As if the smell of stale smoke and Onyx's Spotify playlist being as bipolar as he was, wasn't torture enough, pulling the old sedan to a stop along the curb between our houses, I spotted our mothers in the midst of an intense conversation through the open blinds looking into my dining room.

         Mom was standing, speaking with hand gestures for added effect, while Ms. Hayes sat and responded in the best friend way that Angie had for me on countless occasions, gasps and wide eyes at all the right moments.

         "I wonder what they're talking about." Onyx stated my very thoughts aloud, but when I looked back at him, he wasn't even staring at our mothers conversing, but straight ahead. His right hand had dropped from the wheel and almost instinctively kept grazing the pack of cigarettes in the cup holder, as if he were jonesing but forcing himself to ignore the feeling because his pride and ego was too important to be attacked with my harsh judgements about his smoking habits.

         "Probably sending you to military school." I said with a laugh. "Would definitely do everyone good."

         I didn't have to turn around to know he was rolling his eyes. "Funny. My mom looks upset though, don't you think?"

         Considering his words, I fixated my eyes on the petite woman standing under my mother's raged expression. Mom was red faced and her hands had found her hips sometime during my few seconds of distraction. I'd been under that scolding look and had harsh words spat at me enough times to know she was irritated. But Onyx was right, his mother did look upset, but more so in a mental breakdown kind of way. She had her face buried in her hands, and even from this distance and without my glasses, I could see her cheeks were almost as red as Mom's.

         "Maybe she's on her period." I offered, glancing back at Onyx. "You know how hormonal us women get."

         A tension filled the car silencing me before I could try and crack another bad joke. I shifted my entire body in Onyx's direction, shocked by the vulnerability he was so openly wearing. His jaw was slack, lips turned down, and though his blue eyes were trained ahead, I could tell her was trying to compose himself by his rapid blinking.

         "I heard her on the phone this morning." Onyx's whisper was barely audible, almost as if he were talking to himself, "With Dad."

         Felix had taken off two years ago, refusing to try and reconcile with his wife after he'd cheated and impregnated another woman, and had left Onyx without explanation. Ms. Hayes had been in the midst of recovering from the tragic and traumatic passing of Onyx's little brother, and was completely blindsided by her husband's infidelity. Mom had said this all with tears in her own eyes reliving the bits and pieces of hell my dad had put her through. She had wanted to protect Onyx and his mother any way possible. Thus, both women had sat Onyx down at my kitchen table a few months after his father's departure, and told him everything, but that he shouldn't hate his father and she didn't want this to ruin his relationship with him. I had been standing with my back pressed against the dryer, eavesdropping. Unfortunately for Ms. Hayes, Onyx would find that he hated his father all on his own. Because Mr. Hayes refused to acknowledge that Onyx and his mother ever existed, he had started a new life and pretended his past never happened.

                  "I don't know what he said to her, but it's been years since they've spoke and she was clearly upset." Onyx added quietly, drumming his fingers along the top of the steering wheel.

                  If this had been anyone but Onyx Hayes beside me, I may have reached across the console and touched his shoulder or forearm comfortingly and offered some type of reassurance, even if it were for the sake of calming him. But my distaste for the boy beside me was enough to keep my mouth shut, and I looked back at our moms before he could snap at me for staring too long.   

                  "Your dad dipped too, didn't he?" he just had to redirect the subject to me, and a touchy subject at that. As much as I hated him for it, I understood. Because like me, he understood vulnerability was a weakness and couldn't bare to keep himself open longer than a few seconds.

                  "My sperm doner was an abusive piece of shit."

                  Onyx choked on his own saliva the moment the vulgar response left me. "Damn. You know, talking like that somehow makes you just a little more tolerable."

                  "Wish I could say the same."

                  "Oh, baby, I know how you feel about me. There's a list of forty-nine reasons sitting in some cute rainbow notebook with doodles in the corners of every page in your room."

                  I flipped him off as I leaned down to grab my purse from the floor.

                  "Love you too, Sky."

                  I raised a brow as I stepped out on to the curb and shot him a curious look through the open window. "Sky?"

                  "Look, I can't remember your name half the time and you said your named after that rainbow sky or whatever, right?"

                  I shook my head, trying to hide my amusement. "How did you pass eleventh grade?"

                  "I barely did." He nodded toward my house over my shoulder. "Your mom looks like she's about to come out here and throw me out of my own car. Better go check on them."

                  As soon as I shut the door, he winked and revved the engine before speeding out of the neighborhood at an alarming speed. It wasn't until I was walking up my driveway that I halted to a stop and spun on my heel to stare at the tire marks left by the hell on wheels.

                  If he wasn't coming home to stay, why the hell had he offered to go out of his way to drop me off?

                  "Was that Nyx?" Olivia questioned, stepping out on to the porch, eyes scanning the street her sons car had just occupied. "I've been trying to get ahold of him all night."

                  "It was Onyx." I confirmed mid yawn. "He was safe. He was at a movie with friends from school. Offered to drive me home."

                  She looked genuinely surprised. That made two of us. "Oh, really? That's not like Nyx."

                  "Tell me about it." I hadn't meant to say it aloud, but it got a laugh out of both the irritable women as I stepped through the threshold and into my house. "I don't know where he went though."

                  She sighed, her hands resting on her hips as she shook her head to herself. It made the little bit of compassion I'd mustered up for Onyx in the car disappear seeing his mother worried about his wellbeing and whereabouts. He hadn't even bothered to shoot his mother a text reassuring her he was okay.

                  "I'm going to head home and try and call him." she squeezed my shoulder on her way out and gently shut the door behind her, her thick, long braid nearly getting caught in the door.

                  I waited until I was sure she'd retreated back to her house next door to turn and look at my mom expectantly. She pressed her index and forefinger into her right temple and sighed.

                  "Felix has been calling." Mom stated what I had gathered from Onyx's confession in the car. "He wants to try and reconnect with Onyx. But he's refusing. I can't say I blame the kid. Felix was never a nice man, he gave that kid a complex. He walked on eggshells anytime he was around."

                  I stopped halfway through digging through the fridge for my last iced tea, poking my head back out and narrowing my eyes at my mother. "What? I didn't know that."

                  "Yeah. Nyx used to beg Olivia to let him spend the night here. It was usually after Liv and Felix got into a nasty fight; Onyx would just refuse to sleep there for like a month following it."

                  I closed the fridge slowly. "Mmm, I don't remember that."

                  "It was around the time I was dealing with all the court stuff with your father. I'm not surprised you blocked all that out." she grabbed the empty wine glass Oliva had left on the sea green placemat, "I know you and Onyx have grown into much different people, but maybe try and cut the boy some slack, okay? He's going through it right now."

                  I eyed her down. "You want me to be his friend."

                  My mother's subtly had always driven me nuts. She was always so sweet and persuasive, I was not at all surprised that she was able to get close to anyone she met to buy her book.

                  "I don't think it'd be the worst idea, Rory."

                  "Mom, are we talking about the same Onyx? He's a cocky, arrogant, womanizing, egotistical—"

                  Mom walked over and pressed her index finger to my lips. "Enough with the adjectives. I get it. You two don't get along. Just be friendly, that's all I'm asking. Okay?"

                  I nodded and hugged her. "Yeah, Mom."

                  "I love you, Rory, but you smell like stale smoke and popcorn. Please throw your uniform in the washer."

                  I stuck my tongue out childishly and made my way up the stairs. As soon as I was in my room, I pressed my door shut behind me and crossed the room to my window. I started to draw the blinds when Onyx stalked into his room, clearly in the midst of an argument with his mother, as he was shouting at her over his shoulder before he slammed his door in her face.

                  I couldn't help but feel a pang of pity when he lifted his head and met my eyes. His entire face was bright red, cheeks flushing of color, blue eyes so intense that I could feel the tension radiating from him. I drew the blinds before he could unleash all his pent up aggression on me.

                  As I changed clothes and flopped down on my bed, I threw a pillow over my face and groaned loudly.

                  Because as much as I wanted to continue to hate Onyx, I couldn't. I felt sorry for him, pity, sympathy, empathy; I related to him.

         At least I could still hate that stupid car.