You try to block out the noise, but it’s impossible. Inwardly you curse yourself for coming here, to this place. You don’t know why you always end up here. You wish you could go back, way back. To a time when you were alone, when people didn’t set expectations for you. When they didn’t come to you for advice, when they didn’t depend on you.

You see her out of the corner of your eye. You know what her next move is. You want to stand up, to stumble into the crowd, so she can’t find you. You don’t have the energy to move, so you do what you do best, nothing. She takes a seat next to you, wraps an arm around your waist.

She looking at you, you know it. You’ve known her for years; you’ve never told her the story. She’s asked about her, but you can never get past saying her name. Your positive Glenn has told her the story, but she’d rather hear it from you.

She doesn’t understand why you get like this. You want to tell her, you think if you tell someone maybe you’ll finally be able to move on, but oddly enough that’s why you don’t tell anyone. You don’t want to move on. Your happy living in the past, living in your memories.

But tonight something has changed, you’ve changed, somehow. Something is different, but you can’t quite place what it is. Somehow you manage to stand, you look down at her. She gives you an odd look; you smile a drunken smile, pulling her up.

You pull her past the rising flames. Some drunken college kid shouts out.

"Bonfire!"

You laugh, not because it’s funny, but because someone is drunker than you. That amuses you. You continue to walk, away from the fire. Your nearly there now, you look back to make sure she’s still with you.

She is, right behind you. Following you because she’s grown to trust you, you wish she didn’t. Trust you, that is.