Wow guys! Lots of reviews! I like! Now, if that could happen every chapter, you would DEFINITLY see more frequent updates . But moving on, I found some mistakes in yesterday's chapter so I decided to just edit it, and add today's onto it. It was a little short anyways. The second half will be in Max's POV, just to switch things up a bit. Here you go!

Fang POV

I waited until we had reached a neighborhood about a block from school before I tried to get Max's attention.

"MAX! Max." I ran up even with her and touched her arm. She turned slowly and looked at me with tired, pained eyes.

"Hey, what are you doing here?" she smiled that broken smile of hers, and tried to play cool, but I saw right through it.

"I saw what happened back there."

"Oh. You saw that, huh?" She sighed, long and tired.

"Look, what do you say we get outta here?" I asked. I intend to be the one to help her.

"That sounds perfect, actually. I know just where to go." Before we even hit that old park I knew exactly where we were going. But I don't tell her that. You see, this is somewhere Fang knows, not Nick. So I pretend to have no idea that she's taking me to Our Spot.

We reach Swope Park, and start on the old familiar path. Max keeps looking back to make sure I am still following her, but I know how to get there. We go through the main walk way until we reach a turn. Instead of turning, Max keeps on going straight through the woods, just as I knew she would. We pushed our way past some trees before I saw it. Our little clearing. It had always been there, a little break in the woods, in the shape of a half circle, with one side facing the way we came from, the other looking out onto the pond. It's beautiful, really. Hard to describe, even harder to fully appreciate its beauty. Summed up into one sentence: my favorite place on earth.

Max is watching me. I walk around, pretending to be looking around with new eyes. I guess I kind of am, because I hadn't been there in so long. But all the same, I walked over to our rock, dead center, wide and flat, perfect for two people to sit on.

"Nice place." I say. "How'd you find it?"

Like I don't already know.

Max softens a little bit. She walks over and sits on the rock next to me. "Well, I didn't just move here with my aunt. I used to live here when I was little, you see. And me and my best friend, his name was Fang, we would always come to this park. And do you see that playground over there? Across the pond? One day we were swinging, and I spotted this clearing. Fang and I made it our mission to find out how to get here. And after two long weeks of searching, we found it. And it's kind of our place, you know? But I haven't seen him since I was 7. I miss him a lot. Have you ever had a friend like that?" those big brown eyes look at me inquisitively.

"Yes" I stared out over the pond, remembering that day. It's one of those things that seem like forever ago and just yesterday at the same time.

"Nick?" I look over. "I have something to tell you. It's really personal, but I feel like I've known you forever, and I can trust you. You won't tell anyone, right? You promise?" I nod. She looks at me for a second, searching for something, then nods, mostly to herself I think.

"Okay, so you know how my aunt and uncle got divorced? And that that's why we moved here? Well, back here. But anyways, they didn't divorce for the normal reasons. Irreconcilable differences and all that. It was something a lot bigger than that." Her eyes got this sort of glazed over look as she stared across the pond.

"For almost two years, Jeb had been physically abusing me. A lot of days when I got home, around 3:30, before my siblings and aunt got home at 5:00, Jeb would hurt me. He would get drunk and mad, and I was somehow always to blame for his problems. But by the time my Aunt got home, he would claim to feel sick, and go to bed. But by that time I was in my room, 'doing homework', and trying to find a way to cover the bruises."

"I would go into my bathroom and cry. I was so scared. I didn't know what to do, how, or even if it was possible to stop it. And, you're not gonna believe this, but every time I sat in my room, crying, I thought of him." She looked at me. "of Fang. I would think of Fang and remember the good times and wish so hard to have them back. I was only 7, but I really think I loved him." Her eyes got that faraway look again. "I love him."

All those days I spent in my room praying to get my best friend back, and she had been secretly doing the same thing. But I had done my wishing out of selfish reasons, while hers were desperate. I am so sad and confused and angry and a hundred different emotions right now.

I just couldn't take it anymore.

I cried.

Then, I kissed her.

Max POV

I snapped out of my daze as I saw Nick, sitting next to me, move. He lent forward, legs apart, face in his hands. His shoulders were visibly shaking. Instantly, I freak out.

"What's wrong? Are you okay?" I move my hands to his waist, hugging him. He shook even harder in my arms. His silent sobs broke my heart, a little bit at a time. I can't stand to watch people cry, I just can't.

"It's not that bad, really. A lot of people have it a lot worse than I did. It's all okay now. I'm fine. Fang? Please, stop crying." I practically begged him. This whole time I had been rubbing his back, anything to get him to stop.

As soon as I said Fang, Nick looked up. Suddenly, I froze, realizing the mistake. He looked deep into my eyes, and I stared right back. His eyes are a really dark brown, thisclose to being black. In them, I saw a mix of emotions. Anger, fear, grief, and set determination.

I watched as he broke away and looked out over the water again. He ran one hand through his hair, restless.

I opened my mouth to apologize, but I was stopped rather unexpectedly.

First, Nick turned back towards me. And he moved a whole lot closer. As in, I-can-smell-the-coffee-he-drank-this-morning close.

He reached up and grabbed the back of my neck gently. And, just as gentle, his lips met mine. This kiss wasn't like any of Dylan's. As in, were-gonna-make-out-now,-kay? kissing. Nope, nothing like that. At all. This kiss is about 750x better than that, actually.

I slipped my hands up from his waist to rest at the back of his neck. Now, instead of at my neck, both of his hands were cupping my face. It seemed almost as if Nick had been practicing this, I'm gonna hope in his head, for a long time.

For as gentle as this kiss may be, it was also desperate. Passionate. Not like a guy-kissing-a-girl-right-after-she-gets-broken-up-with kiss should feel like.

'Wait, is this just rebound?' I thought fuzzily in my head. But just as quickly as it came, the thought was pushed away as Nick's hands slid down to my waist. He tightened his arms, bringing me even closer to him than I already was. Yeah, not much thinking happened after that.

After approximately 5 more years of making out (or so it seemed) we finally had to come up for air. Breathing heavily, I once again stared into his eyes. And staring back at me were those same eyes I had seen every day when I was little. I've always been able to read them. Mischevious when getting ready to play a trick. Smug when he knew he was right. Guilty when he did something wrong and he knows it. Miserable when he was crying at my parents funeral.

Oh. I'm a dumb ass. I'm the blondest dumb ass I have ever seen. The world has ever seen, even. Why hadn't I realized it sooner? Nick. Nick was Fang's real name. Nick is Fang. NICK IS FANG. Oh my god.

I looked into his flushed face. He was breathing just as heavily as I was, if not more.

"Fang?" he nodded slowly, not taking his eyes off me for a second.

Well. This makes a whole lot more sense now. Huh.

I bit my lip, thinking. How had this all happened? This is insane. So much is going on. Am I only going with this because I'm on rebound from Dylan? It hadn't even been an hour since that happened!

So many thoughts are going through my mind right now. I have no idea what to think. What to do. How to act.

So I decided I was done with thinking for now.

And this time, I didn't kiss Nick. I kissed Fang.

So there it is! I really like this chapter, while kind of hating it at the same time. Us crazy writers, huh? Haha. Well I decided to recommend a different story at the end of each of my chapters. So here's one: Sir, yes, sir by lavalamp29. It's an amazing story by an amazing author. I hope you guys check it out!

Till next time, so prolly next weekend,

-Brina :D 3