Eleven Eleven

Hotel California

I sat with Mason as he clenched his curls in his hands, buzzed head shaking from one side to the other. "They're gone."

I rubbed his back comfortingly, feeling him relax against my touch. "They'll be going to a good cause. You did the right thing."

Mason opened his hand slowly, watching his hair slip through his fingers like loose change. After a moment of regaining his dignity and composure, he dusted the little hair left on the table into a zip lock and dropped it into Jack's expectant hands.

"I'll go have Steph donate these. The hotel we'll be staying at is only a few blocks away, so we will have a place to lay our head for the night at the very least." Jack said, then ducked out the open door at the front of the RV. I listened for his retreating steps, then turned my full attention to the sad boy beside me.

"Mason, it's just hair. It'll grow back." I whispered.

He propped his chin on his hand, tracing circles around his elbow with the index finger of his free hand. "I know."

"Then what's wrong?"

"I just . . . I just feel like everything's going to shit and changing. I feel like cutting my hair is just another bullshit way for the producers to change me." he muttered softly.

I made an incoherent sound and stretched my hand out until my fingertips curled around the other end of the square table top.

"Mason, it's for Xander." I responded.

"Is it really?" bitterness seeped into his voice. "Or is Jack going to turn all of this into one giant publicity stunt? Make more money and not give a shit about Xan's condition."

As deep as my hatred was for my father, I couldn't imagine him ever using a suffering eighteen year old boy as a way to make him look better. Feeling as though it'd only add to Mason's distaste in my father if I disagreed, I kept my thoughts to myself and diverted my attention to Xander and Ryan sitting in the back of the RV.

Ryan was scrolling through his phone with a bored expression, sideways glances being thrown his friend's way every few seconds. Xander wore an emotionless mask as he read through his songbook, lips occasionally parting in attempt to speak, then slamming shut again when he decided against it. I fought the urge to stand and throw myself between the two to break the tension lingering heavily in the air. Mason must have read my mind, because his fingers cuffed my wrist.

"Don't. He'll lash out." he warned.

I stood, shaking Mason's hand off. "I know, Mason, that's why I need to talk to him."

Ryan got the hint the second I reached the back of the van, rising and slapping a reassuring hand on my shoulder before taking the seat I'd occupied next to Mason a few seconds ago. I grinned as I fell into the spot next to Xander, trying my best to stay optimistic.

"Hey, any luck?" I questioned.

He bit back a sarcastic remark and shook his head. "Did you honestly think there would be? This isn't fair, Willow. I don't have even the slightest clue where the hell these words came from."

I pried the songbook from his grip before he could throw it to the ground in a bout of frustration.

"Alex-" I started.

"Don't start. I don't want to hear your pathetic lies and sympathy. You don't know what this is like, none of you do. Yet you sit here and pretend you feel every little thing I feel." his words came out in a stream of anger and bitterness.

"Alex, we're just trying-"

He pushed away my hand. "I wish I was dead."

The words shut the entire van up. Haiden and Ashton even peered at us from where they sat watching the news, sadness in their expressions. I knew better than to sit and try to comfort him more, he'd only keep fighting. Even with half his memory gone, he was still the same Xander that thought he was the center of the universe and nobody would ever get far enough up into space to understand him.