Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

People usually aren’t aware of how it is exactly to be suicidal. And not like, the type where you cry and have a breakdown in a bathroom and feel like killing yourself, but then it gets better a day or a week after. But the type where you wake up every day and you’re in constant agony. 

You don't just rise up and face the world with the light of hope glistening off the morning sunlight sliding gently down the window glass, no, you wake up in your own puke and try to fall asleep again. And when that doesn’t work, you have to push yourself up to avoid lying down motionlessly with your thoughts alone. You get up and run your hands through the glass shards from your bottles and mirror that you sleep in, and try to find one that is sharp enough to slide your throat cleanly, but on sides dull enough for you to run your fingers around its edges endlessly.

And then you raise it to the sun, asking it for its blessing.

Nicole doesn’t think people actually understand it. They think, ‘Oh! Everyone wants to do that every now and then.’ Or say ‘Sure! Been there, you’ll get through it!’ And it shows how bristle their damn knowledge is. How they think they know of suffering, yet they can wake up and smile throughout their day without a wish of immediate death. As if their past had anything to do with the edge of the goddamn cliff she balanced on.

Maybe they knew of suffering but managed to escape, but some aren’t lucky like that. For some there’s just an everlasting hell, Nicole thinks.

It’s a relief for a disease the world has no cure for. Maybe even the final remedy, who the fuck knows. And yet, they all strive away from it. 

Nicole knows that there was a time where her world wasn’t like that, it’s not that hard to remember on a slightly better day that there’s something that she has indeed forgotten. That’s the only thing that was left for her to hold onto, the hole in her head screaming and crying out for the part that’s missing. And the reliefs who covered it, and all the other ones.

It’s funny how sometimes the thing that makes you want to kill yourself is the thing that keeps you alive. The memory of nothing amidst mist in her head, creating a sense of resemblance- knowing that it had been there and that it had been different, and that once, long, really fucking long time ago, life wasn’t what it was now.

What had it been? 

Nicole tries not to think about that. It’s not like remembering what you’ve lost ever gives it back to you in other form than a one-and-a-half-star (if not traumatic) hallucination in your head.

Honestly, she doubts that she could even fully recall it, but if she could, she’d treat it the same way any other memory of the past was managed in her head. Because she wasn’t going to have any damn favorites the way her mother did, and all the shit in her head was going to be abused indifferently. 

Well, except for any memory of Jecka. 

Don’t get Nicole wrong, the memories of her fell and blended into the never-ending fog like their comrades, but amidst it, they didn’t lie still or dead, they didn’t whisper sweet solutions of peace found in nothingness. 

No.

Those mother fucking pieces of shit floated and shone as brightly as a damn nano iPod would when spammed at three am by creepy dick pics. 

The thing about them though, was that they didn’t make Nicole want to puke and die the way those pics did, but rather made her feel the opposite.

Yeah, the damn idiotic memories of Jecka’s smiles, jokes, or banters made Nicole feel warm, kinda. Not like, swooning and exploding, but steady. 

As steady as it could get when one lives inside a hurricane. At least the white noise of dust never did disappoint. For it, like her, never settled. 

So, pretty much the way one moment was in front of her, and real, the next the memory of that was already gone. Yeah, Nicole the fucking goldfish.

Okay, gods, not like that. It wasn’t gone, it was there, right beside her on her left. It just? happened. One moment she was burning in that hell, and another she was still burning in it but the memory of the moment before felt suddenly unreal.

Like, in the way that if you just skim over it, you’re unsure if it’s even real.

And that… felt nice?

Honestly, living in hell would never be nice. The fire won’t stop licking her skin, her insides won’t stop turning inside out, and the pain never subdues for long enough to even plan or dare to think about wishing for a ‘healthy’ escape.

No, there’s no place for that. So the only non-lethal escape you’ll get is letting the moment behind you, and the one in front of you be a dream.

Not real, not enough to look into it. Not enough to remember and recall, and realize that you’re staying here.

It didn’t take Nicole that long to realize where she was, rather ‘accepting it’ (as much as it’s possible to accept that you’re bleeding on the floor and it just won’t stop) was part of the hard work. 

Because some things you just cannot accept, Nicole thinks. You can push so many lines in life, threaten people, get them to donate gallons of blood for you because you’re hot; get them to kill themselves for you, or break their free-of-gay-streak. You get the idea, simple teenage girl activities. 

And yet, you can’t push that one away, you can’t accept it and you can’t get out of it. And there’s just nothing there, nowhere. You may cast your pride aside and beg for help, go to therapy and get a dumb bitch asking you about your favorite colors at best, or another pedophile staring at your not even see-through shirt. No one is going to help you at the end, because all those “responsible” adults are in reality just (if not more) helpless as you, and they hide it under pretty indoor decor, proper and polite vocabulary, or a sense of being better, whatever show they put on to acquire a certain image that gets them through the day.

It was hardly Nicole’s fault for seeing through all of that, and not wanting to participate in play pretend to escape the truth that they all knew at heart. She didn’t want to, but it meant not that she didn’t, she simply chose to admit to it whilst she did. 

There is that moment where the only thing you can accept is the fact that the only way out is death or a delusion that makes up for it enough to tune out the pain just sufficiently-ish for you to wait.

Because, yeah. That was the only second option. Waiting.

You can’t live like this, not really, just pretend at best, and clutch onto that shard of glass in your bleeding fist, hoping that it’ll distract you while you wait. Because motherfucking hope always dies at last.

Nicole rolled onto her back in the green tent, staring at her little tree air freshener that hung as if a fucking chandelier in the middle of her new home. 

It was a cherry blast fragrance, of course. In case of Nicole spiraling too far away into the chaos to be able to recall her. Her piece of broken glass.

Ari got it for her, hung it up before Nicole got in, and god. Okay, she doesn’t just think that she should feel bad about her treatment of Ari, but now she knows she should. Annnnd that’s as far as that will go. She isn’t a fucking magician, but she isn’t heartless either. Maybe she’ll even put a line or two about it in her new letter. 

Or would that be overboard? Jeez, since when did Nicole turn into an Ari appreciator? But on the other hand, everyone would have expected Ari to just get the Lavender smelling one, and yet she still remembered what Nicole’s favorite one is. 

Was that by choice? Or just because of the fact that Jecka seemed to be the only fucking thing Nicole was able to talk about even when dating a whole real gay-ass lesbian bitch. 

Or was it just a payment for Nicole’s memory of Ari’s scout training shit? Either way, it was better than ‘Leather’, or fucking ‘Summer linen’ scents.

She won’t even mention the ‘America’ one. Like what’s that supposed to be? The peculiar scent of non-free health care, and the Second Amendment?

Nicole shivered in Ari’s sleeping bag. Waiting, waiting, and waiting.

What was today's reason for waiting? What was she waiting for? No, pardon, what she was waiting for was obvious, any kind of relief, but what was going to keep her waiting? 

How does a person who suffers this greatly act? How does one crawl amidst the piles of burned and rotting corpses, bathed in piss and shit, and puke without tearing their brains out? How do you expect someone with two broken legs and a barely working head to gather up strength and push themselves through it? With no direction too.

And with no promise of a soon end whatsoever. The drugs, they promised sweetly, the alcohol kissed, and a person spoke. Spoke and spoke until there was only suffering and that person in Nicole’s world, and Nicole had to keep picking every second of her life which one she’d be looking at.

She wishes she could say that she’d always pick Jecka. 

Nicole did not understand what the world expected of her, or why. She had no strength in her to care for if it was right, or wrong. Because at some point caring about stuff like that becomes a shooting star wish. 

And Nicole was left every night staring at a blank, empty, and broken sky, wishing for at least one star.

Because even if she’d never get another one to make another wish, she’d have something to keep her waiting long enough to amuse and appease Jecka until she finally got tired of her.

Because yeah, Nicole would do that. She would stay, knowingly swimming in an illusion, tip-toeing on the thinnest ice, just to watch Jecka dance on it, swirl and spin. 

What a thrill, a death under your very feet, whispers of ice cracking under the weight on her shoulders, while she’d get to watch Jecka live . Oh and live to the fullest. 

Nicole wasn’t sure if Jecka could ice skate, but she was sure as fuck that she could survive. Even if that had to be ugly jumps from one broken ice surface onto another. Even then she’d look beautiful. 

God, she needed one good enough lie to live, any. But she was too weak to make up one herself. 

Nicole sighed wearily. 

Fuck that. Where was her notebook?!

——-

Jecka was a goddam perfection incarnate, and Nicole irritated her because her existence kept compromising that truth. 

No matter the words that came out of Nicole’s mouth, every reassurance, or well, acknowledgment of Jecka’s perfection was always going to be undercut by the fucking fact that she wasn’t a reason enough for Nicole not to go and fucking die.

It’s not even that Nicole wanted her to be a reason enough, she wasn’t even trying to pretend goddammit. No, just going ahead and showing it. So honest where no one asked for it.

Because Nicole was going to kill herself, and nothing in this fucking god-forsaken world was going to stop her. 

She was acting as if a divine force, kneeling and bowing next to Jecka with a promise of her whole nothing of broken parts glued together, whilst stepping right over her at the same time. 

She bows and lowers her head, avoids her eyes, mutters how Jecka’s it all and everything at once, and then disobeys, crumbles down right in Jeckas hands, dying and leaving all those broken pieces of glass she was made of splintering and cutting Jeckas hands.

There was blood leaking everywhere from them, and Jecka couldn’t stop them from shaking as what was left of Nicole’s head lay motionless on her lap. 

Jecka promised not to leave her, she promised she wouldn’t. Nicole made Jecka swear by being, made her say and then disappoint and betray her own words over and over again, because Nicole wasn’t even better than Jecka, didn’t even think she was, no, god she just trusted death more than she loved Jecka. 

Or rather death loved Nicole more than Jecka ever could. No surprise Nicole couldn’t pick her when a lover was already clutching her shoulders with its bony fingers, breathing gusts of shivers into her ears and embracing her slowly. 

Jecka wished it could’ve been her instead. Nicole deserved for Jecka to be it. Did Jecka deserve to be that?

It seemed not. Or maybe she did, but it was just such an occurrence of unlucky fate. Not that either of them had Miss. luck ever accompany them any further than on a drug-selling operation to get better grades. 

Yet, all of this annoyance and displeasure melted quickly into background noise when Jecka noticed the genuine sadness that swam loops in Nicole’s eyes. She did not understand why Nicole did what she did, why she ruined it all. She really tried to, she waited and waited for Nicole to find a way to explain, to let Jecka accept it, fake the reluctance for a minute or two, hesitate for a solid moment as if she truly had any other option than accepting whatever Nicole would throw at her.

Because she wants it. She needs it so badly, for Nicole to want her back too. To even make up an excuse if needed. Whatever would have held them up above, floating on their feeble raft before the next flood. 

But Nicole basically summoning the storm and then sitting expectedly on their personal fucking titanic version of doors, barely staring at Jecka while the lifeboat swims right next to them was reaaaalllyy not fucking hilarious. 

Is that how lesbians test the loyalty in their bitches? Summon a natural disaster and then ask your ho to pick between watching from the backseats of a broken Honda or speeding away to California in a Lexus? Was Jecka really even gay, or is she just that weak?

Maybe it was just the suicidal tendencies speaking, rather than gay ones? Tho who knows at this point, look at Ari, she’d probably shit herself at the thought of a dramatic picnic; the sun settling down as a bitch of a tornado storms towards her, where she’s using the pride flag as a blanket to sit on with a random girl.

Hold her hand, give a kiss and she’s head over heels. Not that it was right. Nicole had been terrible to Ari, and yeah , Jecka didn’t stop it, no, she felt kinda guilty about that. But mostly mad at Nicole for putting Jecka in a situation in which she has to watch Nicole do something bad, and making Jecka realize that she’s not morally good enough to stop it. 

And Nicole hardly ever felt guilty- god, she hardly felt much at all sometimes. But she wanted to. Jecka saw that, in how she wasn’t burdened for her actions, but felt remorseful for not feeling it. That, or just guilty about making Jecka sad.

How wrong was it that Jecka wished for it to be the second one?

Maybe that was what made Jecka keep coming back. Not Nicole really wanting to be decent, but the fact that Nicole wanted to feel bad just for Jecka’s sake? 

Whatever it was, both worked well enough for Jecka to be ready to accept whatever bullshit excuse (of course, at least one built with some effort, her standards weren’t that low) ((ok they were, she’d just help Nicole make one if she asked her to)) but Nicole had to want one. 

Jecka wondered if Nicole was aware of that fact.

Because yeah, Jecka was fucking codependent on a suicidal trashy ho. 

How?

She wishes she knew how it happened. 

Jecka chuckled, dropping her head in her hands. It was eight am, and she wasn’t sure if ignoring her phone and going about her day as planned was even an option at this point.

Because oh no, she knew how it happened. She just didn’t want it. She wanted Nicole, not the reason behind that need. 

Because, fine, maybe it felt kinda freeing to be with Nicole. To admire and dear the death she carried upon her shoulders. Dead girls do not betray, because they belong to the ground, they do not lie, because their truth is dead, and they do not leave, because they were never there in the first place. Duh.

And it all would’ve been peachy and cutesy, but then Jecka came and fucked it all up by falling in love with images of defense that Nicole put up to keep herself alive, instead of only the girl Nicole was herself. (Though, in Jecka’s defense, it's hard to not be charmed by a tragedy in which you are the hero of the damned.)

Because oh! How romantic! To not be the only ho in town who saw how bad it all was, how sparkles and rainbows to know that there’s a way to survive in this world. And, add to all of it the beauty of being desperately needed and desired.

Oh yes, fall in love with the person who found a way to drag their dead self around in an image of a winner. Because who is better than a girl who’s already dead, and is around only by the mere choice of not feeling like kicking it today? 

She could, whenever she wanted. Jecka knew that Nicole wasn’t afraid of death, so what was it that was keeping her around on the days when she wished for nothing more than the embrace of the cold and dark earth around her?

You wouldn’t have guessed. Jecka wouldn’t have either, because once she asked after Nicole made her usual comment of desire for peace:

 “Why won’t you then?” She replied.

And Nicole just shrugged . Was the misery of living still better than the nothingness of dying?

And Jecka knew that it was bad to enable someone like that, she knew that this was the wrong reply. The correct one would be agreeing, or making Nicole guilty if it seemed that she was saying that more passionately than the normal whiny expression, and then spending some extra time around her. 

Not that they weren’t to hang out together anyway, but maybe turn it into a sleepover. If Nicole ever noticed that Jecka would do that, she wasn’t sure. She’d give Jecka that silent look, but Nicole never complained or called her out, and it’s not like Jecka should need to voice the fact that she indeed didn’t want the brunette to perish into some non-sexy pile of ash.

It was universal knowledge, Nicole wasn’t dumb.

“You wouldn’t be hot in that version, Nicole.” Jecka argued one day, long ago, when it all seemed fine.

Nicole actually smiled- or pretended to- as she changed her tone to a dramatic complaint “And I thought you find me hot in every form, that’s so materialistic of you, Jecka.” 

They hung out at Nicole’s place, the TV played something dumb in the background, and Jecka would have changed it long ago if Nicole hadn’t hidden the remote somewhere. 

“Oh gosh, you’re right.” Jecka nodded solemnly, “I’ll mix you with some cocaine and sniff it. You better hit as good dead as when alive, or I’m requesting a refund.” 

The guy on the tv started saying some dumb shit about fishing baits, and Jecka noticed that Nicole tried to reach for the pillow on her left, but stopped herself. Aha .

“Refund of what, bitch? You’re getting them for free, don’t worry I’ll write that down in my will.” Nicole assured, staring blankly at the TV, not watching it as she focused on their conversation instead. 

Jecka grinned, reaching out and quickly stealing the remote from under the pillow and switching to the channel that aired Smallville. “Refund of you. Your last form, (which happens to be your current one at this point,) preferably.” 

Nicole tried to get the remote back, but Jecka took out the batteries and threw it at her. Nicole just groaned and finally, instead of staring blankly at the TV, she turned her head to face Jecka instead.

Which, well, took her long enough. Jecka wasn’t just a podcast, she was a full sight to behold. All the ounce of attention should be paid, especially when discussing the idiocy of Nicole flatlining. 

“Why not mix crystals in there instead then?” Nicole commented suddenly, “It’ll last longer so you’ll have more time to convince yourself that you don’t have to keep convincing yourself that you miss me.” 

“Wouldn’t that be like, proposing?” Jecka replied, voicing her first thought, and processing the rest of Nicole’s statement.

Nicole’s brows furrowed, “How so?” 

“What if the part of the ashes I’d mix that with was like, your left ring finger. Wouldn’t I be putting crystals on it?” 

“Jecka, meth isn’t a diamond ring.”  Nicole rolled her eyes.

“Honestly, If you’d want a ring, wouldn’t you want one that you could crush whenever and snort it if we ever were to get a divorce later on?” Jecka argued.

Nicole seemed thoughtful for a moment, actually considering that as if it wasn’t the truth. “Well, yeah, but since I’m a goner in this scenario, I don’t see how that would affect me in any way.”

“Of course, it wouldn’t affect you,” Jecka scoffed, “It’d just affect me, being married and widowed the same second. Then I’d have to pretend that I can convince myself that I don’t miss you, because no matter what you say, being married to a powdered version of you is never going to be as dazzling as just being married to one that can at least go and buy me fries.”

Nicole then wasn’t sure what to say, or that’s how it looked like, so she just shrugged and settled with “You’re right, the urn would probably not even be hourglass shaped. And knowing you, you’d just hold me in an empty salt shaker.”

“Damn right I would,” Jecka joked, “I’d just sprinkle you on random people’s food, or leave you in some restaurant.”

“That’s so gross.” Nicole’s face soured, “No one deserves to have me like that.”

“Except me.” Jecka asked proudly. 

“That’s a fucking weird thing to be happy about, Jecka.” Nicole remarked, never looking away.

Jecka waved her off without faltering as she repeated, “Yeah yeah, but except me, right?” 

Nicole stared at her just for a moment, before shrugging and looking at the TV, “Sure, I guess that if it had to be someone, it should be you, you freak. 

Jecka eyerolled, smiling at the fact that it indeed should be her, “Don't act as if you don’t find this hot.” 

“You find Clark hot.” Nicole pointed out, without objecting. 

“He’d find me hot.” 

“Who wouldn’t.”

Jecka shrugged, “Your ashes?” 

Nicole smiled too, fake or not, who cares. “Just dump them down the toilet if they’re gonna be that tasteless”. 

“Yeah, yeah, I like you too, Nicole.” Jecka grinned and replied, before just settling down to focus on the show. 

It all had been so calm, and peaceful. The slight stress of the fact that Nicole would be more depressed on some days than others was something Jecka could deal with. 

Everyone has a bad day, but Jecka was a bit surprised that someone who always had a bad day could experience that. So she stuck close, even if the comments about biting the dust never before had her think Nicole would seriously do it. Well, that soon.

She knew that it was a possibility, well, or something very likely. But she didn’t think about it, she used to ignore it before when they weren’t close since it wasn’t like she could make demands of her four-month best friend.

The realization she had when she saw Nicole one day in the cafeteria with fresh cuts was what made her try to stay around more because that’s when she couldn’t ignore the fact that one day she may wake up to Nicole being dead. 

Her best friend, crush, whatever, being gone. All the best of Jecka’s day just being taken away. 

Nicole just suddenly came into her life, a ghost alive, shifting and moving ever so often. One day you’d have her next to you in class practicing the seven-second rule, the other she’d be planning suicide pacts with the school's hottest psycho in a bathroom stall. 

No attachments when it came to her. She didn’t stay anywhere and had no stability whatsoever beyond the anger and hatred towards the entire world around them and her own existence.

So honestly, what wasn’t there to love about her? 

There were no consequences there. Not for Jecka, because she was the only other girl in that forsaken place that wasn’t a preppy dissociative bimbo, or a trashy maniac eighth original sin incarnate. She got Nicole, and Nicole got her. 

They had each other's backs. 

Jecka could be herself to the fullest and not feel bad about it when being around Nicole, because compared to Karen, Nicole made her feel better about herself, not worse. 

So what if Nicole was barely crawling on the floor of existence? They shared that fucking floor. Jecka had to just pick her up somehow, and push her in a way that will make her run alongside, not fall. 

And how the fuck do you do that without any strings attached at first? 

Yeah, so don’t blame Jecka for being maybe a tad manipulative in her plans. That’s how it was. Nicole would probably be delighted either way for the fact that instead of an old greasy balding low-wage man, it was a hot, pretty blonde girl who was trying to manipulate her into a date.

Wait, was that what Jecka was going to do?

Her phone buzzed for the fifth time now, trying to be bitchy and interrupt her inner dramatic life reflections.

She felt nervous when she reached out for it, and she had every right to be because Ari texted her again indeed. 

——-Ex gay girl——-

[28 August 2009]

Ex gay girl: Hey, call me.

[29 August 2009] 

Ex gay girl: It’s about the love of your life.

Jecka grimaced at that, yet feeling a bit of relief. Ari wouldn’t be the one texting her to inform her about Nicole’s demise. Or well, Jecka hoped she wouldn’t? She’d rather hope for Emily at this point.

Jecka took a deep breath before clicking on Ari’s contact information and pressing call. It rang for only a few short moments before it was picked up.

“H-hi Jecka,” Ari’s voice sounded from her phone, talking as if she wasn’t the one who told her to call. 

“Well, you told me it’s about the love of my life,” Jecka started “So what’s up with Ryan Sheckler? Did he get a new hairstyle or…?” 

The way Ari’s voice sounded a bit nervous as well as confused through the phone made Jecka smirk, imagining how funny Nicole would’ve found this.

“Oh, um no I didn’t mean-“

“Ari I know you didn’t, I’m messing with you.” Jecka cut it short, a tad nervous herself. “What’s up with Nicole, Apollo?” 

Ari was quiet for a short moment, before replying. 

“Your… um, Penelope is dying, J-Odysseus, you need to sail back asap because homelessness- I mean Poseidon -“

“Bitch, what the fuck are you talking about? Did you take something?” Jecka interrupted her ranting. 

“What? No! You just said Apollo and I thought-“

“Do I look like a Greek geek?”

A silence. “No.”

“Good.” Jecka nodded to herself, “Well, anyways I would’ve been Helena if anything, but please continue without dramatic metaphors.” 

Ari gasped, “So you do know who they-“

“Do you want to know what I want to know? Let me give you a clue, it’s about our ex-“ Oh god, they shared something in common,  “- ex that eats pizza cold .” Jecka fixed her voice. 

“Well, she may just eat everything cold from now on.” Ari replied, with a shiver in her voice. 

And Jecka was hoping that it was at the pizza comment, not at the fact that Ari’s lucky enough to share something in common with her, but isn’t sane enough to be grateful for it.

Jecka sighed, “And that’s because?” 

“…She’s living in a tent under a bridge?” 

“Ari, I can’t tell if you’re thinking we’re playing a guessing game or if you’re stating a fact with your voice quivering like that.”

“Oh, no. Sorry, I’m just bad at phone calls, I’m better at texting.” Ari apologized shakily. 

Jecka ignored her ranting for a second, pondering on the information. Did Emily and Nicole get into a fight or something? Ari knew about it, and since she said Nicole’s current living situation is a tent, she’d be guessing that that’s where Nicole acquired it.

Ari wouldn’t have texted her if it wasn’t serious, right? She could be a dramatic whiney bitch, but well, if what she was saying was true, she had the right to be upset. 

Fuck, Jecka was already stressing herself, can’t blame Ari for doing it too then. When she saw the message she guessed it would be something bad, Ari wouldn’t text her if she and Nicole would be getting married after all. 

Wait, she totally would, that cunning bitch would flex it to the entire world. Seems she can only share the bad news, but with that randomly showing and non-suiting confidence of hers, who’d expect otherwise? 

“Also, why didn’t you reply sooner?!” Ari’s voice suddenly broke her inner complaining.

Jecka cringed, twirling her hair with her other hand. “Because I thought that you wanted to… hook up.” 

The phone line went silent.

“Listen, as cool as it would’ve been to be your second gay awakening or a rebound, it would be weird since we’ve both dated Nicole.” Jecka tried appeasing a bit. 

Fucking Ari? Not that deadly, but Dating Ari?! Please, Jecka has some limits. She didn’t want to spiral into whatever that walking pride parade would drag her into while she was in her desperate straight after a break-up phase. 

Also, she did not want to find out if she’d end up acting as Nicole number two, or a gay blue-haired Jessica alter ego. Jessi. Blue-haired vegan Jess. Jessa.

“Whatever, not that I’d want that from you.” Ari somehow mustered up the attitude to say, “I just wanted to inform you about Nicole’s situation before we find out about a dead teen in the newspaper.”

Jecka lifted a brow, “Well, you could’ve thrown rocks at my window if you were that invested.” 

“That’s aggressive.” Ari objected. 

“Thought you liked aggressive.” Jecka slipped. Okay maybe not slipped, attitude must be met with attitude.

“I- I what?” Ari stammered.

Jecka reminded herself that Ari still got Nicole’s address and she should probably get it first before she makes Ari mad or so insecure that she’ll need an hour or two of crying first.

“Like, uhm, personality vise, as in flavor, very specific people- how are you and Hunter doing?” Jecka asked, switching the subject smoothly . 

“Oh?” Ari was perplexed, “We broke up months ago?”

“You did?” 

“Uh, yeah? Like a week after we started dating?”

“Oh. I was just focused on, you know.” Jecka faltered, shrugging.

“My fresh ex-girlfriend at the time?”

“Yea.”

“Fuck you Jecka.”

“Fair.” 

“Your girlfriend too.”

“Let’s not go that far.”

“Why not?”

Jecka smiled, “Threesomes are Emily’s thing.”

“I-that’s not-“

“Ari be cute and just send me the address, ok?” Jecka asked listlessly. 

“Fine.”

“Oh, and also block me after this, please.” 

She heard Ari laugh dryly at that behind her phone.

“Already on it” 

Jecka swiftly moved her phone from behind her ear, but just as she tried to end the call, Ari had outrun her to that. 

“What a bitch.” She muttered, waiting as the three dots appeared and bounced in a quick rhythm before she got the location from Ari. 

Well, no much more to do now than just head over there. It was either seeing Nicole or daydreaming about her, and Jecka didn’t want to be that pathetic yet . Next time maybe.

Okay, if they break up again then for sure. Jecka always got easily attached to stuff that made sense. Who didn’t?

She turned on the ignition and reversed out of her parking spot, time to give her ex-but-soon-to-be-again-ho a visit. 

But before that, she had to go get something on her way. 

Twenty-five-ish minutes later Jecka parked in front of the address Ari’s given her, and it was half shock, and half expected that it was a bridge close to Jecka’s college’s campus. Not a pathway she personally passed by, but one she might have just by chance.

For some reason that calmed her, because why not take it as Nicole wanting to still be near her? Even if it was a random choice (probably not) it still ended up as the first option in Jecka’s brain. 

Jecka’s grip on the steering wheel tightened. She rolled her shoulders and opened the little mirror on the car's ceiling real quick, to fix her hair and check her face. 

She looked as hot as ever, no mistake there, but it would’ve been cringe if her makeup wasn’t properly covering the rings under her eyes from crying the whole last night. 

You’d never know with Nicole, maybe seeing that would make her feel guilty into staying, or at this point, she may be so extremely tired that she’ll decide that this is a reason enough to drop off. She wants Nicole to feel bad about making her sad, but not enough to kill herself, although the notion is nice.

Because of fucking course Nicole could take any dumb thing, reason, statement, or whatever, and make it into a thing worthy enough of killing herself. 

But maybe that meant that she could do the opposite too. If Jecka helped a bit.

Jecka turned the ignition off, picked up a plastic bag and walked out of her car, she closed it and shut the door, pocketing her keys. 

It didn’t take long to spot the ivy-green tent, standing lonesomely under the bridge. At least no neighbors other than criminals and rapists that roam the streets throughout the night. 

Jecka made the last few steps until she was standing right in front of it, clutching the bag she held. 

She hesitated, but then simply decided that fuck it all, she lived nearby so she lowkey-highkey owned this place. Yeah. Definitely. 

Jecka’s hand reached for the zipper and she pulled it open swiftly in one go, praying that no matter how in a way unlucky it may be, that it’ll be Nicole who she finds inside, and not some old hobo junkie. 

The tent opened with smoke pouring out of it in round waves, the scent of cherry and… wait is that banana and strawberry? 

And so as she poked her head inside, she was met by the sight of Nicole, smoking her banana strawberry vape and sitting cross-legged on a fucking Montana sleep bag, a dead cherry vape next to her.

“Hey, what the fuck are - Jecka?” Nicole stopped herself mid-threatening, eyeing Jecka with a shock. 

“What are you doing here?” She asked.

“Well, I’m here to borrow a cup of sugar, obviously.” Jecka replied seriously, tossing her hair back.

Nicole eyed her confusingly, but going along maybe thinking that it was just a hallucination of Jecka amongst all the banana & pink strepsils vape smoke that only now got to fly out, since that idiot closed the tent fully.

(God, Jecka must’ve looked ethereal, her face emerging from amongst all the clouds.)

“I sadly don’t have any.” 

Jecka clicked her teeth, making a sad face “No? And the husband’s not home either?” She questioned, tilting her head.

“No, he just got drafted into the military this morning,” Nicole said in response dryly. 

“Now, that’s a shame.” Jecka answered in a tone that barely resembled sadness or mourning. 

“Would you mind me staying around then?” Jecka asked slyly and winked. “For extra support.” 

Nicole put her vape down. “Jecka, why are we pretending to be in lesbian porn, again?” 

“Do you have anything better to do?” 

Nicole’s gaze slipped to balls of crumbled paper lying next to her, but she quickly looked up again. 

“Don’t you?”

Jecka shrugged, “Not really, got four history classes today so I decided to skip.” 

“And I thought that you wouldn’t be able to do that once you’re in college?” Nicole’s lips quirked up, and Jecka took that as an invitation, kicking her shoes off and entering. 

“I might have been a bit biased.” Jecka admitted, closing the zipper behind her, and placing the bag in between them. 

Nicole made space on the Hannah Montana sleeping bag, and before sitting on Hannah’s face Jecka’s eyebrows furrowed at what she saw.

“Nicole, did you kiss your sleeping bag goodnight?” she asked, kneeling in front of the other one with a hint of concern in her tone, at which the brunette gave her a dead look.

“Yeah, Jecka. Ive been making out with the picture of Hannah Montana. She kinda looks like Emily, that must've been what led me to such an action- Christ, Jecka, please stop looking at me like that, look closer at the kiss marks. Who’s cheap ass lipgloss does it look like?”

Jecka sighed in relief, “Thank god, I was beginning to wonder if you’ve hit a new low without me around to judge you for it, before joining you.” 

Nicole raised an eyebrow. She sat with her knees up to her chest and arms wrapped around them. 

“You’d join me in… making out with sleeping bags?” She puzzled. 

“Bitch, imagine a Ryan sleeping bag. I’d kiss it goodnight too, and recite poems in the mornings. I’d weep having to leave the house.” Jecka responded explaining, “Also Emily? Why not me?”

Nicole nodded, “Ryan, of course.” as Jecka sat next to her. She eyed Jecka’s jacket- well, it was Nicole’s red one from yesterday, and even if Jecka didn’t pick it specifically in the morning with the thought of meeting Nicole, now she was glad that she was not entirely over this thing, because it may show Nicole how much she cares in a way other than words. 

“Would you want me to imagine I’m kissing you goodnight instead of Emily when I’d be kissing a piece of polyester?” 

“Definitely.” Jecka answered easily. “If you have to go psycho about someone, I’d be charmed to know that it’s me.”

Nicole actually grinned at that, “So if I was to start to hallucinate, it should be of you bitching about how bad the nightmare before Christmas is.” 

“No, like, watching you as you shower and making fun of the fact that you’re hallucinating me instead of just calling me.” Jecka joked. 

Honestly though, the thought of Nicole hallucinating her scared Jecka somehow. Wasn’t she enough? Would Nicole prefer a version of Jecka that was only in her head? What would she look like? Act like? Would it still be her, or a perfect copy put on whatever pedestal Nicole had for her in her mind.

Maybe that version would hold Nicole’s hand before she jumped.   

“Wouldn’t that be creepy?” Nicole considered. 

“You’re a girl, so no.” Jecka refuted, “The worst you could do is like, become a witch and curse me or something.”

“So I have your official blessing for imagining you as I shower?”

“As if you don’t already.” 

Nicole shifted her voice to dramatic, “Jecka, you think so little of me?” 

“No, I just think very highly of myself.”

“Ah, that would check out.” She agreed, before looking down at the plastic bag in front of them. “So what’s that?”

“Exactly what you think it is.” Jecka smirked, “Could a hallucination of me do that?” 

“You’re my favorite.” Nicole professed.

“Duh.”

They unpacked the fresh red lobster cheesy biscuits and the rest of their food and began to eat in silence. 

The air between them was… lighter? 

No okay, not exactly. But it was better than how it was the day before. It wasn’t that Jecka straight away wasn’t upset anymore, but it just mattered less now that she’d seen the state Nicole’s in.

She was alive, still joked, even smiled, but the whole thing felt so off in Jecka’s head. There wasn’t that usual energy in Nicole’s voice or eyes. She sat curled up, obviously tired and not well, but she still entertained Jecka’s beating around the bush. 

They were both too tired to be bitter at this point. They could just cast aside the issue and try to deal with the damage they caused first. Glue the broken teacups together, and then swing the basketball bat at them again. 

They just need a lot of duct tape, and some fucking good super glue, not just a glue stick of magic kisses and glitter. No, no, no, they needed to be wrapped well, extra fucking bubble foil insulation. 

Because one of them will snap at one point, and they both have to be ready for that. But now? Now they were both barely standing there, on their respective saucers, with the parts of what had been theirs shattered everywhere. 

And they were no fucking fancy China set- well, Jecka was quite angelic but not made of some half-ass material, and Nicole wasn’t either. But they still had broke, and the porcelain, glass, and ceramic of theirs all mixed up together in shards in between them, making it damn hard to even cross the distance to help the other.

But now Nicole stood weaker than ever, barely the base of her left. The parts didn’t fit together anymore, she didn’t even try to make them hold any resemblance to what it was supposed to look like. It just existed. 

Nicole just existed. Barely, amidst all of the glass and ash of the parts that were impossible to recreate.

So Jecka did throw herself in there too, but only to stick some of the easier pieces into convincing enough spaces, to get Nicole away from it as swiftly as possible. 

They can go back there later, small trips, but just the essentials for now.

“Oh shit, I’ve forgotten the napkins” Jecka grumbled, looking around and trying to find something to wipe the sauce off of her not-new but still fire jeans. She should focus on eating more and thinking less. “God this place is uh messy.”

“It’s all a useless cluster,” Nicole grumbled dramatically. 

Jecka reached out for one of the crumpled paper balls and opened it wiping her hand off on it, but she stopped abruptly seeing what she was looking at. 

She read under her nose, and when Nicole turned around from where she was looking through her backpack for any napkin alternative, she reached out quickly trying to rip it away from Jecka’s hands.

“Jecka, don’t read that-“

“- So when that red-headed bitch hugged me from behind in the cafeteria, whispering ‘Hi girlfriend’ with a nervous stutter, I knew that I had to kill myself, but because of you I didn’t- Nicole what the fuck is that? Did you seriously put anything Ari-related under the session dedicated to me?” Jecka chided.

“Yeah I know, I threw it aside, it’s not to be read!” Nicole complained. 

Jecka scoffed, ignoring her. “I can’t believe that you wanted to kill yourself over that, she could’ve grabbed your ass in public or some shit, this ain’t anything.” 

“Jecka, it was so embarrassing.” Nicole empathized, “It was in the middle of the damn cafeteria, the same day I wrote three pages about how Ari was the reason behind my suicide just out of spite.” 

“You’d never.” 

She shrugged, “Yeah, but I had to let it out, the worst part was Emily reading it. She thought it was a love letter, that was actually what made me want to kill myself that day. But I realized that then everyone would read it, and I didn’t have any inspiration for a better letter because I was hungry and we did have PE together too later that day.” 

Jecka wiped the sauce off her now stained jeans and crumbled the paper again before throwing it at Nicole. 

“Hey, the fuck was that for?”

“For writing this, and for never writing three pages of a love letter about me.” 

Nicole scoffed, “Please, are we in fifth grade to write poems about one another?”

“Literally I now expect you to.” Jecka decided, “After that shit with Ari, my self-esteem has never recovered fully into its full glory.” 

“Maybe that’s better, we don’t need you to have a god-complex too.”

Jecka blushed. “I just know my worth.” 

“As you should.” Nicole agreed easily. “So what’s up with your Ari jealousy?”

“I’m more offended than jealous.” Jecka replied, puffing her cheeks.

“How so?”

“She has an attitude you know?”

“Is that how you’ve found me?” Nicole asked, “Suffered Ari’s seductions?” 

Jecka sighed, “No, more like her declining the idea of mine.” 

“What a crime, saying no to you. Are you actually a man in disguise?” Nicole jested.

“No, I’m just that hot.” 

Nicole shrugged, “Fair.”

Jecka sat back now, relaxing after eating something. “So that’s where you’ve obtained this domicile of yours. No surprise in that I guess, but how the fuck did you get Ari to agree? Weren’t you guys on bad terms and shit after the breakup?”

Nicole groaned. “So, remember when we talked last time abt Ari and I said something along the lines of her having to find it where she left it?”

Jecka narrowed her eyes but hummed along

“So, I might have helped her with that.“

“Did you… apologize to Ari?”

“Um, You could say that?” Nicole nodded, before continuing as nonchalantly as possible, “We kinda made up with breaking up for the second time when I lived with her.” 

“Oh, hey that’s goo- Wait, the the actual fuck?” Jecka sputtered, half shouting. “What do you mean you broke up again? You dated her?” 

Nicole paled, “Calm down, it was just to have a place to stay after I got kicked out.” 

“But when we spoke last time you said-“

“Ohhh, yeah, I genuinely forgot about it, that’s how insignificant it was!” Nicole quickly responded empathizing with waving her hand and rolling her eyes. “God, honestly? It was such a low point in my life, that I tried to imagine it was just a fever dream.” 

“Still, I can’t believe that you were with her.” Jecka huffed, crossing her arms. 

“But I was with Emily too?” Nicole questioned with a raised brow “Well, you know, not like with Ari, but still?”

“Yeah but Emily is-“

-Hot.” Nicole finished for her. 

Jecka nodded. 

“And Ari is just-“

“Pretty?” Nicole asked, “Yeah.” 

“So with Ari, it’s more of a choice, when with Emily it feels like an obligation.” Jecka explained.

Nicole actually nodded, “Yeah I guess you’re right. But to my defense, I was drunk. And on whatever pills Emily gave me goodbye.”

“Bitch I’ve seen you in such a state daily for months, and you’ve done just fine, not a single of Jeffrey’s creepy comments would go unnoticed.”

“That’s because I have the dignity of unburdening you from having to even respond to such bullshit as which’s, probably minor, anime girls' tits are more realistically drawn.” 

Jecka laughed, “Woah, what a girlfriend material you are, aren’t you.” She commented lightly.

Nicole laughed shortly and shallowly.

“Well, it turns out I’m not.”

They were silent for a moment at that, Jecka caught off guard as if this wasn’t part of what they were going to talk about. Maybe it was just that she didn’t expect Nicole to bring it up.

And from the expression on Nicole’s face, she must’ve not expected to do that either. 

“Well if Ari’s told you that, she doesn’t know shit.” Jecka replied, being aware of the lack of any ground for that. “Trusting Dyeboxe’s opinions on such matters should be below you.” She added. 

Nicole looked up confused, “What do you mean, Jecka? You literally broke up with m-“ 

“Yeeeah I did, but since then I’ve realized that we’re the kind of couple that will break up once a month so we may just as well get used to it.” Jecka winged on-spot sentences that clicked true in her head. 

Nicole stared at her, “You mean… that that’s normal?” She questioned in untrusting disbelief.

“ Fuck no,” Jecka giggled, “but neither is beating your wife, shooting heroin up your veins, disciplinary tattoos, threats about beating your own child up-“

“-Drinking four wine bottles alone, kicking your own child out of the house,” Nicole nodded along. 

Jecka grimaced, “Divorcing and trying to date your daughter's friends,” 

“Or blowing your brains out in front of your daughter and blam- yeah .” Nicole stopped abruptly, just nodding and matching Jecka’s face in expression.

Jecka raised an eyebrow for a moment but decided to stay on track, “Yeah, exactly. No surprise then that this -“ she gestured between her and Nicole, “- is normal. Well, our normal.” 

“Our normal?” Nicole repeated, not seeming convinced. 

“Yeah, our normal.” Jecka assured, “That means it answers to no other bitches than us. Our normal, our rules.” 

“But when I was with Ari-“

“Don’t compare our civil emotional abuse to your Stockholm syndrome experience.” Jecka warned.

Nicole still seemed dubious, and tired. Jecka’s improv sadly has never been as convincing as Nicole’s, but her self-righteousness was making up for it here, and it’ll have to do. Because Jecka knew that Nicole could see through her facade, the nervous picking at the skin around her nails, and the overuse of Jecka’s perfections as arguments- but it wasn’t- well. 

The only persona Nicole wouldn’t call her on out was that of literal divine perfection sent from heaven above to tread lightly among all of them. 

Because it wasn’t a lie. 

Well, the wording here had been a bit exaggerated, but Jecka knew who she was, and if you have words then why the fuck not use them as well as you can. 

So of course Jecka might be overusing that fact a bit, but it was the ground, and Nicole didn’t seem to have any other to stand on, so she might as well stand next to Jecka on this universally known one. 

“Do you love me?” She asks suddenly. 

Nicole looked shocked at that question. 

“I… I don’t know-“

“Well, do you want to?” Jecka interfered quickly. 

Nicole looked a bit hesitant before answering “Yes?, yes I do.”

“Well, then you already love me some, dumbass.” Jecka declared proudly, “You have to love me some to want to try to love me.” She recited the thing she read on a fortune cookie paper three years ago.

“Oh?” Nicole let out. “But what if I want to love you because it would like, give me something?”

“Like what? Because I doubt that a will to live would do that, from what you’ve been telling me.” Jecka replied in an unimpressed tone, but she didn't stop smiling. 

“No but like… what if it was to-“

“Feel something?” Jecka guessed.

“Make you happy.” Nicole answered instead.

Jecka inhaled, feeling muddled, but also

“Well, wouldn’t that mean that you still love me a bit, if you want to make me happy? I mean, what else does that give you?”

Nicole looked thoughtfully, “I dunno, like, less guilt if I kill myself? Not wasting your time? Making it worth it?” She shrugged, “Letting you know that I did really fully love you?”

“Nicole, I think that’d make it worse.” Jecka said unsure. She wouldn’t want to- oh god, “I do not want you to write in any of your letters that you love me.” 

“Loved.” Nicole corrected as if she was a fucking English teacher.  

“Never mind, it still would mean that you did, because why, tell me why you would lie about that?”

“To make you feel better?”

“Why?”

“Because I care?”

“How much?” Jecka pressed.

Nicole struggled here, “A lot , Jecka.”

“Well, you ever cared that lot about any of your other friends?”

“I’m unsure. No, I don’t think so, probably not.” Nicole guessed.

“Well then, even if you’re simply in love with me for being your best friend or just because I’ve made the school suck less, that’s still enough.” She said “Why are we even questioning my bulletproof logic? You want to try and that’s enough, maybe that’s more enough than it’d ever be.”  

Nicole began to massage her head, probably because of the plot holes in Jecka’s speech. In her defense, she had like twenty-five minutes to prepare, and she spent a good half doing her makeup in Red Lobsters bathroom, and the other driving and singing her heart out to MSI to prepare emotionally.

“You mean I’ll never have to feel that I…love you?” Nicole finally managed to find an answer, which of course was just another question.

Jecka shook her head. 

“More like, even if you don’t, and you break my heart, then at least the fact that you spent your entire life trying will be enough for me. That’s a lot of love, even if it isn’t directed at me, or given directly to me, it’s still done for me. That’s love too.” 

Nicole looked at Jecka as if she had grown a second head. “So you don’t give a shit if I’ll fail forever?” 

Jecka shrugged. “No. Not if we stay together.”

“I don't know if I can do that, Jecka.” Nicole hissed through her teeth, “Don’t you think I've tried before?”

“We can figure it out, just if you-”

“What do you want me to say?” Nicole interrupted her angrily. “Because I don’t fucking know why I act as if I’ve gotten a darn lobotomy. “

Jecka didn’t know either. She didn’t know if it was because of Nicole’s father's death, her parent's divorce, being pretty, being lonely her whole life, or the realization of what the world is. She didn’t fucking know what was it, and Jecka wished they could blame it on Nicole’s father's death, but they fucking know that it wasn’t just that. 

Jecka knew that Nicole’s mom could’ve done better, that it all could have worked out if anyone gave a single fuck about something else in her than Nicole’s body. And Nicole knew it to.

“You know,” Jecka spoke quietly, and slowly, trying something else instead, “I think that when bad stuff happens to us, it kinda changes something in our brain.” 

The calm response to Nicole’s anger subdued it immediately, and instead, she was back to looking dead as she monotonically asked “Lobotomy on the spot?” 

Wow, she really was into lobotomy now or what? Let's hope that it's a recent development that Jecka can just blatantly rip out before it even properly roots. If it was not a new thing, then well, Ari’s denial to Jecka today would at least make some sense. Though you don’t need that much brain capacity to understand that Jecka’s hot, you only need more if you want to truly comprehend it just how hot she is. No wonder Nicole’s brain is on fire if it has all the gears to get that.

Yet Jecka nodded, as she scooted a tad closer from Hannah’s face to her chest. “I think that it scars us- some stuff in us. It stabs and tears apart, claws at it, and rips to shreds. Like men do when they realize abusing women is practically legal.” 

“Maybe that thing then killed those stuff in me.” Nicole swallowed and shrugged.

Jecka hummed in thought. “I don't think it can kill them.” 

“No?” Nicole replied in a doubtful tone.

“No.” She shook her head. “Just tears it to such pieces, organs, blood and all of that, and it’s so ugly and sick that we don’t want to- or can’t look at it.” Jecka continued quietly and practically whispered the last part.

“Maybe looking would kill us.”

Nicole blinked, not looking at Jecka anymore.

Jecka felt uneasy and sick inside, as she reached for Nicole’s hand, placing hers on the brunette's lightly. 

That made Nicole flinch slightly before she looked up.

Her lips were a thin line and her eyes narrowed as if trying to keep the tears away, when she spoke up “Does it mold?”

Jeckas eyes searched hers, and Nicole took a deep breath 

“…Do you think it rottens…inside?”

“Like...” Jecka tried to search for words, her eyes filling up too now “Like those fucking zombie movies?” 

Nicole shrugged barely, “Yeah, yeah like that I guess.”

Jecka imagined it, the infection spreading on the disinfected wound. The dirt, mud and splinters gathering inside, sickly yellow bubbles growing and dripping with puss, the skin so, so feverishly red around, it all burning and waiting to explode only to rebuild again, and again, until the only remedy was to amputate. 

Jecka didn’t want Nicole to have to cut off her head, or heart. This isn’t fucking décapiter la reine! Nor was Jecka a cardiothoracic surgeon. 

Maybe Nicole despised her for that. 

“We could… maybe just if we…” She was at lack for words, Jecka honestly had no idea what to do at this point. What did Nicole want? What would be enough to make it work? 

“Nicole?” Jecka asked silently after a while, “Are you alright?”

“No,” Nicole shook her head. “I’ve just realized that I need a really good excuse for all of what has happened, for me to be able to live with it. So please, Jecka, give me one.” She whispered in a pleading voice suddenly. “Please just make one up. Make it yours I don’t care, honestly whatever you want, just-“

Oh . Okay, she wasn’t alright. Dumb question.

Jecka knew- and it was fucking horrifying. Okay, no calm down. She knew exactly what that meant, god how insane it was, that’s- she got it- alright. 

It needs to fit the frames Nicole already has. 

In her luck those were scattered and so random but placed in such a specific order, that Jecka had no issue finding the colors that would fit in them. The real issue was how broken and barely hanging, they were. meaning that whatever you’d put in there would probably fall sooner than later.

But it’s not about forever, it had never been about that with them. It’s about right and fucking now. That’s their peak and that’s their highest attainment. Their own ideal aim of living.

So what did they have now? It was always about that. Jecka glanced around, while still gripping Nicole’s shoulders in what she could only wish to be comforting too, since it was most likely rather painful. But whatever, it kept her ho down on earth in whatever extreme conditions she was in right now, and that’s what made it even.

Alright, alright. They weren’t together, so they should be together again. That would be the cast, now onto the doodles that will make Nicole believe that she isn’t lied to about her bones healing. Not that they were, they weren’t even broken, she didn’t know if they were even there, but Jecka wasn’t a fucking wizard, and pretending to be a doctor was enough of a headache.

“We should get back together Nicole.” Jecka whispered frantically, Nicole’s dead eyes hardly even looking up at her anymore. “We just are, okay?”

She didn’t reply.

“Nicole,” Jecka shook her a bit, “okay?”

“...okay.” Nicole replied meekly. 

So the doodles, the doodles, the doodles, the doodles, her name on them amidst, and around whatever makes it believable. So fine. Okay. 

“Nicole, I love you.” She hissed, shaking Nicole a bit. 

And her name, right next to Jecka’s, it’s them together until they’ll have to scrape it apart again, but just for now, for today and maybe for tomorrow too. Or a week, in Jecka’s greatest fucking dreams. 

“And I know that you love me too.” 

Nicole looked up a bit automatically, grimacing at that, because she probably did remember that it used to not be enough. And suddenly Jecka comes up with trying as a replacement for that. 

So what will keep it alive this time, some flowers and sticks and whatever was on hand- Jecka wasn’t a goddam artist, she was just a stupid bitch who wanted to go back home and push stardust into fine lines. Why does love got to be like this?

“And yes, I know I’ve told you that it wasn’t enough. I know, I know,” she pleaded, shifting between that and a firm forced smile as she confessed “But I noticed that nothing will ever be.” 

Nicole frowned so hard that Jecka was waiting for a comment, yet in the end no one was going to stop and save her from this manic rambling. 

“And that’s honestly fine, because you want to die, and I want you alive, and I’ve wanted that future where we will be okay but we don’t have to be! I know you can’t, it’s okay, I’ve told you, we can have our future-“

“I’m bringing you down-“ Nicole stopped her harshly.

“No you aren’t,” Jecka responded harshly too, “I am. I know that this isn’t right, but since when has anything been at this point? I just know that I want you alive Nicole, I really want you here. I don't care what kind of tomorrow I’ll wake up to if your dumb ass wakes is there.”

And it wasn’t a lie.

“I want you here too” Nicole muttered. 

And Jecka hoped that this wasn’t one either.

“You better. Alright, you know that I’ll always stay-“

Nicole tried to throw in a comment. But wasn’t allowed, as Jecka wouldn’t stop talking, 

“I left, yes, I did and I was right for it and all but it doesn’t matter right now. This isn’t something I know how to fix either. But it can be fixed, right?” The last part was hesitant and nearly as hopeful as fearful it was.

Nicole blinked, standing stiffly and glancing around too now before nodding very quietly, staring right into Jecka’s eyes with the same fear glistening in them

“Alright.” Jecka exhaled, loosening just the slightest, “We know it can be, we just don’t know how.” She said very carefully. “And even if it won’t be anytime soon- or ever, we’ll manage.”

That last one was a lie, but a lot of things were, and they didn’t have a lie detector as a witness - thank god - to bitch about it in peep pip peep whiny sound. Hah, that kinda reminded Jecka of Ari.

“So we need to find out, but we have tried everything we know.” She continued before getting interrupted by a displeased Nicole.

“Jecka, I am not going to couples therapy with you.”

“Shush!” Jecka threw her hand on Nicole’s mouth silencing her, “We don’t know how, so we’re going to find it, because that’s what will keep you alive, right?”

Nicole's brows knitted, “ha’s supid’ ‘eka’” 

She groaned into Jecka's still planted on her face's hand, and Jecka smirked victoriously “Sorry, can’t hear you.” Nicole narrowed her eyes and Jecka yelped as the fucking bitch licked her hand. 

“Nicole!” 

“That’s stupid Jecka.” Nicole repeated. “How do you want to do that? Go inside my fucking brain and poke the decaying flesh? Because that may just fucking kill me on the spot.” 

How do you look at the unseeable? Who the hell gazes into Medusa's eyes and comes back. They got no fucking Perseus around, only frat boys at best.

Jecka feared that no matter where Nicole looked, it would end in the same manner. So Jecka had to hold her gaze until she figured out where to lead it. To keep her attention while she fucking poked at that decaying whatever in Nicole’s brain, because the cast gotta get off at some point and whatever they’ll find inside needs to be dealt with somehow.

They can’t leave it. And She can’t let Nicole look at it without offering anything that will soften the reaction to that. Just what, the cast? It was already falling off as she just began to wrap it around. The world will keep scratching it off. 

And when Jecka focused her gaze on Nicole’s darkly blue eyes, that’s when she realized that she couldn’t hold it forever. Neither of them could. So Jecka in a sudden rush of overbearing panic hugged her tightly, because that needed to be enough for the in-betweens. It had to be.

And it would be just for now, but the time was ticking, and Jecka wasn’t- 

She held Nicole closer and began to cry, because oh for fucks sake of course she wasn’t going to cry over the fact that her best friend and ex-girlfriend-but-not-anymore wanted to kill herself, but over the realization that she herself couldn’t be ever enough for that. 

She can’t keep Nicole alive, Nicole won’t let her for long. 

She couldn’t give her a reason to live, but she could offer one worth waiting for. A relief that’ll seem nicer than death for now, warmth, awkward shallow promises they’ll agree on, with a glass of truth aside, that’ll help them swallow it through. A beverage like that demands good quality wine- not the shitty kind Jecka’s mom chugs if she can’t, but the kind Nicole’s mom pretends she can’t afford. 

But she asked for Jecka to keep her now, just for a while, as the fear subdues. The way Nicoles held tightened, made Jecka wonder if the part that loved Jecka wanted to stay around just for a bit longer.

Jeck wished she was Emily sometimes, that way she could’ve granted Nicole an escape, instead of everything she was running away from on a silver platter unintentionally sometimes. At least Nicole appreciated the thought behind it.

The part in Nicole that loved Jecka had been insane to stay during all this, Jecka realized, a miracle at this point. Because to hold onto something like that, was as if grasping a thin thread and hanging on it above the eternal darkness that promised and whispered. 

That void that was Nicole’s first true lover, that had no affection towards her nor emotion. Just a gnawing hunger that patiently awaited Nicole to let go. 

Because that’s what you do when you love or hate someone fiercely, as tightly as you hold, you then let go. 

And that’s what Nicole did too, then, her hold on Jecka lessening, as she pushed herself ever so gently away.

And as everything in Jecka screamed and cried, clawing her throat, she let herself be pushed away. 

“I love you Nicole.” Jecka whispered, vibrating with shock. 

Nicole blinked a few times with confusion, “I know? I… try, Jecka.” She reminded slowly. 

“Yeah. I know.” Jecka voice could be barely heard, and Nicole didn’t seem to know what to do now. 

“Jecka…”

“Well look at it together,” Jecka decided, “just for a short moment, and then we’ll pretend it’s not there, okay? We’ll keep doing that until we fucking die if we have to, but we are going to do that until we figure out what to do with it. 

Nicole tried to disagree “I don’t, why would we-“ 

“Because I’m not dying just to stay alive again!”  Jecka suddenly screamed. “That’s what they’ve made you do, and you want me to suffer that too now?!” She asked, her tears turning to angry ones.

“Because if you fucking die, my heart will too, you stupid ho. So yeah, I’m fucking dying right after you, you know what? We may as well schedule.” She laughed, “Yeah that way it’ll be easier, spare me the sight of your dead body, I know you can be merciful and I fear today is the fucking start of a new road for you, Nicole, because you’re going to spare me all of it! And no fucking Emily involved, that bitch can follow me into hell out of jealousy for stealing her idea I don’t give a shit.” 

Nicole looked shell-shocked, gaping like a fucking fish, goddamit her dream spiritual animal could be a wolf or a jaguar or what the fucking ever that girl dreamed of, but Jecka knew that in her next life, Nicole was going to just be slamming her fish face into a clear bowl of glass, that some brat probably put colorful sand in and a plastic castle at best. 

Golden fucking little fat fish like Jeckas hazel eyes, because if reincarnation works, then the fucking soulmate Japanese myth of looking like your past lover may too. 

“You’re either doing this or getting sloshed down the toilet!” Jecka screamed.

“Are you… threatening to drown me in a bathroom stall?” Nicole half screamed, before her voice wailed off, sounding genuinely concerned. Or amused. Who knew? Jecka’s vision was too blurry for this emotion from face recognition type of shit. 

“NO!” Jecka shouted, pushing Nicole away weakly. “We are leaving now .” 

Nicole raised her hands open, “Okay, okay, jeez, we’re going to uh?” 

“Emily’s.” Jecka decided on the spot, putting her shoes on.

“ Emily’s?! ” Nicole repeated in disbelief, “We are going over to the Bitch who I stole drugs from?!”

“You’re fucking right we are!” Jecka nearly growled in anger, grabbing Nicole by her hood and basically dragging her halfway outside. 

“But-“

“I already asked her, she’s calmed down so do me a favor and chill.”

Nicole may not agree on their deal yet fully, but getting her out of this stupid place and getting some fresh air as well as hanging out with her and Emily may force Nicole to think. 

“Let me pack my stuff, Jecka!”

“I thought it was all a meaningless cluster?”

“It was when I was dying , when I’m alive it automatically gains importance!” 

Ah, Jecka eyerolled, just like her. 

She eyed the Hannah Montana sleeping bag that she shared the amount of spiritual importance with, and sighed, coming back in and beginning to pack Nicole’s stuff. 

Her head snapped around, and she barked “Gonna help me or what?” 

Nicole, who was still lying on the ground beside her, body halfway out of the tent, sighed and levered herself up on her elbows. 

“Can we get a divorce?” 

Jecka smirked, “You fucking wish.”

“Fine then, fine, Mrs.Smith.” Nicole mumbled, dramatically rolling herself over on her stomach and moving back inside the tent.

“Bitch, who told you we were using your last name?” 

Nicole took the Cherry Blast little tree off and threw it at Jecka. “Jecka, think. There can be only one Nicole Reed .” 

Jecka sniffed the little tree thoughtfully, “But then you could be the Evie to my Tracy- Mmm this smells like my perfume, and I don’t know if I should be offended or not. 

“Have you even watched that movie?” Nicole asked, rolling her eyes at the intensity Jecka was glaring at the air freshener. “It doesn’t smell like you, you just smell like it.” 

Jecka frowned as Nicole took it back from her, pocketing it in her hoodie. “That doesn’t make it better, Nicole. I don’t want to smell like a car air freshener, and yes I’ve watched it… or well, actually I’ve planned to, I heard the main characters kiss.” 

Nicole threw her backpack onto her shoulders, and Jecka grabbed the rolled sleeping bag, “Don’t everyone?” she shrugged, “Smell like a car air freshener when they have a car? You should own it, you know? show off that mysterious side of you.”

“Mysterious?” Jecka chuckled, leaving the tent with Nicole following “What’s mysterious about that?”

“Well, for the first, the type of car you’d own.” Nicole replied thoughtfully, and then frowned “Also I have no fucking idea how to pack this shit.” She gestured to the green tent.

“Nicole, I wear designer clothes. It’s not going to be a Honda Civic they’d find. Also me neither.” 

She took a step closer to the tent and kicked the pole, and the thread holding it slammed and smacked Jecka right in the face. 

“OW” she cried, and then shot Nicole a glare, “Why aren’t you doing anything”

“Oh! Uhm?” Nicole halted, standing frozen and staring blankly before she stepped closer and took Jeckas face in her hands before kissing softly her left cheek. Then she took a step back.

“I did not- not that- I- that was actually cute, but I meant like, beating up my attacker?” Jecka said, caught in between blushing and disbelief. 

“Yeah no, I don’t know why that would help. Revenge over anything” Nicole nodded.

“I’ll take both now that I know that it’s a possibility.” Jecka said amused. 

“I’m not attacking your aggressor.”

“Why? So you will kiss my face better, but not destroy the reason behind its pain?” 

“Jecka,” Nicole deadpanned, “it’s a beast. Do you want me to end up like you, or worse?” Questioned Nicole with a tad of humor at last in her voice 

“Uh, duh? Dying for me? So romantic.” Jecka encouraged, placing her right hand on her hip, and held Miss Montana in the other.

“I mean-“

“No, actually forget it- just let’s go.” Jecka eyerolled jokingly offended, and began to walk away.

Nicole eyerolled too, and gave the tent a proper kick goodbye. 

It was too proper though, because she lost her balance in the mud and fell on her ass.

Jecka gasped and ran back over to her, and stopped right above Nicole leaning down and helping her stand up.

“I know how to stand up I’m not that-“

“IT'S A WAR DECLARATION.” Jecka shouted and hugged Nicole with one arm, and the other pointing at the tent.

“Jecka, what are you-“

“A hero is made in the moment, not from questioning the past or fearing what's to come," Jecka spoke solemnly. 

“Bitch is that Smallville? Did that tent hit you that bad?”

“You told me we had a future together,” Jecka called out to the tent, “and that you don't want anything to stand in the way of our friendship” 

Nicole tried to wiggle out of Jeckas hold, but Jecka grabbed her with another hand. 

She shifted her gaze at Nicole now “There are times when I think you don't know me at all. And others when I think you know me better than anyone…” 

“Wait am I Lois? Of fucking course I’m Lois. They aren’t even together yet, are they?” 

“Shuuuuushhh Nicole,” Jecka fake whined, “Lois wouldn’t say that.” 

“Get a cape and bodycon and maybe I’ll rethink.” Nicole smirked. 

Jecka eyerolled and muttered “Buzz kill.” Before smirking too, grabbing Nicole’s face and leaving kisses everywhere.

“Jecka- wha.”

“Well I can’t get revenge on my nemesis at the moment, as it’s way too powerful for me to handle without a cape, so I’m doing damage control. Your idea, by the way.” 

“God- okay- my health is fully restored now. hundred points into recovery. Good game.” Nicole complained, blushing under all the kisses, “Want to just go back to the tent and make out?”

“NO? I’m never stepping inside of that trash can again. You can’t expect me to just embarrass myself like that after I announced the beginning of my rivalry with it?” Jecka pouted. Nicole was trying to look unimpressed, but Jecka could see her lips quirk. 

That was good, keep it light, amuse that bitch out of her depression for a minute. 

“Jecka, you just challenged a bunch of polyester into lifelong combat.”

“Nicole, you just told me ‘GG’ when I was kissing you.” Jecka countered dead faced. 

Nicole faltered. 

“ Please forget that. My brother kept yelling shit through the whole night when I lived at home and I must have absorbed it in my sleep or some shit.”

“I’ll be merciful, even though that was supposed to be your thing now,” Jecka said lightly. 

“Gods. I’m leaving, and taking the horse.” Nicole said, as she turned around and began leaving.

“The horse?” Jecka asked, as she picked up the left behind Hannah Montana on the ground and ran up to Nicole.

“Volkswagen Jetta. The white horse of my white knight .”

“Ok, no, leave the flying and saving from meteors and bald guys to me, and you can get the stinky armor and heavy swords.” 

“Actually-“

“Fine, cargo shorts and myths.” Jecka corrected herself, leaning on the street lamp next to her car. “I think I know a myth you could bust, aka my-“

“Virginity? That’s not even creative.” Nicole opened the trunk, throwing her backpack in it. 

Jecka scowled, before pouting thoughtfully, “Okay then, why is it illegal to turn on the lights in the car?”

“It’s not.” Nicole replied, taking the sleeping bag from her and throwing it in there too. 

“My dad says so.” Jecka argued. 

“Your dad’s a liar.” Nicole replied simply, throwing her hands up dramatically. “Myth busted, bam .” 

She slammed the trunk door shut, and Jecka pushed herself away from the lamp, heading for the driver's door. “No, but seriously Nicole. Didn’t you know?”

“Jecka,” Nicole called obnoxiously over from the other side of the car. Jecka opened her door and got inside just as Nicole did. “The reason people say it’s illegal is because the glare from an interior light can make it fucking hard to see through the glass.” 

Jecka shut her door with a slam, “No way.”

Nicole shut hers too, “Yes way, also you're so gay.”

Jecka rolled her eyes. “I know. Or is it like, my shoes? I just got them yesterday and I fucking knew people would assume that-” 

“No, no,” Nicole interrupted, “like for wanting to watch a movie just because you’ve heard that the main two characters who are girls kiss.” 

“Sorry that I didn’t watch it for the drugs.”

“Bitch, who does that, when you can just take them instead.”

“True.” Jecka agreed, turning on the ignition, “so why did you watch it?” 

“Oh,” Nicole shook her head, “I didn’t.”

Jecka facepalmed, “Then why- never mind. Of course, you won’t watch anything that does not involve men in cargo shorts busting myths.” She shook her head and began reversing out of the parking lot. 

“Cargo shorts over red spandex.” 

“It’s a part of the costume!” Jecka countered, “And it looks honestly good on him.”

Nicole grinned “It looked good on you too.” 

“You know what?” Jecka nodded, “I want that divorce.”

“Too late, Mrs.Smith.” Nicole shook her head, turning on the car seat heating on max, “The chance of your life has flown past you exactly eleven minutes ago.” 

“And why? Because you won’t sign the papers?”

“I won’t.”

“Not like they were legal at first.”

“Exactly,” Nicole “Our marriage wasn’t legal, that means that our divorce would be very illegal.” 

“I could bribe the judge, also-“ Jecka scowled. “How does that even work? You’re contradicting yourself ho.” 

“Well, no, If the marriage was illegal, then performing it was a crime. Divorce would just be confirming it, therefore bribing a judge wouldn’t even work, ho .”

“ Fuuuuckk .” Jecka sighed, “In sickness and health, I guess.” 

“In sickness and health, indeed.” Nicole seconded. 

Jecka felt a shiver because that was what this was now, right? Basically a marriage but better than their parents since they are free to break up whenever without bigger consequences. No spending the shared credit card money on shit to piss the other off.

Jecka wondered suddenly if, if they were to get married, if she’d really end up as useless as her dad kept telling her, her mom was, or will keep shouting at Nicole and threatening her.

Wait, wasn’t that what she just did like ten minutes ago?

“You know that we are not actually married?” Nicole’s voice broke her out of thought. She stared concerned out of the corner of her eye at Jecka.

Oh, she must have been looking quite spooked, rightfully so. But fuck that, she wasn’t her dad. 

“Yet.” She teased.

“Oh, are you going to drop on your knee any second now? Should I be afraid?”

“You wish .” Jecka spoke humorously, “ You’re the one to get me a ring. A diamond one. For all my effort.”

“I can’t afford a diamond ring, Jecka.” Nicole deadpanned. 

“Then steal one, Nicole.” She eyerolled as if it was obvious. 

“You know, I think I know why I half am, and half are trying to be in love with you.” 

“Because I’m enabling your kleptomania, or because I’m the hottest and prettiest bitch in the world?” Jecka asked sweetly. 

“Can it be both?”

“Do I look like Ari?”

“Boo.” Nicole blew a raspberry. 

“Boo, you .” Jecka sniffed and stuck out her tongue. 

Stuff seemed good now. It was a cover of shock and weariness but if they’ll hurry up and get into another distraction, it’ll wear off just in time. 

So Jecka sped up a bit and focused on the road ahead.

——-

We either hold onto what we know, or onto the ideals we have. And all Nicole knew was Jecka. 

And Jecka would be everything she’d know in this life. 

She knew Emily and Ari, sure, that was an experience too, but neither did what Jecka did. 

Emily was ready to give it all at once, it didn’t matter how long the fire burned, but how high.  

Ari kept her around, a steady but low flame. Enough of small escapes to nearly make up for the one that Emily offered. 

And Jecka? She made her realize that living is the only proper way of dying, and in death, only life can be found. Because she had died in so many ways.

Or that was what Nicole wanted to believe because Jecka promised her that’s how it was. Her patience and life span were too short though to wait for her brain to catch up and realize that, so she just will assume it did. 

Realizing that nothing matters repeatedly in different tastes is the best feeling in the world. They gotta be cooked well, a simple yolo is powerful, yes, but let Gordon Ramsey cook you fries n’ chicken, and you gonna shit yourself over the Parmesan and freshly cut grass from the other side sprinkled over it.

Like, you gotta have some good quality ingredients, and boom suddenly it’s not that bad to live and not die. For a moment.

And that’s what Jecka was currently trying to give her, Nicole presumed. She asked for whatever, and Jecka served what she had. She assured Nicole that it didn’t matter how they were right now, because nothing did matter, so why not? 

She didn’t know how long this would last, but Jecka sure did her job at distracting her from all of that for now.

“So,” after a moment of comfortable silence, Jecka began again sounding genuinely curious, “remember, how you've said you broke up with Ari to fix shit, how does that exactly work?”

Ohhh, Nicole sighed. Not that.

“Like, so at first it was only to have a place to stay.” She started with the obvious again,  ‘And then I kinda realized that maybe I could try and see how much I could push Ari’s boundaries again-“

Jecka halted her car suddenly, shooting Nicole a dead glare. 

“Listen! It was before! Before !” Nicole repeated hurryingly not wanting Jecka to hit another car. Because as much as she wanted to drive right into traffic she didn’t want Jecka to. Well, not without consent- no fucking no. Just no dying, not for Jecka. 

“But she wouldn’t really let me, and then I kinda figured it out, a bit?” She explained, “I went over to her and made things worse, but kinda better?” She furrowed.

It honestly made no sense why Ari didn’t kick her out the second she saw her. The last last time they’ve seen each other shit didn’t work, Nicole knew it wouldn’t and knew that she let Ari believe it would. Maybe Ari knew of that too, all along? Maybe as much as it was revenge or proof to herself, it had also just been what they all needed in life, a distraction.

And Nicole served as a good fucking one, mind you.

“Tell me from the start.” Jecka demanded.

Nicole groaned. “Uh so, as you can imagine at first we got into a two-week crazy romance of me wishing she’d shut the fuck up every time she spoke up while replying politely-“

“ You ? politely?” Jecka laughed. 

“Bitch you know what I mean, I didn’t really bully her into anything bad so that was a fucking five-star table manners of me. Mini spoon right next to the mini fork kinda shit.”

“Sure, so what the fuck was next? Because I don’t believe that she just accepted the whole situation somehow, and you guys made up.” 

“No, she didn’t, she was cheating on me-“

“Ari on you ?” Jecka gasped.

“-Mentally with her therapist.” 

“… but like, no sex?”

“None.”

Jecka tried to say something but sighed before trying again “You mean, uh god, Nicole what do you mean?”

“She’d rather listen to that fucks advices rather than mine. Isn’t that cheating enough?” Nicole objected. 

“God, Nicole that’s not even close.” 

“So I set an ultimatum, she kicked me out, and then I uh, made it up? By saying goodbye? But like, god I don’t know how to explain, it was meant to just prove to myself that she wasn’t you.”

Jecka blinked, “Bitch? Do I look like a redheaded slu-“

“No, not like that, geez, like all my relationships ending the same, Jecka. It’s funny…“

It was funny how the first time she left Ari it was Nicole leaving, and when Jecka left Nicole it was her leaving, and when Nicole made a change in her ways the second time dating Ari with a goodbye kiss and a mediocre mending, the same was given back to her by Emily. The hell was next then?

“Did you date anyone since we spoke last time?” Nicole asked a bit worriedly now because she didn’t want that mysterious cycle to get way more complicated.

“You mean since yesterday?” Jecka was perplexed. “Are you seriously asking me if I dated anyone in that short amount of time?”

Nicole didn’t answer. 

“Nicole?”

“What? You’re hot Jecka.” She shrugged annoyed.

“Not that hot .” 

Nicole eyerolled “Now you’re just fishing.”

“Yes I am, tell me more.” Jeckas face shifted from doubt to smugness momentarily and she threw a wink. “Honestly the fact that I even have to ask.”

Nicole managed to smile a bit, “Excuse my obscure and ignorant response, my queen, but did the hottest, baddest, and smartest bitch in the world perhaps find any paramour while I wasn’t present.”

Jecka giggled, “No, Nicole, I did not in the not whole twenty-four hours date anyone. Also, I thought that was Emily’s thing.” 

“Oh she’s the hottest bitch in town , that’s the difference.” 

Jecka smirked, “I see. So never going to let you become an astronaut so you won’t find a green, one-eyed bitch to cheat on me with.” 

Nicole lowered her seat so she could lie down comfortably, “I may be suicidal, but I still have standards, Jecka.” 

“Let’s hope your alien ho doesn’t.”

“Honestly, if I wanted to-“

“Okay okay, yes you’d blow their brains out and save us from invasion I know,” Jecka grinned, “but why were you asking anyway? Afraid that your time to kneel and propose had passed by?”

“That’s still illegal Jecka” Nicole reminded her, closing her eyes. 

“As if that’s ever stopped you before”

“Mm yeah, fine. But no, don't get excited and go dress shopping, I was asking because I noticed a weird pattern that may not really be real and kinda more coincidental than anything, but you know how it is.” 

Nicole opened her eyes to see Jecka just shake her head. “I have no fucking idea what you’re on about.” 

“Well, you were the one that suggested I got brain raped, so-“

“I did not do that.” Jecka argued. 

“Think about it.”

“…”

“Fuck.” She groaned. “It wasn’t meant like that. Lobotomy isn’t… Well okay, it kinda is.”

“Yup.”

They were finally reaching Emily’s house, and it took Jecka about ten minutes to get Nicole out of the car. Now they stood at the front porch of Em’s place, both not willing to take the last step.

“C’mon, go and knock” Jecka nodded forward.

“Why the fuck me?” Nicole disagreed, crossing her arms.

“It’s your ex?”

“Well, it’s your idea.”

“Well, it’s your life.”

“It’s actually our life now, by your design only.” Nicole recalled sweetly.

Jecka cursed, and inhaling deeply she took the last step and knocked. 

What they’d never fucking expect to happen, is to see Ari’s redhead open the door.