A/N: WOW LOOK AT THAT I'M UP TOP THIS TIME. I'll post closing thoughts at the bottom as per usual, but I want to go ahead and apoloize in advance. You see, it's November, so the characters control the story even more than they normally do. Therefore, I apologize for their lack of submission and would like to note that the most surprising part of what you are about to read was never actually part of the original plan. At all. Like, it never existed. They just decided it would. So I'm really really sorry.

Chapter 12

            Stuffed with tasty ramen and unwilling to pedal along alone on a bike for two again, I decided to let AJ walk me home. The sun was just starting to set and fireflies were blinking around merrily. It was a nice evening.

            “So…” he said.

            “So?”

            He didn’t say anything back, and I didn’t make an effort to start a conversation. It was equal parts too difficult and unnecessary. We were getting along well, and I didn’t want to ruin the moment. I looked down at my feet, beginning to feel uncomfortable with the silence. When I looked back up, AJ was playing with a silver chain around his neck that I had never seen before.

            “What’s that?” I asked curiously.

            “Nothing, really,” AJ shrugged.

            “Oh, really?” I cocked an eyebrow. He chortled a little.

            “It was my grandmother’s,” he said, taking it off and holding it where I could see it. I inspected the little silver charm closely.

            It was a smooth, oval-shaped locket, and across the front was the word “happiness” in beautiful cursive script. “What’s inside it?” I asked, my eyes still glued to the locket.

            “A poem,” AJ shrugged. “It was my grandmother’s favorite, so my grandfather put it in a locket for her and gave it to her for their fiftieth anniversary.” My eyes widened.

            “That’s a really long time!”

            “It wasn’t really enough time, actually,” AJ sighed.

            “And why not?” I looked him straight in the eye, arms crossed. “Fifty years seems like forever to me.”

            “She died that night.”

            “Oh…” Suddenly, fifty years was not nearly enough time. In fact, it was much too short.

            “She had been diagnosed with lung cancer the year before. It was a miracle that she had survived that long.” AJ paused, breathing deeply. “She had been getting better, actually. She’d been walking around, eating real food without vomiting. She had been smiling. So my grandfather ran off and found the perfect locket to put that poem in, thinking that all she needed was a little more happiness and she would get better.” He laughed bitterly.

“She got so excited that she was crying, and then suddenly she couldn’t breathe. She didn’t even get a chance to wear it before she’d died from lack of oxygen. We were all there.” A tear slipped from his eye. Subconsciously, I reached up and wiped it away with the pad of my thumb. As I pulled my arm away, his hand found purchase on my wrist. “Can you be my shoulder?” he asked, teary eyes glued to mine.

            “W-what?”

            He sighed. “Can I cry for awhile?” he gestured to my shoulder, and realization made my eyes grow wide.

            “O-of course!”

            “Thank you,” he whispered, and then broke down sobbing. His head fell into the little space between my neck and my shoulder as he cried, and all I could do was try to console him. It was a very helpless feeling, really. It made me feel bad for this poor man, who had not only lost someone who was obviously so important to him, but had also obviously suppressed the memory for far too long. I could understand that perfectly.

After several minutes of standing there with a sobbing AJ, he finally calmed down. At that point, he was still teary, but the worst had passed. So, since it was the only thing I could do to help, I led him the rest of the way to my house, sat him down on the couch, and broke out some bottles of soju.

            “Here,” I said, holding a glass out to him.

            “Seriously?” he asked incredulously.

            “Trust me, it helps.” Reluctantly, he took the glass and sipped at it. I giggled a little at his incompetence. “Like this,” I said, downing it in one fell swoop.

            “That seems painful,” he commented timorously.

            “Trust me, it works,” I laughed.

            “Well, okay then,” he sighed. He squeezed his eyes shut and threw the clear liquid down his throat. The face he made was priceless.

            “Feel better?” I asked after a few moments.

            “Do I have to do that again?” he questioned.

            “Do you trust me?” I countered. AJ downed another glass.

            Soon enough, the soju kicked in and AJ was smiling like a lunatic. “And one time, hic! She went to the store and picked up this pa-hic!-paya and decided to bake it with cheese! It hic! Tasted hic! Horrible!” he began laughing like a lunatic.

            “Okay, come on, let’s get you to bed. Your head’s gonna hurt really bad in the morning!” I somehow managed, in my own drunken haze, to help him stand. Together we stumbled back into my room and I got him under the covers.

            “Where ya hic! Going?” he asked as I began walking away.

            “Just go to sleep,” I laughed, turning for the door. AJ’s hand wrapped around my wrist, still strong despite his drunkenness.

            “Wait till I fall asleep,” he whispered.

            I was ready to refuse, but decided to indulge him just once. It had been a rough night for him, anyways. So I sat down on the side of the bed and shrugged.

            “Thanks,” he grinned. Still holding my wrist, he closed his eyes.

            I woke up the next morning to a stabbing headache and the faint sound of snoring. Strangely, it was the snoring that registered first in my brain, followed by the glee of being right about the fact that AJ snored.

            Of course, the next thing I registered was the fact that I had woken up in the morning to AJ’s snores. As this occurred to me, I fell out of the bed, taking the blanket with me. The snoring stopped. I peered over the bed and found AJ’s sleepy eyes.

            “Good morning!” he grinned sluggishly, sitting up and stretching. About halfway through his stretch, his eyes grew wide and he turned to face me. “D-did we…?!”

            I didn’t say anything, unsure of how to handle the situation. It was then that both of us realized neither of us was wearing a shirt. I stood up, trying not to scream, holding the blanket tightly around me.

            What happened then was perhaps the most embarrassing moment of my entire life: I fell over. A sharp pain shot up my middle and I fell over. Then, knowing what happened, I broke down sobbing.

 “K-Kev, I—“

            “Just don’t say anything,” I snapped. “If you don’t say anything then it can go away!”

            “Not mentioning something doesn’t fix it,” AJ sighed.

            “We can always try!” I wanted, more than anything, for it to not be real. Not there, with him, under those circumstances!

“Kev…” he timidly placed a hand on my arm. “I promise, it will all be okay. I’ll do whatever I can to fix this.” He paused, sighed. “It’s my fault, and I am so sorry.” His voice hitched a little.

            “It’s my fault, too. I provided the alcohol.”

            “Even so, I promise I’ll fix this.” He slowly began rubbing my arm, trying to comfort me. Despite the pain in my body and in my head, and despite the trauma of the moment and the knowledge that, from there on out, nothing was going to be the same, I pulled myself over to where AJ was, let him wrap his arms around me, and just cried.

            “Do you want some tea?” AJ asked a few minutes later when my sobbing had abated. I nodded, too exhausted from my tears to answer. “I’ll go make some.” He began to stand up, but then sat down rather quickly a mere millisecond later.

            “What’s wrong?” I whispered, throat too hoarse to form sound.

            “I just remembered that I’m not wearing clothes,” he laughed bitterly. He glanced around the room for a moment and found his pants, flung across a piled of pillows. He somehow managed to grab them and slip them on all while under the safety of a bed sheet.

            When he stood, I somehow managed to admire his toned muscles for a few seconds before being wholly disgusted with myself. As soon as he was out of the room I frantically dug around for some clothing, any clothing, and ended up with my neon yellow pajama pants and a red plaid flannel shirt. It was an unattractive match, to say the least, but I definitely wasn’t trying to seduce anyone. A few minutes later, AJ walked in with two steaming mugs of tea and an old t-shirt of mine that had always been several sizes too big. Unsurprisingly, it fit him perfectly.

            “I hope you don’t mind,” he said, gesturing to the shirt. “I found it and it fit, so…”

            “It’s fine. It was always too big on me anyways,” I shrugged.

“Okay.” We both became quiet, sipping our teas and trying not to say the wrong thing. After a couple minutes of silence, the doorbell rang. “I’ll get it,” AJ offered, standing quickly.

            “Uhm, thanks…” I muttered. He walked out and I exhaled deeply, glad to be rid of the awkward tension for a few moments. I heard the door open.

            “Kev is—“

            “AJ?!” Eli screeched.

A/N: SO WHO DIED?! I did. As soon as they broke out the soju I just kinda died. This chapter is about 1,563 words, I believe. That's tentative though because I'm too lazy to double check. But yeah. Uhm... I apologize. Really. I didn't see it coming. At all. Sorreh.