nate knows how hurt he is. he understands what he's feeling and why he's feeling it. he knows that not only him, but cameron and gilinsky are hurt, also. they weren't just his friends, they were his family. the only people that were there when others weren't. they cared more than the people that gave birth to him, and his parents didn't even love him half as much as they purported they did. his friends were his family when his family wasn't.
his family was falling apart. he was the reason why.
he didn't want to admit it, but he was. the only job that he had was to protect them as much as they all protected him. they were his priority.
he runs his fingers through his hair as cameron shuffles in his sleep, his eyebrows knitted together as he snores lightly. gilinsky staring off into the ceiling.
they were broken. all of them. all shattered into a million pieces and never to be brought back together. they all thought that they could fix each other, in memory of their loss. but johnson was the one piece that held them all together. without him, they aren't even whole.
they've never been this far apart from each other. these days, they barely even do as much as say three words to each other. and if they did, they would be, 'smoke with me'. and even then, they smoked in utter silence.
"i didn't think it would be this bad." gilinsky says, breaking the silence between them both. nate looked over to him, still, he was staring at the ceiling. not even daring to look back at him. gilinsky gulps, and nate watched his adam's apple bounce up to down after completing the action. nate gulps also.
"yeah," he mutters a chuckle. "me either."
and they didn't say anything more after that. they both stared, getting lost into the nothingness of the hole that they'd all been pushed into.
this is death.
