Author's Note: Thanks to everyone who reviewed! :)

X X X

Walter Nichols was not a man predisposed to dealing well with drama and stress. He had been one of the geeky kids in high school, looked down upon for being too "sensitive"-a trait Josh had definitely gotten from him. Even as an adult, he tended towards childishness, and he knew it, too. It was just part of who he was, and most of the time, he didn't mind, especially not after he married Audrey. She told him that that was one of the things she loved the most about him.

Thinking about his wife, he took his eyes off of the road momentarily to glance at her. She was sitting in the passenger seat of their car, staring out the window, her mouth pressed into a thin line as she was wont to do when she was stressed. Audrey had learned to laugh more after she married Walter, though she'd remained the more serious of the couple. She was the one to remain firm when he panicked, and so now, when their roles were seemingly reversed, he was at a loss.

Sighing to himself, he adjusted the rear view mirror to look at Drake, who was sitting directly behind him in the backseat, almost a perfect mirror image of his mother. The two were so similar, but still so different, and Walter often felt that if he had the rest of eternity, he would still never really get Drake.

Pulling into the parking lot of the police station, he parked the car and unbuckled his seat-belt. When neither Audrey nor Drake moved to follow him, he cleared his throat and announced, "We're here!" He winced as his voice rang out louder than he had intended in the silence of the vehicle, but shook it off as both members of his family exited the car.

They walked into the bustling station and approached the desk of a young woman who appeared to be a secretary. "Excuse me," said Walter when it appeared that the other two weren't going to say anything, "but we're looking for detectives Corbin and Halter...?" Without looking up, the woman pointed a finger to her left.

"That way, third door on the right."

"Thank you." He herded the two others in the indicated direction, taking in Audrey's tense posture and worried expression and the way Drake was clutching his backpack to himself. He laid a hand on the small of Audrey's back, and managed to stop himself just before his other hand touched Drake's shoulder, remembering the way his son flinched every time he was touched. He swallowed thickly as they reached their destination.

The door was open, and inside the office were a man and woman bent over a desk, looking over some file. Walter felt his heart leap as he realized that they were looking at pictures of Drake, Drake with bruises, Drake with-

They snapped the folder closed as they saw the three of them huddled in the doorway. Immediately the man stepped forward.

"I'm sorry you had to see those like that," he said.

"It's, ah, alright," said Walter after a beat of awkward silence. His mouth and throat seemed oddly dry.

"Detective Jay Corbin," he introduced himself, and Walter shook his hand, and then he shook Audrey's. He didn't reach out to Drake, though his eyes lingered on him for a long moment. Corbin indicated the woman standing just behind him. "This is my partner, Detective Lisa Halter." She nodded to them. "Please, come in. Take a seat." There was a small couch and a chair in front of the desk. Drake immediately took the chair, leaving Walter and Audrey to sit together on the couch.

"Because you're a minor, you can have your parents here with you if you'd like," said Halter, her voice low and soothing as she met Drake's gaze, speaking directly to him. He shrugged. "If you want them to stay, that's fine, but if you don't, nobody's going to be mad or upset or hurt, here. This is about you and what you need, Drake. Do you want your parents to stay?" Drake bit his lip, and glanced at the two of them before lowering his eyes to the floor and shaking his head no. Walter stifled the urge to protest, knowing that Drake would probably just find it that much harder to talk about it with them in the room as opposed to strangers.

Corbin stood. "Why don't we go to the break room for some coffee?" Audrey and Walter stood and followed him from the office, leaving Halter to speak to Drake.

They followed the officer down a few other crowded halls before coming to a small room where he sat them down at a table in the corner. They watched in silence as he grabbed a few cups of coffee, bringing them back to the table after a few moments. Walter began drinking immediately, grateful both for the liquid and for the excuse to do something with his hands, though Audrey made no move to touch hers.

"Detective Halter is very good at interacting with victims like your son," he said, and neither man missed the way Audrey blanched at Drake being called a victim. "She'll make sure he's not too overwhelmed with the investigation. When did this happen?"

"The Friday before last," Walter answered when Audrey said nothing.

"Very recently, then," Corbin commented. "When did the two of you find out?" Again Walter deliberately paused for a moment to give his wife a chance to answer. She remained silent and impassive, staring at the untouched coffee before her.

"Just this last Friday." The officer nodded, looking pensive.

"Has he been to a counselor?"

"No, but when his brother took him to the hospital, they gave him a list of numbers."

"His brother took him?"

"They went this past Friday, and then told us what had happened when they got home," explained Walter. Corbin "hmm"d and nodded again.

"Are they close? If they are, then we might want to speak to Drake's brother, too, for background," he said. "Other kids sometimes know a little more than the adults involved." Walter nodded, not doubting at all that Josh would know more than he did about Drake—that was really kind of a given.

"I'm sure he'd be more than willing to talk to you about it," said Walter, then frowned. "Although they had been fighting up until last Friday, so I'm not sure how much of the last two or so weeks he could fill in for you."

"Anything he could give us could help," assured Corbin.

After that, they made mindless chit-chat about Drake—school, his band, his dating habits—until, almost an hour later, Detective Halter approached them, a small, polite smile on her face.

"We're done for now," she told them. "We can write something for the school for the classes he missed today, as well as tomorrow, just in case he doesn't feel like going."

"Where is he?" asked Audrey, speaking for the first time since they had entered the station.

"I left him in the office," she said. "I wanted to give him a moment to get himself together. He did well, giving his statement, but it was hard for him." Audrey fidgeted uncomfortably, and Walter knew that she was itching to see Drake, wanting that reassurance.

"Thank you," said Walter as he shook both of their hands.

When Audrey finally caught sight of Drake, the only thing stopping Walter from feeling completely horrible as he put a restraining hand on her shoulder, stopping her from hugging Drake, was the small smile of thanks he got from Drake as he did.

X X X

The house was empty when Josh and Megan got home from school, their parents and Drake having not yet returned. Josh stifled the urge to call them, standing in the entryway, looking around listlessly for something to do.

"Megan!" he called, but received no answer. She had run up to her room almost the instant they got through the door. Sighing, he moved to put his backpack down on the dining room table when the doorbell rang. Turning around, he felt his heart skip a beat as he saw Mindy's familiar form through the glass of the door. Opening it quickly, he was about to begin speaking to her when she pushed past him and into the house.

"Josh, we were supposed to start heading for downtown immediately after school! Now, you'd better be ready right now, because otherwise, we're never going to make it to the seminar on time!" she said. He shook his head.

"I'm not going to go, Mindy," he told her. "I'm sorry, I should have told you earlier, but it was honestly the last thing on my mind this past week." Hearing the genuine sadness in his voice, her expression softened.

"What's wrong?" she asked. Josh didn't answer at first, both wondering what he should say and what he would say if he started to say anything at all. "Wow, it's that bad?"

"Yeah," he said, his voice cracking. "It is."

"Tell me about it," she ordered, "it'll make you feel better." Josh knew that it would, and he was so, so tempted, because Mindy was a good friend, and she could be a good listener when the occasion really called for it, but...

"It isn't exactly my place to tell you," said Josh apologetically. But then Mindy's mouth formed into a smirk, the one she got when she had some brilliant epiphany to which he wasn't privy, and Josh felt anger and resentment beginning to swell within him.

"Well, you cut Drake out of your life," she said blandly, and Josh's stomach churned at the reminder, "so he must have done something really bad to have impacted you so much." At that, the anger and the pain Josh had been fighting not to show the past three days became too much for such a naturally expressive person to keep in, and Josh exploded.

"Drake didn't do anything, Mindy," he hissed. "He didn't do a damn thing wrong, okay? All he did was get hurt, first by me, his own damn brother, and then by some asshole who had no business touching him at all! It wasn't Drake, not any of it, it was me, and it was whatever guy that was—and now you're coming in here and acting like you know everything about him, everything about this, about us, when you don't have any fucking idea what it's been like.

"So you know what, Mindy? Just get out. Get the fuck out. Go to your seminar, go wherever the hell you want, do whatever the hell you want, but don't you ever act like you know what kind of person Drake Parker is, because I swear to god, you will never understand."

The first seconds after this tirade were perfectly still. Mindy's expression was startled, her eyes wide and her brows furrowed as she stared at him, and he simply stood there staring back at her. It might have gone on that way for a while longer, but at that moment, they were interrupted.

"Mindy, I think it would be best if you left, now," said Walter, and both teens turned to face him. He was standing in the doorway with Audrey next to him, and behind them, staring at them with an expression just as shocked as Mindy's, was Drake. Josh groaned and squeezed his eyes shut, knowing that he'd just screwed up for the second time in as many days when all he'd been trying to do was help Drake.

He noticed that Mindy had left only when the door closed behind her, the sound making him jump. Opening his eyes, he saw that no one else had moved. His eyes met Drake's, and he swallowed.

"Drake, I-"

"Josh," his father interrupted gently, but firmly, "I think we need to talk." His eyes stayed locked onto Drake's. "Josh. Now."