(song: "Scared to be Alone" - Martin Garrix & Dua Lipa)

8 Months Ago . . .

     "I'm never going to fall in love again," Cassie told me.

     We laid together in my bed staring up at the stark-white ceiling. Her fingers were entwined with mine as we watched the light of the sun slowly shift its beams across the room.

     "You'll be back together with him again," I said. She had broken up with him at least three times in the past five months, I didn't expect this time to be any different.

     She pressed her face into my shoulder. "No, this time it's for good."

     "So you say." Again, I don't buy it.

     Cassie sighed heavily and contentedly onto the nape of my neck. "I like that we can be so intimate without involving messy emotional feelings. It's like friends with benefits."

     "Sure. Minus the sex."

     "We don't have to minus that . . . " Her voice was low and exposed. "It'll be a test to see how strong our friendship and trust can really go."

     Maybe I was old-fashioned, but I didn't want loveless intimacy from her. I was too emotionally attached. For me it'd be an act of love, for her it'd be an act of curiosity.

     But guys aren't supposed to be that way, we're supposed to always be rearing and ready to hump the nearest available leg.

     She drew herself onto me and like gravity our mouths collided. It felt amazing, her lips were so plush and soft; everything I imagined they would be. Somehow in the process of locking lips her shirt found its way to my floor and so did mine.

     Things got far, almost too far, but I stopped.

    "What's wrong?" She asked from beneath me.

     Everything.

     "Nothing," I said, but rolled off her just the same. "I'm just not feeling it."

      Cassie fixed her hair with her fingers and snatched her shirt from off the floor to redress herself. I didn't bother to do the same.

      "I guess it's good that we stopped when we did; with no feelings involved it feels just like scratching an itch," she said.

      Did this girl have any inkling how much her words could injure me? I had to stop because I was feeling everything. If I had reached the finish-line I knew my heart would have exploded into a thousand pieces and I wanted to prevent the cardiac arrest my love might inflict.

     She leaned down and kissed me one last time and left. We never kissed or attempted anything like that again. The following week her arms were locked around Greg's waist and when he kissed her I noticed that her body bent towards him with emotion.

     It was the beginning of the end for our friendship.

I lay in my bed watching the ceiling. The thought-bees are back. I think about Greg, mostly. What is his real agenda? Who is Eddie? Should I look for him? Where is Cassie? Does Kristen hate me again?

    "Toby! Kristen's at the door!" My mother calls up to me.

    So many different emotions spark through me. I bolt up with a speed I didn't even know I had and rush down the stairs. I see Kristen standing very still and quiet at the front door. I wait for my mother to give us privacy.

     "You don't have to explain anything to me, Toby. I'm here for Cassie, because I have a duty to help my friend—"

     I interrupt her words by pulling her into a hug. She's taken aback, I know, but I still hug her. Her arms slowly lift, but not to push me away, they lift to hug me in return. The world fades, the universe expands, stars die and are born with each exhale. We're the only beings in existence.

     I'm no longer an isolated island.

     "I never had sex with her," I whisper. "I got pretty close though, but there was no feelings on her part so I stopped it."

     "I know," her voice mimics my tone.

     "You're the only friend I have, Chapman."

     "I know."

     "You're not a replacement."

     "I know." She squeezes me just a little. "Hell or high water, Toby. Let's go watch the tape."

     We're back in my man-cave and the VHS player waits for us. I slide the tape in and take a seat beside Kristen. Greg is no longer a part of our mission, it's just her and I.

     Static fills the screen for a second or two and then Cassie is there. Her happy disposition is gone, she looks a little more faded that the bright, vibrant girl in the first tape. I recognize her clothes. This tape must have been made a month before she left.

     "Toby . . ." Cassie says to the camera. "I should have told you everything sooner. I didn't want to tell you this way, but if you find this tape, it means I didn't have a choice. You told me about your video collection and I saw the layer of dust on it. I knew it was a place you wouldn't look unless you were told specifically to."

     Kristen shifts uneasily at my side. "Maybe I should go, this tape isn't for us, it's just for you."

     I catch her wrist to keep her from going anywhere. "Stay."

     So she does.

    Cassie pauses to look over her shoulder at something—or someone off camera—and then back again. "I'm sorry for being a crummy friend Toby. Our friendship was confusing and messy,  but that made it kind of beautiful too. My life changed because of two things: my adoption and you. I grew up with a drug addict mother and entered the foster care system. I never expected to be adopted. Lily Learner was 41 at the time and wanted a girl who's age better matched her own. Suddenly, I was in a family that had money. I went from sharing a room with three other girls to having a large empty room with just me in it. My life style was better, but I was lonely—then there was you . . . "

     A lump forms in my throat as our past is made fresh again. Cassie mentions the day we first met and the horrible haircut and problematic skin I had.

     "My time with you helped to mask the ugliness I knew. Then I met Greg Summers and his grandfather Gregory Senior. This . . . is where things get complicated. Gregory Senior turned out to have a business on the rise, they were going to break out of their six figure income and turn it into a seven-figure income. This is because of success, right? Wrong. I found out just how wrong. I learned one secret that I couldn't unlearn."

     Cassie sighs with heavy shoulders and a head shake. "The only option left for me is to run away and try to take care of things from a safe distance, but I can't do it alone. No one will question the idea of a former foster-care kid running away from home, cause we're all considered delinquents. Right? The police won't spend much time or energy looking for me. I can't ask Lily for help just yet because she's involved in Gregory's business. So I am left to reach out to the three people I can still trust. Kristen my confidant, Eddie my foster-brother and you, my best-friend forever . . . "

     The tape stops. There's nothing more, no instructions and no bread crumbs. We have to wait for the next postcard.

     I'm mad. Mad at Cassie for not telling me sooner and mad for her reaching out to me in a way where I can't give a response. I'm angry at Greg and mostly at myself for not doing more. Hindsight really sucks.

     I get up, walk over to the posters on my walls and start tearing them apart with my fingers.

     "Toby!" Kristen calls to me, but there is no stopping it.

     I'm too much of a giant for her to be able to keep me from ruining my own man-cave. Once every poster lies on the ground ripped to shreds I feel better. Kristen sits on the couch watching me nervously hoping that I don't do more than shred up paper.

     "I'm fine," I say to put her at ease.

     She places both her hands on one of my arms and her eyes are filled with hope. "Do you know what this tape means? It means we can fix it. If we fix it, Cassie can come back. Don't you see? This is a good thing."

     I'm skeptical. "How? She didn't give us any instructions."

     "You already have a clue—Becker & Long. We just have to figure out the connection they have to David Walters and Greg's grandfather."

     I gently try to pry her fingers off me. "There is no we. Greg told me that he was pulling me into this mess. For Cassie to run off the way she did it means her life was at risk. My life is probably at risk now too and I don't even know why yet. You don't have to risk yours."

     Kristen doesn't let me go. "You don't get to shut me out Toby. I'm in on this with you, wherever this path leads we face it together."

     My emotions shift between the color black to a neutral blue. Everything inside me is suppressed into some imaginary box and locked away with Cassie's name on it. I look down at Kristen's small, rounded face and slender fingers.

     "You need to leave," I warn her.

     "Why?" She asks.

     "Because if you don't, I can't promise that I won't try to kiss you again."

     She doesn't move. Her lips part and our eyes lock together in an unbroken chain. I don't understand why she wants me, everyday she learns more about how messed up I am.

     I give her one final warning. "You shouldn't want me to kiss you. There's a lot of emotional baggage tied up in this six-foot-two sized humanoid."

     Kristen may as well be made of stone because she still doesn't move or break eye contact.

     "Dammit Chapman!" I pull her up from the couch and firmly against me. She makes a quick gasp that literally drives me crazy and I kiss her. I hold her face and her waist and kiss her hard. Her fingers squeeze fistfuls of my shirt and she presses back against my kiss with just as much force as me. We're two sides of the same wave, a force to be reckoned with.

     We stumbled over torn strips of paper, empty cans of energy drinks and game box covers. I press her back against the wall and one of her legs wrap around me like a ballerina amid a pirouette.

     Kristen bends her back with her feelings raw and available.

     Her hands push on my chest and we break the kiss. We pant in unison heavily as the electricity we created dissipates.

     One kiss with Kristen made me feel high, like I had flown to the moon and back. It's nothing like it was with Cassie. I try to compare it to anything with Cassie. Is this what kissing was supposed to feel like, or is Kristen a miracle worker?

     Her leg slides back down against mine until her foot touches the ground again. I press my forehead against the wall still trying to catch my breath.

     "I have a lot of emotional baggage too, Toby. You just haven't seen it yet," she says so quietly that I have to strain to hear her.

     "So this—" I motion between the two of us. "—what does it mean?"

     Kristen sighs and every sound that leaves her makes me tempted to kiss her again. "I don't know, Toby. Maybe it means we're scared and only have each other."

     Is that really all it is?

     I nudge her nose with mine. "Being scared doesn't make my mouth want your mouth."

     She smiles, but it's a sad smile. "Would your mouth still want my mouth if Cassie was around?"

     I think on it and I don't have a decisive answer for her.

     Kristen wiggles out from me and collects her things really calmly. "I know that I'm not a replacement for Cassie, but in your mind you do still compare me to her. What you both had was long, intense and unique. She will always be your first and greatest love. Your story with her still continues; I'm just a road-bump in your path towards her."

     She nears me once more, but only to kiss my cheek and show me that she isn't upset. "I'll take a rain-check on the dinner. Maybe next Friday, right?"

     "Right," I say gruffly.

     Then she heads up the staircase and far from where my eyes can see her anymore. I lay down on a pile of ripped posters and evaluate my feelings for both Cassie and Kristen.

     On one hand, there is the girl I've loved for several years and on the other hand there is Kristen, who at least likes me back. I can't completely fall for Kristen unless I know how Cassie feels about me, and that isn't fair to Kristen.

     Cassie is my chaos and I am Kristen's . . .