The following Saturday I stayed home alone and moped around the house as my mother went to work. I had heard nothing from Nate over those past few days, and I was beginning to get a bit worried. Nothing was more suspicious than Nate not trying to get a hold of me after a fight. But this time was different.

He was addicted to alcohol. We're all addicted to something, but he was so young. We've all had our fair share of some beer at parties and such, but he was drinking it in unhealthy amounts.

I had no clue how long Nate had had this addiction. And that kind of worried me. Was the boy I had fallen in love with really the person I thought to have known? What else was he keeping from me? What else was there to unfortunately discover?

I decided to go out and find him. I had sent him a text no more than three hours before and there was still no reply, so I left the house and drove over to his place.

Knocking hard on the door, I nervously bit my nails. His mother came to the door, her face looking very similar to his. Her brown eyes were like warm chocolate and her blonde hair shined like honey.

"Hi, Mrs. Hawkins," I greeted shyly. "Um, is Nate at home?"

She smiled at me and shook her head, furrowing her eyebrows all the while. "Why, no," she replied, a bit of suspicion rising in her voice. "In fact, I'm not entirely sure why you're here..."

It was my turn to furrow my brows. "Is something the matter?" I asked her.

"A few days ago, Nate said that you and him were going on a road trip to Couer D'Alene for a few days...he left on Wednesday."

"What?" I exclaimed. "No, he never said anything about a road trip..."

"Then why would he leave?" his mother asked worriedly.

I shook my head. "I literally have no clue," I lied. I knew perfectly well why. However I refused to burden his mother with such knowledge. I began to turn around. "If you hear anything from him, please let me know."

She nodded hastily. "Of course," she replied. "Same for you."

I nodded back at her. "No problem."

She shut the door behind me as I walked back over to my car and started it up. Where the hell could Nate possibly be? I hadn't the slightest clue in heaven or hell where he could've gone off to. Maybe he had gone on some sort of vacation to seek out help for the alcohol? Or maybe just the opposite. He had told his mother that we were going to Couer D'Alene. Maybe he went to Silverwood with some friends and since he was mad at me he didn't tell me? But Nate never expressed an interest to go down to Silverwood before.

As I was obscured in a cloud of thoughts and emotion, I found myself driving around aimlessly in a rather empty part of town. By then, the sun had just slipped behind the horizon, so the cloudy sky was dark and grey. I slowed down a little bit. This wasn't exactly the nicest neck of the woods. The ghetto looking houses and buildings that surrounded me were falling apart and the barbed wire fencing sloppily set up around them were beginning to crumble. I could hear dogs barking all around me. I didn't even realize that I had driven this far.

One of my new biggest fears was getting car jacked like Gomez, Luther and I did back when we were at Taco's. What happened to me wasn't exactly traditional car jacking, but that only intensified the fear.

I turned down a new street that would hopefully lead me back into town. I started seeing buildings that were more familiar. Letting out a sigh of relief, I turned on the radio on low. It began to rain again for the millionth time that week. Rolling my eyes, I put on the windshield wipers and let them do their work.

As I drove, I spotted something out of the corner of my eye. At first, I thought nothing of it, for I thought that the rain and my blurry mind could be tricking me. But as the seconds went by, and I thought more about it, I realized that I wasn't seeing things.

Suddenly, I slammed on my breaks and went in reverse, for no one else was on or around the street. I backed up to what I had seen.

I saw a tall man standing at the entrance to an alleyway. He was wearing a black hoodie, but with the sleeves cut off, like a makeshift hoodie tee-shirt. If there had been sleeves on that sweatshirt, I never would've thought anything of the man, but I recognized one of the tattoos on his tan arm. I rolled down my window to make sure that it was him. His back was to the street, but I could tell that he was having a heavy conversation with somebody on the phone. I no longer had any doubt. I leaned forward and shouted out the window.

"Gomez!" I screamed. The man then turned around, his phone still clutched to his ear. His right hand was resting on top of his head, but he slowly removed it to take off his sunglasses, revealing his shocked, olive green eyes. Eyes that I hadn't seen in seven months. Not exactly the pair of green eyes that I wanted to see, but it was something completely out of the blue. In shock, he brought his phone down from his ear and hung it up.

"Aye," I heard him whisper under his breath. I stared at him in confusion and a hint of horror. What was he doing back here?

Without even thinking twice about it, I unbuckled my seat belt and bolted after him. He turned around and started down the dark alleyway. I followed close on his heels. "Gomez!" I screamed at him. He didn't stop or pause for a single moment. And he was so much faster than me. I struggled to keep up, and panted all the while. "Stop!" shouted with my last breath. He turned a corner, which led to nothing but a dark, boxed off space.

"Gomez?" I whispered. "Where are you?" I walked back out into the alleyway and looked around. There was no sign of him anywhere.

By this time, I had given up any hope of finding him. Not to mention, I was soaking wet and freezing. Giving up any chance of seeing him again, I stalked back over to my car, of whose door I had left precariously open.

All of a sudden, I got this eerie feeling that somebody was watching me. After a few moments, I turned my head, thinking that it was Gomez. But it wasn't, of course. Following some distance behind me, were two, black, hooded figures. I turned my head back and picked up my pace. I could hear their footsteps getting closer. My heart pounded hard against my chest. They were following me.

Someone suddenly walked around my car and stood casually in front of the door. That was when I started to panic. I broke into a sprint and ran to the exit of the alleyway for my life. I could hear the two men behind me break into a run as well.

"Hey beautiful!" one of them shouted. "Why don't you come on back here?"

To frightened to even scream, I pressed forward. I was halfway through the long alleyway when three more hooded figures approached from the entrance and started toward me. I suddenly stopped running and looked behind me. There was no escape. Before I knew it, I was shoved up against the wall by six men, who's faces I could not see.

"What do you want?" I asked almost in a whisper. Either they didn't hear me, or chose not to hear me, because they didn't respond.

"Hey, is this even the one that he wants?" one of them asked.

I looked quickly back and forth between the men. "Huh? Who? What are you talking about?"

The one closest to me pulled out a knife a held it close to my throat. I gasped and lifted my neck up. "What's your name, Strawberry Shortcake?" he asked me with so sign of screwing around in his voice.

"A-Ava," I replied quickly and immediately. "Ava Lane."

The guy holding a knife to me looked behind his shoulder. The man he was looking at smirked and nodded. "Oh yeah," he replied. "She's definitely the one."

~*~*~*~*

I was gonna add more but I'll save it for the next chapter>:) MWAHAHAHA

but ya Gomez decided to pay a little visit. Hope he brought some dope for us. Jk I don't smoke. Comment if u do with a funny story tho

Vote and comment and follow!!! Help me get to 1k by chapter 10!!