OBX Imagines

Smoke The Pain Away | JJ

I was laying on my side on the hammock in John B's backyard, facing the water, the sun reflecting on the tiny waves working as a cure to my anxiety.

Another day, another useless fight with my mother, resulting in her reminding me how much of a disappointment and a failure I am and in me storming out, making sure to hit the front door hard, and taking refuge at the chateau. I've been bottling up all this bullshit for years, ever since my dad left us. I hated him for leaving me behind but at the same time I understood why he left: he was as mentally drained as I was because of my mom. I just wish that, at the time, I had enough courage to face the woman and beg my dad to take me with him.

The Pogues knew about it, and they knew I didn't live in a normal mother-daughter environment, but they didn't know about the fights, the psychological abuse, the panic attacks and how many times I thought about running away, leaving everything and everyone behind and starting a new life somewhere else. To be honest, my four best friends were the only thing keeping me from doing it. They meant too much to me for me to just leave them and I knew I wouldn't be able to keep myself together without them around. Despite all of this, I was still able to wear a smile everyday, crack up jokes and live as if everything was ok. I was good at lying and pretending, it was a coping mechanism I developed and it saved me many, many times. But, just like everything in this world, there's so much you can take and lately I've been finding it harder and harder to hide my anxiety and bad thoughts. I was afraid I was reaching my breaking point and the thought of any of my friends witnessing it terrified me more than actually breaking down, because that means I would have to explain to them what the hell was going on and I hated talking about my feelings. It was something I had in common with JJ and, call me a hypocrite, but I hated when he did it. To be fair, the difference was that he didn't talk about it even knowing damn well that everyone knew what happened in his house. In my case, what happened in my house was kept a secret, so, what they didn't know wouldn't hurt them.

But it was hurting me and JJ noticed. I could hear Kie's hushed voice telling JJ to just leave me alone for a while and that I would reach out to them when I felt like it. Honestly, she wasn't wrong.

"Dude, she didn't even say hi when she arrived, she went straight to the hammock. Just let her be, she'll talk to us when she's ready.", John B argued back, taking Kie's side.

"Yeah, I've never seen her like this, it's better if we take it easy.", Pope added.

But JJ was stubborn, another thing we had in common, and his footsteps on the grass made me wipe away a tear that ran past my nose.
"Dude!"

JJ once again ignored Kie and gently laid next to me on the hammock.

The thing about JJ and I is that we weren't sure what our relationship was. We were best friends, closer than the rest of the Pogues, but we both knew there was something more between us. A previous kegger led to spilling drunken words that were actually reminded the next morning. It wasn't awkward, it wasn't uncomfortable, but it sure wasn't like before. We weren't certain what it was, but we knew we loved each other unconditionally and we cared about each other deeply. Our lack of affection was a myth when the subject was us.

I heard the door to the chateau being closed behind me, so I assumed John B, Pope and Kiara had gone inside and I sighted in relief.

"(y/n)?", his voice was the most gentle I've ever heard and I almost didn't recognise it.

I couldn't find the strength to speak so I just hummed in response.

"What's wrong?"

And that simple question was all it took for my bottled emotions to spill. One tear was followed by another until the light breeze started to feel cold against my wet face. When it became harder to hold my crying, I had to cover my mouth with my hand to make the sobs as silent as possible, acting like JJ hadn't already noticed.