A dark farmhouse loomed up around a sharp bend.

The place was tough to find in the pitch-black night and there were no streetlights to help guide my way. In addition, my cell service was cutting in and out the longer I drove, so my GPS was helpless with providing me with any sort of directions.

There was only one house that I found on the secluded road, which I hoped meant that I had found the right place.

It was completely still on the inside and fucking creepy.

I shouldn't even have bothered coming out tonight. 

JD invited me to some end-of-summer bonfire thing the guys threw every year.  He said it was a tradition I shouldn't miss—even if Aiden made faces at me behind his back, informing me I wasn't welcome. 

I wasn't feeling up to going at first and made up an excuse about working until close—I had missed over half my shifts since I found out Riley was pregnant and wasn't planning on working the one tonight either.

JD called me again a few hours ago, begging me to come hang out after I got off. He mentioned that Mark had cleared out a liquor store and there was more than enough to keep us all drunk for months. He gave me the address of the place in case I changed my mind. 

I decided to go in the end after the drumming in my head refused to stop. I was desperate for a release from the debilitating anguish crushing me.

I needed this. I forgot what it was like to feel normal.

It had been over three weeks since I saw Riley last. She never returned any of the calls or messages I left her. The girl's legendary stubbornness was sucking the life out of me. 

It wasn't like we didn't have things we needed to figure out.  She had my baby growing inside her and refused to talk to me about anything. She could have at least called me to tell me how she was doing. It wouldn't change how I felt about her decision to keep the pregnancy, but I was still worried about her. One little message saying even just the word 'hello' would have gone a long way to bringing me back down.

Something needed to lessen the unease soon. Instead, it just grew and grew, festering like a pus-filled infection in an open wound.

I needed to catch my breath before it killed me--just one more fucking breath without feeling like I was suffocating.

I didn't know what I should be doing with myself. There was nothing else I could even really do other than wait her out and see what would happen.

Every room in the band house had a newly worn path from my constant, nervous pacing. I felt caged and restless, like a wild beast trapped behind the glass at a zoo. The only places I didn't wander around aimlessly were behind locked doors, which was pretty much only Aiden's room. 

I was never welcome in there anyway, not that I wanted to go in there in the first place.  Aiden and I would come to blows again because he couldn't open his damn mouth without finding some way to insult me and remind me how much better he was for Riley. His ego was too big for his fucking body. 

I attempted to get away as often as I could from the chaos—take walks around the neighborhood, sit outside in my car, or do whatever else I could to make the time pass.  I was terrified about going anywhere or leaving the house for longer than a couple of minutes.  My luck would be that Riley would decide she was ready to talk and drop in while I was away.

Knowing my girl's short-fused temper, she would have an explosive meltdown when I wasn't home, waiting on her like a good little puppy. Riley would find a way to make me pay for it.

I couldn't do anything right by her—no matter how hard I tried.

It sucked always feeling like a fucking failure.

The constant buzzing sound of people talking around me was becoming too overwhelming.  Everything anyone did grated against my nerves. Brynn and Aiden were the worst.  During the day, they would find a way to whisper Riley's name to each other just loud enough for me to hear and then look over to see how I would react. Then, they would close Aiden's door at night and scream at each other. 

Those two alone were killing my high—which was the only thing keeping me standing.

JD was tiptoeing around me too.  I wasn't sure if he suspected something was going on between Riley and me, but he was treating me with kid gloves like I was going to blow up any second.

To be honest, I was close.

The second Riley shut me out, I had lost everything—even my motivation to play my guitar.  I started skipping band practice and wanted nothing to do with music.

The only thing I had to fill the void were the drugs, which still didn't ever seem to be enough.

When I pulled around the side of the house, I saw the tips of large flames blazing just over the side of a hill.  I placed my car in park next to a line of cars I didn't recognize.

I climbed out of my car when I spotted Aiden's close to the house.  I wasn't thrilled to see him, but at least I knew I had found the right place.

But it wasn't really the right place—this wasn't where I should be.

There were too many people here and I didn't want to be around any of them. I turned around in the long driveway getting ready to get back inside my car to leave.

"Hey, man. Glad you came." JD's voice echoed behind me.  When I spun around, he jogged up to me and pulled me into an awkward one-armed side hug. 

"Uh, yeah.  Work was slow. We got out early." I lied and pulled away.

"Figures, come on.  Let's get you a drink." JD motioned for me to follow him down the hill. 

We walked in silence towards a table about a hundred feet away from the crackling fire.  The table was covered with cups, an ice bucket with beer, and various bottles, alongside copious amounts of mixers.  They weren't joking when they said they went all out for tonight.

Too bad their idea of a party didn't include a bowl of colored candy to dip my hands into.  A pharm party heavy on Benzos would have fit my dark mood much better.

I settled for the nearest bottle of whiskey. I grabbed a red plastic cup off the stack and poured it half full.  The liquid burned my esophagus the second I guzzled it back.  Once it was empty, I dumped in another half cup's worth for a refill.

"Damn, you might as well just chug the bottle." JD laughed and smacked me on the back.

"Don't tempt me." I raised my eyebrow and took another sip.

Mark and a few random people made some small talk for a bit around me until JD excitedly suggested that we go check out the fire. JD mentioned something about getting the fire really going before it got any colder. He also took the opportunity to brag about his expert marshmallow roasting skills. 

We strolled over to the fire, with him yapping on about burning the fluffy sugar until it was crispy on the outside. Right when we got close to the flames, I finally saw her. 

I was going to collapse and die.

I didn't expect Riley to show up tonight. My vision blurred with shock and confusion at seeing her here.

She shouldn't be here.

Why was she here?

Did she come to see me?

The beautiful girl who broke me was quietly sitting on a log with a plastic cup in her hand. The fire beside her was dimmed by the light that radiated off her. My body tingled with hunger when she raised her brilliant, sparkling green eyes up to me. She lazily ran her gaze up to my thighs, over the front of my jeans, and followed the whole length of my body until she locked her eyes on mine.

Her cheeks flushed immediately. I raised my eyebrow, trying to invite her to say something to me. I turned around and sat down on the log opposite her body since Anna was already glommed to her side. I lined myself to get a perfect view of her.

Brynn walked over to Riley and bent over with her ass in the air. She was whispering in Riley's ear.  Riley stared directly at me and frowned. From the expression on her face, she didn't think she would run into me tonight.  This was an accidental encounter, not a planned one.

She didn't want to see me. 

I started to open my mouth to say something to her about it when Mark broke the silence before I could.

"What's up, Riley?" Mark yelled gregariously at the blond.

"Not much, Mark." She batted her eyelashes and flirted back right in front of me.

I huffed and looked away. She was fucking pushing it.

"Not much at all, Marky-Mark. Just a baby hanging out in my belly while I'm at a party living it up."  My jealousy-filled inner voice chimed in, mimicking her tone.

Anna started glaring directly at me with disgust written all over her face.  I took another sip of my drink and stared back at her. It didn't take a high IQ to realize she had figured out something was going on with Riley and me. She kept watching the interaction back and forth between us, daring me to make a move.

I glanced around the fire when I felt the weight of everyone gawking at me on my shoulders. All three girls around the fire were burning a hole into me. 

"Lil Bit, you going to drink or what? Don't tell me you're wimping out on us." JD joked with his sister.

Riley slowly raised the glass to her lips and tilted it back without hesitation.  She was drinking and pregnant with a baby that she was clearly determined to keep. The baby was already damaged because of the parts of me inside it; it didn't need her to add to its list of issues.

I clutched at the log under me and broke pieces off into splinters as I watched her gulp the drink down.

Was Riley being serious right now? How careless could she be?

"You happy?" She rebuked.

I had to bite my tongue and hold it in. I raised my glass for another distraction so I didn't leap across the fire and wrestle the cup away from her.

"I still can't believe you landed us the opening spot at the outdoor festival." JD sipped on his beer and high-fived Mark.

I turned my head and gave him a confused look out of the side of my eyes.

"Well, you would have known if you actually showed up for band practice." Aiden chimed in maliciously.

I flipped him off and he shrunk back down into his seat to sulk.

I locked eyes with Riley again and attempted to get her attention.  I wanted her to sneak away with me. She lowered her eyes and drank out of her cup again, ignoring me.  She began doing that fidgeting thing again like she was uncomfortable.   

Out of nowhere, my girl was up on her feet and almost jumped out of her shoes.

"Something wrong, Lil Bit?" JD questioned his spastic sister.

"No, I'm just going to grab another drink."  She smiled and started to bounce away quickly.

"Cool." JD brushed her off and turned to Mark to talk more about the next show. 

Riley raced away towards the table where all the drinks were stashed. I downed the rest of my drink and then got up to chase her down.  Her back was turned to me and she was already tipping the orange juice carton to fill the rest of her cup to the brim.

"What the fuck are you doing here?"  I leaned against her back and whispered into her ear.

"Believe me. I don't want to be here either." She mumbled as she turned around with a full cup of whatever she had concocted.

"You shouldn't be drinking."  I stepped closer and leaned down into her.

"You shouldn't be trying to tell me what I can and can't do." She replied with bratty defiance and raised the cup back up to her mouth.

I smacked the cup away from her lips before she could do any more damage to herself and the thing inside her.  The cup flew out of her hand and splashed back against her light gray shirt.

"It was just orange juice, Ezra. Why do you even care?  It's not like you want me to go through with this anyway."

"You're right. I don't care." I feigned indifference, feeding into her nonsensical drama. She jumped back like she thought I was going to grab her when I went for the bottle behind her.  I pulled it up to my mouth to guzzle it down as she watched.

As I drank down more of the bottle, I started falling apart faster. This back and forth with her hurt too much. It wanted to break free from my body.  I had to do something to let it out.

Riley was shaking in front of me like she couldn't get warm. When I glanced down at the bottle in my hand, an idea popped into my head.

If she thought I didn't care, then I wanted to show her exactly what not caring looked like.

I tilted the bottle and poured the rest of the liquid onto her chest.