraid too. He had been afraid that he had lost a friend. "I still am," I told him.

A/N: I know there's a little part of you that really wants to submit a REVIEW!