Chapter Text
jfk and van gogh were from different worlds, it seemed. no one associated them with one another, or ever saw them in the same place. then one day, the two were holding hands in the school halls. of course, word spread fast, and everyone at clone high had the same burning question:
what the fuck?!
why was this relationship so confusing? well, three things were shocking about it:
one: van gogh and jfk were total opposites. van gogh was emotional, a tad socially awkward, and took things a little too seriously. while he did attend most school events, he was by no means the life of the party. not too many people paid him much attention outside of art class, and he seemed to be fine with it; even wanting to keep it that way. meanwhile, jfk seemed to be happy and chipper all the time without fail (save for a few incidents in junior year). he could strike up a conversation with anyone (no matter how awkward), and he never seemed to take anything seriously. being one of the loudest and most popular clones at the high school, jfk never hesitated to be the center of attention, and he seemed to want to keep it that way. they were practically the physical embodiment of the phrase ‘opposites attract’.
two: they hardly ever interacted, and when they did, it was minimal. the most that people ever saw of them together before the relationship was on the track team, and even then, jfk seemed to spend most of his time around the cheerleaders or other teammates, while van gogh stood to the side for most meetings; the majority of students thought he was only on the team to fill out a gym credit. the two didn’t have any classes together, either, and never passed each other in the hall. the only time in school they could have possibly interacted was during events and assemblies, and… well, how much talking could they even get done then?
three: at the same time, jfk suddenly came out as bi. that took a little time for everyone to get used to, and along with the sudden relationship, it was a double shocker.
given these circumstances, everyone was a little more than shocked by the two’s sudden relationship, and understandably so. their confusion only grew when time passed, and the two stayed together without a problem. jfk wasn’t exactly known for long term relationships, much less closed ones. bets even went around for how long the two would last, how long it would take for him to cheat with one of the girls at school, or to announce that the whole relationship was a joke.
they just had to wait.
and wait they did.
a month passed, then two, then six, and soon enough, a year had gone by. the students at clone high decided to just come to terms with the fact that, yeah, the relationship was actually happening, and they finally moved on to another couple to obsess over.
flash forward to the first day of senior year.
despite the fact that multiple girls hit on him and pressured him, jfk hadn’t cheated at all; which he was very proud of. yeah, it seemed like the bare minimum, but suddenly going from an open relationship to a closed one wasn’t easy. and despite knowing that the real jfk had been in many relationships, he still continued with van gogh because he made him happy. getting to see his boyfriend every day, that made it all worth it. it made jfk feel warm inside, something he never remembered feeling with any of his previous partners.
he wanted to see van gogh more, and he knew just the way to do it. he would sign up for art classes.
now that he was actually going, jfk realized how weird and unnatural it felt to be in the art hallway. he never went into this part of the school, unless there was a pep rally and it was a convenient shortcut. the real jfk never took art class, so he’d never had a reason to be there. the room numbers marked on the walls were completely new to him, so with his school map and schedule in hand, he made his way through the hall to find wherever the class was.
none of his friends did art class either, so there he was, alone, walking through a brand new hallway.
now he could feel another completely new feeling: people’s eyes were boring into him, judging and whispering as he walked by. aw fuck. how many times had he talked shit about someone behind their backs? is this how they felt? he grumbled in annoyance. the real jfk wouldn’t let something like that get to him, would he? he would probably move on like nothing happened, because he was confident and knew it didn’t mean anything. so jfk pulled himself together and brushed off those thoughts quickly.
he realized that he’d made it to the correct class and scanned the room for van gogh. he quickly spotted him in the back of the room, sitting alone and staring wide-eyed at his boyfriend’s sudden appearance in the doorway. the other students looked almost equally as surprised. the teacher glanced over from their desk and motioned to the introduction slide on the screen.
“sit wherever, there’s open seating. today we’re going over the syllabus.”
despite feeling the eyes of everyone judging him, he flashed a smile and gave the teacher a thumbs up.
“will do, mister man!”
perhaps a little too quickly, jfk headed to the back and sat across from his boyfriend.
after the introduction to the class, they were assigned some warm-up sketches and given some shitty printer paper to practice on. it was just to “see where they were at with their drawing skills” as the teacher put it. jfk was sure that the real jfk never did art; he’d never really thought about it, but he didn’t know why. no matter if he did or not, jfk couldn’t switch out of classes even if he wanted to. he was already in multiple sports and social studies electives, and that was about as close to the real jfk as he could get! he just had to do his best in this class.
as if it wasn’t hard enough that he wasn’t living up to the same sort of relationships that his predecessor had, he was doing way too poorly academically than he’d like to admit. he knew that the original jfk wasn’t the best student, but he wanted to be better than the original. he wanted to exceed expectations. but... ugh, the clone was so stupid! he would just have to work harder.
“i didn’t know you were gonna take this class.”
jfk snapped out of his thoughts, looking up at van gogh. the two had been sitting in silence for several minutes, he realized. “i, uh, just thought it would be a good idea to try some things that the, uh, real jfk didn’t do!” and seeing the other’s confused expression, he added, “i also might have wanted to spend more time with you, and to, uh, see why you like to draw so much.”
van gogh looked at him with a small smile, and jfk felt butterflies in his stomach. “are you sure that you’ll want to take this class the whole year? it’s a lot of hard work…”
“of course i’m sure!” jfk gave his partner a thumbs up, “i’ll be, uh, just fine!”
the other hummed, seeming content with the response and continued his drawing. jfk leaned back in his chair and smiled, noticing that van gogh was wearing his favorite blue cardigan. he always seemed to wear it, even in hot weather. though this sometimes confused and worried jfk (he didn’t want his boyfriend overheating!), he managed to forget about it most of the time. after all, they were seniors in high school; he should be able to take care of himself, right?
at least he thought that, until the teacher instructed them to start painting something in addition to their sketches.
jfk liked to watch van gogh paint; it was calming to watch how the artist seemed to know exactly how to do it and make it look good, right in the moment. and, coincidentally, van gogh rolled his sleeves up and began to paint, so while jfk watched his boyfriend practice his painting, his eyes drifted up to his wrists, and he didn’t like what he saw one bit.
being in so many sports and activities, jfk had his share of scars and marks all over his body. he knew what they looked like, and how bad some could be compared to others. and the ones on van gogh’s arms were some bad scars. they were white, raised, and so evenly spaced that jfk could tell they were intentional. his heart skipped a beat. what the fuck were they from? had someone hurt his boyfriend? his head pounded, his worry only growing as van gogh looked up at him with a confused expression.
“jack? you ok?”
he looked around, debating on whether to ask, and impulsively landed on yes.
“uh, what are those from?” jfk asked, trying to subtly point out the scars. his voice was quiet, as if he were hesitant to ask. “did someone, uh, hurt you?”
van gogh’s eyes widened for a split second as he glanced from jfk to his arm. he quickly pulled down his sleeve. he seemed so flustered about it that jfk immediately wished he hadn’t asked. the class was relatively loud, so no one could really hear them, but that didn’t stop jfk from immediately knowing he shouldn’t have done it.
“i, er, uh, i shouldn’t have asked that. uh, er, uh…”
“no, it’s ok.” van gogh interrupted, “i’m ok with telling you, it’s been a while since i’ve done it.”
jfk sat, confused as van gogh grabbed his stuff and moved to his side of the table, taking a seat next to him. done it…?
“i’m sure it’ll make you uncomfortable, but uh… you deserve to know since you noticed. so… ugh, for a while i had issues with self harm. i used a razor and just… used my body to punish myself. i guess i was just insecure about living up to the original van gogh, and since i thought i wasn’t good enough… i… you know.”
jfk felt the blood drain from his face. he didn’t quite understand. self harm? why?
“i’m ok now though!” van gogh quickly added, noticing the look on jfk’s face, “i was able to get the therapy i needed, and now i have you. and a lot of people appreciate my paintings, so... knowing people like me as much as the original van gogh really helped. i’m not exactly the same as him, but now it feels good to not punish myself over being different.”
jfk was silent for a few moments, trying not to look at van gogh’s arms any more than he already had. wow, he’d really… thought he wasn’t good enough like his original? it almost reminded jfk of himself, except that van gogh seemed to move on from those thoughts. it was ok for van gogh to not be just like the original, but… what about himself?
“hello? jack, answer me! are you okay?”
jfk felt his boyfriend put a hand on his forearm. jfk bit his lip, glancing away nervously and taking a deep breath in. he could feel himself spiraling, thinking too much. but instead of letting go to his thoughts, he took a deep breath and let a goofy smile spread across his face.
“er. uh, yes! i just, uh, worried about you for a sec there!”
the other hesitated for a second, then smiled at him. “cool. thanks for not freaking out about it.”
“course. i’m just, uh, that good of a boyfriend.” jfk smirked, ruffling the shorter one’s hair affectionately.
van gogh giggled, looking back down at his painting to finish his work. “ok, kennedy.”
--
despite going through the rest of his classes asking the same dumb questions and saying the same funny comments that made everyone laugh, jfk couldn’t stop thinking about what had happened. he’d never really thought self-harm was real; he’d seen it in stupid teen drama shows sometimes, but he wasn’t even aware that it was something a person could do. he may have been overthinking it, but he maybe almost considered… no. van gogh obviously knew he was different than his clone parent, and didn’t deserve to be hurt because of it. but...
after school, for the first time since he’d gotten it, jfk drove with the hood down on his convertible.
jfk’s head pounded from thinking so hard. what did he deserve? why did people like the real jfk? because he was compassionate and inspiring, like his gay foster dads had told him? he’d done all the reading he could possibly do on who the real jfk really was, what he was really like. he’d done his part! he thought he was improving in being just like him! he knew what he was doing, and he still couldn’t accomplish it! maybe... uh… maybe he was the one that deserved to be hurt. he couldn’t even do what he was made to do.
he couldn’t even live up to his clone father’s powerful legacy. the real jfk was a strong, caring leader. clone jfk was just… some stupid douchebag.
he didn’t realize that he’d gotten home until wally greeted him.
“baby, you doin’ ok? you look like you’re about to blow smoke outta your ears.” wally gave his foster son a concerned look from the couch. jfk doesn’t make eye contact, refusing to look up from the floor.
“er, uh, i’m just a little worried that i’m not living up to the real jfk.” he said after a moment. there was a small silence.
“well, for one, you are the real jfk, okay?” wally started, “but since you started hanging out with your cute li’l boyfriend, you’ve started gettin’ more compassionate, and that’s really what being like the original jfk is all about. so stop worryin’ so much about it, baby, you are your own person and shouldn’t be too concerned with all that clone business. be who you wanna be, ok?” wally gave jfk a smile. the clone nodded and passed the living room to go upstairs. despite hearing the concerned whispering of his dads, he continued down the hall, going into his bedroom and locking the door behind him.
sure, he used to be a womanizing asshole who slept around a lot, but he was different now! he was trying not to be that kennedy anymore!
…no, the real jfk wasn’t like him. he would never have done what he did. the real jfk was good. the clone wanted to be good, too. he could be better than his clone father, even. he knew it.
the clone started the shower to make some noise, then looked at himself in the mirror. his tall, well-combed hair was styled nothing like his clone father’s. his hair was more brown, while the real jfk’s hair was reddish brown. his eyes were hazel, while the real jfk’s eyes were green. he bit his lip. he was all wrong, this wasn’t supposed to be what he looked like. he felt like a paper copy of a puzzle put together all wrong. he had to fix this.
before he knew it, he’d gone into the cabinet below the sink, pulling out a razor he used to shave his face every so often. he plugged it in. as the bathroom steamed up from the shower, he stared hard at his reflection, holding the razor up to his hair. he was doing this to be more like him. this would help.
jfk’s breathing turned ragged as he began to take off a few inches of hair off the top. he just had to get enough off to brush it back. then he could go out and buy hair dye. and contacts. and... then move on to do whatever else he had to do. his heart pounded as his hands grew shaky. maybe he’ll never look like him. this was his own fault, wasn’t it?
the razor clattered loudly as jfk dropped it into the sink. his hair was messy and uneven, but that was the least of his worries. his head spun as he reached back into a drawer. what was happening to him? why did his throat feel so tight, was he dying?
he quickly grabbed a replacement razor from a plastic container and held it in the palm of his shaking hands. a tear ran down his cheek. it looked scary. he didn’t want to do it. but van gogh was just as good (if not better than) his clone father. why couldn’t he be the same? why couldn’t he just be like him?
maybe it’s what he deserved. maybe it would calm him down. he couldn’t think. why couldn’t he think?!
he was such an idiot, oh god.