"What the hell took you so long to get back?" Troy asked you almost as soon as you walked in  the door. "School ended for you like an hour ago."
"I was talking to someone." You replied, shrugging as you went into the kitchen and placed your car keys on the counter. About a month and a half after you and Mark had stopped talking, you ended up getting your license, which was mostly due to the fact that Troy had said that he was getting tired of driving you around everywhere. The only problem that you two ran into now was that you had to share Troy's truck since you didn't have the money to get your own car. Since this was the case, you and Troy decided that you would have days where either he or you got the truck for the entire day before it rotated the next day to the next person so that they could have the truck for the entire day.
"Who were you talking to?" Troy asked, a small smirk forming on his face.
You rolled your eyes as you walked into the living room. "If you think that it was Mark that I was talking to, you're mistaken."
"Damn." He muttered underneath his breath as he sat down on the couch.
"Why are you upset about that?" You asked him as you sat down next to him.
Troy shrugged. "I don't know. I thought you two would eventually become more than friends. You guys seemed like you had something between you that was pretty much impossible to break. I'll be honest with you when I tell you that I was waiting for the day that I heard that you two had gotten together."
"What?" You asked, shocked by what he had just told you. "Troy, Mark and I didn't even know each other that long before we completely stopped talking. Besides, I had no romantic feelings towards him and he had no romantic feelings towards me. He was too busy mourning his deceased ex-girlfriend to fall in love with anyone and besides, we both came to the agreement that we would stay friends and that we didn't want to lose each other as friends."
Suddenly remembering all the times that you shared with Mark in the short almost two month time span that you knew each other, you felt tears forming in your eyes. Not wanting to cry because of the past, you sighed and asked Troy, "Hey, can we talk about something else please?"
"Yeah, we can talk about something else." Troy whispered as he placed a hand on your shoulder. "I'm sorry for bringing that up. I should've known that you were still upset about losing your friendship with Mark."
"I wasn't upset when I ended things with Derek." You whispered back. "Derek only wanted me around so that he could complain and so he had someone with him whenever he decided to do drugs in case he ever got caught. He also wanted me around to try and get me to fall in love with him." You sighed as you recalled Derek and everything he did for the first time in a long time. "But with things ended with Mark..." You trailed off as you stared down at the ground as memories you had made with the now electric blue haired boy, from the shopping trip to the mall where you made him his own flower crown to the night where he showed you his drawings and actually gave you to keep, flashed inside of your mind one by one. Even to this day, you kept the drawing Mark had given you hanging up on your wall so that you could look at it every single day and remember all the times that you shared with him before things ended so suddenly. "I didn't even know what to think. I didn't want to be upset because I've dealt with losing friendships before. But when I realized that our friendship was truly over, I became devastated. I tried for a couple of weeks to contact Mark, but he would ever even respond. After I gave up trying to be his friend again, I moved out of his house and moved in with you after you told me that you could. Ever since that day, I've just been trying to get by. I've also been trying where exactly I want to go to college and want I want to do with my life because I have no fucking idea what I'm going to do with myself after I graduate next year."
"I totally get it." Troy said as he stood up from where he was sitting. "I was in exactly the same situation you're in right now back when I was a junior in high school. Trust me when I say that things will get better. You'll find something that you love doing and you'll find a college that's the perfect fit for you."
"I sure hope so." You sighed, looking up only to find that Troy had walked into the kitchen. "I also hope that my friendship with Mark isn't gone forever."

*****

Deciding that staying inside and smoking weed with Troy in order to forget about things wasn't really what you wanted to do for the first time in a long time, you left the house with intentions of heading to the park. Feeling glad that it was your day to have Troy's truck all to yourself, you unlocked it and opened the door before climbing into the driver's seat. After doing so, you closed the door and buckled your seatbelt. You let out a sigh as you started the car and began making your way to the park.

*****

After arriving at the park, you found yourself heading to the same spot where you and Mark had sat and talked a couple of times. As you were walking to the old spot that you once shared with the sixteen year old boy, you wondered why you had suddenly started thinking about him. For about three months, Mark was someone who you never thought about because you knew that it would only bring you pain and sadness if you did. 
At that moment, you realized what had caused you to suddenly start thinking about Mark again. Once you realized what it was, it began replaying in your mind.
You saw the girl with the extremely long electric blue hair wearing the flower crown that you had made just for Mark.
You saw the girl running her fingers through her unbelievably long hair and keeping her eyes on Mark as she did so.
"Okay girl-that-I-don't-even-know-the-name-of, you can kindly get out of my head." You muttered as you forced yourself to push the girl out of your head because you knew that if you thought about how Mark had shoved you out of his life and replaced you with her, then you would just become sad again.

"Woah there, are you jealous of someone?"
Hearing a voice behind you caused your heart to leap up into your throat. You turned your head in the direction that you heard the voice and immediately saw that August was standing nearby.
"You scared the living daylights out of me, you know that?" You asked him as you placed your hand on your chest and breathed a sigh of relief.
August chuckled. It was then that you noticed that he had a really nice laugh, much like someone else that you knew...
Stop it (Y/N). You scolded yourself. You came here to take your mind off the situation with Mark and that's exactly what you're going to do.
"I didn't mean to." August smiled. "You were so immersed in your thoughts that you didn't notice me approaching you. And then when you muttered to yourself and I overheard what you said, I decided that my curiosity was quite piqued and that I wanted to know exactly what you were talking about." He adjusted his glasses and began slightly swinging his guitar case, which he was holding with his left hand, as he ever so slightly bit his lip.
"Is that so?" You smiled back at him as you made your way over to the fountain and sat down on the edge of it. You felt water droplets hitting your back as you watched as August sat down next to you. He set his guitar case down next to him before he unlocked it and took his guitar out before placing it on his lap.
"Yeah, it is so." He placed his hand on the strings of his guitar as he placed his other hand in his pocket. A moment later, he pulled out a purple guitar pick and smiled down at it.
"A purple guitar pick, huh?" You asked, deciding that you would tease him a bit. "How manly."
August looked back over at you and his eyes met yours. As you looked into his eyes, you could see that his eyes were brown. They were the exact shade of brown that Mark's were.
August, why the hell do you remind me so much of Mark? I was starting to think that you were going to help me forget about and move on from him. But all you're doing is making me miss him even more.
"Purple's a very manly color (Y/N)." August grinned. Even the way he smiled reminded you of Mark. His eyes even crinkled like Mark's did whenever he smiled. "But pink's the manliest color of them all."
Hearing him say that caused Mark to flash in your mind. You saw the then pink-haired boy with a huge grin on his face as he saw the flower crown that you had made for him. You also saw his eyes crinkling more than they usually did, something that only happened when he was extremely happy.
(Y/N), how many times do you have to remind yourself to not think about that Pre... No, Ugly Boy. He's moved on. Why can't you?

"You okay there (Y/N)?"
August's voice pulled you away from your thoughts and you were relieved when he did so. You had no idea what would've happened had you continued to think about Mark. Knowing how you were, more memories of Mark would've popped up in your mind and they all would cause you to start crying. The last thing that you wanted to do was cry in front of August, especially since you just met him today.
You nodded. "Yeah, I'm fine."
"Are you sure?"
You nodded again. "Yes, I'm sure. I was just thinking about a couple insignificant things, that's all."
Insignificant. Yeah, you wish they were insignificant things. You scoffed silently to yourself.
August shrugged. "If you say so. I won't push the matter any further. After all, I literally just met you today. Your personal matters aren't my business."
You really didn't know how to respond so you just stared at the gray and black flannel that he was wearing. Not only did have have the same brown eyes as Mark, but he had the same crinkle in his eyes when he smiled. August even dressed similarly to Mark. While Mark usually went for a red flannel, August seemed like he prefered to go for a gray and black one. But while the flannel choice differed between the two of them, their choice of shoes didn't. August wore the same black Converse that Mark frequently wore.
Why do you have to be so similar to him? You silently asked August. I know you're not trying to be and that you're just being yourself, but you're seriously almost exactly like Mark.

"I think that this place could use a little bit of spicing up." August pulled you away from your thoughts once more as you watched him take a hat out of his guitar case and place it down next to his feet. "I could also use a bit of pocket money."
You couldn't help but smile as you thought about how you were going to hear August play again. Sure, you had heard him play earlier, but this time around, you were going to hear him play while he was sitting right next to you.
"Any song requests?" August asked you as he moved his guitar pick from right hand over to his left hand.
You shook your head. "Play the first song that comes to your mind."
August smiled slightly. "I'll play the song that I was playing in the band room earlier then."
"By the way, what was that song?" You asked him before you forgot to do so. "I was listening in order to try and figure what it was, but I couldn't figure out what song it was."
"It's probably because I wrote it myself." August's slight smile turned into a grin of pride. "It's the first song I've ever written." His grin of pride disappeared almost as soon as it appeared. "To be honest, it's probably not even that great."
"Why do you say that? I'm sure that it's wonderful." You reassured him.
August let out a sigh. "I don't really think it is."
"Well, why don't you let me and everyone else in the park be that judge of that then?" You smiled a bit. "You did take a hat out of your guitar case and put it down on the ground with the intention of making some money."
"Yeah, you've got me there." August bit his lip as he began tuning his guitar. You watched as his right hand twisted the knobs and his left hand occasionally strummed to check whether or not the guitar was tuned or not. After a few moments passed, he let out a frustrated sigh as he continued to tune his guitar. "Man, this thing is so old. It gets out of tune so easily. It drives me insane."
You didn't respond as you continued to watch him tune his guitar. Something about watching him tune his guitar was fascinating. Perhaps it was because he was left-handed and could successfully play a guitar with his left hand. As you realized that he was left-handed, you began to wonder if he was self-taught or if someone taught him how to play.
"So, I'm curious." You decided that you would go through with asking him. "How'd you learn to play guitar? I imagine that it was pretty hard to learning how to play seeing as you're left-handed."
August laughed a bit as he began tuning his guitar. "Oh, you think I'm left-handed?"
"Yeah..." You trailed off, confused by his response.
"Well, technically speaking, I'm ambidextrous." He shrugged a bit. "But I find myself using my left hand more than my right hand."
You grinned a bit. "I'm guessing that you prefer using your left hand when you play guitar?"
August nodded as he moved the guitar so that he was holding it in a way that a right-handed person would hold their guitar while playing it. "But to answer your earlier question about how I learned to play guitar, my parents signed me up for guitar lessons when I was nine because... Well, I don't actually know exactly why they signed me up. I think they must've thought I could be some musical genius or something. Well, that's what I wanted to believe when I was younger. But now that I'm looking back, they most likely wanted me out of the house so that their attention could solely be on Julian." He rolled his eyes and began lightly strumming his guitar and continued to speak, "And yeah, I guess they were right when they said I could be a musical genius. I took lessons for a year before my parents decided to stop paying for them because they decided to send Julian to Boy Scouts and a bunch of sport camps." August's hands seemed to tense up as he continued to talk about his little brother. "I swear, Julian had both of my mom's and my dad's full attention almost one-hundred percent of the time and yet, look who turned out to be the one who wasn't dead because of him." August stopped strumming and put his guitar on the ground with the neck of it leaning against the fountain. He continued to hold his guitar pick in his left hand as his hand formed into a fist. "I always had a bad feeling about that kid. I always had this feeling in the back of my mind that he was going to do something terrible. And guess what? I was right." He let out a sigh as his left hand slowly opened up so that it was no longer a fist.
"August..." You trailed off, not even knowing what to say and feeling pretty pathetic because of it.
"No, it's okay. You don't have to say anything." You felt a tiny but of relief that August spoke up so that there wouldn't be awkward silence between the two of you as you struggled to find something to say. "I kinda went off on a little tangent and rambled too much. I bet that that was pretty annoying to listen to."
"No, it wasn't annoying at all." You shook your head as you spoke truthfully to him. "In fact, I thought that it was pretty cool to hear about your past. I like hearing about people's past experiences. It's one of the many things that makes a person who they are."
August smiled a bit and smiled a bit as he placed his guitar back on his lap. "Yeah, you do make a good point there." He adjusted the guitar so that he would be able to play it with his left hand. "So, let's get back to what we were focused on before I went on that little rant of mine." He moved his guitar pick in his hand so that he could hold onto it with all of his fingers. The tip of the guitar pick grazed the middle string of August's guitar as he very slightly bit his lip, which is something you started to think was a habit of his. "This is the song I was playing in the band room earlier and the song that I wrote."
You smiled as he began playing. As you were listening, you realized that he was actually way better than you thought he was at playing the guitar. It was almost as if he had been playing it ever since he learned how to walk rather than since he was nine. Still continuing to listen, you bent down and moved the hat he seemed to keep in his guitar case so that it would be more apparent to people who happened to walk by and hear him play.

Almost as soon as you moved the hat, a girl walked by and stopped in her tracks as she heard August playing. After studying this girl for a few moments, you realized that she had the same long blue hair and the same flower crown as the girl that Mark had kissed in the hallway earlier today.
But that was probably because she was that girl.
She began walking towards you and August while holding the hand of none other than Mark. As you saw the two of them holding hands, you forced yourself to look at the sixteen year old that you had once deemed to be a Pretty Boy. He really did look and act different than the Mark you knew five months earlier. You missed it when he had his light pink hair and flower crown combination. You missed it when you were the only person that he hung out with because you were the only friend that he had and because he seemed to genuinely like you as a friend.
Now that you were thinking about, you realized that you missed him.
Even though you didn't want to admit it to yourself, you wanted to be his friend again.
You wanted to hang out with him again.
You wanted to do things like go to the mall and go all the way to Cleveland again.
Those days are gone (Y/N). You need to realize this and move on. Your Pretty Boy turned ugly.

You felt your body tense up as Mark and what you assumed to be his girlfriend walking over to you and August. You wondered if you should say something to Mark when he got close enough to you to actually hear you. If you had decided that you would say something, it would something simple, such as, "Hey Mark" or "What's up Mark?" because it had been months since the two of you had last talked and you didn't really know what else you would say to him if you actually decided that you were going to do so.
But of course, in typical (Y/N) fashion, you didn't say anything to Mark once he was close enough to you where he could hear you if you actually were to say something to him. You just forced yourself to look down as he reached into the pocket of his jeans and pulled out his wallet. You felt like someone had punched you in the stomach when you saw that it was a Legend Of Zelda wallet. The only reason it hurt to see that his wallet was a Legend Of Zelda wallet was because it made you think of the night where you and Mark had cosplayed as Link and Zelda respectively. You never remembered him having that wallet so you assumed that he had bought it with that night still in his mind.
You resisted the urge to look up at the once Pretty Boy as he put what looked to be a five dollar bill into August's hat. Soon after Mark had put money into the hat, the girl followed suit, though instead of putting one bill into the hat, she put two into the hat and they were what appeared to be two five dollar bills from where you were sitting.

As you were about to bend down in order to move the money from the hat to inside of August's guitar case, the girl put a small piece of paper into the hat. Wondering what exactly the contents of the piece of paper were, you waited for Mark and the girl to walk away and disappear from your line of sight before you looked at August to make sure he was still immersed in playing his guitar. Once you were sure that he would pay you no mind, you bent down and picked up the hat. You removed the money and placed it into the guitar case before you removed the small piece of paper from the hat and placed the hat right back where it was. You unfolded the piece of paper only to discover that the girl had written, "You're extremely cute and talented. Call me sometime." before adding a smiley face and what you assumed to be her phone number at the end.
So, does this mean that she's not Mark's girlfriend?
No, she has to be. Mark kissed her in the hallway.
But if she was dating Mark, why would she give August her phone number?
Deciding that you were going against your reasoning for actually going to the park by thinking about Mark, you placed the piece of paper into August's guitar case just as he finished playing the song he had written.
"So, what did you think?"
"I thought that it was absolutely beautiful." You grinned as you looked over at him. You then pointed to his guitar case. "And guess what? A couple people share the same opinion as I do."
August adjusted his glasses as he looked inside of the guitar case. "Wow, I didn't think that people would actually give me money. But I wonder why they left money in there instead of the hat. That's a little bit strange."
"I put it in there." You told him. "I wanted to make room so that more people could leave money."
August smiled a bit. "I guess I'll have to play a couple more songs to see if people will leave me more money or not."
You silently sighed with relief because he hadn't noticed the small piece of paper inside of the guitar case. You didn't want August to get involved with the girl who left her phone number until you knew what exactly was going on between her and Mark.

As August began playing another song, you heard your phone buzz, which indicated that you had received a text message. You pulled your phone out of your pocket and you were shocked to see that you had a text from Mark.
I love you.
Before you could even react to the text message, Mark immediately messaged you again.
Shit, wrong person. Ignore that please.
You resisted letting out a sigh of anger as you began typing your response to him.
I miss you.
You stared at the simple, yet complicated three words you had typed. What would happen if you actually decided to press the send button? Most importantly of all, what would Mark think if you ended up pressing the send button?
Not wanting to find out the answer to the questions you had, you deleted the short message that you had typed. Instead, you decided that you were going to tell him how you felt about what's been going on for the last five months.
No, I won't ignore it. You don't talk to me for months and yet you claim that you messaged the wrong person. What the hell has happened to you in the last five months? It's almost as if you've been replaced. What happened to the Mark Fischbach I knew all those months ago? You know, the Mark Fischbach that was so kind and the Mark Fischbach that once cherished the friendship that we once had? Who or what changed you?

As you pressed the send button after you finished typing everything that you wanted to say, you realized that you didn't want to hear what his response to your message would be.
Upon realizing this, you blocked him, not sure how you felt about making your feelings about the whole situation known to him. All you knew is that you didn't want him to know that you missed him.