It's shocking -that is, if Alex could feel anything besides numb- how much someone can accumulate in a year. It's not like her side of the room is cluttered or anything, but now that it has all been pulled together into a pile on her bed, there's just no way it will fit into the two measly suitcases she had arrived with Freshman year. She should probably throw most of it away, but nearly everything has some memory attached to it — one that she is desperate to cling on to.

This is what Annabel walks in on; Alex sitting cross-legged on the floor under the mountain that her bed used to be, staring intently at a handful of small Happy Meal toys, and trying to define the value of their existence. When she was a kid, these were the first things to go during the annual Toy Box Purge, her mom was ruthless about it. Alex almost wishes she could be as emotionally detached as her mother, it would make things so much easier.

"Holy fuck," Annabel exclaims from the doorway, "so it's true." It isn't a question, just an affirmation of whatever she has already heard. Did she find out from Matt? Or was it one of the peanut-gallery that bore witness to Alex's heartbreak? Annabel slides down the doorjamb to sit on the floor and asks the only question that has been repeating like a broken record in Alex's mind, "why?"

Why? Why, why, whywhywhy why why.

Alex shakes her head, unwilling to speak. Annabel was having none of it.

"Fuck that, Alex," she growls, and instead of pointing an accusing finger at Alex, she turns it on herself, "I deserve to fucking know!"

Alex can't argue with that, and cant fight the pleading look on Annabel's doll-like face. So, she starts at the beginning: High school, her diagnosis, how different everything became when she started taking the medication. But when the words come, she can't stop. Suddenly she's purging her soul, confessing all the things she had hidden away. Annabel's eyes grow wide as Alex admits to going from one extra pill a day, to three...and then four...and then she lost count the night she stayed up to finish her painting.

When Alex looks up, Annabel is seething. She scrambles to her feet and yells, "you could have fucking killed yourself!! I-I," her whole body is shaking, her fists are curled in tight to her sides. Alex has always thought of her fondly as a firecracker, but now she's a bundle of fucking dynamite.

"I can't even!!" She explodes before she slams the front door behind her, hard enough to make the coffee mugs rattle on their little hooks above the coffee-maker. Alex spends the rest of the night alone and sifting through the rubble. 

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Alex ends up buying some boxes at the mail center early the next morning. After her fight with Annabel, she knows that her memories are all that she will have left of her time here, and she's not willing to purge a single one. She packs the boxes carefully, tapes them closed, and addresses them to her parents house in Las Vegas. It took a painfully terse conversation on the phone with her mom to find out if she was even welcome back home. She was, at least, just until she left for rehab. After that, her mother made it clear that she was on her own.

She stacks the boxes outside the dorm room door- three in all. It's funny, there were plenty of people lingering around Student Services when the last thing she wanted was a freaking audience, but now that she could use a hand? The dormitory is a ghost town. They aren't small boxes, either. Each one could easily fit a large microwave, and were about as heavy. She stares hard at these cardboard cubes that hold all that's left of her happiness - puzzling over how the hell she's going to get them to the mail center- when a set of hands breaks into her line of sight.

Ezekiel effortlessly picks up the stack of 2 boxes, and gestures for Alex to lead the way. They don't speak during their journey across the street to the Mail Center, or the way back. When they reach the dorm rooms, Alex stares longingly at Matt's door. It's so close, and yet it feels miles away. Ezekiel clears his throat and adjusts his glasses when he says, "give him time." He darts his eyes to hers and back to the door, "he's angry. At himself." His eyes dart again, "he didn't see it."

Alex sighs, " he couldn't have, I was more myself around him than anyone else."

Ezekiel nods once. He steps towards his door, but freezes when Alex cries out, "wait!" With her hands folded behind her back, she looks down at her shoes when she asks, "I know I'm probably not going to ever see you again, and there's something I've always wanted to do...can- can I touch your hair?"

It had been a point of contention between herself and Matt; and he constantly berated her for her strange obsession with it. She couldn't help it though, Ezekiel had the most beautiful dreadlocks she has ever seen -- Tightly coiled, not a single wild hair or malformed strand, and absolutely perfect. She just couldn't figure out how individual hairs could have created something like that, and the curiosity drove her to distraction when she thought about it.

Ezekiel gives her a long look over the rim of his glasses, and she fully expects him to turn around and go into his room. Her jaw drops to the floor when he unwraps the elastic, and let's his hair fall loose from the bun he always has it in. It tumbles down to the middle of his back in a Fabio-worthy wave - that is how perfect his dreads are. They are so much longer than she was expecting, but considering that she's never seen it out of that messy pile on top of his head, she isn't surprised.

Slowly, as if she were approaching a lion, she moves her hand up to touch a lock of his hair. It's not oily, or crunchy even, but more like soft suede. Firm and flexible, Alex winds the hair around her finger easily. She could play with his hair all day, but she can tell already that she's making him uncomfortable.

But, since he's already uncomfortable, she goes in for the kill and gently hugs him. He surprises her again when she feels his fingertips press lightly into her shoulders --the closest he would probably ever get to actually hugging someone back.

Ezekiel hastily ties his hair back and smooths down the front of his sweater when she takes a step back. Whatever kind of friendship this was, she is thankful for it, and she hopes it shows in her smile. He hesitates when he reaches for the handle of the door and looks over his shoulder as he says, "get well, Matt's-Girlfriend."

  ~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~ 

 Alex lingers in front of the building she used to call home. She's loitering, really. Desperately hoping that if she stays just another minute longer, someone -anyone at this point- might come around to see her off. That's not what she gets though. What she gets is a ticked off cabby yelling and honking at her to hurry up.

Who is she kidding? She doesn't deserve a hallmark moment. Matt isn't going to run through the crowd to scoop her up and declare his love. His isn't going to give her a swoon-worthy kiss and beg her to stay.

This isn't the movies, this is her life... and she has royally fucked it up.There's no fanfare when Alex finally gets into the cab leaves the school she had pinned all her hopes on, while simultaneously digging her own grave with every pill she took. She doesn't get any bittersweet goodbyes, only bitter pills.

And now she is going back home.Back to the overpriced and underwhelming suburbs of Las Vegas, where she will once again be shipped off to a - most likely overpriced and underwhelming- rehabilitation center.

"Hello. My name is Alex Winters, and I'm a drug addict."

_____________________________________________________

Word Count: This Chapter-  1,386 Total- 9,215

Authors Note: This isn't close to the end for Alex Winters, and no, it isn't really the happy ending most people like to have. When it comes to drug abuse, sometimes there is no happy ending. BUTTT after the contest I will be tagging on an epilogue and maybe re-inserting a few sections. I had to cut scenes like Jason cuts cheerleaders, let me tell ya!  I also have a second book plotted out in my head that may (or may not) have the Happily Ever After you might be looking for...we'll see!

A quick note to @AMLKoski : Thank you so much for hosting this contest, it was the just the push I needed to ACTUALLY FINISH a story. LIKE ACTUALLY. FINISHED! Heck, like I said, I had to edit the  *insert curse-word here* out of it to get it to stay within the word count! 

...so yeah. Anyway... thanks again.