Wow! I can't believe I got so many reviews for the last chapter, that's great! Much thanks to Banana4422, katemmalestrange, Miss Riley, Strokes, wiseoldman, allyson, and the (Former) Queen of Marstons Mills! Also…if you've read my other fic, you know Katie's screenname. AIM let me have it, so if you wanna chat, you can IM me there…but see, this is a trick: you have to read my other fic to find it! Muahaha. I'm so evil.

Just to make things simpler: the titles have the names of the person who's POV the chapter is in. So if it says Katie Likes Food, Katie's the one talking. Okay? Sweet, let's go. :)

-Sienna

Chapter Three: Katie's First Night As a Runaway

I feel really strange. Excited, but a calm sort of excited…like…kinda happy. Like this is where I want to be, but I'm surprised and a little nervous to be here. Does that make sense? Nervous happiness…nervappy. I feel nervappy.

The cold air doesn't freeze me anymore, it feels good, refreshing. I'm all nice and warm inside my pea coat and hat and mittens and boots. The snow is falling more heavily now, turning the road ahead into a misty and indescribable white void. I look over my side every so often to check on Freddy.

"What?" he asks.

"Just making sure you're still there," I say. He smiles.

But God, where is he taking us? I'm determined, I've decided that I'm not going to ask; I'll prove to my kidnapper that I trust him. Besides, what good will it do me to know?

What if he misses the place because it's so snowy?

"Aha," Freddy says, pointing. There's a sign up ahead, maybe only twenty feet, but completely obscured so all I can see is a vague blue oval. Then we get closer, and I read it—O'Brian Elementary School.

"This is it?"

"Well, not the sign, obviously. Come on."

He leads me across the athletic field. We stick out like two shadows in the spotlight against all the snow, which is more than calf-deep here, but it gets shallower as we make our way around the building. I look at the old, unfamiliar playground—somewhat ghostly in the bluish night.

"Miss Brown, your accommodations for the night." He gestures to everything with a wave.

"Here?" I ask. I'm asking all kinds of intelligent questions tonight.

"You have your choices of rooms," he says, striding around proudly, as if he owned it all. "We have the slide, which is…shiny…actually I don't recommend sleeping there. There's under the castley-thing, and that's got a nice roof—good when it rains—but it's also open, and cold."

"You know from experience?"

"You bet. There's the swings…no point in them…on the bench works on a nice night…ah, but here we have my personal favorite." He walked over to a large black lump in the ground and patted it fondly. "The sunken tire things!

"They've got roofs, they've got walls, they're relatively dry and warm."

"Sounds excellent," I say.

I walk over to the tire next to him, no more than a foot away. What are these things really for? I wonder as I crawl inside mine, squeezing more than a little to get in. I'm squeamish for a second, thinking of all the possible bugs and spiders and other wiggly things inside—but then I remember what I said earlier. "If I wanted someplace cushy to sleep, I'd have stayed home."

On the inside, it's not such a bad fit. The rubber walls are only a little dirty, not buggy. They squish me gently on either side and curve up under my head. It's kind of snuggly, once I spend five minutes twisting around to get my backpack off and hug it in my arms.

"You good?" Freddy asks.

"Yep," I say.

I watch him climb into his tire. Like the smart boy he is, he thinks to take off his backpack first.

"You do this a lot," I say, even though we've already established that. "Why?"

He pauses before answering. "Why did you want to run away?"

Even though he can't see me, I shrug. "I know I don't have it as bad as some kids. Like, you or Zack, getting yelled at and stuff, right?"

"And stuff," Freddy says.

"Yeah…so, I don't know. It's kinda sad I hate Christmastime so much. It's just all the people telling me what to do and expecting I'll do it, no questions asked, when it's my holiday too…it's all special for the little kids, and the adults make a big deal out of taking as many days off from work as they can, and I've got two weeks with no school to spend cleaning," I end in a huff. "It sucks."

"That does suck."

"Not that…not that I'm totally the worst off person in the world—"

"But it still sucks," says Freddy. "It's okay. Just cause your problems can't top everyone else's, doesn't mean you can't vent them to your friends. I mean, it's like a God-given, unmailable right."

"Unalienable?"

"Yeah, that."

He doesn't even care that I corrected him. Some people (like Summer, for instance, though God knows she never does anything wrong) get really pissed when you do that, even if you didn't do it in a mean way.

"What about you?" I ask.

There's a sigh from the tire next to me. "Kinda the same. Parents. Stupid little [he used a word I'd never heard someone my age use before] that think they can tell you everything. Like they know everything. And you try to freakin make a point, and all they do is yell and…tell you more of what you can't do…."

"Your parents are nice to me," I say, hoping I don't sound like a traitor.

"Of course, you're the nice girl from across the street. They're nice to Zack too. But you know, if we go through with this…hide out and make them worry for a whole week…they're gonna start to see you as my accomplice."

I laugh. "Well, it was my idea too."

"Katie Brown, you're now officially my partner in crime." I hope he's grinning too.

"Like Bonnie and Clyde."

"Who were they?"

"Um…I'm not totally sure…a guy and a girl that robbed places and stuff together, I think."

"Sweet. Feel like holding up the 7-Eleven tomorrow?"

"Not really. I'm still new to this whole disobedient and mischievous thing…let's pay for our food."

"Okay, okay. I didn't bring my gun anyway."

"That's reassuring."

We are both quiet for a moment. I guess he is drifting off to sleep, but I'm wide awake, looking out at the snow. What if something tries to hurt us out here? …but then, what is out here? We're only two miles from our backyards, and close to our preppy school, too. It's not exactly the wilderness.

"Do you really have a gun?" I ask finally.

"…joke, Katie…" comes Freddy's muffled reply.

"Okay."

It's actually very peaceful…. I adjust my backpack, feeling the edges of my CDs's jewel cases digging into my rib. Time to sleep, Katie.

Haha, yeah, like I can sleep….