A/N: I know this one's kind of short, but it seemed like a good place to end it. I'll try to update sometime tomorrow, but I can't promise. Thanks to the people who've reviewed so far. Everyone else who's reading without reviewing, please do.

Disclaimer: I don't own anything.

"I'm not sure why," I tell Madison. She raises her eyebrows. Since I accidentally told her about it two years ago, I've never once mentioned anything about going back. To Ohio. "Clay called this morning. Said I was running from everything, and I need to get my act together."

"Not to sound like an uber-bitch, but you do need to get your act together," Madison informed me. "It's been five years, Spencer. That's a long time."

"But it's not enough time," I whine. That's exactly what I sound like: a whiny little baby. And I know it, but I can't shake the feeling. "It's not like I can forget."

"So don't forget," Madison says with an almost puppy look on her face. "Move on."

I look down at my half-eaten hoagie and twiddle my thumbs for a moment. "I can't."

"Don't say that," Madison implores. "You can. But you need Ashley."

"She knows less than you," I mutter bitterly. "She doesn't even know anything about it. I'm not ready to tell her about it." I'm just about ready to get up and leave, because I know what Madison's going to tell me next. She's going to tell me to tell Ashley about it, because that will help me get over it. And I don't want to here it.

"Then don't," Madison says with that same look and that obnoxiously endearing over-simplification of the problem. "I just think you should go to Ohio with her. Things will fall into place there."

I stare at her, my jaw dropped. "You want me to introduce Ashley to Ohio in the middle of it?"

She growls angrily at me, and I'm taken off guard. "Look, Spencer. I'm trying to give you advice, but it's a bit hard when you're hiding what I need to give you advice on. I don't know anything about Ohio at all. Just that your family sucked. Probably hated you because you were gay. But I'm guessing there's more to it than that. And if you won't tell me, then the only other person you would even consider telling is Ashley. I know that makes me sound like an egomaniac, but that's the truth, and you damn well know it is." By now people had turned their heads at us. I'd never seen Madison this... well, angry wasn't really the word. Frustrated. Hurt. Confused.

Loud would also be a good word.

"Madison." I didn't even know where to start. And then something hit me. "Wait, how do know I'm gay?"

"Please," she says with a roll of her eyes. "Like it wasn't obvious. Half-assed relationships with guys, all that ogling at the pool. I'm not stupid. I can see. Plus, I have the best gaydar west of the Mississippi."

I smile lightly at that, glad for the change of pace. But I know that Madison will return to deeper subjects in another couple of seconds. "Somehow I don't doubt that."

She shakes her head in a very sassy way. "Uh-uh. We aren't staying on that subject. You are going to Ohio this summer, and you are taking Ashley with you."

"And this was decided when?"

"Just now. You need to get over it. Five years, Spencer. People take less time than that to get over the deaths of special someones. No one died. Face your demons. Get the hell over it. Win your girl- or realize you love her, because there's no competition. Finally get laid."

I am horrified by that comment. Getting laid by Ashley, who I assumed she was talking about, is the furthest thing from my mind at this point. Though I will admit that sometimes, it isn't all that far. "Madison, it sounds so easy when you put it that way. But it's not."

"That," she informs me forcefully while taking another chip and making another face, "isn't true. It's easy. It's easy to go to Ohio with Ashley."

"No."

Madison smirks like she has a secret. "Well, I see it this way. You feel safe with Ashley, right?"

"Definitely." I say that without pause, without hesitance. Because I feel safer with Ashley than I've ever felt with anyone. It's that kind of safety you feel on the cold winter nights when you're cuddled up under a fuzzy blanket with your head scrunched into the pillow just right, and there's an amazing warmth that spreads all the way from the tip of your head to the bottom of your toes. It's a safety, the safety I feel with Ashley.

"Then take her to Ohio," Madison says yet again. "No matter what the location is, you will always feel safe with Ashley, and no amount of crazed homophobic family members is going to change that, okay? If you need to leave Ohio, metaphorically speaking, then Ashley is there for you. She's a safe place here, in Ohio, hell, she'd be your safe place in the middle of nuclear warfare. So go. Take your blankie with you."

I smile. And for a moment, I consider the possibility of going back.

"You wanna not hog all the mooshu pork, Spence?" It's Sunday night and Ashley and I are dining in, splurging on some Chinese food. We're sick of studying, but are making use of this last minute cramming time to quiz each other.

"Sorry." I hand her the box. We just eat eat right from little cartons with our own pairs of chopsticks. It's easier, and we don't want to wash the dishes.

"Okay." She settles in with the box of pork and my binder. "What is the difference between a participle and a gerund?" She looks at the book strangely because she has no clue what the question is talking about. But it's not her question to answer.

"A participle is a verb in either the past or progressive tense that functions as an adjective. A gerund is a verb in the progressive tense that functions as a noun," I rattle off.

"Woo-hoo," Ashley says sarcastically. "Look, Spencer, you're obviously going to pass with an amazing high score, so can we stop studying."

I launch myself into the pillow for the second time that day. "I'm just so stressed." But I'm not just stressed about the finals; I'm stressed about Ohio, because I haven't asked her about it. I haven't even mentioned Madison's suggestions. I barely mentioned having lunch with her.

I hear her shuffling in the background, putting down the Chinese food container and my binder. She scoots over to me, and puts one hand on my back, rubbing circles on it. The other she runs through my hair.

Safety.

"Spencer, I've seen you through two strings of finals and two strings of midterms," she whispers gently, but firmly. "You're never this stressed. There's something else, isn't there? You can tell me. You can always tell me."

And just like that, I can tell her. Ashley never asks me tough questions, because she can read me so well that she knows when I don't want to talk about something. But whenever she really needs to know what's wrong, she asks. And she knows I can't ever lie. "Ohio. I want to go back, but I don't know. I'm not sure." I sit up and lean into her for a comforting hug.

"I'll come with you, if you want," she tells me, idly playing with my hair. She knows this calms me down, and I'm obviously in need of calming down.

"I'm not sure if I even want to... go," I mutter lamely.

"My opinion is that you should," she explains. "I don't know what happened there, but it's clear it's hurting you. There's only one way to face your problems, and that's head on, preferably with a machine gun in hand."

I chuckle. The more I thought about it, the more I thought that now would be the perfect time to go. "I'll give it serious consideration, on one condition."

She looks at me curiously. "And what's that?"

"That you'll be my machine gun," I joke.

She laughs. "What else would I be?"