The Criminal Diaries

      Some time later, Peter finds the strength to get up slowly, even if he feels that his legs get sharply weak and shake slightly due to the sense of dizziness. His widely open eyes look closely at Helene standing in front of him, keeping her hands folded in front of herself and still smiling sweetly as she feels a little confused and excited.       “No…” Peter pronounces faintly and shakes his head slightly. “No… No w-w-way…”       “Olalala…” Theodore smiles slyly and starts walking around Helene with a proud look and looking at her from head to foot. “What a fucking twist… Holy shit! Is the gal alive?”       “I must be hallucinating…” Peter grabs his head with a heavy breath. “I’m going crazy…”       “Erm… Dude, I’m not the one to have to do with this. I swear I didn’t do anything!”       “It’s really me…” Helene protests quietly and confidently and takes a step closer to Peter. “Real…”       “You…” Peter pronounces in a shaking voice. “You aren’t real, for sure… You… You’re my imagination… My hallucination…”       “No, Peter, I’m not a hallucination. I’m standing here in front of you right now…”       “It cannot be the truth… It cannot… It’s impossible…”       “But what if it’s possible?” Theodore wonders. “What if the gal was really lucky? Who the fuck knows how, but miracles can happen at times.”       “I know what’s happening seems unreal,” Helene says softly. “I understand it all… It’s a long story. But I promise I’ll explain everything to you.”       “No, no…” Peter protests and goes two steps away from Helene as he looks at her scarily. “You can’t… You can’t be real… It’s impossible! Impossible!”       “Everything seems a real miracle, but the explanation is actually simple.”       “Damn, I think I really have to go to the specialist to get help.” Peter grabs his hands as he turns aside. “The situation is getting worse and worse… I’m talking to my copy, but now I’m seeing you…”       “I completely understand it all, sweetie. But please, let me explain everything.”       “Yeah, cutie, explain everything to us now!” Theodore exclaims. “Where, how, what, and why…”       “You can’t be real…” Peter says hesitantly. “You can’t… You… You d-d-died… You’re dead… I saw everything with my own eyes! You died!”       “You didn’t see everything,” Helene locks her fingers. “You didn’t see what happened after… We lost the connection with each other.”       “I don’t believe… I don’t believe you… You’re in my head! You’re my imagination! You can’t be real!”       “If she wasn’t real, the guys and I wouldn’t see her,” Daniel’s voice pronounces confidently.       At this moment, Edward, Daniel, and Terrence come confidently to Helene.       “And if she wasn’t real, we wouldn’t be able to hug this girl,” Daniel adds and hugs Helene around the shoulders.       “But as you see, we can,” Terrence says confidently.       “What?” Peter opens his eyes widely. “You… You see it too? You see Helene in front of you?”       “We don’t just see her, Rose,” Edward chuckles. “We drove her here so that she could meet you.”       “What if…” Peter looks at all the men with a hesitant look full of fear. “What if you all aren’t real, either? What if what just happened is just my imagination? What if it’s never happened?”       “Don’t doubt, blond, this is really Helene,” Daniel replies confidently. “She didn’t die. She survived. I mean, someone helped her survive.”       “No… No, it can’t be the truth! I saw it all! We saw it all!”       “Don’t worry, guys, I’ll explain everything to him now,” Helene says softly, turning on Daniel, Terrence, and Edward. “I’ll tell him how it all happened.”       “So, I think we can think our mission has been completed successfully,” Edward says thoughtfully, putting his hands on his hips.       “Uh-huh, and now, Marshall, it’s all up to you!” Terrence exclaims, clapping Helene on the shoulder.       ‘Thank you so much for your help, guys,” Helene thanks amicably. “I don't know how I would do this all without you.”       “I…” Peter barely moves his numb lips. “I don’t understand… I don’t understand… Where’s the truth… Where’s the lie…”       “Relax, Rose, your girlfriend will tell you about all her adventures now,” Terrence assures.       “But we prefer to leave,” Daniel adds, hugging Edward and Terrence around the shoulders. “I personally need to go to a food store and buy something.”       “And I must go to the petrol station shortly,” Edward confesses. “Petrol is almost gone!”       “Let’s go, guys!” Terrence exclaims. “Let’s leave them alone so that they can talk. Helene knows what to do next.”       “Guys, wait…” Peter calls hesitantly after Edward, Terrence, and Daniel want to turn around and leave. “I…”       “Later,” Daniel pronounces quietly. “We’ll talk about everything later. But now give attention to Helene. She missed you so badly and was waiting for this moment.”       “I just wanted to say…”       But Peter does not speak his mind because Daniel, Terrence, and Edward turn to the side where the car of the latter one is parked. And he says his last words under his nose:       “I'm very sorry…” Peter inclines his head, looking down with sadness in his eyes. “For everything…”       “Yeah…” Theodore pronounces thoughtfully, stroking his chin and looking questioningly at Helene from head to foot. “I don’t even know how to react to this… She’s kinda so real, and your friends can see her… But on the contrary… It cannot be the truth! How is this actually possible?””       “No, I…” Peter pronounces hesitantly and shakes his head sharply. “I can’t believe it… I can’t believe I’m not going crazy… That… You… You’re really here…”       “I understand everything, sweetie,” Helene replies softly, comes closer to Peter, and takes his hand with both hands, making him shake slightly and tense. “But I promise you’ll understand everything. Understand when I explain the situation.”       “It must be my dream… The dream that is about to turn into my nightmare.”       “It will not, I promise.”       “Everything seems unreal to me now… As if… All of this… Unreal… As if I’m… Sleeping… Can’t wake up… No…”       Peter grabs his head with a heavy breath and looks at everything around him with widely open eyes, considering this world something unreal.       “It’s okay, Peter, it’s okay…” Helene calms down, stroking Peter’s shoulders. “It’s okay… Calm down, please…”       “No…” Peter steps back sharply, feeling nausea in his throat and being barely able to breathe in the air due to the heaviness in his chest. “No, you can’t be real… You’re an illusion! You’re not here! You’re dead!”       “No, honey, I’m not dead. I’m alive.” Helene smiles to encourage. “Here I am. Here. Though I still can’t believe it, either. Because I thought I’d die.”       “No… It’s impossible…” Peter swallows nervously, looking at Helene from head to foot again and again with eyes full of horror in mistrust. “Impossible!”       When Helene wants to say something else, Daniel’s voice behind her pronounces loudly:       “Hey, Rose!”       Peter moves his eyes to the source of the sound and sees Daniel come to him all alone.       “I almost forgot to give you something back.” Daniel puts his hand in the pocket of his jeans. “I had to borrow it for some time, but now I don’t need it anymore.”       When Daniel takes something from his pocket, he throws it to Peter, who catches the keys from the car that he could not find before with no problems.       “You need to pass two meters from here so that you can find your baby! And yeah, you’d better wash it because it looks really dirty. It’s bad to drive your girlfriend in a dirty car.”       After throwing a mysterious smile, Daniel turns around and leaves quietly, while Peter watches him hesitantly and then moves his eyes to the keys in his hands.       “He said the thing I agree with!” Theodore exclaims, walking next to Peter. “I feel like I’m driving in a dirty trunk with pigs. I do wanna go to a shower and wash off all this shit with a washcloth.”       “Let’s sit somewhere and talk about everything,” Helene suggests softly. “I’ll tell you everything now.”       “I don’t understand…” Peter pronounces hesitantly and sniffs loudly. “I don’t understand… You died, but they see you… And I see you…”       “You’ll get it, I promise. Just let me put everything in order.”       Helene looks around quickly in search of a place to sit and stops her eyes on the small bench without a back near the house.       “Oh, let’s go there! Sit there!”       Taking Peter’s hand, Helene pulls him after herself to the bench she paid attention to, while the guy is still sure that he is seeing a dream: the fight with his friends and the appearance of his allegedly dead girlfriend. But when they sit down, Rose starts touching his face, grabbing his head, and pulling his hair as he chokes from the lack of air and understanding that he is obsessed with a much stronger wave of shaking.       “Please, do something for me to wake up!” Peter begs desperately. “Do something for this nightmare to end! I don’t wanna get through what’s gonna happen next. I don’t have the strength! You see, I can’t!”       “Quiet, quiet, my sweetheart, quiet,” Helene pronounces quietly, putting her hand on Peter’s hand and caressing it. “Quiet… Breathe deeper… It’s okay. You’re not sleeping. It’s all real.”       “No, it’s not the truth! You’ll talk to me and then say you’re dead in the end. And do something horrible to me.”       “What are you talking about?”       “Please, Helene, don’t torture me… Just do something for me to wake up.”       “Alright, say nothing now, but I will tell you everything. Just be silent and listen. If you wanna specify something, it’s alright.”       “Even if I dream of you being here, how is this possible? How did you survive in the situation when nobody would’ve done it?”       “Everything is actually easy enough: I was saved. Some time before the explosion happened. I couldn’t get out by myself because I was in a fire trap and later passed out after breathing in too much carbon monoxide.”       “And who was it?”       “One of Marcus’s accomplices. He distanced himself so that nobody suspected anything, entered the burning house, found me, and drove me to the hospital.”       “Marcus’s accomplice?”       “Elijah. The one to be his right hand. Almost like a leader, so to say.”       “The one who disappeared at some moment, while Marcus was talking to those bastards via a videocall?”       “Exactly! Thanks to him, I’m alive and healthy now.”       “So…” Peter pronounces, still not believing it. “You want to say… You spent that whole time in the hospital?”       “Not quite. I was in the hospital for one week. They treated my burns that I got in the fire. And I was too exhausted because they didn’t feed me or give me water.”       “When they had a videocall… You… You were really exhausted… Tired… Weak…”       “I suffered from stomach pain all the time. I had dizziness… And I fainted several times. And I had to eat what Elijah gave me for several days not to die. Besides, I started to hallucinate at some moment. I saw something all the time. And nightmares made me feel much worse. You came to kill me… Or Marcus, his friends, the men, and the girls… It all made me literally die and stop suffering like that.”       “Oh, damn, Helene…”       “And even if it’s summer now, I felt cold all the time. Especially at night. They held me in the abandoned house in the small room where the wind got in from lots of tones and where some living creatures were creeping: from mice and rats to cockroaches and bugs. Mosquitoes bite me a lot… And when mice and rats ran there, I shouted like a pig. I’ve always feared them to death. But I had to live with them.”       “Really?” Peter opens his eyes widely.       “By the way, I was in the hospital and had SARS. Though I had felt bad already. I felt that I was having a high fever. My face was burning, and I felt cold… I had a sore throat… I had a running nose…”       “But how do you feel now?”       “Much better,” Helene smiles shyly. “Of course, I have a running nose, but the fever is gone, as well as my sore throat.”       “I must admit that… Now you… Look… Not the way you did then. Now… It’s much better…”       “They took care of me well in the hospital. And the food was really delicious. Well…” Helene shrugs. “Or I was just too hungry and could enjoy even water and bread.”       “Okay… And where were you after you were released?”       “Elijah drove me to his apartment. I mean, he later confessed that it was the apartment of his older brother, who agreed to help him.”       “Does that asshole have a brother?”       “Yeah, he said they hadn’t spoken for several years, but they recently got close again.”       “Does it mean he is kind of his accomplice? Used the fact that nobody would suspect him and covered that bastard?”       “Elijah isn’t as terrible as the others. He was never close to Marcus’s accomplices and went after him like a tail out of respect for his father, who was his friend. But at some moment, he understood that he didn’t wanna do that anymore and found a way to get away from him somehow.”       “Oh, yeah, I trust him,” Peter throws gloomily, crossing his arms over his chest. “A criminal becoming good shortly!”       “I didn’t believe him until the end, either. But at least, he treated me well when hiding me in his brother’s apartment. We managed to get along. Before I left, he even gave me some money for a taxi. And I brought it back by transferring it to his card when I came back home.”       “And why did he decide to hide you?”       “He wanted to make sure that Marcus and his gang were really arrested. He was worried that your father would get enraged if he understood that his plan of killing you failed. Like, he wouldn’t calm down until he knew I was dead.”       “Wow, what a noble guy he turned out to be…”       “By the way, he knows many dirty secrets of Marcus that may make his situation much worse. He knows where to find many people whom your father has ever killed. Nobody knew anything about them for the time being, but Elijah could tell where Marcus hid their bodies.”       “So, does he hope that he will avoid the punishment and live as if nothing happened?”       “Elijah said that Marcus killed his childhood friend, with whom he was very close. It’s one of the reasons why he hates him. Though Marcus himself doesn’t know it because Elijah never told him that.”       “Since you know the location of that bastard, you must tell the police about it. So that they get him arrested and put him in prison along with my father and his friends.”       “Elijah has been arrested already. He went to the police station and surrendered at his will. As he promised to me before letting me know that I could come back home.”       “I hope so,” Peter replies gloomily. “I hope all these bastards will pay for their tricks. The bastards I shall never forgive for.”       “I thought Elijah wouldn’t go to the police at his will until the end. But Edward recently said Mr. Johnson called him and told him about it.”       “Wait, how long ago did you leave that bastard’s apartment? And how long have the guys been aware of you?”       “It’s been several days since I met them,” Helene confesses shyly. “When I left Elijah, I decided to walk in the city a little because I didn’t wanna come back to four walls again. And on the way, Edward called me. He was the first one to know that I was alive.”       “Edward?”       “Of course, he didn’t believe and stared at me as if he was hallucinating. But I put everything in order and calmed him down when we entered the café and drank a cup of coffee.”       “I see. And the others?”       “Edward sent a message to everyone, asking them to come together shortly. In the end, we decided to meet at Daniel and Anna’s home, where MacClife and I went. And then I met the guys. Who were all dumbfounded at first and didn’t believe it all. The girls actually almost collapsed from shock. I mean, Anna scared all of us a little.”       “Does it mean everyone knows it?”       “They do,” Helene nods with a slight smile. “And the next day, I went home to Grandma Scarlett. Daniel drove Sammy and me after we spent a night with him and Anna.”       “She knows everything, too?”       “As well as Jessica. As well as all my colleagues. As well as your neighbors. And other friends of ours are aware of it.”       “Seriously?” Peter opens his eyes widely. “Do you wanna say I’m the last one to find out all of this?”       “The guys tried to tell you that! Everyone tried to tell you that I was alive! I also tried to reach you a million times! I went to your home, I called you, I sent you messages! But you ignored everyone! You hid from everyone!”       “Damn…” Peter shakes his head hesitantly. “Does it turn out… Does it turn out that the guys didn’t lie to me? They told me the truth?”       “Exactly, silly!” Helene exclaims happily. “The guys hoped you’d be happy, but you attacked them with charges for lying and wishing to hurt you!”       “Fucking shit… I screwed it up…”       “That’s right!” Theodore sneers evilly. “You outdid all these men! Of course, they all screwed it up somehow, but nobody could outdo you.”       “Hey, do you know Daniel, Edward, and Terrence don’t want to befriend you anymore?” Helene asks quietly. “Do you know that helping me arrange my meeting with you is the last thing they wanted to do for you? After that, the guys wanna stop talking to you and let you live as you want.”       “Yeah, I screwed it up as hell…” Peter confesses shamelessly, looking at his hands folded in front of himself. “When that explosion happened before my eyes, I was kinda outta my mind. I stopped watching what I was doing and saying.”       “I have just one question for you…” Helene shakes her head faintly. “Just one. Why? Why, Peter? Why did you do this to them?”       “Helene, sweetie…”       “Honestly, I have many questions for you. Especially after everything I have found out about you.”       “I can explain everything.”       “Why the hell, pardon me, did you attack the men? What the hell? You insulted and humiliated them and tried to kill them! Kill them with your own hands! At your will! And you called them murderers who were guilty of my death! And you wished them to die!”       “Listen, I’m really sorry about what happened…” Peter excuses himself with sadness in his eyes. “I… I…”       “How could you, Rose?” Helene wonders. “How could you do this to them? How did you actually dare? What were you thinking of?”       “Helene…”       “It’s okay you attacked Marcus and his gang and tried to kill them! But the lads! Why did you make the innocent guys guilty? Why did you do this to your friends? The friends, who were ready for anything for you!”       “Listen…”       “They risked their lives for you! They could’ve died because of Marcus, who got all of them tortured as hell. He enjoyed the way his henchmen beat them, broke their arms and legs, burned the skin, and something like that!”       “I know, sweetie… I know I acted like a beast.”       “Exactly, like a beast!” Helene pronounces a little louder and harsher. “You wanted to become a killer! You wanted to take after your father and become the improved version of Marcus Longbottom. You wanted to start your own criminal diaries.”       “Please, don’t be so cruel to me,” Peter begs with pity in his eyes.       “Serious? So, do you think I should pretend that nothing is happening? That killing your friends is fine? Killing them more than one time!”       “Helene…”       “I know what you wanted to do to Daniel during your conflict after the tour with ‘The Loser Syndrome’. I know you tried to kill him. You grabbed a knife and tried to put it into his heart. And you cut his veins in the end. And you tried to kill him several more times after that.”       “Yeah, it happened, I admit it!” Peter exhales sharply. “But I didn’t want this! I swear I’m really very sorry.”       “You didn’t want, but you did!”       “I’m still madly ashamed of that case. I don’t know what I would’ve done if people had learned about it much earlier.”       “Is that why you terrified Perkins? You probably told him something like, ‘If someone knows it, you’ll be dead!’ Yeah?”       “What?” Peter opens his eyes widely. “No, it’s not the truth! I told him nothing! He decided to be silent!”       “And you were happy! You were happy that you’d get away from this and become a victim for everyone, while Daniel would be a beast who mocked you. However, he had been the one before he said you slapped him first.”       “It happened! I… I understood the truth would come to light early or late and waited for that. I was waiting for Perkins to tell people everything about me.”       “Yeah? But he decided to be silent!”       “It was his decision! I swear I didn’t make him say anything! If he’d wanted, he would’ve told the truth.”       “But what about your slogan, ‘A bitter truth is better than a sweet lie’? Huh, Rose? Did you forget it? Did you think you could keep pretending to be an innocent angel since your friend did you a favor and didn’t make you an asshole?”       “I really wanted to confess everything!” Peter replies desperately. “I really wanted to confess that the conflict was much more serious, and Daniel had a right to be mad at me. The right not to talk to me anymore. Or actually report me to the police.”       “And he shouldn't have forgiven you, of course,” Helene says without emotions. “Daniel must’ve reported you. He shouldn't have covered your dirty tricks because of pity.”       “Please, Helene, don’t talk to me like this.”       “Sorry, Peter, but I can’t close my eyes to what you’re doing. What you did back then. Everything you’ve lately done.”       “It’s all my hallucinations!” Peter confesses. “They encourage me to do bad things all the time. I act like a bastard because of them.”       “Come on!”       “I’ve never said it, but they’ve been chasing me for many years. I mean… I see myself in front of me… Someone named Theodore. He’s the one to make me a monster.”       “Oh, c’mon, Theodore!” Theodore rolls his eyes. “I am guiding you on the go, but you make all decisions by yourself. With your stupid and empty mind! With just one thought: everyone but you is guilty of your problems.”       “What kind of bullshit!” Helene frowns strongly. “Who’s chasing you?”       “I’m not lying, Helene, it’s the truth. Theodore is always near. Every day. Every hour. Every second. He comes to me wherever I am and whoever I am with.”       “Oh, yeah, do you want to say a certain Theodore is the one to encourage you to do all these terrible things all the time?”       “Yes, him!”       “It’s a stupid excuse, Rose. Really stupid. Couldn’t you come up with anything better?”       “When I’m in a stressful situation, Theodore is really unbearable. He does his best to make me crazy. He’s the reason why I’m always close to hysteria. I can’t hide from him. I can’t get rid of him. I can do nothing!”       “You’d better tell her why I don’t wanna leave you alone,” Theodore smiles slyly. “Tell her. What you should do to make it happen.”       “He’s here right now. Walking in circles and commenting on many words of mine.”       “If I could do this, I’d fuck this cutie.” Theodore looks at Helene from head to foot with a dirty smile. “She’s so sexy… She’s so attractive…”       “So, is this how you’re trying to excuse your evil tricks?” Helene concludes quietly. “Is this what you want to say to excuse yourself?”       “I’m not excusing!” Peter protests.       “Do you understand what you did? Do you understand what consequences it all may lead to? You’re about to go to prison if the guys wanna go to the police and report you! Daniel, for example! He could easily go to Mr. Johnson and tell him to put you in prison for the murder attempt. Several attempts, I want to say!”       “Yeah, you’re right, there’s no excuse for my actions. And I’m really very sorry. I swear I didn’t want anything like this.”       “Alright, I can believe in the story about your hallucinations. All of us noticed some weird things about your behavior. We saw you talking to someone as you looked aside. Saw you screaming at someone, trying to strangle someone, throwing everything you saw… Telling someone to leave you alone.”       “Really?” Peter pronounces in a shaking voice, opening his eyes widely with the thought that his heart stops for a moment. “You knew it? You saw everything?”       “I did several times. Though I didn’t pay attention to that back then. But I should’ve, as I see. You just admitted that you had mental issues.”       “It’s disgusting to confess it… But I am really ill. I’ve always been ill.” Peter shrugs hesitantly. “Though there’s nothing surprising about it, knowing who my father and his family are.”       “Yeah… I thought I knew you well, but you actually turned out to be a dark horse. The one I shouldn't have gotten in touch with.”       “Helene…”       “I don’t understand, Rose! Since you’re ill and know it, you must get therapy! You must take cures, get therapy… Why the hell do you continue to live with all of this? Do you like all of this, I don’t understand?”       “No, of course! I don’t like all of this! I am sick of this life. I am sick of feeling ill.”       “If you really were, you’d go to the doctor.”       “Yeah? To let them put me in a mental hospital and give me tons of sedatives? To let a strange man or a strange woman get into my mind and know my secrets? No!”       “But you will never get cured in this case! You’ll never be able to live a normal life!”       “I do know what’s happening to me. I don’t need any psychologists to figure it out.”       “Not only do they figure it out, but they also help you find the strength to live with it.”       “No, Helene! I don’t want! I will not!”       “Do you want your hallucinations to be with you until the end of your life? Do you want them to push you to terrible things much more? You’re going crazy, and you have some imaginary friends playing on your nerves, repeating that there are only betrayers, who want to harm you, around like a mantra!”       “This world is really unfair to me.”       “No, Peter, the world is not cruel, you turn your back on the one. Nobody denies that there are good and bad things in it. But it doesn’t mean you need to behave like this.”       “You don’t understand anything…” Peter shakes his head with sadness in his eyes. “You don’t understand what I had to get through. What I still have to get through.”       “Right, I don’t understand. I don’t understand how you could go so far? Why a shy and sweet guy has become something like this? Something that’s ready to rip his friends, charges them for who the hell knows what, and terrifies those who surround him.”       “Please, don’t call me a monster. I’m not as terrible as you think.”       “I do not know what to think about. I do not know how to treat you now. I don’t understand!”       “Helene, please!”       “You know, I think I need to do the same thing as the men and turn my back on you, too. For my own safety.”       “What?” Peter opens his eyes widely. “No! No, honey, please, don’t do this!”       “Since you don’t pity the guys, threaten your old neighbors with murder, want to take revenge on all your enemies, and start a riot in your apartment at night, I’m about to become your next victim.”       “No, no, no, don’t say that, I’m begging you!”       Peter takes Helene’s hand and squeezes it tightly in his hands.       “I swear I will never harm you, no matter what happens. Never!”       “Yeah?” Helene pronounces without emotions. “What about the day you blamed me for betraying you? When you behaved really aggressively, probably for the first time in the years we’d known each other. And you almost killed me.”       “I’m madly ashamed to remember that. Remember that I believed in that insolent lie of my father, who wanted to separate us.”       “You should’ve been ashamed back then.”       “Please, Helene, don’t be so cold to me. I’m really very sorry. I wanted to harm nobody. I wanted to betray nobody. I was gonna lose nobody.”       “Think you’ve lost. Lost everyone and everything.”       “No, no, please, don’t do this to me,” Peter begs desperately. “Anyone but you. I will be dead without you! I won’t survive in this world! I will die!”       “Congratulations, Peter Rose, you got what you want. Though it would probably be wrong to call you like this. Because you’re Theodore. Theodore Longbottom.”       “Don’t call me Theodore! I’m not Theodore! He’s bad! He’s a bastard! I’m not him! I don’t want!”       “I should’ve thought back then. Thought about whether it would be right to have a deal with you. If Sammy hadn’t been near, you would’ve killed me much earlier than the stinker, because of whom I almost drowned.”       “If it’d happened, I would've never forgiven myself for that. I wouldn’t have been able to live with this burden. I wouldn’t have!”       “Oh, yeah, sure! Your hallucinations would’ve washed your brains again, and you would’ve gone to kill without thinking. Knowing about the illnesses of your family and the cruel way you were treated, I am really surprised that you didn’t become a criminal before. Though I may not know something about you.”       “I could get wild and attack anyone but you. No way. Never. I tried so hard to hold on if something pushed me to that. I made myself remember that you were my very important person.”       “The important person, whom you were ready to kill with your own hands at the thought that she allegedly betrayed you.”       “I know I shouldn't have believed what Marcus didn’t prove. He talked a lot and promised to confirm everything, but I got nothing. Nothing! Which means that bastard talked to the wind, thinking he would get what he wanted like this.”       “Nevertheless, you believed him initially, not me. I mean, the one you didn’t know anything about back then.”       “A betrayal of a close person is a thing that hurts me. I can barely take even hints at this. I wouldn’t feel so offended if I suffered because of the stranger. But if I got the knife in my back from a close person, I’d just go crazy.”       “Call me just one reason why you could doubt me. Have I ever given you a hint? Have I never done something bad to you? Have I ever been wrong? Tell me! What’s my fault? Why do you treat me like this?”       “Please, forgive me, my sweetheart…” Peter begs desperately. “I’m sorry about daring to doubt you. I promise it was the first and last time. It will not happen anymore. I swear!”       “I’m sorry, Peter, but we’ll hardly have a good relationship in the future,” Helene says with sadness in her eyes. “You’re not the one I have a love for. You were a quiet and shy guy who needed love and care. But now you’re a heartless and bloodthirsty stinker with tons of mental issues and illnesses he’ll have to live with all his life.”       “Sometimes I don’t understand who I really am. I don’t understand where the real me is. And whether I wanna be the one I’ve been since birth or the one this world made me. I act like Peter, a quiet and shy guy. But I may become Theodore. A bastard who turned everyone he knew against himself.”       “Another stupid excuse.”       “No, it’s not the truth! Sometimes there are really moments when I think I have two personalities living in me. The personalities, between which I switch constantly.”       “Peter Rose did all these evil things. This is the name you have in your documents. You’ve lived twenty-seven years of your life with this name.”       “I wanna be Peter! I don’t wanna be Theodore! It’s not the one I’m supposed to be. Not the one I feel like.”       “You wanted different things some time ago.”       “I was outta my mind! Because I thought you were dead! I was going crazy ‘cause I thought I lost you forever. I lost the meaning of life. All this time, I’ve been doing shitty things, speaking rudely. Drinking, walking in the city, driving somewhere, fighting with someone… Arguing with my hallucination… I even fought with one man at the bar ‘cause he didn’t understand my plea of leaving me alone and wanted to talk to me openly. I barely got away from one, but then another so-called psychologist showed up. So, I lost my patience. The visitors tried to break us up, but the staff members called the police, who took both of us to the station. They kept me there until the early morning and then let me go, telling me to pay a big penalty for violating the order.”       “Trying to pity me?”       “Don’t you believe me? Don’t you believe I suffered? Suffered without you, the girl, for whom I tried to hold on until the very end! And then I lost the meaning of all of that! I had nobody to hold on to!”       “What did you do, Peter?” Helene sighs heavily. “How far you’ve come! I didn’t expect anything like this from you. I thought you were good, kind, shy, and sweet. I thought you wouldn’t hurt a fly. I was happy you didn’t get at the whole world after so many insults and humiliations from the guys from your school. I admired your power of will. I was surprised… But now it happens that… I was wrong?”       “Please, Helene, don’t say that…” Peter begs in a shaking voice. “Don’t consider me a monster. I’m not actually like this…”       “M-m-m, I think the gal is going to leave you…” Theodore assumes with a sly smile. “My gut tells me that… She’s sick of you doing some shit. She decided to meet another man. Someone to be much healthier. She realized she didn’t need a bastard who suffered from hallucinations, fell into depression, and blamed the whole world for all his problems.”       “Sorry, but I really can’t…” Helene says hesitantly, inclining her head. “I can’t be with you after everything that’s happened. You’ve gone too far, and I… I can’t consider you decent.”       “No!” Peter pronounces much louder and more desperately, takes Helene’s hands tightly, and kisses the front of them several times. “No, no, no, no, please, sweetie, don’t do this! Please, don’t leave me! I’ll die without you! I need you! Please, don’t do this! Don’t leave me alone in this world! Please, Helene, please, don’t do this! Don’t do this!”       “You don’t need people too much, as I understand. Since you turn your back on those who are ready to help you so easily, it doesn’t make sense for all of us to save you and get you out of the pool. Where you come back again and again.”       “No, it’s not the truth!”       “Interesting! You’ve always said you feared loneliness to death and wouldn’t be able to accept it. But you’re doing your best for nobody to be with you. You push everyone off, you hate everyone, you blame everyone for your trouble, you wanna kill everyone, you wanna take revenge on everyone…”       “I haven’t learned to trust this world. And I’m waiting for a trick even from someone I know well. I… I’m afraid to be betrayed. I’m afraid that my close people will show their real face someday and leave me, putting a knife in my back.”       “Is that why you attack them with a knife and try to kill them?”       “It’s just my protective reaction. I don’t wanna seem weak. I don’t want them to hurt me again. I don’t want anyone to know about my feelings.”       “Trying to kill a person is not a protective reaction. It’s an illness. A mental illness that you must get rid of.”       “Yes, I suffer from hallucinations and mistrust of people. Yes, I’m tended to a suicide. Yes, I can’t understand who I really am. I can’t decide who I’d rather be: the weak and unhappy Peter or the shameless bastard named Theodore. I don’t know!”       “Are you sure you know everything? Are you sure you understand where all your feats and your mistrust come from? Maybe you need to spend a lot of time sorting your mind out and looking for a reason for this behavior? Yes, genes are genes, but I think everything depends on your education and your surroundings. If your life were different, you’d never do anything like this. You’d never kill, rob, or take revenge. You’d be able to forget and forgive. You’d learn to live with it.”       “I can’t do all of this without you. I may have nobody in this cruel world, but I can’t lose you. I can’t even think about you wishing to turn your back on me. Just one thought about this makes me hysterical already.”       “If you really wanted, you’d jump out of your skin to fix the situation. But it seems like you’re happy with everything.”       “I want to fix everything!” Peter exclaims. “I really want! I want to live like a normal man!”       “I can’t save you every time you jump in a pool and drown in it. I can’t, get it! I will get sick of all of this early or late! Any person gets sick of helping the one who doesn’t appreciate it and aims to change nothing.”       “Not truth! I do really appreciate everything you’re doing for me. And I honestly try to hold on just for you. I have no reason to try and fight if you’re not with me.”       “By starting to attack your friends and blame them for stupid things, you marked the beginning of the end. The end of all the good things that connected you with the guys, me, and those who loved you.”       “Now I am ready to keep fighting. The thought that you’re alive is gonna give me the strength and keep my wish to hold on again.”       “I doubt someone will need you after what you’ve done. I talked to the guys. And they are really disappointed in you. They don’t understand how they could spend so much time wiping your snots and doing something for you. And I’m thinking about whether I'm wasting my time. Maybe I should put a dot in our story and start to think of myself, not about how to save the one who gets out of the cliff and glances at the one with a wish to come back there again someday.”       “No, Helene, please, don’t tell me that!” Peter cries desperately. “I don’t even wanna hear anything like this! I don’t want! I don’t want!”       “I’m sorry about your problems,” Helene pronounces without emotions. “But until you decide on your goals and decide who you wanna be, we have nothing to talk about. It doesn’t make sense to continue this relationship.”       “No, sweetheart, don’t do this to me!”       Peter jumps from the bench sharply, gets down to his knees in front of Helene, and takes her hand, looking at her with tears in his red eyes full of pity.       “Please, don’t leave me! Please, don’t do this! I swear I’ll fix everything! I’ll do anything you tell me. Anything! I’m ready for anything! But I’m begging you, don’t leave me. I’ll die without you. I need you! I need you like never ever. You’re the only one who can help me get through this nightmare. Please, Helene, please, I’m begging you!”       “Sorry, I’m tired…” Helene pronounces in a low voice and turns her face aside. “I’m sick of being your savior all the time. The savior whose effort went down the drain at one moment.”       “NO, PLEASE, HELENE, DON’T LEAVE ME!” Peter starts crying loudly and bitterly. “I WILL NOT HANDLE THIS! I WILL NOT! IF YOU LEAVE ME, I WILL KILL MYSELF! I WILL DIE WITHOUT YOU! I WILL!”       “Trying to blackmail me and scare me?”       “No, it’s not blackmail, I swear! These are my real feelings. My real feelings. The real me is now standing in front of you.” Peter sniffs quietly. “Swear, insecure, unhappy, terrified one who’s been betrayed many times and barely able to take the pain and betrayals.”       “I don’t understand where the real you is. And you don’t know it, either. You change your personalities like channels on a TV: if you want, you become Theodore, but when you have to, you put on Peter’s mask.”       “Maybe I was named Theodore at birth, but I grew up under the name Peter. Even if he’s a deeply unhappy milksop, he’s much closer to me. I really wanna be Peter. I don’t wanna be Theodore. It’s not the real me.”       “When you become Peter and get rid of Theodore once and forever, come back then. We’ll talk about everything again. But now I’m giving up. As well as the other guys.”       “No… No, please, Helene, no…”       “I don’t have a wish to help the one who doesn’t want it. And I’m not able to do it, honestly.” Helene sighs heavily. “Someone’s gotta help me now. After everything I got through.”       “Please, don’t leave me… You mean a lot to me. You’re as important as the air. I can’t lose you! I can’t!”       “You’ve already lost…”       “NO-O-O-O-O-O!” Peter screams. “NOT THIS! PLEASE! DON’T GIVE ME PAIN!”       “Stop, Peter…”       “It’s too hard for me now… I’m close to hysteria. Close to a nervous breakdown. If you leave me, I’m gonna go crazy. It’s gonna be the last drop. I’ll die if you give me pain. A much stronger than the guys… If they… Used me…”       “I said everything, Rose,” Helene pronounces in a low voice and swallows nervously, looking at her hands. “Until you get therapy, we can’t even talk about any kind of the future. If you don’t wanna solve your problems, live as you want. Alone.”       “NO-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O-O!” Peter cries bitterly. “PLEASE, DON’T DO THIS! DON’T LEAVE ME ALONE IN THIS CRUEL WORLD! PLEASE, HELENE, I’M BEGGING YOU! PITY ME! A-A-A! PLEASE, DON’T LEAVE ME! I WON’T HANDLE THIS! I WILL NOT! DON’T DO THIS! DON’T DO! DON’T DO-O-O-O-O-O! NO-O-O-O-O-O-O!”       At first, Peter screams desperately at the top of his lungs, but then he leans on Helene’s knee with his forehead, hides his head in his arms, and keeps crying bitterly as he is still sitting in front of her on his knees. He has not come to himself after Edward, Daniel, and Terrence brought him to an uncontrolled hysteria with their actions, but now he gets obsessed with it again for a different reason. The guy is like a little child left by adult people. The one who does not know what to do, where to go, or who to ask for help. He is starting to understand that he has done too many unforgivable mistakes, for which he does not deserve any forgiveness. A sense of shame is eating him inside to the bones so that he feels the pain in his heart every time it makes a beat and feels that his whole body squeezes with the pain because of the frost running wild over his skin. Tears roll out of his eyes in an uncontrolled flow that Rose does not want and does not try to hold down.       “So what, buddy, you got what you wanted?” Theodore sneers evilly, bending to Peter. “The last thread is about to be ripped. Because of you. Because of your tricks. If you hadn’t gone crazy, nothing would’ve happened. And now you must pay for your mistakes. Which you will never fix.”       In reply to this, Peter makes a much more heartbreaking scream that makes Helene’s heart squeeze painfully. Speaking the truth, she was not actually going to leave this man seriously. Even if his behavior makes her anxious and think better about whether she should keep being with him. The girl just decided to use a so-called shock therapy and scare him. Even though it’s unpleasant for her to do this, just like it was disgusting for Daniel, Edward, and Terrence to pretend that they wanted to use him dirtily. It’s possible to say that she is ashamed of harming the man, who has gone through too much in his whole life.       Helene hesitates for several seconds before she moves her sad eyes to Peter sitting on his knees in front of her and crying bitterly, caresses his head softly, and says in a quiet, soft voice:       “Hey… Hey… Get up, please… Hear me? Get up.”       “I don’t wanna live in this world without you…” Peter says in a high, shaking voice. “I don’t want… I DON’T WANT! If you’re not with me, I WILL NOT NEED THE FUCK ANYTHING! NOTHING AND NOBODY! A-A-A-A!”       “Stand up… What did I tell you? Get up, I said!”       “I will not! Until you say you don’t leave me!”       “Peter!”       “TELL ME YOU WON’T LEAVE ME! PLEASE!”       “Get up first, so that we can talk about everything.”       But despite her attempts to make Peter get up, Helene cannot do this. He keeps crying loudly and bitterly, sitting on the ground, closing his face with his hands, and doubling over.       “Rose, do you hear what I tell you?” Helene asks, gets down to her knees in front of Peter, takes him by the shoulders, and shakes him slightly. “Get up! Don’t sit on the dirty, cold ground!”       “Why don’t you believe me?” Peter wonders loudly and takes Helene’s hands, looking at her with wet, inflamed eyes. “WHY DO YOU THINK I’M LYING? WHY?”       “Listen to me…”       “Do you think I won’t fall off the cliff if you leave me? You think I’ll do nothing to me if I stay alone in this world? WHY WOULD I LIVE IN THIS FUCKING WORLD IF I HAD NOBODY BY MY SIDE? NO FRIENDS, NO GIRLFRIEND! I DON’T WANNA BE ALONE, GET IT! I DON’T! I WANNA FIX EVERYTHING! I WANNA BRING EVERYTHING BACK! BEING HAPPY IS ALL I WANT! DO I ASK TOO MUCH? TELL ME! IS THIS SOMETHING UNREAL? IS THIS SOMETHING CRAZY?”       “Listen, Peter, listen to me!” Helene grabs Peter’s face. “Look at me! Don’t go crazy! Hold yourself down! You must hold on!”       “HOW?” Peter wonders and sniffs. “How do I hold on? Why? FOR WHO?”       “Let’s sit down and calm down a little. C’mon, c’mon, get up… Okay…”       With these words, Helene manages to make Peter get up and sit on the bench again. Then she fixes his hair slightly and wipes carefully the tears off his wet face.       “Okay… Breathe deeper… It’s okay… It’s okay…”       “I’m really very sorry…” Peter says in a shaking voice much quieter. “I didn’t want to harm anyone. I didn’t want to hurt anyone.”       “Sorry, Peter, but you should understand that your behavior is not fine.”       “I understand it! But I can do nothing for myself! I can’t! I don’t want! I don't have a wish!”       “If you want to be loved and appreciated, you need to start with yourself. You need to live and fight for yourself first of all. Not for someone else.”       “Why? Why would I live for someone?”       “People treat you the way you treat them. If you consider the world your enemy and blame it for all sins, it’s stupid to wait for the one to keep loving you. Even a mother can’t close her eyes to the terrible actions of her own child if they go too far.”       “I’m just protecting myself! I just don’t want to seem weak and vulnerable.”       “Scuffles and murders are not your protection. They can’t help you feel better. They’re the reason why you can make everyone who is ready to do just something for you turn their backs on you.”       “Do you think it’s so easy to forget the way they treated me? Do you think being their victim was good? The victim, who wasn’t allowed to open his mouth and stand up for himself somehow! I was scared! I was afraid to get up and show my fist to them. I was afraid to show my power.”       “And why? Are you supposed to be mad at the world?”       “I still can’t forgive any of those who’ve never hurt me. Neither the guys from my school, who turned that time into real hell. Nor my mother, who preferred vodka over me and fucked me off, making me deal with that shit I was dragged into by myself. It’s been many years, but I remember everything. While the others forgot. They forgot it and don’t even think of apologizing to me.”       “What would change if they apologized?” Helene wonders. “What would change? What would you expect if it happened?”       “I’d understand… They’re sorry… They’d fix it all if they had a chance to.”       “What are you expecting if you killed them? What’s supposed to happen after you take revenge on them?”       “I just need to let it all go. I can’t keep it all deep inside anymore.”       “Your past is your past, Peter. You can’t change it. You must accept the fact that it has happened. You must accept it as a part of your life that made you stronger.”       “IT DID NOT MAKE ME THE FUCK STRONGER!” Peter explodes. “I was always a weak guy. BUT AFTER ALL THIS SHIT, I ACTUALLY STOPPED FEELING SAFE. Because everyone gives FUCK about me. NOBODY cares about my problems. Nobody has ever thought of standing up for me and teaching me to do that. NOBODY! I’VE ALWAYS been alone! SINCE CHILDHOOD! I had NOBODY to complain to! NOBODY to hug! NOBODY to tell me words of love! NO-BO-DY!”       “It’s not a reason to hide in your cocoon and wait for something evil to come for you. Something heartless that wants to take revenge on you for something. Not a reason to cover it with aggression and turn your back on anyone to come to you in good faith.”       “My faith in the kindness of this world was killed when I was a child. I’m no longer expecting good gifts from it. The only thing it can give me is suffering. The endless suffering that makes me exhausted more and more.”       “You’ve had many good moments in your life! You shouldn't forget it! If you were so unlucky, you would have nothing from what you lost because of your stupidity.”       “Isn’t there a way to fix just something?” Peter asks in a shaking, quiet voice. “Is everything really lost once and forever?”       “If you don’t stop it now and don’t stop rejecting help and care, you’ll come to the moment when you can change nothing. When you have nothing but to lie in a coffin.”       “But I don’t want this! I don’t want to die! I want to live! I wanna be surrounded by my close, loving people! Loneliness is not about me. I need to have someone by my side. I need to know I have those I can always count on by my side.”       “Your words don’t fit your actions. You say one thing, you think of another, you do a third thing…”       “My mind was more or less clear just because you were near. Because you didn’t let me go crazy and stand in the wrong way. But when I lost you for a while, everything went wrong. I stopped belonging to myself and controlling all my actions.”       “Oh, Peter, Peter…” Helene sighs tiredly, putting her hand on her forehead. “I shouldn't have gotten in touch with you… Now I don’t even know what to do to you.”       “Please, Helene, give me another chance,” Peter begs. “Help me find the real me and live a normal life. Please, save me! Save me from this nightmare. I can’t get out of this without you. If you don’t lend me a hand, I’ll die there. You’re the only one who can bring me back to life. The only one to be able to help me reunite with the real me.”       “If you really suffer from mental issues, I can do nothing in this case. A good doctor and strong drugs are the only things that can help you.”       “No, honey! You’re the only one who can help me! You’re the only one who can protect me from this world. Help me find my own place in this world. Understand who I really am. Help me stop feeling like trash.”       “Oh, Rose…” Helene sighs tiredly as she glances aside.       “Please, don’t leave me,” Peter begs with pity in his eyes, squeezing Helene’s hand tightly in his. “Don’t leave Peter. Don’t leave the weak and broken guy, who just wanna be loved and know that he’s not alone. I… I’m really sick of feeling like some kind of shit. I'm sick of being weak. Sick of hiding from everyone and everything. I know it’s not fine, but I can do nothing about it. I’m scared, you know. I’m afraid to trust this world. I’m afraid to open my heart to the one.”       “All is in your hands. If you wanna change your life for the best, start it with yourself.”       “I can’t do this all alone. I can’t fight this world alone. I need my close people. I need my beloved girl. My greatest motivation and reason to live and fight. The reason to keep my mind straight when I have to get through serious stress.”       “Peter…”       “Yes, when you’re near, my hallucination is still with me. But it doesn’t hurt me and doesn’t encourage me to do something terrible. And when I was alone, it drove me crazy. That’s why I was freaking furious and could kill anyone who stood in my way.”       “I repeat, if you want to live a normal life, get therapy. Though you will hardly get rid of this forever. This illness can just be taken under control with cures.”       “My best cure that I can have is just you. No doctors, no psychologists can do what you can do.”       “Alright, it’s your right. Nobody makes me get therapy by force. You’re an adult man and can decide what you need.”       “I’ve said what I need. Don’t pretend that you understood and hear nothing.”       “Nope, I understood and heard you,” Helene replies without emotions. “I understood it well…”       “The fact that you’re so cold to me is killing me.”       “Did you think I’d rush to hug and kiss you after everything I’d been told about you?”       “Alright, what do I do? Tell me what I should do for you to stay with me?”       “First, just talk to the guys and apologize to them for your disgusting behavior,” Helene insists. “Be brave enough to recognize your mistakes and reveal your problems.”       “No problem, my sunshine! I’ll surely do this! Yes… If the guys hadn’t left, I would’ve asked them for forgiveness.”       “I’m not sure if they’ll forgive you after all these adventures, but it’s gonna be good for you. That’s how their opinion of you won't get worse.”       “I’m afraid that the guys won't talk to me, too. But I will try anyway. I will let them know that I… I understood my mistakes… I understood that… They didn’t lie to me about you.”       “And yeah, I will not persuade them to forgive you,” Helene says harshly, raising her index finger. “Either for me, the girls, or anyone else. Daniel, Terrence, and Terrence should decide if they need it all by themselves.”       “It’s okay, I will understand it all,” Peter sighs with sadness in his eyes. “I did a very cruel and unfair thing to them. I said too much to them, I did so much to them… I think my whole life wouldn’t be enough to pay for everything.”       “It’s your fault only. They gave you no reason to doubt them. You made yourself think that they were guilty of my alleged death and literally agreed against you with the whole world.”       “I know…” Peter doubles over and, sniffing, runs his fingers through his hair. “I'm a loser for life for the reason. Maybe I even deserved it all. Not my illnesses are guilty, I am guilty.”       “M-m-m, how suddenly the appearance of the gal made you sober,” Theodore sneers evilly, crossing his arms over his chest and bending to Peter. “You were running here with a knife and seriously wanted to throw your friends off the cliff, but now you’re sitting here, crying on your girlfriend’s knee and trying to persuade her not to leave you.”       “I’m an idiot… Just an idiot… The bastard who messed up everything again. Again, I did a really cruel thing to those who were guilty of nothing. The guys wanted to make it better, but I… I thought they wanted to hurt me. Just like those I have ever met.”       “And trust me, buddy, it’s gonna happen until you remember the main reason for all of this. Until you know when you started to doubt the kindness of this world and started to ignore people. And the girl will not help you. I will help you. Me, the voice of your subconsciousness.”       “I even hurt you… I believed my father 'cause I was a naive bastard. I believed that you weren’t really loyal and honest to me. Though you’re literally the only one I shouldn't have expected anything bad from. Maybe I doubted and doubt the others, but your intentions were always true and clean.”       “And it’s madly hurtful,” Helene confesses. “I opened my heart to you fully, but this is what you did to me. You shouted, you blamed me for betraying you, you looked like you were about to kill me.”       “What a shame… Fucking shit, what a shame…”       Peter covers his face with his hands, starting to sob loudly and frequently again.       “What am I doing? What did I do? What have I come to? How could I screw it up? Fuck… My whole life won’t be enough to sort out this shit! People are gonna hate me even if I die! Just because I don’t have brains! Because I’m a fucking sick bastard who must really be put in a mental hospital. Who deserved everything that has happened to him. DESERVED!”       After making a heartbreaking shout, Peter keeps crying much more bitterly, not being shy of expressing his emotions in this way, since he just cannot hold them down anymore. Every single muscle of the body shakes, he lacks air in his lungs, his hands are shaking… A sense of helplessness and vulnerability for the intolerable pain and the nightmare that is not going to end. The guy tries to scream and say something unclear two more times, but he kind of lost his ability to speak, and soundless words get out of his numb mouth.       “That’s what you deserve, asshole!” Theodore gloats. “You really deserved it all. And the fact that the gal ain’t gonna come back to you is your pay, too. The pay for your father’s sins. For everything your family could’ve done. Since you’re the members of the Longbottom family, you’re gonna have to carry this burden. You’ve been carrying it for twenty-seven years. And you’re gonna do this until your death.”       Peter sobbing loudly again grabs his hair with his fingers and pulls it painfully, breathing heavily and unevenly as he is not able to escape the shaking that his whole body is possessed with. Looking at this scene, Helene herself feels that her eyes water with tears, and her heart squeezes painfully. The girl hesitates a little and fingers over nervously before she presses his head to herself softly, puts it on her chest, and caresses it tenderly, stroking down his ruffled hair at some moment.       “Okay, okay, sweetie, okay, calm down, please,” Helene says in a tender whisper and kisses Peter sweetly on the temple. “Calm down… It’s okay…”       “Don’t leave me…” Peter begs in a low, shaking voice and sniffs. “Please, stay with me… I’ll die without you. This world is gonna eat me if I stay alone. But I don’t want it! I don’t wanna be alone! I don’t wanna die! I want to live! Live, get it!”       “Your behavior disappointed me a lot. Really…”       “I really wanna fix everything. I wanna let everyone know that I’m very sorry. I didn’t want it. I didn’t wanna harm anyone. I wanted to betray nobody.”       “I would be happy to help you, but now nothing depends on me. Since you made a mistake, you have to fix it.”       “No, you can help me!” Peter steps away from Helene and takes her softly by the forearms. “You can help me. Just be with me. If you’re at least next to me, I’m gonna feel much better already.”       “Do you promise to apologize to the guys and explain everything to them?”       “I swear, my sunshine! Even if nothing changes after this. If I don’t apologize, a sense of guilt is gonna eat me. But I won’t handle this.”       “I hope. I don’t want you to fight with some of your friends and familiars over me. And if we have some problems, we must solve them. Must not judge those who don’t accept our position and stand by the side of someone else.”       “Just tell me you don’t wanna leave me. This is the only thing I wanna hear from you now.”       “Uh-huh, keep dreaming!” Theodore sneers, crossing his arms over his chest. “Don’t even dream about this after you screwed it all to the fuck!”       Helene spends two seconds thinking about something silently, inclining her head, before she moves her sad eyes to Peter and says quietly:       “At least, I’ll try to. I’ll try to close my eyes to your actions if you feel truly sorry for them and apologize to those you hurt without a reason.”       “I’d even crush myself for you,” Peter says much more confidently, sniffing and raising his head.       “No, you don’t have to do this for me or someone else. You must do it for yourself. Because you’re sorry. Because you wanna get the guys’ trust back. Because you surely know you don’t wanna lose your friends.”       “You can kill me if I don’t do this. You can do anything you want to me. You can give me any kind of pain. The pain I do deserve.”       “Just don’t do these stupid things anymore, so that everything is okay. Don’t give the pain to someone since it may come back to you as a boomerang, early or late. If you betray someone one day, someone will betray you someday later.”       “I promise, Helene, I’ll no longer disappoint anyone. Anyone, hear me! Especially you! You’ll no longer have to be ashamed of me, suffer, and regret meeting me.”       “Okay, okay, Peter, okay,” Helene replies softly, caressing Peter’s cheek. “I believe you. I do.”       “Wouldn’t you leave, would you?” Peter sniffs, looking at Helene with watery eyes. “Please, tell me we’re still together. I won’t live if you leave me. You’re the most important thing I have in my life. I can’t lose you, I can’t! I can end up outside, being hungry and wearing my underwear only, but not without you. No, not this… Not this!”       “Quiet, quiet, my sweetie, quiet…”       Helene takes Peter in a tender hug and caresses his head and shoulder, while he presses her impatiently to himself, putting his hands on her scapula, snuggling his nose in the girl’s shoulder, and still crying bitterly like a little child who was hurt by a bad man.       “Okay, okay, calm down, please…” Helene kisses Peter’s temple. “I’m here, here. I don't leave, I stay with you. It’s okay… It’s okay…”       “I need you…” Peter pronounces in a shaking, low voice, squeezing Helene’s waistcoat on the back with his fingers. “Please, Helene, don’t leave me… Please! I’d do anything you say! Just don’t leave! Don’t give me to this cruel world! Please…”       “Quiet, quiet, Pete, it’s okay. Calm down, please…”       “I don’t wanna be alone. I don’t wanna lose the most valuable thing I have. Please, sweetheart, don’t go… Don’t go! I’m begging you!”       “Please, stop crying,” Helene pronounces in a shaking whisper and blinks her eyes several times with tears on them. “Don’t break my heart…”       “I can’t!” Peter sobs and hugs Helene much tighter, putting his hand on the back of her head. “I can’t stop! Because I feel too bad…”       “Please, Peter, stop…”       At some moment, Helene succumbs to the wish to cry bitterly and press herself very closely to Peter’s chest, while he does not hold down his emotions due to the sense of shame and loneliness, and the fact that he does not believe that he is now hugging his beloved girl. Who did not die and stayed alive. He believes this is a dream that is supposed to end with something terrible. Just like it happened every time she came to him every night, in case he managed to fall asleep for a while.       “Oh, oh, here are wet tears rolling down…” Theodore winces, turning aside and raising his hands. “Yeah, yeah, let’s cry all together in buckets! I’ll join you too now, wait… Let’s make a threesome!”       “Helene…” Peter pronounces in a shaking from excitement voice. “Helene, my girl… Baby…”       “I’m here, my love, I’m here,” Helene assures and caresses Peter’s head. “I don’t leave…”       “Damn… I… I almost went insane as I tried to find you… When you had to suffer because of these bastards.”       “I was waiting for you… So badly… I believed you’d come until the very end…” Helene sniffs. “The door of that room would open, and you’d show up on the doorstep, not Marcus or his accomplices.”       “I’m sorry, my baby…” Peter apologizes with pity in his eyes, caresses Helene’s head, and kisses her temple with his shaking lips. “Forgive me for not being able… To save you… I screwed it up… I screwed it up as fuck…”       “I wanted to send you a sign so badly. Let you know where to find me. But I could not. I was too far. Without communications. I couldn’t escape. I could not. And I didn’t know how.”       “I shook every time I thought about where you were and what those bastards were doing to you.”       “You wouldn’t rather know that…” Helene makes a loud sob, squeezing Peter’s leather waistcoat with her fingers tightly. “What they were doing to me. They didn’t just torture me with hunger and beat me…”       “I know…” Peter pronounces in a low voice. “Marcus sent me photos.”       “What?” Helene opens her eyes widely, feeling severe pain in her heart. “P-photos?”       “That bastard sent me photos of you revealing all of you every day. And how these bastards…”       “P-p-peter…”       “I was ready to rip those motherfuckers at that moment! Rip those bastards who dared to touch you with a finger. Dared to put an eye on what belonged to me.”       “Forgive me…”       Helene steps away from Peter and, closing her mouth with a hand, starts crying loudly and bitterly.       “Please, Peter, forgive me…” Helene apologizes desperately. “I swear I didn’t want this! I… I tried to resist! I tried not to let it happen! But… There were too many of them… But I was alone… I was weak! I… I…”       “Hey, hey, don’t worry, honey, it’s okay,” Peter calms down, grabbing Helene’s face. “It’s okay, don’t worry.”       “I felt disgusting because I literally betrayed you literally more than because they rapped me. I only thought about how ashamed I was of you. About how enraged you’d be if you knew it.”       “Please, Helene, don’t excuse yourself. I know everything and understand it.”       “I am so ashamed of you,” Helene cries bitterly, not holding herself down. “Ashamed of being able to do nothing. They mocked me almost every day. One came, another came, they came in companies… It was hell! The nightmare I couldn’t get out of!”       “Quiet, quiet, sunshine, quiet, it’s okay…” Peter hugs Helene tightly and presses her to himself, caressing her back softly. “Sh-h-h… It’s okay…”       “They were very rude to me… After every act of rape, my whole body hurt. As if they ripped something. Sometimes I was even bleeding. And my strong stomach pain was caused by what they did to me, not only the starvation.”       “I get it…” Peter pronounces in a shaking voice and swallows nervously. “I get it…”       “I started to see nightmares after the first act of rape.” Helene sobs loudly. “You came to me and… You were mad at me… You cursed me for betraying you, calling me a bitch, a whore, a scum… You even tried to kill me… You didn’t hear any of my excuses. You only insisted that I betrayed myself by lying naked in front of them and… Sucking on all of them by one… Letting them fuck me all together…”       “No, no, it was just a nightmare. It’s never happened. I’m not mad at you at all. I understand that you couldn’t do that at your will.”       “Peter…” Helene pronounces excitedly, steps away from Peter, and grabs his face with shaking hands. “Peter, my sweetheart… Sweetie… Sweetheart… For God’s sake, forgive me… I swear I didn’t want it! I resisted as hard as I could! But they were stronger! I couldn’t resist them! I was weak!”       “Helene, my girl…”       “If we didn't date, I wouldn’t be so worried. Because I’d have nobody to betray. But I had you. And I betrayed you. Even if I didn’t want it. Even if I spent most of the time unconscious during these moments. Thanks to this fact, I didn’t go crazy. And I am more worried about you considering me a betrayer.”       “I don’t deny that the anger clouded my mind when I received these photos from Marcus for the first time. And if not the guys, I would’ve surely thought you betrayed me. But they were near. They managed to bring my sober mind back. Their arguments were clear and great. And I believed them. I saw you were unconscious and didn’t know what they were doing to you.”       “God, I’m so ashamed…”       Helene closes her face with both hands and doubles over.       “What a shame… How could everything go so far? Why did nothing and nobody stop it all? Why did I have to take it all until the very end? Why?”       “Don’t blame yourself, Helene, you’re guilty of nothing,” Peter calms down, hugging Helene around the shoulders, pressing her to himself, putting his hand on her cheek, and kissing the other tenderly. “They just wanted to make you as exhausted as possible. They wanted to make me freak out. They thought they did it.”       “Yeah, I don’t deny that I’m really not holy. At least, I wasn’t the one in my childhood and teenage years. But are my sins so serious since I had to be rapped? Many times!”       “Sometimes even innocent people suffer. Even more than those who do dirty things to people all the time. As if this is the cost kind people have to pay every time someone does evil things.”       “Tell me you aren’t really mad at me. Tell me you don’t consider me a betrayer. You won’t kill me after what I did.”       “What are you talking about. Helene? Me killing you…” Peter turns Helene’s face to himself, still keeping his hand on her cheek. “I would never forgive myself for that! Me… Harming my closest person, who means a lot to me.”       “Please, Peter, forgive me… Forgive me, forgive… Don’t leave me… I can’t do without you, either. You mean a lot to me. No matter what. Even if you’ve made a lot of mistakes. You’re the best thing I have in my life. All my brightest memories are connected with you only.”       “I’ve already said…”       “I’m madly ashamed to look into your eyes after all of that. Madly ashamed… I want to be swallowed by the ground… I’ve never felt so ashamed in my whole life. Never…”       “You don’t have to be mad, sweetie. I’m not mad at you and would never dare to reproach you for what they did to you. It was done against your will, I’ve understood it already.”       “Please, Peter, for God’s sake… Don’t leave me… Don’t leave, please…”       Helene grabs Peter’s face and caresses his cheeks, looking into his eyes with a heavy breath.       “Please, please…” Helene starts whispering. “Please… I’m ready for anything for you to forgive me. I’d do anything. But I’m begging you, don’t leave me… I can’t do without you, I can’t. I need you. I need you so badly. Please, don’t leave… Forgive me… Don’t be so cruel to me. I’m really very sorry. Please, Pete, please…”       Snuggling her nose in Peter’s shoulder and squeezing him tightly in her hug, Helene keeps crying bitterly and shaking from fear of being left. This scene makes the man feel a lump in his throat, which he cannot swallow, and the girl’s emotional shout makes him feel the pain in his heart and a lack of air due to the squeezing in his chest.       “Please, sweetie, stop…” Peter begs quietly and sniffs quietly as he runs his hands over Helene’s back and caresses her head. “I can’t look at you like this. Helene… Hear me? Stop!”       “Tell me you love me,” Helene begs. “Tell me we’re still together. You aren’t mad at me. Please, Peter, tell me!”       “I do, sunshine. I love you very much. I’ve never loved anyone stronger than you.”       “I’m so sorry… I’m really very sorry… Really ashamed… I don’t know how to make amends. How to prove that I don’t even think about any other man. My gosh…”       Since Helene does not even want to stop crying, releasing all her emotions that she has kept inside for a long time, Peter steps away from her a little, grabs her face, brings his lips silently to the female's soft lips, and stays in this position for two or three seconds. Thanks to this, the girl stops sobbing, holds her breath unconsciously, and realizes quickly, feeling that the burning warmth spreads rapidly throughout her whole body. While the heart of the man himself trembles nicely, and all the tension and anxiety leave him, leaving the sense of bliss that he has lacked all this time.       “I won’t reject you so easily,” Peter states determinedly in a low voice, kisses Helene tenderly on the forehead, and leans on it with his forehead. “I will not give my girl to anyone. I am the first one to find her and get a love for her!”       “I’m such an idiot…” Helene says much quieter and sniffs quietly. “Just an idiot… The idiot, who deserved it all.”       “Don’t say it, sweetheart. Don’t say…”       “It’s true… I’m an idiot…” Helene inclines her head guiltily. “I… I wasn’t really honest with you… I didn’t tell you everything about me.”       “What are you talking about, Helene?”       “I haven’t understood how Marcus found it out, but he didn’t lie to you. He told you the truth. I… I really have something to hide.”       “Oh, who cares about it now!”       Pressing Helene closely to his chest, Peter kisses her sweetly on the cheek and rubs his cheek covered with a light bristle against hers.       “I don’t care about what you’re hiding. The important thing is that you’re alive and next to me.”       “Anyway, I think I should tell you everything,” Helene says hesitantly. “And I was gonna do that before I was kidnapped. Before my connection with you and the men via a videocall was lost.”       “Whatever that is, I’m sure that I don’t have to do with it.”       “No, of course! It doesn’t have to do with you.”       Helene looks into Peter’s eyes, while he keeps holding her in his arms.       “I’ll explain everything when we all come together. But now I can say just one thing to you: I used to be a thief.”       “A thief?” Peter rounds his eyes.       “Yes, I robbed from other people. I was stealing everything in my way. Even if I… Even if I didn’t need it at all.”       “It’s something like…”       “Kleptomania. Yes, I was a kleptomaniac. I got away from it for a long time. But one day, I got really serious problems. Which I barely managed to solve.”       “Wow…”       “It’s a long story. But I promise I will explain everything. But I want the men to know it too. I promised to tell them everything.”       “And the girls?”       “The girls knew it from the beginning.”       “What do you mean, they knew?”       “They did. And they could tell you about me at any time. But… They decided to be silent for a certain reason.” Helene shrugs. “I guess they just pitied me. Thought it was enough to tell you about me bullying Natalia and Raquelle. About what you wanted to break up with me.”       “And they can tell that story from start to end?”       “They can. They can confirm all my words and… Explain how they almost suffered because of me. I mean… Natalia suffered much more.”       “Don’t tell me she was blamed for theft because of you.”       “I would say so. And if not for the case, Rochester would’ve had to pay for nothing.”       “What a twist…” Peter pronounces thoughtfully.       “It’s another reason why my grandfather and grandmother kept me on the leash. Why they banned me from everyone and literally held my hand when going with me somewhere.”       “And now?”       “It’s all in the past now. I got rid of this habit and don’t steal anything anymore.”       “I see…”       Peter falls into silence and thinks for several seconds, biting his lip slightly.       “M-m-m…” Theodore sneers evilly. “The gal is not as innocent as it seems, huh. The former criminal, I would say. Just like you are. You two are worth each other. You two are assholes.”       “I know you’re judging me,” Helene says hesitantly, looking at her hands. “But at least, it’s the truth. It’s my past. The past I don’t like to remember. The one I tried not to think about. Until Marcus and his accomplices started to remind me of that.”       “Well…” Peter exhales slowly. “In this case… It’s better… Of course, theft is bad. But… You’d rather steal half of what I have at my apartment than betray me. It’s not… An attempt to put a knife in my back… Not an attempt to give me unbearable pain.”       “Don’t worry, Peter, I will not rob you or anyone else. I stopped doing this a long time ago.”       “In my case, this is the most innocent thing you can do to me.”       “But I think I’ll dare to show some insolence and steal something important from you.” Helene puts her hand on Peter’s chest. “Something I ain’t gonna give you back.”       “You can take anything from me.”       “Even your heart?”       “I’d give it to you.” Peter rubs the tip of his nose against Helene’s nose. “You don’t have to steal it from me. Though it’s been all yours for many, many years.”       “It’s only been two years.”       “No, sweetheart, much longer. Much longer. I paid attention to you a long time ago.”       “Uh-huh, but you pretended to be a hard-to-reach one I didn’t wanna come to at all!”       “I just needed time to trust you. It happened to everyone. I didn’t get any sympathy for other guys and spent some time watching them.”       “No reproaches! I’m just standing the fact.”       “But when I trusted you… When you and I became friends… I seriously started to think about wishing to be more than just a friend to you.”       “Hey, do you remember how I went to your home with a bottle of wine, which we drank together?” Helene asks shyly, pushing Peter slightly on his hip. “After I fought with my grandmother and grandfather over their permanent bans and control of my life.”       “Oh, forgetting that is impossible!” Peter laughs. “The way we drank to hell together and then spent in that condition.”       “Uh-huh! And then we woke up naked in bed with hellish pain in the body and started to pretend that nothing happened. And then we didn’t talk for several months.”       “These were the hardest months in my life. You can’t even imagine how much I missed you.”       “Sometimes I also wanted to call you and find out how you were doing. I missed you, too. But it happened that Grandfather Roger got sick and was dying slowly for several months. I didn’t have time to think about it.”       “Don’t you really remember anything from what we were doing when we were drunk? Or did you lie to me and know all of that?”       “Well… Since we’re in a relationship now… I’m not ashamed to admit that I remember everything. I remember what happened on that day. On that night…”       “Everything, everything?”       “Maybe… Some memories got out of my mind. But I’ve got a more or less clear picture.”       Peter chuckles kindly before he says confidently:       “The picture turned out to be very good. And I didn’t regret anything back then, and I don’t regret it now. I felt cool. I felt free. Literally for the first time in my life.”       “You and I haven’t talked about that case since that day,” Helene notices thoughtfully. “Even when we started to date. As if nothing happened…”       “Right… But I often recalled that day. That I remember clearly.”       “I got it… I remember how gloomily you became when I literally started to piss you off. Because of how frivolous you were.”       “I just started to like you at that moment. I no longer wanted to be just a friend to you. I wanted us… To be a couple.”       “Same…” Helene chuckles kindly. “And I wouldn’t have actually minded if we’d gone to register our marriage when we were drunk.”       “Uh-huh, you and I wake up in the morning, but we’re naked after sex and married, with rings on our hands,” Peter laughs.       “And with a positive pregnancy test!”       “Hey, didn’t you get pregnant from me?”       “Nope, I was lucky! I would say I jumped on the train. Though I made tests every time for some time. And I got rid of them so that my grandmother didn’t find them.”       “Yeah, you just went to my home to cry on my shoulder and complain about being misunderstood…”       “C’mon, I felt cool anyway! I pissed off everything and everyone to hell and did what I wanted.”       “You wanted us to fuck?”       “You were really a part of my sexual fantasies,” Helene confesses with a sly smile, bringing her face close to Peter’s face and looking into his eyes. “I wanted you…”       “When I started to accost you, but you answered me back and didn’t reject, I was a little surprised. I thought you’d start to squeak, resist, and call me a maniac and a rapper.”       “I didn’t even think about it…” Helene runs her hand slowly over Peter’s chest. “You’re so handsome… So attractive… It was impossible to resist the sexy naked pretty boy with an incredible body.”       “I would’ve hit myself with a pen on my head if I had been sober, but I couldn’t have held myself down and decided to take you to my bed. If I hadn’t been able to resist.”       “But now it doesn’t make sense,” Helene notices in a low voice and puts her arms around Peter’s neck. “You’re all mine now. Which means we can let ourselves relax and have fun.”       “I don’t think…” Peter pronounces hesitantly. “It’s gonna be easy for you… After everything you got through…”       “It’s okay, I’ll handle this.”       “Maybe… You should go to the psychologist? Talk to them about it?”       “I’d rather talk to my close people about it. Cry on their shoulders, tell them what I feel… Write about it in a notebook. That I started to make it happen.”       “Are you sure you can do this?”       “Don’t worry, Peter, I’m really okay,” Helene assures, caressing Peter’s cheek. “I deny nothing, I hide nothing, I tell everything… I write everything about my emotions in the notebook. I write without thinking. About everything I have on my mind. And when I have nothing else to say, I will just burn it down.”       “And traumas? Do you have some trauma on your body after what happened?”       “I had something, but the doctors worked on it when I was in the hospital. I need to wait a little before everything comes back to normal. And the burns on my skin are going away, as well as bruises… And everything.”       “Hey…” Peter caresses Helene’s head and tucks a strand of her hair behind her ear. “If I do something wrong… If you feel uncomfortable… Let me know. I will not do this. I don’t wanna give you pain.”       “Alright, sweetie, as you wish,” Helene smiles shyly. “I will not be silent.”       “Do you feel comfortable now? Do you feel comfortable as I caress you and hug you?”       “This is what I’ve dreaming about all this time. What I missed so badly without.”       Helene presses herself closely to Peter and puts her head on his shoulder, while her arms are wrapped around his waist.       “No words needed – only your strong arms and warm chest… I need nothing more…”       Peter’s smile gets much wider when he presses Helene to himself with pleasure and caresses her head tenderly.       “Damn, isn’t this really a dream?” Peter wonders. “Are you really with me now? Didn’t I really lose you?”       “I was so scared when I thought I’d never see you again,” Helene confesses with a heavy breath. “I didn’t wanna die so badly… I didn’t wanna leave you… I knew you couldn’t do without me…”       “I swear I will never let anything like this happen! I’ll not dare to let anyone harm you. I will not let anyone hurt you. And I will not hurt you. I will take care of you like a brilliant.”       “Are you sure you can do this?” Helene kisses Peter tenderly on the cheek. “That I made the right choice.”       “Just be next to me so that I don’t lose myself. Be the one to be much closer to me. Don’t let any Theodore take my place.”       “Please, do this… One beautiful day, I fell in love with a guy named Peter. And I wanna be with him, not Theodore I don’t know at all.”       “Wrong, babe!” Theodore protests. “You know me very well. I had a lot of pleasure fucking you while being in the body of this bastard. He is always insecure, but I do it differently. I surely know how to make you scream and finish. Without me, you wouldn’t know any kind of epic orgasm, dolly.”       “Anything for you, my sweetheart,” Peter says confidently and kisses Helene several times on the temple. “Anything for you, my sweetie…”       “My God, Peter…” Helene smiles with tears and snuggles into Peter’s shoulder. “My sweetie…”       “I’m so sorry…” Peter sniffs. “So ashamed of not being able to save you. I had promised that I wouldn’t leave you so many times, but I didn’t make it… I did not…”       “Alas, but nobody could find me, and I had no opportunity to escape. Marcus did his best not to make it happen.”       “I’m sorry, Helene… I’m sorry about not being able to protect you from this nightmare… About turning out to be bad in this case.”       “No, no, my dear, don’t blame yourself, you’re guilty of nothing.” Helene starts running her hands over Peter’s back up and down. “You did everything you could. I know you tried.”       “I’ll no longer let anything like this happen. I swear, my girl, I’ll no longer be so stupid. I will not let any bastard even touch you with a finger. If I know someone does it, I shall break their neck.”       “I believe, Peter, I do.”       “Damn, Helene… My little girl… My happiness…”       Hugging Helene tighter, Peter understands that he cannot hold down his tears. Tears of happiness and unbelief in having his beloved girl by his side, and crying quietly with her nose snuggled in his shoulder.       “Even if it’s a dream, I don’t wanna wake up,” Peter says in a low, shaking whisper. “I don’t wanna come back where I’d be without you.”       “I was waiting for this for so long…” Helene barely holds back the tears. “I wanted to hug you tightly and kiss you. This wish was the one to let me hold on for so long.”       “As much as you want, sunshine… I’ll be hugging and kissing you as much as you want.”       Helene makes a quiet sob and wipes tears off her cheek against Peter’s waistcoat, feeling awkward when it gets tracks of powder that she removes with her fingers without problems. After stepping away at some moment, the girl grabs the man’s face and gives him a tender, continuous kiss on the lips, to which he answers with pleasure, hugging her tightly by the waist, which, as he notices, seems much thinner now.       The lovers feel that their hearts start beating like crazy, and the world kind of stops when their lips connect. When the warm hands touch the soft skin. When they feel the smell and cannot remain indifferent. All the pain leaves them immediately, goes into the unknown. As if they had never lived the past several weeks, suffering from the separation from each other. And their hugs get stronger every second that the kiss lasts, so that they hold their breath.       “Helene, my baby…” Peter pronounces with a happy smile, caresses Helene’s cheeks tenderly with both hands, and leaves several short kisses on her tender lips with a heavy breath. “Little… Girl…”       “I can’t…” Helene whispers with tears and laughs nervously, feeling dizzy for a moment, while her fingers get through the matted strands of Peter’s hair. “I can’t… Oh my God…”       “I’ll give you to nobody, I’ll let nobody hurt you.” Peter leaves a peck on the tip of Helene’s nose and around her mouth with his shaking lips. “This time, I’m gonna be your protector, for sure. The best one. I promise.”       “My God, I can’t stop crying… I can’t…”       “Quiet, quiet, sweetheart, quiet… It’s okay… It’s okay…”       But Peter cannot keep his emotions under control and keeps crying with happiness along with Helene and choking from a lack of emotions. They sob again and again, they look into each other’s eyes again and again, they smile again and again, they kiss their partner’s face again and again, as if they are hungry for the feelings that are little forgotten but still desired and exciting.       “I’m now crying as bitterly as the girls when they saw me alive,” Helene confesses in a low voice.       “But I cried several months ahead today,” Peter replies. “And I can’t calm down yet…”       “If I pass out now, please, don’t be scared. I just can’t…”       “Don’t pass out… Be with me… Be with me…”       Peter gives Helene a much more impatient and greedy to some extent kiss on the lips, which makes her make a quiet, continuous moan. The moan that is the reason why his heart trembles nicely. Just like it happens in the case of the man’s heavy breath that makes her feel a nice shake in her abdomen, which spreads rapidly throughout her whole body. At some moment, the blond just takes his girlfriend in a strong hug, putting his arm around her neck and putting his hand on her back. While she presses herself to the man’s chest as closely as possible, through which she can feel his frequent and strong heartbeat, and enjoys the incredible warmth her boyfriend’s body spreads.       “I love you, baby…” Peter pronounces in a tender whisper and kisses Helene tenderly on the top of her head. “Very, very much. You’re the most important thing I have in my life.”       “I love you so, so much, too, honey,” Helene smiles widely with eyes closed from pleasure and touches Peter’s naked shoulder softly with her lips. “My treasure… My wonderful man…”       “I swear your heart will never bleed. You know I’d come to you at deep night.”       “You just need to call my name… And ask me to come, support, and stay…”       The silence that settles in the air can only be broken by Helene and Peter’s heavy and deep breath as they spend some time in each other’s hug, not wishing to step back due to the fear of losing their beloved person. Due to the fear of letting each other disappear after letting go. That’s what makes them press as closely to each other as possible and make this magical moment both of them dreamed about so badly as long as possible. The one they dreamed about every day before sleep. The one they were afraid would never become reality.       Who knows how much time has gone by before the lovers take their emotions under control more or less and step back a little to wipe their and each other’s tears with fingers or a handkerchief Helene finds in her pocket. They notice silently how red and puffy their eyes are, and Peter wipes the mascara carefully under the girl’s eyes after it gets down, while she puts his ruffled hair in order.       “So, you feel better?” Helene asks.       “Yup, much…” Peter smiles shyly and sniffs quietly.  “Though I still can't believe in this miracle.”       “It’s not a miracle, it’s people’s kindness.”       “Kindness shown by a bad person can’t be a miracle. It’s a rare thing, fearing which is much easier than accepting and enjoying.”       “Anyway, the result of this situation is before your eyes.” Helene shrugs. “And I am madly grateful to Elijah for helping me.”       “Of course, I thank him for that, but it won’t help him get away from having to pay for all his tricks.”       “He always differed from Marcus and his friends. My gut told me that I could count on him. Even if he pretended that he didn’t care about me until the very end.”       “I guess you were overwhelmed when you found out who helped you.”       “Oh, yeah! And I was really scared at first. I almost escaped the hospital in fear. Then I calmed down a little. Though I kept treating Elijah with suspicion until the very end. I was waiting for something bad. But… It didn’t happen, luckily.”       “Elijah Hartley is still a bastard, but I pay tribute to him for saving you. He did just something good in the end.”       “By the way, Elijah reads really interesting detective books. While I was recovering after all these things, I read something from what he offered me.” Helene glances aside. “And actually, I had a good enough rest. To be honest, I was a little tired before I was kidnapped… I worked, I had problems with you, I helped my grandma, I couldn’t forget my friends, Sammy wanted attention…”       “I’ll personally make sure you come to yourself,” Peter promises, caressing Helene’s cheek. “So that you forget what happened and never think about it again.”       “It’s hard to forget all those terrible things… But maybe I just need some time. And a good company. So that any pain weakens.”       “You can count on me in everything, sweetie. Just tell me how to help you so that I do anything for you.”       “Just being next to you would be enough for me,” Helene smiles shyly and takes Peter’s hand. “It’s enough to know that my man wouldn’t love to leave me and let me solve my problems on my own.”       “It may happen in your nightmares only.”       “And I hope you will stop harming yourself and turning everyone against you by doing terrible things. And apologize to Edward, Terrence, and Daniel for all the bad things you’ve done as soon as possible.”       “May something heavy fall over my head if I don’t do this! If I dare to harm them again. And if I briefly get a thought about having to harm and take revenge on someone.”       “I’m here, Pete, I’ll always be. And I won’t let you turn on the wrong way.”       With these words, Helene caresses Peter’s cheek tenderly, while he smiles sweetly, puts his hand on her hand, and snuggles his nose in it. And at some moment, he sniffs her skin on it and feels the perfume with the smell of lavender that makes him feel dizzy every time he breathes it in.       “What about joining the guys and making them happy?” Helene suggests with a mysterious smile. “The girls are still together, but the men are gonna join them soon.”       “They’re together?” Peter asks hesitantly.       “I think it’s a good moment to greet the girls, meet Sammy, who misses you so badly, and apologize to the men.”       “I… I’m scared… So badly…” Peter swallows nervously. “But I understand I must do this. I can’t run from them forever.”       “Right! And if you choose this way, the guys are gonna be much madder at you.”       “Do you think I have a chance to deserve their forgiveness? Or that’s all? Is my friendship with them over?”       “If you’re true, the guys will understand it all. Moreover, it’s much easier for you, men: you can fight and crush each other’s faces but reconcile and become literally brothers in two minutes.”       “I dunno, Helene… I’ve got a bad presentiment… I think the guys won’t forgive me.”       “I don’t exclude it. But you must do this anyway. Apologize just once, explain everything, and leave. Give them time to think about everything. And then they’ll say if they agree to give you another chance.”       “What number? Not the second one, for sure…”       “You still have a chance. If you don’t miss it, everything is gonna get better.”       “It’s my dream. The guys mean as much to me as you. I don’t wanna lose anyone. I don’t wanna lose my close friends.”       “Just do what you should, and then things will get clear. I suggest you just do this as soon as possible and go to the guys right now.”       “They’re all now at Daniel and Anna’s house?”       “Yup. It’s not gonna take too much time to go there. Literally five minutes before you’re there.”       “Alright, let’s go there,” Peter exhales sharply. “Not sure if I’m lucky in this case, but I’ll at least try to do this.”       “Wise decision,” Helene nods in approval with a slight smile.       “I promised I’d do this. So, I’m doing.”       “But do you want to get your friends back? Right?”       “Right!”       “Let’s go then!”       Helene jumps from the bench and gives her hands to Peter, saying:       “C’mon, Rose, get up! Since you make mistakes, be able to fix them!”       “That’s right! Sadly, nobody is going to fix my mistakes for me!”       Taking Helene’s hands, Peter gets up from the bench and looks around quickly.       “But how do we get out of here? Where did these idiots drive me? And where’s my car?”       “Don’t worry, your car is a little further!” Helene exclaims. “And I’ll show you the way. I memorized it more or less when Perkins and I were on the way.”       “Now I see where he disappeared and why the hell he stole my car and the keys from it.”       “Yeah, the guys had to work hard to make you wake up.”       “My blame…” Peter pronounces shamelessly. “I was really out of my mind at that moment…”       “Oh, Peter, Peter, you’re our trouble…”       Helene puts her arms around Peter’s waist and presses herself to him as closely as possible, while he answers her with pleasure and closes his eyes for two seconds. But when he opens them and looks around, he understands that it’s kind of lighter outside, even if it’s getting closer to the evening. Then the man moves his eyes to the sky and sees the shoots of the bright sun get through the thick clouds with stubbornness, even if there is not supposed to be any hint of it, according to the weather forecast. It unconsciously makes Rose recall one of his nightmares, in which Marshall herself came to him and gave him a little promise:       “…When you meet your true love, I will give you a sign. The bright sun will suddenly light up the whole city in the gray sky covered with thick clouds. And a couple of little birds will fly by you, sit on a stick next to you, and sing the most beautiful song in the world.”       And then Peter pays attention to two little birds that fly by him, make a couple of circles, and land on one of the sticks of the tree placed near the bench. Then they start tweeting and whistling in unison, creating the unrepeatable music that spreads throughout the entire woods, caresses the ear nicely, and fills the soul with something light and happy. It makes the man smile widely, starting to think more and more that at least one of his dreams has become real. It gave him a sign that things were not what they seemed. And one beautiful day, Helene would show up and be with him again.       “My dream has become real…” Peter thinks. “We’ve really met. I got the sign. The sign of meeting my love. My true love that I must take care of.”       Peter hugs Helene tighter, putting his hand on the back of her head. And when she moves her eyes full of tenderness and smiles at him shyly, he kisses her sweetly on the forehead and leans on it with his forehead, enjoying the way the incredible warmth fills every single cell of his body and kicks out all the negative emotions that want to possess his mind and get rid of the rest of good things that are still alive inside him.       At some moment, Helene smiles much wider, puts one arm around Peter’s waist, and leads him after herself to the side they need, while he hugs her around the forearms and puts his hand on the girl’s hand that is lying on his chest. The lovers literally cannot stop looking at each other and do not pay attention to what surrounds them. Well… Maybe only two birds that keep pleasing their ears with a touching song and flying after them, jumping from one stick to another, and not staying on them for longer than two seconds. Rose ignores his hallucination in the form of Theodore, who walks beside him silently and says nothing for some time, not hiding his shy smile.       “Okay, since your girlfriend is alive and healthy, I congratulate you with all my heart,” Theodore breaks the silence. “You can live and enjoy your life again, hugging this cutie, kissing her, and fucking her when the morning wood in your pants drives you crazy. I won’t bother you two… You wanted it so badly… You dreamed of it… Alright, it’s all up to you!”       But Peter ignores all the words of Theodore and rubs his nose tenderly against Helene’s temple after he kisses it a couple of times.       “But remember that you won’t get away from me even after this. I will keep being next to you. I will keep reminding you of the most important thing that’s gonna poison your life. No matter how much you don’t want this, you’ll have to remember everything. Remember everything that happened to you in your childhood. Find out what your biggest fear of people started with. Why you started to consider them a threat and preferred to run from them like crazy, get into a fight, or fuck them off. Be sure, you will have to unblock all these memories early or late. It doesn’t matter if you’re ready for this or not, the birdie living inside you wanna get out so badly. It’s time to give it a chance to fly high in the sky. It’s been stuck in your for too long…”       Again, Peter ignores all of this and brings his lips to Helene’s lips for a continuous kiss full of tenderness, during which he puts his hand on her cheek.       “Don’t pretend that you don’t hear me as you suck this dolly! I won’t get off you, I repeat! If you want to live a normal life, you will have to remember your childhood. You’re not a boy anymore. You’re an adult man. Which means you can handle what a child wouldn’t. Remember this, buddy!”       But no matter how hard Theodore annoys Peter, the blond keeps paying no attention to him and gives it all to Helene. In the end, his hallucination waves his hand with a sharp exhalation, as if he says that he gives up now. Rose keeps kissing Marshall with great pleasure and pressing her tightly to himself, while she is not going to get off the one she missed so badly, at least in the near time. Just like the blond, who is still trying to make sure that he is not sleeping and has a wish to keep living in this world again for his sweetheart with full confidence about choosing the right partner.       

***

      After doing their business, Terrence, Edward, and Daniel go to the home of the latter, where Raquelle, Anna, and Natalia are still getting busy with talks and games with Sammy making everyone happy with his wonderful mood and good appetite.  While the girls help them treat all the wounds and work in the kitchen, the men let themselves relax and sit comfortably on the sofa, not hiding their pride due to the mission that has been successfully completed. Not mentioning some things, they tell their girlfriends about how they reached their goal, even if the ladies know something from what Perkins told them during his short return at home.       “Gosh, finally these lovebirds have met!” Natalia exclaims happily, holding Edward sitting next to her under his arm and keeping her head on his shoulder. “Finally, we’ve caught the bird and put it in the cage.”       “It took a lot of strength, but we did it, after all,” Daniel replies as he plays with Sammy pulling the short rope the dog grabbed tightly with his teeth.       “Now Marshall is gonna wash the brains of that idiot,” Edward notices, running his fingers through Natalia’s hair. “And make him overwhelmed by his actions.”       “Uh-huh, let her deal with him now!” Terrence exclaims, clapping slightly Sammy on the back after the dog hits his knee with his tail several times. “We’re giving up!”       “And what’s next?” Anna wonders, coming back to the living room with Raquelle and putting a plate of recently cooked puff pastry tongues with sugar on the coffee table. “Is this all? Has your friendship with him come to an end?”       “Most likely. We’ve said we’d piss him off after bringing Marshall to Rose.”       “But what if a miracle happens, and he regrets everything and wants to apologize?” Raquelle asks and puts a plate with several cups of strong tea on the coffee table. “What if Helene’s appearance puts his brain back to the original position?”       “It’s hard to say, but the guys and I are madly hurt,” Edward confesses and takes one puff pastry tongue and one cup of tea, while the others do the same, and Anna and Raquelle join them by sitting down on the sofa. “It’s hurt that we’re showered with mud like this.”       “On the way here, we even talked about what to do to him participating in the band,” Daniel confesses and bites a piece of the tongue. “Whether it would be right to keep having a business with him even if we stop befriending him. Or we shouldn’t make it harder and keep working as a trio or find a replacement.”       “Whatever you decide, we’ll support your decision,” Natalia promises, holding a cup of tea. “Who are we to change your mind and make you do what you don’t want?”       “Yeah, but it doesn’t mean we want something like this!” Terrence exclaims. “It doesn’t mean we want to kick Peter out of the band. No, vice versa! It would be hurtful for us to do this. It would be madly hurt to break all the contacts with him.”       “Agree, no matter what, there were moments when he seemed a really cool dude to us,” Edward adds. “That’s why it’s much harder to make this type of decision.”       “As Natalia said, you’re the only ones to make a decision,” Anna recalls. “Though the girls and I didn’t fight with Peter. And he’s never given us claims, he’s never reproached us for anything…”       “If you want to keep talking to him, we won’t mind,” Daniel promises. “Until he harms you somehow, it’s alright.”       “Anyway, I’m sorry for him,” Natalia says with sadness in her eyes. “Yes, Pete behaved like an asshole toward you. But he is not guilty of being sick.”       “And his hostility to the world is clear enough,” Raquelle adds. “He was waiting for any help from it, but nobody heard his desperate scream for a long time. Nobody gave him a hand to help.”       “You know, sis, we all suffered to some extent and felt left and lonely at some moment,” Edward notices. “But none of us got through the same things that happened to Rose.”       “I guess we’ve just got a strong enough psyche,” Daniel assumes. “To handle some shocking things and not to go crazy.”       “And we don’t suffer from any mental illnesses!” Terrence exclaims.       “Anyway, I don’t personally think he’s really a cad,” Anna says quietly. “I mean, I don’t think about it at all. And his aggression is the way to protect himself from this world. That is not always kind and fair.”       “And I don’t think we should consider him a stinker,” Raquelle agrees.       “If someone gives him much love and protects him from any possible betrayal, he’s gonna be the sweetest one,” Natalia adds.       “Oh, we understand everything, girls…” Terrence sighs tiredly, rubbing his forehead with his hand. “We understand that we may cross the line at times.”       “But at the same time, nobody can reproach us for wishing him all the worst,” Daniel adds. “You all know that we did everything for Peter. We tried to be good friends to him. We replaced his family and were next to him in hard times. We were happy to accept his care for us. Complaining would’ve been a sin!”       “Be patient, guys!” Raquelle advises. “And remember, even if he attacks you with fists, it doesn’t mean that Peter hates you. At these moments, a scared, humiliated, and lonely boy, who wants to be hugged and caressed, is sitting inside him. Trust me, if you hug him tightly and say something good instead of attacking him with fists back at these moments, he’s gonna get confused and let all his anger disappear.”       “Maybe it’s true. But until Rose decides who he wants to be and who we are to him, it doesn’t make sense to talk to him.”       “Uh-huh, we actually wanna befriend Peter, not Theodore, who he is gonna be,” Edward adds. “If he brings back the old himself and kills his dark version, we’ll be happy to talk to him. Even if it’s gonna mean nothing.”       “We get it, guys,” Anna says softly. “We know you’re hurtful and painful.”       “Anyway, we kept our promise!” Terrence notices and drinks a little bit of tea from his cup after biting a piece of the tongue. “We promised to help Helene meet her sweetheart – we did it.”       “Yeah, if not for her, we would've pissed off that psycho a long time ago,” Edward confesses. “As if we wanted to spend time taming him and making him do what we wanted.”       “But now, as they say, we can relax!” Daniel adds cheerfully, stretches his arms, and cracks his fingers. “Do our business and be happy that this story has finally ended.”       Sammy barks two times as if he agrees as he is sitting on the floor next to Terrence and Raquelle.       “Hey, folks, watch the tongues!” Terrence advises. “It seems that Sammy put an eye on them, judging by how hard he licks himself.”       “Hey, hey, no, glutton!” Natalia jabs, raising the plate with tongues that Sammy tries to reach. “Stop, I said! Dogs don’t eat flour!”       “Hey, buddy, do you actually know we’ve already fed you?” Anna recalls. “And how many treats Helene gave you when we walked and played!”       “C’mon, girls, let the doggy eat!” Edward adds. “He was hungry for nobody the hell knows how long!”       “Uh-huh, and then he won’t get through the door with his big ass!” Raquelle exclaims. “And ask us to take him in his arms when his paws can’t hold his heavy body.”       “Oh, c’mon, friend, don’t exaggerate!” Daniel waves his hand. “Maybe Sammy’s got a love for tasty food, Marshall weaned him to the physical activity.”       “Don’t teach the dog bad things!” Natalia insists. “Just because you eat as much as mammoths every time you’ve got a chance doesn’t mean Sammy needs to.”       “Well, of course, I’ve got a good appetite, but it doesn’t impact my body negatively at all,” Edward notices with his head proudly raised.       “And you shouldn't laugh at me eating too much!” Terrence adds funnily. “I’m still freaking handsome and slim anyway!”       “Huh, why you wouldn’t be so funny!” Daniel throws gloomily. “You ate a big pack of chips secretly from me when I left to take Helene out. And then went to my home to put puff pastry tongues in your stomach.”       “Since the lady of the house suggests that we eat, refusing would be a sin,” Edward smiles innocently.       “Oh, our boys are ready to talk about food forever,” Raquelle laughs.       “Uh-huh, they just need a reason,” Natalia agrees.       “Food is not just a source of life power!” Edward notices cheerfully. “It’s also a way to get pleasure. Isn’t it a pleasure to eat a big piece of chocolate cake with tender crusts and heavy crème?”       “Or baked potato with juicy meat?” Terrence rolls his eyes dreamily.       “M-m-m, what about spicy, broiled chicken wings?” Daniel smiles slyly.       At this moment, Sammy licks himself as he looks at everyone purposefully.       “Hey, hello, stop teasing the dog!” Raquelle resents. “Look at how hard he’s licking himself!”       “We’re actually exhausted and hungry after today’s adventures,” Terrence adds and bites a big piece of the tongue. “You must feed us like kings and lords!”       “Excuse me, it’s like what?” Anna smiles innocently. “Are two baked pigs enough for you? Or should we get a third one?”       “M-m-m, I’d be happy to eat pork now,” Daniel replies thoughtfully.       Sammy barks several times loudly, wagging his tail energetically.       “Oh, my gosh…” Natalia rolls his eyes.       “You’re right!” Raquelle strokes her hair down.       Sammy starts pressing himself against Edward and looking into his eyes as if he asks for attention, and closes his eyes when the man scratches his face with both hands with pleasure. And when the dog comes to Terrence with the same plea, everyone can hear the doorbell in the living room, which makes them look at each other questioningly.       “Oh, who’s that?” Daniel wonders. “We’re waiting for nobody…”       “Maybe Helene’s back?” Raquelle assumes. “Alone or with Peter?”       “We didn’t kinda agree to meet here,” Terrence shrugs.       “Sit here, but I’ll check it,” Anna says, getting up from the sofa. “What if some of our neighbors need something?”       Leaving her friends and boyfriend with the dog in the living room, Anna quickly goes to the hall door, while someone presses the ball for the second time. The girl unlocks it quickly and sees Helene smiling shyly and Peter looking guiltily and having the brunette pressing herself to him.       “Wow!” Anna pronounces surprisingly and closes her mouth with a hand. “Helene, my God… You did it?”       “I did it!” Helene exclaims and presses herself much closer to Peter, looking at him with tenderness. “Pete knows everything now.”       “Okay, come in then! You’ll tell us everything now!”       “Hey, Anna,” Peter greets hesitantly after Helene and he enter the house hesitantly. “It’s been a while.”       “Hey…” Anna replies amicably, closing the door after the visitors. “Come in too, Peter, don’t be shy.”       “I hope nobody will mind if he’s with us now,” Helene expresses hope.       “I’m personally happy to see him.”       Anna hugs Helene amicably and does not ignore Peter, who answers her back a little hesitantly. After stepping away from him, she looks at the lovers closely, noticing that both of them look tear-stained.       “Gosh, you two have such red eyes!” Anna horrifies. “It seems that you two cried non-stop!”       “Erm, I’d say so…” Helene confesses hesitantly, biting her lip, and touches her eyelashes carefully with a finger. “It was… A very emotional talk.”       “I’d say, too emotional…” Peter adds much more hesitantly.       “It’s all clear about you,” Anna laughs, calls Helene and Peter with a gesture, and leads them to the living room. “Alright, come in since you came. Of course, we weren’t waiting for you, but we won’t kick you out.”       “Everyone’s here? The girls and the men?”       “Yup, here. The men are talking about food, and Sammy is licking himself.”       “A glutton!” Helene exclaims. “We’ve fed him recently, but he’s asking for food again!”       “Yeah, it’s hard to remain indifferent when a talk is about spicy wings and baked pig.”       “I get it, I get it…”       When Anna, Helene, and Peter show up in the living room, the others move their eyes to them. While Raquelle and Natalia are truly happy to see Rose and smile at him shyly, Daniel, Terrence, and Edward look at each other indifferently.       “Wow, who’s decided to come to us!” Raquelle exclaims happily, raising her hands up.       “Yeah, Peter Rose himself decided to make us happy with his visit!” Natalia adds.       “Hey, girls,” Peter greets, waving his hand shyly. “Glad to see you.”       “So, buddy, did you decide to stop running from us, after all?” Raquelle asks.       “I’d say so…”       “Of course, he didn’t wanna come here, but I persuaded him,” Helene confesses, putting her bag on the sofa. “I said you missed him so badly.”       “We’ll close our eyes to what we know and just rejoice over the comeback of our friend,” Natalia replies with a slight smile and gets up from the sofa along with Raquelle.       “Yeah, no matter what, we’re happy to see you anyway,” Raquelle adds amicably.       After Raquelle and Natalia come to Peter, they take him in an amicable hug, to which he answers with pleasure but a little hesitantly.       “Welcome back, buddy!” Natalia exclaims after she steps away from Peter.       “We’re happy to have you back,” Raquelle adds softly when she hugs Peter, too.       “Thanks a lot,” Peter thanks with a slight smile. “I missed you, too.”       “So, where have you been, dork?” Anna wonders and hits her fist against Peter’s forearm. “We were so worried about you, but you were running from us. We called you one hundred times! And we sent you two hundred messages!”       “I’m aware…” Peter glances aside for a second, locking his fingers tightly. “But I… I needed to spend some time alone…”       “Or you just thought we were guilty of all sins and wanted to harm you freaking bad,” Raquelle crosses her arms over her chest with a sly smile. “That’s why you were ignoring us.”       “Sorry, girls, I’m really very sorry. I know you’re guilty of nothing.”       “Oh, Rose, Rose, our walking trouble…” Natalia sighs heavily, putting her hands on her hips.       “I promise it won’t happen again. I’ll no longer disappear and remove the SIM card from my phone so that nobody can annoy me.”       “Exactly!” Helene exclaims. “We see you made yourself think that everyone gave a damn about you and wanted to hurt you so badly.”       “Even if nobody gave you the reason to think so!” Anna adds.       “Alright, alright, beauties, alright, I got it!” Peter raises his hands up. “I won’t do this anymore, I promise!”       “Never do these tricks anymore, you got it?” Raquelle warns. “Don’t hurt our friend and don’t dare to harm the men!”       “Uh-huh, if you don’t want us to hang you by your balls,” Natalia threatens. “If you dare to hurt our close people again.”       “No, I won’t hurt my girl not for anything,” Peter says confidently with a slight smile, hugging Helene around the shoulders and pressing her to himself. “And I’ll let nobody do this.”       “Uh-huh, you decided to blame Marshall for betraying you!” Anna resents. “The girl, who was ready not to sleep, not to eat all day long to make you feel good.”       “Hey, do you really know what Helene did in the past?” Peter asks hesitantly.       “She told you that?” Raquelle frowns slightly.       “Yup, she let me know it wasn’t connected with me.”       “It’s true,” Natalia nods. “If Helene decides to tell you everything, we can confirm her words and add some details.”       “I’ve told Peter that I wanna confess everything to him and the men,” Helene says quietly. “To end all of this once and forever.”       “You did it well,” Raquelle nods in approval. “You should’ve told him everything a long time ago.”       “Now it all doesn’t matter to me,” Peter replies. “What happened in the past stayed in the past.”       “Anyway, I need to put everything in order and never come back to this anymore,” Helene says thoughtfully. “You and the men should know it.”       “Yeah… We’d better end it soon… And never come back…”       Peter moves his eyes slowly and hesitantly to Edward, Daniel, and Terrence still sitting on the sofa with their arms crossed over their chests and looking at him gloomily enough but quietly at the same time. They do not even think about coming to him and the girls and watch him from afar, feeling the anger but struggling with a sense of awkwardness due to the tension in the air. But when Rose finds the strength to say just something to them, he pays attention to the loud and happy bark of Sammy, who is running wild to him after going somewhere at some moment.       “Sammy!” Peter pronounces happily. “Buddy!”       Peter gets down to his knees when Sammy comes to him and starts snuggling his nose in his hands with a quiet whining, jumping happily, and wagging his tail energetically.       “Sammy…” Peter starts scratching and stroking Sammy with both hands. “I missed you so badly! I really missed you!”       Peter starts laughing shyly when Sammy snuggles his nose in the man’s face, licks his nose, and keeps being restless when Rose hugs him tightly and presses him to himself.       “Yeah, yeah, I know you missed me too. I believe.”       After stepping away, Sammy keeps snuggling his nose in Peter’s face and trying to lick him, while Helene, Natalia, Raquelle, and Anna laugh shyly and do not refuse to caress the dog that accepts all this attention from them with pleasure. And even this scene does not make Daniel, Terrence, and Edward smile even for a moment and rejoice along with the others.       “Yeah, fucking excellent split personality!” Edward throws gloomily. “He was running after us and threatening to kill us, but now he’s hugging the doggy and smiling at the girls.”       “As I understand, Marshall really washed his brains,” Daniel says thoughtfully, while Peter gets up on his feet, and Sammy jumps into his arms in happiness and snuggles his nose in the man’s face. “Reminded him of all his actions and made him fucking overwhelmed.”       “Even if it’s so, it will hardly change anything,” Terrence sighs tiredly. “Rose has done too much to make us pretend that nothing happened so easily.”       “It’s right, he did an unfair thing to us,” Edward agrees. “We did everything for him, but he turned his ass on us.”       “Nevertheless, we crossed the line when trying to make him hysterical,” Daniel notices tensely. “Rose screamed as if we were gonna cut him.”       “Agree, that was cruel,” Terrence replies. “But he forced us to do this. We tried to agree with him kindly.”       “Hey, what did you say about his last words he said before running from the house?” Edward frowns slightly.       “Ah, yeah, when he was hysterical, he said something like…” Daniel recalls, scratching his temple. “I don’t wanna get through all of this again… Like… It’s okay they raped me, but if you did this, it… It would be too much…”       “He lied to escape?”       “Hard to say. But I ain’t sure. Any truth comes out when you’re in a condition like this.”       “Still, I wouldn't be surprised if he was raped by his schoolmates,” Terrence says, rubbing his hands nervously.       “If he didn’t lie, it’s literally the confirmation of the fact that they bullied him harder than we thought,” Edward says thoughtfully.       “Do you think we need to learn more about it?” Daniel asks.       “The question is whether he wants to speak? It’s a very delicate thing that men are always ashamed of talking about. If it’s… All about him…”       “Anyway, now I’d rather be careful in this case. And find different methods in case his brains melt.”       “While Helene is near, he will hardly act like a psycho like this,” Terrence assumes. “She managed to wake him up.”       “Yeah, now he knows she’s alive,” Edward adds. “Maybe this idiot would calm down a little and put himself together now.”       “We’ve gotta think better about how to talk to him next,” Daniel says quietly. “Whether we want it… Or our friendship with him ends… But we can work together…”       “We’ll see, buddy… Watch him, listen to what he’s gonna say to excuse himself… And then make the decision.”       Terrence and Daniel say nothing and just look tiredly at each other, and Edward fingering over nervously. At some moment, Helene comes to them a little hesitantly, while Peter keeps playing with Sammy, and Anna, Natalia, and Raquelle caress the dog in all areas.       “You don’t wanna talk to him?” Helene asks with sadness in her eyes.       “Nope, honestly,” Daniel shakes his head. “At least, now.”       “I thought he was truly sorry about what he did to you when I reminded him of that.”       “Even if it’s so, it will change nothing,” Terrence sighs tiredly. “We aren’t sure if we can forget everything and forgive.”       “I get it, guys… That’s why I insist on nothing and ain’t gonna persuade you to forgive him.”       “Anyway, we’re glad you reunited with him,” Edward smiles shyly. “Glad he saw everything personally. And realized that… We didn’t lie to him.”       “I didn’t believe I’d do this. But… I must confess… I didn’t have to try hard… When talking to me, Peter never showed any kind of aggression. He agreed with everything, he listened to everything…”       “Does it mean we can say you made a miracle for the second time?” Daniel rounds his eyes.       “Maybe,” Helene shrugs. “Besides, when I scared Pete and said I wanted to leave him after everything he had done, he was hysterical. He was really scared to have our relationship end.”       “Did you really decide to be with him?” Terrence specifies. “Are you sure you won’t regret your decision?”       “I’ll at least try to. And I wanna believe I made the right choice. Peter is actually not as terrible as we think. His aggression is just a mask. An attempt to protect himself from the cruelty of this world.”       “Anyway, we won’t turn you against him,” Edward promises. “If you’re sure, you can date him. Still… Just because we have a conflict with him doesn’t mean you’re supposed to turn your back on him, too.”       “Thanks, guys,” Helene smiles shyly.       “And we won’t prevent the girls from talking to Rose,” Daniel promises. “He’s done nothing bad to them yet.”       “We’ll protest in case Peter dares to harm them somehow,” Terrence adds. “But still, we wanna believe he won’t go against us. He’ll be afraid. He’ll remember that we’ll rip him for your friends.”       “No, no, guys, don’t worry about the girls,” Helene shakes her head with a slight smile. “Peter is gonna treat them with respect.”       “I hope he understands it,” Edward expresses hope. “He didn’t forget what we could do if someone dared to make the girls cry and scare them.”       While Helene says nothing and inclines her head, Anna comes to her.       “Good job, Helene, you did it again!” Anna exclaims happily, hugging Helene around the shoulders. “You breathed into Peter and brought his brains to the original position.”       “She’s really the only one to be able to do this,” Edward smiles shyly.       “We’re glad she did it,” Terrence says truly. “If she’s really sure that she’s ready for this, nobody bans her.”       “I hope you don’t mind me coming here with him?” Helene asks hesitantly.       “Nope, nope, it’s okay,” Daniel shakes his head. “May he stay since he came.”       “You’d better try to be more down-to-earth,” Anna advises. “You’re sitting here like you’re doing him a favor. Like, thank us for tolerating you, dude.”       “We can’t say we tolerate him, but we can’t say we’re happy to see him,” Edward says thoughtfully.       “I get it, guys, but let’s not make this time worse if we decide to have a little dinner and congratulate Helene and him on reuniting.”       “Don’t worry, Anna, it’s gonna be okay,” Daniel assures with a slight smile. “We ain’t gonna fight with him with the pretense of you and your friends.”       “I hope he won’t do this, either,” Terrence expresses hope. “He’s still got some brains.”       “Anyway, let everything that’s gonna happen next be my responsibility,” Helene suggests, putting her hand on her heart. “Since I brought him here… If something goes wrong, I will take him away.”       “Don’t worry, friend, we’ll do our best not to make this evening worse and not to scare you, Raquelle, Anna, and Natalia,” Edward promises.       “Alright, guys, let’s have a little dinner in this case,” Anna suggests. “Eating tongues only isn’t enough for you. We’ll cook something better now.”       “Well, the guys and I never mind eating something,” Daniel laughs.       “Oh, yay, you love this thing!” Anna ruffles Daniel’s hair slightly and strokes it down shortly. “Not less than laughing with each other at something.”       “It’s holy, friend!” Terrence raises his index finger. “A lot of laughter, food, and sex is the best thing a human may have. If you manage to find a way to keep this balance, you can think you won this life.”       “Trust me, you’ve got a lot of this!” Helene assures.       When Edward, Terrence, and Daniel look at each other with a slight smile, Natalia and Raquelle join them, Anna, and Helene.       “So, since we have some visitors here, we must accept them well,” Raquelle says cheerfully.       “What are everyone’s suggestions about food for a little dinner?” Anna asks. “Something we don’t have to spend too much time cooking, but something to let us feel well-fed.”       “Anything, princess!” Daniel states with his head proudly raised. “If your magic hands cook something, even bread is gonna be something incredible.”       “Give us anything you want!” Terrence exclaims. “Just feed me enough!”       “And I’m not picky, I eat anything I have on my plate!” Edward states.       “Alright, we’ll come up with something now,” Natalia exhales sharply. “The girls and I will do this quickly and feed your gang to the up all together.”       “Hey, girls, let’s go to the kitchen!” Anna suggests. “Let’s see what we have in the refrigerator and drawers. Maybe it helps you get inspired somehow.”       “Don’t fight here while we don’t watch you,” Helene insists. “Who knows what may come into your mind.”       “It’s gonna be cool, cuties!” Terrence promises with his head proudly raised.       “Don’t worry, we’ll find something to do,” Edward says. “We can talk, we can laugh, we can play with Sammy. We won’t have to be bored, as they say!”       “Let’s leave him here as a leader so that he can watch the order,” Raquelle smiles slyly and moves her eyes to Sammy just coming to everyone. “Agree, Sammy? Will you watch the guys while the girls and I are cooking?”       Sammy barks confidently two times as if he agrees.       “Excellent, my boy,” Helene smiles sweetly and caresses Sammy’s head softly. “We count on you.”       “Follow me, girls!” Anna calls with a gesture. “Let’s not waste time.”       While Anna takes Helene, Raquelle, and Natalia to the kitchen and starts talking to them about all the potential dishes, Peter being in the other corner of the living room watches them with sadness. Then he inclines his head for a second and looks at Daniel, Edward, and Terrence, who are still sitting on the sofa with their backs to him and pretending that they are too busy with their talk. And no matter how awkward he feels, the blond completely understands that he cannot avoid this talk and must keep the promise he gave Helene. So, he exhales sharply and comes to his friends slowly but confidently and, locking his fingers tightly, asks in a little shaking from excitement voice:       “Erm, guys… I…” Peter swallows nervously. “Erm… Can we talk?”       “Is there something to talk about?” Daniel asks without emotions.       “I… I want to apologize to you… For everything… For what’s lately happened… For… All my hysterics…”       “So, did Helene wash your brains well and put something back in their place?” Terrence asks in a low, little rude voice.       “I know I behaved disgustingly. I know I was unfair to you this whole time.”       “Right, you behaved like an asshole toward us,” Edward throws gloomily.       “It’s true… And… Now I understand you don't deserve it. I shouldn't have blamed you and considered you liars.”       “Wow, what kind of miracle Marshall made!” Daniel crosses his arms over his chest. “How suddenly you have changed! You have turned good immediately! You have put your mind in order shortly!”       “Please, guys, don’t be mad at me…”       Peter sits on the edge of the sofa hesitantly in front of Edward, Terrence, and Daniel, who look really gloomy.       “I’m really sorry about what I’ve done,” Peter adds with sadness in his eyes. “I’m really ashamed…”       “You should’ve been ashamed when you tried to kill us,” Edward says in a low voice. “When you called us murderers and blamed us for Helene’s death.”       “Understand me… After that explosion happened, I was really out of my mind. I stopped understanding what I was doing. I was ready to tear apart anyone who stood in my way. I gave a fuck about who it would be: a friend or an enemy.”       “Did you really think we’d forgive you so easily after everything you had done if you said the simple ‘sorry’?” Terrence asks surprisingly. “Did you think you’d come here so sweet and nice, but we’d forget everything and say everything is alright?”       “I’m not expecting your forgiveness immediately. I’m not waiting for you to understand me now.”       “Do not do, Rose, you turned us against you,” Daniel states determinedly. “Congratulations, you got what you wanted. You have stayed all alone. Your fear has come true.”       “Please, understand what I felt when I thought my girlfriend was dead. I thought my world crashed. I mean, the remains of it.”       “Hey, don’t shower us with emotional speeches with the hope that we will melt and call you our friend and brother,” Terrence shows his hand with his palm first. “It will not impact us.”       “I’m not trying to pity you now,” Peter protests. “No… No way.”       “How could you?” Daniel wonders. “How could you do this? Why? Why did you do this to us? We were your friends! We supported you, we comforted you, we were near in hard moments… But that’s what you did to us…”       “I was full of anger. I should’ve released it somehow. Otherwise, it would’ve driven me crazy.”       “Yeah?” Edward surprises loudly. “And should you have used the guys and me for that? Ran after us with a knife, beat us, strangle, try to throw us off the cliff, shoot…”       “I didn’t want it, guys, I swear!”       “Oh, come on, man!” Terrence resents. “If you hadn’t wanted, you wouldn’t have done it! Or you would’ve released your anger differently!”       “I repeat, I didn’t differ anyone and anything at that moment! I saw a goal and didn’t see barriers!”       “Good excuse for your disgusting actions. But it’s too bad that it will not help you.”       “Guys…”       “You have gone too far, Peter. We could’ve closed our eyes to many things because you were mourning. We would’ve forgiven you for any shouts, insults, and humiliations… We would’ve been ready to support and comfort you as much as you needed. But we lost our patience when you tried to put us in the grave.”       “It’s okay you tried to kill Marcus and his friends,” Daniel adds. “It’s clear – these bastards were guilty of what happened. But what about us? Why the fuck did you show such strong aggression toward us and leave us deeply shocked?”       “Exactly!” Edward exclaims. “We were fucking dumbfounded by how crazy you went! You lost your mind and wanted to take revenge on everyone: those who were guilty and those who were innocent.”       “You’re right, I don’t dare to argue,” Peter agrees with sadness in his eyes, fingering nervously. “I felt freaking offended at that moment. Because this whole world was unfair to me. Because every asshole wanted to put a knife deeply in my back.”       “As we understand, this world kicks your ass again and again for the reason,” Daniel says gloomily. “Everything happens for a reason. You’ve got sins. The sins you have to pay for.”       “I’ve done nothing bad to anyone in my life! I’ve been trying to be good for everyone! But everyone’s been rejecting me! Again and again!”       “Don’t pretend to be holy, blond!”       “I’m not!”       “Daniel’s right: fate never punishes people without a reason,” Edward says confidently, crossing his arms over his chest. “It’s clear you screwed it up as fuck a long time ago. Not just now.”       “Please, guys, don’t make me evil incarnate. Yes, I’m not holy, I don’t deny it. But I’m not so bad. I’m not a monster. I’m just a lonely and unhappy guy who’s been fucking unlucky in this life. Who can’t find his own place in this world. Find the place where he’s loved and appreciated.”       “Why the fuck do you need it?” Terrence wonders. “Why the fuck do you need what you don’t value? What you treat disgustingly? The guys and I did everything for you! We were ready for any sacrifice to make you feel good. We spent time on you, listened to you, supported you, comforted you… We tolerated all your complaints and hysterics…”       “I’m really very sorry about what happened.”       “Do we really mean nothing to you?” Daniel wonders. “Don’t you the fuck really friends? It seems that you’ve been letting us befriend you all this time! The fucking lord was pleased to come down to some pathetic people!”       “Not truth! I do need friends! I need those I can count on! I can’t and don’t want to stay alone in this world. I don’t. I won’t survive alone. It’s gonna crash me like a pearl early or late.”       “It seems like you are sort of a masochist!” Edward states. “As if you love suffering. You love feeling pain. You like people beating and humiliating you. You love dominating people. You love the feeling when you look at them from up to down and feel higher, stronger, more confident…”       “Show me at least one idiot who loves suffering and tolerating the way someone kicks them on the head again and again!”       “Sitting in front of us.”       “I’m not a masochist! And I don’t love suffering!”       “Controversial statement. But you surely love dominating someone. You love attacking weak people. Because this is how you compensate for your insecurity and take revenge for being kicked by everyone somehow.”       “Uh-huh, you shitted your pants to the fuck when you were tied,” Daniel adds gloomily in a low voice. “You were running with a knife so sassy and bold, but then you put your tail between your legs and peed your underwear from fear.”       “Right! You can hardly dominate someone when you’re surrounded from all sides and tied up tightly. So, you only have to rack your vocal cords, snap, and scream with the hope that someone can hear you and save you.”       “As if you didn’t like mocking me,” Peter throws as he glances aside.       “Sorry, man, but you gave us no choice,” Daniel replies quietly. “It was the only way to cool you down a little. Otherwise, you would’ve kept jumping like a donkey until the deep night and wipe your fists in blood until kicking us to the stop of the heart.”       “I’m not reproaching you… I know you did all of that for the reason…”       “Yes, we tried to persuade you to meet Helene at your will. Make sure that we didn’t lie to you. But you refused to go by yourself. So, you got what you got.”       “Sorry…” Peter inclines his head. “I’m really sorry about not believing you at first. And thinking you kinda wanted to mock me. Laugh at my grief.”       “Even if you acted like a bastard, we aren’t so nasty to do this,” Edward states. “And the case is not about pity or something like this. We’re just better. We’re on top of that. Our mind is clear and sober.”       “I seriously wanted to solve it all when I came to you at the café. I wanted to apologize to you and ask you not to turn your back on me. I really didn’t want it. But seeing how happy you were at the moment of mourning, I went insane again. I wanted, I ain’t gonna lie, to strange you. Because you… You were happy with my grief… Were happy with my girlfriend’s death.”       “Yeah, you switch your personalities literally faster and better than a prostitute jumps from one bed to another,” Terrence replies coldly. “You can be Peter one hundred times for five minutes. As long as you can be Theodore.”       “Oh, I don’t understand who I really am…”       Peter leans back on the sofa, while Sammy watches him with sadness in his eyes, sitting next to him from the beginning of the talk.       “There are many ‘for’ and ‘against’ about every personality. If I’m Peter, I’m gonna be a weak, cowardly, and broken freak. But if I'm Theodore, I’m gonna turn into a heartless bastard, who’ll really take after his father and start killing everyone to take revenge for his sufferings.”       “Yeah, yeah, we understood that you liked being in the skin of Marcus,” Edward puts his hand with his palm first. “You liked beating people’s faces and feeling sassy with a cold gun in your hands.”       “I wasn’t doing this with pleasure!”       “Oh, yeah, sure!”       “Uh-huh, did you try to kill me for pleasure, too?” Daniel resents. “Did you take a knife from the pillow and run after me in the whole room before cutting my vein for fun? Did you try to kill me several more times after that for fun?”       “You just made me enraged!” Peter exhales sharply. “I was fucking done with your jokes about my personal life! I was fucking done with you not hearing me when I asked you to stop all of this.”       “Alright, my blame, I admit it! But you the fuck tried to kill me! Kill, Rose!”       “My patience wasn’t endless. I understood I’d lose my patience early or late if you didn’t stop. And you got what you deserved.”       “Agree, I did. It was unfair.”       “You didn’t only get it for your jokes. You got it for your attempt to denigrate me in front of everyone by spreading all those dirty rumors.”       “I said I didn’t spread those rumors about you!”       “There was nobody else to do this!”       “Yeah, but it wasn’t me!”       “Which rumors?” Terrence frowns slightly and moves his questioning look at Daniel. “What’s he talking about, Daniel?”       “Rose thinks I allegedly spread the rumors about his sex issues,” Daniel crosses his arms over his chest. “Like, he’s got a small dick, he never gets an orgasm, and he’s actually a freaking impotent. When we worked in Albert’s band, the guys talked about it for a long time, the men laughed at him openly, and the girls ignored him and said bad things.”       “Because of you!” Peter adds with a reproach.       “I did not do this!”       “Sorry, Dan, but we have to agree with Peter,” Edward says quietly. “You cared about his thing more than everyone. You pressed on him with your jokes about his personal life all the time. And when you had a conflict, you called him an impotent.”       “I swear, guys, I don’t have anything to do with that! Yes, I said it, I admit it! But I wasn’t the one to spread all those rumors.”       “There’s nobody else but you,” Terrence notices.       “Don’t you believe me? Guys, come on?!”       “Sorry, but Rose’s words sound pretty true. And if he attacked you because of that, we do understand why you got your ass kicked back then.”       “I did admit my guilt for what happened. And I have apologized to that like one hundred times.”       “Then find the courage to admit that you have to do with those rumors,” Peter demands.       “I didn’t spread them!” Daniel raises his voice.       “Who, then?”       “I don’t know! Anyone could do this! Don’t forget, you didn’t get along with a bigger part of the place where we worked. If just a little thing went wrong, you started to bark like a dog.”       “Because they humiliated me! I just didn’t let them hurt me and protected myself!”       “You didn’t always need it! There were cases when the guys did nothing to you, but you managed to see something.”       “Because everyone wanted to shower me with mud!”       “Sorry, Peter, but you were guilty of that. Most of the people were nice to you from the beginning. You were the first to start barking and showing your claws. So, don’t be surprised that everyone treated me much better. I tried to get along with everyone. Of course, they weren’t my friends. But they at least respected me. Almost all of them.”       “Alright…” Peter raises his hands. “Alright… I agree. Sometimes I wasn’t right, huh. I trusted nobody. I expected something bad from everyone. That’s why I attacked them first.”       “And in the end, you got a lot of enemies,” Terrence notices. “By the way, I also noticed that the people from the studio didn’t like you a lot. But I blamed the unfriendly environment for that since it tensed me. But now it’s clear that it wasn’t the only problem.”       “The environment was really uncomfortable there. Only a few people from one hundred were more or less good. While others were rats. The rats I had to behave like a rag toward.”       “Ha, the guys from our team don’t love you a lot, either!” Edward chuckles. “They talk to you well, but they secretly whisper about you being a distanced one who looks at them as if they’re aliens.”       “I don’t trust people – that’s my problem! It’s hard for me to get rid of the thought that one or another person may put a knife in my back.”       “If you were bullied by several people from school, it doesn’t mean the whole world would do that.”       “But it happens differently! I’ve been bullied all my life: my mother, my schoolmates, strangers, or someone else… Even my friends think they must shower me in mud. They think they must tell someone terrible things about me.”       “Fuck, I am sick of proving to you that I don’t have to do with those rumors,” Daniel moans tiredly, running his hands over his face. “It’s been nobody the fuck knows how long, but you keep reproaching me for what I didn’t do.”       “How would you prove you didn’t do that?”       “Why did you actually think it was me? Didn’t you have any other suspects? No other candidates! Knowing your relationship with everyone, anyone could do that!”       “Uh-huh!” Terrence agrees. “Maybe it was actually the work of Marty Patch, whom you fought constantly with. She hated you to the fuck and missed no chance to give you some claims.”       “Right! Have you never thought about that idiot? She bullied you more than the others! You sometimes had such serious conflicts that you even used fists at times. She attacked you, or you punched her in the face. That’s why I was fucking overwhelmed ‘cause I did judge raising a hand on a girl.”       “Yes, that girl and I didn’t get along,” Peter agrees. “But it was hardly her.”       “Maybe it was her?” Daniel assumes determinedly and smiles slyly. “Maybe that girl took revenge on you after you had a brief affair in that way.”       “We didn’t have an affair!”       “Yeah? But some sources told me different things.”       “I don’t know what they told you, but I didn’t date that bitch.”       “Hey, you said she wasn’t your taste!” Terrence recalls.       “She wasn’t! I’d never date someone like her.”       “But there was something between you.”       “Oh, there was nothing between us…” Peter swallows nervously, moving his eyes aside. “Expect the fact that we fucked once…”       “M-m-m, what a twist…” Terrence smiles slyly.       “You?” Daniel pronounces surprisingly. “You fucked that girl? Seriously?”       “Yeah, I slept with her!” Peter states, clenching his hands tightly into fists and starting to breathe heavily. “We did… Though I didn’t like it at all… That girl could do nothing… And I told her about it… Then she showered me with a lot of swearing words… She slapped me in the face many times and got out to the fuck…”       “Here’s the proof!” Edward clicks the fingers of his hand. “Marty was the one to spread those rumors about you. She was mad at what you said and decided to take revenge by attacking you back and telling everyone these hurtful things.”       “Right!” Terrence agrees. “But you, idiot, attacked Perkins! Yes, you had a reason to think it was him, we can’t deny it. But still, you should’ve thought better before blaming someone.”       “I didn’t think about it…” Peter confesses with reluctance, glancing aside with his arms crossed over his chest. “Though it still means nothing.”       “Anyway, I will keep standing my ground until the end,” Daniel raises his head proudly. “I didn’t spread the rumors. I didn’t have a reason to do this to the one I considered my best friend.”       “Okay, fuck it! It doesn’t matter how.”       “It does since you still remember that and blame me.”       “Give me at least one reason to believe you so that I can take my words back.”       “Yes, I can hardly prove it. But at least, remember everything we’ve gotten through. About all the cases when I was near when you had a hard time. And think about whether the one who took care of you like a brother could do such a mean thing to you.”       “I trust nobody, Daniel. And I can’t consider all this case true out and out. Can’t make myself sure that it was done with all the heart. Not for a benefit. Not for putting me off guard and hitting me on the head with something heavy or stabbing me with a knife.”       “It’s your problem. But I’ve never deceived you. I’ve never let you down. Yes, I made mistakes. But I tried to be a good friend to you anyway. The friend, whose effort you did not appreciate. The friend, who wasted five years of his life on you.”       “I really tried, but I could not trust fully. Though it doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate everything you three have done for me. I do really appreciate it. It’s just hard for me to believe all of this doesn’t have a hidden meaning.”       “We did everything we could,” Terrence says quietly. “But now our patience is gone. We are sick. Sick of proving to you that we are not your enemies. We are sick of helping the one who rejects our help, no matter how many times we’ve given him a hand.”       “I'm not happy with it at all,” Peter confesses. “I want to change. I want to trust those who love me. I want to stop waiting for a betrayal from them. I am really sick of withdrawing into myself all the time and pretending that I love loneliness. It’s not true. I do hate it. I mean… I fear it… It scares me. If someone loves being alone, it’s okay. But I need to be in companies. I feel like an extrovert more.”       “You had a million chances to get a company,” Edward recalls. “A million chances to meet good people and befriend them. But you missed all of them.”       “Please, guys, don’t turn your backs on me…” Peter begs with pity in his eyes. “Give me another chance… The last one… I promise I won’t let you down anymore. I… I will learn to trust you… I’ll be your good, loyal friend you can always count on.”       “To befriend the man who’s got two personalities?” Daniel asks surprisingly. “Who can be sweet and good but turn to a heartless bastard if something goes wrong?”       “Indeed, Rose!” Terrence exclaims. “We only need to give you a little reason so that you attack us with fists and a knife… I wouldn’t be surprised if you had a pistol somewhere.”       “No, no, I swear it will not happen anymore!” Peter shakes his head sharply. “Never! I swear!”       “Your promises are as empty as oaths of alcoholics and drug addicts to wean themselves away from it,” Edward throws gloomily. “As a rapper’s oath of leaving their victim alone and stopping to mock her or him with a wild wish to feel like a lord of the situation.”       “I’m not a monster! I’m not a bad man. I’m just unhappy. Broken and unhappy. I don’t understand how to live in this world. How to stop feeling like shit.”       “We can give you just one piece of advice: get your head checked,” Terrence insists. “Solve your problems. Find out where this shit comes from. Work on your traumas on your own or with a psychologist. And if you’re mentally unstable, take prescribed medicines. Take control of the situation before you really kill someone and go to prison after your father. Who, trust me, is not going to get away from it after all of his shocking statements.”       “I’m not the same as Marcus! Yes, he’s my father, but I don’t wanna be like him! I don’t wanna choose the same way. I wanna live a normal life: meeting friends, working, earning money, being in a relationship with my girlfriend, thinking of children…”       “As we understand, there are many things that don’t let you put everything in order,” Daniel says thoughtfully. “So, you'd better spend your time sorting this shit out. Call your memories, decide on what you want, try to do your best to make it happen…”       “I don’t know how!” Peter exclaims a little louder, with a bit of despair. “I don’t know what to do about this!”       “I can help a little: since you started hysterics after a hint of the rape that someone could do to you, this is the thing you need to reflect on.”       “I don’t understand why I reacted like that! I… My brain was kinda turned off after you started to talk about it… I was fucking scared… I had a strong panic and could barely breathe or speak. I thought I’d really die…”       “You said you were raped by your schoolmates.”       “What?” Peter opens his eyes widely, feeling that his heart is squeezing painfully. “I said it?”       “Don’t act like an idiot. You were telling us not to touch you at the top of your lungs. Like, it’s okay that my schoolmates raped me, but if my friends did it, I’d go insane. Weren’t these your words, huh?”       “I… I don’t remember that…”       “But I do. And I don’t have any amnesia this time.”       “And we remember you said you didn’t want to get through that hall again,” Terrence adds. “And it’s really surprising that you didn’t lose your voice after screaming so loudly.”       “It aches a little now…” Peter confesses, grabbing his throat and swallowing nervously. “But the reason is my talk with Helene. I couldn’t hold myself down when she started to say she wanted to leave me.”       “It’s not the only reason,” Edward replies. “You were just freaking out. Screaming at the top of your lungs. Making some inhuman sounds.”       “I’m not lying to you, guys. I can’t really remember if I said something like this.” Peter glances aside. “And… To be honest… I vaguely remember what happened after I was knocked out for the first time. I know I was tied… I know you mocked me… But without details…”       “It’s okay, a memory loss is possible when you have hysteria,” Daniel notices. “Wait for a day or two. And get fucking overwhelmed by what you did and said.”       “Well, or have an intense workout at a gym class,” Terrence adds. “Maybe it can help you get rid of all the stupid things. Maybe that’s what let you hold yourself down somehow.”       “I can’t remember half of my life, huh…” Peter confesses in a low voice with a tired sigh. “And I can’t connect everything that’s happening to me. I don’t understand myself! I don’t feel like it’s really me.”       “We’re powerless, man. You’re the only one to solve all of this.”       “And we don’t want to spend time on you,” Edward adds. “Enough, we’re done with actions we may be wanted to kill for.”       “Please, guys, believe me!” Peter begs desperately. “Yes, I wasn’t often right. But I do admit it. I do recognize my mistakes and am ready to fix them.”       “Too late, Theodore,” Daniel throws gloomily. “Nothing can be changed.”       “I’m not Theodore! Don’t call me like this! I don’t want it!”       “You thought about it too late. You should’ve thought earlier.”       “Don’t be so cold to me.”       “Ha, did you think we’d run to you happily and hug you tight?” Terrence asks surprisingly. “Did you think we’d close our eyes to everything just because Helene did it, and Anna, Raquelle, and Natalia accepted you warmly?”       “At least, give me hope that I can deserve your forgiveness. Let me know I didn’t lose you.”       “Sorry, Peter, but we can’t forgive you,” Daniel upsets. “And we will hardly ever forgive. Yes, we’re connected by many good moments, but your disgusting behavior struck it all out. It killed our respect for you. We can’t talk about any kind of friendship.”       “I’m ready to do anything you say. If I can fix just something, I will do this immediately.”       “The only thing you can do is just not to screw up anymore,” Terrence replies. “But it will not change our decision to end any contact with you.”       “Please, guys…” Peter begs with sadness in his eyes. “Please, don’t leave me. I need you. I can’t sort out this shit without you.”       “You have Helene, she will help you,” Edward says without emotions. “And she’s got many more pedals to impact you with. As the practice showed, we’re powerless in your case.”       “Not true! You’re not powerless! If you hadn’t been by my side, I would’ve gone crazy and killed myself a long time ago. You give me the strength, which is the reason why I'm holding on.”       “You didn’t appreciate what we did for you,” Terrence states. “You didn’t appreciate the fact that we opened our hearts to you. We were honest with you, we were loyal to you… We were happy with your success and worried when you had failures…”       “I am really grateful to you for your effort. Please, don’t think I’m a thankless pig that can only accept. And don’t forget how much I’ve done for you. How many times I’ve been by your side when something happened to you.”       “You know, Rose, I’ve lately been starting to regret running after you like an idiot and offering my friendship to you,” Daniel confesses. “I shouldn't have done it, I shouldn't have. Because you’ve never needed it. And you agreed to befriend me just because you wanted me to get off you.”       “What?” Peter rounds his eyes full of horror.       “Really, blond! I shouldn't have even started. And if it were possible, I’d come back five years later and do my best for us to never become friends. To remain colleagues who would stop talking in case one of us left the band.”       “I regret getting in touch with you, too,” Terrence says quietly. “And spending so much time on the man, who I didn’t expect anything like this from.”       “And I thought you and I were friends,” Edward says with sadness in his eyes. “But your actions only make us disappointed.”       “Please, guys, don’t do this!” Peter begs. “I know I hurt you. But please, give me a chance. The last. The very last one.”       “You were given a chance after the story of your life in the hospital,” Daniel recalls. “But speaking rudely, you crapped it up. And we are not going to handle your mistakes again and again.”       “You couldn’t forget everything we’ve come through! You could not! I don’t believe it!”       “You forgot it, so why can’t we do it?” Terrence surprises coldly.       “Don’t leave me, guys, I’m begging you. I’d do anything for you. Anything you say. But please, give me a chance to fix everything. Just one chance. I don’t need anything else!”       “Sorry, but no.”       “Guys…”       “At least, until you really decide on who you want to be and understand what matters to you. Which way you want to choose.”       “I know, which! I wanna be with you! I wanna be Peter! Despite all his shortcomings and failures, I wanna be the one. I wanna be the one you befriend.”       “You can’t know it for sure while you remember the fuck nothing about your life,” Edward notices. “While you can’t sort out the shit in your head. While you don’t solve your problems. While you don’t get your head checked.”       “It doesn’t make sense if I don’t have my close people by my side.”       “Helene,” Daniel pronounces. “Do this for Helene. Don’t let down the girl who loves you. Who is not sure if she did the right thing. Who will hardly close her eyes to your next actions if you don’t stop in time.”       “Helene is my everything. I’m really gonna be unhappy without her. But you’re all important to me, too. I can’t and don’t want to choose between her and you.”       “Stop, Peter, we said everything to you,” Edward says quietly. “We have nothing else to add. Our friendship with you has ended. And you’re the one to provoke it.”       “No, guys, don’t do this…” Peter shakes his head with pity in his eyes. “Please, bros…”       “Everyone knows we didn’t want it,” Daniel says in a much lower voice and swallows nervously. “We didn’t want to fight you and ruin our relationship. But sadly, you forced us to.”       “I didn’t want it, either! I did not!”       “This talk is over. We’re putting a thick dot in this story. Biting the bullet, clenching the fists.”       Peter shakes his head with despair in his widely open eyes in mistrust, breathing heavily, and getting horrified by the fact that something he wanted much less has just happened. He glances aside, seeing Theodore sneering sinisterly, inclines his head slowly, and swallows nervously as he clenches his fingers for a second and rubs his hands, while Sammy sitting next to him and watching him whines with pity as if he shows his true sympathy.       “Fine…” Peter pronounces in a low, little shaking voice after the tense, short pause. “If you don’t want, I don’t insist. I… Understand… Completely understand…”       “Since Helene brought you here, it’s alright, you can stay,” Daniel says quietly. “Let’s not make the girl’s mood worse with our fights. We wouldn’t like to scare and upset them. They suffered a lot because of the thought that their friend was dead.”       “I ain’t gonna fight with you. And it’s the business of you and me. They don’t have to do with it. We shouldn't have them involved in all of this.”       “And we will not attack you if you behave well,” Terrence promises.       “Could you do me one little favor?”       “Which?”       “Don’t kick me out of the band, at least…” Peter moves his eyes full of sadness to Edward, Terrence, and Daniel. “Don’t take my outlet away. Music is my everything. I want and am ready to continue to play in it and work at one hundred percent.”       “Who can guarantee that you wouldn’t frame us?” Edward asks gloomily. “Who can guarantee that you’d go on stage and wouldn’t let us down somewhere one minute before the show?”       “No! You can count on me! No matter what, I will continue to play in the band. You won’t have to think about where to find a new drummer. You won’t have to upset our fans with the news about my departure.”       “They’d hardly want you to stay if they knew everything about your tricks,” Terrence replies.       “I hope they’ll know nothing, and we’ll let it all stay between us.”       Terrence, Daniel, and Edward say nothing and look at each other with a tired sigh.       “Alright…” Terrence pronounces in a low voice. “Alright, you can stay for a while. For a while. Your departure would give us much trouble, but now we don’t have a wish to deal with this shit.”       “Anyway, we’ll think about your future in the band,” Daniel promises. “We are not happy with the prospect of working with you, but we don’t want to let our fans down.”       “Moreover, we’re about to release the album and go on the tour,” Edward adds. “Let’s play it quickly and see it later. If we can, we will keep performing like this. You’ll be just a colleague to us. Just a drummer of our band, who we will communicate as if nothing happens on stage not to upset anyone and not to give the journalists a chance to write some shit.”       “I agree on all your conditions,” Peter states confidently. “Just let me stay. Do my favorite business and earn money. A lot of money. Besides, I’m now literally broke after giving almost all my money to buy it. I need to earn more. For life and home improvement.”       “Deal,” Terrence replies. “And now we will try not to upset the girls. Not to upset our fans. Not to let down George, the agency, the team, and the organizers.”       “Okay… Thank you for that, at least. I am really grateful to you. I promise I will keep showing a high class on the scene and make our fans scream.”       Edward, Daniel, and Terrence say nothing and look at each other briefly, while Sammy whines with pity and sadness in his eyes again as if he understands what’s happening. Being depressed, Peter caresses the dog’s head softly and presses him to his feet, while the retriever keeps showing his sympathy by putting his face on his laps.       “Terrence, Edward, let’s sit in my room, while the girls are cooking,” Daniel suggests quietly and gets up from the sofa. “Think about what to do.”       “Why not?” Edward shrugs.       “I don’t mind,” Terrence agrees.       When Edward and Terrence get up from the sofa, Daniel hugs both of them around the shoulders and takes them with him, coming to the stairs and getting up to the second floor. All this time, they never look at Peter, who, however, does not try to get their attention and watches the men silently with eyes full of sadness. But he does not have to stay all alone for too long because Natalia comes to him shortly after this.       “Hey, Peter, you didn’t do it?” Natalia asks with sadness in her eyes, sitting next to Peter and putting her hand on his shoulder.       “Alas,” Peter inclines his head. “They don’t wanna talk to me. They don’t wanna be my friends.”       “Anyway, we can understand them. You hurt them a lot. You did your best for the guys not to be able to trust you anymore.”       “I didn’t count on anything. I completely understood that I could fix nothing so easily.”       “Just give them some time,” Raquelle advises, sitting on the other side of Peter after coming to the living room. “I’m sure they aren’t happy to break their relationship with you. But they’ll get cool and forgive you someday later.”       “No, Raquelle, hardly. I really screwed it up as hell. I went too far.”       “At least you apologized, and it’s very good.” Raquelle caresses Peter’s shoulder softly. “You’re a fine fellow, Pete. That’s good you decided not to be silent.”       “And do you believe me?” Peter asks hesitantly, looking at Natalia and Raquelle. “Do you believe that I didn’t want it?”       “We do, Pete, we do,” Natalia says confidently.       “Don’t worry, we befriended and talked to you and will keep doing this,” Raquelle promises. “Not only because the men don’t mind it. Because we want it.”       “Yeah, buddy, you’ve always treated us well. And we love you, despite all your mistakes. Moreover, we’re all far from being holy, sweet, and fluffy. Who are we to judge you and give you lectures?”       “Right, remember how many mistakes the men made back then! And they completely realize it.”       “It’s okay, girls, I get it,” Peter smiles falsely. “I’m happy at least because the guys agreed not to kick me outta the band. Because I wanna keep performing at concerts and earning money.”       “I think you should really give some time to the lads,” Anna says softly, coming to Peter with Helene, and caressing the man’s hands folded in front of him after she bends to him. “Moreover, they haven’t come to themselves after what happened.”       “They do admit that this kind of decision is really hard for them,” Helene adds, standing next to Anna, and shrugs. “Because… Many good moments connect you.”       “I’m such an idiot, girls…” Peter shakes his head and runs his hands over his face. “Just an idiot… Can’t believe I screwed it up like this. And I lost almost everything.”       “You just need to remember well that Edward, Terrence, and Daniel have never wished you anything bad and didn’t befriend you out of a benefit,” Anna says confidently. “Whatever happens, they won’t choose what can make them go against you. Never.”       “I know, Anna, but it’s hard for me to trust someone completely. I’m afraid to get a knife in my back and get much more disappointed in people.”       “We get it, sunshine,” Helene pronounces softly. “But we’ve never given you a reason to doubt us. We’ve never done anything that could break your heart.”       “It’s been broken for ages. It’s been wounded and bleeding for eternity.”       “You’re hostile to this world because you’re still mad,” Raquelle notices. “You’re mad at those who hurt you. You’re mad that they grew up and didn’t probably get any punishment. While you’ve got any kind of offences, they keep you on a leash. To set yourself free, you need to stop waiting for your offenders’ fall. Or there’s a risk of being stuck in the past forever and making it worse for you by carrying the veil that is getting heavier every day.”       “That’s why it hurts. It hurts that they got away from it. Nobody was punished, nobody apologized, nobody did something good for me.”       “Do you think we’ve never met bad people?” Natalia surprises. “No, Pete, you’re wrong! We ran into betrayals, meanness, and hate. But it didn’t make us get mad at the whole world. We understand that we can’t make the whole world an enemy because of two or three people. You can run into assholes all your life, but you need to remember that you must not judge humanity by a small crowd of people who will not stay with you forever. This big world is not guilty of you being in the wrong place, at the wrong time, in the wrong collective.”       “I should’ve heard these words when I was younger. When absolutely everyone I counted on turned their backs on me. When nobody needed me. When I was a pain in the ass for everyone. Even if I did nothing bad to anyone. Nothing to turn someone against me.”       “We’re sorry about you not getting love and care every child should have,” Helene says with sadness in her eyes.       “Even if your close people were harsh to you at times, they loved you anyway. You had people who said nice things to you. They were your strength and support. Thanks to them, you stayed strong even in the darkest times. But I had nobody! I could tell nobody about my pain. I could complain to nobody. Nobody cared about me. And I hoped someone would notice me until the end. But it did not happen. Nobody noticed me. But everyone hurt me. Everyone mocked me as much as they wanted.”       Sammy whines with great pity, putting his paw on Peter’s lap, while Helene and Anna sit next to Natalia and Raquelle.       “You’re not alone, buddy,” Anna comforts, caressing Peter’s shoulder. “You have us. We’re always near to listen to you and help. Your problems with the men will not impact our relationship with you.”       “Yes, sweetie, the girls and I loved, love, and will love you,” Helene assures.       “Thank you so much, but nobody will help me anymore,” Peter sighs heavily, yanking Sammy’s ears softly. “And who knows… Maybe I deserved it all… Maybe my loneliness is a pay for my sins. For the sins… Of my family… Maybe someone in heaven saw that my father didn’t wanna pay for his tricks and decided to make his son pay for them.”       “No, Pete, don’t say it!” Raquelle protests. “Marcus’s sins are his sins. And he’s the only one to pay for them. But you’re gonna pay for yours only.”       “I’ve got tons of them.” Peter swallows nervously. “The guys are right, I’ve never been holy. I don’t love talking about it, but my demons were the reason why I turned many people against me. It happened before I met your boyfriends.”       “But you regret it?”       “Obviously!”       “We understand you didn’t behave like this because you became a bad man,” Natalia replies confidently. “They just destroyed you. Some evil folks who weren’t probably loved a lot, did it to you.”       “Exactly!” Anna exclaims. “They were all weak victims of adult people who made them nothing. And then they discovered that they could choose an unprotected person and take it out on them. Their victim shook from fear, and they liked it. Fear was what they needed from you. Those who shake from fear and feel weak often choose to be frightening and become a nightmare for another person. The one they consider a reflection of themselves. A weak, unhappy, and insecure person, with whom they actually have a lot in common.”       “I’m afraid I may become the same,” Peter confesses hesitantly. “I’m afraid I will want to look for the same weak victims and mock them with a wish to feel the power. Though I don’t wanna be the one. I don’t. I’m not a killer, I’m not a rapper, I’m not a robber. I’m not a criminal!”       “Since you’ve got something light inside you, it means you can resist,” Helene smiles shyly. “And it’s amazing you didn’t choose the wrong path before. You believed in a miracle until the end. People don’t become criminals for nothing. There’s a whole story of their evil things.”       “I repeat, I can’t call myself holy. Not only after what I’ve lately done. But much earlier. And knowing that I can’t remember my childhood and a part of my teenage years, I don’t exclude that there is a chance that I did something terrible nobody knows about it.”       “Do you think you did something terrible?” Raquelle rounds her eyes.       “Yup… And… I’m afraid… I’m afraid to remember everything and get horrified…”       “I’m sure it can make many things clear,” Natalia assumes, “Explain the reason for the way you treat people.”       “I subconsciously try to delay this moment as long as possible. I don’t wanna remember what happened to me. I feel bad because of what I remember now. But if I remember the other part, I… I’m afraid… I won’t handle it… I’ll go crazy…”       “We’re always near, Pete,” Helene says softly. “No matter what happened in your past. Even if the men decide to end their friendship with you, we will not leave you. You can always count on us.”       “Thanks a lot, Helene,” Peter smiles falsely. “Thanks, Anna… Raquelle, Natalia… You’re wonderful girls. And you’re so nice to me…”       Sammy barks quietly two times, getting attention from him and closing his eyes slightly when Peter caresses his head.       “When you cook food, call me,” Peter says quietly.       “You wanna leave?” Anna rounds her eyes.       “Yeah, I’ll sit in front of the pool on the back of the house. Reflect… On everything that’s happened…”       “You can sit here. Play with Sammy. You see how much he missed you. He doesn’t leave you alone. Besides, it’s getting kinda dark outside. It’s about to start raining now.”       “I know…” Peter yanks softly Sammy barking shyly by the ears. “But I just wanna spend some time alone. Sorry…”       After he kisses Helene on the cheek, Peter gets up slowly from the sofa and comes to the door that leads to the back of the house.       “Peter…” Helene pronounces with sadness in her eyes. “Peter, wait…”       Peter does not even turn on the call and goes to the back of the house, closing the door, while Sammy barks at him with pity, and Helene, Raquelle, Anna, and Natalia look at each other with sad eyes.       “I’m upset, girls…” Natalia sighs heavily. “Really upset…”       “I guess I shouldn't have brought him here,” Helene embraces herself with both arms. “We’re all gonna feel awkward because of this.”       “I’m afraid he’ll understand it and want to leave later,” Raquelle assumes.       “At least Pete apologized to the men and let them know that he was sorry,” Anna shrugs.       “Do you think they really put a thick dot?” Helene asks hesitantly. “Or is there a small chance that the guys will change their mind?”       “Anything’s possible,” Natalia replies thoughtfully. “But we aren’t those who decide. Since Peter hurt the men, they should decide if they wanna befriend him.”       “We don’t meddle anyway,” Raquelle replies. “We can’t change anything.”       “Anyway, we only have to wait,” Helene notices. “And hope Daniel, Edward, and Terrence will get cool and give Peter a chance.”       Sammy barks quietly and presses himself closely to the legs of Helene, who caresses his head tenderly. Anna, Raquelle, and Natalia do not leave the dog without their caress, which the dog accepts with pleasure. At some moment, they look at each other and try to give mutual support with amicable hugs, pressing themselves to each other as closely as possible, and not hiding how upset they are by what’s happening at the moment.       

***

      When he is in the back of the house and closes the door, Peter embraces himself tightly with both arms and starts walking slowly from side to side and reflecting on what happened. He is happy he kept the promise he gave Helene and found the courage to apologize to his friends, but he is saddened that they refused to accept it. He is upset that the men clearly let him know that they were not ready to close their eyes to his actions, because of which he crossed the line. He is saddened that they are ready to tolerate him just as a bandmate, in which he has been allowed to play not to upset the large enough fan base of the drummer of “Against The System”.       However, Peter did not really count on anything when deciding to come to Edward, Terrence, and Daniel and explain his behavior to them. He was ready to be rejected by them. He was ready to hear many bad things about himself. He was even ready for them to attack him with fists. Seeing that the guys talked to him with reluctance, the guy felt an intolerable pain that broke his heart apart. Seeing that these three started to ignore him after they agreed not to start scandals, at least with the pretense of the girls, who also look depressed due to this situation, but prefer to stay aside.       Nevertheless, Peter is glad Anna, Natalia, and Raquelle did not turn their backs on him and are ready to give him support, as well as Helene. He is glad to have at least them. Those he can share his feelings and emotions with. At such a hard moment, he needs the support of his close people, without whom he thinks he will not handle everything that has lately happened to him. Everything he has been getting through all his life.       After getting sick of walking in circles on the back of the house with no sense, Peter lies comfortably on one of the chaise lounges and sets his dead eyes into the distance. He looks at the woods stretching for many kilometers and hills that kind of disappear in the smoke that rose above them. When it’s sunny outside, there is a chance to admire the way the sky is painted with many warm colors, and the sun goes down slowly on the horizon. But today, he can only see thick gray clouds that do not let the bright shoots of the sun light up the city after they showed up literally for several minutes.       This view makes Peter sigh sadly and close his eyes to exhale slowly, putting his hands on the armrests and strengthening his legs that hurt a little after a long, intense run in the woods. And when he opens his eyes and decides to think about something, the guy can hear his own voice behind him and does not doubt that it belongs to his hallucination named Theodore.       “Oh, yea-a-a-a-ah…” Theodore laughs evilly and stands in front of Peter with his arms crossed over his chest. “You’re a fool! The fool, who fucked everything up as hell.”       “So, did you come to gloat?” Peter asks gloomily in a low voice.       “Did you really think these assholes would forget everything and forgive you for everything after hearing the magic word ‘sorry’? Which turned out not to be magic, huh.”       “At least, I kept my promise I gave Helene. I said I’d come to the guys and apologize. And I did it.”       “Oh, yeah, that gal must be proud of you. And you’re proud of yourself. Because you are a man! You're a man who does everything he says.”       “You have something against it? You have something against me keeping my promise?”       “It doesn’t make sense for a rabbit to run when a wolf pushes it into a corner and is about to attack. You woke up and started to run after it too late.”       “I was just in despair!” Desperate at the thought that my girlfriend was dead!”       “Oh, yay, but now, when she showed up alive to you, you woke up and brought your sober mind back!” Theodore rolls his eyes. “You must use your brain, not your penis!”       “Do you have to stand here and play on my nerves? Make my mood much worse? I want the fuck to hang myself, but I have to tolerate you!”       “What’s my fault, huh? You’re guilty of everything! You lost your friends because of you. You shouldn’t have turned off your brains and succumbed to your emotions.”       “You know well how hard it is for me to talk to people,” Peter recalls coldly. “How much effort I have to make not to look like an idiot and not to say something wrong.”       “No, Peter, the problem is not about your fear of people in this case. The problem is your head. The fact that you didn’t take control of yourself when you should have done it. You let your emotions control you and get a victory. Though you just needed to listen to your friends. Trust them, talk to them, let them support you…”       “I wanted it! I wanted them to be near!”       “Not the fuck at all! You needed nobody. You thought you’d get through on your own. Just like you do every time you run into something that breaks your heart. But it’s not the truth. You can’t fight yourself alone. You can’t take control of yourself by yourself only. You need help. The help you’re rejecting.”       “I’m not rejecting it now. Now I need support. I need the support and care of the guys, without which I won’t survive in this world. Helene is not the only one I need. I need Daniel, Edward, and Terrence, too. But sadly, they hate me.”       “They’re doing the right thing! You deserved it. You deserved it after you shitted them with mud as fuck. And it would’ve been okay if you’d just insulted them. You tried to kill them. You’ve tried to kill the tough guy Danny many times.”       “You know I regret it so badly. It’s one of the cases I wanna strike out of my memory once and forever.”       “It’s amazing you helped him treat the wounds. You didn’t leave him to die. You didn’t make it look like a self-murder to get away from it.”       “What shit are you talking about?” Peter frowns strongly.       “I say what you had on your mind after Daniel started to bleed. When you cut the vein on his hand.”       “I said I am sorry! Yes, he made me enraged, but I didn’t wanna kill him. I didn’t wanna hurt him!”       “Yeah, yeah, but it just happened, blah-blah-blah… Blah-blah-blah…” Theodore sneers evilly. “Now you have to be afraid much more. Since Perkins is much madder at you, he can easily go to the police and report you. Just like he threatened to do this in the woods during your fight.”       “I know… He can really do this…”       “And he will do this! Daniel is a word person: he does everything he says. And he can take Edward and Terrence with him so that they confirm everything and tell how you tried to kill them, too. And then, pretty boy, you can expect a visit from the cops at your home and get ready to spend the rest of your life in a dark and rotten prison cell, not at your new house with your sweetheart and your future children. To eat expired shit, sleep on the cold floor, be permanently sick, and fight for survival with your cellmates. And trust me, those guys are much tougher than your friends and your father’s pals.”       “And what do you suggest?” Peter asks in a low voice.       “You can do many things…” Theodore smiles slyly and puts his finger on his lip after he stops sharply. “You can bring the case to an end and kill that company to keep yourself safe. You can die yourself… Or you can just sit and wait for the cops to put a handcuff and a wonderful prison robe on you.”       “No, Theodore! I will kill nobody! No way!”       “C’mon? But what about the revenge on the world for your suffering?”       “I said there would be no murder!”       “Oh, c’mon… You can do this once!”       “Are you fucking stupid? I said, NO!”       “Ah, yeah, you woke up after Helene came back to your life again. The girl who kicked your ass hard for all your dirty tricks and didn’t magically tell you that she’d find another man. A much healthier one. A more decent one.”       “Yes, I’ve got the meaning of life again!” Peter raises his head proudly. “I got the reason to keep fighting myself. Keep aiming to live a normal life.”       “Keep fighting?” Theodore laughs loudly with his mouth widely open. “Oh, man, don't make me laugh! What kind of fight are you talking about if you haven’t even started it yet?”       “Until Marcus came into my life, everything was fine.”       “Are you sure about it?” Theodore asks surprisingly, bends to Peter, and sets his look into his eyes. “Are you sure you were really alright?”       “I’ve never denied that I’m still fighting. I’ve never called myself an absolutely healthy man. But I really felt much better at that moment. I felt happy. I felt I was alive. I was loved and respected.”       “Okay, maybe that’s true. But you tried to make yourself think so. While you kept having thoughts of suicide, offences on all your enemies, and the hostility of this world on your mind.”       “These things can’t be gone so easily!” Peter throws gloomily. “Sometimes it takes years to come to yourself and start to live a normal life.”       “But you’ve only taken two or three steps to it for twenty-seven years of your life. It’s like you’re stuck on the level and can’t pass it. Just like in the case of a computer game. You try to take a victory, try to destroy another boss, but your character dies again and again. It’s starting to make you mad. You’re starting to give up. You wanna give up and leave things as they are.”       “Until I have at least one reason to fight, I will not give up. I will pass this level, whatever it takes.”       “By the way, sometimes your character needs to collect all the necessary things to finish the game. Alas, they cannot move on without them.”       “Hinting at me having to remember what I forgot again?”       “M-m-m, you do really have brains,” Theodore sneers evilly. “Too bad you can’t use them at all. You’re like a girl who uses her feelings and emotions when it’s especially important to use your brains.”       “What if I am afraid to get my memories back?”       Peter gets up slowly from the sofa and starts walking in circles around the back of the house.       “If I’m afraid I won’t handle this. I’m afraid that I could do something more horrifying. I feel I won’t have enough strength to handle all of this.”       “A human often does what they don’t want. Because they have to. Because they can’t live well without it. For example, someone doesn’t wanna work but has to do this. Someone fears something or is shy of something, but they have to bite the bullet and do what they should do. And these people have no choice. Yes, they suffer. But they have to.”       “But I do have a choice. I can remember everything, but I can remember nothing. And it would be much better for me to leave things as they are.”       “Being stuck in your cocoon, being mad at the whole world, not finding the courage to forgive your enemies, and looking for a threat from those who do nothing bad to you?”       “Uh-huh, but when I remember everything, I magically forgive everyone and heal myself from all my illnesses and demons immediately?”       “Well, I don’t guarantee an instant healing. But it can help you understand which direction you should move on. Since you’re missing something, you can’t help yourself. You can’t let other people know how to help you.”       “Nobody will help me anymore,” Peter says hesitantly in a low voice. “Because I turned everyone’s back on me.”       “Do you think other people can help you recover the events of the past that impacted you and your whole life?”       “I repeat, I don’t have any wish to remember anything.”       “Sorry, buddy, but now you’re the only one to do this,” Theodore smiles innocently. “You’re the only one to take your problem under your control. Since you don’t wanna go to psychologists and psychiatrists, fight on your own.”       “Okay, what do you suggest I do to bring these memories back?” Peter stops sharply and puts his hands on his hips. “What stupid thing should I do?”       “First of all, I advise you to work your brains a little and look into the depths of your soul…”       Theodore puts his arm around Peter’s neck.       “Tell me, what did you feel when the guys started to harass you and talk about their wish to fuck you in your mouth?” Theodore starts pinching Peter by the chin with a sly smile, while Rose himself tenses strongly. “Huh? Didn’t ya feel anything similar?”       “I don’t remember,” Peter cuts off sharply automatically.       “Oh, c’mon, you don’t remember!” Theodore claps Peter on the chest. “You remember everything! I mean, your body remembers… It remembers how dirtily the guys from your school used it.”       “I said I remember nothing!” Peter removes Theodore’s arm from his neck sharply. “And I’m not sure if Daniel didn’t dream it all up. If I really said all these things he talked about.”       “But you remember the moment when that trio started to accost you,” Theodore looks at Peter closely. “You remember how they talked about your inability to put your dick in what you need and make a girl get an orgasm. And how they were gonna take off their pants and tell you to suck on them and keep your mouth shut then.”       “Stop…” Peter starts breathing heavily, getting sharply pale from horror. “Shut up now…”       “What’s wrong, princess? Why are you so nervous? Are ya getting the flashbacks of the past?”       “Stop, please… Don’t do this…”       “Hey, don’t you think this shit is kinda similar to some of your nightmares?” Theodore starts walking around the tense Peter and stroking his chin. “I think the guys even said similar words. As if one of your nightmares has come true. I mean, a part of it. These men should’ve only started to sing the song about the monster with a criminal soul they sang in that dream.”       “It’s a coincidence… Just a coincidence…”       “You likely had prophetic dreams. The dreams, events from which become reality. You were a monster for everyone but felt like a lost child in them.”       “And what?” Peter asks in a loud, high voice. “What do you want from me?”       “Don’t pretend that you didn’t understand my hints, Peter. You know very well what I’m hinting at, making you remember how your friends went a little insane.”       “It means nothing!”       “Oh, it does! Remember how the guys from your school used you. They knocked you out, drove you out of the city, tied you to the tree… It was the first thought you got after you woke up and understood which situation you were in.”       “You know I’m trying to forget it…” Peter hisses through his teeth. “And I would’ve forgotten it all if not for your fucking mentions!”       “You shouldn't forget. You should learn how to live with it. Get lessons from it.”       “What fucking lessons? Are you the fuck kidding me now?”       “Well… For example, it could make you stronger if you found the courage to keep living even with this pain. You could start to face your fear little by little. Get rid of your fear of sex that you have by force. Get rid of your fear of losing control of the situation. The fear you feel when a girl dominates you.”       “Seriously?” Peter surprises loudly. “Strong? How could I be the fuck strong after everything I’ve had to get through? When this world did its best for me to feel weak! When people turned their backs on me when I begged them to be near! All my pleas of love and protection were ignored! They thought about me when they needed to release the anger. Mock someone. Take it out on someone just because they were having a bad day. Do you think there’s nothing surprising about me becoming like this? Becoming a weak, lonely, and unhappy guy, who doesn’t know where to go, where to run, and what to do.”       “You had a chance to get a group of support,” Theodore says quietly. “But you’ve missed it. So, my sweetheart, your future is known already. You’re destined to spend your whole life all alone and die, remaining unnecessary to nobody. Nobody will even put a half-alive flower on your grave after finding it somewhere on the highway.”       Peter starts walking near the edge of the pool with an irritated growl and his arms crossed over his chest, while Theodore follows him everywhere.       “And trust me, if you don’t get rid of all your demons, Helene is gonna leave you too,” Theodore warns. “No matter how much she loves you, that girl won’t please your ass forever if you keep pretending to be hard to reach and drowning in the pool, from which even a tank wouldn’t pull you. And her friends will stand by the side of their men, who have already left you.”       “Are you trying to turn me against the guys again?” Peter asks rudely. “Trying to force me to freak out and do my best to lose the girls, too?”       “You won’t have to do anything, it’s a matter of time. You’ve gone too far and would hardly come back to where you started it all.”       “If you don’t stop turning me against the guys, everything is gonna be alright. At least, not worse than now.”       “Don’t take it out on me. I’m not guilty of your mistakes. You make all decisions. You attacked Daniel by your wish, you tried to kill Edward and Terrence at your wish, you were literally ready to strangle Helene at the thought that she betrayed you. As I said, you use your emotions, not your mind. You haven’t gotten along with it, and that’s why you keep doing some shit.”       “I’m doing shit because of you, bastard!” Peter turns around sharply and turns on Theodore. “Because of YOU! If not for you, everything would be ALRIGHT!”       “I’m a part of you, don’t forget it. Yes, okay, maybe it’s the dark one, but I am you. We’re all the same, we’re inseparable.”       “Just leave…” Peter begs in a shaking voice. “Go and leave me alone. Don’t’ ruin my life. Don’t make it worse than it is now. DO NOT RUIN!”       “I told you when I’d leave.”       “Motherfucker…” Peter clenches his hands tightly into fists. “I hate you fucking hard… It’s all because of you… Because of you, I lost everything… Because of you, I am about to lose what remains yet… Because of you, bastard! BECAUSE OF YOU!”       “Do you know you’re blaming yourself for your trouble?” Theodore sneers evilly.       “I AM NOT YOU! I DO NOT have to do with you. I DO NOT, hear me! You’re not here! You are my hallucination!”       “You’ve admitted that you’re sick.”       “YES, I AM SICK! I AM FUCKING SICK!”       “Brave statement…” Theodore pronounces thoughtfully and starts walking near the pool in circles. “And since you confessed it to the guys, congrats then. You’ve officially given them a reason to call a mental hospital and ask the doctors to pack you and lock you in a room where you’re gonna feel much worse. Where they wouldn’t heal you. Where they’d hurt you much more.”       “Hey, asshole, don’t make me enraged… Either you shut up now and leave me alone. Or I STRANGLE YOU WITH MY OWN HANDS!”       Along with Peter’s scream, bass, long-lasting, and deafening rolling thunder is heard, while the black clouds shortly and kind of suddenly fill the sky, and the wind gets stronger and shakes trees with thick trunks with no problems.       “Whoa, whoa, get cool, princess!” Theodore raises his hands. “You’re about to provoke the hurricane in the city with your screams. I mean, you’ve already done… Judging by how the sky got black and how strong the wind is.”       “Yeah, am I guilty again?” Peter roars. “Am I guilty of making the weather much worse? AM I GUILTY OF THE FUCK EVERYTHING?”       “Okay, okay, relax! Why you’re so excited! Let’s better watch the disaster!”       Theodore skips to the place where there is a view of the endless woods and raises his hands with a wide smile.       “Wo-o-o-oho-o-o-o-o-o! Disa-a-a-a-a-a-aster! The disaster begins! It’s gonna hit something now…”       “Damn, I’m late…” Peter swears under his nose, looking around, while the wind is kind of trying to strike him down. “I should’ve gotten out of here… And now I have to wait…”       “Oh, who cares now? Let’s sit here, while they overeat there! We’re gonna watch the DISASTER! The hurricane is about to hit the city and destroy everything in its way!”       “I shouldn't have stopped watching the weather forecasts and hoping for luck.” Peter starts walking from one side to another. “Should’ve guessed that something would happen, seeing the sky is full of clouds, and the wind got stronger. And it’s so hot outside…       “So, buddy, are your pants wet from fear?” Theodore laughs evilly. “Do ya fear thunder? Ya fear hurricanes?”       “You mean yourself?” Peter asks as if in slow motion.       “Oh, nah, I love thunder! I love disasters! I can imagine it destroys the home of your enemy and erases them from this world at all. I hope someone is gonna really be hit fucking hard this time.”       “Okay, I’d rather stay under the canopy… Or I’m gonna be struck down if I decide to walk there…”       “Uh-huh, under the canopy that is shaking as fast as you switch between the sweet and cowardly Peter and the sassy and confident Theodore?”       At this moment, the canopy Peter is hiding under really starts shaking strongly from side to side due to the strong wind. And he feels anxiety as he stops his eyes on lanterns hanging in the air on the edges of the canopy on thin cables. The wooden table standing near the pool rolls sharply at some moment, and the loungers move off at first, but one of them rolls and lies on the side. As long as the black clouds get close, it gets as dark outside as it is at night, and the wind gusts are literally ready to destroy everything in their way.       “Wo-o-ow!” Theodore pronounces with admiration when seeing the sky covered with the lead clouds, which are lighted up by blinding lightning. “Awesome! Perfect!”       “Damn, I’ve always felt uncomfortable when a hurricane starts…” Peter confesses in a little shaking voice, breathing heavily enough, and tensing all his muscles.       “Relax, buddy! C’mon, get out of there and come to me! Look at all this beauty! Thunder sparkles, the wind gets stronger, and the chaos begins! I already feel that those who haven’t hidden in a safe place are running wild outside now.”       “Are you k-kidding me? It’s frightening! My gut tells me that some dumbfounded shit is gonna start right now!”       “Oh, yeah! Oh, yeah! Trees shake, lamps shake, the ground shakes… I can hear the hum in the air… The glasses of houses crash… The catastrophe is coming! I feel that Zeus is about to show all his power to this city! YEA-A-A-A-AH!”       With these words, Theodore starts laughing evilly, raising his head up and making Peter much more horrified so that he puts his head on his shoulders, gets sharply pale, and holds his breath unconsciously, while his dumbfounded eyes are set into the distance.       “Hey yo, cowardly boy, will ya keep standing there like a column?” Theodore wonders. “Will ya be waiting for that heavy shit to fall over your head and kill ya?”       “Uh-huh, do you think it would be better if the wind takes me away?” Peter resents loudly, while the invisible hands pull, shake, and try to remove his clothes and hair, and he hears the noise in his ears.       “If you don’t want to, don’t do this! Keep standing there! But don’t complain if that thing crashes like a card house, and nobody pulls you out of the ruins.”       “As if you’re dreaming of it!”       “Your enemies would be happy if nobody managed to save you.”       “I will not die to spite my enemies!” Peter states loudly and determinedly when another long-lasting clap of thunder is heard outside. “I shall not let them rejoice! I shall not! Even if I’m all alone, I will do my best to survive in this fucking world that has given me much pain for twenty-seven years of my life.”       Peter shakes and, shouting scarily, moves his eyes sharply aside when the bright thunder hits the street lamp placed near him so that it falls to the ground before his eyes. He tenses much more when the strong gusts of the wind turn the wooden table and chairs upside down. When the chandelier shaking under the lounge falls to this one. The growing fear is the reason why his panic attack gets much stronger: his hands get sweaty, he lacks air in his lungs, something presses in his chest, and he can barely stand due to the strong wind and weakness in his legs. His feet are kind of glued to the ground, not letting the guy step aside or enter the house and ride out the storm there.       “Get out of there, idiot!” Theodore demands loudly, kicking Peter out with a gesture. “Go to the house! Stop standing there! Do you want to die there? You hear what I say? Go to the house! GO TO THE HOUSE!”       “I can’t!” Peter shouts, feeling a fast heartbeat in his head. “I can’t move! I’m scared!”       “RUN, IDIOT! RUN!”       Peter jumps aside sharply with widely open eyes when he hears a deafening clap of thunder that hits the roof of the canopy, under which he is standing now. That’s why fire starts on the up, and the construction itself starts crashing and folding rapidly.       “S-s-someon-n-n-ne…” Peter pronounces in a shaking, begging voice, not blinking and setting his widely open eyes on the half-ruined part of the canopy that is burning more and more. “H-h-help me…”       “STOP STANDING THERE!” Theodore roars. “ESCAPE THERE! GET OUT! RUN BEFORE YOU LOSE YOUR CHANCE!”       “I’m sleeping… It’s still my nightmare… I’m sleeping! I am sleeping! HELP ME, SOMEONE! HELP ME!”       “DON’T STAND LIKE A COLUMN, YOU, BRAINLESS IDIOT! RUN! SAVE YOURSELF! RUN!”       Another part of the ceiling falls due to the fire, making Peter jump from one side to another like a boiled kettle.       “A-A-A-A!” Peter screams heartbreakingly. “SOMEONE, WAKE ME UP!”       “Nobody’s gonna wake you up!” Theodore exclaims. “This is reality! The fire is real, the hurricane is real! AND THE THREAT TO YOUR LIFE IS REAL, TOO!”       Again, Peter screams emotionally when thunder hits right several meters away from him, provoking much fierier fire and the beginning of the full destruction of the construction.       “WATCH O-O-O-OUT!” Theodore screams at the top of his lungs.       Peter raises his head sharply and sees that the ceiling above him starts collapsing rapidly. That’s what makes him move off and try to run somewhere. But sadly, a part of the heavy construction falls right over his head. And when he shakes sharply and steps back automatically, he ends up near the edge of the pool, in which he falls like a stone with a heartbreaking shout, not being able to stand on his feet due to his slow reaction and the fact that pieces of the ceiling end up in the water too. The headache that he suddenly gets clouds all his feelings and turns off his ability to think soberly. The guy’s body gets deeper and deeper. It’s like he loses consciousness for several moments, but then he wakes up shortly due to the thought that he cannot breathe. Releasing the air out of his lungs, Rose starts waving his legs and hands in panic, trying to remove a part of the heavy burden that trapped him to the bottom of the pool. He tries to get up desperately, but he cannot get out of this trap, as if his strength does not let him do this and drags him down.       His lungs burn from the lack of air, his ears pop, and something starts squeezing his chest. His eyes sting every time he tries to open them wider. The frost gets through every cell of the body, making his muscles clench in a painful tension. It seems that the more he waves his hands and feet, the sooner he can get to the surface, but everything turns out to be otherwise. Peter starts losing his strength rapidly, while water gets into his body through his nose, ears, and mouth, making him choke and feel a much stronger panic. Again and again, the guy tries to push himself and get up, but the heavy construction keeps having him hostage. It happens several times before he tries to scream at the top of his lungs. To ask someone for help. But his scream remains unheard by everyone.       At some moment, Peter grabs his throat and tries to pump some air into his lungs, which get filled with water instead, so that he feels pain. He almost spends his little reserves of strength, his movements get slower, and the exhausting tiredness comes to replace the wild fear. No matter how hard he wants to get out of this trap, he cannot do this. His body refuses to obey him. With bleary vision, Peter sees the bright light somewhere on the top that starts to seem blurrier, while pieces of the broken canopy end up near him after falling in the water along with him.       After putting himself together, Peter tries to remove the heavy part of the canopy. And he somehow manages to set free the bottom of his body that is pressed to the bottom with this thing. Then he tries to swim up, but the water is like a trap that is holding him really tight. A soundless, desperate scream gets out of his mouth, his lungs are in stinging pain as they fill with water. His legs cramp, his fingers shake, the consciousness leaves his body little by little, the world gets blurry, and his chest literally burns every time he tries to take a breath. He starts giving up and relaxing slowly, hearing the heartbeat in his temple rarer and rarer. A sense of panic and fear leaves his body. A non-typical calm comes. He feels warm now. Suspiciously easy. And this feeling makes him much more scared and anxious. And the mind is obsessed with just one thought, “Is this all? Will nobody come to save me?” Peter reaches his hand out to the little source of the light that fades away and looks up in hope for someone’s help. His dead eyes remain focused into the distance for some time, but then they close slowly. He falls into the infinite, thick darkness, and his body, as slight as a feather, gets down rapidly to the bottom of the pool and shakes slightly, depending on the flows. At some moment, several big concrete pieces fall over him and form a wreckage, from which he would hardly escape if he did not swallow too much water. Then more parts fall over him so that the body of the unconscious guy ends up pressed tightly to the bottom. And one of the pieces hits Rose on the head and ends up near his relaxed hand. While pieces of the canopy swim by him, and the real hurricane rules on the surface and is ready to destroy everything in its way.