Just got back from a Writer's Weekend with a couple of friends, during which I added approximately 10,000 words to my NaNo. Visit my LJ thru my Profile Page if interested in more details. A very rewarding experience, tho I am kind of mentally drained at the moment. But I wanted to post the next chapter of this story. It looks relatively short, yet packed with angst. Enjoy.

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"Way to go, Gordo!" Veruca cried, standing up in a puddle of sprite and cola.

"Me?" Gordo returned, grabbing as many napkins as he could. "It was your boyfriend who---"

"He's not my boyfriend!" Veruca screamed. "And it's not his fault! I can't believe how you egged him on! How could you be so cruel? And to think I actually---oh, shit!" she exclaimed, close to tears as she stormed out of the restaurant after Ethan.

True, Veruca was upset at Gordo, feeling so disillusioned with him, but as she ran out of the restaurant, all she could think about was Ethan. Where was he and what was he doing? She hated it when he got this upset. Whenever he got this upset, he usually ended up crying, and then he hated himself for crying. Sometimes he would punch himself, sometimes he would even cut himself. She couldn't let that happen again.

Veruca went out into the night and looked around. She hoped Ethan had not taken off running. He could be anywhere, and she wouldn't know how to find him. She was just beginning to feel frantic when she noticed a lone figure sitting on the bus bench by the main road. At this hour of the night nobody would be waiting for the bus, and Veruca could tell by the slump of the shoulders exactly who it was.

She ran to Ethan, sat beside him and put her arms around him. "Ethe!" she cried. "Ethe, don't do that to me. Don't ever leave me alone like that."

Ethan had his hands over his face. Already he was fighting tears. "I hate that little bastard," he spat out. "That goddamn stuckup little prick, he knows exactly what to say to piss me off. And he's got Lizzie! He doesn't deserve her, but he's got her. And I don't. Fuck! Fuck! Fuck!"

Now Ethan really was crying, bawling his eyes out as Veruca wrapped her arms around him and cried with him. She was crying for Ethan feeling so bad, and now that she knew he was safe, she was also once again able to also think about her own feelings.

"You're right," Veruca sniffed. "That Gordo is a goddamn bastard. How could I be so fucking stupid to want to have anything to do with him? I hate him! I hate him!"

They cried together a little more. Ethan was still thinking about something Gordo had said, something that had really disturbed him, but which he could share with no one, not even Veruca. The truth was that Gordo had too eloquently described his deepest fear---that he would end up alone and sad, dead from drugs, lying in his own filth. Sometimes he dreamed about it, and woke up sweating and screaming. Now as he sat here on this bench, thinking about it, he found himself sweating, and then he heard himself screaming. His heart was racing. He felt like he was going to fall off the edge of the earth. And the only thing that kept him from doing so was Veruca's arms around him.

"Ethan…Ethan…Ethan…" she said desperately, clinging to him. "Please…please…"

Slowly then, at Veruca's urging, Ethan was able to bring himself under control. But he still said, now very softly, "That stupid stuckup Miranda. And that fuckin' Gordo."

"I know," Veruca agreed. "I hate him. I really hate him."

Ethan laughed a little through his tears as he grabbed Veruca's arms and said, "No you don't, Rookey. You wish you could hate him. But you don't."

"Damn!" Veruca cried. "This is so sick! What the hell is wrong with me? Am I a fuckin' masochist or what?"

"No, I'm the fuckin' masochist," Ethan said. "Why the hell did I have to spill soda all over Lizzie? Oh my God! I'm such an asshole. I should at least buy her a new sweater, you think? That one will be ruined. Not only that, but she's going to hate me forever now. Do you think she would accept it if I bought her a new sweater?"

"No," Veruca said. One of the things Ethan loved about Veruca was that she was always brutally honest with him.

"Then what do you think I should do?" he asked desperately.

"I think you should try your hardest to completely forget about Lizzie, the same way I should do whatever I can to get Gordo out of my head, and out of my heart, the bastard. I know, I know. Easier said than done. But I think it's what you should do."

"I can't wait till we go away," Ethan said, now holding tightly to Veruca's arms around his chest. "I can't wait till we go to Ohio and get our sorry asses out of this sorry horse town."

Veruca laughed sadly. "One horse town," she corrected. "Yeah, it'll be great to get away from here, won't it? And to start all over, where nobody knows who we were before this, so there will be no comparisons, no judgments. Well, there will always be judgments, but at least not those kinds of judgments. And of course the best part of all…Lizzie and Gordo won't be there."

"I can't wait to go away with you," Ethan said, leaning his head against Veruca's. "I can't stand it anymore, seeing Lizzie every day. It just hurts too much. Especially when I have to see her with that prick Gordo."

"I hate him," Veruca repeated. "I wish I could hate him. I don't want to see him anymore either. I want to forget all about him and all about Hillridge, this one horse town, where everybody has…has…how did you put it? 'One foot in the graveyard of comatose suburbia.'"

"Who said that?" Ethan asked.

"You did, you moron! Don't you remember? You were so fucking eloquent."

"I was? I don't remember."

"Ethan! You were absolutely poetic! I was so proud of you! You really stood up for what you believe in. You were better than ten Gordo's put together."

Ethan understood this was possibly the highest compliment he was ever going to receive in his life, and his heart was overcome with love for Veruca, so pleased by her faith in him. He turned to give her a big hug.

And as he did, from the corner of his bleary eye he saw a figure walking towards them.