1Here we go again..

I don't know exactly why I yelled at Lea the way I did. I kind of regret it. I normally don't yell at people like that, especially my friends. I wasn't very angry with her, I was just so frustrated on what just happened between Don and I, then hearing her and Leo go at it again just made me feel even worse. I felt so bad for Don, especially when I saw the look on his face when he got upset when Leo said that he wished that Lea and I would just leave.

I walked to the back of April's apartment to the small extra room to where I knew Don must have gone. The door was slightly cracked open, and light was shining out. I could hear ruffling and the sound of a bag being unzipped. I walked softly up to the door and knocked on it gently. I heard Don's familiar voice say, "It's open."

I opened the door gently and I saw Don sitting on the edge of the small bed that was in the room. There was a brown duffle bag on his right side, which was unzipped. In his hands was a circuit board. It looked to be something like a motherboard from a computer. I could see him staring down at the motherboard, studying it tremendously. "Are you okay?" I finally asked him. I stood by the door, I was kind of afraid of getting closer because I wasn't too sure on how he was right now around me after Leonardo and Michelangelo walked in.

I can still see what happened over in my head. When I had fell on top of Donatello, the door to the apartment had opened and in walked Leonardo and Michelangelo. I could see the immense anger in Leonardo's eyes. He immediately had crossed his arms and I could feel his cold stare on me. "Am I INTERRUPTING anything?" Leo had asked us. His voice was so low it almost scared me. I looked at him and then back at Don. I got off of Don, but it was too late, the way we were totally did not look right.

I remember Don's voice was shaking as if he was kind of scared also on Leonardo's tone. "Oh, Leo…are you back so soon?" I noticed that Don had scooted as far away from me as possible on the couch. I let my eyes move over and fall upon Michelangelo. He was almost about to bust out laughing. I could see him making teasing faces at Don on the situation. Leo's voice made my eyes move back over to him.

"I'll be outside to wait for the others to return," he said as he gave me the cold glare once more. I watched him turn and leave, pulling on Mikey's arm to make him go with him. The door slammed shut. I don't know for sure how long Don and I sat there till Lea and the others got back. I felt like as if we were being made there to sit there and to think about what we had done as if we were being punished. But we didn't do anything wrong!

Don didn't even look at me when he finally answered my question, "I am fine. Why wouldn't I be?" He chuckled some, but I could tell it was a nervous chuckle. His eyes stayed on the motherboard. I stood there at the door and watched him. I knew he was not telling the truth. But I felt kind of sorry for him. I really hoped I didn't make his brothers mad at him for me coming over. I mean all I did was to come over and thank him for saving me. I was just trying to be nice and be appreciative. But as I stood there and watched Don, I felt myself kind of drawn to him. He was hiding things from me and probably from his other friends and family. He seemed to be the kind of bottler of the family, not expressing emotion as much. After awhile I found him to be kind of amusing staring at the motherboard as if he was studying it. "You know you can tell me the truth, Don," I smirked some as I watched him. I could see the guilt written all over his face when I said this to him. He looked up curiously as if he was amazed to see what I had seen right through him. "I mean I know you must be hiding what is really wrong with you because nobody can stare at a motherboard for that long period of time." I smirked. I was happy to hear a soft, happy chuckle from Don's mouth as he put the motherboard back into his bag. "So you going to tell me?" Don looked up at me for a moment as if he was hesitating. I could see like he really wanted to tell me, but something was holding him back. He let his gaze fall back down on the floor; I saw a frown appear on his face. This made me frown because I knew part of him must have been sad from having his brother mad at him. "Don…look I am really sorry for making Leonardo mad at you. Maybe I shouldn't have come back today, but I really wanted to tell you thank you. It would be wrong of me not to. I'll tell him if he wants to be mad at anyone, then it should be me because I should have never came today." I hate to feel like I am a burden to people. I always hated throughout my life when I felt like I was annoying to people.

"No, today was not your fault, Melinda. What happened was an accident. Anyone could have fallen. I shouldn't have pulled the remote that hard to make you lose your balance," Don replied, his gaze was still off of me and this kind of troubled me, but I am not sure why. "If Casey had fell then Leonardo would have just laughed. It's something else…" His voice trailed off and I could see that he had looked up. His eyes now were staring at the wall.

"Well what is it then?" I asked him, I was very curious to know what was going on. I felt kind of bad, I could see the sadness in his eyes and hear it in his voice as he spoke.

Don let out a very deep sigh; I could see that this really troubled him. "Nothing. Don't worry about it." He got up and zipped up his bag. I felt so helpless for him. Don was kind of like my friend now even though I hardly knew him.

I walked over to him and gently touched his arm from behind. "Please tell me. You helped me and I want to help you…"

Don sighed heavily again and sat back down on the bed. He sat there for at least a minute, pondering about something. Then I finally saw him lift up his head; his eyes had locked up to mine. "Leo's upset because he knows that I like you, Melinda…"

As soon as he said this, I felt my body grow kind of wobbly. It was just so hard to comprehend. I knew what he meant also when he used the term "like." I felt emotions swarming inside my head, making me stand there for like an idiot for at least 2 minutes. I could hardly talk because my heart beat rate had increased. "B-but you hardly know me, Don." I said. I don't know why I was trying to protest against this because deep down inside I knew I kind of liked him too, but I was just nervous and overwhelmed and unsure about everything that I didn't know what to do. I needed Lea there to be with me. I felt trapped and helpless.

"I-I know…" Don had stuttered back. "But ever since that day I saved you, I couldn't stop thinking about you. I want to get to know you, Melinda. I never had feelings like this before so I know there must be something about you." He looked up at me with his eyes once more; I could see him pleading to me. I looked away; I couldn't bear to look at him again. Here he was basically pouring his heart to me and I didn't know what to do! I was so confused that I felt so frightened. I felt myself pushing him away some as I started to back away.

"Look, Don. It can't work out between us. It just wouldn't be right! You're a turtle and I am a human! I can't like you or for even that matter love you…I am sorry. I should just leave," I stammered. I couldn't control what was being said. I just wanted to get out of there. I felt so scared, lost and confused. I didn't know what to do! I just wanted to leave there! I walked out of the room, leaving Don sitting there. His face was filled with confusion, pain, and shock as well. But I didn't want to stand there and look at him anymore. I walked down the hallway to the door. I felt the apartment swirling in my mind. I was so troubled that I felt tears coming to my eyes. I walked past Casey and April who were standing there looking at me confusedly. Michelangelo was standing beside them as well. At first when I got up to him he was grinning from ear to ear, but when he saw the look on my face, I saw that he looked at me shocked as well. "I-I am sorry, April. I-I have to be going now. I'll give you a call in a couple of days." I said quickly as I opened the door, my feet seemed to feel like they didn't want to work.

"Wait, isn't Don suppose to make sure you get home okay?" April asked as I opened the front door.

I knew that my voice was trembling terribly at that point. I remember I could hardly get my words out. "N-no..I'll be fine…trust me," I said quickly. Not even looking at her, I opened the door and walked out of there quickly. I reached the street and started to walk at a quick pace. I felt so frightened that I even began to run some from Soho, going towards Midtown once more.

As I got closer to Times Square, I heard a familiar song playing nearby. It was "Monsters" by V Shape Mind. I looked around and noticed that the song was coming from a shop, across the street. I wasn't exactly in Times Square yet, but pretty close. I looked down at my watch to see that it was almost 9:30pm but I was sure that Lea wouldn't be too worried about me. After all, I did yell at her to leave so I was sure that she wouldn't care how late I came back. Besides I was near Times Square, only about 8 blocks away. I could already hear the sound of busy cars nearby so I wasn't in any danger. I made my way across the street over to the shop where I heard my song playing. On the left side of the shop was a dark alley and then on the right side was a barbershop, which was already closed for the day. I stood there for a moment, trying to look inside the windows at the shop to see what it was about. I was very surprised to see that it was like a Hot Topic. There were many heavy metal band shirts inside including chains, necklaces, tons of gothic stuff. I still had quite bit of money left on my trip so I decided that maybe some shopping would help ease my mind. I was so happy as I walked inside hearing my song playing. Luckily the song had just begun when I got there so I could hear it playing.

I walked around looking at the different band shirts. Yeah this did make me feel like I was at home. The employees even were wearing body piercings, had dyed hair and chains. I found a necklace that I liked that had a Celtic knot on it. It was a Celtic knot symbol on top of this pendent that looked like jagged circle, almost like a ninja throwing star, then the necklace chain itself were chains. I thought it was pretty neat and it was on sale for $6.00 so I decided to go ahead and buy it, to spoil myself. As I walked up to the counter to pay for it, I heard the door opened and about a large group came inside the store. It was 3 guys, one with purple hair, one with blue hair, and the other bright green hair, and a woman who had red streaks in her hair. They all were wearing dark black gothic like outfits and chains and body piercings everywhere. Yeah they totally match this store. "Yo, Chris! We are going down to the harbor tonight, you want to come?" The guy with green hair said as he walked up to where I was standing. I was assuming that Chris was the guy who was ringing up my necklace.

"Sure, I'll go. Midnight?" Chris said as he looked over at me to get my money out.

"Yah, we'll see ya there then," he said as he smiled at him then he looked down at the necklace. "Nice. Good choice, girlfriend." He smirked some at me as he turned to walk back over to his group. I giggled some as mumbled a thank you as I handed the cashier my ten-dollar bill.

I walked out of the store and stopped near the left side of the store to get my necklace out of my bag. I was so happy to actually buy something. It kind of erased what totally happened earlier that day. See it does help to go shopping when you feel bad about stuff! I use to spoil myself all the time after tests at college but now I am learning that whenever something bad comes up, not even school related, you should just go shopping to buy you something! I was just about to put on the necklace, when I heard a familiar voice coming from the alley. It was the same guy with the green hair in the shop! Curious, I stepped closer to the alley and peered and saw the guy with the green hair and his friends down around the middle part of the alley. I never noticed how long that alley was. They must have been at least 50 feet away from me. I couldn't really make out exactly everywhere thing they were saying just sometimes when their voices got louder. Especially when I heard them cheer out when I saw another group of people who were dressed like them walking up to them. My eyes went wide when I saw a large guy appear from the new group. He was tall, I mean must been clearly over 6 feet tall. His body width must have been almost 2-3 feet because this guy was very huge! He had blonde hair that went into a ponytail and he was wearing different clothes from them. His was mainly just black with no chains. However, he did have a tattoo on each arm but I couldn't make out what they were. Clearly, I think he was the leader of the group because he was talking to them. About a few minutes later, they had turned and were walking away down to the opposite end of the alley. I could hear them laughing and making remarks to one another as they were walking. I watched them walk away and then looked down at my necklace. I looked back up and decided to follow them some. I got down to the middle of the alley where they were originally. They had already turned the corner of the alley. Suddenly an empty can bounce near me from behind. I turned around and didn't see anyone. I looked up and saw a dark silhouette on a fire escape near the roof. This time I knew who it was. It was Donatello. He was watching over me still. I looked up at him for a brief moment and then turned to walk my way back out of the alley. I felt really bad. I probably completely broke his heart and he was still watching over me to make sure I wouldn't get myself into trouble.

I walked back into the hotel and made my way up to the room. Amazingly Lea didn't show up till about 30 minutes after I arrived. When she first entered the room, both our eyes met. I was curious on where she was, but it wasn't my place to ask since I was the one who told her to leave me alone. I could see the pain still in her eyes so I spoke up first. "Lea, we need to talk." I sat on my bed with my legs crossed, Indian style.

"Alright…," She said as she sat on her bed and faced me. I was a bit surprised on how she was acting because she seemed a lot calmer than I thought she would be.

"Look, I am sorry for everything. I shouldn't have yelled at you like that. It wasn't your fault. I was just confused and frustrated on the whole event. Look, it's not what Leo thinks it to be. See Don and I were watching a movie, we started to fight over the remote and when he pulled hard, I accidentally fell on top of him. But that's it," I said looking at her.

"Okay," She said. "So there's nothing going on between you two? Because you can just tell me if there is."

"Well I do have to tell you something," I said. "Donatello likes me. He told me so. He said that was another reason why Leonardo was so angry against all of us. I don't know what to do. I broke his heart, Lea," I sighed some heavily. I felt so bad, I could still see the look on Don's face when I left April's apartment. "I told him that we couldn't be together because I am a human and he's a turtle. Right? There's no way, right?" I looked at her for a moment and then quickly said, "Besides I don't like him anyways." But Lea "What am I going to do?"