Five.

November.

I was running so quickly that I could feel my lungs struggling to keep up, my breaths coming in quick pants. The hallway around me was dark but I somehow knew where I was going. I could feel bumps in the carpet against my bare feet, occasionally something would cut me and I would flinch but I never stopped running.

The sound of his laugh bounces from the walls and I blink quickly to keep the tears at bay. My hands clutch my neck as I feel the rope bound tightly around it but as I lift my hands I realise they're also bound.

I blink again and I'm on a bed, in a bright room, the world spinning around me as I take in the khaki green wallpaper. His laugh is louder now, more twisted too. My body felt like it was on fire, I could feel the fear deep into every crevice.

I scream as loud as I can but it's muffled, my mouth is stuffed with something and I suddenly can't breathe at all.

I can't breathe.

I can't breathe.

I can't-

"NOVEMBER"

I jolt upright on my bed, covers falling from my body as I sit and my eyes search for the reason of the noise. I could feel my airways constricting tightly as I struggle to catch my breath.

Sweat sticking to my skin uncomfortably as I try to readjust my eyes to the brightness of my room.

"November oh my god" Amelia is sat the foot of my bed with a panicked look in her eyes. Her cheeks are wet as she looks at me and I realise she had been crying. As I stare back at her, blinking softly, I see another tear fall from her left eye, then her right, then her left again.

The sight of her crying sending a wave of sadness through my body, the first thing over than fear that I had felt so strongly.

"Amelia I-" I pause, searching for the right words as I awkwardly clasp my hands together.

"I'm sorry I scared you" I finally settle on.

"November no" she struggles to find words also, we both sit in silence, watching each other breathe. Like we both wanted to just be in each other's presence.

"Can I?" She gestures to the bed and I smile awkwardly at her, patting the unused side and inviting her in.

A feeling of calmness washed over me in waves as she settled beside me, cuddling herself into the covers and laying on her side to face me. I settle down too, facing her eyes and just laying there together, relaxed and covered in the blanket of the night, I felt like I belonged somewhere.

─── ･ ｡ﾟ☆: *.☽ .* :☆ﾟ. ───

I awoke the next morning to the smell of waffles in the air. I love many scents, like my mums house on a Saturday morning, when she's just been and picked fresh daises and put them in jars all over the house.

Or my grandmothers house when I was 8 and she would bake cookies and leaves them out for us to enjoy whilst we played.

But waffles? Waffles always wins. I had 4 scented candles placed around the flat to light when I was sad, it was one of the many things I would do to help myself feel zen. But that was before, before him, before that night. Before my world turned upside down and I don't know which way is up.

Smelling waffles, it gave me hope again. Even just a small amount, I could light the candles, cleanse myself of the fear I was feeling and go back to being, well, me.

The only bad side about smelling waffles? Amelia was a really bad cook.

"Amelia! Please don't set my house on fire!" I scrambled from my bed, clad in pyjama shorts and white vest top I propelled myself towards the kitchen. Only to find that Amelia was sat, calmly chewing on perfectly baked waffles, with a coffee Infront of her at the dining table.

"Wait, you aren't cooking?" I question, my hand reaching to touch my forehead in relief.

"No of course not" she giggled slightly, smiling at me. "God could you imagine?" She laughs abit louder this time before taking another bite of her waffle.

"So? Who made you waffles?" My confusion is at an all time high right now, but I was thankful for at-least some sort of feeling.

"Asher came to visit, said you hadn't been replying to any messages. I think he got worried"

Now Asher being here was a problem in itself. By that I mean that, problem number one, he's my best-friend. Why is that bad you may ask?

Well, because I had ignored him for 10 days and disappeared off the face of the earth, something that November Sky, would never do.

Problem number two, he doesn't know anything, I can't tell him anything and he probably still thinks I have a boyfriend.

All of which, are problems.

"Shit Amelia" I scold her, hoping she sees the problem with her last sentence and I watch, as realisation dawns on her face.

"Shit" the world slips from her mouth and she looks at me, guilt seeping out of her eyes.

"Okay, shit, I'll handle it. Don't stare at me like that" I wave her off and try to calm her down, her puppy-dog eyes worked on me when we were just friends, now that I feel closer to her than ever, I can honestly say they were breaking my heart.

"November! You're alive!" Asher propels himself towards me at 80mph and I flinch instantly and back myself up against the wall. Hands out Infront of me and body shaking. I can feel the room start to spin, my breathing go shallow and as my hair frames my face like a shield I feel more panic arise.

I need to calm down, I can't do this. Not here, not now. I am not in danger.

I am not in danger.

"You are not in danger" Amelias voice breaks my inner freak out and emptyness washes over me. A heaviness sits in my heart as I look up at Asher slowly. Guiltily.

"Sorry, sorry. I just- uh-"

"She had a nightmare last night, really gory stuff. We watched Saw, it got super gruesome and well, you know what Ember is like with horrors she just can't handle them" Amelia holds my arm softly and helps me up from the floor, I smile awkwardly and rub my arm. Trying to rid myself of the goosebumps that formed. As I'm doing so I felt a soft nudge of an elbow into my side.

"Right, yeah, ha ha, you know me and my horrors!" I awkwardly force out the sentence and stare at Asher for the first time since he'd entered the room.

He looked exhausted. Like he'd slept 4 hours a night and even then it was a stretch. Bags hung from under his eyes and I could see the lag in his limbs.

"You girls need to stop having these movie nights, look at what it does to you! God November, you looked scared out of your mind" He plops my plate of waffles down on the side and smiles at me widely.

"I'm glad you're safe, why haven't you answered my calls?" His eyes scan my body, looking for injuries or something else to explain my disappearance. Luckily everything was healed and the only tell-tale sign was my quick reflexes to human touch. We had narrowly gotten away with that one though.

"I lost my phone-"

"She broke her phone-"

Mine and Amelia responses fire out at the same time and I turn to her, staring incredulously at her. I knew she was trying to save my ass, but god she could've given me a moment!

"She uh- broke her phone, then lost it" Amelia nods at herself, proud she had managed to form a semi-decent lie. Then proceeds to sit back down and shove half a waffle into her mouth.

She gestures for us to join us and I do, settling down softly on the bench. Smiling at Asher as he does the same, suspicion lays in his eyes but the subject is dropped for now as Amelia dives into a story about her Instagram love affair with a model from Canada.