Regrets were always something Roman didn’t quite understand. When it was past the point of no return, he would simply give up. No point in dwelling on mistakes that can’t be changed. In spite of his opinion, he did have an occasional regret; Knowing Ellis Holloway was one of them.

Ellis was so furious when they got into the car, he didn’t even stop to remove the pink brochure from under his windshield wiper. He practically had tossed himself into the car while Roman just slouched deeper and deeper down. The car just was another thing Roman hated about Ellis. It was just a weak way for him to flash how rich he was as if it really mattered to anyone. Most of Ellis’s lifestyle was to look more important than he was. Roman often wondered if it was Ellis’s inflated sense of self-importance or his helicopter parents that shifted his personality from a normal teenager to a future politician. There was so much about him that Roman couldn’t stand but most of all it was the way he still cared. If he didn’t care, Roman could have written him off, wandered back to the party but instead he sat in Ellis’s stupidly expensive car like a child being picked up from detention.

Ellis didn’t say a word, but his lips were pursed as if one wrong move and he would spill everything. Roman stared out the tinted window and let out a long, overdrawn sigh. His mind wandered back to the roof. He considered the jump, unsure if he was actually going to go through with it. It was blatantly obvious he would have been hurt, not even a professional diver would have taken that risk and yet something deep in Roman’s chest told him he had to. The reason was somewhere between having something to prove and a desire to feel pain, but he wasn’t sure which he wanted more.

Whirling the car around, Ellis headed back towards Emmerson proper. Emmerson was just another part of Roman’s life that he couldn’t stand. The small-town mentality twisted with the extremely wealthy left a bitter taste in his mouth. The narrow streets, perfectly manicured lawns and exquisite gardens were all just small lies the town lived and breathed. An illusion to make people want to stay instead of facing the truth of what the town could do to people. It would rob people of empathy and compassion, leaving them only with a strong sense of pride and judgement. Roman knew all too well the judgement the town would bear down on its citizens.

It wasn’t until they reached the town square for the second time that Roman realized Ellis was driving them around in circles. With his hands tightly gripping the wheel and his jaw firmly clenched, Ellis must have been furious or at the very least lost in thought. Occasionally, he would try to speak but no sound came out. Roman debated getting out of the car, but with every lap, Ellis increased the speed although he didn’t seem to notice.

“I know you.” Ellis pushed down on the gas. Roman didn’t know where Ellis’s head was at but even in his inebriated state, he knew it was best not to provoke him.

“Yeah, be a little weird if you denied that.” It was meant to come out as a joke, but the words fell flat.

“No, I know you Roman. More than I think anyone cares too.” He turned off the typical route, heading back towards the lake.

“You should slow down.”

He didn’t. Pushing onward, Roman noticed Ellis’s driving skills had started to slip. Veering into the opposite lane, Ellis tried to say something again but for once he was speechless. Tears were forming in the corners of his eyes. To say Roman wasn’t good with crying would have been a massive understatement. He wasn’t sure what scared him more; Ellis’s driving or the thought of the conversation they were about to have.

With shaking hands, Ellis pulled off the road and into a gas station parking lot. In the neon glow of the open sign, he turned to Roman with a look of disbelief. The neon red bounced from his glasses making it hard what was going on behind his eyes.

“I know you don’t want friends.” Ellis said plainly. “I know you really don’t want me as a friend.”

“That’s not true. I have friends.” Defensively, he crossed his arms as he spoke.

“Sure, but you don’t want them. Friends don’t just hang out to be a public nuisance, they don’t just bail on each other the moment things get hard or someone gets in trouble. You’d rather be alone but that’s not an option for you.”

Roman wished he was wrong. Friends were complicated, he wanted everything to be simple. After the night on the docks, he knew that friendship simply wasn’t worth the hassle. Loneliness was a terrible thing, but never quite as bad as the guilt he felt.

“Friendship isn’t worth much.”

“Really? Then why am I driving you home even though we haven’t actually had a normal conversation in three years? Roman, I care about you. As much as I wished I didn’t, I do. It’s annoying but true.”

“Your mistake, given half the chance I’d stab you in the back.” He wasn’t sure why, but he lied.

“Bullshit. You could have easily gone to the cops, but you didn’t. It doesn’t matter that you don’t want friends. People are always going to care about you, and you can’t change that. No amount of pushing people away is going to stop anyone.” Ellis paused for a moment and started the car again. “You know better than this…I don’t want to go to your funeral, Roman.”

Ellis tilted his head back and stared at the roof of the car. Vulnerability wasn’t something he showed often but the frustration clearly drained him leaving him in a state between disappointed parent and concerned friend. At any other moment in time, Roman would have said Ellis was always playing a part, pretending to be this suave and succinct leaderlike person but in the car and in the shitty gas station parking lot, he was more than that. There was no pretending, no lying, only genuine emotion.

There was just a second of pure silence before Ellis swallowed hard. By the way he closed his eyes, Roman could tell he was trying to formulate some sort of monologue that would reconstruct his persona.

“I’m sorry.” Roman didn’t know what else to say and he wasn’t even sure he meant it. “You want a slushie?”

“Sure.” Ellis laughed as Roman gestured back at the gas station.

It only took him a few minutes to return to the car carrying two slushies, one neon blue and the other a deep green. Ellis always had a preference for the blue although Roman considered that to be a popular opinion. Taking the drink from him, Ellis thanked him. Before pulling out of the parking lot, he started to speak.

“So does this mean we are-”

“I think it does.”

The complicated duality of Roman and Ellis relationship was something onlookers often spectated on. How could two people be so different and yet at the same time so similar? The two were two sides of the same coin. Ellis had always been pretentious, like privilege personified. Roman was friends with him in spite of it because as infuriating as he was there was no one more fiercely loyal or with a stronger sense of integrity than Ellis Holloway.

“Am I driving you to your moms- Why am I even asking? You're drunk and there’s no way you’d want to see Marta.”

“Do not call my mom by her first name, it makes her sound human.”

***

Resentment was building up in Roman’s chest. There was plenty in his life that he resented but never before was it so intense. When he sobered up after the party, he had reconsidered his relationships. He wasn’t sure anymore if Warren was a friend or just someone looking for cheap entertainment. Somewhere along the way, he lost his sense of what he needed and so he spent over a week trying to figure out what he wanted.

Roman didn’t want much. He didn’t want friends, he didn’t want family and he certainly didn’t want to do any soul searching and yet he needed them. He needed Ellis Holloway and that killed him.

Sulking outside the locker room waiting for the football game to begin, Roman remembered everything wrong he had ever done. It was a laundry list of narcissistic behavior twisted with self-destructive tendencies that made his stomach churn. Pridefully, he would usually say he had no regrets but it was almost like his entire life had become a regret.

With a quick sigh, Roman tried to shift his focus. There was a trick Fletcher had taught him years ago about focusing on what he could feel and see but he couldn’t remember it now. He decided to give it a shot anyway and began to look around. The trees were almost bare, dead wet leaves muddied up underneath them. All of the typical pretty features of autumn had come and gone leaving browning grass, dying gardens and bitter wind. It had become barren in its preparation for winter.

It was no use, his mind kept rolling back to his character. In the high pitch squeal Ellis was accustomed to, the words because I’m your friend echoed in Roman’s mind. Friendship wasn’t something Roman could sustain and yet Ellis still believed the two were connected. Roman wanted to be better, something more than the pessimistic moody teenager he was. Even in his stupid blue and gold football uniform, he wasn’t a person but rather a caricature of the high school football jock. Staring down at his helmet, he wasn’t sure what he had become, but he wasn’t proud.

Normally, he was shameless and yet one short sentence from Ellis created a seed of doubt in the back of his mind. If the other boys were still his friend, why was he so cruel? In quick flashes, he remembered how he treated Fletcher. It was more than just pushing him into the lake, it was how he ignored Fletcher’s need for help.

“Davenport! Get on the field, games about to start.” Coach hollered at him.

Jogging over, Roman gripped his helmet tightly in his hand by the mask. The bleachers were beginning to fill with fans and parents alike. Even his parents attended. That in itself was a surprise but what was more surprising was his parents sitting beside each other. Declan sat on his mother’s side, playing on his phone as he always did. From the rigid posture and expressionless faces, they looked strikingly like the Addams family. In contrast Sam and his brother sat in the front talking wildly with grand gestures. Roman wasn’t entirely sure which brother it was, but he guessed it was Percy considering the scraggly beard and long hair. Roman guessed they were just high and looking for something to do. A few rows behind them were the Yates family. Noticeably, Ellis was missing though his parents were there.

The crowd ate away at him. It should have been simple, a basic game with no pressure yet everyone decided to show up as if it were some championship game. Taking a moment, he switched his focus to the game. Football was easy enough; get the ball to the endzone, don't get hit. Easy, at least that’s what Roman thought until he saw the other team. Shit was the only thought Roman could muster. Comprising a group of boys who could have easily been mistaken for full grown men by their size alone, the other team was stacked.

The first half of the game played out as expected with Holloway Academy getting their asses handed to them. Strangely, the coach tried to spin it as having the other team right where they wanted them although they were behind by over 30 points. Huddled in a circle the coach described the next play but Roman couldn’t quite follow what he was saying. Even though he had been practicing with the team, it was still like a different language to him and most of what the coach said was lost in translation.

“Listen, we got this. Don’t think about the score, focus on the game.” Coach pointed as he spoke. “Forget about how big the other guys are, you guys are better trained and ready to kick ass. Now, get out there and kill em’!”

For a motivational speech, it left Roman feeling moderately uncomfortable and severely confused. Getting back on the field, he took his position. The longer the game went on the less interested he was. Most of the first half had him running back and forth, not tackling or getting the ball which left him bored and uncomfortably sweaty. It wasn’t like he really played using his mind anyways, he simply waited for the ball to move and then his instincts took over.

As they started the third quarter, he watched the opposing team make decent ground towards him. His eyes followed the ball as the quarterback made a wide pass. With graceful footwork, Roman made his way down the field, dipping past a large boy trying to intercept the pass. As the ball got closer, Roman’s smile grew but something out of his peripheral vision caught his attention. It was a familiar face. Stopping dead in his tracks, Roman turned to see the face. Standing in the bleachers was a boy, broad with a mess of brown hair but the trademark wildfire grin was missing. Bright red blood covered half his face.

Impossibly, he was staring at Davis Astor in the flesh.

No one else seemed to notice. He tried to rationalize it; any explanation would have been fine but there was nothing logical about it. The air was sucked out of his lungs abruptly, his chest jolting back. It wasn’t until the ground slipped out from beneath his feet that he realized he had just been tackled. Crashing into the ground, his right shoulder took the brunt of the fall but not before his head bashed against the turf. Through the ringing in his ears, he could hear a whistle blow and the coach's bombastic voice hollering something he couldn’t make out. He stared up at the football field lights before pulling himself up to his feet. It was a mistake. The instant he was upright he began to sway, his vision blurring.

“Don’t move!” Coach shouted and ran towards him. “That’s pass interference!”

Roman guessed the second part was for the referee. He bent himself over, keeping his hands on his knees. It was as if he was seasick. With his mouthguard still in, he vomited through his mask. The smell was horrendous, but the taste was worse. A mixture of acidic potato chips and stir-fry coated his mouth. Through the haziness of his mind, he didn’t notice the small group surrounding him.

“You alright, buddy?” His dad asked.

His dad must have made his way off of the bleachers but Roman didn’t notice until he was standing beside him, hand clasping his shoulder. Roman didn’t respond immediately, knowing full and well being referred to as buddy was usually prefacing something he didn’t want to do.

“Is he still okay to play?” Coach said in his best hushed whisper, but it was closer to a normal speaking volume.

“Robert,” His mother addressed his father in an awkwardly formal way. Roman didn’t recall his mom joining them but apparently, she had. “There are college scouts here, he should play.”

“Roman, you still want to play?” His tone implied it wasn’t a question but rather a fact.

Slowly nodding, Roman took off his helmet and attempted to clean the bile off of his mouth guard. His head ached but no amount of pain was worth saying no. The coach gave a thumbs up at the referee to signify that they were going to keep playing. His parents lurched off of the field, back over to the bleachers. Watching carefully, Roman noticed Mrs. Yates standing and waving her arms around, but his parents ignored her. She shifted her focus to the referee. A few moments later, the referee blew his whistle motioning for Roman and the coach although his parents joined them.

“No way in hell that boy is playing.” Mrs. Yates snapping with a level of venom Roman had never seen her nor Fletcher possess.

“Oh?” Roman’s mothers voice raised to an unnaturally high octave. She felt challenged and probably attacked but Roman was still convinced his mother didn’t feel any emotions. “Did I miss the part where you gave birth to him? No? That was me. My son, my decision. If he wants to play, he can play.”

His mother was about to bust a blood vessel. Pulling her long sleek black hair back, Roman was half concerned she was going to attack Mrs. Yates. It wasn’t just that his mother was aggressive, she was cutthroat. Behind her petite exterior was what Roman kindly referred to as a deranged woman although other people described it as passionate.

“Marta.” Mrs. Yates started. “Your son has a concussion. Take him to the hospital.” It was bizarre seeing her drop the calm demeanor.

“Oh, and you’re a doctor?”

“Yes. Neurosurgeon actually, so not only am I qualified to say this, I’m also a mandated reporter and not taking him to the hospital seems pretty neglectful.”

Stepping between the two women, his father kept his face expressionless. In a lot of ways, Roman looked like his dad. The icy eyes and sharp angular features were all traits he got from him, but he certainly hoped he didn’t inherit his father’s indifferent expressions. The man was hard to read and Roman was fairly certain he preferred it that way. With open arms, he gestured at both women and started to speak in a level voice.

“That’s all fine and well, but if he says he’s fine to play, he should play. We’ll take him to the hospital after to ensure he’s alright.” Compromise was a common tactic his dad used to get what he wanted but he usually gave very little in the agreements. Mrs. Yates was smarter than that.

“Ever heard of second impact syndrome? If he plays and gets hit again, he could do some serious damage. You want to wheel your brain-dead kid off the field?” Mrs. Yates rolled her eyes at his dad’s lack of interest and shifted her attention to Roman. “Honey, do you want to go to the doctor?”

His head throbbed; the pain akin to a knife being jammed through his temple. It wasn’t the pain that bothered him, but rather the sight of Davis. Maybe Fletcher was right, Roman thought before his stomach started to churn. It took him a few seconds to realize Mrs. Yates was actually waiting for a reply from him instead of his parents. Squeezing his eyes shut, he tried to speak but the nausea hit him again. Gripping his abdomen, it occurred to him how ill he really felt but saying yes to the hospital would be something his mom would spin into disobeying and disrespecting her authority. Regretfully, he slowly nodded at Mrs. Yates.

“Fine. We’ll take him.” His father said but Mrs. Yates scoffed.

“I’ll take him because it’s become pretty apparent that you don’t give a shit about his well being.” The swearing was uncharacteristic of her but she seemed so passionate although Roman disagreed with her.

“Excuse me?” His mom screeched like a banshee causing Roman to wince. “You’re overstepping. You have no right!”

Roman tuned out his mother’s rant and looked back at the bleachers. There was no Davis to be seen but Sam and Fletcher both were slowly walking towards him. Both wore expressions that hinted at concern. Between the screeching of his mom and Mrs. Yates demands, Roman half considered leaving on his own accord, but he wasn’t sure he’d make it to the parking lot.

“We can meet him at the hospital.” Fletcher suggested, suddenly appearing beside Roman. Silently grateful, Roman leaned on him. “That way my mom feels comfortable knowing he is there, and Mrs. Davenport gets to take her son.”

“Duvall.” His mother corrected. “I suppose I can agree to that.”

Leaving the football field, Roman had two things on his mind; Davis and Fletcher. If Fletcher was right that meant there was something darker going on. He wasn’t sure if it was the concussion or the guilt, but his stomach was twisting in ways he didn’t think were possible. If Davis was alive, that meant something had gone terribly wrong but more importantly it was doomsday for the boys.