FicWad

At no one…

I mean it was just an empty booth.

“Where?” I ask her again and a puzzled look crossed her face.

“He was just right there…” She said scrunching her face a little.

“Did he have a tattoo?” Frankie says nervously.

“Uh yeah.” She says looking around the diner quickly and Frankie’s face dropped. Mine did too… I mean the first thing that came to mind was Will… as impossible as that seemed…

“No Frankie it couldn’t be.” I said softly and he frowned.

“Are you sure?” He asks the waitress.

“Uh…yeah.” She tells him scanning the room quickly. “He had quite a few actually.” She says frowning… “I don’t understand he was just right there…” She mumbled to herself.

“A few tattoos?” Frankie said wrinkling his own face in confusion. That didn’t sound like Will… Sounded like that creepy guy that broke into Pauls…

“And the bluest eyes you’ve ever seen right?” I ask her as a wave of nauseousness passed over me…

“Oh yea.” She sighs and I felt myself growing faint…Fuck… It was the creepy dude that broke into Pauls…

“Uh we’re gonna take his food to go.” I say and Frankie frowns.

”Elle.” He argues and I give him a look like, please don’t argue with me. He pouts and crosses his arms on his chest defiantly. “I'm eating my breakfast here.” He declares and I feel myself tensing up in anger.

“Then you're eating it alone!” I say harshly as I pull out two twenties and toss them on the table and stormed out. Frankie jumped up and dashed out after me.

“Elle what the hell!” He cries out half laughing half yelling at me.

“Frankie when I say we have to go… we HAVE to go.” I say gripping his arm tightly as I pulled him across the diners parking lot.

“What is this cause of the cheesecake?” He says wrinkling his face at me and I sighed in annoyance and didn’t answer him as we stepped over the cement divider things separating the lots… “Elle who sent the cheesecake?” Frankie says to me a little nervously.

“I don’t know Frankie.” I tell him and he looked at me like he didn’t believe me. “Honestly I really don’t know… I just think it’s best if we get the hell out of here!” I say a little flustered.

“Well that ain’t happening!’ He laughs and I frown.

“What?” I say pulling my keys out.

“Elle what the fuck did you do run over some glass?” He says making a face and I follow his line of sight… My front passenger side tire was flat… Like totally flat… I frowned as I went over and kicked it. There was some broken glass on the floor across the lot but I was no where near it…

“Fuck!” I cry out rubbing my eyes a little. I was starting to get a headache, a big headache… “You know how to change a tire Frankie?” I ask him and he laughs.

“Elle how could you drive and not know how to change a tire!” He says rolling up his sleeves.

“I didn’t say I don’t know HOW to!” I hiss at him. “I know how to!” I insist. “But I'm wearing a fucking skirt Frankie!” I start to yell at him. “You want me to fucking bend over and change it!” I practically scream at him.

“Chill out Elle!” He says holding his hand up to my face and I took a deep breath… I was too stressed out… I was about to snap. I could just feel it…

“I'm sorry.” I say after a moment of silence.

“Its all right I understand.” He says running his hand through his hair. “Give me the key I’ll get the spare.” He tells me and I toss him the keys and lean against the passenger side door as he circles around.

“Oh fuck.” I hear cry out and he comes back around the front of the truck.

“Frankie do not tell me the spare is flat.” I say shutting my eyes a little.

“Uh I don’t know I didn’t check it.” He says and I can feel my temperature rising… I was losing patience with him… and quick…

“Why not?” I say gritting my teeth a little.

“Elle how many spares you got?” He says and I make a face at him.

“One.” I reply.

“And you got two flats.” He says and I frown as I circle around the front of the truck. Sure as shit the other front tire was flat too.

“Motherfucker!” I cry out.

“Its all right Elle… I’ll just go call Gerard.” Frankie says I lose it.

“NO!” I scream at him… Good thing we were alone in the middle of the parking lot cause I was causing a quite a scene.

“Okay then I’ll call Bob.” He says and he's met with the same response. “Elle what the fuck!” He cries out in frustration himself now.

“Look I don’t want you to call either one of them!” I say lowering my voice down and kicking the gravel in front of me. “I gotta learn to take care of myself Frankie.” I say sniffling a little, although I wasn’t crying…not yet…“I'm not calling them.” I repeat and he sighs a little.

“Well then what do you suggest?” He says and I bite my lip a little.

“I don’t know I need a minute to think.” I say kicking the gravel in front of me again… I was scuffing up my boots but I didn’t care… I mean I would’ve never paired these boots with this dress… Seriously I was dressed like a fucking hooker. Tall boots, short dress, standing on the side of the highway ...now all I needed was a pimp. I bet Frankie would make a good pimp…

“Elle.” Frankie sighs and I shook my head a little trying to clear my mind… Fuck I'm suppose to be thinking of a way to fix my tires... “I think we should call them.” He says a little softer and I shake my head no insistently.

“No Frankie- obviously I'm meant to be alone in this world, I'm just gonna have to learn how to deal with things alone.” I say and he comes over and wraps his arm around me.

“But you're not alone Elle.” He says squeezing me against him and his words touched me deeply… Frankie was a good friend to me… I had never really thought about it before but he was… I leant my head against him as I watched the traffic whiz by on the highway…

“Thank you Frankie.” I say and he smiles looking down at me.

“For what- I cant fix the tires!” He teases me and I smile.

“No for helping me be alone.” I say and he chuckles.

“Elle if I'm here -you're not alone.” He says and I smile back at him.

“Yeah but I'm pretending like you're not here.” I tell him and he smiles wider. “And thanks for turning me down last night too.” I say and he looks up at the sky like he's trying not to laugh. “No really thank you for not fucking me.” I say and he finally laughs as he steps back from me.

“Ouch!” He says clutching at his heart like I was killing him. “Thank you for NOT fucking me! …That hurts Elle!” He laughs.

“Aw come on” I nudge him laughing too.

“So what do we do now hmm?” He says once we both stop laughing.

“Now?” I say shrugging a little. “Now we walk.” I say and he looks at me like I’ve got to be kidding. “I'm not kidding!” I tell him linking his arm in mine. “God gave me these legs and now I'm gonna use em.” I say and he laughs.

“And very nice legs they are.” He says licking his lips as he looked them over.

“Oh shut up! You had your chance!” I nudge him and he laughs as we start down the highway. It wasn’t a really far walk... maybe a mile or two to the school….but it was all highway which sucked…And it wasn’t really cold, just kinda windy, and I could feel my skirt flying up slightly in the early morning breeze. I mean I was doing my best to try to hold it down but it wasn’t really working out… We were only walking for a few minutes when a truck goes by and honks it horn at me as my skirt flew up from the wind…

“Asshole” Frankie cries out flipping him off.

“Frankie!” I scold him.

“What?” He says like he really had no idea how ironic it was what he just did… I was gonna explain it to him but I didn’t get a chance… A car pulls up suddenly along side us and I looked at the driver in disbelief…

“Need a ride?…”

It was Paul… Grinning at me with that fucking arrogant look in his eye that I've come to despise. I just looked at him and didn’t say anything… Out of all the fucking people in the world that could’ve driven by it had to fucking be him! I mean he was loving it too… He loved to see me down like this… Like it just proved him right that I couldn’t take care of myself.

“You need a ride?” He repeats and I shrug. “Why are you walking down the highway Elle?” He says sounding slightly annoyed with me and I leant over and looked at him through the passenger side window since we were walking against traffic.

“I umm got a flat tire.” I tell him and he frowns. Mostly cause he was the one who taught me how to change a tire. “Two of them.” I add and he laughs.

“Two?” He repeats back like maybe he didn’t hear right.

“Yeah I guess I ran over some glass.” I say even though I didn’t believe it…

“Just get in.” He says a little annoyed as he reached over and unlocked the passenger side door, cracking it open slightly…and I paused for a moment… I hated having to take a ride from him… I mean it was like if I did, then all those things he would say about me were true. That I was hopeless. That I couldn’t take care of myself. That I needed him looking out for me… and if not him then somebody…

But I was foolish to think that I was going to be able to walk to school, certainly not dressed like this. And that’s when I realized I was letting my pride get the best of me… I was so focused on showing how ‘independent’ I could be that it was like all my common sense had flown out the window… I mean what was I thinking… There's nothing wrong with asking for help when you need it… is there?

I looked over at Frankie like do you wanna? He kinda shrugged like whatever. I know there was no love lost between him and Paul, but a ride was a ride…

“All right.” I sigh reaching for the door and I nod to Frankie to get into the back. Paul laughs sharply.

“Not him. Just you.” He says and I raise my eyebrows up in astonishment.

“You're kidding me!” I say, lifting my hand off the door handle roughly.

“Nope.” Paul replies and I scoff at him. “Naw, I ain’t giving him a ride Elle, he could fucking walk.” He tells me.

“Paul!” I cry out in shock.

“No.” He says stubbornly. “Just you. Now get in.” He orders me and I step back and slam the car door as hard as I could.

“Fuck you Paul.” I say and he snickered and mumbled something that I couldn’t make out before peeling off. “ASSHOLE!” I cry out flipping him off as he sped off.

“Elle!” Frankie laughs pulling my hand back down.

“Huh?” I say as he shook his head at me.

“Don’t do that.” He tells me and I smile.

“Why you just did!” I reply and he laughs.

“Yeah but you're a girl, its not…” He says searching for a word.

“Lady-like?” I suggest and he nods. “Ah Frankie there are very few things about me that are lady-like.” I tell him and he grins.

“Yeah well I saw a few things last night that say otherwise.” He says and I feel myself blush. “Two actually.” He says cocking his eyebrows up and I swat at his arm.

“Shut the fuck up.” I tell him and he laughs. “You gonna rag on me about this forever or what?” I say and he shook his head yes and I tried to frown but it was hard cause he was just too cute…

“Aw I'm just kidding ya.” He says wiping his nose a little. “But uh you really should’ve taken the ride Elle.” He says shoving his hands into his pockets.

“Frankie.” I shake my head at him. He was talking nonsense now.

“No really.” He insists. “I would’ve walked.” He says and I frown.

“By yourself.” I tell him and he shrugs.

“Well yeah.” He replies. “I'm a guy you know.” He tells me and I just cant resist teasing him back…

“Well no actually I don’t know, you wouldn’t show me last night.” I say softly and he grins widely.

“oooh burn…” He says wincing a little and I laugh as I wrap his arm around mine and start pulling him along… I mean we were just standing on the side of the highway still… And I wasn’t sure what time it was but I know Paul goes in like a half and hour or so early for some kinda varsity related shit… So I figured if we didn’t start walking, there was no way we were gonna make it on time…

“Come on. Lets go.” I tell Frankie as we start walking.

“Really Elle, you should’ve taken the ride.” Frankie says as he kicked a rock along in front of him as we walked… I don’t know why he's still on this… Maybe he just feels bad… maybe he doesn’t know what else to talk about… I'm not sure…

“I wasn’t gonna let you walk alone.” I say and he opened his mouth to argue and I talked over him. “Don’t even say you could cause you're a guy.” I tell him and he frowns.

“But its true.” He says and I roll my eyes a little.

“Frankie do not get me started on this.” I warn him… I mean what the fuck. Guys can do things girls can’t? …It’s okay for him to walk cause he's a guy? Is that his argument? All of a sudden Frankie stops walking… “What?” I ask him as he stepped towards the road.

“We’re gonna cross.” He says and my jaw drops open.

“HERE?!” I yell out and he nods. The fucking crosswalk was like still another 500 feet away. He couldn’t seriously be suggesting we run across 4 lanes of traffic, hop a 3 foot cement divider and then another 4 lanes of traffic! It was like he was reading my mind cause he nudged me a little.

“Its not that bad Elle.” He says and I shake my head no.

“No Frankie” I tell him and he makes a face.

“Elle the fucking crosswalks like a gazillion miles away.” He says pointing down at it. “And then we gotta walk all the way back to cut across towards the school.” He says and I sigh a little. He was right… I mean the way the u-turns and the streets were set up, if you were in a car it wouldn’t be so bad… You hardly notice it… But on foot… Yeah it was a lot… And the road we wanted was just right there across the way…

“Frankie I'm sorry I can’t.” I tell him stepping backwards again.

“Its not a big deal, you just wait for the light and run.” He says and I make a face.

“Run!” I cry out shaking my head no.

“Come on the light is changing!” He cries out and before I could argue he grabbed my arm and dragged me into the road with him. I had never been so scared in all my life…

We got to the cement divider thing and he hops over it like nothing and I just stood there. “Come on.” He says and I just looked at him.

“Are you kidding me?” I say and he makes a face as he reaches over and grabs my waist and helps me slowly climb over it…

“Fuck!” He cries out as the traffic started picking up again….I guess we took too long going over the divider and the light changed.

And now we were stuck… Stuck in the middle of the road… Cars whizzing by in both directions, and all we could do was lean against the cement divider and wait…

“This is all your fault Frankie.” I said gripping onto his arm tightly.

“My fault!” He laughs. “You run slow as shit.” He tells me.

“You know how hard it is to run in these boots!” I say lifting my leg at shaking it at him.

“Come on its slowing down, lets go.” He says grabbing my arm again and tugging me the rest of the way…

I was so relieved to reach the other side safely. Even though I was out of breath, slightly sweaty, and feeling quite nauseous…

“Frankie wait.” I tell him rubbing the sides of my head a little. I was starting to feel a little dizzy now… He was right before… I should’ve eaten something…I don’t know why I've just been so intent on doing the opposite of whatever people suggest…

“Come on Elle, its just through the woods now.” He says and I nearly passed out.

“WOODS?!” I cry out tossing my hands up in the air.

“Yeah you know.” He says nodding to the slightly wooded area up ahead.

“Frankie we are NOT cutting through the woods!” I tell him determinedly.

“I'm not walking around them.” He says folding his arms on his chest stubbornly.

“Frankie I can’t go through there.” I say getting a little worked up.

“Why not?” He laughs. “There's nothing in there Elle!” He says and I sigh. “Come on you're gonna tell me you’ve never been in these woods before!” He says like he doesn’t believe it.

“What's that suppose to mean?” I say kinda already knowing what he's hinting at.

“Cause this is where all the stoners go to get high.” He says and I roll my eyes and don’t answer him. “Well?” He says tapping his finger on his forearm as he continued to stand there with his fucking arms crossed on his chest, waiting for my answer…

“I didn’t say I was never in the woods.” I say and he smirks like he knew that already. “I'm saying I can’t go in like this okay!” I tell him trying to hold it all together.

“Like what?” He chuckles.

“In a fucking skirt Frankie!” I say and he just looked at me. “I have no pants on!” I tell him. “There's fucking bugs and ticks and shit in there!” I say and he laughs.

“Elle, what do you think they're gonna crawl up your skirt and into your-“

“Frankie!” I gasp cutting him off and he shrugged and laughed to himself…

“Look, its your own fault…why are you even wearing a damn dress!” He blurts out stupidly and I crossed my arms on my chest.

“What?” I say loudly.

“You should've left your jeans on.” He tells me and I lose it…

“My jeans on!” I yell back at him. “Yeah cause topless with jeans is much better then a short dress any day!” I say waving my hands around. He went to say something but I just carried on ignoring him. “Yeah, no you're right Frankie! This is all my fault. I should've known better! Maybe next time you burn my house down, I’ll remember to dress more appropriately.” I tell him and his jaw drops open.

“I didn’t burn your house down!” He says and I laugh.

“You put the fucking shirt on the lamp shade!” I tell him.

“And you should've taken it off when you saw it burning!” He replies.

“I told it to stop.” I tell him and he gives me a funny look.

“You what?” He says slightly amused and I can feel myself losing control of my emotions…

“Fuck Gerard was right!” I yell at him. “He said you were the last resort!” I wave my finger at him and he just stared back confusedly at me. “I mean I would’ve been better off strapped to a damn race car and driven off a desk!” I laugh and Frankie arched his eyebrows up cautiously… Like he thought maybe I had just snapped or something… Can’t blame him… I wasn’t really making any sense any more…

“Elle you okay?” He says cautiously reaching for me.

“Oh god…” I sniffle…“I can’t do this Frankie…” I say lowering my voice down as the tears began to fall from my eyes… It was like everything had just hit me at once… I was overwhelmed suddenly… I didn’t want to be here. I didn’t want to be arguing with him… I don’t know how things go so far out of control! I hung my head forward and looked down at the grass and tried to steady myself… Tried to stop the tears but I couldn’t…

”Elle.” I hear him say and I feel his hand on my back… “Elle, what do you wanna do huh? You tell me.” He says and I sniffle looking back up at him.

“I wanna go home, but I can’t.” I say and he looked down remorsefully. “I wanna crawl into my bed and die Frankie.” I tell him and he frowns.

“Stop saying that.” He tells me and I shrug. “Look do you wanna cut through the woods or go down through the condos.” He says and I sigh a little debating to myself…

“Which was is less painful?” I ask and he smiles.

“The woods are shorter.” He says and I shrug.

“Then the woods it is.” I reply and he wraps his arm around me… But I couldn’t shake this bad feeling I had as we started down the makeshift trail…