Before Blaine started playing the song I had chosen, for saying goodbye, now Blaine was going to play the guitar, I sing and then I was going around to show the others some places, saying goodbye.
I riffled in the scrapbook to the page where the picture of me and Maddie, Maddie with a party- hat on her head.
When I and Blaine had finished the song, I stood up and so did the others, we walked three blocks away to the house I had lived in with first Katheryn, Brian, Maddie and Zeb, then with Brian and Maddie, then Wyatt, Brian and Maddie, then just Brian. I pointed.
"That´s the house… gosh, the ones living there now must have fixed the house up…" I looked up to what had been my window and remembered. "Once… I tried to sneak out. It didn´t work, Brian´s bedroom were right on top of the stairs. He heard me."
After walking another couple of blocks we came to the school I went to primary in.
"Johnny Carlsen´s primary… see the little kiosk over there?" I pointed again. "I used to steal stuff from there, bags of sweets, milk, bread, pretty much anything just so I and Maddie would get something to eat."
"Did you ever get caught?" Aiden asked with a smirk.
"Twice, but think about I did it like five hundred times then…." I turned around and continued towards Johnny Carlsen´s primary again.
"You know… I never actually graduated from here." I said when we walked past the school. "The whole day I laid on the floor in my room, couldn´t move a millimeter because Brian beat me up so bad… I wonder if I could go back and do it… But on the other hand, they´d probably wouldn´t want me back there… I was… special there… never did as I was told."
"Oh God, there´s so many memories around here!"
"I used to stand there in the door, watch the cars passing by."
"By the way Lex…" Tyler began. "I know you´ve got a lot more photos than what was in that scrapbook, so… how did you decide which ones to use and what to do with them?"
"I laid out all the pictures on the floor in my bedroom, like, all over the floor, and looked at each and everyone, and then came up with the ideas what to do with them. I used the best ideas… I also did steal some photos from mum and dad…. I hope that´s okay."
"´Course Lex." Dad laid his arm around my shoulders. While we kept on walking.
"There used to be an old arcade slash bar, called Charlie´s bar and arcade here." I pointed to a house.
"Dad and Wyatt used to go there as much as every night. Blew every dollar they had on games and beer. I heard somebody set fire to the place a couple of years ago.
"So where were you and Maddie when they were here?" Connor asked me. I sighed.
"Either they just left us at home… but most of the time they…" I stopped talking as I remembered.
"Most of the time?" Connor said.
"…They used to leave us in the car, turned the radio on and left me and Maddie there for hours. Soon, I and Maddie knew almost every song. I used to tell her… that one day I´d sing to more than her and a steering wheel."
"Look over there." I pointed again. "Outside that kindergarten, I stood the very first time I kissed a boy. Never been so nervous in my whole life."
"Who was it?" Tyler chuckled.
"Timothy Duncan."
"I know him…. He had twins with his girlfriend on Valentine´s day." Johnny said.
"I know…. Dad knows him… God knows how long it is since I last met Tim though."
"Gosh, there´s so many memories around here." I turned around and walked back towards the Hudmel- house. I knew I´d have to pass my old house one last time on the way back.
"God, can you imagine all the times I walked out of that front door."
"It may seem like those times just was one long misery… but no… there are things I kinda miss… like sitting in the car with Maddie and sing along to the radio… and Maddie of course… and even though big parts of what happened is a long misery… it´s hard to just leave it behind. It´s my whole childhood we´re talking about."
"If you could go back in time…" Mr. Schue began. "Would you change anything?" I sighed.
"Of course I would like Maddie to live…" I began. "But I´m not so sure… my life´s better now than what it ever was before. That and the good memories I´ve got I wouldn´t trade for the world."
"There are heaps of memories from this house." I looked through the kitchen window from where I stood. Two blonde boys, perhaps between five and seven years old were running around playing. I smiled. "There is… but it´s time to let go." I turned around, but walking up the hill I turned around one last time and looked to the house."
"Goodbye." I whispered, so quiet the others couldn´t hear it, then I turned around again, and walked back to the Hudmel- house without looking back.
The scrapbook still laid open at the garden table where I´d left it, the page up was still the one with me and Maddie.
I closed the scrapbook and walked inside with the others to eat cake. We sat down around where there was place- in the sofas, in the chairs, in the stairs, on the floor and so on.
When everyone except Mr. Schue and Tyler had left in the evening I sat up in the window in the living room, when Mr. Schue came in.
"What you´re thinking about Lex?"
"Secrets revealed."
"What?"
"I mean… I knew that when my secrets would be revealed, things would change… I´d never expect them to change this much."
"Yeah… a lot happens when secrets are revealed." Mr. Schue nodded. "Wow Lex, didn´t know you could be that deep. Secrets revealed almost sounds like a book- title or something like that." I smiled, then turned my head to look at the rain falling down outside, and it was raining as if the skies were coming down
"Come on." I jumped down from the window, and asked Mr. Schue to come with me. I stuck my head through the kitchen door and asked the others to come to. Then I walked outside, but still being under the ceiling, I turned to the others.
"You know, life isn´t about just riding the storms out, it´s about learning to dance in the rain… so come on." I more or less jumped out in the pouring rain and began dancing, the others were just laughing at first but then Mr. Schue followed me, then Tyler, Finn, and so on. At last we were all just freestyling under the pouring rain, with neighbor standing in their windows and looking at us.
I took Tyler´s hands and started dancing with him. To say that we were ugly- dancing would be an understatement. But none of us could care less, we were dancing all the way until a lightning broke heaven in two, and there was an ear- piercing boom from the thunder that we ran inside and stood in the hallway with pools of water around us, until mum came running with towels.
Not long later we sat around the living room in the sofa, I looked around.
"You guys know…" I began. "There´s no way I can put in words how much I love you guys. And… Mr. Schue and I earlier talked about how all the secrets I´ve revealed the last year… but… the fact is… They would never have been revealed without you. And I just wanted to say… thanks."
"We did nothing." Finn exclaimed. "You did all the hard work!"
"Nah… You did…. You did so much more than I could ever tell you. You made me feel like I… like I matter. And… I know there´s still millions of children out there who are living like I used to… but… you made a difference to one of them… and that means more than the world to me. So thank you… Just thank you."
"GROUP HUG." Finn shouted and that´s exactly what happened.
"And thank you Lex." Mr. Schue said after multiple seconds of silence. "Thanks for helping me realize what is truly important in life… and I think I speak for all of us when I say… thanks for being you." We split up and I held up my teacup.
"Here´s to families. You too Mr. Schue." The others held up their cups.
"Toast again…" Mr. Schue held up his cup. "To Lex."
"To Lex."
And little did we know, that the changes… they´d only just begun.
Well… not quite happy with the ending but after like four attempts to make a perfect ending this seemed pretty good.
Well, that´s the end, although I´m uploading the first chapter of the first sequel for this at the same time as I´m uploading this.
Everything during the walk where Lex showed the others the arcade and everything, is based on the song Photograph by Nickelback
Thanks so much for sticking with this story all the way to the end.
-Linnéa
