"What were you doing at the game anyway?" Laura asked when they started walking.
"Honestly, getting a look at that other school's girls," he said keeping his arm around her. She was definitely not ready to walk by herself yet.
"I hope I didn't ruin your night," she apologised.
"Ah don't worry about it," he said waving his hand, "they're all dogs anyway."
Laura smiled a little and put her hand on his back to steady herself.
"I feel horrible," she said, "I don't know if I can keep walking."
"Wanna stop for a bit," he said sitting her on the ground.
"When will it go away?" she asked.
"Probably not tonight," he said honestly, "those bastards gave you straight liquor, and you don't even drink so that makes it even worse."
"Why wouldn't they just leave me alone?" she asked.
Eyeball looked at her a second and decided to be straight with her, "I dunno what it is but you have this thing."
"What thing?" she said confused.
"This look, or vibe or whatever it is. It's like vulnerable or something. Like if a guy tried something, you wouldn't try and stop him."
Laura looked shocked but then thought about it. Nobody ever grabbed Connie's wrist, she would have yelled so loud and probably kicked them a few times, she was so strong. She hadn't even lost her virginity yet because she hadn't wanted to. But Laura just stood there frozen.
"I don't think it's a good thing really," Eyeball mused, "it keeps getting you into trouble. See the thing of it is it probably wouldn't be so bad if you weren't so beautiful."
"I hate it," Laura sobbed, it seemed the only reason anybody had ever talked to her since she had turned twelve was because they thought she was beautiful.
"Well it is who you are, you shouldn't hate it," he said, he wouldn't say it out loud but he figured that was why Ace had liked Laura so much, not just because of her appearance but the vulnerability that went with it. He probably got off on it, Eyeball thought.
"You're pretty nice," Laura said, wiping her eyes on her handkerchief.
"I'm not really," he assured her, "this is just an exception."
"I don't even know your real name," she admitted.
"It's Richard," he said.
"Why do people call you Eyeball?"
"When I was in the second grade I got into this fight after school and I gouged the guy in the eye so bad that it came out for a second before it went back in."
"That's pretty gross," she said.
"Yeah I know," he smirked, "but it did wonders for my rep."
"Was his eye okay?"
"No idea," Eyeball said, "he never complained to me about it."
Laura smiled despite herself.
"Ready to give it another go?" he asked standing up.
"Okay," she said and Eyeball pulled her to her feet.
"How has Ace been lately?" Laura asked after a few minutes of silence.
"Did something happen with you two?" he asked. First Ace had been way too interested in the fact he had seen Laura out of the house one time and now she was asking about him.
"I haven't spoken to him in over a month," she said, "well that's not completely true, I did talk to him on New Years day but it was only for a second."
Eyeball was stunned. He had no idea about any of this.
"Jesus Christ," he said feeling a bit paranoid that Ace would come along any second and jump to conclusions about why Laura was so wasted and why he had his arm around her. "What the hell happened?"
"We had a fight," she said, not wanting to elaborate.
"Oh right," Eyeball said, still feeling very wary of the whole subject. "I wouldn't worry about it too much hon, I've seen Ace go through plenty of girls but he likes you more, I can tell."
They made the rest of the way to her house relatively quickly, Eyeball knocked on her front door and came face to face with Caroline.
"Oh my god what happened to her?" she cried when Laura's head lolled forward and Caroline seen the only reason she was standing in the first place was because this boy was holding her up.
"These assholes at the high school forced her to drink booze," Eyeball said, "pardon my french," he said sheepishly.
"My god," Caroline said helping her into the house. She sat Laura down on the couch and got her a drink of water.
"Did she know them?"
"No they were from out of town." Eyeball didn't feel like he needed to traumatise her mother with anymore details.
"Thank you so much for bringing her home..."
"Eyeball," he said grinning.
"Ah, you must be Ace's friend," Caroline said with a look of comprehension.
"Sure am," he said.
"Would you like something to eat?" she asked him as she refilled Laura's glass of water.
"Yeah okay," he said, sitting down at the table. He had thought Ace was nuts for hanging around Laura's house so much but he had no idea how nice Caroline was. She gave him Laura's dinner and told him if he wanted more all he needed to do was ask.
"So are you just as bad as Ace," she asked him as she put a cool cloth against Laura's forehead.
"Worse," he said smirking.
"I hope that's not true," she said, "he's frightened Laura somehow so she doesn't want to see him anymore."
Eyeball was surprised. Why would he frighten her, it didn't make any sense. "I'm still surprised she didn't run for the hills when she met him," he joked.
The two found themselves getting on surprisingly well, so much so that Eyeball even hung around for dessert. Caroline put Laura to sleep, satisfied she would be fine in the morning and got him some pudding from the fridge.
"Thanks for the meal Mrs Stratford," he said as he got up to leave.
"No problem at all," she said, "thank you for saving my daughter."
And in that look Eyeball realised he didn't need to tell her what happened, she already knew.