I found Chase a beaten, bloody mess in the center of the snow blanketed football field a little after the last bell of the day sounded throughout the school. From where I stood at the school's front entrance, I caught only a slight glimpse of the limp black lump peeking out from the thick snow, nearly engulfing him within it. I started across the field without hesitation, my eyes finding the crutches discarded a few feet away, too far to be within reach for the limp figure waiting for the cold to consume him.

We'd gotten snow over the last few days, but I hadn't thought it to be enough to nearly hide a body.

"Chase?"

Casting a look downward, all I was greeted with was a pool of red. Fresh blood gushed from Chase's frost bitten nose, his teeth smeared with the same crimson liquid that had been spit up and on to the white snow at his side. He made no attempt to move or sit upright; it was as if he was already half dead.

"Chase." I repeated, crouching at his side. "Chase, hey."

Shaking him slowly, he was momentarily stirred out of his lifeless daze and turned his head in my direction. "Go away."

"It's freezing, Chase." I stood and swept both of his crutches from the snow before they could become embedded in it, tucking them under my arm as I fell back into a crouch at his side. "Come on, we've got to get you out of this before you get hypothermia."

He pushed my outstretched hand away. "I don't need your help, Harper."

"I don't care. I know you want to die, but I'm not going to stand around and watch it happen, let's go." I forced my bare hands into the thick snow until I felt the back of his black hoodie and started pushing him up. He was shaking his head repeatedly, but didn't make a move to try and stop me. Upon realizing I wasn't going to give up and wander off or stay out of the situation as everyone else apparently had, he helped as much as he could. Once he was sitting upright, the blood gushing from his nose fell at an increasingly alarming rate and splashed against my hand. Swallowing my queasiness, I reached forward and touched his chin, jerking my hand back once I felt how cold his skin was.

"Jesus, Chase." I whispered. "You're freezing."

Flakes of snow fell from his long lashes as he blinked. "On the inside too."

Ignoring the morbid comment, I tore my backpack open and pulled out a travel size pack of tissues. Tearing the wrapper off them, I shoved them into his hand and forced it up to his nose, tilting his head back in a swift movement.

"We've got to get you out of this snow, Chase. You've got to help me." I tugged on his arm a little, hoping it'd irritate him enough to agree. I got the sickening feeling he had lost most feeling in it when he appeared to be oblivious to the gesture.

I shook my head. "Chase, stop acting like a child and help me get you up."

"I can't feel my leg." he shut his eyes. "The one I usually can, I mean. The broken one is a lost cause anyway."

"If you don't let me help you up, I'm going to call 911." I threatened.

The threat hit a weak spot in his tough exterior, and he started to grasp my forearm with his ice cold fingertips. After a few failed attempts-one of which resulted in me collapsing in the snow beside him-I was finally able to get him to his feet. He kept his head bowed and shifted most of his weight on to my shoulders. With the little he did to help me get to the short brick wall outside the school, I was able to get him to the edge of it, allowing him to grip my shoulder for support.

"I'll pull my car around. Just stay right here." I ordered, touching his shoulder. "And make sure to keep the tissue against your nose and your head tilted back a little."

He looked far beyond protesting and nodded. Hurrying out to the emptying parking lot, I spotted my small silver Buick awaiting my arrival. Climbing into it, I checked behind me and drove the opposite way everyone was headed. Slowing the car to a stop along the curb in front of the school, I pulled the keys from the ignition and walked around the car to open the passenger's side door.

"Why are you helping me?" Chase questioned when I reached him again.

I draped his arm over my shoulder and nudged his good leg, relieved when it twitched and he started limping forward.

"I need you to give me the directions to your house." I said quietly, hoping he didn't catch the redirection of the topic. If he did, he refused to delve any further into the question and looked over at me with glassy eyes.

"I can't go home like this." he whispered. "My dad will freak."

I looked ahead as my car door became within reach. "Then you can hang around my place until you're cleaned and warmed up. My parents won't care."

Why the hell am I helping Chase?

"Ronnie." Chase grasped my wrist tightly once we'd gotten him situated in the car, his crutches reserving the back seat.

I was beyond relieved today was one of the few days I'd drove myself to school instead of begging Jordan for a ride because I was too lazy to drive.

I whirled around in surprise. It was the first time he'd ever said my name.

"Yeah?"

Through cold and flushed cheeks, a bloody nose and blood-stained teeth, Chase Parker met my eyes with a look I knew I wouldn't be able to shake from my mind the rest of the night. "Thank you."

The moment we broke through my front door, Vic looked on the verge of a heart attack.

"Instead of just standing there and staring, can you help?" I groaned, starting to feel my own legs give up from carrying most of the jock's weight. My little brother rushed toward us, immediately relieving me, both physically and mentally, of Chase. He helped the older boy to the couch, eyes wide. He looked like a frightened child.

"What the hell happened?" He thought about it. "Are you ok, Ronnie?"

I nodded, but my eyes were glued to the frost bitten hockey player on our couch. He looked to be losing more color by the second.

"We need to get him in a warm shower." I said it more to myself then either of the boys.

Chase used the little bit of energy he had to looked disgusted. "There's no way in hell you're helping me into the shower."

I shuddered at the thought myself, that hadn't at all been what I was thinking.

"Absolutely not. But I have a brother and-"

"Your boyfriend isn't going to do shit either." Chase cut me off before I could suggest I call Jordan. Vic was looking between us until the conversation died, taking the opportunity to interject.

"I need you to at least help us to the bathroom, Ronnie." He said, touching a hand to the older boy's pale cheek. "I don't know if I can handle all the weight."

It was saying a lot for my brother to not be able to handle it. He'd been training and working out in the school gym for months, building muscle and losing his childhood chubbiness in order to make it on to the hockey team as soon as he hit high school next year. I'd noticed a huge change in not only my brother's body, but his mental state as well. He was much more confident, and happier, and having Jordan as a stand-in older brother helped. They were both addicted to adrenaline and working out.

"Veronica." Vic said my name with a warning tone, almost as if he'd been trying to catch my attention the entire time I was lost in thought. "We don't have a lot of time. Look at him."\

Chase was so pale I was sure he was about to pass out. Without hesitating this time, I helped my brother to the master bathroom. I knew Mom and Dad wouldn't be thrilled about hearing that a teenage boy inhabiting their private space, but we didn't have much time to think about it.

"What happened?" It took me a minute to realize Vic was asking me and not Chase.

I frowned, opening the bathroom door with my free hand. "I don't know. I was heading out of the school and found him like this. Nobody else seemed to notice, and if they did, they didn't care. They all just walked by."

A sad look crossed through my brothers eyes as he left Chase's ice cold body leaning into me to turn the water on. He started it on the cooler side, knowing the shock of different temperatures could cause more of an issue that what we were dealing with.

"You can go now." Chase breathed, lips quivering so much his words were jumbled. I squeezed Vic's shoulder, nodding. He understood and smiled weakly, closing the door in my face. I waited until I heard my brother trying to make conversation in the bathroom to wander out of the bedroom entirely. I pressed my back into the wall in the hallway, burying my face in my hands.

I had so many emotions at war inside me right now I felt as if I were about to combust. On one hand, I felt as if helping Chase was something that had to be done. It wasn't about my bitterness or hatred anymore, hell none of my feelings could even come remotely close to whatever demons that boy was fighting within himself.

The other side, the part that had resented Chase and loved Jordan, wanted to kick him back outside in the cold. Helping him and bringing him back here probably hadn't been my best idea. Jordan would be livid, and everyone who'd been watching in silence when I'd forced Chase into my car, probably had spread every rumor possible.

"What happened to him, Ronnie?" Vic rested his head against the door frame, glancing quickly at the open bathroom door on the clear other side of the room to make sure our semi-unwanted house guest hadn't toppled over and hurt himself more.

"I don't know." I squeezed my eyes shut. "And I don't know why I helped him. Or brought him back here."

My brother looked at my with a helpless expression, tears pooling in his own eyes as the realization and reality of everything that happened settled in. The fear and adrenaline of the situation had hit him like a freight train.

Victor had worshipped the ground Chase Parker walked on as far back as I could remember. The moment Vic had caught sight of Puck practicing at the ice rink downtown as we were cleaning up after his seventh birthday, he'd strived to be everything the older boy was, and more. He went to every game at the high school, cheered him on when none of Chase's family bothered to show up. He was quite literally obsessed with the older boy and everything he represented.

I'd watch him crumble that morning a month ago when he'd seen the news. And each day since, he seemed to become more and more unmotivated. His idol had fallen apart, had almost died, and with that, were my little brother's hopes and dreams of becoming him.

"You don't think someone kicked his a-" He cut himself off suddenly. "Ronnie, you don't think Jordan did this, do you?"

Everything inside me wanted to say no, that Chase's foot probably just got caught in a pile of snow and he fell backwards and couldn't pull himself out. That I knew my best friend enough to know he would never be so cruel.

But I couldn't force the reassurance passed my chapped lips. Because Chase was beaten and bruised, his nose had been bleeding when I helped him up. He did look as if he'd gotten his ass kicked.

"He looks like shit." Vic continued when I didn't say anything. "He looks so helpless, Ronnie. And there's nothing I can do. That we can do."

"I shouldn't have brought him back here." I whispered, meeting my brother's dark blue eyes. "I should have just called 911 and let them handle it."

Vic rested a hand on either of my shoulders and shook me. "Stop convincing yourself of all the bullshit Jordan has been feeding you is what's right. You did the right thing, Ronnie. You put your own feelings aside and didn't remain just another passerby like everyone else, just waiting for the life to slowly leave his body."

I shook my head to myself as my brother gave my shoulder the same reassuring squeeze I'd give him only a few minutes before. He then turned his back to me and headed for the bathroom.

I stood with my back to the bedroom, keeping my thoughts and eyes trained on a photo or Jordan, Vic, and I on our trip to Disneyland last year. Vic was on my left, Jordan on my right, both grinning and purposely flexing their bicep as the Gaston cast member was seen doing in the background a few feet away. I was sitting on the wall in front of the fountain between them, a book on my lap, in the middle of rolling my eyes at the dumb pose they'd put themselves in.

Vic broke my concentration by passing by and heading for the laundry room, clearly lost in his own thoughts. He was even muttering quietly under his breath as he stormed passed me.

I shouldn't have turned around to engage in conversation with Chase, but I did. He was sitting at the end of our parents perfectly made bed, on top of a lavender comforter.

All color had returned to his face, including the fresh bruises and dry blood that had finally started to clot under his right nostril. His striking eyes, a good two or three shades lighter then Vic's, were distant.

"Are you going to tell us who did this?" I broke the silence.

His shoulders slouched forward. "It's not your problem or your business. I fell anyway,It became my problem and business when I stopped to help you up." I snapped. "When I helped you to my car and my brother helped you shower."

He stared at me for a long time, almost as if he were staring right through me and into oblivion. "It wasn't your boyfriend. I know that's all you care about."

I couldn't say I wasn't relieved.

"That didn't answer my question." I huffed.

He shrugged. "Thanks, Veronica. For helping me. But this isn't your problem. I'm not saying that to be an asshole. It's really not your problem."

He grabbed at the corner of the dresser and pushed himself up, eyes everywhere but me.

"Where the hell are you going? It's freezing out there."

He sighed.

"I'm going home. Your brother went to go order an UBER for me." He hesitated once he had made it to where I was just outside of the room, so close that his shoulder brushed against mine.

"You can't keep pretending to be a bitch, Veronica." He breathed so quietly I was sure my brother couldn't hear a word. "It's the easiest way to mask emotions and pretend they don't exist. But at some point you won't be able to keep all those feelings bottled up and pushed down. You know what happens then?"

I stared at him with a blank expression, figuring out if I should smack him or go to my room and cry. "You kill yourself?"

He ignored my comment and met my eyes, the empty abyss of nothingness within them startling me enough that my entire body grew rigid as the next three words left him, leaving a cold heaviness in their wake.

"They consume you."

***AN***

*Unedited*

Hope you guys enjoyed!

What do you think about Ronnie defending Chase? And what about Jordan? Do you think he'll play a bigger role in the book or will remain as a friend in the background?

Let me know what you guys think/thought!