Meeting Me Halfway (HSMTMTS Fanfiction)

Chapter 41

Ricky
"I'm not an idiot, I just." I stop to think. "I don't use common sense as much as I used to."
My dumbfounded sentence causes the 3 of us to let out a laugh.
"No. I just moved at the worst time. Drama and what not, but I guess it was for the better." I say.
A nod from EJ and a forced smile from Nini caused me to hide a grin by lowering my head.
"Right. About that," EJ starts, "why'd you move anyway?"
"EJ.." Nini says quietly.
"Oh uh. My mom. I found it was best to live with her instead of my dad. I was Uh..I was gonna go in the summer so I can just head to my new school with much ease, but that clearly didn't work out." I force a chuckle.
"Right. How come you didn't let us know? Nini didn't even know." These questions came out of no where. Funny how he randomly tries to pitch in whenever he likes.
"Like I said. There was a lot of drama at the time so, I guess." I look at Nini, who was casually switching her vision from me and him while taking sips of her coffee. "I found it better to leave your lives when you hated me most." She gives me another forced smile.
"I get it. And you really changed over the time. I see you in these nice ass suits and I swear I can see your muscles from a mile away. What's your secret?" I laugh at his question. Nini chokes on her coffee.
"Well I," I chuckle, "time and dedication I guess. I had a lot of that. No one to distract you. And I started wearing what I do now when I realized it was best to feel confident in what I wear. I feel like I have..I don't know...more worth? I don't know, I guess its just luck I'm not sure."
He raises a brow, causing me to do the same.
"What? Something wrong?" I ask.
"Nothing. I just saw my friend enter. I haven't seen him since I went to Illinois. My friends and I went there for a semester of school." He continues to eat his food.
"You can invite over here if you'd like," Nini says.
"Uhm. Sure cool." He stands up. "Lenny! Hey come over here!"
While EJ waves his friend over, I look at Nini, who was still awkwardly staring at the two of us as she sips. I chuckle before kissing her on her forehead.
   "You two okay?" She asks, continuing to sip. At this point, I wondered just how much coffee was in that cup.
  "Us? Why wouldn't we be?"
    She shrugs and looks up at EJ as he brings his friend over.
   "So guys. This is my friend I met in Illinois. This is Labyrinth. Labyrinth, meet Ricky and Nini." EJ Introduces. I look up at the man, but immediately, I want to throw up and run.
  "Labyrinth? Like..the movie?" Nini asks.
  "Yeah. Just....stupid naming shenanigans between my family." The brown hair man says.
  "Excuse me.." I mumble as I push my way out of the booth.
I don't come back.
Well.
Not for a while...
At least.

Lachlan
   "Look Chief. I-.." I pause. "The best thing that we can do around this time is just take EJ Caswell and Richard Bowen in for questioning."
  I wouldn't normally just say something like that out of the blue, but it he was on my ass.
  "And the victim. Nina Salazar-Roberts. She didn't say a thing since then. 3 years and 47 days since the apposed night and all of a sudden she's just in the files?"
  I don't know why he was questioning me at this point.
  "Why does that matter? It's the fact that she was clearly assaulted. That picture? The picture that went missing? You saw it all."
"I know I told you to eventually take him in for questioning...but in this case. We need to let it go. The victim didn't say anything and it's anonymous. If you think about it..it really isn't evidence."
I raise a brow but quickly lower it.
"Fine. Just don't sign me onto something that clearly doesn't seem to bother you," I say, standing up from my chair as I begin to shuffle papers into my hands. "It's wasting both of our times."
  Yeah, I probably shouldn't say that to the chief but I'm pissed. Who wouldn't be?

Narration
    Lachlan set off, angered, frustrated, and ready. Ready for what? No one knows.
  Ricky sat in the bathroom stalls for nearly 40 minutes and still is. Shaking and frozen, Nini not even knowing about it. Instead, sitting at the table with EJ and his friend. I'd be lying if I said Nini wasn't eager to rush into the boys bathroom looking for Ricky, but she didn't even know where he was. He got lost into the large crowd that was casually entering at the time. Nini noticed Labrinths glare at him. He seemed mad but she passed it off, not even realizing that she and Ricky wasn't safe.
   EJ, stuck at school, didn't even think about the situation that is happening between Nini, Ricky, Labyrinth, and Lachlan. He didn't know that there was a case...well..a closed one now...of his ex-girlfriend being raped. Let alone  him and his past frenemie, Ricky were the accused targets.
   Big Red, also unaware of any of this happening only has one thing on his mind. Is his past best friend, an underaged alcoholic?
   Carlos Rodriguez, still shocked and concerned for his high schools leading star, sits at home, wondering if he should've just called Seb the moment Lachlan walked into his home. Telling him that Nini was raped and her exes are the accused targets of it all. It wasn't his story to tell, but it was his friend group that was in jeopardy. Plus, no one would know it was him who leaked the occurring news anyway, right?
  It was just a story that was left unfinished. Left undone. Left helpless. Left...alone.