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[Lani Hunter]

Lani was not sure what apologizing would accomplish. She was furious and not looking to listen to any excuses he made. Any explanation would be an excuse. He didn’t want to make excuses, he wanted to explain himself and how he had been killing himself making sure that no one got hurt. He had even gone to Dr. Neville. It wasn’t really working but he was trying. He was desperate. Lani clenched his jaw and flared his nostrils. He counted slowly from ten to zero and did his best to not start yelling again. It wasn’t the answer he was looking for but he had set himself up for that one. He chose that saying less at this point was better but the anger in his eyes was not dying down. He had done worse. It was as simple as that. It stung more than he anticipated that she agreed with him. What had happened to him?

Lani let his eyes drop and squeezed them shut as the blond girl’s words struck him. The worst body guard ever. He was a failure. He couldn’t protect her and he couldn’t protect Odion. He couldn’t even protect his own sister from illness. He looked down at his feet for a long time his eyes shut tight against the world. He wanted those thoughts to go away. He could help people, but if he kept failing and the people he was helping got hurt what use was he? He was a double edged sword. Even with all of his power he couldn’t protect them. He could destroy anything with his power, but he always ended up hurting the person he wanted to protect. Even Shapiro got hurt when he was careless. Lani looked back up squinting at her as if the light was too much for his eyes. He shook his head but she wouldn’t believe him even if he protested. “You can’t expect yourself to keep a level head with something like that. You expect too much of yourself. If anyone froze it was me.” He hung his head for the first time admitting to Adrianna how he had too frozen. The fact remained that had Odion not had enough sense they would both be dead. His power sensing his frustration with himself launched loose rocks into the air, luckily making them fall away from them. He dug his nails into the palm of his hands. All of this power and he hadn’t done anything.

Doing a little bit of a double take Lani’s face blanked with surprise. “What?” Was all he could get out. As far as he knew Adrianna’s father was out of the picture. And he was back? Why now? When her mother was dying? Lani already hadn’t liked him and now his anger was growing. Perhaps it was the situation itself but he was about ten seconds from finding this guy and skinning him. It was the situation. He was angry at himself and at what was happening to Adrianna. He wanted someone to take the blame when it rested on his shoulders. Before he could let his anger get away with him, he swallowed it down burying it deep in the folds of his mind like he did with most strong emotions. He had something he had to take care of now. Right now. Adrianna was a mess. She needed someone and probably she hoped that someone wasn’t Lani. But he was here now and he was going to help her get better. He couldn’t fail again.

They were playing dangerously close of the edge with this one. It was so easy for Lani to fall back into the role of comforter and protector. He just held onto her and ignored everything else at the moment. He knew everyone hated feeling broken. Hell he had wanted to die too when he had been broken with Odion taking care of him. In all honesty he was surprised that Odion hadn’t hit him for some of the things he had said. He settled himself more comfortably figuring they might be on the ground for a while. “You’re never going to be the same,” Lani told her, hating that he had chosen to be honest. “But that’s not a bad thing. You’ll come out stronger. Better. Think of this as a… a metamorphosis.” He was trying. “You’re stronger than you think. And if Venn doesn’t come back you’ll be sad for a while, but you’ll get over it. Your life is going to be wonderful. But for it to be wonderful you have to learn how to fall and get up. The world is always going to be trying to destroy you. It’s up to you whether you let it or not. So you’re going to get through this temporary change. You won’t be who you were again when you emerge.” He gave her a soft if painful smile, “You’re going to be spectacular.”

Lani nodded absently. “Adrianna, please. Promise me you won’t do this again.” He carefully touched the bandages. Every cut underneath felt like a slice through his heart. “Don’t do this again. Please. If you ever feel like doing something like this… dance. Dance or draw. Or for heavens stake come to me. Please.” He was now beyond the moment where begging was something he didn’t want to do, it was something he was doing in desperation. Adrianna was his first girlfriend. When they broke up he didn’t just stop liking her. He sometimes wondered if he could have grown to love her. If Odion had not been in the picture. The feelings he had for Odion were so strong so foreign. Adrianna was the love of a friend and he had let her down.

[Adrianna Carstyn]

Adrian would have smacked him if she heard half of what he was thinking. He couldn’t protect everyone and no one expected him to. She definitely didn’t expect him to save her all of the time. So why did he always try to take everyone else’s problems as his own? It just bugged her because even if she couldn’t read his thoughts now she knew that’s how he was as a person. Sure, she loved him to death as a friend, but he needed to stop biting off more than he could chew. And for him to tell her that she expected too much of herself, well that wasn’t helping a whole lot. “Okay Mr. Hypocritical. You say I expect too much of myself and yet here you are saying you froze. Lani, none of us were expecting it to be like that, even if you knew it was a possibility, you didn’t know.” And how would any of them know how to react to something like that. Odion had been quick on his feet and clearly knew his ability well enough to use it to an advantage. Adrian didn’t know either power that well even still. Lani had just started working diligently with his. Maybe Odion just knew how to work with it in that moment unlike the other two.

All of his previous frustration and anger slipped from his face when she brought up her father and she looked away. Way to just slide that little bit of information in there, she had hoped that he wouldn’t catch on to it. She wasn’t done being mad. But the deer in the headlights expression softened her and she shrugged. “He came back about a month ago. I don’t know why, but he hasn’t left my mother’s side since he showed up. And it pisses me off that he’s there and I’m not,” Oh how it pissed her off. She wanted to rip his throat out and she fully intended to give him a stern talking to when she went to California. There was no way he was just going to show up out of nowhere with no consequences for having left. The very sentence passed through a tight throat and she blinked away tears again. It was his fault that she was so screwed up to begin with and she wanted him to know how much she hated him.

Lani didn’t have to worry about him and Adrian doing anything that wasn’t just a friendly thing to do. She wasn’t a cheater, and she’d been on the other end of the cheating stick. Yes it felt natural to fall into his arms for comfort, but it was just as a friendly gesture. He was helping her, comfort was what friends offered, even if they were exes. It didn’t matter to her. “I just thought that I’d already hit rock bottom ya know? That I couldn’t get any worse than I already was and yet here I am, a complete mess and not even close to being myself. I miss not having to worry so much about everything. I miss being happy,” She said her voice breaking on the last word. His smile only made it hurt more knowing that she’d probably never be happy like she used to be. She remembered when she was bright and enthusiastic, happy about everything and she never let anything get her down. Least of all when it was in front of people. Now that was all she did.

His request wasn’t something she could promise. Adrianna couldn’t lie to him either, so what was she to do? He touched the bandages lightly, but the cuts were still fresh and she winced and bit down on her lip. “Lani, dancing and sketching stopped working. And you have your own life to worry about, I can’t keep burdening you with all of my problems.” She refused to do that. He was constantly trying to protect her, but how could she be independent if she still depended on him for everything? “Just…let me handle it, okay? I’ll figure this out and I’ll get better. I will, I just need time to get over this bump in the road.”

[Lani Hunter]

If she had asked him why he probably wouldn’t have answered. He didn’t have an answer for why exactly he did what he did or why he tried to protect everyone. Perhaps it was because he had always protected Caroline and he had always felt a strong need to help those who couldn’t help themselves. Then there was the theory that he was trying to make up for all of the terrible things he had done in the past. Lani didn’t always feel that stealing from people was bad. In fact, he rather enjoyed it. Especially since he was no free to do as he pleased. He knew a lot of the time if he went into a house on his boss’s orders that he most likely was going to hurt someone with what he did. But he never really stopped to care very often. Then there was another theory that he did it because he had so many problems himself that it was easy to tackle others than it was his own. All probably had a little bit of truth in it. He blinked at her and frowned. “I should have!” He snapped back and his teeth bared in frustration. “I should have been ready for anything. He had all this power, what the hell was it good for if he couldn’t use it when he needed it.

Lani recovered slightly from his shock, enough for his frown to deepen and his brow to come together in a glare. “Are you serious? Has he tried to talk to you?” He crossed his arms, this man he had only heard things about was back. It felt altogether very similar to when Rhett had returned to Hammel. It was something he hated because it brought up strong emotions, often times more mixed and confusing. And as much as he hated to admit, even back then there was a little tugging of fear when Rhett returned that Lani would lose Odion. Lani supposed he owed a little bit to Rhett in a strange and twisted way because he really laid down the straw that broke him and Adrianna. They were both better for their breakup but it had been hard, not being able to comfort her like he wanted or the constant fighting that they had seemed to come down to. “I don’t want you seeing him alone.” Lani said suddenly almost surprised by his own words. “I don’t trust this guy. If you go to see your mother I’m going with you.” Lani finish firmly leaving no room for argument.

At this point if they kept fighting there was probably such a rare chance that something would happen between them that it was probably hanging out with unicorns. Lani nodded having hit rock bottom himself, it’s hard to imagine a place darker especially without someone to help you crawl out. “I know,” he said and just held her tighter as she opened up to him. His heart broke, not being happy. It was hard. “You know, once you hit rock bottom the only way to go is up. You can’t fly to the top. It doesn’t work like that.” He rubbed her back and hoped that she was at last having some hope. They did say that when people were thinking about hurting themselves they were on an upward track but the road seemed so long. “You’re going to slip and you’re going to fall.” He said his eyes looking at the ground his mind far away. “But you’ll catch a handhold and keep moving. Because you want to be happy. Keep that in your mind. It’ll help.” He advised.

He pulled his fingers away as if burned when she winced at his touch. He shook his head. “No, no. I pulled you into my problems, it’s the least I can do,” he gave her a little smile hoping to help her see that happiness isn’t so hard to find. “And you know what, maybe dancing and sketching failed but have you tried writing?” He lowered his voice a little bit. “I’ve never told anyone this,” he leaned closer to give her his secret, “When I’m pissed at the world I write. It’s the best medicine I’ve been able to find. I mean it’s all crap, but that’s the point, cause no one has to see it.” Most of his ended up in the trash anyways. “Instead of taking it out on yourself and holding it in until you feel the need to… bleed it out, you get it out on paper.” He felt himself blush a little bit. No he realized why he didn’t ever tell anyone about that. His private thoughts on paper, it did sound utterly ridiculous when said aloud. Lani sighed and shook his head a little bit. There was no way he would agree to that. “Adrianna, you don’t have to do this alone. You have so many people who love you and want to help. Let us. I mean I don’t care if it means calling me in the middle of the night to I don’t know go on an ice cream run or something. Unless you want a foot massage, I draw the line at feet,” he said jokingly hoping to get a little bit of a smile out of her. He knew this wasn’t a laughing matter, but sometimes laughter was the best medicine.

[Adrianna Carstyn]

“Lani, stop doing that to yourself! You’re always blaming yourself for things you have no control over, don’t you get it? None of us should have been prepared no matter the circumstances. You didn’t know he was going to do that, you didn’t know he’d come to a school full of people and kidnap someone. You can’t keep acting like this is all your fault because it’s not!” She said just as frustrated as he was. There were some things he could be held accountable for like the fact that he was working for a horrible man, but he didn’t know what that man would do to his friends. And even if he had, he couldn’t know how to handle it. All in all, they ended up doing pretty well all things considered. What did he think he could do alone? Honestly Adrian thought they all should have contributed a little, but it was Odion that had done everything. Then again, his ability came in handy with those sorts of things. Hers should have too, but she was still learning at the time.

Adrian frowned, “Yeah he tried and I wasn’t having it. He thinks we can be one big happy family for the few months that my mom has left. And he’s fucking stupid for thinking that.” She really hated him. Seeing pictures, she tried to imagine that she looked nothing like him, that she acted nothing like him. She was Amelia’s daughter and was just like her. As hard as she tried though, there were things that caught her attention that were similar. The slightly thinner lips she had than her mother, the fact that her earlobes were attached and Amelia’s weren’t, they were all small things, but they still made it clear that she was related to him. And as far as personality was concerned, she had gotten the less adventurous genes from him and that irritated her thoroughly. Shocked by his sudden intensity, she nodded, “I was going to take you with me anyway, for her sake if anything.”

Adrian rested her cheek against his chest and closed her eyes. Just listening to him speak, the vibration in his chest was soothing. Everything about him had always comforted her because he made her feel safe. It didn’t matter what happened, he was always there to save her from the bad people in the world. She just wished that every once in a while she could have been that for him, but she knew she never had been. She was too weak to save him. “I do, I really do want to be happy again, Lani. I just don’t know if I can keep getting hurt like this and get back up. I’ve done it for years, but it’s never been this hard,” Granted it had never been of this magnitude that she’d been hurt. Things just kept happening lately that kicked her while she was down. Adri knew that as long as she had her friends with her though, it didn’t matter what happened, she’d survive this for them.

She sighed when he pulled away. She hadn’t meant to flinch, it just was a little tender still. Listening to his confession, she had to admit it surprised her a bit. He had never struck her as someone who wrote, but Adrianna thought it was good for him. If he couldn’t tell anyone else what he was thinking, at least he had some form of an outlet. “I do write, I mean I have a journal. Two actually, one with pictures and one with just words. Sometimes it helps, but sometimes I can’t even write what I’m feeling. It’s all so dark and scary,” She shuddered at the thought of a few things she had drawn. Dreams she had, images that flooded her mind. Adrian sighed, “Lani, I want to do something without having to depend on everyone else for once. I can get through this on my own and if I have any trouble I will go to someone. If I need you, I’ll come to you, but I want to give it a try…” She said in all seriousness. But her serious face deteriorated when he made the comment about feet. Adri actually let out a small laugh and poked his stomach, “I have cute feet thank you very much.”

[Lani Hunter]

Lani frowned. It honestly took the vast majority of his will power not to break down and hug her. It was the first time someone had told him it was okay that he hadn’t been prepared for all hell to break loose. It was a relief that shouldn’t have been a relief. A strange and sad feeling that overcame his heart. He missed Adrianna’s bright self. She had been so strong and Lani saw her deteriorating and it was killing him. He had Odion, should he really be so emotionally involved with Adrianna? He suppressed a sigh, of course he should. He loved her like his sister. His best friend and he couldn’t watch her spiral downward any more than he could if it were Caroline sitting right there. Lani had a responsibility to the people he cared about and he was so sad to have let them down time and time again.

“You’re kidding,” Lani exclaimed in shock. Who did that? Adrianna was what, eighteen now? And her father really thought that after so many years Adrianna would just accept him like nothing had ever happened. But he could sympathize. Maybe there was something about his relationship with Amelia that Adrianna didn’t know. “I completely agree,” Lani said, “But, what if also just wants to say goodbye?” He winced knowing the chances of her taking that one well were slim. He wouldn’t stop Adrianna if she wanted to hit him, nor would be keep Adrianna’s father from trying to restore what he had broken. Lani honestly wanted the same thing for Odion. He wanted his boyfriend to give his parents a chance. Even if he hated them after one meeting, he would know.

Lani hummed a simple tune trying to comfort her as best he could given the situation. He sympathized, but he had been able to pull himself out of his dark place, but he had had his family and Adrianna to help. He wanted to help her as well. “I know, it’s hard and it’s only going to get harder. Adrianna, if you don’t think you can get up by yourself, you have people who will offer hands to you.” Every time Adrianna rose after being knocked down she became stronger. They fell and they would fall again and again. It was a fact of life. Life was not a smooth terrain. It was covered in rocks and ice and thorns. But one did not have to traverse these paths alone and when the going got though and the friend that one made on the way fought through the thorns and laughed when they slipped on the ice and had a hand to offer when one tripped over rocks. “You are not alone.” Lani whispered to her.

Lani cocked his head considering this. Finally he shrugged. “So? You’re in a lot of pain, if you’re afraid of what’s on the page then change it. If you write it you don’t have to read it. Ever again. If you write it you can shred it afterward. Not everything you write has to be happy.” He never let anyone see anything he did. Never. But he knew the feeling. It was scary to have that much darkness resting upon the soul. He had been so lost in his own mind in the dark when his secrets had first been revealed. Lani nodded but otherwise didn’t agree. He wouldn’t agree to sit on his hands. He laughed a little glad he could finally get her to laugh, even if it was just a baby laugh. He twitched and covered his ticklish stomach. He rose to his feet and offered a hand to her. “Well, let’s use those cute feet for something useful. You and I still have a race to settle.”