~****~

There is a bright light, I open my eyes and I am surrounded by white. I turn around and there is still white. I turn around again to face the way I was originally looking to see my dad.

"Daddy?" I say.

"Yes sugar plum it's me." my dad never called me princes or pumpkin because I hate those nicknames.

"daddy." I run to him and hug him, he hugs back. "How are you alive?" I ask.

"I'm not." He says.

"Am I dead?" I ask.

"You are dying." He says.

"So why am I here?"

"This is the point where you can choose to continue to fight and go back to you friends and family or you can give up." he says.

"If I give up do I get to go with you?" I ask.

"You do." He sighs.

"Then I choose to go with you." I say.

"I figured you'd say that." He says with a smile. "But you should go back."

"No, I want to stay with you."

"They need you, your mother needs you, your brothers need you, and most importantly that boy Zack needs you."

"You know about Zack?" I ask.

"Of course I do, I know everything." I smile at what he says.

"I'm glad that you haven't change one bit." I say. He laughs, I miss his laugh so much.

"I want you to meet someone." he says. Then a woman with dark drown almost black hair appears.

"Hello Dylan," she says, "I'm Kennedy, Zack mother." She hold out her hand and I shake it. I can't believe I shook hands with Zack's mother.

"Dylan," Kennedy says, "I can't force you to go back but I know my baby boy and he needs you. He will blame himself for what his asshole of a father did."

"But it is not Zack's fault, I was the one who came looking for him and his father was the one to shoot me." I say.

"But he made a promise that he will always protect you." She says. "Every now and then I go into his dreams to help guide him in the right direction, keep him strong, or if he just needs someone to talk to. After he left your house that night he pulled you out of the locker he went to that tree house and slept there. I popped into his dream and as we were talking he brought you up. He told me how he pulled you out of that locker and he held you. His said you looked so scared. Then he said that he would never let anyone ever hurt you again." She puts her hand on my cheek. "If you don't go back he will kill himself from the inside out." Tears fall from both of our faces. "Please don't let my baby self-destruct."

Then the three of us stand in the waiting room of a hospital. My mom, my brothers, almost the whole football team, Tara, Mackenzie, Jessica, and a few others are there. But the person I see setting in the corner of the room by himself breaks my heart. Zack sets in the corner.

"They can't see us." My dad says.

I walk over to Zack, his head is hanging down. I put my hand on his cheek and he looks up. And as if he could feel me he puts his hand where mine is. I see that his eyes are red and puffy from crying. Seeing him cry broke my heart but knowing I'm the reason he is crying makes the pain so much worse.

I must choose to go back to Zack or stay with my dad. I love them both so much but I must choose. And I know with which ever I choose they will both be strong.

I know now who to choose.