*Aw so sorry, but this is gonna be quite corny again. Listening to music by Linkin' Park and Papa Roach all of the time has a strange effect on me. I am inspired to either write corny or killing stuff – don't worry, the last is upcoming soon. I only never expected all of this would take so long.*

Chapter7

Later this day Max stepped by to take Alex to Matt's office, where his parents were waiting. It sent a stabbing pain right through his body thinking about facing them just in a few seconds. Hell, he didn't even remember their faces. As to him they were two complete strangers. Maybe everything would change the moment they took them into their arms, telling him that everything was alright now. Take him back home.

Home.

Wherever that was.

Matt just stepped outside his office as they arrived, giving him an encouraging smile.

"What-?" Alex wanted to know, but he was interrupted.

"I guess it's better to meet them alone. Anything like making this feel like a session might only get you unnecessarily excited. As well as them. Don't worry, I'll be just here, outside. Go." With that he shoved the boy into the room, cautiously closing the door behind him.

Alex felt trapped. Beside him there were two more persons in the room, standing in front of Matt's desk, looking at him obviously as nervous as himself. He stared at their faces, getting more frustrated each second as he couldn't find anything familiar in them. Geez, what had he expected? That there would be a loud BANG and suddenly everything was perfect? They would fall into each other's arms and live happily ever after?

Admittedly, part of him had.

His mother was the first one to move. She took a few steps forward and then hugged him with a desperate sigh. Her arms wrapped around his body, light at first, then stronger. As if it had been a sign his father had been waiting for, he pulled them both into his arms, giving Alex the feeling of being choked to death. He started to feel really uncomfortable. Maybe he wasn't the tender guy; he forced himself to hold still for he didn't want to destroy the moment since his parents seemed to be very pleased to see him again. His mom mumbled incoherent sentences into his hair and he could tell by her croaky voice that she was crying.

"Give him some air, sweetie", he heard his father whisper softly and she reluctantly obeyed, pulling her son to the sofa. As they sat down she still wouldn't let go of his hand.

The uncomfortable feeling didn't diminish. Alex longed to remember anything, a tiny little childhood memory, anything. But his mind had different plans.

"How are you? God, honey, you can't imagine how happy we were when we finally got the call that they had found you!" His mother sobbed.

"What happened?" Alex wanted to know, feeling relief that he would finally find out.

"What is the last thing you remember?" his father asked.

Alex shrugged and summed up: "The accident. Headlights out of nowhere, ka-boom, asphalt, bad headache, blackout. Before – blackness."

"Blackness?" his mother asked confused.

"Nothing. Monster-blackout."

For a moment none of them said a word. Of course his parents had been told that he was suffering from amnesia, but he supposed they had shared the same hope; that somehow it would sort itself out when they met. He knew he was right as his mother swallowed hard.

"Nothing?"

Again he shook his head.

"I'm sure the memory will come back", his father assured.

"I guess so, too. As soon as I will be home, in my usual environment, I will …. what?" The quick, almost shy glance his parents exchanged, hadn't escaped  his attention.

"What?" he repeated.

His father cleared his throat. "Well, uhm , we …. the doctor thought it would be better if you stay here for another while and-"

"WHAT?!" Alex felt like having a bad dream.

"Don't get upset, Alex. You – God, how am I supposed to tell you that – you-"

"Fucking get me outta here!" he burst out. This wasn't only a bad dream, this was a fully grown nightmare.

"Alex! Calm down! It's not so easy – "

"It's FUCKING easy! I grab my bags n we get out! That's what you came here for, wasn't it?" He stared at his mom. "WASN'T IT?"

"Alex", she began, "we …. oh my God, when you ran away from the Price Institute we thought we had lost you forever. We almost thought you were dead – no one was able to find you. We thought you might have done something to yourself- "

"Why the fuck should I do that??"

"Do you remember Price?"

Her son tried to focus his thoughts on that name for a moment. Clear had mentioned something like Stoneybrook. But Price? He shrugged.

"We sent you there – one evening. Oh my God, Alex, you totally", Mr Browning searched for the right words, "blew your top because of Tod and all the things that had happened. You were absolutely persuaded that something was after you. We had found all the drugs in your drawer to get you high – you hadn't slept for days – we just didn't know what to do anymore. So when Rory, you know, Rory, he's a medic and …. he gave us the address and number and desperate as we were, as we saw you were –" he stopped, looking at him to find some comprehension. Something his son wasn't willing to give.

Instead of he just stared at him blankly. "You …. you sent me there …. like ….you called some guys you didn't even know to take me to a place you never heard of before …. was that the only possibility to get rid of me?"

His mother gasped, obviously hurt by his words. "Oh my God, Alex, don't you say such horrible things, honey, we didn't want to get rid of you, it's –"

Alex drew back from her hand. A sudden feeling of deadly rage rushed through him. Like something he had felt before – out of the same reason. But he couldn't exactly remember, there were no pictures from the past in his mind that showed him what had happened. So he depended on what his parents told him, two people he had thought a while ago to be the only persons that would never let him down. The same two people he right now never wished to see again. He got up.

"Alex, where do you want to go?" Ken Browning asked.

"I think I need some fresh air", he snapped.

"Alex please, this is just where we stopped last time!" his mother pleaded. "Don't let it all happen again, darling."

"Or what?! In case you might not have noticed it seems I already am in the loony bin so there's nowhere worse you can send me now to punish me! Jail maybe though. But whatever I did to you, don't you think that grounding me for two weeks would of have been enough? Did you really have to exaggerate it like that?"

"See, it wasn't as easy for us as you might think", his father began to explain while his mother swallowed hard to suppress her tears. "We just didn't know what to –"

"AW, SHUT THE FUCK UP!" his son yelled and grabbed the handle.

"Alex listen-" his father began in a  more severe tone.

He swung around. "No, you both listen!! I don't give a fuck about explanations, okay?? I just don't care bout anything these guys here are trying to talk me into nor bout what Matt or this slut Cole say and I surely, damn 100 percent don't give a shit on what the two people have to tell me that are just fucking responsible for me being here at all!!" He opened the door so powerfully that it crashed against the wall behind him, making the middle glass part rattle.

"I told you it might not be the best idea", Barbara Browning murmured as her son had left them.

"So now it was my plan!" her husband said in a bitter voice but then hugged his wife instead of further arguing with her. "He's gonna be alright, you will see. It's only a matter of time and everything will be as good as it was before the whole thing started. You will see."

Meanwhile Alex had nearly knocked over Matt as he stormed out, telling him to stay the fuck away from him. Matt shook his head as Max made a move to follow him. "Give him some time", he said and turned around to enter his office.

Alex  went straight into the TV room, hoping not to find anyone in there. And fortunately he wasn't disappointed. At least not for fifteen minutes. Then the door was opened.

"Oh, still here?" The dark haired boy smirked. "Mommy n daddy didn't want their lil baby boy back? Aw."

"Fuck you!" he growled back. "Shouldn't you be making out with your girlfriend?"

"It's just that sometimes Mr Automobile needs to cease for he's running out of gas, if you know what I mean. Even it's a Lamborghini. – Since when do you do that?"

Alex followed his eyes to his hand, which was holding a cigarette. He shrugged. "Dunno. Something inside of me just said 'get some' and so I did."

"From the way you inhale I would tell it's not the first time", the jock commented as Alex took a deep pull, exhaling almost no smoke.

"You know that this can kill you?"

Alex yawned. "I'm not even going to deign this with an answer. I just thought it might …." 'help me remember something' he had wanted to say, but realized that it sounded a bit weird and he wasn't in the mood to get pissed by Carter's comments.

"So what about your parents now?" Kincaid repeated impatiently for he hated to ask questions twice.

"They", Alex began, but then cut off and looked at the table.

"You are not going to cry now, will you?" Carter mocked, but Alex just gave him the middle finger, taking a deep breath and stubbing his cigarette in the ashtray.

"Tell me. Tell me what you are really here for."

*The original Mr Automobile sentence actually belongs to DHARKE PRODUCTIONS. And I should go and  change my 'genre' to 'drama' right now.*