The apartment was small but clean. A small television, along with a bookshelf was pushed against one side, a couch on the other with a wooden coffee table in front. John helped him over to the couch. A bar separated the living room area from a tiny kitchen and the door off the side of the refrigerator was open and John could see Randy's bed.

Randy had hardly spoken on the trek there, except to refuse a trip to the hospital. Now, John didn't speak, he simply sat Randy down before making his way into the bedroom and through another door to the right of the bed that was the bathroom.

The bathroom was even smaller than the kitchen, although just as tidy as the rest of the place. It was definitely too small for the both of them to fit in while John did what he needed so he left Randy in the living room instead and opened the cabinet over the sink to find what he needed.

It wasn't how John had pictured, when they'd talked earlier, taking Randy home but he couldn't have left Randy alone, not when he was injured like he was and he couldn't take Randy back to his place, not with Mike there.

When John came back into the room, supplies in hand, Randy was leaning forward on the couch, elbows on his knees and staring at his hands. His knuckles were bloody too and John knew that he hadn't gone down without one hell of a fight.

"You gonna tell me what happened?" John asked, his voice coming out flat, guarded. He sat on the coffee table in front of Randy, close to him and Randy sat up straighter, putting more space between them.

"I'm being punished, apparently." Randy ran the thumb of his left hand lightly over the dried blood on his right.

"You fought back," John pointed out. He took hold of Randy's right hand, turning it so he could clean the blood off with the wet towel he had brought with him. Randy didn't make a sound during. Not while John was cleaning the blood off, not while he gently smoothed some triple antibiotic cream over the split knuckles.

"Can't help it with them." There was a blank look in Randy's gray eyes as he said the words, as he met John's gaze.

"Them? You mean Justin Gabriel and his friends?" John asked with a raised eyebrow, reaching up with the cloth to clean the blood from Randy's chin.

Randy flinched but not from the pressure John put on his wound but from the name. "Been talking to somebody?"

"Yeah…"

"We were all friends. Me, Orton and Justin Gabriel. He's the smallest of those guys you stepped in front of the other night. There was another one. Adam. We used to hang out all the time but Adam and Randy were close…Closer than any of the rest of us…"

"I talked to Mike," John admitted after a moment, settling his hands in his lap.

"They were together…you know. Nobody knew about it. You know how high school kids are, man, especially in a small town like this. They would have been ostracized. I found out, though, about a month before…"

"Then why are you here?" Randy asked with a sigh, leaning even further from John.

"Because I couldn't just leave you alone like that. Besides, I…" He trailed off, unsure. He'd been hoping that it wasn't true. That what Mike had told him wasn't true.

"When the cops got there, they found Randy beside him, covered in Adam's blood. I talked to him before and after, John. He knew details…details about how it had happened, what had happened to Adam even though he claimed that he'd only gotten there after Adam was already gone…"

"This guy that everyone thinks you killed…Adam?"

Randy flinched again and the blank look left his eyes, replaced by a fire of rage. "Get out," he growled, pushing John's hands away from him.

John blinked, surprised. "Randy-"

Randy stood abruptly, his injuries seemingly forgotten for that moment and walked to his door, jerking it open. "Get. Out." He repeated with a glare.

John sighed and stood, walking over. Randy refused to meet his gaze when they got close but John could clearly see him blinking back tears.

"I'm sorry," he said quietly, without thinking because Randy looked so miserable in that moment and, in that instant, John couldn't believe what Mike believed, what Gabriel and his friends so obviously believed.

Some of the anger died in Randy's eyes and John heard a quiet 'thank you' before the door was shut in his face. He stood there, outside Randy's door for several minutes, before finally turning and walking away.

Xxxxxxxx

Randy slid down the door, to the floor, after John had left, the memories nearly consuming him. He couldn't escape them.

He fell to his knees next to Adam, not noticing, or caring, when the blood soaked into his jeans. He leaned forward, put his hands out. Adam's chest was a bloody mess. And he'd seen this before. Seen it happen. Why hadn't he said anything?

The good memories intermingled with the bad. The good memories that he'd tried so hard to hold onto after. For months after he'd found Adam, all he'd seen was the man's blank eyes staring up at him, all he'd seen was the blood pooling beneath his body.

Despite what most of the town believed, Randy had never been charged with anything. He'd been at the hospital with his mom, with plenty of witnesses, at the time someone had come into Adam's home and done that to him…

Still, he'd known details about what had happened, details confirmed by the cops after their investigation, details he'd told Mike during the time after when he'd been out of it with shock and grief.

Mike hadn't believed him when Randy had told him how he'd known it. Randy had been so sure he would. He and Mike were good friends before but the only one of his friends from before that had believed him had been Trish.

He'd loved Adam, had never been able to imagine hurting him so the fact that Mike actually believed he could do it…that he could use a knife to…

Randy shook his head and forced his legs to work. When he got to his room, he grabbed his headphones, hooked them into his stereo and turned the music up almost loud enough to blow out his eardrums, willing it to block out the memories.

Xxxxxxxx

John lay in bed, unable to sleep. Mike's story kept playing over and over in his head, the look in Randy's eyes just before he'd left the man's apartment kept flashing behind his closed eyelids. It didn't match up.

Maybe he just didn't want to believe but the look in Randy's eyes didn't match with the look he'd imagined from someone who'd be capable of stabbing another person nine times, especially a person he had loved.

Mike had said that he believed the reason Randy had done it was because Adam had wanted to take their relationship public, had been tired of the secrecy. It was such a stupid reason, John thought, to commit murder, a reason he couldn't hold onto, couldn't put on Randy.

But John had been around the world and back and he knew that there were people that were capable of anything.

He imagined the conversation he'd had with Randy at the bar. He remembered Randy stealing food from his plate, grinning at him so brightly. He remembered Randy leaning on the bar, gray eyes sparkling with amusement as John professed his love of rap music and war movies.

He just couldn't believe the guy was capable of murder, didn't want to believe the guy he had connected with so quickly and so profoundly had taken a knife to his high school boyfriend.

Xxxxxxxx

His face was a mess. A swollen, puffy, bruised, mess. Randy had already called into work. He didn't need Trish, Cody, or Shawn to see his face.

He lay back on his bed, staring up at the ceiling. He'd been doing that all night, unable to sleep after John had left. Any thoughts he'd had about maybe starting something with John had been wiped completely from his mind. He was reminded again that he couldn't possibly have something like that again.

Maybe he should have accepted it. Accepted the fact that high school really had been the best years of his life and that he couldn't ever get any of that happiness back. Even the tiny apartment he'd been living in the past several years was a testament to that fact.

His mom had left him her house but he'd been unable to stay there after she died. Unable to stay in a place that she had made her own, in a bed that he and Adam had spent countless nights together during the year and a half they'd been together.

They'd planned on moving to the city. Adam had wanted to go to college there but of course they'd never made it. It wasn't supposed to be like this. Randy closed his eyes, squeezed them shut, the reminders of what he'd lost that night almost too much to bare.

Randy pulled his pillow over his face with a groan when he heard his door unlock and someone step inside. He felt the bed dip beside him and already knew who it was. There were only two people who had keys to his apartment and Cody was the only one who came in without at least knocking first.

Cody stayed with him a lot. He and his girlfriend seemed to have a blowout at least once a month and Cody would sleep on his couch for a night or two before going back to make up with her. Randy had been mildly surprised that Cody continued to stay in such an explosive relationship.

"Hey, buddy," Cody said brightly, reaching over and pulling the pillow out of his hands. As soon as he saw Randy's face, a frown of concern crossed his. "What happened?"

Xxxxxxxx

Rocking on his heels, Justin scrubbed at his hands. There was blood on them again. Orton's blood. He hardly noticed the cut over his eyebrow, where Randy had gotten a shot in of his own.

Blood stained. Even after scrubbing his hands for hours, he could still see it; still see the red tinge to his hands. Blood always stains. He'd learned that a long time ago. His hands shook for a moment before he steadied them, banished the memories.

It was Randy's fault. All of it was Randy's fault. He held steadfastly to that belief even as he scrubbed his hands raw.