Hide and Seek is Over
He'd been pretty good about cleaning up after himself.  Didn't want to leave a trail, you know?  That was the best way to keep himself from being tracked down by his friends or his family.  He thought he'd had a few close calls in the past few day, though.  The shadows were following him all the time, and people always stared (even though his face was always covered).  It's like everybody knew who he was the minute he walked by, and that was unacceptable.  Keith Queen was dead, and that's the way he liked it.  He'd even started to shut Marissa out; hadn't called her or tried to talk to her.  There was no way of knowing who was going to turn on him.

Keith turned the corner into an alleyway.  Once he hit the shadows, he pulled off his hood and half-mask to breathe better.  He'd been having trouble breathing for awhile now, especially behind all that fabric.  There was no real explanation for it.  He hadn't breathed in any of the smoke from when he blew up his house, and he'd always been physically fit.  This whole ordeal should have been a breeze.  But it wasn't.  He put his hand to his forehead and pressed his fingers hard against it, trying to force a thought into his head.  Or, not really into his head.  Maybe he was trying to push a thought out of his head.  There were some things he didn't like to think about; things he liked to avoid as much as possible.

But apparently, you couldn't avoid some things forever.