Chapter Text
“And this is Hard Harry, reminding you to sleep upside down and dance in the rain,” Mark said, ignoring the looks he was getting as he signed off. This was so much easier when he didn't have an audience, and now it seemed like he was guaranteed at least one person, if not two or three watching him every night.
“That made no sense, you know,” JD observed, coming over to lean against the desk. Mark looked up at his twin and shrugged. He wasn't at his best these days, and they all knew it. He still felt every bit of his injuries, and he tried hard not to take the pain medication any more than he had to, knowing JD took it even less often than he did.
Somehow, his brother's tolerance for pain was more than a little unsettling, but then JD had endured Bud Dean for years. Mark had only dealt with him for a day, and it was more than enough for anyone.
“It's not like it's unusual,” Nora said. “Half the time Harry didn't make sense. It was just fun to listen to him go off on weird things as well as the angst we all deal with, and to be... entertained and drawn in and... Well...”
“What she means is she loves you,” JD said, and Mark smacked him. His brother just laughed, going over to his own girlfriend and wrapping his arms around her.
“So... how exactly are you going to take your dad up on that offer he made?” Veronica asked, voicing the question Mark had been trying to figure out for a few days now. “I mean, you know about the whole 'legitimizing your act' idea, but no one's actually made contact with Hard Harry, so... what are you going to do?”
Mark grimaced. “Are you asking if I plan on telling my parents I'm Hard Harry?”
“The grace period of 'you almost died so we'll forgive you about anything' is almost over,” Nora said as she crossed over to him. “If you're going to tell them without huge repercussions, it would have to be now, I think.”
Mark was aware of that, which was probably part of the reason he'd been having so much trouble sleeping lately. He didn't know how to face his parents over the Hard Harry thing, even if they'd seemed more accepting than pretty much every other parent at Sherwood. He'd outright lied to them a few times when it came to the radio thing, and even when he hadn't, he'd said some things about them he didn't know that he wanted them to know about, but as he knew his dad, at least, had reviewed all the tapes, he was not sure he could ever say that was him.
“You still won't tell them,” JD said, and Mark flinched.
“Would you?”
“Fuck, no, but then I didn't start this weirdo therapy on the air that caught on with all of Sherwood, either,” JD said. He frowned. “You know, come to think of it, I'd probably have been more likely to burn the school down or something.”
“Not now, though,” Veronica said, looking up at him, and he just shrugged.
“So we need a way to get your dad's offer to Hard Harry so he can agree to it with some stipulations like... he's not telling them who he is or something,” Nora said. “I don't know that it's going to work unless you come clean. The point was to have him be licensed and approved by the school.”
“Which is kind of against everything Harry stands for,” Mark said, rubbing his forehead. “I don't think I can do that. Can I?”
“I think if we're getting existential about this bullshit, we need to be drunk,” JD said, and Mark winced again. He'd never actually been drunk before, but he had a feeling JD knew way too much about what that was like.
“Not tonight,” Veronica said. “My parents are expecting me home for a change.”
JD tensed up. “What? You never said—you're going to sneak back out and come back, right?”
The naked desperation in his brother's voice had Mark wanting to fidget for another reason, and he grabbed his cigarettes off the desk, grimacing as he rose and went toward the door. Nora followed him, which he'd expected, but he figured JD and Veronica would rather have the rest of that conversation alone.
“She's not actually going to go home,” Nora said, shutting the door behind them and taking a cigarette from Mark. “No way. Those two... they're practically inseparable. And your brother is so not over the nightmare thing.”
Neither of them were, but while Mark had an abbreviated horror show of Bud trying to pack in seventeen years worth of abuse into a few hours, JD had lived that. “Well, her parents still don't love him, despite my parents doing what they can to calm them down.”
Nora nodded, blowing out some smoke. “So... plan there?”
“Depends on what Veronica decides, though we could always try and do something that would impress her parents and convince them he's more... likeable than he is.”
Nora laughed. “Oh, come off it. You two really care about each other. In the short time you've known each other, you've become closer than anyone else in our clubhouse is with their siblings.”
“There's also huge age gaps and gender differences with most of those cases.”
“So?”
“So when are you going to admit your home life is more messed up than you're letting anyone know or there's no way you could be over here every night without people noticing?” Mark asked, and Nora stared at him long enough for him to regret asking. Still, he wasn't stupid. She shouldn't be able to come and go like she did. She never seemed to have to ask her parents for permission, not like the others, and never checked in with them. It was like they didn't exist.
“They're not Bud Dean,” Nora said. “They just... work all the time and could care less what I do so long as I'm not in their way.”
“Neglect is still abuse.”
Nora turned toward him, wrapping her arms around him. “It's not that bad, okay? I promise it isn't. If it was, you'd really know. I wouldn't lie about that. Especially not after what happened to you and JD.”
He nodded, though a part of him was still worried.
“You can't go,” JD said, hating himself for the words. God, he was so fucking weak. The idea of facing a whole night without Veronica next to him was already freaking him out, and it wasn't like he'd really be alone. If he asked, his brother would stick around with him.
It wasn't the same. Mark was a great guy and all, but it wasn't like they had grown up sharing rooms or beds and it was just... awkward to be in the same space, sometimes. People still stared at them, even after JD was able to replace at least part of his wardrobe and kept to his trench coat to help differentiate himself from his twin.
The forced haircuts from surgery had not helped any, and honestly, he didn't want to go back to school until it had grown back out. Not because he was vain, but because he was determined to be his own person even if Mark looked exactly like him.
Well, almost exactly like him. Mark had glasses, after all.
JD was never getting them, even if his eye sight got worse, which he thought maybe might be the case after the whole head trauma thing, but he wasn't saying a damned word about that to anyone.
“Look, I've used just about every excuse I can with my parents, had all of my friends cover for me, and Mark's parents have tried, but the plain fact is my parents still can't accept that I might want to have sleepovers with a boy,” Veronica said. She reached up to touch his face. “I don't want to go, but they said I really would be grounded again if I didn't.”
JD choked. “Veronica, I... I can't do this without you.”
She winced, and he hated himself for the admission, but all he saw when he closed his eyes if she was more than a few feet away from him was her death, Bud taking her from him like he had his mom—yeah, that was suicide, but JD never had any illusions about why his mom took her own life—and how he'd almost taken his brother and everything else.
Bud hated him, and he would do that, given half a chance. If they let him out on bail before his trial, if he managed to get acquitted somehow... the nightmare would start all over again, but it would be his life, just like it had been before.
“It's not forever,” Veronica said. “Just... one night, and I'll be back first thing in the morning. Mark's dad cleared stuff with our teachers so me and Nora can be with you in the daytime and keep up with class, just like the two of you and—”
“The nights are always the worst.”
Veronica sighed, wrapping her arms around him. “I suppose we could see if they'd relinquish custody of me to Mark's parents. Then I could be here all the time.”
“Yeah, right.”
“Well, if Heather hadn't poisoned them against you and we hadn't made a few mistakes of our own... things could be different, but my parents are still having a hard time accepting me as a grown up, and if they knew about the rest of it—”
“Come on. For all the jokes about it, we haven't actually had sex since I got out of the hospital.”
“No, not really because you're still hurting and I refuse to break you, but it's not like they see it that way. I'm still surprised Mark's parents are as accepting of it as they seem to be.”
JD snorted. “Because they're not stupid enough to think we're actually doing the whole thing because she's a nurse and knows better. Your parents are always going to think the worst of me. It's fucking ridiculous. Of all the bad shit I've ever done, I'm getting judged for the stuff I didn't even do.”
“Well, you did kick Kurt and Ram's asses—”
“Please, like anyone couldn't have.”
“And we did stay out really late one night because we did have sex and we did sneak you into my room several times for that purpose and—”
“Are you agreeing with them?”
“Just clarifying. There was stuff we've done that is legitimately what they're upset about, not just the stuff Heather lied or exaggerated about,” Veronica said. “Look, I... I love you, and I don't want to lose you or go home right now. I'm just trying to do this so it's not worse for us later. Because getting grounded again would really make things difficult, and I am not getting sent off to boarding school, either. We're going to finish school here, together. You and me. And maybe we do college. Maybe we don't. Whatever comes, it's us facing it together.”
He leaned his head against hers. “I don't... I know Bud just... he... too much good has happened lately, you know? I don't... I don't trust good. There's always something really bad coming when things seem good.”
She sighed. “Sometimes the good stays, too. This is one of those times, because we are going to make it one of those times. I swear.”
“And yet you're still going.”
“Only for a few hours. I promise I'll be back as soon as I can.”
“You can say it, you know. I'm pretty fucking pathetic without her,” JD said, coming up next to Mark to watch the station wagon with the girls drive away. Mark had a feeling his observation about Nora's family was why she'd said she needed a ride just before Veronica left, and it made him feel sick all over again.
“Like you're the only one,” Mark said. “Let's face it, neither of us copes all that well with our problems.”
“You have the non-violent solution.”
“Yeah, but it's not like people would say breaking the law, hosting illegal broadcasts, and stealing my neighbor's phone line is exactly... sane or right, either,” Mark said, shivering as the night got cooler. “I wish I knew what the hell to do. I should just tell them, but I can't. I'm afraid. I act like I'm not, but I'm terrified. I keep thinking I'll lose all of this—you, Nora, Veronica, the rest of the club—if I say anything to my parents about Hard Harry. And it's stupid because they forgave just about everything and seem to be totally fine with the whole girls sleeping over aspect of this... which most parents wouldn't be—”
“Um, your parents aren't stupid, and our injuries kind of hinder the missionary position, so—”
“Seriously? Did you have to—”
“You started it,” JD said, and Mark sighed.
He had kind of brought it up, but he didn't want to think about it now. Used to be he talked a lot about sex, but he'd come to understand just how immature his own attitude toward sex was when he'd had to tackle topics like abuse and even rape on the air. He wasn't sure how to deal with that, but making masturbation a giant joke on his show no longer felt half so funny as it was when he started.
“What is it?” JD asked. “That's not the usual reaction you get when I tease you about your prudish side.”
“I... I just was thinking... I mean... how much of what I did as Hard Harry was... flat out wrong? I mean, isn't it better if it just gets shutdown all the way?”
JD frowned. “After you exposed Sherwood's corruption, found a murderer, and tried to save a bunch of idiots from killing themselves because they don't have better outlets for their pain, you think you should just... stop?”
Mark ran a hand over his face. “It's a bit much for one person to be... that for everyone, and when I think about the early stuff I did... I don't know.”
“I think you're just looking for reasons to avoid telling your parents, which I understand, but I don't think you can walk away from this. It's not that simple anymore. Maybe if you hadn't reached anyone, but you did. You are these kids' voice, and yeah, it's way too fucking much for one person, but then again... you're a twin, so... maybe you're not one person.”
“Um...”
“I mean... no one's ever needed or wanted me before, but... there were a couple times there when you and I were... a team for Hard Harry, so technically, you're not alone in it. And Nora filled in for you once, and Veronica knows, so it's not just on you. You actually stand to do more good now than before, since you can ask the girls if there's an issue that is more up their alley than ours, and just thinking about how much you've helped with that already...” JD shrugged. “I don't think this is done. Remember, there's still the missing kids your dad is looking into, and Creswood needs to lose her job and Paige was talking about how messed up it is that Mazz got expelled, so there's still stuff that needs to be told, and you have a way to do that.”
“Yeah, but should I?” Mark asked, looking at him. “I'm just a messed up kid myself. I don't know the answers. I'm just as scared and lost as everyone else, maybe more, since what Bud did... I don't... that still... terrifies me even with him in jail, and I don't know how you can face it because he was so much worse to you and—”
“And you still had enough of a clear head to call the cops in his office and save our asses.”
Mark snorted. “Yeah, but that doesn't change what he did or what he said—I mean, when he had me and he was telling me how he was going to make up for seventeen years and how he'd done this kind of stuff to you when you were—”
“Don't,” JD said. “Just... don't. Okay? I'm fine. It's done. He's in jail, and I'm not—I'm done with the bastard. I see him again, I'll probably kill him, but he's not here now. He doesn't get to fuck up my life anymore.”
Mark didn't know what to say to that, not when JD was practically falling apart over the idea of Veronica sleeping at her own house for a night. Bud still had a hold on both of them, in prison or not, and it wasn't going away anytime soon.
“We could watch movies.”
“What?”
“Neither of us is going to sleep now,” Mark said, and JD didn't even try to argue it. “So let's just watch movies until morning.”
“Fine, but none of that romantic bullshit the girls keep subjecting us to.”
“Like you do anything but make out with Veronica when they do.”
“You could be having your own session with Nora if you wanted.”
Mark shook his head, still not really comfortable with being so... public about his affection for Nora. “Let's do something that won't remind us of anything that's bothering us.”
JD snorted. “You think that actually exists?”
Mark thought about it for a minute. “Um... maybe not.”