love in the 21st century//jancy

20.

chapter dedicated to eadrik_shipper for being so nice (:

;;

Lucas picked up on the fifth ring.

"Mike! Man, why are you calling me when you're in the greatest city in the world?"

Nancy swallowed hard as tears sprung to her eyes. He sounded so excited, so hopeful. He had no idea what was going on. Why did she call him?

"Lucas...it's Nancy," she managed to say.

"Oh. Hey, Nancy. What's going on? Why are you calling on Mike's phone?"

She pushed through the crowd, scanning for anyone that looked like her tall, lanky brother. Up ahead, she saw someone that towered over her by a few inches with Mike's hair, and she grabbed Holly's hand and dragged her through the biggest crowd she'd ever been in and gripped the person's shoulder, spinning them around to face her. It was a boy slightly younger than Mike, and he looked startled as he looked up at her and then ran away down the street. She sighed, rubbing her temple and letting her tears fall. That boy hadn't even been wearing clothes that looked like Mike's. She had just been too hopeful.

"Nancy?"

"Sorry! Sorry, I'm here. I was just wondering...did Mike say anything to you about this trip? Or...anything out of the ordinary before we left?"

"Um...well, he started smoking. And he said something about going to a party. I think he did go to a party one night. And then he started acting all weird the next day. That was before you came back. I don't know what happened or if anything happened. He was just..."

"Weird how?"

Her phone was buzzing in her pocket.  Holly was crying while screaming her brother's name. Nancy could not stop to comfort her. Not yet. She pulled her phone out and saw that it was Steve calling. With a roll of her eyes, she rejected it.

"He was just quiet. He didn't want to play video games or read comics anymore. He still met up for academic team and AV stuff in the afternoon, but after that he was just...weird. Plus all that stuff with your parents...and his girlfriend."

"Tell me about the girlfriend."

"It was some girl we didn't even know. He was just suddenly friends with her one day, and they were dating the next week. Her name was Ali. She's in the grade above us. We all know he likes El, but she's just trying to do her own thing right now, so I guess he just decided to date around. I don't know, Nancy. What's going on?"

Nancy stopped in the middle of the street and swung Holly up into her arms, cradling her and rocking her as best she could while Holly cried into her shoulder. She was breathing hard, and her heart was aching. She never bothered to ask Mike if there was anything else going on his life. This was all her fault. Maybe if they could have talked about it, they wouldn't be in this situation right now. She wouldn't be standing in the middle of New York City, surrounded by totally oblivious passersby while she wondered if her brother was even still alive.

"Don't freak out, Lucas. Just answer my questions, okay? Did Mike ever tell you anything about feeling trapped or hopeless or helpless or anything?"

"He said he didn't feel safe anymore. I wasn't sure what he meant, and he wouldn't tell me. I thought he was talking about that shithead Troy and his friends bullying us, so I told the principal. Naturally, nothing happened."

"Did he ever get really mad for no reason? Mood changes or anything? Was he ever trying to do something stupid?" She squeezed her eyes shut, trying to remember what the signs of suicide were that she learned in her psychology class. Her phone buzzed again, and she wanted to scream.