I pace the sidewalk, focused on finding the source of the music. But it’s not a car. It’s a house. My next-door neighbor’s house. The same neighbors who shined their headlights on my house on my return home from my fucking war.

And now I’m back to insanity.

My strides are long, bare feet stomping through the grass of my neighbor’s front yard, my anger rising with every step. I bang on the door, not caring how I look or who I upset.

Bang. Bang. Bang.

Nothing.

I knock harder.

Still nothing.

I peer through the window next to the door, feeling it shake from the base against my hands.

I knock again.

Louder.

Stronger.

Whatever the fuck the song is, it sounds like a drowning cat, clawing its way out of a chalkboard bathtub.

Insanity is an asshole.

“Yo,” I shout, along with more banging.

Finally, the door swings open, the volume doubling.

There’s a girl who I kind of recognize. Her feet are bare, just like mine. So are her legs—long and lean and pasty white. Her dark blonde hair’s a complete mess. So is everything about her. She’s wearing an over-sized shirt that goes past her hips and nothing else. She’s holding a bottle in one hand, a cupcake in the other. She’s older than I remember, not that I had a lot of interaction with her before. “Riley?”

She pulls a phone from somewhere inside her shirt and taps it a few times. The music stops. “What?” she snaps, dropping the phone onto the hardwood floors. She takes a sip from the bottle and cocks her hip to the side, her eyes on mine the entire time.

It’s barely nine in the morning and the girl’s drunk off her tits.

And it just makes me pissed. Or pissder. More pissed? What the fuck ever. “Turn the music down. Or off. Preferably.”

She takes one final swallow before pulling the bottle away and holding it to her chest, her eyes unfocused, lids heavy. “Can you go away? Or fuck off. Preferably.” She slams the door in my face.

“What the fuck?” I whisper, banging on the door again.

The music returns, louder than it was, and I’ve fucking had enough. I kick the shit out of her door. And I’ll keep kicking the shit out of it until the music is off and I can finally sleep.

The door opens again. “What?!” she shouts, spitting food out of her mouth. Half the cupcake is gone. Half the icing is smeared on her lips. “Who the fuck do you think you are?”

I ignore her question and step into the house, pushing her to the side as I search for the source of the sound. It doesn’t take long. A few steps down the hallway, second door on the left and I’m in a bedroom. Her bedroom. Whoever is singing now sounds like she’s drowning while strangling the clawing fucking cat. I find the speakers set up on her nightstand and try to switch it off but I can’t fucking find the power button. Now Riley’s yelling from behind me, asking me what the hell I’m doing. I find the cord, follow it to the outlet and yank until the music dies.

Silence.

Sweet, sweet, silence.

“What the fuck are you doing?” she yells.

I pick up the speaker, lift her window, and throw the source of my insanity outside.

“You can’t do that!”

I slam the window shut and finally face her.

Her eyes are wide. So is her stance as she glares up at me, her nostrils flared, her lips pursed. “I hope you die a rotten death and go to hell for all of eternity.”

As weird as a time to think it—she’s real pretty. Not that it’s relevant. In fact, the irrelevance of it makes me even angrier. Because pretty girls have ugly hearts, and I’ve had enough of both. “I asked you to turn it down,” I seethe, towering over her.

“You didn’t ask me, asshole. You told me. And no. Fuck off. It’s my house. My rules. Now get out!”

“My pleasure,” I yell back, walking around her toward her door.

“Wait!”

I don’t.

“Fucking wait!” she yells again.

I still don’t.

Then something soft hits my back.

I turn swiftly. “What the hell is wrong with you?”

The cupcake’s gone now, but she’s still gripping that bottle like it’s somehow saving her life. “You better get my speaker and bring it back to me.”

Now I lose it. Beyond lose it. And I don’t even care if she knows. “Look. I just got home last night. My room is gone. The couch is gone. I couldn’t even sleep on the floor of my own fucking house. I tried. Oh, how I fucking tried. But everything’s fucking changed since I’ve been gone. I can’t fucking sleep at night because I hate the dark. I hate the sounds. Every fucking sound. And the only way I can sleep is with the help of the fucking meds they got me on to somehow deal with being shot in the goddamn shoulder. But that doesn’t change the fact that I close my eyes and I’m fucking back there again, listening to the gunshots going off around me.” Pause. Breathe. “I don’t care who you are or what your problem is that has you drunk off your ass at nine in the goddamn morning because right now I’ve got a bed waiting for me in the back of my truck, and it’s the best I can do, and I need to sleep because if I don’t I’ll probably end up killing somebody so please, please, for the love of God—” Pause. Breathe. Calm. “Please, just let me sleep.”

She hasn’t moved.

Hasn’t said a word.

Hasn’t even blinked.

I doubt she’s even taken a breath.

But her eyes are wide and on mine and for a moment it’s like she can see right through me—through the bullshit anger I’ve just shown and she can see the fear because I couldn’t restrain it like I did with Dad and with Eric. Quickly, her chest rises with her intake of breath, as if she’s coming up for air after being left to drown.

She takes a step back, and then another, away from my form of crazy. The back of her knees hit the side of her bed and I think she’s about to sit down… about to let me walk away with a win. But she doesn’t. She turns around and pushes her covers aside. Then she faces me. “Take my bed. I’ll wake you in a few hours.”

“What?”

She’s staring at my bandaged shoulder. “You won’t even know I’m here,” she says, moving around her room, only half closing the blinds and the door to her bathroom. “You’re Dylan, right?”

I nod once. “I don’t need your pity. I just needed some quiet,” I tell her, sighing as the reality of what I’ve just done sets in. “I’m sorry about—”

“It’s not pity,” she says, pointing to her bed. “It’s understanding.” She takes another swig from the bottle then offers it to me. “It helps take the edge off… keeps the nightmares away.”

I take the bottle from her and take a few sips, ignoring the foul taste as it goes down my throat. Then I take her offered bed, watching her watching me with a frown on her face—but something tells me it isn’t pity. It’s exactly what she said. It’s understanding.

She sets herself up in the corner of her room where cushions are scattered along with jars filled with pieces of paper. Then she starts silently writing in a notebook.

I turn to my side and face her, watching without really watching, feeling the exhaustion start to take over again. “Riley?”