Page 2 of Forget Me Not

Gun.

He likes it here. I can tell because he never wakes up when I sneak in and there’s a lot to be said for feeling safe enough to sleep so soundly. On the rare occasions that he does pass out beyond waking, it’s like I get to peek back at the boy he was before I knew him, the kid who lived in a car with his mom. Who was alone and forgotten most of the time, and who knew it was best to keep quiet, to stay small and out of the way. It was safest to just sleep.

Gun’s not little anymore. He towers over me by a long shot, towers over most. But, when he falls into a deep sleep like this, he still curls up into a tiny ball, knees pulled up to his chest, arms hugged tight around them and his face, the one that’s worn and wise so far beyond his years, is sweet and almost at peace, tucked close to his arm, chin nearly meeting with his knee caps.

I watch him like this for a long time. Even after I’m too tired to stand upright and wind up slowly crumbling to the floor. Eventually I curl up into a Coop sized ball myself and finally get some rest. The last thing I remember, is watching his chest rise and fall with the silent rhythm of his breath, and wondering what sort of things he dreams about and if in those dreams, he’s the sweet boy he sleeps as or the guy I know who wakes.

CHAPTER TWO

Ican feel Gun watching me out of the corner of his eye as we walk but I ignore him, instead focusing all my efforts on devouring this breakfast sandwich consisting of all of my favorite foods – pancakes, bacon, eggs and a healthy drizzle of syrup to make it all stick together. It’s not so much that I’m more devoted to this meal than I am to my best friend, as it is that I know there’s stuff brewing behind his heavy stare and I’m not ready to find out what it is. Mornings that come with a hot breakfast are few and far between, and just for the moment I’d prefer to pretend they were a common occurrence and that my life is no different than any other seventeen-year-old’s walking to school this morning. I can’t do that if I pay attention to Gun and his stare.

“So.” His elbow lands in my side, forcing my attention away from my food and onto him. As soon as I look up, he smiles broadly, a clear indication something is up. He never smiles. Not like that. “Where are we headed?”

I shrug and take another bite in hopes it will sway him from pursuing this conversation. “School?” I mumble the obvious.

Apparently not so obvious to Gun. “Nah. I’ve got a total bitch for first period. Not feeling it. I say we take off. Fuck all of ‘em.”

I freeze up mid-step, an empty set of pancake rims now permanently abandoned and dangling listlessly at my side. So much for enjoying breakfast. “We can’t just take off, Gunnar. You finally have a decent place.”

“It’s a fucking group home, Coop. Not the Brady Bunch.”

My eyes roll up into their sockets. He drives me crazy. Mr. B and his wife may not be parents, but the way they run the house they may as well be. “They make you pancakes for breakfast.”

“So does IHOP.”

“Gun.”

I can hear him release a long, ragged breath as he tries to calm his screaming demons. He won’t yell. Not at me anyway. But he doesn’t exactly have to. He gets his point across just fine without ever raising his voice at me. Like via that noisy-ass exhale.

“No. I’m not sticking around to eat paaancakes,” he elongates the word, doing an exceptional job today of trying to make me out to be the irrational one, “while you’re stuck in a house you don’t feel safe in.”

I can’t argue with him when he’s like this, there’s no point. AndI knewhe would be like this. He can’t stand it when something good happens to him but not to me. Annoyingly, he never seems to have this issue when the situation is reversed.

I drag my flip flops across the sidewalk and start moving again, tossing my leftovers as I shuffle along listlessly. I’ve lost my appetite completely, but maybe there are some birds or squirrels around who will enjoy the treat.

“It’s not that bad,” I mutter, making a last-ditch effort to sway him. “I’ll deal with it. I won’t come running to you again.”

He’s back at my side in a flash. “You know damn well that’s the last thing I want. Just tell me what’s happening and I’ll take care of it.”

“No.” I bite down and make every muscle in my face go stiff. The last thing I need is for him to see me get upset. I don’t even know which is harder to swallow, my own freaking life or the fact Gun’s about to blow up his own just to try and save mine.

“Cooper.”

“You can’t, Gun. There’s nothing you can do, okay?” I shout, the helplessness of it all driving me over the edge. “It’s their son. I caught him standing over my bed last week while I was sleeping. I screamed when I saw him and his mom came rushing in. He told her some bullshit story about how I was having a nightmare and he came to check on me and that was the end of it. Didn’t matter how much I insisted that wasn’t what happened, no one believed me.” I force myself to gulp down the rest of the story. I already told him too much.

I watch in slow motion as the anger spreads from his inside to the out. His body changes, tenses and fury flares in his face, though he still doesn’t say a word.

“You can flash your eyes at me all you want, Gun. I’m not going to let you screw up your good thing just because I’ve hit another little snag on the road through foster hell. It’s senior year. We’ll both be eighteen before summer. We almost made it through. Let’s just stay on track and get there.” I point ahead at the hypothetical path we’ve been put on. We could make it.Icould make it. It’s not that much longer.

“Look, Coop. You’ve got two choices. Either we head for the train station and get the hell out, or I’m walking you to school and I’m tracking down the piece of shit who left a mark on you – yeah, I saw your wrists – and I kill him. It’s as simple as that.”

“Don’t be stupid.” I kick at a rock on the sidewalk. Not the smartest thing I’ve done today given the shape my sad, swollen feet are in. Not the dumbest either. “You’re not going to kill anyone.” I’m reminding him. Mildly, casuallybegginghim.

“The only thing I’m not going to do, is sit on my ass and eat pancakes while someone is threatening you.” He takes a step into my path and stops. “See this?” A few hundred dollars in twenties are dancing around in my face. “It’s enough money to get us by for at least a week. Maybe longer if we’re smart about it. By then, we could be on the other side of the country. Why the hell wait for eighteen? Let’s just go now.”

“Where did you get that money?” I ask, pissed and panicked competing for top spot now.

“I stole it, what do you think?!” He makes a face and returns the stash of bills back to his pocket. “Before you freak, it was cash Mr. B took out to pay some dude to replace the downstairs carpets. It wasn’ttheirmoney.”

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