If Nicole ever thought Jay was strong enough, she was wrong. Although he had always managed to keep himself composed around her before, he couldn't now. Jay's head hung, snapping down as if he'd actually been hung (which he might as well have been), and he grimaced and whimpered softly. He'd bitten his tongue hard to keep from breaking into choked sobs.

"I'm sorry!" Jay cried, his body suddenly pulling itself up so Jay's tear-stained face could be visible. "I'm so, so, so sorry! I couldn't- I didn't- I just..." He'd never really felt like the way he was feeling now. Jay had never wanted to be weak, so he let himself be angry. Angry and bipolar and two-faced and snappy and all those things he'd been in the beginning to Nicole. Maybe it was a relief to cry.

( Dude... That's freakin' perfect. "Envious of Kurt, that was, who never really lost Jay until he died, and sad for herself who never really had Jay until Kurt died."
Omgomgomg. )

"Nicole?" Jay squeaked out. This wasn't happening. It wasn't happening, he wasn't losing the love of his life. He'd never really realized how much he needed her until she was gone that week or two. He'd never really realized how much he needed anyone, at that. Now his friends were all gone, Zooey was all the family he really had left, and Nicole... What was going to happen with Nicole?

Jay caught her by the wrist, pulling her back. "No. Wait. Nicole." Each word came out like a sentence, a forced sentence that he could barely get the air in for. "Nicole... Don't." His brain wasn't functioning correctly enough for him to manage complete sentences, it seemed. His mind was reeling, his heart was racing, his lungs were hurting him. "I'm sorry." Finally, a sentence. "Please, don't go. I'm sorry."

( ...I still can't reply, but I'm going to edit this later with a reply.

Is there really anything left for him to do besides a, cry or b, shoot himself? xD
Yeah... We know he's not gonna do that.
ENTER.

CAIN. )

"No, Nicole," Jay croaked, trying to grab her wrist again. The only thing he got was a fistfull of nothing, and a house empty but him, his sister, and the emotions that he thought wanted to cut his throat. "But... But, I love you..." he whispered at the door, his hand clutching tighter at nothing. He slammed his empty fist against the door, making a dent in the hard wood of it, and let himself drop to the ground.

He sat there, leaned against the wall, bawling like a baby. Now, this was the first time he'd cried so hard in years. The feeling of a quaking body and hands against his face actually felt unfamiliar. Jay felt like he didn't know anything anymore, so he kept crying. What else could he do?

( He didn't shoot himself, he cried. )

( ;A; I totally feel bad for him. Like. Actually legit this time. )

As soon as she was to the sidewalk, Nicole had started to sprint back to her house. It was good mile away, but that gave her time to think. Thinking didn't help, though, her cheeks were stained with runny mascara and tears, and only one kind of thought same to mind. So, that's it. He's gone, we're not together. We're not going to get married, and we're not going to have a family. We'll probably never talk again, and if we do, we'll yell and scream and never get anywhere.

There was an aching in Nicole's chest, like a gaping hole through her heart. That hole was Jay's place in her heart. That hole would never heal properly, she didn't have what it needed anymore.

When Nicole got mach to her house, she didn't refer to it as home anymore because she refered to Jay's house as her home, she pulled her brother into an embrace that he didn't return. Instead, he looked at her, dumbfounded, while Nicole cried into his clothes and screamed into his shirt. An insincere "What's wrong?" Came from Nathan's lips and Nicole just continued to cry. What was improtant to her that would make her cry like that?

"Jay?" He asked, his arms actually winding around her, too. One arm was dressed in a splint now. Nicole nodded into his chest, not saying anything. Nathan frowned, Jay was right. It was a terrible thing for him to have ever said he didn't care about Nicole. "Well?" Nathan pressed. "What, did he die?" Nicole raised her hand and hit him lightly. Nathan frowned. "What, Nikki?" She hated that nickname, but she wasn't going to argue right now. Nicole mumbled into his shirt, and her words sounded muffeled. "We broke up, okay?"

Nathan was a bit shocked, he knew Nicole would rather take her own life than have Jay taken from her. "Why?" He asked, losening his grip on his younger sister. She didn't feel like explaining, to she pulled away from him and walked up to her bedroom, locking her door and crawling into her bed, stomach down, competly concealed with her blanket, her face burried in a pillow, crying still. 

Nicole figured she would lay like this until she ran out of tears.

Nicole pulled her phone out of her pocket, sticking her arm out and dropping it, letting it fall to the ground. It was the only way she could keep herself from calling Jay and begging forgiveness.

( No. o3o We gotta stop spammin'. xD
I'll edit. The other one. With a post. But, liek. Then we gotta fill in the spaces. u.u
Uh. And you're gonna help me think about it. xDD; )

( No. o3o We gotta stop spammin'. xD
I'll edit. The other one. With a post. But, liek. Then we gotta fill in the spaces. u.u
Uh. And you're gonna help me think about it. xDD; )

Zooey peeked out from around the corner wall, just to see what her brother was doing. Now, Jay had buried his face in his arms, which were on his knees, as he'd pulled his legs up close to his body. This muffled the sound of his sobbing, but Zooey was still sure that he was crying just as hard as he had been not too long ago.

And, it was pretty much her fault. If only I'd kept my mouth shut... she thought, furrowing her brow and frowning sadly. If she had, then Nicole wouldn't have left, and their mother's ring wouldn't be on the ground without a finger of a happy girl to be around.

"Jay?" she said quietly, coming towards him and gently setting a hand on his shoulder. Carefully, she sat down next to him and hugged him. And they only sat there, with Jay barely minding his sister.

Nicole's breathing was labored and staggered by now. She crawled out from under her blanket, standing and waddling to her closet. She pulled the small red shirt Jay had given her, and pulled it up to her face, inhaling. It still faintly smelled like him. She pulled her own shirt off and put it on instead, dropping hers to the ground.

Nicole had just laid back on her bed before Nathan stormed into the room. "Roll over." He commanded, and Nicole did so she was on her back. She stared at him wide-eyed when he pushed the bottom of her shirt up until she realized why he had done it. He was pointing to her tattoo.

"Damnit, Nicole! I told you you'd regret it! Damnit!" Nicole sat up, pulling the shirt back down. "I don't regret it, Nathan. This was to show him I'm his, and I still am. Even if we're broken up."

( Lololol. )

"I'm going to bed," Jay said finally, pulling away from his little sister without a look at her or a second thought. He wasn't going to think about things right now. Thinking would make his head hurt, and thinking would make him cry again.

"Jay?"

He ignored her. That's all he needed to do, ignore. Ignore the world, ignore himself. Maybe everything, including the pain of his losses, would fade away. If that was possible. He imagined that it would be difficult to even attempt at such a thing, but, he could try.

Slipping under his covers, Jay checked his phone, squinting at the light from it. No messages from anyone at all. How depressing. Jay thought, feeling his pillow getting wet.

( Duuudeee. I knew you'd point that out. xDD )

Gage, of course, was sitting around, being bored out of his mind. He'd thrown a ball against his wall and then hit it back with a tennis racket, played games on one of the game consoles he had, tried to write, and reminisced with a small smile. Finally, he'd decided on laying in his bed and staring at the ceiling.

He jumped when his phone belted out a loud song that he liked, quickly grabbing it and opening the message to shut his phone the hell up. The message was from Nicole; he had her number in his phone.

"Uhm, Nicole?" he sent back. For what reason could she possibly be texting him?

~

He felt as though someone had dropped a thousand pounds on his back. Jay was obviously struggling under that weight, and thinking about that weight made him squirm and cry again. He needed someone, something. What he really wanted to do was go to Jonah's house and try to unlock the door to the last floor, or maybe look for secret rooms or compartments like he used to do, just because.

Either that, or go to Kurt's house and sit in his room. His creepy, creepy room. The air in it had a dead feeling to it, like it along with Kurt had died. Just as Jay was getting up to go to either place, Wolfgang trotted in, jumping onto the bed and laying down next to Jay. Settling again, Jay sighed and pushed his face into the pillow. Oh, well.

( [LINK] GAGE LOOKS LIKE HE'S TWELVE.
AND HIS HAIR REMINDS ME OF JUSTIN BIEBER, LOL. IMAGINE IT SPIKIER. )

( IKNOW. HOMG. YOU JUST WANNA NOM HIM. )

He actually waited for the next message to come, setting down his phone on the far corner of his desk and sitting down at the edge of his bed, twiddling his thumbs. As soon as the screen lit up, Gage pounced, grabbing his phone and checking the message. His blue-brown eyes saw the words in the message, but for a moment, he couldn't comprehend them. What in the world had happened, anyway?

"I can talk for a minute, listen for a minute, come over for a minute, whatever you need." Gage sent back, and stuffed his phone in his jeans pocket. He felt nervous now. Had something happened to Jay? If that was so, then Jay was an idiot. If he'd done something, Jay was a fool.

Wait...

~

There was a way to forget it all! The idea was just forming in his head, but it already seemed like  a good one. Jay stood up, grabbing a jacket and swinging it on. He blinked his eyes a couple times, stopping to look in the mirror, then decided he didn't care if he looked like he was just crying. What did it matter, anyway?

Wolfgang couldn't come. The dog was trotting at his side, asking for attention with that hard look he always wore, but Jay ignored him. He also wondered why the hell he had him. Wolfgang was Kurt's dog, not his. The dog jumped up when Jay grabbed his keys, snapping at his forearm. Jay grabbed the dog's muzzle, shook his head by it, and released him, hurrying out the door.

That was unusual. Wolfgang rarely tried to bite him. Maybe he's hungry. Jay thought absentmindedly. Zooey'll feed him.

( I READ THAT WEIRD. I THOUGH YOU SAID 'YOU JUST WANT HIM'. C:
BUT YES, I WOULD LIKE TO NOM ON HIM. IF THAT'S OKAY WITH YOU, OF COURSE. )

Nicole sighed, sitting up and pulling the collar of Jay's shirt up to her mouth and bit down on it. She would kill to have someone she considered a friend there to hug, but not if it wasn't convenient for him. She stared at her phone for a minuite before replieng. She wanted to reply with 'If you could come over, that would be so amazing.' but instead wrote 'Anything is fine.' She hit send, then dropped her phone somewhere in her blanket.

Laying back down, Nicole sighed. How was Jay taking all of this? Of course, she as.sumed the worst, figuring he was happy to finally be rid of her and to be able to date whoever he wanted again.

( I THINK GAGE MIGHT BE GAY, THOUGH. )

Gage pulled on a hoodie, reading the message as he walked. He'd come over, because he knew that that was what Nicole really wanted. Actually, he was just guessing that. It seemed like every time someone said they didn't want something, they wanted it. So, he'd just come over to make sure.

"Where are you, anyway?" he sent, quickening his pace to a sort of trot. He guessed that she was either at Jay's house or her own house. It was a pretty easy guess, anyway.

 ~

He'd actually been planning on staying away from this stuff. Staring tentatively into the reddish-tan color of a small gl*censored* of bourbon, he debated. Should he, or should he not? Jay's fingers settled on the cool gl*censored*, ignoring the wanton gaze on him from across the bar by an employee. They were probably wondering about his age or something.

Who cares? Jay thought, and the gl*censored* touched his lips. His throat burned slightly as the drink went down, and he felt a little better. So, he asked for a refill. And another. And another. And it just went on like that. They didn't deny him; it was only a profit for them.

( Told you it was gonna happennn. )

"Right." Gage answered, and broke into a run. Yes, he was used to running fast as hell. It was actually no problem, running like he was. Kurt loved to set off alarms, it was like a hobby of his. He'd come by Gage, whisper, "Get set," then bolt. And that's when the alarms went off and that's when they'd all be haulin' *censored*. However, they'd all be laughing their heads off, because it was just so fun.

Kurt even set off library alarms. He liked disturbing the silence.

And those were the things Gage thought about while he was running to Nicole's house. By the time he got to the front door, he was only panting a little. He wasn't laughing like a madman while he ran, so he could stil breathe.

Gage knocked lightly on the door, then a little louder. He was afraid she wouldn't hear the door and someone else would answer. "Nicole?" he called.

~

Jay had had so many drinks, he was sure he couldn't even see any more. But, there was a pleasant buzz in his head, and a real, genuine smile on his lips. His head was in his hands, but if one were to bend down just the slightest bit, they'd see glazed over eyes, a smiling mouth, and they'd realize that he was completely hammered.

He wasn't worrying about a thing. He wasn't worried, or sad, or mad. Jay was perfectly content, sitting on a stool with an empty gl*censored* in front of him. The world was spinning perfectly, the clock on the wall was clicking perfectly, the fire in his throat was still burning perfectly. Everything was just utterly perfect. Right?

Just before Gage could say a word, Nicole hugged him. Uncomfortably, he hugged her back, feeling awkward and a little scared. What could possibly be wrong? Once Nicole moved away and greeted him verbally, Gage let out a sigh of relief. "Hi, Nicole," he said in a murmur, a small, almost sad smile creeping up on his legs. "What's up?" He almost added "buttercup" to that. It was something he'd started saying, but only to girls.