Comfort In Odd Places
Jake pulled back into Kieran’s driveway, and pulled the keys out of the ignition, but he didn’t get out of the car right away. He needed a moment to gather his thoughts. He never imagined that Audrey would ever do that, she always seemed like the strongest person of the Lakewood six, but maybe she was just the one with the strongest mask. He ran a hand through his hair, taking a deep breath. If someone had told jake just a few months ago that he would be so worried over Audrey, he would’ve laughed in their face. But, here he was, worried sick over the girl used to torture emotionally, with the help of the ever infamous Nina, of course. And, based on how close him and Audrey were now, he sometimes wondered that, if Nina had lived, if they too could have become friends. He sincerely doubted it, but there was no way to ever know, not now.
Sighing, he popped open the car door and stepped out into the cool night air. He could still see Brooke chatting Emma’s ear off in the living room, with Kieran’s arm wrapped around Emma protectively, and Noah walking around, looking around with a confused, so at least he knew that no one, other than Audrey, had gone home yet. But, in all honesty, he was probably going to have to have drag Brooke away from Emma, kicking and screaming. She had obviously missed Emma an insane amount, since she hadn’t left her side from the second she had gotten home. He had a feeling that when he took her home that she was going to be furious at him, so with that thought in mind, he decided to put on his best shit-eating grin as he walked up to Kieran’s front door.
“Hey, the Jake has returned!” He said cheerfully as he pulled open the door and strode inside. Everyone looked up at him, and Emma flashed him a smile. Brooke just rolled her eyes at his antics, and he was pretty sure that she had no idea that he had driven away in the first place. He collapsed on one of the empty arm chairs, eyeing Noah curiously as he peered out the windows, as if he was looking for something.
“Where’d you go?” Noah asked, stepping away from the windows, taking a quick swig of the near empty beer he had in his hand, and giving Jake a sceptical look. He walked over to him, stopping to collect one of the full beers from the counter when Jake motioned awkwardly for it, and handed it to him as he got near. “And, have you seen Audrey? She’s just up and disappeared.” He added, worry very clear in his voice, because Audrey was his best friend, and he could tell when she wasn’t okay, even when she said he was. Normally he didn’t press the subject, because if she wasn’t comfortable sharing, he wasn’t going to make her, but when he did, he never did it around others.
“Oh, yeah. I drove her home.” He said nonchalantly, digging in his pockets to find the bottle opener that Audrey had accidentally taken when they left. His words caused Noah to raise an eyebrow suspiciously, because it made no sense to him that she would get Jake to drive her home, when she could very easily ask him. “I guess the kinda wanted to a nap or something after what happened at the theater.” He said, trying to ease Noah’s confusion, but he only made it worse, Audrey never showed her weakness to anyone other than him, she never even told anything to her dad, so why would she talk to him? Of all people, the guy who played a very pivotal part in making her entire life a living hell since fourth grade.
“Theater? What happened at the theater?” Emma’s said, interrupting Noah’s suspicious glaring at Jake, and making Brooke start glaring at him instead. Jake met her intense gaze, and threw up his hands defensively, and mouthed ‘I’m sorry!’ to her in an attempt to get back on her good side. They all made a silent agreement in that moment that no one would say anything more about it, they’d just brush it off like it was nothing big, although, it was harder for Jake, as he remembered the scars on her arms. Apparently, Noah didn’t get the memo, because he soon pulled out his phone and clicked to the video, skipping through it until he reached the point when the “killer” starting peeking around the curtain, and handing it to Emma. She just stared, transfixed at the screen as Audrey knocked down a stack of boxes while she was running, Brooke just started hitting him with her purse, making him shrink away. “Audrey…” Emma mumbled, covering her mouth with her hand.
“Okay that’s enough.” Brooke said, pulling the phone out of Emma’s hand as Audrey’s attacker collapsed. Emma looked shocked, and there was a bit of pity in her eyes for Audrey and Noah was just glad she wasn’t there to see it, because he knew how much she hated being pitied. Emma looked over at everyone, and they all refused to meet her eyes, she had obviously pieced together that they were planning on keeping this video a secret. Emma scoffed, standing up from the couch and stalking off into the kitchen. “Em, wait! We just didn’t want to freak you out!” Brooke explained, not wanting her best friend to be mad at her the night she got back, she jumped up, and started to follow Emma, but Kieran stopped her. He put a gentle hand on Brooke’s collar bone, making her halt, he flashed her an ‘I got this’ look, and followed Emma into the kitchen. Brooke sat back down on the couch, crossing her arms in front of her and glaring daggers at Noah, who was sending her an apologetic look.
~~~~~~~~~~
Audrey groaned, turning over onto her back on her bed, and opening her eyes, she was greeted by darkness, so at least she wasn’t blinded, but she was annoyed and confused as to fact that she was up so early. There was no reason for her to be up this early, nothing to do, since it was a Saturday morning, and she hadn’t set an alarm for anything, yet, she still heard an annoying ringing sound. She turned her head to her right, and saw her phone, with the screen light up, ringing with the same sound she had set for her alarm, she’d have to change that later, because it was becoming incredibly annoying. The phone kept ringing, even though she turned away from it, and covered her ears with one of her unused pillows. Finally, it rung out, and she pushed the pillow off of herself, cuddling into herself, and smiling slightly, enjoying the bliss of falling back to sleep.
Her eyes shot open as the phone began ringing again, she looked over at her clock, reading the red numbers, and getting progressively more annoyed as she read it. It was 3:46AM, who the hell wanted her attention so bad, so early in the morning? She knew it was probably Noah, who couldn’t sleep, and was calling her to rant about a horror movie or another, if that was the case, she was going to kick his scrawny ass. She rolled onto her stomach, leaving her head tilted towards the phone, giving it the most intense death glare she could muster in her groggy state. Originally, she had planned to just ignore it until whoever it was got tired of calling of calling her, but around the sixth call, she caved and reached towards it, pulling it off the nightstand. She sat up, not bothering to check who was calling, before putting it to her right ear, hoping to just tell them to piss off.
“What the hell do you want?!” She said, pinching the bridge of her nose and closing her tired eyes. Her voice was hoarse from lack of use, so it made her voice sound scratchy, but she didn’t mind, she actually hoped they would hear that in her voice, and hang up sooner. She rubbed her eyes with the heel of her hand, whilst yawning loudly, with her mouth pointed away from the microphone so that they could still hear it, but it didn’t bombard their ears.
“I want to know if you thought you were getting away with it.” She didn’t know whose voice she was expecting, but she was not expecting the distorted voice that Piper had used to taunt them to come through the phone. And, for a moment, she tensed up, and her left hand shot up, self-consciously tracing her scars, remembering the reason why she had put them there in the first place. But she quickly realized that Piper was dad, and it was over, so she just rolled her eyes, whoever was calling must’ve been some dumbass kid that was trying to freak her out, but why were they calling so late at night? And, how did they get her number in the first place, it wasn’t like she had told a lot of people what was. In fact, only the Lakewood six, Rachel, and her parents knew her phone number, or had known in Rachel’s case. Her eyes flicked over to the porcelain container, and stayed there as she spat out her sassy reply.
“Did you actually waste two bucks on some godforsaken voice changer app just so you could try and scare me, really?” She said in a condescending tone that got her message across very clearly. She really wasn’t in the mood for this, and her mind was replaying old memories of Rachel now, so she could already feel tears pricking up in the corners of her eyes. If she ever found out who was playing this stupid prank, she was going to promptly kick their ass, and make them regret doing this in the first place. This was probably that chick Haley from the theatre, now that she thought about it.
“You shouldn’t be so rude to me, Audrey, I could’ve called your precious little Noah instead, and told him all about how you and Piper.” The voice said, making Audrey almost drop the phone from her ear in shock. She suddenly felt as if someone had dumped cold water over head, she was wide awake, and scared shitless. What did they know about her and Piper? Did they know that she brought Piper here, and that she had told her everything there was to know about Emma? Her heart rate rose at these thoughts, and she found herself scooting slowly but surely towards the nightstand that had Rachel’s porcelain container on top. “Oh, did that scare you? This is going ot be easier than I thought.” The edited voice said, noticing her prolonged silence, and laughing in delight.
“What the hell are you talking about, dickhead?” She growled, trying to make it seem like she genuinely didn’t know what he was talking about, but was getting annoyed by his false accusations. Although, she doubted she was being even remotely convincing, and even if she was, she had a feeling that whoever this was, actually knew what they were talking about. Her Haley theory was seeming less and less likely by the second, because Haley had no idea what she was talking about when it came to Piper’s rampage.
“Oh, I think you know, all those sad letters sent to her, begging for her to be your friend, because everyone else hated you! Little did you know, she hated you too!” They taunted, and without realizing it, Audrey found herself pulling the porcelain container off the nightstand, clutching it in her left hand. She felt the tears that she had been holding back dripping steadily down her cheeks, and the hand the jar started to shake slightly. “Oh, is she thinking of adding more cuts to the collection?” This time, she really did drop what she was holding in her hand, but it wasn’t the phone, it was the porcelain container instead. Luckily, it landed on the bed, so it didn’t break apart into a million pieces, but the lid did come off flying onto another area of the bed, along with the razors, but they didn’t to in the same place. She didn’t stop to collect them, she was more worried about the fact that someone was knew about her and Piper, and they were watching her at that very moment. Just the thought of it made Audrey’s skin crawl, so she turned and looked at her window, expecting the curtain to be open, but they were drawn shut.
“Leave me the hell alone, asshole.” She said in a shaky voice, and quickly hung up the phone, and shoved it under her pillow when it began ringing again. She felt as if she couldn’t breathe, this had to be a nightmare, it certainly felt like one. Her heart was beating loudly in her chest, and she didn’t know what to do, until she moved her leg slightly, and it bumped into the bottom half of the container. She reached down, picking up the lid and the base, she put them together and placed it gently on the nightstand. She couldn’t tell anyone about this, because not only did they know about her and Piper, but they knew about the cutting as well, and she didn’t know what would be worse if they found out. Her gaze fell on the bed again, not looking at anything ni particular, just trying to put her thought in order, but her eyes did see something, a small, sharp razor, sitting atop her comforter.
She wasn’t sure if she could stop herself, she couldn’t think of anything else to do to deal with the guilt and fear that was now bubbling in her chest. A shaky hand reached towards it slowly, and she felt some deja vu, this was how it was most of the time, she would cut in the cover of night, when her dad was either asleep or spending the night at Wendy’s house. Se would cut most nights, because all of her friends, all of the people she hung out with, were the people she had hurt so dearly.
So, with tears streaming down her cheeks, and silent sobs racking through her body, she pressed the blade into her arm, and let the warm blood creep down her arm.
~~~~~~~~~~
Jake pulled his shirt over his head, it was difficult to do since he was hadn’t completely dry yet, and it kept sticking to him. He slicked his hair back, and it stayed in position solely because he hadn’t bothered to even try and dry his hair. Below him, his phone started to ringing with that bland default ringtone that he hadn’t bothered to change. He always made a mental note to turn it into something cool that he could jam out to anytime the phone rang, but he had always set it aside. Maybe it would make him more pumped up to talk to whoever was calling, and he certainly needed it now, since he wasn’t really in the mood to talk to anyone. He leaned down, picking up his phone, fully prepared to deny the call and run after Brooke before it got anymore ugly between them, but when he saw who was calling, his heart stopped. He looked at the doorway that Brooke had stormed out, and back at the phone in his hand, he knew what he was going to choose, what he had to choose. Quickly, he answered the phone call and took another long look at where Brooke had exited, he was going to try and make this quick, as selfish as that was.
“Audrey? I’ll be honest I wasn’t expecting you to call so soon, is something wrong?” he asked, hoping with every fiber in his being that she wasn’t doing anything to herself, and part of the reason was because he wanted to end the call. He hated that part of himself, it was those exact words that ran his life when he was jackass, and he was determined to not let them control him anymore. But, when it came to Brooke, he sometimes reverted into that horrible version of himself, at maybe that was why he pissed her off so easily.
“J-jake?” She stuttered, obviously hearing the tiniest bit of annoyance that she must’ve heard in his voice. But, that very annoyance dissipated when her heard her voice, it was shaky, and she had obviously been crying, or had at least been on the verge of tears for some time. “I know y-you said to call you, but I… I dunno I just…” Her sentence trailed off into muffled sobs, and he imagined that she had covered her mouth with her free hand in an attempt to keep him from hearing her weakness, though it was futile. At her words, Jake’s heart started beating rapidly, and he starting silently begging that she hadn’t done it again, he didn’t know how he was begging to, maybe to her, maybe to some higher power.
“Audrey,” He started, keeping his voice calm and level so he didn’t freak her out more than she already was, “What happened… did you… did you cut yourself?” the words felt bitter in his throat, but he didn’t want her dodging question, because he knew she would try, it was just her personality. He could hear her breathing heavily into phone, but as he listened, he heard her slow her rapid breathing, which he was incredibly happy about, because he didn’t want her to start hyperventilating.
“I’m sorry.” She sobbed, not directly answering his question, but it was good enough, he could figure out what she meant by that, she had done it again. But, buried in all the sudden sadness, pity, and worry, there was a tiny bit of happiness, because, even if it was after, she had still called him, she still trusted him with this. He took a moment to collect his thoughts, he didn’t know what caused her sudden lapse into this, she had seemed okay when he dropped her off, she seemed exhausted, but okay. Although, he wasn’t sure exactly what she was thinking, she might’ve been upset that Jake found out, but she had called him, so that couldn’t be true. Right?
“Don’t be, I’m coming over.”
~~~~~~~~~~~
Audrey swayed slowly on her bed, watching blood drip off her arm and onto the towel she was using to protect her bed. She knew that she probably should’ve gotten something to clean up her arm with, but she just felt weak, like all the strength had been sapped out of her body. Her tears had stopped, but she hadn’t bothered to reach up and wipe away the tear tracks on her pale face. She must’ve looked like a zombie, sitting cross-legged on her bed, sway slightly, with bags under her eyes, and a dead look in her eyes. That’s probably why Jake had frozen in place when he had seen her, after quietly pushed the door to her room open, and promptly closing it before actually taking a look at her. She didn’t meet his horrified eyes, she just rubbed at her nose and sniffled, grabbing the blood dotted towel from the bed, unfolding it, and wrapping it around the arm that she cut.
“Sorry.” she mumbled, regretting calling him in the first place, because having him here made her feel twenty times worse than before, when she had actually done the cutting. She knew that she didn’t deserve his pity, and she knew that if he knew why she had started doing this in the first place, he would have pity on her, he would hate her. He’d probably tell everyone, and she’d be alone again, everyone would leave her, He would, Brooke would, Kieran would, Emma would… again, and worst of all, she had a horrible feeling that Noah would leave her too.
“Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, hold on.” Jake said, snapping out of his trance and dashing towards Audrey as she started to climb off her double bed. He just managed to get to her in time to push her back down as she rose off the bed, she didn’t fight him, and she doubted she could, even if she wanted to. She wanted to rewind, she wanted to go back to before she had called him, and stop herself, because she felt ashamed of herself, of what she’d done. He couldn’t help her, he shouldn’t help her, in that moment she just wanted him to leave, to let her sit, alone in her pit of pain, because she deserved it. Her thoughts kept replaying three words, ‘You’re a monster’. She couldn’t tell Jake this, because he would argue that she wasn’t a monster, she was a survivor, she did nothing wrong, but she knew that that wasn’t true. He knew nothing.
“Audrey, come ‘ere.” He whispered. Trying to coax her into a hug as he climbed onto the bed with her. She let him pull her into a hug, but he didn’t hug back, she just stared blankly at his chest, watching it rise and fall, and trying to match her breaths with his. He rested his chin on her head, squashing her bed-head. He rocked her slightly, trying to comfort her, he had never done this before, so he had no idea what to do, all he knew what that he wanted to help her.
“I’m sorry, god I’m so sorry.” She said, watching as tears clouded her vision, then poured over the edge of her face. This time, she knew exactly what she was sorry for, she was sorry for what she had done, how much she had hurt everyone in this small town. Even if they didn’t lose anyone, they were probably scared shitless. He pulled her closer into him, and she felt her tears get absorbed by the fabric of shirt. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry, please, I’m so sorry, I’m sorry Jake, I never wanted any of this.” She sobbed, and just kept repeating the same words, ‘I’m sorry’ over and over again, but they never lost their meaning, not to her at least. He just shushed her, and tried not to break out in tear himself, because he wanted to cry, for her, and for how sad her whole predicament was.
That was the last time she ever saw Jake alive.