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JD wasn’t used to uninterrupted night’s sleep. Most of his nights were filled with sporadic short naps between hours spent pacing his room, reading, or scanning the radio for something decent to listen to. Tonight was no different, though he was calm enough that reading was fine, rather than the frantic pacing he did on more anxious nights. The steady rain outside made his impersonal, under-decorated room feel cozier than usual, and he was content.
The slight, hesitant knock on his window startled him, but he was used to it enough that he didn’t jump that much. He and Veronica had insomnia in common, and occasionally on a bad night they would sneak out to see each other.
But it wasn’t Veronica’s face that waited for him at the window. It was Heather Duke, sodden, pale, and shaking as she raised her hand to knock again.
He rolled off the bed so fast he nearly tripped before making it to the window so he could let her in. She looked up at him, her eyes seeming too huge in her pale face framed with soaked hair. It was shocking to see Heather like this. Heather, who was always put together, well dressed and perfect even when she was miserable. “If I look good, everything can’t be falling apart,” She’d told him once.
Everything must have been falling apart, if her looks were any indication.
“Heather…” JD kept his voice low, because the last thing they needed was for his father to wake up. Looking at her, he hated the feeling that he already knew what her explanation would be, and hated that he would need to hear it from her.
“My parents.” Her voice broke and her face crumpled. JD reached for her awkwardly, and was shocked when she stepped into his arms, burying her face in his shoulder so he couldn’t see her cry.
Her parents knew. They had to. No other single event could have brought Heather Duke to JD’s bedroom in the middle of the night during a rainstorm. He didn’t try to ask her about it. Instead, he coaxed her gently to the bed and wrapped his threadbare quilt around her shoulders.
She continued to cry, keeping her head ducked low as she tried to stifle her sobs in her blanket. Tears made JD uncomfortable, and as much as he wanted to help, he knew he was so far out of his element they’d reached another continent entirely.
JD reached for his phone and dialed Veronica’s number without looking away from Heather.
She picked up, her voice thick with sleep. “Who--”
“Veronica, it’s me. Heather is here. You--” He stopped to glance at Heather. She was watching him as if waiting for his explanation. “You need to come over here.”
God bless his genius girlfriend, she understood some part of what happened. “I’ll be right there.”
JD returned to Heather’s side. “Veronica’s on her way. It’ll be--” His words died in his throat. Could he promise that things would be okay?
Heather nodded weakly and tucked herself back into his shoulder. She seemed so small and fragile there, JD was scared he would break her if he touched her, but she also looked so lonely, and though he couldn’t follow where her mind had gone, he carefully put his arm around her and patted her shoulder.
This awkward comfort seemed to work a little, and by the time Veronica climbed into his room, Heather’s tears had slowed, though they hadn’t stopped altogether.
“Heather?” Veronica whispered, crouching next to the bed. “What happened?”
Scooting away from JD, Heather tugged the quilt more snugly around her shoulders. “Someone at my parents’ country club made a joke about how I don’t go out with boys. Apparently,” She stopped and hiccupped, wiping at a stray tear, “Someone started a rumor, that I might be… And they just kept pushing me, and yelling, and demanding explanations and finally I snapped. I yelled ‘Well what if it was true?’ And they… they just lost their fucking minds.”
There was a long beat of silence while Heather took a few steading breaths. “They told me to get out of their house, so I did. I was going to go to Veronica’s, but it was raining and yours is closer.” She shrugged and Veronica patted her shoulder.
JD was glad Veronica was there to provide some stability, because Heather’s story had touched a part of him that he usually tried to avoid. Now he paced, sorting through wild ideas of going to Heather’s house. Images of shouting, burning, breaking, or throwing things raced through his head like a slideshow of bad decisions that he couldn’t stop.
Heather sat on the bed, trying to pull herself together, and JD paced his room, wishing he could hurt the people who’d hurt her. Just to be able to do something would have calmed this urgency inside him, but with no bullies to fight, he felt utterly useless.
“Can Heather spend the night here?” Veronica asked him, her pragmatism taking center stage while the two people closest to her walked on the edge of falling apart. “Tomorrow you can come to my house and we’ll talk to my parents--”
“I can’t tell them!” Heather said, her voice catching.
JD jumped a little at her raised voice and glanced at the door again. He didn’t hear any sign of his father stirring, but there was no way to be certain.
Veronica put a hand on his arm to calm him and continued. “You don’t have to tell them everything. Just say that you had a fight with your parents and they asked you to leave. They won’t press you.”
JD knew Veronica’s parents weren’t question-askers. They accepted the world at face value and wouldn’t look deeper, and for once JD was grateful for that negligence.
Heather looked at him. “Is that okay?”
Even knowing the risk, JD could never have abandoned Heather right now. “Yeah, it’s fine.”
The smile she provided was weak, but steady. “Thank you.”
She was kind enough not to mention that they’d only put a band-aid on a gaping wound.