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Eli wrapped his arms around Alaska from behind, everyone stood on the hill later on that night. She leaned back against him with a secure sigh. He planted a kiss to her shoulder. "How do you feel?"
"Better." she hummed, her voice was weak, but still her. He kissed the side of her face. "I know I won that."
"Yeah, you did." he promised her, rocking slightly with his arms locked around her tightly. "And i'm so proud of you. You have no idea."
Alaska leaned her head back against him, listening to the chatter around her. "Terry Silver will get what he deserves."
"Agree." Eli circled her with a minor smile. He held her face. "Regardless of what happened tonight, you need to know that you fought so good, you made all of us so proud. I'm about to go make a lap around the entire hill and tell everyone Alaska Lee is my girl."
She had to laugh, leaning into him some. Eli gave her a peak on the mouth. "You sure you wanna do this tonight?"
She looked to her friends, looking at the floating lanterns in their hands as they talked to each other. Alaska nodded. "I need to."
He nodded his head. Kody walked over, giving Alaska her lantern into her, once again, braced wrist to help the pain. "Here you go, gorgeous lady."
Alaska took it with a small smile. "Thanks, Kody."
He rubbed her head, joining Eli a few feet away, tossing his arm around him.
"Hi." Alaska stood a little bit higher on the hill to talk to everyone below her. They all held the lanterns, staring up at her. Everyone in her group was here except for Johnny and Carmen, who said they were going home to get Miguel then would be there. "Um, I know tonight was kinda a mess, and it's kinda left all of us in a pretty weird head space."
Zane put his arms around Beth and Gina. Wyatt leaned his head on Demetris shoulder as they watched her. Alaska took a small breath. "After what happened, I really got in my head. I started to think all these bad things, and I was hurt and embarrassed. But, then I stopped and thought about everyone around me. My family, my friends, people I even thought were my enemies, new friends, old friends. And I know that non of you think of me the way I was started to see myself."
Sam gave her a tiny smile to encourage her to continue. Alaska took a breath. "Being one year sober has opened my eyes a lot. This whole year, i've been hiding all these urges, going to so many meetings, and just struggling with all of it. That was hard, and it's always gonna be hard, but it also made me realize that there are things I love in this world more, what keeps me away from relapsing, things that protect me from myself."
She really wished Miguel was hear when she said that. "Every single one of you keeps me grounded, karate too, but most importantly my-fucking-self."
There was claps over the small group, giving a few "woo"s at her words. Alaska shook her head quickly. "I'm not just the girl that had an addiction, and i'm sure as hell not the girl that relapsed and lost the All Valley from it either!"
