A/N- OMG a new chapter! Wahoooo! This is honestly more exciting for me than it is for any of you, because I have just been thinking about this damn story for months. It's been awful and I couldn't come up with anything to write about in a filler chapter so basically I got hung up. Then the other day I had a 'wow growing up isn't any better than being a kid; it's actually worse' moments, so I wrote it down. Oh and Restrained Freedom, please keep reading my story. I beg of you don't leave me because of what I told you the other day. I fear I may have scared you off.

By morning a fine layer of snow had built up on the windshield. The inside of the car was freezing and I was cold. I glanced over at Mae. Her arms were wrapped around her torso tightly and her head rested on the window. She must have been cold in her sleeveless dress, so I slipped off my suit jacket and laid it over her. I looked at the snow on the car disdainfully and turned around in my seat to see if I had left any sweatshirts in here. I really didn't want to get out of the car and brush off the snow with nothing but a really uncomfortable and very drafty tuxedo shirt. Finally, after a lot of digging, I found a sweatshirt shoved under the passenger side seat. I sat back and began to unbutton the bloody shirt I had worn all night. I slid it off my shoulders and threw it in the backseat.

"Murtagh, what are you doing?" Mae's groggy voice broke the silence in the car.

A sudden rush of embarrassment hit me at being half naked, but I slid the sweatshirt on over my head and turned to her. "I have to go out and clean off the car and I wasn't about to do it in that." I pointed back at the seat where I had thrown the bloody shirt.

I turned the key in the ignition. The car started and thankfully the heat kicked on. I got out; brushed of the car and got back in, holding my hands over the heat vents for a bit before I could feel them again. I pushed down on the gas pedal and began to drive.

The car was dreadfully silent for a long time, with only the radio playing quietly in the background. Eventually though I just turned it off because it was just playing the same goddamn Christmas carols over and over again. I kept glancing at Mae and then looking back to the road really fast. I could tell she wanted to say something, but it was like she couldn't tell how to put it or something.

"Would you just spit it out, if you're gonna say something," I said a bit more hostile than planned.

I could feel her glare but I didn't look at her. I kept one hand on the wheel and the other on the cold window.

"Yeah," she said suddenly, "I think I will spit it out. You're a jackass."

That took me by surprise, I almost laughed. I looked at her, "What?"

"You heard me. I said you're a jackass," she said completely seriously.

I went to open my mouth, but she cut over me. "No just shut up for a bit. For example what was last night all about? Why did you do that? Why would you hit him?"

I opened my mouth again but she told me to shut up. "You asked me a question; no three questions. Don't you want me to answer them?"

Mae glared at me, "No I don't not yet. I want you to think about them until the end of my speech." I shut my mouth and glared out the window.

She began again, "Look I didn't mean to start this conversation with 'You're a jackass', it just slipped out. But you are and I'm worried about it." She paused for a bit and continued, "Okay I'm starting again. Do you remember when we were kids and I had you over for my eleventh birthday party?"

I shook my head.

"We went swimming?" she offered. I remembered but I didn't feel like saying I did. "Anyway, all the kids were teasing the shit out of you because you wouldn't swim. You had told them you didn't know how. I had seen you swim before so I had no idea why you would tell them that. I was so young and it was before I learned to expect the worst with you. But now I'm older and I realize it was because you were bruised. He had beaten you and you had the bruises to show it. You were so grown up about and you were always smart enough to hide it. I never understood what was wrong with you until I was older. Once I grew up I always just expected that you were broken and scarred; in more ways than one." She paused to think for a bit.

I hated the way she said that. I was broken; like I was fragile or something. But then again, I was, in a way. I turned to her opening my mouth slowly in case she started again. When she didn't I continued, "I wasn't all that grown up about it. I cried all day that day, until the party. I figured I should be a boy and show the girls I was tough. I was so damn scared." I added the last bit as an afterthought, in a mutter, but I think she heard me.

"As you grew up, though, I started to see you were healing. You weren't as lost as you used to be. You had gotten used to it. That was almost worse than the revelation that you were being beaten almost every night. I hated it that you just accepted it. I hated that you were free to talk about it and you showed the bruises like they were medals. It was awful. And it was worse to know everyone knew but they never did anything to help because you were the social outcast." She sort of spewed all of this out in one breath. I glanced over at her wondering where she was going with this but she hushed me again.

"I suppose what I'm trying to say here is that my whole life I've been there for you. You always had so much pain in your life, I felt guilty about thinking about my life as painful. But now you're safe. The danger has passed for you and now everything is just crashing down on top of me. Everything I ever felt when we were kids is gone now and I can't stop thinking about everything in an awful way. Everything you say or I hear it just weighs on me more and more. I can't take it any longer." She was in tears and she couldn't stop.

I just sat there like a moron thinking about how much of a jackass I really was. Never in my entire life do I remember asking her if she was okay. I never remember even stopping to think about how anything would affect her. I was a conceited, self centered, jackass! I parked the car on the birm again and crawled over into her seat beside her. She leaned into me and I wrapped my arms around her as best I could.

"I'm sorry," I whispered into her ear.

She sat there just sobbing into my chest, before finally, between sobs, she choked out the words, "It's just you don't know what it's like to be your friend. It hurts."

There was a huge pause where I just sat there not knowing how to respond, and she dissolved into tears again. She pulled herself together again and wrapped her arms around me. "I love you." I heard her say these words and fear jolted through me. Oh my fucking god! She loved me. This wasn't happening and it couldn't but I just sat there rubbing my fist against her back and said "I know."

A/N- I hope I got this out early enough some of you may be able to read it tonight but if not, tomorrow is another day *snigger* Sorry I just watched Gone With the Wind the other day and every time I hear the word 'tomorrow' I laugh internally because she was just such an awful character.