you're on your own, kid... obx

078. depressed twins

Erin firmly but gently presses the bandage onto Zack's cut after she cleaned it up. She rubs her thumb over it, carding a hand through his hair.

"Good?" She quietly asks and he nods. The solemn look on his face breaks her heart, but she knows there's very little she can do to fix it.

"You know what's the funniest part?" JJ asks. "Is that I actually thought he was coming back for us. But no, he just wanted to get rid of us. And now Pope's a fugitive. Welcome to the club, bro. And we have nothing now. We lost everything, and it's all my fault." He gets up.

"It's not your fault." Brooklyn argues, following him.

"Yeah, it is." JJ insists.

"Look, if it's your fault, then it's also my fault." Zack says.

"No. No, you were hesitant." JJ says. "It's on me."

"Dude..." Zack tries, but JJ only walks further away. Zack sighs, his shoulders slumping.

"Baby, hey." Brooklyn follows him. "Babe, it isn't your fault. You-- we didn't know. None of us knew."

"But why would I trust him so easily? Or-- or give him the benefit of the doubt, whatever I did." JJ says.

"You... you wanted a dad." Brooklyn quietly says with a small shrug of her shoulders. "You just wanted to be loved, and I get that, I would've--"

"Yeah, whatever." JJ walks away.

"JJ." She calls, but he keeps going.

~ ~ ~

Zack is lying back against Erin, his head resting on her chest. Her arms are wrapped around his shoulders, one hand resting on top of his head. He doesn't say anything or move, staring into the fire with an empty but broken look on his face.

"Growing up, Luke would always tell us when he was drunk off his ass, "If there's one thing I know, hell is other people."" JJ says. "When I was a kid, I didn't get it. It didn't make any sense to me. But then one day, I just decided to ask him. I said, "What do you mean hell is other people?" And he looked at me for a while, then he just said, "Just keep on living... and you'll find out.""

"Luke's been wrong about a lot of things, but, man, was he right about that one. Went from a fake dad... to a real dad who just tried to kill us. Yeah, Luke. Yeah, we found out. Hell certainly is other people." He chugs the rest of his beer down.

+++

"Guys." JJ calls.

"What?" Kie asks, the group looking over at him as he stares out at the water. The others quickly see what he's looking at, noticing the boat.

"Who's out here this early?" Pope asks.

"It's the cops." JJ says.

"Fuck." Erin groans.

"How did they find us?" Kie asks.

"Don't they always find you guys?" Finn asks.

"Hey, if you're gonna hang with us, stop saying "you guys." You're in this shitshow now, too, buddy." Erin lightly smacks him in the chest.

"Kie." Finn frowns, pointing to the Stewart girl.

"She is right." Kie comments, gently patting Finn's chest.

"So what's the plan?" Pope asks as the boat gets closer.

"Follow me." John B says. "Let's go." The others follow him.

JJ quickly puts out the fire with one of his beers and takes his knife out.

The group run under the dock, getting in the water. They stay silent and still as the cops tie their boat to The Snapper. They get on the dock, walking down it.