Five

The car ride back to Scranton was as uneventful as any road trip could get. Wyatt got them lost by taking the wrong turn at least five times and Cheyne talked the entire trip. Needless to say, Dylan was glad to get out of the car when it stopped in front of her home.

She climbed out of the rental car and walked to the back to get her luggage out of the trunk. When she had two suitcases sitting on the sidewalk in front of her house, she returned to the car and pulled Ephraym out. He gave her a questioning look, but she silenced him and said goodbye to the others. She waited for the car to drive away before she pulled Ephraym into the house.

“Dylan!” he shouted. “What are you doing?”

She pulled him into the house and closed the door behind him. “I’m not going to let you go home, Ephraym,” she said. “I refuse to let you return to that.”

He chuckled and ran a hand back through his hair. “It’s not this easy, Dylan. He’ll come looking for me and I don’t want you to get caught up in it.”

“Let me get caught up in it,” she said, her arms crossed over her chest. “I told myself that I would make sure you got away from him. If he does anything to me, I’ll go to the police.”

Ephraym smiled and shook his head. “Dylan, you don’t understand what he can do to you if he finds out that you’re trying to hide me.”
“I don’t care, Ephraym!”

Dylan stormed past her raven-haired boyfriend and went up to her bedroom with both suitcases. Ephraym shook his head and followed after her.

“Why are you being so stubborn?” he asked.

“I’m being stubborn because I refuse to sit back and watch the person I love get hurt when he doesn’t to stay there. My parents will understand if we tell them why you can’t return home and they’ll let you stay here with us. I’m not going to let you go home, Ephraym.”

Dylan went downstairs and left a note for her parents before returning to her bedroom. Ephraym was already asleep on her bed. She smiled at the tranquility in his sleeping face, so different from the constant torment that shone on his face when he was awake. She crossed the room and lay down beside him, closing her eyes when his arms wrapped around her.

She kissed his forehead. “I love you, Ephraym,” she whispered, and drifted into a deep, dreamless sleep.

Dylan was startled awake a few hours later by the incessant ringing of the doorbell. She groaned and buried her face in the pillow, reaching her arm out to wrap around Ephraym, but he wasn’t there. Her eyes shot open and she searched the room around her. Ephraym wasn’t there. He’d left.

The door downstairs squeaked as it was pulled open, and muffled yelling seeped in into her room from the crack between the door and the doorjamb.

‘No!’

Dylan crawled out of the bed and peeked out of the small crack in her door.

Ephraym’s stepfather was standing in the open doorway, rage marring the features of his face and making Dylan’s heart stop in terror. Ephraym was standing inside the house while he argued back and forth with the man, stepping back every time his stepfather tried to reach for him.

“You’re comin’ with me, boy!” the man yelled, lashing out and hitting Ephraym across the face. While Ephraym was disoriented, the man grabbed onto his elbow and began to pull him out of the house.

“No!” Dylan yelled and dashed down the stairs. “Let go of him right now!”

The man released Ephraym’s arm, and Ephraym ran to Dylan, wrapping his arms around her.

“I’m so sorry, Dylan,” he cried. “I didn’t know.”

Dylan sighed and wrapped her arms around her crying boyfriend, her cold eyes locked on the seething man just beyond the doorway.

“Stay out of this, little girl,” Joseph said. “This is between me and my son. It’s none of your business.”

Ephraym pulled away from Dylan and faced his stepfather, lightly wiping his eyes on the sleeve of his shirt.

“You’re not my father and I’m not going home,” he whispered dangerously. “I’m going to stay here with Dylan, and if you don’t like it, tough. I can’t stand the sight of you, I can’t stand to be in your presence, and I can’t stand the fact that you will kill me one day if I don’t get away from you. Now leave, and let me enjoy my peace before I have Dylan call the cops.”

The man smirked. Eyeing the pair of teens in the doorway, he chuckled softly and turned on his heel.

“I may not be your father, but that doesn’t mean that I can’t control you, boy” he growled over his shoulder. “I’d watch my back if I was you.”

With that the man walked away and climbed into his car. Dylan kept her eyes locked on the vehicle as he drove away and out of sight.

“Sorry about that, Dylan,” Ephraym muttered, rubbing at his face where a bruise was already forming.

Dylan shook her head. “No, don’t worry about,” she whispered, lightly brushing her fingers over the black and blue mark as she pushed his bangs out of his eyes. “I’m just glad that he left without you.”

She kissed him softly on the corner of his mouth, and Ephraym hugged her close to his body, sighing in despair.

“I wouldn’t have let him take me, Dylan,” he whispered. “You saved my life and now I’m here to stay.”

Dylan smiled contentedly and thought about poor, confused Deirdre. She owed everything to her new friend. She had helped her save her boyfriend’s life and had given her more time than anyone had ever done. A lone tear ran down her face for the raven-haired beauty.

But, although she couldn’t see the beautiful anomaly, Dylan could feel that the goals that had bound Deirdre to this earth had been accomplished and that she had moved on.

Sighing, she laid her head on Ephraym’s chest and whispered a last farewell to her friend.

“Thank you, Deirdre. For everything.”

-THE END-

I know it's not the best thing I've ever written, but I figured I would post it anyway. Cool if you enjoyed it and if you didn't then oh well. It won't hurt my feelings any.