Chapter Text
Veronica Sawyer was one of the best things to ever happen to him, JD was certain.
The best thing, probably; the spot of light in his entire pathetic, meaningless existence. He’d met her not at all long ago, so that might have been a bit of a dramatic thing to say, but he’d always been a little dramatic, anyway. It was hard not to be dramatic, when it came to Veronica, because she was genuinely the most incredible person JD had ever met.
And he’d met a lot of people; JD had gone through a total of ten high schools by the time his senior year had started, getting dragged around the united states by his father, and he was used to the people. Used to the borderline offensive stereotypes, used to the bullshit social hierarchies. He’d had a system, for every high school. Try to avoid people, mostly, especially the popular ones; keep his fists ready in case someone got too mean, a method that never worked with his dad (for obvious reasons) but worked well enough with dumb football players; make sure Lydia, his little sister, doesn’t get murdered and/or high; and mostly stay out of people’s way. Don’t get attached. Be the mysterious new kid, the one who sat alone reading with his headphones in during lunch (because his freshmen sister hated cafeterias with the burning passion of a thousand arsons) and sent a clear message of not wanting to be disturbed. The one who looked kind of like a threat, with a long, black trench coat that could definitely have a gun in one of the pockets (although it didn’t) and a motorcycle that made a satisfying whirring noise whenever it was started up. The one people didn’t bother getting close to; because if people got close, JD would get attached. And he’d learned long, long ago that he didn’t need attachment.
That had been, probably, the main reason he hadn’t spared Veronica Sawyer a third glance the first time he’d seen her. And yes, third. Not second. Because a second glance definitely had been spared.
The first time he’d seen her was on his first day of Westerberg; September 1st, 2019. He remembered the date exactly (not that it was a hard one, but for the dramatics let’s say that it was). He was walking down the hallways, sometime before the first bell. Lydia had separated from him long ago; he’d walked her to her class, despite her insistence that he was being weird, but he left soon enough so now it was just him, wandering his way over to homeroom 6G. He wasn’t looking at people, precisely, but he knew what was happening around him. Two girls walked past him, their high heels making identical clicking noises as they strutted, one clad in green and one in red; without looking, he knew they’d soon be making some poor kid scatter away in fear with one precise bitch face. Popular girls were like that. Then it was two guys in identical varsity jackets, walking in a way that took up too much space and hollering to each other at something; without looking, JD knew it had been a dirty joke. Jocks were like that. Then a boy with a space themed t-shirt and glasses too small for his face walked past, eyes fixed on the ground; without looking, JD knew he’d soon be the new target of some taunts from the bitch-face girls or the varsity jacket guys. Nerds were like that.
But then he’d seen her.
He hadn’t been that surprised at her, at first glance, when she was walking in front of him; all he noticed was that she was gorgeous. Fairly tall, but still significantly shorter than him, with this messy mane of frizzy dark hair framing her round, pale face, peppered with tiny, almost unnoticeable freckles around a button nose and pink lips and big brown eyes. Those eyes weren’t looking in front of her, at him, though; they were hyper focused on some notebook she was holding, scribbling stuff into it with a blue pen as she walked. It was a bad idea, to write while walking, JD knew; but apparently the girl didn’t. Or she did and she didn’t care. The notebook fact alone could’ve helped JD define her, but when he paired it with the clearly unkempt hair and the girl’s out-there clothing style (some long blue dress, an oversized denim jacket and a rainbow scarf that went with absolutely nothing and was completely unnecessary inside the suffocating building) helped him describe her even more: the girl walking in front of him was a nerd.
An unexpectedly stunning nerd, but a nerd.
So, JD hadn’t spared another glance. Not that time, at least. He thought he knew all there was to know about her; just some girl who hid herself in big jackets and scrawled into notebooks like some tacky movie heroine, one who probably shied away from anything uncomfortable and squeaked when she was embarrassed before promptly running away. In his years of experience JD had learned that not even nerds were particularly nice people; they were better than jocks or cheerleaders, sure, but they tended to ignore their surroundings enough to be considered annoyingly ignorant.
But after the girl had walked past him, he heard a crashing noise from behind. He turned, unsure why; perhaps to see if everything was fine? No, that wasn’t it. JD was as cruelly uncaring as any high-schooler just trying to mind their business. Perhaps it was to glance at the pretty girl one more time? Eh, maybe, but he never cared about any girl like that before, so why would he have started now?
Whatever the reason was, it gave him another chance to glance at the girl nonetheless. And he did; he looked at her, noticing the way she now was looking in front of her, notebook clutched to her chest as she watched the two varsity jacket guys stalk away after they’d apparently crashed space-shirt-small-glasses boy against a row of lockers. Predictable, JD couldn’t help but think. He expected the girl to go back to her precious notebook and leave the scene, just as he was planning to do, so he was surprised when she instead approached the nerdy guy with this tentative expression.
“Are you okay?” she asked, loud enough to be heard and firm enough to be reassuring. That was… unanticipated.
“Get away, nerd!” the boy huffed, hurrying away from the girl. JD noticed her mouth open and close, probably muttering an “okay” of some sort, before she shook her head and returned to the notebook.
Huh. Something was different about her, JD had decided that day. Something he unexpectedly did not want to distance himself from.
Everything was different about her, he learned in the next couple of weeks. She was in his English class; AP, since that was the only subject he was actually good at without putting in any effort. That was how he’d learned her name; she sat one row to his right and two in front of him, in a way that made it so her fluffy mane was always in his field of vision, and he’d learned her name when the teacher had taken attendance. Veronica Sawyer, Mrs. Addams had called, and the girl one row to his right and two rows in front of him raised her hand. Veronica was a pretty name, JD decided; he knew it existed, of course, but he’d never met a Veronica before. It was a little unusual, for such a common name, but JD found that it suited her. When he thought about the girl in his head, an occurrence that surprised him in its frequency, the name Veronica seemed to fit.
Veronica was smart, JD learned. She raised her hand a lot in English class, her answers always clever and correct and fully thought out; he’d even seen her walk into an AP calculus class, once, so he could only figure she was just generally smart. One of those straight A-students. Although he’d learned early on that he shouldn’t assume, not with her; because while she was smart, he’d seen her make forged hall passes on more than one occasion, leave the classroom and not come back until seconds before the bell. Why, he wasn’t sure, but he respected the idea. It always seemed to work for her. She got bullied sometimes, it wasn’t hard to tell; she was, by social standards, a nobody. But she always seemed to take any hastily thrown insult or practiced side-eye with her head held high; JD had never seen that before. She didn’t have many friends, he noticed; just two girls. One of them was this tiny, perky, blonde girl that JD suspected was a cheerleader, and one was a fuller girl, with pink glasses and noticeably slouched posture.
Now, you could say it was a bit creepy for JD to be watching this girl like that, picking up facts on a random person he thought was pretty. But at least for JD, Veronica Sawyer was a hard person to miss. She dressed in a way that didn’t blend into crowds, exactly, all grandma-y clothes and funky scarves; her hair was never tidy, always a frizzy halo around her like a picture frame, like it was an arrow pointing to her striking face; and when JD had heard her laugh a few times, the sound was loud and obnoxious and unique. Not trying to hide; not trying to be missed. And JD simply couldn’t miss her. It was force of nature; not creepiness.
It was, like, roundabout creepiness. His arm was metaphorically twisted, or whatever.
Which explained why one day, about three weeks into his stay at Sherwood, Ohio, when JD was sitting at lunch and reading a book, he couldn’t help but look up when he noticed a long, flowery skirt and a familiar head of hair back its way into his field of vision. When he glanced away from his book he unsurprisingly saw Veronica; unfortunately, he also saw two frustratingly familiar football players. Kurt Kelly and Ram Sweeny; he’d had the misfortune of learning their names when he was ditching his math class one day with Lydia to end up sitting under the bleachers and accidentally listening in on a gym class. Lydia had wrinkled her nose, saying that those names sounded asshole-y, and the statement didn’t make much sense but JD couldn’t agree more.
He wasn’t sure what Kurt and Ram wanted from Veronica, but he could only assume it wasn’t good. Guys like that never wanted anything good from girls like her. And that much became obvious when he noticed they were walking towards her, backing her up so far she was forced to sit down across from JD to avoid them crashing into her. She wasn’t facing JD, though; he wasn’t sure she even noticed him sitting there. She was facing the two jocks, looking up at them with squared shoulders. JD noticed her fingers tapping a rhythm on the cafeteria bench, a little tick taking away from her otherwise brave stance, but he was pretty sure only he was seeing it.
“Leave me alone, idiots.” Veronica demanded, and JD heard a bit of a tremor in her voice but it was subtle enough for no one but him to pick up on.
“Why should we?” Kurt asked, leaning his head down demandingly to be on the same level as her. Veronica recoiled backwards, probably at whatever odor the jock was reeking of; JD put his book down on the table and closed it, just in case he’d be needed soon. He’d forgotten his headphones at home that day, something that usually pissed him off but today it seemed to be a twist of luck. Protective instincts have always been a sort of second nature to him.
“Yeah, what are you going to do about it?” Ram taunted. Veronica pointedly let out a sigh, and when JD heard her mutter “original” under her breath he almost grinned.
“Look, I don’t know what you guys think I am,” Veronica started, still looking up at the jocks with tense body language through her brave attitude, “but if you think I’d be interested after what you did to Martha literally five seconds ago, think again.” She finished, the disdain in her voice obvious. JD had to wonder who Martha was.
When the two jocks looked away from Veronica to the right side of the cafeteria, he noticed one of Veronica’s friends; the girl with the glasses, covered with some form of cafeteria slop, her tray on the floor. The blonde cheerleader friend had a hand on her shoulder, comforting softly. JD could only assume the former was Martha.
“Martha Dumptruck?” Ram questioned, his voice beyond belittling. JD could see Veronica’s fists clench at her sides.
“Why do you care about that lard-ass?” Kurt continued. Those two probably shared about a quarter of one brain cell, JD noted to himself.
Veronica paused, letting out another pointed sigh. JD was briefly considering intervention, because it seemed like the jocks weren’t letting go, but then Veronica spoke. “Because her mind is bigger than a peanut, unlike either of your minds. Or balls.” she stated, beyond confident in her words. JD almost choked on his own spit; well, he thought to himself, that was unexpected. “She’s going to do great things, you know. Me, too. And the two of you are at your peak right now; you’re high-school-has-beens waiting to happen. You’re going to die working a minimum wage job at some gas station with snakes in the bathrooms.”
“What did you say to us, skank?” Ram threatened, coming closer to Veronica. Her body tensed, and JD saw how badly she wanted to recoil. He decided to not get involved yet; it probably wouldn’t help, him coming over there and punching those two off of her. Plus, he was selfishly curious as to what she’d do next.
“You heard me.” She said confidently. Then her face formed into a kind of pout, and it was so condescending JD wanted to laugh. He didn’t; but he did smirk before he even noticed he was doing it. “Or did you not learn word combinations yet?” Veronica crooned patronizingly. “Is has-been too many words for you to understand at once?” her superior tone made Kurt and Ram lean just a little away from her. Damn, JD thought to himself. She’s good.
“Whatever, prude. Nobody wants you, anyway.” Kurt muttered. Ram huffed out a ”Yeah” as they finally backed away.
Veronica’s shoulders visibly relaxed now that she had her personal space again. “Whatever you want to tell yourself, guys.” She said, sounding just the right amount of exasperated as she turned to JD.
She gave him this smile; it seemed apologetic, almost. He made sure to give her a grin of his own, complete with widening his eyes, as if to say a silent damn, girl. The expression made Veronica’s smile turn sincere, and she huffed out a chuckle of appreciation. For what, he wasn’t sure, but he was happy about it nonetheless. He didn’t have much time to dwell on that, though, because soon an awful odor was surrounding his personal space on both sides. Veronica rolled her eyes, as if to say here we go again.
“Hey, new kid,” Kurt started, and JD had to plant his foot on the ground forcefully to stop from punching him in the face, “why so quiet?”
“Yeah, where’s your boyfriend?” Ram asked. JD almost furrowed his eyebrows, because what boyfriend, before he remembered that he was talking to two Ohio-native football players. Right, homophobia.
What a joy.
Honestly, it was 2019. They were the weird ones here.
“Screw off, dude.” He muttered, making no effort to move the jocks just yet. He didn’t feel like getting in a fight today; not with this pretty girl watching him curiously. Not when she’d handled those two so well.
“With you?” Ram guffawed, and JD had any space at all he’d face palm, because what did that even mean.
“What does your boyfriend have to say about that?” Kurt continued his obnoxious friend even more obnoxiously. JD’s hand, curled into a fist, lifted out of its own accord; but before it could do anything, a voice stopped it.
“Why,” Veronica piped up, “are you two seeing other people?”
She was good at this, JD noted to himself. He didn’t love the continuation with the homophobia theme, but it was enough to make Kurt and Ram quiet for two seconds, so JD respected it nevertheless.
“Lay off, Sawyer.” Kurt said after his two seconds were unluckily over, though he didn’t seem as cruel as he’d been with her earlier. A little more reserved, apparently. “This is none of your business.”
“Thanks for the input.” Veronica deadpanned quickly before Ram could jump in with his own comment. “Now, don’t you two have some other poor girl to go sexually harass, or are we broadening our gender horizons for the new year?” That patronizing pout was back on her face by the end, and JD loved to see it.
It worked magic, just like the first time, and the two boys started finally walking away.
“Fuck you.” Ram hissed at Veronica as he left.
“Someone’s going to,” Veronica called at the boys’ retreating backs, “but it’s not going to be you!”
After the boys left, Veronica didn’t look at him for a few moments. JD noticed her take a breath, probably trying to calm down. When she did look up, that sorry smile back on her face, JD made sure to grin appreciatively.
“That was impressive as hell.” He stated honestly, eyebrows raising to punctuate his point. “All of it.”
Veronica’s smile turned a little bashful, something that he hadn’t expected to see appear so fast. “Thanks.” She said, her voice much calmer than it had been seconds earlier.
“Aren’t you scared of those two?” JD asked, genuinely curious. This girl was getting more and more fascinatingly confusing by the minute, and JD was itching to figure her out. “Everyone else seems to be.”
“Nah.” Veronica dismissed. “I try to only be intimidated by people who actually have enough intelligence to hurt me.” She said self-assuredly, and JD watched her intently all the while.
She looked down for a moment, contemplating, but then back up. It seemed like she trusted him enough to tell him something, a fact he definitely appreciated.
“Okay, that’s not totally true.” She admitted, somewhat shyly. “I get scared, usually. Even of them. But sometimes they act like they have this… claim over women, and it’s so infuriating I forget to be scared. Like, this morning, they left a note in my locker with both their phone numbers, and it said call for a good time. Call spelled with an o. It makes me more angry than scared, you know?” she finished her rant, looking at him hopefully.
He nodded, now angry on her behalf. “I do.” He said, not lying.
Veronica smiled, the expression making her beautiful face shine. “Sorry, I’ve been talking a lot.” She apologized, but she still seemed satisfied that he was listening. Which he was, and happy about it.
“You’re a pretty good person, aren’t you?” he stated more than asked. A little out of nowhere, but randomness was mysterious in its own way. He’d always thought so. Veronica’s smile widened, but she looked down, as if thinking she didn’t deserve the praise.
“Everyone’s a good person.” She said softly, almost to herself. JD shook his head.
“It is pleasant to know that some fragments of an old truth are exploded in the faces of all these obsequious flatterers of humanity,” JD started quoting before he even realized what he was doing. He quickly looked at Veronica’s face; she wasn’t looking down anymore, but tilting her head at him in somewhat endearing inquisitiveness.
“of all these humbugs and quacks who repeat in every possible tone of voice: ‘I am born good, and you too, and all of us are born good!’” JD continued, and Veronica was still looking curious. Not confused, not put-off; curious.
“Forgetting, no!” JD kept going, suspecting that she’d caught onto his game. “Pretending to forget, like misguided equalitarians…” he trailed off at the end, if only to see what she’d do.
“that we are all born marked for evil.” She completed for him, beaming when he grinned at her. “Baudelaire.” She stated, the name familiar in her voice like she’d said it a hundred times before.
JD nodded. “I appreciate a well-read woman.” He said, some playfulness in his tone, and Veronica let out a short, strange giggle.
She looked away from him for a moment, behind her, but then seemingly remembered something and turned to him urgently.
“I need to go find my friends.” She explained, getting up from the table. “You know, before lunch ends. To see if they’re okay.” JD nodded, a little disappointed at the abrupt end of the conversation. This girl knew Baudelaire quotes off the top of her head, for God’s sake; he’d keep talking to her all day if he could. But she was going to help her friends; a good person, indeed. He’d never really seen that before.
She gave him a quick wave as she was leaving, and he had just reopened his book when she turned back towards him. She seemed like she was about to say something, so he waited.
“I didn’t catch your name.” she blurted eventually, suddenly a bit awkward. JD hadn’t seen that shade on her since his fateful first day, when she’d been intently writing into her notebook in the hallway, but he liked it just as much as the unexpected boldness.
he made a big show of closing the book again, taking his time with the answer. “I didn’t throw it.” He said eventually, voice deadpan.
He noticed a pink blush spread on Veronica’s pale cheeks and nose almost immediately; he was pretty sure she didn’t notice. A few moments later her mouth opened, like she was about to say something, but then a harsh sound cut through the room. That damn bell.
Veronica stayed put for a few seconds; JD followed suit, waiting to see what she’d do. In the end she just clamped her mouth shut like she was some sort of fish, gave him one last glance, and awkwardly darted away. Her face was practically a ripe strawberry, red and freckled.
Well, JD thought to himself once again as he stood up from the uncomfortable cafeteria bench, that was unexpected.
He kept thinking about Veronica all day; a fact that, after the past couple of weeks, didn’t surprise him quite as much anymore. At least this time he had a reason, he supposed. He couldn’t stop trying and failing to figure her out, with what little information he had; and he was beyond frustrated in the best way.
She didn’t fit into any norm; nothing he could come up with in his head, at least. She was awkward, but she was also loud; smart, but beyond stunning (not that pretty girls couldn’t be smart, they often were, JD had simply come to learn that they never showed it); a regularly bullied nobody, but brave and sharp in her responses. And she stood up for herself, was concerned for people who weren’t even nice to her, and knew quotes of his favorite book, even ones that seemed to go against everything she believed in (“Everyone’s a good person”, she’d told him. He hadn’t gotten that out of his head quite yet).
To sum up; it took two weeks of careful, slightly stalker-ish if you squint watching and one whole conversation for JD to realize that he liked this girl. It was a bit of an overdue realization, actually, because she’d not left his head since school had started and the only people JD usually had in his head were book characters or an occasional concern for Lydia, but he wasn’t really used to this kind of stuff. It was his first time really liking a girl; he’d had crushes before, sure, but nothing like this. And he didn’t hate it as much as he’d always figured he would.
By the end of the day, when school was over, JD had managed to replay the lunch conversation in his head a grand total of twenty-three times. He was acting like a sappy movie character, he knew, but he was just trying to dissect what had happened. He was beyond curious about Veronica, and until he got to talk to her again, he’d use whatever information he had to keep attempting to figure her out.
He really was being disgustingly sappy, though. Because when he was exiting the school, he couldn’t help but look around for her. Sue him, okay; he wanted to look at her again. See her big hair or big eyes or contagious smile. Wave at her, maybe; and, if he was lucky, watch her go bubblegum pink again. She wasn’t indifferent to him, he noticed. He wasn’t sure what he was going to do about that, but the picture of her awkward, blushing, giddy face as she said goodbye to him at lunch was certainly not a neutral one. It was a fact he decided to keep in his mind; for a rainy day, if nothing else. Hopefully for something else, but he had to think it over a bit more.
As luck would have it, JD did end up seeing her. He was out of the school by then, looking for his motorcycle in the parking lot, when he heard a familiar, loud laugh. His head whipped around as if on instinct, and there she was; Veronica Sawyer, walking with Martha and that cheerleader girl JD still didn’t know the name of, laughing at something they’d said. She looked even more beautiful when she laughed or smiled, JD observed; something in her face lit up, making her shine like some dimple-cheeked star.
“What’re you looking at?” a familiar, bored voice asked him.
JD wasn’t startled, exactly, but his head did whip away from Veronica just as fast as it had towards her. Predictably, he was met with the sight of his sister; Lydia, a tiny shadow in her black clothes the same way he was a towering one. If she was in any way satisfied about surprising (not startling) her brother, you couldn’t tell from her stoic face. She probably wasn’t, though; materializing out of seemingly thin air was a Dean sibling’s regular ole Monday. JD liked to think Lydia got that tendency from him.
“Nothing.” he said, going for casual and managing to sound it. You don’t hide your thoughts from people for years without getting good at it. Still, his lie was a little unconvincing, and Lydia raised an eyebrow. “There was some bird there.” JD added, and internally kicked himself. That was an even weirder thing to say.
Lydia seemed to be taking it as such, because she ignored his denial. “Was it her?” she asked, like he was supposed to understand.
“Who?”
“That girl over there.” Lydia clarified. “With the scarf.” She pointed to Veronica, rather obviously. JD, a little panicked, slapped her hand away.
“Don’t point!” he hurried to chastise. When he looked back at Lydia, her eyebrows were raised. God, what was up with him?
“Sorry, sorry.” He apologized, vaguely gesturing at the hand now resting at her side to signify what he was sorry about. “Didn’t mean to do that. Are you okay?”
“Are you?” Lydia countered, looking up at him incredulously. JD sighed; it was a fair question, but he wasn’t going to tell her that.
“I just recognized her.” he explained, not entirely lying. “I talked to her at lunch today, but that’s it.” Lydia’s face was still stuck in this stoic, disbelieving, slightly arrogant expression, so JD felt the need to keep clarifying. “It’s not a big deal, Lyds.”
Lydia nodded, following when JD started to walk away towards his motorbike. She was silent for a few beats, and JD knew she was contemplating something.
“Think you’re ever gonna…” she started eventually, trailing off pointedly mid-sentence, “talk to her again?” She was snooping in that Lydia way of hers, all deadpan and sarcastic but still somehow annoying. The girl was a damn good little sister, when she wanted to be, and those times usually came when it was most inconvenient for JD. Which was kind of the point, he supposed.
He rolled his eyes, stopping his walk when he reached the bike. Lydia stopped, too, still awaiting an answer. “I don’t know.” JD said eventually, shrugging like he didn’t care.
“You do.” Lydia declared, and JD rolled his eyes again. Lydia Dean was a lot of things, but subtle had never been one of them. She was honest to a fault, almost, and while it could get her into endless trouble and annoy the shit out of him, JD found that sometimes her frank attitude was a nice thing to be around. Not refreshing, since she was just about the only person he had prolonged conversations with for the length of his childhood, but not that awful at all.
“Why are you here?” he asked her now. “Do you want a ride?” Lydia shook her head, and this time JD rolled his eyes when she could actually see them.
She’d been making faces at his bike ever since he’d gotten it last year; she refused to be on it at all, in fact, even when he assured her that he had an extra helmet and that she’d be perfectly safe. Not that Lydia had ever particularly cared for safety, and JD wondered if her adamant refusal to go on the bike was a way of hers to imperceptibly piss him off. But, for whatever reason it may have been, Lydia usually walked home from school while JD rode his bike. It used to make at least a little bit of sense, when they weren’t in the same school, but now Lydia was a freshman while he was a senior, so he really couldn’t see why she had to walk home. But she was a stubborn girl, and he had enough to bicker with her about anyway, so he left it alone.
“I was walking home.” Lydia explained in answer to his former question. “The house is over there.” She stated, rather unnecessarily, pointing towards the direction opposite of where she came from.
“I know, Lyds.” JD sighed. He loved Lydia to death, but sometimes she was a complete weirdo. Not that he minded; it was a good thing, he supposed, that she felt comfortable to voice any and every thought she had to anyone and everyone. It was an unfamiliar concept, to him, but he figured the two of them didn’t exactly grow up the same.
Lydia had definitely been through a great amount of shit in her life, with her mom committing suicide when she was merely six and her dad… well, being Bud Dean. But JD had always tried, almost pathetically so, to shield her from any form of hurt. She was his sister; this tiny little thing (the short gene was from their mom, and JD wasn’t sure how it didn’t affect him but he wasn’t complaining) who had too much emotion and nowhere to put it. That much JD had known ever since he’d seen her grieve; it wasn’t hard to tell, that she didn’t know what to do with own feelings. While JD had no idea what to do with own, either, when he’d been nine or even right now, he usually resorted to repressing them. Putting them in some locked drawer in his brain and throwing the key into a metaphorical ocean. That way he could help Lydia cope; she needed him, even if she never said it. Needed him to help her survive, to keep her away from their asshole of a father (to the best of his abilities), to make her dinner when she was too young to do it herself, to have someone to scream at when she needed release, to give her his old toys. Lydia needed JD to… not raise her, exactly, since both the Dean siblings pretty much raised themselves, but to provide some form of stability.
So maybe it was good, that she let herself be so weird. Maybe it meant that JD had done a good job.
“I think her name’s Veronica.” Lydia piped up now, when JD was actually expecting her to leave. At the mention of Veronica’s name his head whirled around faster than lightning, but he had to remain casual.
“Who’s name?” he asked, trying to sound like his heart wasn’t lurching as he picked up his bike helmet.
“The scarf girl. From earlier.” Lydia clarified. JD could see a hint of satisfaction on her face at his reaction. “I saw her in the hallway, too; she was talking to someone, and they said Veronica, so I figured.”
“Oh. Yeah, it is.” JD confirmed. When he turned to see Lydia’s eyebrows raised in questioning once again, he realized it had been a mistake. Curse his big mouth and nosey little sister.
“You know her name?” said little sister asked him now, her voice in some mild form of a patronizing sing-song. JD shook his head at her, unamused.
“She’s in my English class.” He supplied. When Lydia just nodded, for far too long, he gave her leg the gentlest of kicks. He was violent, sometimes, but not with her; never with her. She retorted with a kick much stronger than his had been.
“Go take your walk.” He hissed at her with an eyeroll as he put his helmet on, signifying the end of the conversation. She gave him this half-smirk and then sauntered off, black dress swishing behind her. Lydia always wore black; JD had never wondered where she got that from.
While JD definitely willed and wished for another encounter with Veronica, he was not expecting it to happen this fast.
Not that he was complaining, of course, but you know. He would’ve appreciated some form of a heads up.
He just hadn’t expected it to happen the next day. He didn’t see her at school for all of Friday; he didn’t know where she was, but they didn’t have English on Fridays and he couldn’t see her at lunch, and it felt pathetic to seek her out. Even for him. So, he spent the day with the only form of her being in his mind; she popped up quite a bit. He didn’t want to admit how much, not to anyone, and frankly not to himself. He’d talked to this girl once, for Christ’s sake; she didn’t even know his name. And yet, damn Veronica Sawyer was all he could think about until he got home from school. And it wasn’t like he hated that fact; he actually liked it, and was mostly annoyed at himself for it.
And a little scared, maybe. Just a little; JD never got fully scared. He couldn’t allow himself to.
He didn’t come straight home from school that day. He’d texted Lydia, saying he’d be late (she never said she got worried, but he always wanted to give a warning if he was leaving her alone. Just in case), and drove around on his motorcycle.
He did that, sometimes. For no actual reason, other than wanting out of the house.
Even when the only person there was Lydia, who he loved, JD sometimes needed to get out. He’d been moving around his whole life, with his father dragging him and Lydia across the United States whenever he had a new job opportunity. It happened every nine months, at most; deconstruction was a rotating business, apparently. But all of those moves resulted in JD never feeling truly home anywhere. Not really. He had a house, wherever he was; usually not a horrible one, too. Just some place with rented furniture. A house. It wasn’t his, wasn’t his dad’s, wasn’t anyone’s. But it was what he had. And sometimes, JD was okay with that; sometimes he felt like he didn’t need a home. He needed somewhere to crash at the end of the day, an okay bed he could lay awake in during the night (insomnia had been a bitch to him ever since his mom’s death; he hadn’t had more than eight full nights of sleep ever since), a kitchen he could cook semi-decant dinners in, a floor to store all his cardboard boxes on (he never really unpacked after a move, not in the past couple of years; he’d come to the conclusion it was useless). He didn’t need anything more than that. He needed a base, just somewhere that wasn’t the street, and he’d be fine. He’d make sure Lydia was fine, too.
But sometimes, he didn’t want to go back to whatever house he was staying at. Sometimes this overwhelming feeling could sneak into his head, this feeling that made it impossible to be at the place that should’ve been his home. But it wasn’t; it never was. And when that feeling showed up, the one that sent alarms ringing in his head that he definitely was not fine, he’d have to get out of the house. He’d do whatever; usually just drive around on his bike, like he was doing today. Because when he was distracting himself, out and about, it was easier to pretend he had somewhere to go back to. Somewhere that was more than rented furniture and dull, generic interior design; somewhere that was home.
Not that he really knew what a home felt like anymore, but that was the point of pretending, wasn’t it?
So, yeah. That feeling, that annoying all-consuming thing that could sometimes make his stomach feel queasy, popped up that Friday. So JD drove around; he wasn’t sure for how long, honestly, but he made sure to get back home before his dad. He didn’t like leaving Lydia alone with him; JD felt like no one should ever be subjected to being alone with their dad, but Lydia being subjected to it gave him a particularly uneasy feeling. Even when she repeatedly said he didn’t have to worry and that she could handle herself. He knew she could; she just shouldn’t need to. Why should she, if he was there to help?
When JD finally got to the house (not home) after he drove a bit around the boring streets of Sherwood, he found his sister reading on the couch. She only ever ventured out of her room when she was home alone or JD was with her; she, unlike her brother, had the skill to make whichever room she stayed in something close to a safe haven. She didn’t hang up some tacky Keep Out sign from a Disney show, or anything, but she learned how to work the door lock and she found the most comfortable spot on the mattress and she filled up her closets with black, stowing her cardboard boxes at the bottom of them. JD never understood why she did it; but he helped her unpack when she asked. Not that it happened a lot, since neither of them ever had much stuff, but still.
She didn’t greet him when he walked in. Lydia never greeted anyone; she didn’t like saying meaningless things like “hey” or empty “how are you” questions never to be answered. When she wanted to have a conversation she’d jump straight to the chase; and when she didn’t, she’d make it obvious enough.
Still, JD greeted her with a “Hey” when he walked through the door. She looked in his direction; didn’t nod, but she caught his eyes, which was as much as anyone usually got from her on the welcoming front.
Not that he really wanted to dwell on his sister’s communication skills right now, though, because one look at her face had sent warning signs yelling inside his brain.
“What the hell happened to you?” he asked, knowing she’d appreciate the directness if nothing else. He walked over to the couch, crouching next to her, since she was still half-laying when he approached and taking up most of the room.
“Nothing.” she brushed off. JD brought a hand near her face, not touching it, but a clear sign for her to look at him. Lydia sighed to herself, but she turned to him anyway. He cringed internally.
Just as he’d seen earlier; Lydia had a smack on her face. A red one, bluing slightly in the middle, right across her left cheek. Its outline was the shape of a perfect hand, the perfect hand of Bud fucking Dean, and JD’s gut dropped.
“I thought he wasn’t home.” He muttered, mostly to himself, as he looked at Lydia’s face with concentration. Was this an ice pack situation, or something else? He wished he’d been there when it happened; at least he could’ve known.
“He wasn’t, when I got back.” Lydia offered, her tone a little overly bored as if she was showing him she didn’t care. “He came back to grab something, not sure what, and I was accidentally in his way so he moved me.”
“By your face?” JD retorted, still looking at the bluing spot on Lydia’s cheek. She was much paler than him, always had been, another thing she’d gotten from their mom, which meant the bruises showed a lot more on her then they did on him. This one would be a big one, he could already tell.
Lydia shrugged one shoulder as an answer to his question. “I guess.” She said it so casually; JD wished she didn’t. He could say it casually, that was fine, but Lydia shouldn’t need to.
“Did you just leave it like this?” JD asked her now. He could hear the concern in his own tone; he usually prided himself on being able to hide his emotions, but in situations like these he just couldn’t seem to do it. Lydia was, apparently, just fine at it, because she shrugged again.
“I put ice on it for a few minutes. It’s okay now.” She supplied. JD raised an eyebrow, showing just how much he didn’t believe her, and Lydia rolled her eyes. “It’s not a big deal, JD.”
She was fine, JD tried to calm himself. Lydia was fine. She’d have quite a bruise from this, but she had makeup so that wasn’t a huge issue. Worse things had happened, JD reminded himself; his dad had once pushed him so hard he’d broken his arm. This was just a blue mark on the face. A common occurrence, really; nothing a Dean sibling couldn’t handle. Even the youngest one.
But damn it, this was Lydia. She seemed strong and fine, to the untrained eye, but JD had literally known her before she was born. He knew she took these kinds of things harder than him. And he hated that he let it happen to her, he hated it so much. While she could never stop his pain, he could stop hers, and he did so any chance he got. She shouldn’t go through the same things he did; why should she, when he could be there to stop them?
Only today he hadn’t been, and there was nothing he could do about it now. And the alarm bells in his head were still ringing, this deafening noise that only one thing could ever quiet.
“Go to your room if he comes back early, okay?” JD instructed Lydia, who had now returned to reading her book, seemingly unbothered. She nodded at him. She didn’t ask where he was going, as he was leaving through the front door; she knew when she shouldn’t.
It was his second coping mechanism today, JD noted to himself as he made his way to the nearest 7-Eleven. It was really close to the house; only a six-minute walk. He appreciated that fact, and he knew he’d keep appreciating it. Because JD didn’t drink, unless it was a special occasion. He’d quit smoking around last year. He didn’t do drugs. But make no mistake, Jason Dean was addicted.
To slushies.
He’d discovered them years ago; when he was eleven years old, to be precise. They had just moved somewhere (Nebraska? Pennsylvania? Maryland? He could never remember), and for once, his dad had nowhere to be their first afternoon. His job at that state hadn’t exactly started yet. And so JD, even as a little kid, wanted to keep him and his sister away from the house as long as possible; and that’s how instead of going home he and Lydia wound up at a 7-Eleven near their elementary school.
JD bought her a slushie with the little bit of money he had, if only to distract her; and he’d bought himself one, too, because no kid could resist the promise of frozen, icy sugar. Even one as overly mature as he was.
They sat on some bench outside with their drinks, Lydia swinging her legs off the bench and JD sitting as straight as he could to make them reach the ground. He took a sip of his slushie, and it was nice; a bit overly sweet, but pretty refreshing. While he was taking another sip, he heard Lydia let out a squeak next to him. He immediately turned to see if she was okay, and was met with the sight of his sister clutching her forehead through her thick bangs.
“My head hurts.” She muttered. It would’ve made more sense for her to whine or cry, young as she was, but Lydia never whined.
“You shouldn’t drink it fast.” JD half-reprimanded, but he took the freezing cup from her hand so she could warm up a bit. “It’s called a brain freeze.” He added.
“It feels like my brain’s all static.” Lydia complained, now bringing a second head to her forehead. JD, who’d been turning her cup around in his hands, now glanced at her with curiosity.
“Static?” he questioned. He didn’t even know she knew that word.
Lydia nodded, the hold on her forehead getting stronger as she winced. She really shouldn’t have nodded, in his opinion, but then again; she was eight. “It’s like I can’t think anything.”
Can’t think anything.
Huh.
JD had never thought of that concept before; not thinking (and no, the irony of that sentence was not lost on him). JD always thought. Ever since his mom had died, two years before, it felt like he couldn’t stop thinking, even if he tried. His brain was always at work; thinking about what clothes he’d give up on their next move, trying to memorize his dad’s schedule to know when he needed to make sure Lydia stayed in her room, trying to come up with excuses about why his school notebooks had been torn up (excuses that didn’t include his dad having a fit of drunken rage, that is). JD was always contemplating, considering, envisioning. Always, always thinking.
What would it feel like to just… not?
JD handed Lydia her cup back. She took it, hands coming off of her forehead now that the horrible static was apparently over; he’d have to drink more, he realized. If it worked. If not thinking was as good as it sounded.
And when JD took a long, fast sip of his slushie, the one almost radioactively blue that was sure to dye his tongue, he realized that it was.
Static was a good way to put it, JD had to give his sister that. When the freezing ice spread all around JD’s temples, it really did feel like static. It felt like when your foot fell asleep, and it buzzed like an old TV. Only it was in his head; better yet, in his brain. The static, the stillness, felt like some sort of wall; something blocking any thought from getting out of his subconscious. Blocking anything from getting in, too. Just leaving a complete, engulfing, stabbing kind of stillness, that felt cold in the best way. Felt like the most tactile nothingness; like complete and utter numbness.
And only a while later, when the pain had faded away, did JD realize he’d momentarily forgotten if his dad was even home.
And that, in a nutshell, was the start of what would turn out to be his worst habit. Whenever he was sad, he’d wander around whatever city or town he was in and find his way to a slushie. When he was angry; slushie. Tired; slushie. Anxious; slushie. Even bored, sometimes; slushie.
Extremely-uneasy-because-his-asshole-dad-hit-his-little-sister-and-she-was-acting-completely-unbothered-about-it-so-he-knew-it-would-inevitably-happen-again-really-soon-and-might-be-a-whole-lot-worse; slushie.
So, JD made the six-minute trip to the 7-Eleven. He was glad it was still September; while it wasn’t hot, by any means, because Ohio, JD was wearing his signature trench coat that he never took off. He had a pretty good tolerance for heat (if he did say so himself), but even he was feeling uncomfortably warm and stuffy as he entered the not air-conditioned store (because, again, Ohio). A slushie was always the best if he drank it in the heat; froze his brain and his body. A winning combination.
He knew where the slushie machine would be. It was always in the same place, at every 7-Eleven he’d ever been to; they all looked the same. That was just another perk of his admittedly unhealthy habit; convenience stores were a stable thing. At every state, they all looked the same. Smelled the same. Had the same bored teenagers manning the registers and the same grumpy people coming in to buy cigarettes and the same loud teenagers buying mixers before a party. They weren’t a nice place, God no, but they were the closest thing JD had ever had to unsurprising stability. And call him boring, or weird, or kind of fucked in the head, but he liked the expectedness of it all. It calmed him; and as he walked in, he could already tell the dreary predictability was calming the sirens that have been blasting in his head ever since he’d seen Lydia’s face. And soon, the sirens would be frozen away, and all will be predictably right in the world.
So, JD got his usual; blue raspberry. Predictable. He walked through the store’s aisles, and noticed a group of kids stocking up on candy. Predictable. Then, about an aisle down, he saw a middle-aged man buying a newspaper. Predictable. Then, not far from there, a teenager was buying some energy drink that would surely be the cause of her early death. Predictable. Then, in the chip aisle-
Wait.
Whoa.
Unpredictable. Very, very, very unpredictable.
Because there, in the chip aisle of the local 7-Eleven, straining her hand to grab something off of a high shelf with a mountain of bags balanced carefully in her arms, stood Veronica Sawyer.