summary: johnny tries to fix the mistakes he made.
word count: 1,378
warnings?: angst with...an ambiguous ending
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If there was one thing in the entire world that Johnny regretted, it was the way he broke your heart. Ever since that day, when you walked away, all he could think about was trying to find a way to make things better. To find a way to make it right. To fix the destruction he caused. But, he never saw or heard from you again. No matter where he looked, you were never there. And Sue would never tell him if she had heard from you or not, where you had gone to. Said that she didn't think he deserved to know what you were doing. Perhaps she was right. Perhaps you were better off without him.
But, now that Reed and Sue were back together and Ben had started seeing Alicia, he was painfully aware of just how lonely he was. How he had ruined his one shot at true love. Sure, there had been others after you had left his life. But none of them compared to you. No one set his soul, set his heart, on fire like you did. All he wanted was you, but because of his stupidity, he pushed you away.
For a while, he was able to distract himself. Saving the world from certain destruction and all that. But there wasn't always enemies to fight. There wasn't always people who needed saving. Most days, he was by himself. And no amount of women or booze or other futile attempts to dull the pain would ever work. Nothing could ever take away the sharp pain stabbing at his heart.
To the rest of the world, though, he was still the same old happy-go-lucky guy. The kind of guy who didn't think too far ahead. The kind of guy who took risk after risk after risk. The kind of guy who didn't think of the consequences. But he knew now that some consequences aren't worth living through.
"Alright kid, what's the issue?" Ben asked as he took a seat at the table, pulling Johnny out of his thoughts.
"Don't know what you're talking about," Johnny muttered, staring down at his bowl of oatmeal, before pushing it away. "I need to go."
"Hold on," Ben said. "I'm a lot of things, kid, but stupid isn't one of them. You might not think we haven't noticed something's wrong, but we have."
"Why does it matter? Nothing can be done about it."
"So there is something. Care to share?"
Johnny shrugged, leaning back in his seat, crossing his arms over his chest. "I...I did something really stupid."
"I could've guessed that."
"Do you remember Y/N?" Johnny asked quietly. When Ben nodded, he continued, "I...She told me that you liked me."
Ben frowned. "Isn't that a good thing? Everyone knew how—"
