We pull apart when we hear the whirring of oncoming sirens. Again, the sharp contrast of red flashing against cool blue is the only thing to fill my vision. Police cars and ambulances, I've never been so glad to see emergency vehicles in my life.

"Zoe used a neighbours phone," I explain to Zach's questioning look.

Zoe's running up to them now. A middle aged couple trails behind her - presumably the neighbours we owe a lot to. They take in the sight before them with with an equally shocked and confused look masking their faces. I can tell what they're thinking: how could something so gruesome happen in their quiet pocket of the world?

When I look around myself I'm not surprised. In a word the scene before us is carnage. Blood all over the place, five dirtied teenagers and a spraying of glass beside a bloodied knife. It looks like a scene from the dark depths of a horror movie. Something close to pride surges up inside my throat. A couple of dumb teenagers in dramatic party outfits - except Lucy, of course - and beyond all odds we survived. We are survivors.

Paramedics rush to Roberto's side first where Lucy begins giving them a thorough detailing of the injuries he sustained. They take Zach from me next. He gives me a warm smile as he goes but doesn't protest as they lead him to the back of a waiting ambulance.

"Are you hurt, miss?" A paramedic is crouching in my face.

I shake my head 'no' and don't resist when she helps me up onto my wobbly feet. We have to avoid the limp body of the old man as we go and a wave of guilt tries to wash over me. Paramedics are by his side and under the all-commanding direction of Zoe, police have been placed around him too.

"Will he be alright?" I ask the Lady.

She wraps a grey shock blanket around my shoulders and gives me a reassuring smile. She'd be a great mum if she isn't one already. "He's in for a rough couple of days of surgery. We're not sure what permanent injuries he's sustained at this point but he'll survive."

I nod before allowing myself to be lightly pushed into the back of an open ambulance myself. All five of us need to go to the hospital for mandatory check-ups but as Zach and Roberto are the only ones with any serious injuries, they've been put in a separate ambulance to Lucy, Zoe and I. A part of me is disappointed I'm being ripped from Zach's side so soon after our brief reunion but the other part of me is just happy to be with Zoe and Lucy.

We huddle on the same stretcher bed in the back of the emergency vehicle, each of us holding each other's hands. It reminds me of being a little kid again where the world was a place too big for us and monsters hid under every bed. With the threat of lives over and the rush of adrenaline finally bleeding from my system, drowsiness has gained control over my body and I struggle the urge to fall asleep, still sitting upright.

"Hey Kales," Zoe brings me out of my haze, her voice too, tinted with sleep.

"Yeah?"

"I'm sorry I made you come to that stupid party."

I look at her big brown eyes and, momentarily dropping Lucy's hand, I hug her. I hug her so tight. Without saying it, we're both expressing our relief. Our sudden release of a breath we'd been holding since first leaving the bonfire is expelled into the night. It's the sort of embrace that says all this in a way that's impossible to explain to someone that has never had a proper, I'm-with-you-until-we-die kind of best friend before.

"It's okay," I say eventually, "It was fun until that bit where we found a body and almost died." It's a sorry attempt of a joke I probably shouldn't be making so soon, but I feel Zoe laugh a little anyway and instantly some of the tension of the night is able to float away into nothingness.

The hospital is quiet when we finally reach it. I'm not surprised given the time it must be. What is it? Four AM by now? Zoe, Lucy and I are shuffled into an empty room where we're given individual beds to rest on. They check our injuries and check our blood pressure. They tell me things to do and ask me questions. By the end I'm hardly thinking of anything besides my warm bed, loving friends and family that I want to be surrounded by.

I'm escorted to a separate room to give my statement to the police. A thousand years ago when this night first began, being alone in a room of police officers would've been pretty high on my worst fears list. A thousand years ago and we only got in this mess to begin with as we were trying to hide from the cops.

They ask me a lot of questions. The who, what, where, why and how. The standard stuff. I realise that some of my answers could probably land myself and the others in a bit of trouble but in the moment, I couldn't care less. We're alive, we're safe and that's all that really matters. If I still get a slap on the wrist and some fines because of my honesty, then I can deal with that.

Seconds turn to minutes and minutes become dangerously close to hours before I'm finally released and allowed to leave. In contrast to the stark emptiness of the waiting room when we first entered the hospital, the place looks like city plaza on Black Friday. Bleary eyed parents, relatives and close friends clog the hospital couches, each one wearing the same worried expression.

I never made any calls and I don't think any of the others did either so I assume the hospital must've been the ones to call all our listed guardians and calls of contact. It scares me how many familiar eyes I hadn't seen in a very long time turn to look at me when I break through the wall of doors to meet them. This fear is turned into shock when the first person to rush over to me is not my mum or my brother or even Lucy's father Patrick, rather it is the black-haired, green-eyed mother to none other than Zachary Evans. While I had always gotten on well with Rosemary Evans, I hadn't seen her since the break-up. It takes awhile for the shock to subside but eventually I find myself patting her back in an awkwardly-trying-comfort-you but grateful-you-still-like-me sort of way.

"How is he?" She whispers into my shoulder. Her voice is shaky from crying and already I can feel the salty moisture soaking into my T-shirt.

"Uh," for a second all I can think of is his emerald eyes, strong jawline and lanky build. Because I realise replying with: 'you're son is hot' probably isn't the response she was looking for, I clear my throat and try again, "He hit his head and I think he may have broken his arm, but he's okay. He never lost consciousness so he should be out soon. I think he's a bit shaken up, but we all are."

Rosemary pulls back far enough so she can see my eyes and whispers a heartfelt, "Thank you."

I smile at her but before I get the chance to say anything else, I'm being ripped out of her arms and pulled into a very tight and very familiar set of arms: Mum. She's crying and patting my hair and mumbling incoherent words that I can't understand through her tears. For a moment I think I'm about to tear up too but I don't let the emotion overtake me. Instead I stand squeezing her back and repeating, "I'm okay, I'm okay," like a mantra over and over again. It's strange how I'm the one who's survived the psychopath in the dark and yet I'm also the one comforting her.

I feel others crowding around me, too. My brother and even Patrick. They pat my shoulders and give me side hugs, constantly mumbling the same comforting words that are as beneficial to each other as they are to me. Remember that feeling of having the crappiest day of your life until you step into a shower that burns your skin pink and creates enough steam to rival that of a Roman sauna? Remember the way your muscles relaxed and the cotton balls inside your lungs evaporated into the sweet air you had been starving from? Well that is me. That is this moment surrounded by all my family and friends after a really crappy day. That is love.

After the initial tidal wave of worried affection, I find myself sitting in the backseat of Patrick's forward drive squished snugly between Lucy and Zoe. The three of us were cleared to leave the hospital as long as we stayed in a close proximity of the area for a couple of days in case the police had any further questions for us. As for Zach and Roberto, I haven't seen either of them since they were loaded into the back of their ambulance. Because of their injuries, they'll be kept in the hospital over night with no visitors besides their immediate family - a rule I have trouble understanding as I was his fellow trauma victim and yet am not allowed to see him.

"We can visit them tomorrow," Mum curves her neck around the passenger seat to assure us although she's only looking at me. Being my mother, there's a lot of truth in saying she knows me better than I know myself. She can tell something's changed between me hating Zach's guts to whatever we are now.

I know she wants the details. She wants the inner gossip of my life but I'm not ready to go into that with her tonight. So instead I nod and mumble out a tired, "Okay," before returning my gaze to the darkened window.

With the threat over our lives now only a bad memory, fatigue has latched onto my body like a phantom on Halloween and I never want it to let go. The dream of crawling under my thick blankets after a brutally hot shower is now a very realistic possibility in my very near future. A future I am more than happy to embrace with wide open arms.

For possibly the first time all night, I am safe.

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A/N:

And we're rapidly reaching the end of Misplaced. Only a few chapters left to go!

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