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Most of the drive is silent.
And, honestly, that's fine with Pope. He could use some time to wallow in his own self-pity. Yeah, he felt sorry for himself. His bones ached, his skin stung, his head hurt, he had a gun in his pocket and the world seemed intent on fucking him and his family over until the end of time. His father always told him self-pity was a waste of time and effort, but Pope figures he's allowed to feel pretty sorry for himself, at least right now. But- and maybe he's just too observant for his own good- he can tell Kie wants to say something. It's kind of obvious, actually. She's gripping the wheel too tight, and she keeps huffing at every turn, even though literally no one is around, so she's not exactly battling traffic here. She's chewing on her lip, too, a stupid nervous habit she'd picked up from Sarah. So now Pope's multitasking, feeling sorry for himself and anticipating Kie's big news- bad news, probably , he thinks to himself, because he's really, really good at the whole self-pitying-and-wondering-about-Kie-at-the-same-time-thing. He's waiting, and waiting, and wait-
"You know John B kissed me?"
That was… not what Pope expected her to say. He isn't exactly sure what it would be- something about her parents or the cross or why he looked like he'd been dragged face first through a muddy creek. Not- John B kissed Kie?
"Wait, what?"
She smiles, weakly, and looks at him. "Yeah- before you and me, obviously, and before him and Sarah. Just once. It was… weird."
"You seem to love that word," his retort slips out of him before he can stop himself. Kie just looks down. There's another beat of silence before he realises he needs to start backtracking or she won't say anything else.
"I'm sorry, that was shitty-"
"No, no it's- you're right." She swallows, and smiles at him again, "You're always right, Pope." God, that makes him feel even worse. He could swear Kie's about to start crying. The last time he saw Kiara cry was when she was told her friends were dead, and he’s like 99% sure his comment wasn't as bad as hearing that . Kiara's emotions are always a little unpredictable, though. He knows that, but he feels bad anyway. Pope's too compassionate for his own good, too (at least, that's what JJ tells him, when he's trying to convince him to live with him and his folks at home, instead of alone at a house that was haunted with a man that was probably halfway to Yucatan by now. JJ seems to have a weird complex about people being kind to him, though, so maybe Pope had just enough compassion, actually. And he's distracting himself now. He doesn't even know how to begin to fix the mess unfolding in front of him; it’s easier to think about JJ, who always seems to have a simple solution for everything.)
"Kiara-" He starts with, because he figures he can't go wrong with saying her name, though he's really not sure what he'll say next. Kie cuts him off, though, in a rush of words that are glazed thickly with choked-back tears. He can’t tell if he’s relieved or not.
"Me and John B kissed, and it was all wrong, and it was weird, and I shut it down immediately," she's just looking forward, now, at the empty road ahead, "I knew I didn't like John B, and I knew we could never be more than friends. But you… I mean, you're Pope . When you said that you liked me- that you loved me- I thought… it could work. That maybe I'd find the spark along the way, you know?"
Oh. He understands, now. Kiara's trying to tell him she never liked him in the first place. He knew he hurt her feelings but Jesus , kick him while he's down. All he can do is look at her whilst mentally adding "tragic love life" to his self-pity list. He's not quite sure what the point of this conversation is. If this is her just implementing 'radical honesty,' or whatever she calls it, now really isn't the time.
"I'm sorry, that's probably shitty to hear."
"Yeah. Kinda." He bites the inside of his cheek- a nervous habit that he adopted from John B (and now Pope's thinking, maybe we're all just made up of each other, and maybe we've started fighting all the time because we've stopped seeing friends that we love and started seeing ourselves, who we hate, because we're teenagers and that's what we do, the way he hates when he talks to much but loves the way JJ can talk for hours about shitty horror movies. And now he's thinking he shouldn't be allowed to contemplate for too long lest he become insufferably pretentious- which, now that he thinks of it, is probably something he caught from Kiara, or she caught from him. Pretentious or not, it's nice to think that even if Kie was had to leave, the rest of the pogues would carry pieces of her inside themselves. He realises he's managed to ponder his way out of being pissed at Kie. Too good for your own good, man! He hears JJ's voice again, feels his hands clapping him on the back. Yeah, maybe JJ was a little right. Broken clocks, etcetera.)
"Every time I say this," she laughs, lamely, and it hangs limply in the suffocating air of the car, "I say it wrong. What I mean is…" and now she looks at him again, firm and sincere and he stops thinking for five seconds and just listens for once, " What I mean is: If there was ever going to be someone, it would be you. Because… you're smart, and you’re kind, and funny. And cute. And... I love you. And… you're Pope ." She says it again, like that explains everything, and smiles more genuinely than before, although there's still a tinge of sadness to it. "You're like… the greatest guy in the world."
Okay, never mind, he's pissed again. He's really fucking mad, actually, because he's been pushed around by a bunch of rich pricks in the last few days (and his whole fucking life), he's currently losing a piece of his history- of his ancestry - he's just gotten the shit beaten out of him by a guy who’s so crazy he deserves his own chapter in the DSM-5, and now he's having the most confusing conversation of his life (if you don't count his initial love confession to Kie, but he thinks most of that confusion was from being high out of his mind… although he really can't be sure because they never talked about it again). Kiara was trying to make a point, but he isn't sure what the fuck it is, and he's tired of playing guessing games with her, since that seems to be all they've done lately. Everything sucks, and Pope Heyward feels sorry for himself, and Pope Heyward is too nice for his own good. Yeah, he's really working himself up now.
"So what, Kie, I was perfect? I'm the perfect guy? I'm Pope , whatever the hell that means, but I still wasn't good enough? That still wasn't enough for you? What did you even-"
"I'm gay."
And all the air is knocked out of him, just like that. He figures he's going through way too many fucking emotions for a single car journey. The air in the car gets staler, somehow. Her confession lingers; he swears he can hear it echo, tangled amidst Kie's heavy breathing and the truck tires hitting gravel. Everything feels too quiet and way too loud at the same time. Well, fuck. Fuck fuck fuck shit fu-
"Please say something.” Pope doesn’t. “I'm sorry, this wasn't the right time, but I couldn't think of a better one. I'm sorry," she's really crying now. Shit . "I didn't want to leave lying to you. You know, it- it really was an it wasn't you, it was me situation. I thought it might- fix things if you knew. I wanted you to know there wasn't anything wrong with you."
You know, Pope doesn't get straight As in English to not be able to read between the lines. He hears the words Kie doesn't say loud and clear: it's not because there's something wrong with you, it’s because there’s something wrong with me . He processes them for a second, the fucked upness of it all. Of the fact that Kie is gay and seems to kind of hate herself for it, of the fact that she had to come out before she gets sent away by her parents, telling him in between him getting beaten senseless by a madman and them doing something dangerous and stupid, but necessary. He thinks about a film he hasn't thought about since he watch it at a drive-in with JJ, some romcom about a gay guy in the closet- he remembers saying it was cute, but derivative and JJ tapped his chest twice and said when are we gonna get you a heart, tin man? and it made him feel- kind of bad, honestly, and so he tried not to think about it too much. But now he recounts this one scene, where the main guy tells his friend he's gay in the car after hanging out at a diner together. And the main guy- he was really bricking it. He was nervous as hell. It wasn’t exactly a scene of unbridled joy. But… they got to have fun at a diner first. He got to pull over before he said anything. Afterwards they both said I love you , and the main guy, he let out this huge fucking sigh of relief. It was… cute. It was a real cute movie. They deserve that, he thinks. Kie deserves that. She deserves that big fucking sigh of relief and Troye Sivan music to swell as they keep driving (or, not Troye Sivan, but- and here Pope realises he doesn’t know any lesbian musicians. He never said he was perfect). Yet, here they are. Despite what Kiara Carrera deserves, she’s still next to him, too much air trapped in her lungs, eyes fixed on the road, her hands so tight around the steering wheel it’s like all the melanin has left her knuckles. Kiara just told him something incredible, and they’re both sitting in silence, tired and miserable knowing the worst is far from over. Pope feels, sometimes, like he's stuck in a looping tragedy, circling over and over, like a spiral, becoming more and more terrifying every inch it grows closer to the center; the catch is, in a spiral, you never truly get to the centre. You never get to the end. You just circle around and around forever, as things only get worse, escalating and escalating but never ever peaking. (Really, Pope is very, very good at the whole self-pity thing.)
He thinks he'd like to be in a romantic comedy instead, if just for a moment- just for this moment- because Kie deserves a sweet and saccharine coming out and he deserves bones that don't ache and skin that doesn't sting and Denmark Tanney deserved to be able to bury his fucking wife without getting killed for it. They deserve something soft and sweet and swelling music and grand gestures. They deserve better, and maybe Pope’s dad is right- maybe self-pity is a real waste of time, maybe assuming you deserve better is your own damn problem- but they’re seventeen, and there’s never been a more appropriate age to waste time. They’re seventeen, and they’re kids in dirty clothes with bloodshot eyes. Sometimes it’s worth looking around and going y eah, I deserve a hell of lot better than life is giving me . Pope knows a lot of things; it's sort of his MO. But he doesn't know how to stop the spiral of tragedy. That's the fucking thing, isn't it? That's the reason they're tragedies, aren’t they? They're inevitable. An eternal spiral, a neverending apotheosis. They’re about to enter god-knows-what. Things are only going to get worse. But they deserve one moment. They deserve a sweet and saccharine moment, that maybe- maybe - you could splice into a romcom without telling the difference- if you ignored the dirt on his jacket, the gun in his pockets, the red rimming both of their eyes.
"Stop the car."
"What?"
"I've not forgotten what we're doing. I just need a second. Stop the car."
She slows to a stop in the middle of the road, vacancy lazily stretching out in front and behind them, all the time in the world. All the time Pope didn't have.
"Pope, what-"
He hugs her. Pope has never really been a physical guy- he thinks of JJ, surprise in his eyes and a joke already on his lips: ' unexpected PDA there, Dr Spock' - but he knows when it's time to talk and when it's time to hug someone, and Kie really, really needed a hug. He did too, honestly. Maybe they wouldn't all be fighting so much if they just hugged each other a little more. He's still holding onto her, turned uncomfortably over the console of the car, letting her tuck her head into the crook of his neck and cry. She deserves the love of having someone hold her as she breaks. She deserves the dignity of not letting anyone see her face whilst it happens. It's not quite romcom worthy- there's no music, there's less triumph and more overwhelming emotional release, and he thinks his bottom lip split and he might be getting blood in her hair- but he hears her exhale, feels the hot breath of it on his neck, and he’s never known a better reason to stop a car in the middle of the street.
It's been about 45 seconds- he knows, because he counted, because Pope may know when to hug people, and he may be glad he did it, but it definitely didn't mean he was that comfortable with it- when she sniffs once, surely, and pulls away. She breathes out, steadily, and turns back to the road, wiping her eyes.
"Thanks."
"Yeah- yeah, no problem." They don't have time to keep talking (or hugging, for that matter), and he doesn't know when they will. He thinks about everything and wonders if he'll ever get another day of peace in his life again, or if he'll keep walking the spiral, his hand scraping the left side, the way his dad had taught him, but still no exit to be found. But, right now, he knows they'll be alright; Kie and him, they'll be okay. He knows she knows that, too. She starts the car again and smiles at him- grins, actually, and her eyes sparkle and her head tilts, and he suddenly gets what she meant when she said You're Pope because she's Kie . She's Kie and she's the most beautiful girl he's ever seen and that he'll ever see and he loves her to death and she's gay, and that's fine, that's beautiful, actually. It fits so perfectly, when he thinks about it, and it's like he's looking at a newer version of her, like she's been coloured in with brand-new pens, the real fancy Kook stuff instead of the old cheap ones his dad used to get him at the bottom of the dollar bin. Kie is here . She’s truly here for the first time in weeks. Months, maybe. He wonders, for all his yearning glances, how long he had failed to truly see her until now. Until now , when she is bright and alive. It's Kie , his lesbian best friend, who maybe he's still a little bit in love with, but he figures where's the fun in friendship if you aren't all at least a little infatuated with each other? Maybe that's why he's in a tragedy, why misery seems to envelop his life, because now he sees love, and joy, and relief pierce through it all and god , they're the most beautiful things in the world. He savours every last glorious bit of it. Spirals and tragedies and rich pricks with a violent streak don't have anything on Kiara Carrera's fucking smile. He grins back at her and- yeah, they're gonna be just fine. He looks ahead, at the long road ahead of them; the long life ahead of them. And Pope doesn’t feel sorry for himself one bit.
"Let's get this fucking cross."