"C-Carter you're drunk, you should maybe go home?" Ethan stutters, running up behind Carter, trying to stop him in any way, but Carter wasn't listening. Carter was by now outside of the house and was fast walking down the street. 

"I...I am not going back there...never, ever going back there!" Carter stammers to say, continuing to walk away with his head hung low as he fast walked away. 

Ethan had finally caught up to Carter, grabbing a hold of his forearm to stop him as he questions "Carter, why don't you want to go home?" 

Carter stopped walking once he felt Ethan's grip on him but continued to look down. He wasn't in his right state of mind, to be honest it was most likely that Carter didn't even realise he was directly talking to Ethan. "No one loves me where I live" Carter admits in sadness. 

"Your...parents don't love you? You, you don't know that, right? They probably really love you, they just don't know how to show it." Ethan says in a sad chuckle, trying to comfort Carter as much as he could, but he didn't know the right things to say. He's never comforted anyone before, let alone no one's ever tried comforting him. 

"I don't have parents, they don't love me...they abandoned me." Carter admits in a drunken haze, looking off to aside, through the moonlight shining down on the two of them, Ethan could see the tears filling Carters eyes. 

"You...don't have parents?" Ethan repeats, looking at Carter a little surprised. 

"Nope...never knew them, but hey, why should I care? They didn't want me, they left me..." Carter says, going off about it before moving his hand back to get out of Ethan's grip. 

Carter started walking away again but Ethan knew he couldn't let Carter walk away like this, not as hammered as he was. "Where're you going to go if you don't want to go home?" Ethan questions, following behind Carter but not walking beside him. 

"I..." Carter starts off with saying before he stopped walking to think about it. He looked down at the ground while furrowing his eyebrows just thinking about it. "I don't know" Carter says before coughing. 

"Then...you...want to come to my house?" Ethan questions, looking at Carter a little intimidated. Even Ethan himself didn't know what he was doing, but he knew he couldn't leave Carter on the streets alone this wasted at this time of night. 

Carter still had no clue who Ethan was but was surprised Ethan was offering to let him stay the night at his place. "Y-You want to bring me to your house?" Carter asks and Ethan hesitantly nodded meaning yes. 

"Then lets go" Carter says in a smile, turning around to walk towards Ethan which surprised Ethan. 

Meanwhile with Jake and Nate, Nate was leading Jake back to Nate's house. "Your house" Jake says in confusion but stared at Nate's house with no emotion on his face. 

Nate shook his head "no, the place I'm bringing you is behind my house." Nate explains in a smile, going to the backyard of his house. 

Jake followed behind Nate, going to wherever Nate was leading him to. "This is a quiet place I always go to, especially when I want to be alone." Nate explains, walking up to the huge tree in his backyard and points up to a tree house in the middle of the huge tree. 

 "tree....house?" Jake says, looking up at the house inside the tree and Nate nodded meaning Jake was right.

"Yup, it's a tree house. My father built it for my brother and I when we were young. It was kind of like our own little hide out from people or things. My brother doesn't come up here as much anymore, but I always go up here when I'm upset, or when I just need a quiet place to go." Nate explains, starting to climb up the tree to get to the tree house. 

While halfway up the tree, Nate looked down to see if Jake was following him, but it didn't look like Jake was moving. "Come on, you don't have to be worried Jake. It's a sturdy tree." Nate reassures Jake in a smile before continuing to climb the tree. 

Jake looked hesitant to climb the tree but ended up climbing the tree after Nate, going all the way up to the tree house. 

Once the two boys got up into the tree it was in pitch black darkness. "I usually come up here when it's bright outside, I've never been in here when it's dark outside." Nate explains in a chuckle, leaning himself against one of the walls as he looked around. 

Jake sat down next to Nate, looking around as well. Silence filled the tree house between the two boys. The only thing that could be heard was the faint crickets coming from just outside the tree house.

Jake liked the tree house, having a warm feeling inside of it. He couldn't help but close his eyes, feeling a calm aura around the both of them. At the same time Jake suddenly felt Nate's head laying on his shoulder. He looked down at Nate to see his eyes were closed and he was sound asleep.

This was something new for Jake, he didn't know what to do, but he kept still so he didn't wake up Nate. Feeling Nate breathe against him softly as he was sound asleep made Jake feel something light and fluffy inside of him. It was a feeling he had never felt before. Jake slowly started to close his eyes, leaning his head on Nate's as he started to fall asleep as well. 

Meanwhile with Max and Ryan, Max was sitting on the edge of his bed while looking down at his bandaged wounds that Ryan had helped him wrap up. "Are you okay, do you want me to get you something to drink?" Ryan questions and Max pointed to his closet where the door to the closet was broken off. 

Ryan looked at Max questioningly but got up anyway and walked towards the closet, looking underneath a couple of clothes that were on the ground to see a  whiskey bottle that was almost all finished underneath a couple clothes. He held up the bottle and says "you mean this?" 

Max nodded meaning yes and held out his hand, wanting Ryan to put the bottle into his hand. "Max...you can't drink all your problems away, that's how alcoholics think." 

"Who says I'm not an alcoholic? Now give me the bottle." Max says in a more aggressive tone.

Ryan could hear the anger in Max's voice and quickly gave him the bottle, not wanting him to get mad and start throwing punches. 

Max snatched the bottle out of Ryan's hand once Ryan brought it closer to him and took the cap off as he started drinking it, making a face after he took the bottle away from his mouth and took a hard swallow. 

"Do you...have anywhere else to go, do you really have to live with these people?" Ryan asks, now sitting down next to Max.

Max lightly chuckled, looking at Ryan like there was a little sorrow in his eyes, but he was trying to hide it with his tough persona. "You really think I have friends?" Max replies, continuing to chuckle lightly before bringing the bottle back up to his mouth and taking another gulp. 

"I don't know..." 

"People don't like me." Max explains, trying to drink the couple of drops that were left in the bottle, but when he realised there was nothing more in it, he threw the bottle against the wall which left a dent in the wall, but the bottle cracked once it hit the floor. 

"I would...let you come to my house, but I think my parents would freak out if I brought someone like you home." 

"Someone like me?" Max repeats, looking at Ryan confused with one eyebrow raised. 

Ryan's eyes opened a little after realising what he said and looked away from Max. "No, I didn't mean it like that. I just mean...you go against all the beliefs my parents go by, they'd have a field day with me if they even knew I was hanging out with someone like you." 

"Well you don't really go by everything your parents believe in too, right gay boy?" Max asks, smirking at Ryan while Ryan looked down into his lap, gripping onto the end of his shirt tightly.

Max looked at Ryan, bringing his hand up to Ryan's face and forcing Ryan to look at him into his eyes. Ryan did so and they both stared at each other for another moment or so before Max brought his one hand behind Ryan's head and closed the space between them with his lips. 

Ryan was surprised, his eyes opened wide once again. He was surprised Max was kissing him again, the second time that night. Max's mouth tasted like cigarettes with a sour mixture taste of alcohol, but for some reason Ryan didn't seem to mind. Ryan slowly closed his eyes, following along with Max's actions as Max now started to push his tongue into Ryan's mouth. 

Ethan had finally got Carter to his house which took a while because Carter kept trying to walk in the wrong direction. Insisting he knew where Ethan's house was, even though Carter had never been to it before. 

Ethan's parents weren't home, so he wasn't worried about his parents catching him bringing a drunk person home to stay the night. While closing the door behind the both of them, he realised he didn't know where he would let Carter sleep. He didn't have an extra room in his house for Carter to sleep in. 

"House...nice...house" Carter says, walking around in circles as he was looking at everything while spinning. 

"Come on, stop spinning" Ethan says, grabbing Carter's forearm and bringing Carter into his bedroom. 

Ethan's bedroom was completely dark. Especially because everything was black in his bedroom. His bedroom walls were painted black, even his bed sheets were black. "You can sleep there" Ethan says, pointing to his bed. 

"Sleep in...a bed...." Carter says, looking at the bed before jumping onto it, burying himself into the covers like he was in a cocoon. 

Ethan lightly smirked and nodded before saying "uh...sleep well" leaving his bedroom, closing the door behind him as he went into the living room and slept on the couch. 

~~~~~~

Thank you guys for liking this book and being patient with these updates! Who do you want to see in the next chapter?