𝐋𝐈𝐆𝐇𝐓𝐒 𝐔𝐏! [𝐉𝐉 𝐌𝐀𝐘𝐁𝐀𝐍𝐊]

nineteen

LIGHTS UP
nineteen | ❝P4L.❞

                GRIEF AFFECTS everybody in different ways. This much, Wes is sure of.

He hates to admit it, but the first week and a half or so after the incident (maybe even longer, since that's what Kiara always argues) him and JJ rarely even spoke to anyone but one another. They'd lay in bed for most of the day. Sometimes they'd talk about it, other times they'd be silent, comfortable to feel whatever they were feeling in each other's presence. Some nights they'd go to the beach, smoke a joint under the stars and listen to the waves. They'd always end up staring at the water for far too long though, and they'd end up with tears in their eyes, unavoidably thinking of their friends.

It wasn't the healthiest- Wes can admit that, definitely now. But it felt almost, right, in the moment. Like that was exactly what they had to be doing in order to function. Even if it meant they were shutting everyone else out.

Eventually they did go back to real life. They've since been back to hanging out with Pope and Kiara, Wes got his drivers license, JJ has a job waiting tables at some fancy restaurant on Figure Eight. They aren't okay yet, not by any means. None of them are. But slowly, kind of, they've been trying to adjust.

All of them are still grieving. Trying to get over what they lost. Wes can see how each of them has chosen a way to feel about it.

Kiara is furious. Any time she sees Ward or Rafe Cameron, or any time anybody brings them up, she wastes no time in labeling them as what they are: murderers.

Pope wants to lay low. He's poured himself into worrying about school, even more so than usual. Wes thinks more than anything, though, that Pope wants to go back to normal. And, also that he to figure out what the hell Kiara's intentions are with him.

And JJ. Wes knows exactly how JJ feels about it. How sick he is of all the pain, how he just wants to numb it. He's well aware of the panic attacks JJ's been getting when he hears people spew the terrible, untruthful things about John B that Ward has got every Kook believing. He knows JJ just wants it all to stop hurting.

It doesn't feel great, though. Watching JJ try to numb all the pain. Wes doesn't even know how to talk to him about it. He can talk to him about anything, just not the drinking.

As for Wes- since they've "integrated themselves back into civilization", like Kiara refers to it, he doesn't really know how to cope with what he feels. He supposes he feels angry, him and Kiara have shared enough angry rants together about the situation to know that much.

But he doesn't have that drive, that motivation to do with his anger everything that she does with hers.

If anything, Wes has kind of lost interest in everything.

School starts tomorrow and he has nothing prepared, some nights he literally needs to smoke weed in order to fall asleep, and he can't even get JJ to stop drinking his meals— Wes is pretty much positively sure that he's never felt worse about himself. And he can't even care enough to do anything about it.