....So strange to love you again...

[Aiden "Rave" Hamilton]

"... Yoah a sponsor?...Smokin' inside the apartment isn't allowed.. Devon doesn't like it.."

He asked and watched the guy with untrusting eyes. Rave remarked on the lit up cigarette in the man's hand. He was still very, very weary of the person in front of him despite what he said. He look like a former drunk to say the least.

"It's kinda hard reactin' in any otha way when yoah ge' home and finds yoah best friend with a bloody naked bitch in his lap with his fingahs up her cunt aftah preachin' about no' havin' any at all...Dunn even know why he let the bitch in.."

He snorted at the last part and then watched this old man in front if him again while he spoke about wall mart's flip flops or getting in to get some shoes.

Rave wouldn't allow the guy to get in with that cigarette lit but he opened the door a little more, still holding it but allowed the man to enter inside to his left side, holding the door with his right but not letting his bandaged and aching thumb touch it.

He had gone from upset to a predator watching the pray to take one wrong step and then bite his neck off. It basically was like letting a lamb go into the lion's den just before dinner time. From Rave's point of view? ... protect Devon, protect the apartment; then get rid of Amy one way or another.

[NPC]

"Yeah, I'm a sponsor. I'm Devon's sponsor in face." He took a drag off his butt as he listened to Rave run down on Devon's girlfriend. "Riiight, and of course your reaction didn't contribute at all to him running out of the house with no shoes on to puke in the street. Very supportive. I'll just stay out here in the hall since you're concerned about his reaction to my smoking in the house." Burke blinked at Rave passively.

Every word was said quietly, calmly and without rancor. But each word was a truth that couldn't be dodged either, and Burke knew it.

"Shoes?" He reminded Rave.

Beyond Rave he could see a pretty little strawberry blonde fretting. He felt sorry for her, but not to the point that he was going to worry about her. His job here was for Devon, pure and simple. No wonder the kid was fucked up if this is what he had to come home to.

"You know," Burke said as he started turning away. "Devon's talk about you in meeting, and we aren't supposed to say anything about stuff that goes on there, but, I must say, you're not acting like the good friend he made you out to be."

[Aiden "Rave" Hamilton]

"Oh wha' the hell do yoah know of wha' happened here!? Yoah weren't even here.."

Rave growled, spitting the words out at the guy he didn't even know the name of and who had apparently just decided to stay outside to smoke instead of walk inside when Rave had eventually opened the door for him to walk inside.

"wha' evah..."

He snorted and glared at him for a moment as if weighing him up for a moment before going to get Devon's shoes, socks still tucked into them for some reason but Rave didn't really care about it and gave them to the man outside while still watching him closely.

Rave didn't as much as give Amy a second glance, too focused on the door and the visitor there. The last line of what this old man said almost made Rave growl at him but instead he clenched his jaws tightly as ever.

A slight glance to the side made him aware of the fact that Amy stood there and that made his desition clear. He stepped outside and shut the door behind him, still looking at this old man while doing so.

"I 'ave issues too, an' if yoah're Devon's sponsor, I'm sure yoah know abou' them. Bu' to have something you want and long for so close an' no' ge' it without takin' it because yoah want it to be willingly... is killin' from the inside.. an' to see that' "somethin' " in the arms of someone else isn't really somethin' yoah do with peace at heart mistah who evah yoahr name is.."

He growled lowly but hopefully Amy wouldn't hear too much of the discussion, at least he hoped not.

"I want him, an' I want him bad... bu' not by force.. an' then this bitch come's around and she gets to his pants in five bloody seconds aftah Devon's preachin' to me about no' doin' any sexbits at all?... We've had our fun moments, we've had our good moments and of course bad moment's too.. bu' we always find eachotha again... We.need.eachotha.. bu tha' wasn't really somethin' I expected to see when I walked through the front door an' it pissed me off to see his fingahs up her cunt when I want them to touch me..."

Rave blinked a few times, somewhat shocked over his own choice of words but what was said, was said and it almost sounded like a love serenade, was he in love with his best friend? He furrowed his eyebrows and closed his mouth and looked around for a moment, running through his mind to try and find an answer to that question but for now... without luck.

[NPC]

"Right." Burke said again after listening to Rave's rant. He took the shoes. "I'm not at liberty to discuss what goes on in meetings. I'm not here for you, or her. I'm here for the boy. If you loved him, you'd do what's best for him. Somehow I don't think making him run puking into the street or calling the girl he's been waiting for two years is a cunt is gonna do it."

He sucked another lungful of death and looked at Rave from experienced eyes. "If I gave you any advice at all it'd be that when we chase something, it runs away. You make him choose... You lose. Even if you win, you lose. Learned that the hard way, myself."

He turned to start for the stairs. "Sounds to me like you're being selfish too, and not just jumping the gun. If you'd let it lie, they might of found out they don't suit each other anymore." He gave Rave a bittersweet smile from the top of the stairs. "But now, now they got something to fight against. And that's you, hotshot."

He shook his head sorrowfully took a step and then paused, spite made him do it, because Devon really was a nice kid and seeing his face when he got in the car dug a little hole in Burke. "You know, he was more than halfway to you. He was coming to grips with his feelings about you. But, I think that's down the toilet now."

[Aiden "Rave" Hamilton]

Somehow this old guy managed to get right through to him, Rave wasn't sure how he'd done it but the words just struck him like arrows through the heart. Love? did he... love, Devon? He'd never really thought about it that way. Rave frowned, inhaled and looked up at the old man and spoke with a sudden low tone.

"Wha' should I do then?... if I can't chase him, if I can't wait for him... or make him choose... wha' then?"

He finally asked when the old man slowly started for the stairs. All of a sudden he didn't want this man to leave, he wanted to talk to him, to get advice and that was the first time in his life that he felt that way.

"wait..!"

Rave took a few steps towards the old man. Had Devon really been more than half way to him? Honestly? And, he had of course fucked it up like he always did with everything he ever cared about.

He hesitated for a moment while looking at the floor, running his left hand through his curly bleached hair before looking up at the old guy again, his eyes showed regret but also longing for his friend down in the car.

"... Can I talk to him before you go?.. please."

The voice was pleading as well as his eyes. The sharp hostillity in his entire being was gone while he resisted the urge to just run down there and say he was sorry over and over.

"Please.."

He said again.

"...I'll do anythin'.. I know things go' out of hand... I was shocked of wha' I saw when I go' home an' I snapped... I'm workin' on it, I'm goin' to meetin's as well bu' I get relapses too.. this is one of them... an'... when I do.. I dunn think.. things just... happen.."

He confessed then looked down the floor while ending up looking really remorseful. Rave was well aware that he'd fucked up and done so greatly, perhaps he'd just needed someone to hit him in the face with it.

Someone that didn't yell back, someone who kept his calm and only giving facts that he couldn't argue with. Someone like this guy.

"... Devon must feel lucky to have a Sponsor like yoah.."

He said quietly, still not looking at the guy, but out the window at the car just by the stairs where Devon had probably sat before his Sponsor showed up.

"Please.. let me talk to him, yoah can watch, I dunn care.. I'll be calm, I promise"

Rave pleaded again, not until now looking up at the Sponsor with honesty in his eyes.

" I know I can't set things straight right away.. bu' I have to talk to him now. I know he's gotta go with yoah anyway bu'... There are things I 'ave to tell him befo' yoah leave... I broke a promise I nevah break promises..an' I wanna tell him tha' I'll try bettah an' work on it..."

He confessed. What he really wanted to do but would restrain from, was to run down there and wrap his arms around his friend and tell him he was sorry while burying his head in Devon's shoulder but, that wasn't really going to happen, he knew that. Devon was fragile as he was now so he had to move carefully.

"I'll stay on the stairs.. yoah can ask him if he want's to ge' out an' talk to me, please?"

Rave had slowly walked towards the stairs and towards the old man while talking about setting things straight and by now, he had reached the top stair, the sponsor standing a few steps down.

[Amy Wilson]

Amy resolved not to rise to Rave's bait, instead responding to his comments to her with stony silence. When Rave started talking to the sponsor she remained silent, observing both Rave and the sponsor. Rave was digging himself a nice big hole and she knew that her best option was just to stay quiet and allow him to continue digging. At the rate he was going, handing him another shovel was unnecessary and pushing the dirt in on top of him was overkill.

When Rave closed the door behind him, Amy slipped out of her shoes and quietly moved to stand with her ear to the door so that she could hear the conversation. Amy had intended to find a hotel but there was no way she was going to leave Devon alone with Rave. Listening at the door to the conversation going on outside only served to confirm her decision. She knew she carried a major part of the blame for what had transpired. It seemed that Rave thought himself entirely blameless.

She knew, she really, really knew that she shouldn't but the temptation was just too great. No sooner had she heard Rave move away from the door, than Amy gently slid the bolt across. There was no way Rave was getting back into the apartment without her letting him.

Unpacking was a little premature, so Amy opened the TV cabinet. There was a DVD player there and some old films; Hitchcock, no less. Amy selected one at random, put it in the player and retreated to the couch where she curled up. She wished Devon was with her. She wished that she could at least go down and see him, but with the sponsor there, she at least knew he would be safe and she knew the worst thing she could do would be to go down and insert herself back into a volatile situation.

It was only a very minor, almost non-existent consolation that she had an old film to watch.

[Devon Eckes]

Devon watched his sponsor come out from the building with a grim look on his face, not that Burke looked anything but hangdog anyway, but the set of his mouth was firmer than usual. In his hand he carried Dev's shoes and he opened the car door and lay them on the curb.

"Your friend wants to talk to you." Burke said, blocking the view to and from the stoop. "You say no, and I'll just get in and we'll drive off. But he's behind me, on the steps."

Devon looked up at Burke's face as he slipped his feet into the socks and then the brown loafers. As always, Burke was accepting of anything that Devon decided, but there was a hint of disapproval there...not towards him, but towards probably Rave. "I'd better talk to him, especially if I'm leaving, so they won't ... I... shouldn't go. They'll..."

"They are grown people who will do what they do with or without you beating yourself up over it." Burke told him. "You made some mistakes casting this show, but, it's them who's deciding how to play the roles. You take care of yourself, one day, one hour at a time."

"Yeah, yeah..." Devon nodded, took a deep breath to steel himself and stood. Burke moved to lean against the car, leaving the passenger door open in case Devon needed to make a run for the car.

Rave stood on the steps, looking contrite, concerned, but still...anger shimmered around him like a heat wave.

"I have to go. I can't stay. Not like this." Devon said, his hands in his jacket pockets and his shoulders hunched. He looked like someone who had barely survived a beating, but the marks hadn't shown up yet.

[Aiden "Rave" Hamilton]

Rave had exhaled slowly when Devon's sponsor who he still didn't know the name of, allowed him to follow him down stairs even if it was with a slight nod and not with a word he accepted him to.

As requested, Rave stayed on the steps and waited for the old man to talk to Devon, which he knew very well that he had to go with his Sponsor.

Once Devon showed up behind the old man, all anger that was left inside of him vanished. He looked like a hurt animal waiting to get more beating and it stung hard in Rave's heart to know that he had been a part of that mental beating.

All he wanted to do was walk up to him and hold him and it showed on his body language but he stayed put on the stairs' last step which he was instructed to do, controlling himself, restraining his wishes on what to do.

"... I know Dev.. I know yoah have to go."

Rave said softly and with a slight tremble on his voice. He didn't cry and hadn't cried since he was a child but inside his heart ached for what he had done. He really needed help with his actions.

"..can...nh... can I touch you?"

He asked with pleading eyes, knowing full well that he had to ask when Devon was like this. The answer came like a slap in the face, a no with a few steps backing away from him. Rave closed his eyes for a moment and lowered his head while forcing himself to stay on the steps and also being aware that the Sponsor was watching.

"I won't... touch you. You said no, it's fine, it's okay. I'll stay on the steps."

The words were soft while his body language showed he wasn't really sure where to go or how to start to say what he wanted to say. He inhaled then sighed with a defeated tone.

"Look, I'm sorreh Devon... I didn't mean the things I said in there... I go' shocked of wha' I saw an'... I flipped. I wish I could undo it bu' I can't..."

Eyes were still diverted to the ground and his voice showed remorse as well as his body language did. Slowly his right hand moved to the railing as if to steady himself.

"I broke a promise to yoah the first time she came 'ere... I'm sorreh, I wish I could undo tha' too.. I've nevah broken a promise to yoah, not like this..."

Slowly he glanced up at his friend with his head still lowered towards the ground. He wasn't sure he dared to look at him as if he'd break by one single look.

"I'm sorreh tha' I flipped , I'm sorreh fo' startin' the argument... and I'm very sorreh fo' all the things I said to yoah.. I really didn't mean them.. I... I go' hurt..."

Rave closed his eyes again. What he was trying to say was so hard and he was trying to find the right words to say. He'd never said anything like this before and never said he was sorry, not from the heart like he did now.

"...I... go'..hurt...nh... because.. I wanted to be in her place, I wanted yoah to feel fo' me.. like yoah do her."

He spoke low almost as if he was ashamed of the words he said but he still needed to say them out loud. Rave swallowed again and glanced up at the sponsor.

"I think... someone... made me realize tha' just now.."

He mumbled and looked back to the ground again.

".. yoah should go. I'll pack up some stuff an' call my sponsor as well... I need to ge' back on track.. I... I won't be around her fo' a while.. I think tha's best since she's my triggah right now.."

Rave confessed even though he didn't want to accept it but it was a fact and he needed to tell Devon that he'd realized this much at least and that he wasn't going to hurt her.

"Go with yoah sponsor an' come back when it's bettah... I'll let her have the spare key to the apartment an' I'll sleep somewhere else, okay?"

The words were still trembling but he kept it together. Rave wasn't even used to being this emotional or see Devon like the state he was in now, that was something completely new to him so in all honesty, he wasn't really sure how to act or even react to this except for telling his best friend that he was sorry.

[Devon Eckes]

He couldn't look at Rave when he came up to the steps, and when the other boy asked to touch im he felt like he would shatter if anyone laid even too hard of a look on him right now. He stumbled back. "No." He said. A short word, but loaded with meaning and emotion. It was a blanket rejection to everything that had happened in the last half hour.

That it cut Rave was obvious, but it was a small hurt compared to the hemmorage that Devon felt. Something had died. There had even been a knife and blood on the floor to prove it. And he was in shock. It was the only way he could explain the feelings he was having. Or the lack of them. There was just a overwhelming pain in his chest now, and he couldn't breath around it.

"I broke a promise to yoah the first time she came 'ere... I'm sorreh, I wish I could undo tha' too.. I've nevah broken a promise to yoah, not like this..."

"Fix it." Devon said to the sidewalk. His voice was flat and his face blank. "When I come back, I want it fixed."

"Go with yoah sponsor an' come back when it's bettah... I'll let her have the spare key to the apartment an' I'll sleep somewhere else, okay?"

Devon searched in his pockets and pulled out a scrap of paper and a nub of pencil. He wrote quickly and started to step forward towards Rave, but stopped, and put the scrap on the ground with the pencil for a weight.

"Give that to her for me." He backed up again. His face worked and he looked off down the street. "I don't know when I'll be back. Make sure she has some money. Make sure she stays until I do. If either one of you love me at all, this won't happen again."

He turned his brown eyes on Rave and stared at him. "I can't take it. I shouldn't have to. You shouldn't have put me through it. Or her. I blame you, but, it's not totally your fault. But it's not her fault at all. And if you don't fix it, I don't want to see you again."

There were other things he could have said, but he just stared at Rave for another long moment and got in the car.

"Let's go." He said to Burke. Once they turned the corner he folded his head down on his legs, covering his head with his coat, and quietly broke down.

Amy, I can't explain what is going on. He knew that the deal was, he knew I was waiting for you, always you, and I'm so sorry. I'm sorry I'm not strong enough to stand between you. I'll come back when I can talk. Please, please, please be there.

[Aiden "Rave" Hamilton]

Fix it? How was he supposed to fix it? How did you fix things like this? It pained him to hear the flat tone of Devon's voice he had truly broken down and bad too.

The ache in Rave's chest nearly made it impossible to breathe and it was all due to how he had treated Devon. And now a big responsibility rested on his shoulders and it had been his best friend that had said the words, the very best friend he'd been with for almost two years.

Just to see Devon place that piece of paper on the ground with the pen as a weight on it broke his heart even more. He couldn't bare to either watch or touch him? Rave had really done some damage today, damage he wished had never happened.

"yeah...I will, I promise"

He said quietly and watched the little piece of paper on the ground then glanced up at Devon again while he said he blamed Rave. He slumped his shoulders and kept looking down at the ground and simply just took it. Took the words for what they were and they stung, they actually hurt more than any of the beatings he'd gotten during his life.

".. I'll do wha' I can.. I don't want to loose you, Dev... can't live without yoah..."

Rave said then whispered the last part mostly to himself while Devon was getting into the car. When the car drove off, he looked up to see the car vanish with a right turn. Slowly he leaned forward and took the note in his hands and read it.

"... I knew yoah were waitin' fo' her... bu' I didn't want to believe tha' she'd come here at all..."

He whispered then sunk down to sit on the stairs for a while with his head in his hands and the note in his left hand, hiding his face in his palms. Breathe, he had to breathe.

With trembling hands he slowly reached down in his pocket and picked out his blackberry and hit the speed dial on one and put the phone to his ear.

"Hi...it's Rave...yeah... I... I think I.. need help. I did something really bad.. I can't breathe. No... no, no one's dead...except for me.. inside. Can you.. come pick me up? I'm afraid I might loose it if no one's holding me down in a few minutes... yeah... thanks"

His voice was trembling and forced calm and low almost as if he was going to cry but without tears. His hands were shaking just like his hands were. The anxiety that was building in him was slowly turning into anger and he could feel it grow like water on the stove slowly reaching the boiling point.

Rave wrinkled the note in his hand and slowly started to breathe in through his nose and out of his mouth while holding his fists against his temples, working on keeping himself calm until his own sponsor would show up.

The cell phone fell down on his knee then on the ground between his army booted feet but he didn't even care to pick it up.

"please... please... come here fast..!"

He whimpered to himself while feeling himself slip deeper and deeper down the black pit of his own mental rage where anything could happen from hurting someone or himself by hitting walls or what ever was close by, unfortunately it usually resulted in him kicking a person's ass instead of his own.

"need to fix this... need to fix... fix it... fix how..."

He mumbled while he gripped his curly, bleached hair by the temples and somewhat tearing his hair by making fists over and over.

[FATE]

Amy's cell phone rings.

[NPC]

Chris Hudson, PB Mickey Roake, RAR sponsor, 3 years

Chris Hudson didn't have to be at work at the night shift of the auto plant until midnight. That might be enough time to talk this kid he was sponsoring down,or, he'd have to pass him off to someone else. Still, it took him twenty minutes to get from his condo to the kid's apartment on his '86 soft-tail.

Not that it looked like the guy had moved much since phoning him. Just sitting there, head in hands, phone between his feet about six feet from a pile of vomit. Idly Chris wondered who'd tossed their cookies.

"Hey, kid." Chris called out from where he parked his bike, still straddling it. "What's going on?"

It was a nice neighborhood, nicer than he'd expected, but then again the members of RAR came from all walks of life. The chapter of Rage Against Rage they both belonged to were from the surrounding towns of Medford, Phoenix, Ashland and Talent. Wife beaters and kids who broke their hands on walls instead of talking out their problems were the norm. Rave wasn't much different. Just a big ball of crap, leaking out all over the place and splashing the innocent and guilty alike.

[Aiden "Rave" Hamilton]

Rave didn't even look up when Chris drove up with his bike by the sidewalk. He was just trying to focus on keeping calm. Slowly he looked up at his sponsor with eyes that were a bit dimmed by the inner conflict he had inside.

"lo' of shit..."

He said still with a trembling voice but now topped with anger slowly spiking in his system. He swallowed and closed his eyes again and went back to listening to his watch ticking to focus on that and breathe along with it. Five seconds in, five seconds out. He hadn't even bothered about the slight smell of Devon's breakfast laying on the ground.

"...I... came in on Devon with his long lost an' gal, the one tha' was in prison a while back..."

He started before taking a long inhale and slowly exhaled it, still tugging his hair by clenching and releasing his fists, note still in his left hand.

"... I flipped both by shock an' by anger it wasn't me he was touchin'... said things I didn't mean... started a fight with her.. then spat things out at Devon tha' I didn't mean, nearleh cut my thumb off in anger an completely broke Devon down... he left with his own sponsor just a minute befo' I called yoah.."

Rave said quietly then made a mine of pain when he felt his chest burn and ache after what he had just said. It annoyed him, pissed him off to the limit of wanting to bash something and do it hard.

"... I spoke to him befo' he left... he told me to "fix it"... an' tha' If I didn't fix it... he didn't wanta see me evah again... I can't live without him.. have nothin' to live fo' without him... an' now I have this bloodeh' note I am supposed to give to his gal in our apartment.. bu' I'm no' sure I can do it alone without flippin'... an' I am to leave her some money so she can ge' by until Dev comes back... She pisses me off!!"

He growled and rose from the stairs, grabbed his phone on the ground and turned around to get up to their apartment. The anger spiking more and more inside of him, wanting to bash the door in and kick her ass for making him do that to Devon, it was all Amy's fault!

[NPC]

Chris nodded as Rave spoke, but when the younger man got up to go back inside Chris got off his bike and called out. "Dude, hold on, before you make it worse."

He was too far away to grab hold of the kid, but he wouldn't be stupid enough to do that anyway. It'd just refocus his anger on him rather than at someone else.

"Come back here and let me do my job, OK? You called me for a reason." Chris waited for Rave to take some breaths and come back down the stairs and handed the guy a smoke. He surely needed one. "So, I know some of it. I thought this chick wasn't supposed to be back for a few more months. Are you mad because she's here, or mad because you walked in on them? Must of felt sorta like he was cheating on you, huh?"

Chris scrubbed his scruffy chin with his hand. "Well, he was cheating, but on her, with you...Or am I not remembering it right?"

[Aiden "Rave" Hamilton]

Rave had gotten several steps up when he heard Chris call to him to stay and let him do his job. He stopped in his way while holding the railing in a hard grip that made his knuckles go white before he sunk down where he sat.

"FUCK!!!"

He yelled from the top of his lungs so it echoed between the walls of the complex before he once again hid his face in his hands while breathing hard but trying to focus. He put the watch to his ear again and listened to the ticks and tocks of the seconds while clenching his jaws.

Rave's entire body was tensed, every single muscle. When Chris walked up to him and handed him a smoke, he gladly took it with a shaking right hand, lit it with the flame that was offered to him and he took a long drag from it.

"Thanks... I left mine upstairs.."

He mumbled, still holding the now wrinkled piece of paper in his left hand and against his hair which he kept pulling at. He took another deep drag while his sponsor spoke to him then nodded quietly.

"No.. she wasn't... probableh go' out soon fo' good behavior or wha' evah... dunno, didn't quite ask her.."

Rave muttered and took yet another drag, wanting the nicotine to calm him as much as possible. This made him really wish he had some pot or maybe even some opium or something better to calm his nerves with, maybe he should call Sissy later to get some stuff.

"...No, none of it...nh.. or... both... I dunno!"

He growled with the smoke between his lips and both his hands in his hair while he tensed his calfs so his feet ended up on his toes for a few seconds before he relaxed them again. Slowly he took the cigarette from his lips again and closed his eyes.

"...I dunno... I think... a part of me wanted it to be me in her stead... I want him to touch me like tha' ... bu' tha's not goin' to 'appen now is it... I fucked up an' royally... I'll be fuckin' happy if he even wanta see me again aftah this..."

Rave sighed and shook his head slowly then put the cigarette back to his lips to take another deep inhale again. With a defeated sigh he then nodded.

"Yeah... he cheated on her with me... but I feel the same by findin' them like tha' ... he practically had his fingahs up her..."

He cursed and clenched his eyes shut, he didn't want to see the picture in his head or even remember this had happened. This day had started out so good so why on earth had it ended like this?

"...fuck... I'm startin' to wondah if I..."

The words fell from his lips but the sentence wasn't finished when he let the words end. He wasn't ready to say those three words yet, not by a long shot. Rave took another deep drag of the cigarette which was soon out and only a butt with a filter but he'd keep on sucking it until there was nothing left.