Can We Make It Through This?

Chapter 6

Johnnie POV:

Going to bed that night was difficult. Johnnie could tell Jake was stalling with the TV show so that he could keep Johnnie in his sight. His mom would do the same thing when he was younger and struggling. Jake just kept going until both of them could barely stay awake anymore and finally, Johnnie spoke up.

"I'm gonna go to bed, Jake."

The look Jake gave in return was one of fear and wariness. "Yeah, we should probably sleep."

The two sat there in silence for a second while Jake logged out of Netflix and went back to the regular cable channels. Jake turned off the TV and looked over at Johnnie. "Would you be okay leaving your door open or is that just pushing it?" It would have been crossing the line to ask Johnnie to sleep in his room, but hopefully, this offer would be okay.

Johnnie avoided Jake's eyes. "Maybe just for tonight."

In reality, he hated the idea of keeping his door open. It reminded him of all his worst points in his life, and he didn't feel anywhere near that. And, also, as ironic as it sounded for someone who showed a lot of his life on the internet, he had always been a relatively private person. An open door felt like a complete invasion of privacy.

But he didn't want to be more of a burden to Jake. Jake had been so stressed out about him for weeks now, and he was probably at peak stress levels right now. And it was all his fault. He hated the idea of causing anymore problems for Jake.

Jake POV:

Jake nodded at Johnnie, knowing there wasn't much more he could do and started to head to his room. He heard Johnnie move towards his room which, inconveniently, was on the other side of the house. With Johnnie keeping his door open, Jake would have to keep his open as well so that he could hear him.

Honestly, Jake had no idea what to do in a situation like this. His first idea would be to try and convince Johnnie to go to the hospital so they could check his wounds and then hopefully stay in a ward there for a little bit, so he could get better. But he knew how much Johnnie hated those places. He had told him that numerous times. Jake was at a loss. He was so worried about his friend, but he couldn't even tell him that because he knew that it would only make Johnnie feel like more of a burden.

From Johnnie's body language, he could tell that Johnnie really did not want to keep his door open, and he didn't want to push Johnnie to do things that he was uncomfortable with. Especially now. But it felt important enough to Jake that Johnnie did it, just for tonight.

He took the razors out of his pocket which he forgot were there and opened the box. Most of the razors seemed like they were still there, so that was a good sign. But what caught his eye was the one razor covered in dried blood. Johnnie's blood.

Jake felt he was about to throw up. He shut the box immediately and put it in one of the drawers of his desk. Seeing that razor just confirmed all of Jake's worries. Yes, Johnnie had already just told him, or at least, he didn't deny it, but the whole situation just seemed surreal before. Everything felt real now. Too real.

He crawled into bed with his heart pounding and breathing heavily. He knew that he wouldn't be able to sleep, so he stared at his ceiling until the sun came up.

Johnnie POV

Johnnie stared at his open door, warily. He hated what was happening. Why did he have to admit it to Jake? Why couldn't he have just kept it to himself? He really wanted to just curl up and die.

Somehow Johnnie was able to fall asleep for a few hours. When he woke up, his phone said it was 8:17am. And even though he had probably only fallen asleep after 5am, at least he got some sleep at all. He looked over at his door which was now closed just not latched. His door was fully open when he had fallen asleep. He stumbled out of his bed, not caring that he didn't do anything to try to seem the slightest bit presentable.

He saw Jake on the sofa watching youtube. He looked down, embarrassed. He didn't know what to say. "Hey."

Jake looked over at him, smiling softly. "Hey." Johnnie looked at Jake's tired eyes. It was all his fault. He made Jake worry about him this much. Jake was suffering because of him.

"I, uh, I closed your door earlier." Jake muttered, looking down.

This confused Johnnie. "Oh, yeah I was wondering about that. Why, though?"

"Well I knew that you really didn't want to keep your door open last night, you just did it for my sake, and so when I got up, I figured I would close it so you felt more comfortable when you woke up."

"Thank you." Johnnie could feel his eyes welling up with tears. He was not much of a crier but hearing someone finally understand him in this way and knowing how to make him feel this comfortable was something he didn't find very often. Jake wrapped his arms around Johnnie and the two there for a while.

Johnnie rested his head on Jake's shoulder while the two still had their arms wrapped around each other and they continued watching the video that Jake was watching on the TV. It didn't take long for them both to fall asleep, and when Johnnie finally woke up, he still stayed there, feeling safe in Jake's embrace. He hadn't felt this safe since, well he couldn't even remember.

As he sat there staring at nothing in particular, he realised that he hadn't taken care of the wounds on his leg at all. Now that he was thinking about it, he could feel the stinging and itchy sensation coming from the cuts. It wasn't like he could just get up now; he would wake Jake up. But he also knew that if he waited too much longer the wounds would get infected. While the pain from the blade helped him, the pain from an infection was a whole other story.

He slowly reached for his phone to see what time it was. His phone read 5:43pm. It wouldn't be awful of him to wake Jake up at this point, seeing that he probably wouldn't be able to sleep that night if he continued sleeping right now. But selfishly Johnnie wanted to stay wrapped up in his safe touch. After a few minutes, Johnnie started to get himself up, which made Jake stir a bit. He tapped Jake's shoulder. "Hey Jake, we should probably get up now."

Jake opened his eyes slowly and stared at Johnnie, who was pretty much fully out of his grip now. "What time is it?" Jake said groggily.

"It's like 6 o'clock."

Jake sat up immediately. "Are you serious? We slept the whole day?" Johnnie nodded confused why this was such a big deal.

"Oh my god, I was supposed to meet Tara and David for a video like an hour ago." Jake said desperately trying to find his phone. "I have 5 missed calls from Tara. Shit." Jake got up to call Tara back to inform her that he wouldn't be making it to the shoot.

And just like that, Johnnie was sitting there alone on the sofa with his own thoughts. 

A/N: Hey guys, sorry about the wait. There's been so much happening the last few months, and I have barely been keeping up. I hope this chapter was good! I have actually have a question for you guys. When I started this fic, Jake and Johnnie were still at their old house and Carrington hadn't moved in yet. As the story continues, should I include Carrington in the story? He wouldn't be anyone's love interest or anything, he would just be included in the story. Let me know what you guys think! Hope you are doing well! <3