Chapter Three (Alden).

"Two... seven."

"You can't just jump to seven!"

"Six."

"You have three."

"Fine, three."

"Better."

We were driving to Estlin for a show. It was far away, about an hour. We were playing a very non-creative game of counting yellow cars. I kept cheating by jumping ahead numbers, Avery kept calling me out on it.

"Turn it up!" I said.

"No." He replied. I reached over and twisted the knob anyways.

"AND I TRY TO JUST KEEP MOVING ON WITH MY BROKEN HEART AND MY ABSENT GOD. D****t. It's the end."

"Dude. Your music is so girly."

"Bright Eyes is not girly."

"Dude." He rolled his eyes, I punched his arm.

It had been exactly twenty two days since i had seen Indie. She didn't show up at Allen's even though i went almost every weekend now, looking for her. I wasn't sure if i wanted to see her, because that might mean we would have to talk. Even though something was pulling me towards her, my instinct was to fight it.

"....hello? ALDEN?"

"Mmm?" I was staring out the window looking in every parking lot and every car hoping to see her. I had taken this up as a habit ever since i left her house that one morning. I had never gone back because i wouldn't know what to say. "Hey! It's great to see you again!" I thought i would say if i ran into her in public. If i went to her house i would have to either make up a really dumb excuse, "Do you have any eggs? I'm cooking and ran out.", or just admit to her that i liked her enough to come see her again. Neither seemed suitable, so i decided to just wait it out and look for her in public. It was, afterall, a very small town.

"Why are you so spacey lately?" Avery asked.

"I'm not." I said, turning my head from the window to him.

"I can't even keep your glance for more then a minute before you start scanning."

"Scanning?"

"Scanning." He responded. "Moving your eyes quickly everywhere as if you are looking for something."

"I am not scanning." I annunciated the words. Why i didn't just bring up Indie, i didn't know. It was like talking about her would make her more real, and i didn't want that. i wanted to forget. i wanted to be the normal Alden.

"Looking for chics? Cara not giving you what you want?" Avery pryed.

"Cara's great." I responded. Cara was my girlfriend. And she was far from great, she was a b***h.

"Your looking for something. Your mom? Cuz dude, she's not here anymore."

I swallowed hard. "Dude, don't." I looked down at my beat up nikes.

"Sorry." He bit his lip and focused his eyes back on the road. He knew he had crossed uncrossable territory.

We showed up in Estlin around nine, and got a late dinner at the Whopper House, home of the biggest cheeseburger that Illinois had ever seen. The show started at ten. We were there past promptly at 10:05. The opening band was a band that we had never heard of before, so we sat down in a booth and ordered two beers.

"How old are you?" The waitress asked, peering out of her dark framed rectangular glasses.

"Twenty one." Avery answered within a second.

"You don't look twenty one." She said, patting down the back of her jet black bob and pursing her red lips.

"Here." Avery handed her a fake ID and she glanced over it. She lifted her eyebrows up at us then held it up to the light. I wasn't sure what that did but within two seconds she looked at us, threw the card back on the table, mumbled "bullshit" under her breath, and walked away. I casually slipped my "ID" back into my pocket.

"So we can't even have water?" Avery called out at the waitress, she ignored him. "F**k!" He yelled.

"Dude, lets just stay sober tonight."