Oh, Marcel! 2

"If I Stay, You'll Explain. Right?"

~Ember~

Emily slowed the Range Rover and pulled off to the side. The car that was behind us flew past, happy that we had finally gotten out of their way.

"You can't be serious.." Emily parks the car and stares at me. Her brown eyes searching my face for signs that I was lying. However, I was completely serious. She sighed in frustration.

"I am." I stare intently back at her. There will be no more running away from my problems. This time I was standing my ground. Marcel needed me and we needed to find Harry. Too many times have I backed out of things, this time there was other lives on the line besides mine.

"Why?" Emily was utterly confused and I don't blame her. I probably sounded crazy after telling her to drive away from this horrible place.

"All my life, I've run away from my problems. Remember when I told you why I had moved here?" My mind travels to my attempted suicide.

"No?" She questions.

Did I forget to tell her my past? How could I? She was my best friend.

"Well, I had this best friend and let's just say, for the sake of time, that I tried to kill myself in the end." The look of shock on her face is one I know all too well. "I know. Shocking that little old Ember would ever try to take her own life. But it's true." I say somewhat sarcastically and regret sounding that way.

"Why havent you ever told me?" She asks and touches my shoulder with her right hand, forgiving me for sounding so harsh.

"There wasn't anytime to tell you." Emily nods her head in understandment of the recent events.

"I understand. If I stay here in Edwardsville with you, you'll explain everything right?"

"I promise you, Emily. You're my best friend and I won't keep secrets from you. We're in this together now." My hand finds her hand and squeezes tightly to reassure her this is the best thing we can do for our boys.

"It's strange how one person can bring so many people together." She comments as she returns her attention to the road. My thoughts begin to run. Was she talking about Johnny? Or Marcel? Or me? Maybe even someone completely different.  I just nod my head, even though she doesn't notice because she isn't focused on me anymore.

The car is shifted into gear and Emily turns around on the now empty road. Thoughts of our survival now run through my head. I hadn't even thought about where we were going to stay, or even where we were going to get money.

"Harry had a bit of money in his suitcase. We can live off of that until we find some income." Emily says like she had read my thoughts. Or maybe she had just thought about it herself.

"How much?" I'm curious as to how much the mega star actually brought. Thinking this way brought my mind to a happier place for a moment. Then it turned dark as I wondered where he was.

"He brought um...." She shakes her head as if she was embarrassed. "About ten thousand dollars..."

My eyes grow wide at the number and I momentarily stop thinking about everything else. We could do so much with that. Maybe we could even bail out Marcel.

"That's a lot. I know he has much more, but to me it's a small fortune." Emily continues and I agree with her.

"Maybe we could rent an apartment in town. There was some near the police station." I say, thinking that if his bail is too high, I will still be close to him.

"But wait, won't you get in trouble from the hospital since you left?" Emily asks and my body breaks out in a cold sweat. I completely forgot about that.

"Could we go back so I can sign out properly?" She shakes her head.

"Who is paying for this? You know that bills are a lot..."

"I can. I'll just have to tell my parents. They can forward the money from my account." I say and nod my head at my quick thinking.

"You have money?" She asks and quickly looks over at me, her eyebrow raised.

"Well, not a lot, but I think I have enough to cover my bills from the hospital. We can live off what Harry has brought and I'll have some extra if we need it. Although I’m not sure how much I have saved.”

"Okay. Gosh I feel like a complete loser with only 500 dollars in my name." She quietly laughs and heads toward the hospital as it's tall parking garage comes into view.

Though the town of Edwardsville was considered ‘small town America’, it had it’s own hospital, police station, and it’s very own McDonald’s with a gruesome new history.  I’m sure that it had much more hidden in all the little cracks and crevices that know one even knew about. It almost made me want to stay in this town awhile just to figure out Edwardsville’s best kept secrets. I especially wanted to find out why Johnny’s step-mother came all the way out here to work as a police officer.

It was such a long way from what I can remember, but then again everything was new to me. I had never lived in the state of Illinois before. Where I came from in Michigan, I knew all the towns that surrounded where I lived, and just exactly how long it took to get there. But I hadn’t lived here long enough to know any of that.

"Emily thanks for doing this." I say into the quiet atmosphere as she pulls into the garage and parks next to and older grey Ford Focus.

"It's what friends do right?" She questions more than states. "I never knew what real friendship was. Sure I had the group, but Sara and Bailey were best friends and Maya follows Veronica around like a puppy. I was so glad when Veronica introduced you to our group. It gave me the chance to have my very own best friend."

As she speaks the words, I start to feel like we are more relatable. We understand each other. I needed a real girl best friend just as much as she did.

"I saw you on the first day you came in when you sat next to Marcel. The kid was literally trembling in his seat with each step you took.” She smiles at me and shakes her head remembering that day.

“He was in love with you when he laid his green eyes on you. He fell for sure when you uttered a hello and smiled a dazzling smile at him." Emily said as a blush started to form on my cheeks.

"He was? I didn't even notice." I say as I feel tears brimming behind my eyes. My hand reaches up to catch one as it falls out of my left eye.

"Yes, and that's how you know that you fell in love with him then too. You overlooked his flaws, or in his case, his nerdiness." She smiles with her teeth, her brown eyes warm.

"I did..." A tear slides down my cheek again and she wipes it away with her index finger.

"Come on. We can talk more later tonight. Right now, we have things to do." She smiles again and we exit the car. The parking garage feels cold and empty.

Walking up to the door we could see the people walking in fast paces behind the glass panes. It looked like a normal busy hospital, nothing seemed amiss. They surely weren’t scurrying around because a tall girl with blonde hair and blue eyes was missing.

I let out a pent-up sigh as Emily pulled open the door ushering me into the warm building.

I hope this will be as simple as it sounds