Mark had an emotionless look on his face as he stood up and grabbed both his sketchbook and dry erase board before heading over to where his mother was, which was at the bottom of the hill. You followed behind him, not really knowing what else you should do.
"I've been looking for you for hours and hours." Mark's mother crossed her arm and had an expression on her face that showed she was extremely pissed off at her youngest son. "Tom told me that you were probably in Columbus. The only reason I found you was because I saw your car and read your license plate, which, by the way, I know by heart."
Mark didn't make eye contact with his mother as he slowly raised his dry erase board to see where he could both see it and write on it.
"No, I don't even want you to write anything." Mark's mother took his dry erase board and marker from him. "You've been scaring everyone that cares about you so much recently. You almost took all of your pills the other night, you disappeared for an entire month and tried to tell me not to worry about you, and now you come all the way out here without even telling me. You told me that you were sick. Now I know why you were ignoring my calls and texts."
Mark continued to avoid eye contact with her.
"You're grounded. As soon as we get home, I'm taking your keys. The only time I'm going to allow you to drive is when you go to school and when we drive home tonight. But for the next month, you're grounded. Now, come on."
Mark trudged behind his mother and stared at the ground as he did so. Not knowing what else to do, you followed behind the pink-haired boy. You didn't bother trying to break the high tension that existed between him, his mother, and yourself because you only felt like you would make things even worse by doing so.

*****

"Well, I'll see you in the morning when we drive to school, I guess." You said to Mark after you had arrived home, but not after having to endure an extremely awkward two hour drive back home to Cincinnati. He had closed his door behind him before you could actually say anything to his face. You guessed that he didn't get grounded very often so he was taking actually being grounded pretty hard.
"Please don't do anything you'll regret, Mark." You didn't care whether or not he was actually listening. You were just scared what could happen behind the closed door you were currently staring at. "And please don't do anything that will hurt not only you, but the people around you as well."
You waited a few moments for his response, but it never came. You sighed and went into your room, hoping that Mark would be feeling at least a little bit better when morning came around.

*****

"Mark, here are your keys." Mark's mother said as you and the flower crown wearing boy went into the kitchen. "Don't you dare go anywhere after school. You better come straight home and put your keys back in the kitchen. If you want to go anywhere after that, you're going to have to walk."
Mark took his keys from her hand and motioned for you to follow him. When he did so, you noticed that he didn't have his dry erase board with him at all. That was definitely something that was off because he always carried it with him wherever he went.
"Mark, aren't you forgetting something?" You asked him, hoping that he really did just forget to grab it rather than not bringing it on purpose.
He stopped in his tracks when you asked this and seemed to think about your question for a few moments before shaking his head and beginning to head out to his car again.
You sighed, deciding to tell him what he was, hopefully at least, forgetting. "Your dry erase board, Mark. That's what you're forgetting."
He looked back at you and shook his head.
You sighed again. "We're having a little talk as soon as we step outside."

"Look, I get it that you're upset about being grounded, but you need to stop acting like such a drama king." You crossed your arms and sighed yet again. "You did something wrong and now you're being punished for it. You need to take your punishment and admit that you made a mistake. You didn't even tell your mom that you were sorry for not telling her where you were."
Mark crossed his arms as well and rolled his eyes.
"You're only doing that because you know I'm right."
Mark shrugged and rolled his eyes again.
"Whatever, be like that." You rolled your eyes as well and began making your way to his car. When you reached the passenger side, you attempted to open the door, only to find that it was locked.
"Unlock the door!" You called out to Mark.
He shook his head.
"We have to go! Do you want to be late?"
He turned his back towards you.
"Mark Fischbach, you are acting like a complete and utter child right now!" You tried to open the door again, only to find that it was still locked. "You would be just fine if your mom didn't ground you. In fact, you'd probably do something like that again."
He kept his back turned towards you.
"Mark Edward Fischbach, your behavior is absolutely ridiculous." You yelled at the top of your lungs as you tried opening the car door for a third time and discovered that it was still locked. "You're acting like an immature brat!"
Mark didn't need to be facing you in order to know that he rolled his eyes at that moment.
"Fine, I'll just walk to school then!" You gave up on waiting for him to unlock the door. "Also, don't even bother waiting for me at the end of the day because I'm going to see how Julian's doing and I don't want you to come." You turned and began walking to school, trying to push Mark out of your mind because he had pissed you off quite a bit.

*****

At the end of the day as you were about to walk out of school, you felt a hand on your shoulder. You turned your head only to see that Mark was standing behind you.
"I told you that I didn't want to see you and I meant it." You forced him to remove his hand from your shoulder by shrugging your shoulders. "I'll be back home later. Don't text me because I won't respond."
You stormed away from him, not looking back to see what his reaction was because you honestly didn't care. He was the last person that you wanted to see right now.

*****

"Julian? Oh yes, he's actually been asking to see you ever since he got off life support yesterday."
"What? But I thought you said he would never speak again."
"He found another way of communicating."
"How so?"
"He communicates in sign language."
"Oh. That's nice." You smiled a bit. "But I don't understand sign language." You frowned when you realized this.
"One of Julian's nurses does. I'll have her stay in the room with you two so she can tell you what he's saying to you."

*****

When you stepped into Julian's room, you almost wished that you hadn't.
There were countless machines surrounding his bed. There were some that you recognized, like the heart monitor for instance. But there were others that you swore you've never seen in your entire life and sure as hell didn't know the names of.
As for Julian, he looked like an entirely different person.
He had a breathing tube in his nose and countless needles and wires throughout his entire body. When he opened his eyes, it was almost as if all color had been drained out of them.
He honestly looked like he was hardly alive.
"Julian..." You trailed off, not really knowing what to say to him.
The extremely tall boy slowly raised both of his arm and began speaking using sign language.
"Julian, I... I don't understand sign language."
"He simply said, "Hi (Y/N)."
You jumped when you heard a voice behind you. You turned around and saw a nurse standing behind you.
"I'm assuming that you're his nurse?"
"Yes, that would be me. And you are (Y/N), I presume?"
You simply nodded in response.
"I was told you needed my assistance translating what Julian is saying to you. Is that correct?"
"Yeah, I never learned sign language." You laughed a little.
""I was afraid you would never come.""
"Huh?"
"That's what he just said." The nurse pointed to Julian.
"Oh." You looked back at him. "Hey, I didn't even knew that you learned sign language, Julian."
The nurse managed to keep up with Julian perfectly as he signed. ""I've known since I was little. My mother taught me because she was a sign language teacher.""
"That's cool." You smiled a bit. "So, how you've been?"
""Oh, you know, I've just been stuck in this fucking hospital bed with shitty ass hospital food."" The nurse sighed as she translated. "Julian, watch your language. And the food really isn't that bad?"
He started signing to the nurse, who didn't bother translating what he was saying.
"Well, I would love to leave you two alone but (Y/N) won't be able to understand anything that you're saying."
Julian rolled his eyes, clearly annoyed as he looked back at you and started signing.
""Where's Pipsqueak? I need to use that dry erase board of this?""
You sighed. "First of all, he has a name. Second of all, he's not here because I'm pissed off at him."
""What the fuck did he do?" The nurse sighed as Julian continued using profanity.
"To make a long story short, he got grounded for a month and he acted like an immature brat this morning because of it." You sighed again as you remembered how Mark had refused to unlock his car for you earlier. "He's only allowed to drive his car to and from school and he's pissed off because of it."
""Man, Pipsqueak getting in trouble? Damn, that's something that I didn't think would ever happen. But I seriously need to talk to you alone." He looked towards the nurse and signed something that you tried to at least somewhat understand, but you ended up failing miserably.
"I can go get you a dry erase board." The nurse replied to Julian. "You just have to wait while I do so."
Julian nodded the slightest bit as she left the room, taking her time as she did so.

"You know, you don't even look like the Julian I knew back in eighth grade or the Julian I knew before... Well, you know." You kneeled down so that you could get more on his level, which you found very strange to be doing so since normally you would have to really strain your neck upwards in order to look him in the eyes since he was so tall. "You've changed a lot in three years. What the hell happened?"
You immediately felt stupid for asking him a question because the only means of communication that he had was something that you didn't understand.
Julian scooted over as far as he possibly could that wouldn't make him fall off the bed and patted the spot he had moved from.
"Fine, but only because you've been stuck here by yourself for the past few days."
Julian smiled a bit as you laid down next to him.
"Wow, this reminds me of the old days." You felt his arm wrap around you and you didn't protest because, despite all the shit he's pulled over the past three years, you still cared about his well-being. You never wished for any of what happened to him as a result of Mark shooting him in the head to actually happen. "You know, the days where you weren't an asshole and weren't cheating on me." You rolled your eyes as you couldn't help but point out just how much Julian had changed over the past three years and how his decision to cheat on you was very shitty on his part. "With that being said, I'm really wondering why the hell I'm allowing you to wrap your arm around me and why I decided to lay next to you in the first place."

*****

When the nurse returned to the room with a dry erase board and marker in her hand, she placed it down next to you and left the room without saying a single word.
You sighed as you sat up before getting off of the hospital bed. "Okay, there's the dry erase board that you wanted oh so badly. Say what you've been dying to say."
Julian slowly sat up, wincing in pain as he did so. He placed the dry erase board on his lap and began writing.
There's so many things that I want to say. I don't even know where to start.
You shrugged. "Well, you have to start somewhere, so you better pick a place where you're going to start."
Julian stared at the ceiling and placed the cap of the dry erase marker on his chin. You assumed that he was probably thinking about what it was when he wanted to say.

So, you know that Pipsqueak had a girlfriend before he met you, right? It felt like forever had passed before Julian had actually started writing.
You sighed, not really feeling like correcting Julian for saying "Pipsqueak" rather than "Mark."
"Yeah, her name was Amy." You paused for a moment before speaking again. "Wait, what does this have to do with anything?"
You know she's dead, right?
"Yeah, I know." You felt a little sick as you remembered Amy's gruesome suicide video. "I'd rather not talk about this."
We have to talk about this (Y/N).
"Why do we have to talk about this?" You whispered, looking down at the ground as you remembered how much Mark had cared about the blonde-haired and flower crown wearing girl. "Mark's heart was broken into a million pieces when he found out what she did. I don't like talking about things that don't make him happy. Even though I'm really pissed at him, I want him to ultimately end up happy more than anything because he's my friend and I care about my friends a lot."
Listen (Y/N), let's not get off topic. There's something you need to know.
"What is it?"
Did you watch Amy's video? The one where she... Well, you know.
"Yeah, I watched it. Why?"
Did you notice anything weird about the video?
You didn't even have to think about his question in order to come up with an answer. "Yes, as a matter of fact. I did indeed notice something weird about the video."
What did you notice about the video that seemed weird to you?
"I noticed that it ended very abruptly."
What do you mean by that? Please, explain to me further.
"Well, it ended almost as soon she was done... stabbing herself in the stomach." The video again flashed in your mind and you felt sick as you saw all the blood that was all over Amy, especially around her stomach. "Which is kinda weird because she didn't get up to turn off the camera and there's no way that the camera died because the video wouldn't have saved otherwise."
You are correct. That was the thing that you were hoping you would bring up.
"What the hell do you know about that video, Julian?" You asked as you crossed your arms and looked directly in his eyes. "It's now clear to me that you know something since you just said that you were hoping I would bring up the fact that the video ended abruptly."
Did you ever consider the fact that someone could've stopped the video because they were present at the time of her suicide?
"Well, maybe once or twice..."
No one seemed to care about the video ending so suddenly. All they seemed to care about that sweet and innocent Amy Nelson was dead.
"How do you know her name?" You found it strange that he knew her at all, especially since he even knew her last name. You didn't even know what her last name was until he revealed it just now.
Julian seemed to laugh a bit despite not having a voice to actually produce a laugh. How do I know her? Oh, (Y/N), her and I go back quite a long time.
"What do you mean by that?" You were starting to getting annoyed at how incredibly vague he was being.
Let's just say that we share a little bit of DNA. Her mother is my mother. Well, I guess I should say "was" because my mother is no longer with us. But even though we had the same mother, we did not have the same father. Since I don't think your brain can properly process things without me stating the obvious, the reason why Amy and I go back quite a long time is because she was my half sister. She was exactly one year younger than me. We shared the same birthday and everything.
"You never told me that you had a half sister. You told me that you were an only child."
Julian shrugged. A little white lie never hurt anyone. I guess while I'm over here telling you everything, I'll tell you that I have an older brother too.
"Who's your older brother?" You asked him, feeling both a little angry and hurt that he had lied about being an only child.
You don't know him so it doesn't even matter. Besides, I don't even know if he's alive. He ran away from home a few years ago and people have basically given up on looking for him. Some assume that he's dead and others assume that he's alive, but he's either keeping a low profile or he's going by a different name and drastically changed his appearance. But I digress, this is not the topic at hand. We were talking about Amy's video.
"Right." You paused for a moment as you thought of a question to ask him. You didn't speak again until you actually thought of something. "So, what involvement do you have in the death of your half sister? It's become clear to me that you had something to do with what she did to herself.
"Something to do with what she did to herself?" Julian seemed to silently laugh at that moment as if you had told him that it was raining cats and dogs outside. While he was writing, he had to erase what he had already written numerous time and he rolled his eyes every time he did so after giving you a few moments to read what he had written. Oh, (Y/N), you're such a jokester sometimes. I had everything to do with what she did to herself. As soon as I found out she was dating Pipsqueak, I knew that I had to do something about it because there was no way in hell that I wanted to possibly be in-laws with him one day, even if it wasn't a significant amount. I didn't want to be related to that Pretty Boy in any way, shape, or form. I, of course, thought about getting rid of him first, but then I realized that I would be more likely to get caught because of that mother of his. She kept an eye on everything that he did. She always seemed to know where he was and what he was doing at every single moment of the day. Upon realizing this, I realized that the only choice I had now was to kill Amy. After I realized that I had to kill Amy, I started putting everything together. My plan was to blackmail her saying that I was going to kill her precious boyfriend of hers if she didn't commit suicide on the date I specified. Of course, that young, dumb, and in love girl fell for it and I watched and filmed the entire thing. Even though Julian no longer possessed a voice, you knew that if he still did, he would be laughing the way a murderer laughs when they talk about what they did to their victims. I'll be honest when I say that I found it amazing to watch the way she stabbed herself nearly to death. I, of course, allowed myself to have the blow that ultimately resulted in her demise. After I stopped the video, I took that blood-stained kitchen knife of hers and drove it straight into her heart. Oh, (Y/N), you should've been there to witness it. The way the blood just spilled out of wounded heart was just so beautiful. It was this wonderful crimson color that, upon seeing it, I realized I wanted to see more of. But, of course, I knew that I couldn't kill again so soon, despite how much I wanted to. But then, the perfect opportunity for me to kill was born a few months later when both of my parents started to suspect that I was the reason Amy had committed suicide. Now, I couldn't have this because I had been on track with committing the perfect murder and I didn't want this ruined because of my stupid parents. So, I silenced them before they could actually figure out the truth. The dumb police still thinks that they're missing to this day. You think that they would've figured it out by now. But oh well, the more time I get to go without eating that nasty ass prison food, the better.

"Julian, you are the most twisted and disgusting human being that I have ever met in my entire life." You honestly couldn't believe that someone you had once dearly cared about was a cold-blooded and cold-hearted killer that was the cause of Amy's death, which was in turn caused by Mark's depression. "Just wait until the word gets out."
As you turned to leave, Julian somehow managed to grab ahold of your hair and yank you down to the ground. He winced in pain as he did so, making it obvious to you that he was forcing himself to muster up any strength that he had. You tried to escape him, but the pain from him holding onto your hair like his life depended on it proved to be too much for you to handle.
No word is getting out about this. You will keep your mouth shut about this by your own choice or I will not hesitate to make sure that someone shuts your mouth for now. Trust me when I say that I know people and I will know if you say even a single word about this. So, I would choose what you do about this information you've been given about this information extremely carefully if I were you. Do you understand me?
"Y-Yes, I understand." You whispered, your voice barely audible at all. "P-Please let me go now."
As you wish. Julian struggled to write with one hand, but he let go of your hair a moment later. Remember, I have eyes and ears everywhere (Y/N). I will know almost as soon as you even speak one word about everything I just told you, you can trust me on that.
You gulped when he said this. You also felt chills run down all the way down your spine. As you stood up, you found that your legs were so weak to the point that you almost fell over.
"I'm leaving now." You meant for what you said to come out as confident, but it came out as if you were a terrified child that had just gotten yelled at by their parents.
Don't come back to visit me ever again. If you follow what I said to you just a few moments ago, you will never see me again. And if I were you, I would keep it that way.
For the first time since meeting him in sixth grade, you were scared of Julian. Then again, his actions back then never pointed to the fact that he liked killing people and seeing people suffer. Besides, he had actually been pretty nice to you prior to what happened the night of the Halloween fair. He had even called the police on your parents and got them arrested, which you still found to be strange.
"I won't say a word." You promised him as you slowly backed away from him as if he would strike or snap at any given moment. "Y-You... G-Get well soon... I-I suppose."
At that moment, you turned your back to him and ran out of the room. You didn't look back until you were actually outside of the hospital and you thought you were dumb when you did so. You knew that Julian was bedridden and because of that, there was no way in hell that he would chase you. And yet, there was still a part of you that thought that he would because of everything he confessed to you during your visit.
Just then, a red Jetta Volkswagen pulled out of a parking spot that was closest to the hospital as it could possibly get. A moment later, it began driving towards you. It didn't stop until it was right across from you. A confused look fell on your face as whoever was inside the red Jetta Volkswagen began rolling down the window that was on the passenger's side.
"Mark? What the hell are you doing here? And why do you have your car?"
He beckoned for you to come inside.
You sighed, realizing that you had no choice because you really didn't feel like walking all the way back to Mark's house. "Fine, I'll get in. But you've got some explaining to do. And plus, I'm still mad at you from this morning."