There was so much about Adam she didn’t know.

He’s funny and wild and loud and stomps around behind her while she’s trying to fix the car, but it’s almost like a lullaby (rhythmic or hypnotic or something. The stomping is reassuring, anyway. Deb couldn’t tell anyone why.). He’s pacing and shadow-fighting the street lamp near her with his pocket knife, ducking and dodging himself and making the same noises little boys do when they play-fight.

“You’re gonna get us heard, you know.” Deb says without looking up, eyes fixed on the interior hood of the car, trying not to zap herself into next week. She used to be nervous around him, even though Chad says ‘not to bother’, but her hands dirty with oil and blood and the fresh-cut grass smell from stumbling. (At least Adam stopped to help her up those times. Didn’t make fun of her when she started swinging her bat either.) He can’t be that bad.

She almost jumps when he ruffles her hair, and she falls to her side, dropping the battery into place on accident. “Adam!!” She manages to gasp out, looking at him almost incredulously.

It’s pitch dark by the time Adam takes a third left turn, as relaxed as can be behind the wheel.

“Just admit it, you have no idea where we are,” Tiffany huffs from the passenger’s seat, arms crossed and eyes straining to make something (anything; really, anything at all) out in the darkness. Instead of any road signs or familiar landmarks, she’s met with gravel roads she doesn’t recognize and the soft glow of the headlights.

If Adam’s arguing, she’s not bothering to listen.

“I should have known it’d be totally stupid to agree to this,” She grumbles from where she’s hunched up against his leather interior, all bark. A party in the woods wouldn’t be nearly as exciting when they were found in a ditch! Seriously!

They’re hardly on the road for a few moments when the hulking figure emerges from the woods alongside of the car, and Tommy whirls the weapon around to point out the window; click, BANG. A piercing ringing in his ears. Smoke curls out the barrel of the shotgun, peeling away out the open window. The bullet clips the figure in the arm, stumbling him, but not stopping him. Fuck, okay. Icy terror washes over him like an undertow. Like a spectre, Jason appears in front of the car, and Adam jerks the wheel hard, the tires giving a harsh shriek as they narrowly miss the swing of the pickaxe.

“I’m glad you’re having fun,” he has to shout, still hanging half out the window as the car jolts, rolling violently off-road, around trees and rocks. They’re losing him in the woods somehow, trees closing out behind them as Adam pulls them onto an actual path, evening them out, speeding up to make distance.

It becomes immediately apparent that they’re trapped in the Packanack kitchen, now, as he shoulders the door closed, breathless from sprinting and fumbling to turn the lock (as if a locked door is going to stop that thing.)

He’s holding his weapon—a goddamn tree branch— up toward the door in a threatening fashion, pretending like his heartbeat isn’t jumped up in his throat, like his hands aren’t trembling. Adam is a bit ahead, opening the window over the counter and dropping his bat down through the opening.“Did you know that I fucking hate you, Palomino?” He hisses this over his shoulder, watching the boy disappear out the open window.

The sound of wood splintering from somewhere in the house is enough to rattle him into action, quickly following suit. Whoa, way higher up than he thought. He lands next to Adam, not nearly as graceful, bolts of pain catching him at the knees as he hits the grass.

A few expressions cross Chad’s face all at once— surprise, hostility, landing on a haughty disbelief. “Shut up—“ He tips his chin imperiously, letting go of the front of Adam’s shirt with a scoff–like he’d meant to have this whole goddamn emotional outburst to begin with.