"Okay, well, they start out with Dave beating me and Ricky, then laughing, locking us up in the bedroom, the closet, wherever. Then he goes out drinking, and I can hear him raping my mother. She still loved him after all that, I don't know why. Then he comes up and kills Ricky first, then just as he's about to kill me, I wake up."

He blinked. "Damn. I can see how that'd be..."

"Terrifying?"

"Yeah. But anyway. I'm getting sick of this place, aren't you?"I asked, quickly changing the depressing topic. He nodded cautiously, obviously wondering where I was going with this. "Well, whaddya say we start going?"

"Where?" he asked.

I shrugged. "Who cares?" He smirked and shook his head.

"When do we leave?"

I laughed. "Wanna leave today?"

"Sure, why not? It's not like we've got anything to do up here."

We set to work filling our canteens and the glass jars with water, then putting onions around them in our backpacks. I had to arrange things carefully so my tampons and sketchbook wouldn't get wet- hopefully. 'Cause then I'd just be screwed. And embarrassed out of my mind. And well, yeah, you get the idea. I pulled the comb from my bag and combed my hair, which was in dire need of some shampoo, then pulled it into a tight braid. My hair was no longer the color of unbleached silk, but of dark straw from oil and dirt. We both smelled terrible, like onions, sweat, dirt, and something unrecognizable, but nasty all the same. "So, do you want to do something to commemorate our last day here?" I asked.

He thought a minute. "How about you dance? Give me a couple pencils, I'll give you the beat." I shrugged and pulled two pencils from my bag. He experimented a bit before finding something he liked. I shook out my hair, closed my eyes, and started moving to the beat he created, my hair spinning, arms, legs, hips, all moving independently. "Yeah!" he yelled. I just kept moving, losing myself in the moment until my body didn't want to move anymore and I collapsed into his arms. "Wanna rest a while before we go?"

"No, I wanna run!" I said sarcastically. "Here's your sign," I muttered.

He just rolled his eyes and tugged me into his lap. "Oh, shut up." I laughed and relaxed into his arms. "You know, you're a really good dancer."

I shrugged. "Hey, you don't go VHS for nothing. Man, every girl there thought she was straight out of the Bronx. So did all the guys. All a bunch of rich white boys tryin' to be low-mid-class black boy thugs. Sad. But I learned to dance there, so, ya know."

"Vega high school? I went to Amboy High. Were you that girl that was in all the dace competitions that Candy loved to hate?"

"Probably. Why?"

He shook his head. "I was just noticing what a small world this is." I smiled up at him. We sat for a while, then when we were ready, we started slowly walking/climbing down the mountain, careful not to break the jars. It must've taken at least 2 hours because of the terrain. Then we just started walking across the desert. It took three days of sweat, exhaustion, and occasional tears on my part, but we found a road. A deserted road, but a road no less. If I hadn't been so tired, I would have danced.

"Civilization, sort of."

I laughed weakly. "Come on. Let's keep going. It's not over yet." And so we walked. And walked. And WALKED! Then we came to a fork in the road. Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, I thought to myself. One looked as if it hadn't been traveled on for years, but another had dirt that was slightly packed, and I could tell it'd been driven on before. We nodded at each other and kept walking, too tired to say much. Whenever a car drove by, we put our thumbs up, but no one stopped. Of course not. Who wanted to pick up two kids dressed in prison-like jumpsuits? I looked up at one point and saw a little tiny Motel. "Alan? You see that?"

He looked where I was pointing. "The tumble weed?"

"No, the motel!"

He shook his head. "Trust me, sugar, there's no motel."

I sighed and we kept walking, looking at the road. After what seemed like weeks (but was actually three days) I tripped on a chunk of asphalt. "What the hell" I looked up and saw what he was seeing. "Alan! It's a town!" I cried, hugging him tightly. He hugged back wordlessly. The name of the town was Flowers. Population 350. We walked down the sidewalk of the sleepy town, mostly looking for a place to stay. I may not have money, but I've got charm. I saw a little hotel on Main street called the Carnation. "Come on. Let's try it."

"Okay" He followed me inside.

The receptionist was a kind-looking woman in her early forties with glasses and a sweet smile. "May I help you?"

I sighed. "Ma'am, we really need a room. See, we... well, we ran away, and we don't have any money and-"

"You're those two from Greenlake, aren't you?"

I could feel Alan cringe as I answered, "Yes."

She shook her head. "I've heard horror stories about that place. Well, we don't get a lot of business, but you could help out to earn your stay. You know, make beds and such. And don't worry, no one will ever know you're here." She shuffled things around on her desk and gave us a key. "There's only one bed, but I'm sure you'll manage. If you need anything, you know, toothbrush, comb, razor or what have you, come to me and I'll find something."

"Uh, could we get a razor, toothbrushes, toothpaste, and some extra shampoo?" I asked immediately. She smiled and got the items for me. "Thank you miss," I said as she gave us our room key and sent us along.

"How did you do that?" He asked as we walked into the smallish room.

I smiled. "Hey, I can charm people just as well as the next girl. You wanna shower first or should I?"

"After you."

I ran in and took off my clothes, unbraided my hair, and got into the warm shower, washing my hair, shaving my legs, and brushing my teeth. It must have taken at least half an hour, but it was worth it. I was Astrid again.

When I walked out clad only in a towel, Alan ran in. After a few minutes of channel surfing, there was a knock at the door. I opened it to find the receptionist (who was also the owner from what I gathered) holding pajamas, jeans, T-shirts, sports bras, and packaged underwear and boxers. "Hello."

She smiled. "I thought you might need a few things. They may not fit right, so I brought you each a belt. I hope you li-"

I grinned at her. "Thank you so much." She smiled and left. I closed the door and changed into a pair of pajamas. 15 minutes later, he came out of the shower and stared at me. "They're from her. Either she has a donation box or she owns the clothing store as well. Come on, get dressed." I went into the bathroom to get our old clothes and put them in the bag the place oh-so-conveniently provided.

"Hey Astrid, what are we gonna do about food? I'm starved." I walked out and saw he was wearing a pair of blue pajama pants and a white shirt. And was clean, and smelled incredibly good compared to about an hour ago.

I ran my fingers through my drying hair which was white blonde again and shrugged. "Let's ask her." I took his hand and grabbed our key as we walked out to the desk. She sat there, reading White Oleander. "Excuse me, Miss? What about food?"

She smiled at us. "Oh, I was going to come down with some spaghetti once I finished this chapter. Just a minute." She ducked into a back room and came back with two Styrofoam bowls of spaghetti and plastic forks. "Here you are."

"Thank you," we said as we left. We ate hungrily, then climbed into bed, sighing at its softness.

"Astrid?" I looked over at him. He held something tightly in his hand. I sat up straight. "Will you marry me? I mean, when we're both old enough."

I started to cry. "Yes!" I cried. He smiled and put the silver band on my thumb, the only finger it would fit. There was a tanline on his index finger where he used to wear it. I started to laugh.

He laughed with me. "Yeah." He pulled me to him. I fell asleep, safe in his arms. I woke up around midnight to find him staring lovingly into my eyes. I stared right back, my heart pounding straight out of my chest. We were both shaking when he touched my face. I closed my eyes and lost myself in his touch, not caring because I knew I was in love, and I knew he loved me back. I almost froze when he tentatively touched my bare skin, but didn't. I allowed him to feel the scars that resided on my back. "Who did this?" he asked, stopping and pulling away.

"Dave."

He shook his head. "You don't deserve to be treated like that."

"No one does." I turned on the lamp. "Look." I turned my back to him and took off my shirt. He traced the scars. I turned towards him, covering myself. He could still see the scars on my breasts, though. And all around my stomach from Dave's knives and glass from broken windows and too many people and too much stress and...

He peeled off his own shirt. It was also like a cross-hatching of scars. Some looked deliberate, but others looked like mine- broken glass scars, mostly. "She'd break off the end of a beer bottle or bourbon bottle or whatever and use it like a knife. She hated me. Said I was a mistake. I guess I am," He shrugged.

I grabbed his shoulders, uncovering my chest but not caring. "No, you're not. If you're a mistake, then I am too, but I'm not! I have a reason to live again, Alan! You. You get inside my head easily because you've been there too. I value that. I love you so much, and I am going to marry you when I'm 18 because I love you for YOU and not your past. I want to be with you more than anything else."

He stared at me in total disbelief. He looked first into my eyes, then slowly down to my chest, then snapped back up to my eyes. "You mean that?" I nodded and pulled my shirt back on. The smile on his face was like looking straight into the sun, I swear it. His whole face lit up like candles on a birthday cake as he pulled me into a hug. "I love you."