Spencer awoke to smell of something burning. His eyes flew open- but he saw nothing. There was no smoke, he could breathe fine, everything looked the same as it did the night before.

Wait, where's Billy?

Spencer eyed the room and stopped once he'd gotten to the bathroom, there was a vague light coming from the room.

Bingo

He slowly got up and walked over to the door, peeking his head in.

"Mornin'," Billy greeted once he noticed the boy in the mirror.

"My hair got kinda wet, last night," he explained, seeing Spencer eye the flat iron in his hand.

Spencer sighed; Billy was only straightening his hair.

So that's what it was, Spencer thought thinking back to last night; something about Billy had seemed different, he just couldn't put his finger on it, but now it was all so clear: his hair was curly.

Spencer had figured that Billy's hair was just naturally straight, like his own, but obviously that wasn't the case.

"Do you ever wear it curly?" Spencer asked, unintentionally.

"Sorry, you don't have to answer that," he quickly added. He hadn't meant to ask that, sure he was thinking it, but-

"Nah, it's fine," Billy assured, setting the iron down. "I used to wear it curly, back in grade school, but once I got to high school I stopped."

"How come?"

"I've kinda always hated my hair," he responded, laughing to himself.

"Yea, and mom would never let me straighten it, and she wouldn't straighten it, so once I got to high school I kinda just started doing my own thing, and the hair was part of that."

Billy's explanation only gave Spencer more questions, or rather evoked old questions he'd had pertaining to the boy.

But would he answer them? I'll ask him at a later date, Spencer decided. He'd learned enough about the boy's history for now.

"That's understandable," he mumbled.

Billy shrugged his shoulders and went back to working on his hair.

"After I'm done we can go get some breakfast," he suggested, "unless you wanted to go on down now, then you can."

Spencer shook his head and made his way back to the couch, then waited.

He pulled out his phone and sighed.

It was now Monday and still no one had called him. Though it was only 6:30, and no one usually called this early, still, when you know you're doing something out of the ordinary you kind of expect the people close to you to notice too. Like you send out some sort of 'hey, I might be in danger' signal, but apparently that's not how reality worked.

He decided to focus his mind on Billy. He wondered why he hated his hair so much. Spencer found nothing wrong with curly hair, infact he sometimes wished his hair had curl to it.

There was also the fact that he found everything about himself boring; except for his eyes. Those were totally not boring, maybe that's why he hated them so much. They shouldn't belong to a boring guy like him, unique people should have unique eyes.

He wished his eyes were dark brown, the darkest brown possible, so they almost looked black. Those boring eyes would fit a boring kid like him.

"You ready, Broseph?" Billy asked with a trace of concern in his voice. Spencer was thinking awfully hard about something.

"Oh, uh, yea," Spencer responded a few seconds later.

"That was some intense thinking there," the other boy joked, nudging Spencer in his side.

"Yea," Spencer mumbled nervously.

"You ready?" Billy asked again with the same concern in his voice against before.

"Uh, I gotta use the bathroom first."

"Okay," and with that Billy plopped on the bed, flicking the tv on.

Uck, the news?

Billy hated the news, the only thing he found necessary was the weather reports, everything else either didn't matter, or could have nothing done about it.

As for now though, the reporter was speaking of a storm that was apparently coming later today that would lead into tomorrow.

He frowned, they'd probably be in Oregon by then, and the storm probably wouldn't affect them, and that was the problem.

Billy had a strange atteaction to storms, he even liked to sit out in them sometimes, and let the rain drench his body. It helped him clear his mind, and he was able to write better lyrics. Maybe it'll be raining in Oregon.Must be nice to have someone care about where you are.

He sat the phone back down and made his way back to the bed. A few moments later Spencer emerged from the bathroom.

"You think you could stay with me another day?" Billy asked in a humorous tone, though he was completely serious.

"What?"

Billy began to laugh again, "nothing, come on let's go."

He grabbed Spencer's arm and pulled him out the door.

….

"So he didn't answer?" Rajeev asked.

"No, some guy did. He said that Spencer was busy and that he'd be back soon, then he hung up." Shanilla explained for the hundredth time.

"So what do you think happened?"

"Well his parents are out of town for one of Jessica's things, so maybe he just went with them."

"What!" Rajeev basically screamed, "Spencer hates family vacations, there's no way he'd go to one of those."

But Shanilla was already gone, she'd gotten out of the car, and was now walking up the boy's steps.

"Nilla, we can't keep doing this, haven't you heard of breaking and entering? That's a thing, and you can go to jailfor it."

"We have a key dummy," Shanilla pointed out, shoving the key in her brother's face.

"Besides, it's not like Mr. and Mrs. Wright would care."

Rajeev huffed, and followed his sister in through the door.

"I'll check his room to see if there are any clues as to where he went," Shanilla announced, heading towards the stairs.

"And I'll check the kitchen for food- uh, clues too."

"Whatever," Shanilla mumbled.

When she got to his room there was nothing immediately wrong with it, but once she looked around closer she found that there were so many things off.

A bunch of his things that were usually on his shelves were scattered across the floor; his favourite blanket was missing, his favourite pants, and, obviously, his shoes.

A few of his USB's were missing, and most importantly his camera was gone. Spencer only took his camera with him when he'd be away for a few days

"You never know what could happen, my house could flood, it could burn down, someone could rob the place; you always gotta be prepared," he'd once said. He's so uptight.

All signs pointed to him being out of town with his family. But then who was that guy?

"You're probably looking for Spencer, he's busy right now, but if you're wondering where he is, don't worry. He'll be back soon."

"Ugh, there's nothing to eat here," Rajeev whined, momentarily disrupting Shanilla's thoughts, "Let's hit up the WiFri before school and think about it there."

"Emergency money!" the girl blurted, pushing past her brother.

"What?"

Whenever Spencer's parents were out of town they'd always leave him emergency money, if it was still there then Spencer had to be with them.

Come on, come on..

It's here.

Shanilla let out a sigh. He's safe, and with his family; Spencer's fine.

Still though, that guys voice played over and over again in her head. Things didn't connect all that well now, but this was all she had to go off of, and she wanted things to be okay. So, for now, she was content.

"Let's go, Rajeev," she called up to her brother, and they left.

….

Spencer was amazed at all the people that were in their pyjamas, he'd felt a little embarrassed at first, but it was a thing tons of people did, apparently.

It did make sense though, you can get food here, so why not enjoy it in your pj's with everyone else. He liked doing things with other people involved, the fact that they were all experiencing this thing in a different way made him feel closer to them, even if he didn't know them.

The two boys grabbed a plate, and then found a seat. The dining hall wasn't that crowded, but there were enough people to the point where you had to look for a seat.

"So what time did you plan on leaving here?" Spencer asked.

"Whenever," Billy responded, poking at his food.

"Oh."

They began to eat in silence, as silent as things can be in a room full of people.

"Are you okay?" Spencer questioned nervously.

"Totes." Billy gave a fake smile, and continued with his meal.

It was a strange feeling, what Billy was feeling now. He'd thought Spencer was this loner guy with no friends. He figured no one would miss the guy if he was gone. He thought they were the same, but that girl he'd talked to was obviously one of Spencer's friends.

He didn't want to take the boy away from people that loved and cared for him, now he had to rethink everything.

Billy hadn't even finished his breakfast before he threw it all away.

"We have to be out of here by noon, so we can leave then," he explained, and they made their way back to their room.

….

"So, if we go back the way we came we should get back to Sacramento, and from there we can get to Oregon," Billy said thinking out loud.

"We should use a GPS this time though," Spencer suggested.

"Right."

At that moment Spencer's phone rang.

"It's your mom," Billy announced.

"Can you put it on speaker?" Spencer asked a little too eagerly.

"Yea?" Spencer called out to the phone.

"Spence, mom told me to tell you that we'll be gone a little longer, maybe a week?," a voice started, "Because yours truly kicked ass at the karate competition and they wanna sign me up for a state competition, and then eventually I could be best in the country!"

"That's really cool, good luck," congratulated, trying to sound as happy as possible.

"Ugh, you could at least act happy for me," she joked, "See ya, Spence. Love you."

"Love you too Jess.." Spencer responded sarcastically.

And then the phone went silent.

"That your sister?" Billy asked.

"Yea." Spencer hated talking on the phone in front of people, it was one of the most embarrassing things you could do, especially with speaker phone.

But when you were driving, and you figured your mom was calling, whom you hadn't spoken to in days, speakerphone was kind of your only choice.

"She seems nice."

Spencer wanted to laugh. "When we're away from each other she could pass for a decent sister, but at home we're always fighting."

Billy couldn't see Spencer fighting, no matter how many times he tried to picture it, he seemed too uptight and nervous to fight with anyone, but then again, he knew next to nothing about the boy.

He gave a satisfied "hmm," and turned on some music.

"You know how earlier today you asked me to stay with you another day?" Spencer asked suddenly.

"You heard that?" Billy asked, laughing nervously.

"Well, apparently my parents are gonna be gone a few more days, my friends haven't called, and next week is spring break, so," he trailed off.

"Sooo?" Billy questioned eagerly.

"So could I stay with you until then?"

"Uhh," Billy thought. On one hand he could tell Spencer that his friends did infact call, but on yhe other hand Spencer was planning on staying a whole other week, and it's not like Billy minded.

It's not like he minded not having to be alone for atleast one more week, and besides they'd call again right? Right. If they really cared about him they'd call again, and that way Spencer wouldn't have to find out that Billy had sort of been invading his privacy.

"Okay," he finally said.

Spencer let out a breath that he'd been unintentionally holding.

"Uh, then if that's the case, can we make a stop back at my house before we head to Oregon?"

"You're the driver," Billy pointed out, "if you wanna drive back I don't mind."

But a part of Billy did mind, he didn't know why, but he did.

So instead of heading to Oregon, they were on their way back to L.A.

"Ehmm, if you don't mind me asking," Billy started, "what do you need to go back for?

"My parents always leave me emergency money when they leave. I never actually use it, but they keep adding to it whenever they leave, I dunno how much is there, but figured why not," Spencer explained, "and besides, if I'm gonna skip school I've gotta unplug the landline."

Billy smirked, so Spencer wasn't all he cracked up to be; he was a lot more.

thanks for reading guys xoxx