Thanks to Jamie for being my beta.

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Maybe it’s for the best, Chester thought as he stepped onto the train. After all, he is responsible for a fatality and the decaying of a young boys mind.

No paper trails this time. No record of where he’s going, how long he’ll be, or if he’ll be back. It’s better that way, he thought, with leaving a string of broken promises, hearts and lives, it’s better that no one can ever find him.

Nobody was there to wave him goodbye this time. With one boyfriend dead and the other safely locked in a straight jacket. Nobody else would come. In the city of angels, no one waves goodbye. He’ll be back, they say. He can’t stay away from this place for too long, nobody can.

Brad’s better off in a sanatorium, anyway. He needs all the help he can get. Sure, he wouldn’t need it if Chester didn’t drunkenly stagger into his life one night, but you can’t change the past. And anyway, all Chester’s going to do is remind Brad.

Shit happens. And what can he do about it anyway? He can’t fix things anymore, he’s not superman. And as the old saying goes, if you love someone, you’ll let them go.

He’s doing more than letting him go, but it’s the same concept, right? Letting them go to live better lives, letting them go to rot in a psychiatric hospital. It’s all the same; he’s just proving his love.

And Mike? Mike was just one big accident after another, right up until Brad’s hands strangled his disastrous neck.

I’m not meant to be caged, Chester thought. I’m not meant to be tied down with one of the many failed LA guitarists, and besides, they weren’t that serious anyway. They didn’t really live together, Chester just crashed at his place most nights.

Mike was trouble from the very start. Right from when he caught Chester slipping a Rolex into his pocket at the mall. Part-time security doesn’t pay that well, Mike said, so put the watch back, take me for a drink, and we’ll forget the whole thing.

Of course, take me for a drink meant I-want-to-get-wasted-but-can’t-afford-it. So while Mike knocked back the Jack Daniel’s, Chester’s hand crept into unattended bags, wallets and purses. It was 3AM when they left the bar, and since Chester didn’t want to wake Brad up for a where-have-you-been? talk, he crashed at Mike’s, who coincidently, Chester noticed in the morning, lived in the same apartment block as Brad.

Sneaking out of the Mike’s proved to be more difficult than Chester intended. Four different locks on the door, and from experience, he knew the loss of a warm body in the morning wakes you up faster than a bite on the ass.

Working quickly and quietly was Chester’s area of expertise. And no sooner than Mike had begun to stir, Chester was out the door staring a thunderstruck Brad in the face.

Hey, Chester said, must have stumbled into the wrong apartment last night.

Of course, being the brain box he is, Brad added one and one together, making a shocked Mike gasp for breathe before he had even rolled out of bed.

And while Mike died, Chester was packing clothes into a sports bag and making for the door.

Using a stolen credit card, he bought three tickets at the train station, so even if they did track him down to here, they’d have a hell of a lot of hunting to do in Ohio, Washington and Texas. Paying cash, he brought his ticket to Florida and with an infected smile on his face, thanked the cashier and headed for his platform.

And as he waited for his train, Chester wondered how things would have turned out if the Rolex had just been in a different mall. Or if his light fingers didn’t steal the booze that landed him face down in front of Brad.

He didn’t really care. Things happen for a reason, or so his mom always told him. And anyway, he might have fun riding the waves in Florida.

Stowing his other useless tickets into his wallet, he stood up. His train was approaching. I won’t be back, he thought, not this time. He breathed his last deep LA breath, stepped onto the train and left.