Chapter 2 Coping

Two years since he disappeared. Two years since the four hockey friends from Minnesota were torn apart. They lost him, their youngest friend, nevr saw him since. But the three friends left behind never gave up. Not when a funeral was held for him by his parents. Not when the police explained that there was no way he could be alive after all this time.

Two years, but they still held hope. That's just how they were. They had each other's backs. And the other side of the story, admitting that he was really gone, just hurt too much. So, after two years they still searched for him.

"Okay, I was in the park today, showed his pictures again. But no one even recognized him." Logan tells his friends as he walks into their shared LA apartment.

"I hung up some new posters, but no responses yet." Kendall added.

"We did get some new sightings on the website for him. But they all turned up nothing." James adds dejectedly.

The three sit on their enormous couch together, staring off into space. The apartment was big enough to hold four people, all the furniture seemed to say there was a fourth occupant. That's the way they liked it. They always told anyone staying over that the guest room wasn't available. Because it wasn't a guest room. That was his room. They had decorated it in his favorite style. Some people just called it creepy. It was almost like a ghost room, even though no one had ever stayed there. Only the boys were really allowed to go in and they only did so to clean it ever so often.

It was like it was waiting for him. Until the day he would return. A helmet lay on the bed, ready to be worn by its new owner. The old one hadn't been found. It wasn't surprising, seeing as how he never went. That god they never found it. It meant they could keep up hope.

People tried to convince them to leave it, to move on with their lives. But the way they put it, they never could until they knew. Even it that meant finding his body, at least then they knew what happened. They needed to see him. Only then would they truly be able to go on.

These two years had been difficult. Not only did they spend everyday coming home all depressed because he hadn't been found, again. But they had to live together, with the three of them in a silent apartment in LA. Sometimes they would try to crack jokes, like they used to. But then memories of that fourth smile and his laughter would make them all stop again.

Many times they had woken up to screams of terror when one of them dreamt that horrible dream in which they did find him. Other times, a nicer dream led them to tears, because it never happened. They hadn't found him.

Things weren't the same. Their families all stayed in Minnesota. They begged the three to join them. But how could they? What if he came back? They couldn't leave him behind. It just wasn't right.

So they stayed in LA. Not as Big Time Rush. That was just too painful. No, that was kept in the closet. When they found him, they could take the lock from the door again. But for now, other ways had to be found to make money.

James had started modeling. He always wanted to, he still had the face. It paid good money. But it was exhausting, having to be fake all the time. Walking in with a fake smile plastered on his face, it felt wrong.

Kendall could have gone to play for the LA professional team. They tried to encourage him. But it only reminded him of the good old days in Minnesota, laying hockey with his three best friends. That just wasn't an option.

So, he tried something else. He became a songwriter. This way, he could still stay in the music industry, and he could deal with all his feelings at the same time. It was the only way he could cope. Else he would have lost his sanity a long time ago.

Logan, well, he could have finally started his long time dream of becoming a doctor. Everyone pretty much expected him to. But life hadn't been going the way he had planned for a while now. So why stop the process? He decided to try out the one thing no one would have believed he would do; he became a stunt double.

There was only one person who knew about his daredevil side. He would have been rotting for him all the way. Sometimes just the thought of that was enough to brighten up his day. But for now he would have to settle for only James and Kendall, who supported him, but never the way he knew the lost one would have.

"You know, I really hoped that last e-mail I got would have gotten us somewhere. It seemed so like him. But it turned out to be just another joke." James hisses. Kendall just pats him on the back.

"Well, what about the one from Saturday? That seemed real." Logan offers.

"Yeah." James snorts. "Turns out a girl made it up, because she really wanted to meet us. She was actually disappointed when only I showed up. Apparently she used to be a BTR fan."

Logan groans and lets himself fall back into the comfortable couch cushions.

"Why can't people be serious about this? How are we ever supposed to find him if we keep getting bogus replies like this? What if we get a message about an actual sighting and we're off answering to these losers? We might not get there in time."

"Logan, relax. We've never ignored a sighting. Yeah, so a lot of them are fakes. But you'll see, on day the real call will come in and you'll be glad we followed up on all of them." Kendall assures him.

"It's just so frustrating sometimes." James answers. Logan nods.

"Guys, we promised we would keep looking. Look, I know this is hard. But if this is what it takes to find him, I say we just have to deal with it." Kendall tells his friends, going back into leader-mode with a small smile. The others sigh, before slowly agreeing. "Now come on, who's up for some corndogs?" He says excitedly before getting up from the couch.

The other two grin and cheer like little kids, before following their friend into the kitchen.

One would have thought this ritual would have hurt more than anything. But for them, it was the one thing that kept their spirit going the most. So every Friday they would eat corndogs for dinner, making sure they got in touch with their inner child, like Carlos would have. Had he been there.

Meanwhile, near a seemingly abandoned building in an unknown place…

"Are you sure this is the place?" Detective Nathan Parker asks his partner, Detective Lucy Crimson as they eye up the building from their car.

"Yep, this should be it. Our informant has never been wrong before."

"Alright, let's do this." He decides. Both of them slowly get out, getting their guns ready just in case. They wave down some fellow officers in other cars as they start to surround the building.

"Just remember, be careful, there's no telling what we might find in there." Lucy gives one last warning, before nodding to an officer. With on swift kick, he knocks the door down. A lot of yelling is heard as the officers swarm the building.

One thing was for sure, what they found was nothing they expected. Bodies lay on the ground, dead or alive, it wasn't certain just yet. Only one other person was standing, seeming to guard a huge bolted door behind him. He didn't make a single sound, but the gun held tightly in his shaking hands was enough to stop everyone dead in their tracks.

So, what do you think? Sorry for skipping two years, but it'll make sense soon ;)

Thanks for the reviews so far, hope you like this story as much as my other ones!

See ya later!

Love, Baxxie