I pulled away from Clayton, eyes wide. John stood over us, seething in anger. I fell onto my back, scrambling away from John. Curse my luck, he had awoken. I swear I could almost see the steam coming out of his ears.

Clayton sat slightly confused, not sure whether to be furious, shocked, or

happy. I easily knew my emotion: scared. And scared I was. The fear coursed

through my body, paralyzing me in my spot. I couldn’t move, could barely breathe.

“I said, what the fuck are you doing to him?” John growled, his voice

dangerously low. I didn’t move. I wasn’t sure how I was supposed to react. If I told

him, he’d kill me but if I didn’t tell him, he’d kill me anyways.

Either way I died.

“She didn’t do anything to me” Clayton said, shaking his head. “Lay off

her man”

“She. Was. Eating. Your. Face.” John growled.

If I wasn’t so terrified, I would have laughed. Fortunately, I wasn’t at that

level of fear yet where I went mentally insane.

“She wasn’t eating my face” Clayton snapped. He stood up, putting

himself between John and myself. “She was answering a question”

“By trying to eat you?” John hissed

“For the last time she wasn’t trying to eat me!” Clayton yelled “I asked

her a question. She was showing me the answer”

“She could have easily explained it”

“Not really” Clayton said, finally understanding why I couldn’t tell him what a

kiss was. “That’s not something you can explain with words”

“Dude what the fuck happened to you” John said, looking into Clayton’s

eyes. He looked genuinely worried for a second about Clayton’s health. “She did

something to you”

“It wasn’t bad!”

“What the hell did you want to know that involved her attacking you with

her mouth?”

“I asked what a kiss was!” Clayton snapped.

It grew deadly quite. If I thought John was pissed before, I could barely

comprehend how mad he was right now. He shoved Clayton backwards.

Clayton fell on the ground, groaning in pain.

“You WHAT?!” John roared. I flinched at the loudness.

“You heard me” Clayton said with less confidence in his voice. John bent

down, grabbing the collar of Clayton’s shirt and pulled him up. There was a rip in

the fabric, but the shirt held. John shoved Clayton hard against a nearby tree,

getting into his face.

“You know you don’t ask anything about a ‘kiss’” He hissed just barely

loud enough for my ears.

“I know man! I know!” Clayton said, almost pleading. I could tell he was

just as afraid of this John as I was. “I got curious, ok? Am I not allowed to be

curious?”

“No! Not about that kind of stuff!” John growled. He shoved Clayton one

last time against the tree before backing off. “If I ever, EVER, find out you asked

about that again, I’ll personally rip your tongue out and shove it up your ass, you

hear?”

Clayton regained his balance, nodding “Yeah man, gotcha”

John took a few steps back before his gaze landed on me. Slowly, he walked in front of my cowering body until he stood at my feet. He bent down so that

his nose was mere centimeters away from mine.

“You leave him alone. Don’t you ever do something like that to him again.

I’ve no problem killing you myself, but the fat-knocker wants you alive. Don’t forget

I’m ready to strike at any moment” He threatened.

I gulped, not even daring to breathe. I could feel John’s hot breath on my

lips when he spoke, sending chills down my spine. He glared at me with such hate

that I could literally almost feel his eyes burning holes in the back of my mind.

John stayed like that for a few moments, each one long and terrifying.

Finally, he backed away, seeing that his threat got into my head.

Once his back was turned, I shuddered, holding back a sob. Clayton

looked at me apologetically as John took a seat as far away from me as he could

get.

Clayton sat in the middle, but far enough to the right to give John a clear

view of me. He glared at me, eyes hardened in hate.

And then his face changed.

It appeared as if something clicked in his head.

“WHAT THE HELL IS SHE DOING WEARING MY JACKET?!” John

roared. It seemed that if it was possible to be any louder, he had found the way.

In a matter of seconds he was in front of me, arms out ready to choke

the life out of me. I scampered back, trying to get away. I had entirely forgotten I

was in his jacket.

“Relax man! Calm the hell down!” Clayton said, holding him back. He

was the only thing separating me and death.

“Get out of it you wrench!” He yelled, trying to get past Clayton.

“Ellie! Out of his jacket!” Clayton said “John! Chill out! I let her wear it”

I quickly slipped out of it, throwing it on the ground. I stumbled up, trying

to get away from John. As soon as Clayton’s last words left his mouth, John

punched him in the jaw. Clayton fell backwards, groaning.

“Dude! What’s wrong with you?” He groaned, rubbing his jaw. John

ignored him, lunging at me. I screamed and took off running. I didn’t know where I

was going, all I knew was I had to get away from John.

My feet hurt each time I stepped on a stone, but the pain was muffled by

my adrenaline. I could hear John’s heavy huffs as he followed, right on my tail. I

panted, my high-pitched gasps piercing the quietness around me.

Suddenly, I felt the world tip. My foot wouldn’t move as fast as it needed

to, a root interfering with my running. I screamed, falling back. I hit the ground face-

first, pain shooting through my body.

Quickly, I tried to scramble up and keep going.

But John was too close. He hadn’t been expecting me to trip and was

unable to stop. I felt his foot dig into my stomach as he whole body lurched forward

over me. I gasped in pain again, having a man double my weight on top of me.

He groaned, as I pushed him off me. I was sobbing slightly out of fear as

I struggled to get away from him. John reached out, grabbing my wrist and pulling

me back on top of his back. I cried out in surprise, landing painfully on my butt.

“Get off leech!” He snapped, shoving me off while keeping a grip on my

wrist. I fell onto my stomach, face shoved into the ground.

John was on top of me, holding my wrist against my back in a painful

position. He applied some pressure, making the pain almost unbearable.

I screamed out “Stop! Stop!”

He released slightly, just enough for me to tolerate the pain. “I’m gonna

cut you up. I’m going to take that neck of yours and crush it between my fingers”

I could feel myself trembling beneath him.

“John! Get off her!” Clayton’s voice suddenly appeared. He sounded out

of breath.

“Clayton back off” John growled, his hand wrapping around my neck. His

other hand remained on my wrist, the pressure growing.

I screamed in pain.

Suddenly, John’s weight disappeared on my back. Clayton had shoved

him off, punching him in the nose.

I stood up, shaking out my shoulder as the two boys wrestled.

I didn’t know what to do. I wanted to stop them, but if I stopped them,

John would just go after me.

Unfortunately, the innocent part of my mind wanted the fighting to stop. I

knew guilt would bite me up for not trying to prevent Clayton’s beating.

“Stop!” I screamed, panic in my voice “Oh my gosh stop it!”

John stopped movement all together. Clayton landed in one more punch

before he ceased fighting. Both boys were breathing heavily, staring at each other.

After a few tense moments, John stood up, walking back to where I assumed we

had camped.

I watched his figure retreat until he disappeared from view. My eyes

moved over to Clayton, who was looking at me.

“I—i—” I stumbled out, trying to apologize.

He stood up cautiously, “Are you ok?”

I nodded, rubbing my neck gingerly. “I’m so sorry”

As Clayton moved closer, I could see a trail of red running out of his

nose. I gasped slightly, a hand covering my mouth. Clayton brought two fingers to

his upper lip, dipping the tips in the blood. He brought them back, looking at his

discovery.

He wiped the blood off with the back of his sleeve. “Come on, let’s go”

“I—I can’t go back” I whispered.

“You’re right” Clayton frowned, “We need to wait until John’s calmed

down”

“Your nose” I said, biting my lip

“What? Oh yeah” He closed his eyes, blowing out blood from his nose.

Clayton repeated that twice as I started in utter confused. At the third blow I noticed

that no blood came out of his nose. He shook his head, sighing in relief “That feels

better”

“How—what—?” I asked, confused

“Oh, its this thing that you get when you’re a child. Its supposed to

prevent nosebleeds from ever happening, but you have to get it checked every

three years. I don’t get it checked so I just have to blow it back into place” He

shrugged as if it was nothing.

“What?”

“Alright” He laughed, finding my confusion funny “Say for example I

shoved a little plug into your nose. Its going to fall out eventually right? Well this

doesn’t fall out so to say, as it falls out of place. And all you do is blow hard enough

to get it back into the right spot so the blood stops”

I nodded, barely understanding what he said.

He smiled “What did you do when your nose bled?”

“Leaned back with a tissue shoved into your nostril” I said.

He laughed “Oh yeah, they told us about that in the textbooks. That was

absolutely unsafe”

“How?” That was what I had been taught to do. That was all I knew. Of

course there were the few crazy ones like hitting your right knee with your left

elbow to make it stop…

“Well, first off, the blood would drain back into your throat” He explained

“And you could choke on that. Second off, they showed that tissues weren’t as

safe as you think”

“Oh” that was all I could say.

“A lot as changed in 500 years, Ellie” He grinned, sitting down. Clayton

patted the spot next to him, a cue for me to sit down. Hesitantly, I did.